Angry Czeck 2.0

I hear things. Wacky, paranoid, hysterical, condescending, insulting things that used to be confined to the homeless guy who tried to shake me down for $4.25. What I hear most is, “We got to take back our country!”

This implies that, somehow, our way-of-life has been stolen from our grasps. We’ve been bamboozled! Hoodwinked! Flimflammed! And as usual, it’s not our fault!

Well, I have terrific news for you folks: the country is still right here! Look outside. It hasn’t moved an inch. We’re still consuming enormous amounts of calories. We’re still walking around with concealed firearms. We’re still screaming and thrusting poorly lettered signs into the faces of the officials we elected. Everything’s cool.

Yep. Sigh.

But it’s more exciting if everything isn’t cool, right? I mean a world with Bigfoot trundling around the woods is far more intriguing than a world with a dork wearing an Alec Baldwin suit, right? A faked moon landing is more interesting than an actual moon landing. What if George W. Bush really did know the 9/11 attack was coming? Everybody but Fox & Friends would be talking about it for years.

The Czar of the National Death Panel

There is a certain segment of the country that wants a stolen country, if for nothing more than to have something interesting to follow. Recently, a man was asked why he was (legally!) carrying a firearm to a Town Hall protest. “I don’t want a revolution,” he said. “I don’t want a civil war. But it is a possibility. It’s there as an option, as a last resort.”

Public health care is not an option, yet a civil war is. How can this possibly be? Because it would be interesting. Fascinating! Take one protester at the Tea Party hosted on the National Mall in Washington D.C. recently. “We are losing our country, we think the Muslims are moving in and taking over.”

Or take this woman from Battle Creek Michigan: “I really don’t want to be a guinea pig for the experiment they have with the population control.”

Or consider this woman in Canton, Ohio: “(President Obama) is going after our kids to try to indoctrinate them into a national defense army.”

Population control. A national defense army comprised of children. Muslim takeovers! How exciting! I can’t wait to see the movie. Good thing we have stand-up guys like TEA party co-founder Mark Williams calming the citizenry with unoriginal but hearty maxims like, “You can have our country when you pry it from our cold dead fingers!”

Life without conspiracy is boring. We need a man on the grassy knoll, not mundane details like affordable health insurance, quality education, or even a better economy. Have you ever listened to Timothy Geithner drone on-and-on about interest rates, unemployment numbers, and the GNP? Boh-ring. But what if, what if, Geithner not only murdered his wife in the 1960s, but also got his economics degree from DeVry University? Instant interest!

Remember James Frey? He wrote a book called A Million Little Pieces, a true story about his two-fisted battle against drug addiction. Oprah loved it. So did a trillion book clubs. Problem is, it wasn’t true. Psyche! It was all made up. Frey knows that facts are boring.

Donald Rumsfield knows facts are boring. Glenn Beck, too. On the other hand, Roman Polanski knows facts can be so exciting that they can throw you in jail. He’s the exception that proves the rule.

I’d like it all to be real.

Many years ago, I waited in front of the television with breathless anticipation as Geraldo Rivera cracked open the “lost vault of Al Capone.” When, after two hours of prime-time, the vault was revealed to be empty, but I came away with a treasure of truth: The world is a dull, boring place my friend.

Even the Most Interesting Man in the World is dull

I’m not saying that it’s without its beauty and charm. I’m just implying that you may be wasting your time looking for the Loch Ness Monster or a Koran in President Obama’s desk. You don’t have to cancel your ghost hunters meeting at the Barnes & Noble. You can continue annoying your friends by claiming you’re psychic or insisting that you were Cleopatra in a past life. Keep it up, if it makes your world more fascinating.

After all, it’s your country.


***

There are many doors to rage and rancor, and the Angry Czeck holds the keys to them all. Eventually, I will populate these pages with bonus anger and supplemental fury. Until then, czeck out angryczeck.com or facebook.com/theragepage.

The Human Douche Bag takes pleasure in your irritation

“I don’t believe it was rape-rape. He went to jail and when they let him out he was like, ‘You know what, this [judge] is going to give me a hundred years in jail. I’m not staying’.”

Whoopi Goldberg
Idiot Roman Polanski Defender

There is no defense for Roman Polanski. The guy is scum.

I love his movies. The guy is scum. Chinatown is a masterpiece. The guy is scum. I even enjoyed The Ninth Gate. And still, the guy is scum.

In case you missed it, here are the disgusting facts: Roman Polanski drugged a 13-year-old girl with a qualude (how very 1970s of him), plied her with champagne, and fucked her. Wait, that sounds too romantic. He sodomized her. And he did this because he was Roman Polanski, scum. And if your neighbor did the same thing today, you’d set him on fire, run him over with a cement truck, and toss his smoldering body off the Sears Tower. Then you’d collect your gold medal from the Mayor.

Roman Polanski, however, is being received a bit differently.

For Whoopi Goldberg, whose credentials as a mind-blowing genius cannot be questioned, doesn’t consider drugging and sodomizing a little girl “rape-rape.” I don’t want to know what Whoopi’s definition of rape is. Quite frankly, I don’t want to know what her definition of anything is because obviously she is from outer-space.





Martin Scorsese doesn’t think sticking your adult-dick in a child’s rectum is rape either. Directors Wes Anderson and David Lynch are cool with it, too. In fact, a number of Hollywood airheads have signed a petition demanding “the immediate release of Roman Polanski.” It also asserts that “film-makers in France, in Europe, in the United States and around the world are dismayed by this decision.”

