December, 2014:

The Year Has Come and Gone So Quickly I Mean Goddamn

Dec 24th, 2014
by John.
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For some families, it’s a holiday tradition to send a weird family newsletter with your Christmas card. Just a short 7,000 word note about your family’s doings that gives the reader a glimpse into your year. Social media has almost rendered these letters obsolete, as your friends and family can now watch you slowly dissolve into madness in real time, but there’s something quaint about getting an actual letter in the mail.

I found an article that offers Tips for Sparkling Christmas Letters, and the advice is sound. “Start off on a positive note” is number one with a bullet. It says not to start with the phrase, “I can’t believe the year has come and gone so quickly!” because it reminds the reader that death is imminent, and there’s nothing cheerful about walking hand in boney hand with the grim reaper as he whisks you away to the afterlife. Even if his sickle is a candy cane. Keep it positive! Something like, “2014 was a great year, the family and I whispered an ancient incantation that promises immortality in exchange for… something or other. To be honest we couldn’t read the fine print because the book of spells turned to dust when we regained consciousness. LOL it’s fun to be a god.”

I can't believe 1987 is almost over.

I can’t believe 1987 is almost over.

Next on the list of Christmas Letter tips is about resisting the urge to embellish. For example, it’s better to plainly state, “The weird smell in the basement is back” instead of “Plumbers, public service workers and a team of scientists were all baffled by the mysterious raw sewage stench blanketing our basement.” It’s not polite to brag that you had to live in a motel for three months while members of the clergy performed an exorcism on your basement to send the foul odor back to Hell.

The list of tips ends with “Make it personal,” which is pretty vague, so allow me clarify. A 9 paragraph, all-caps sermon about the time you lost your shit on the lady at Dunkin Donuts because she said happy holidays instead of Merry Christmas is personal, but is better served as a journal entry. Similarly, saying that sometimes you look at your family and dream of getting in the car and just driving far, far away until you run out of gas, or that the only time you feel alive is when you hold your head underwater until you’re on the cusp of drowning are deeply personal sentiments, but maybe turn it down a notch for the family Christmas letter. Something like, “My spouse is fine. The children are also fine. It’s Christmas and everything is fine.”

Some last minute tips that the list failed to mention: clippings from the newspaper announcing your child’s honor roll achievements – good! Clippings from the newspaper that contain hidden messages about the JFK assassination that only you can see – also good, but not Christmas letter good. Family recipe for olive loaf – good! Olive loaf jammed into the envelope – thoughtful, but not good. Wishing your friends and family a happy and safe new year – not good depending on the reader, some people like to have dangerous, miserable new years. So with that, my friends, have a new year, and have it however you want it.

You can watch me scream and yell all of my recent posts on AwesomeTalk! It airs every other Tuesday on our YouTube channel, where you can also find past episodes and other psychotic vlog vids.

Thesis statement: Yeah shopping is kinda dumb I guess I dunno

Dec 10th, 2014
by John.
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A neanderthal is crouched low in the underbrush. His keen, primitive man vision is fixated on the watering hole, which I think is just a weird way of saying small lake but kinda sounds like a bidet for beasts. Anyway, the neanderthal is watching the European ass faucet when suddenly every hair on his body stands on end, from the hair on the bottom of his feet to the hair jutting curiously out of his forehead – a bison approaches. Suddenly, primitive man charges the great creature with spear in hand. His tribe will sing songs about the kill, then they’ll eat it, scribble a few cave paintings and go to bed.

Fast forward 200,000 years. A dad is crouched low in the paper towel aisle at Costco. His dull, modern man vision is fixated on a palette of $49 Blu Ray players. He checks his phone, pulls up the Black Friday app – bingo. Suddenly, modern dad charges the great palette, cargo sweatpants billowing in the breeze. He scales the tower, punching wildly, howling and swinging a garden trowel at the other Black Friday shoppers. Blood sprays across the white Costco floor as another shopper is knocked unconscious, his head bouncing off a display of car batteries with a sickening thud. Now atop mount Blu Ray, modern dad holds a player over his head, fluorescent lighting accentuates his #1 DAD sweatshirt as he squeals to the heavens. On Christmas day his family will watch Despicable Me in HD, and during the hour and a half runtime, he will be king.

Black Friday has come and gone, officially kicking off the 2014 holiday shopping season. And every year it’s the same thing – families eating their leftovers, shaking their heads in disgust at the footage of people trampling each other on Black Friday. “Just look at these deal hungry maniacs besmirching the good-natured pilgrims that made this country what it is today. What if the pilgrims left halfway through their meal with the natives to buy discounted hat buckle polish from the general store? That’s not what the holidays are all about!”

O Come All Ye Deadful

O Come All Ye Deadful

But for some, it’s all part of the holiday experience. Maybe there’s nothing like watching the life drain from someone’s eyes as you rip a 32″ Westinghouse TV from their mitts, breathing in their dying breath as your realize, wait a second, this thing only has one HDMI input, then tossing it aside for the full screen version of Silver Linings Playbook on DVD for $3. Who are we to judge?

The holier than thou bitching about holiday commercialism is becoming more annoying than the holiday commercialism itself. People turn into Linus in that scene from the Charlie Brown Christmas special where he’s rattling on and on about the bible and the true meaning of Christmas, and all they’re really saying is “How dare people buy things like that! They should be buying things like this – online, from the safety of their own homes! All liquored up and nude.” I think if Jesus was here right now, he’d say something about casting stones… and sinning… or like skipping stones across a watering hole of sin… I dunno. Something like that. Then he’d give all of us a piece of cake. Happy birthday Jesus, ya ol’ so and so, and to a lesser extent, Merry Christmas.

You can watch me scream and yell all of my recent posts on AwesomeTalk! It airs every other Tuesday on our YouTube channel, where you can also find past episodes and other psychotic vlog vids.