Jesus, no! Film-makers in France are dismayed!

How do you defend a man who buggers little girls? Some are championing some kind of “statute of limitations” defense. It happened a long time ago – more than thirty years past. The victim is a 40-year-old mom today. Polanski is an elderly man now. It was a different era.

The thing is, World War II ended six decades ago, and we’re still rooting Nazi’s out of South America. The freshness date is still good on war crimes. When does child rape go stale? A couple weeks?





I’ve read a number of strange apologist theories for Polanski. He is a Holocaust survivor, he makes great movies, his wife was killed by the Manson Family, he’s eccentric.

He’s a pedophile. Polanski didn’t leave this country to escape persecution. He left to escape criminal prosecution and the prospect of getting ass-raped himself in prison – without the benefit of qualudes and bubbly. Only because he is famous do these Hollywood blowhards lift a finger for him. They’re standing around him in a big circle holding up their fists in the air like he’s goddamn Billy Jack. Roman Polanski is not Billy Jack. He is not even the Legend of Billy Jean. He is scum.

Ronald Harwood, Oscar winning writer of The Pianist of which Polanski directed, says, “(Polanski’s arrest) is really disgraceful. Both the Americans and the Swiss have miscalculated.”

You’re right, Ron. We have miscalculated. We should have done this 30 years ago. And the worst thing that could have happened was that Brett Ratner might have directed The Piano.


*#*

Not long ago, the Arkansas State Red Wolves were the Arkansas State Indians.

In those days, the ASU mascot was Running Joe – a caricature that loosely approximated the resemblance of a human being. He was obviously a first-cousin to the Cleveland Indian. For example, Joe’s nose was larger than his feet. His teeth rivaled the size of Jimmy Carter’s teeth. Earlier incarnations of Running Joe featured him grasping a tomahawk in one fist and a scalp in the other.

Later, yielding to a more sensitive community, Running Joe lost the scalp. Eventually, Running Joe was simply lost completely, and in his place arrived a noble Native American chieftain who presided over football games stoically and with his powerful arms crossed. No tomahawk. No peace pipe. No scalps. Sometimes, a fully dressed, blank-eyed Native American woman accompanied him at his side.

The changes were too-little too-late to appease the NCAA Jedi Council, who decided that the Florida St. Seminole and University of Illinois’ “Chief Illiniwek” were nobler Native American mascots than the one provided by Arkansas State. It then became necessary to devise a new mascot. The process proved cumbersome and lengthy. There were some politics involved. A consulting group was imported to deliver a list of appropriate replacements. My brother and I had our own list.

Personally, I championed The Gorillas, which briefly served as ASU’s mascot in the 1950s. Who isn’t frightened by a gorilla? We’d exchange the highly derivative Tomahawk Chop for the far more unnerving Gorilla Chest Beat. If necessary, we could become the Scarlet Gorillas so the school wouldn’t have to invent a revised color scheme. Who would complain then? Jane Goodall?

My brother advocated The Mustard Gas. “We float into your city,” said he, “and attack your central nervous system!” I kind of liked The Mustard Gas because it was different and it implied a terrible, horrible death. The logo could be a dented canister with gas seeping out of the top. Dry ice machines could deliver a sinister smoke that would prove essential to any half-time performance. The dance team would wear gas masks. Our cheer would be the sound of escaping gas: Psssssssssssssssss.

Arkansas State’s expensive consulting group had other ideas. Among them: The Ridge Runners. The Diamond Cutters. The Red Wolves. Seriously, the Ridge Runners? How about The Incest? Why not The Meth Heads?

Somehow, the Red Wolves emerged as the winner from what was a pretty damn lame list of choices. Arkansas State is located in North East Arkansas, and there are about as many wolves in the area as there are hippos. But damnitt, we’re the Red Wolves now. Let’s live with it.





To my surprise, the school more than lived with it. They embraced it. Quite truthfully, A-State fans always felt like pale facsimiles of Florida St. when we executed the Tomahawk Chop or when our mascot planted a spear into the end zone. The Red Wolf gave us new cheering opportunities. Now we had a big, puffy red dog thing riding around on a motorcycle to open up home games. The crowd howled with every first down. I’ve threatened to buy a werewolf mask and wear it to games. I just haven’t done it yet, but I will.

Still, I arrived with my brother and Dad to Arkansas State’s first home game of the year expecting the same old crap – a disinterested student section and way too many people wearing Arkansas Razerback gear.

You have to understand how aggravating it is to attend an Arkansas State game and to see people wearing Razerback crap. Would one attend an University of Oklahoma game wearing Oklahoma State Cowboy attire? Would you wear a Hawkeye jersey to an Iowa State game? Of course not. Yet Arkansans believe it’s just as appropriate to wear a Hog hat to an A-State game as it is to engage in sexual congress with your sister.

“I’m taking my camera phone,” I announced pompously, “and snapping pictures of all the fools wearing Razerback crap to the A-State game!”

Except, I had no subjects to snap. The stadium was packed tightly, and everyone was wearing Red Wolves attire. The image of the Red Wolf himself, unimaginably named Howl, was bared on the chests and backs of nearly everyone in attendance! I struggled to find a single Hog. I came up empty. Empty! Finally, ASU pride had seeped to the top of what was once a cesspool of apathy, chagrin, and denial. Arkansas State Red Wolves! Arooooooooo!





We’re still new to this loyalty thing. We’re not completely sophisticated. For example, one popular shirt featured the penetrating eyes of the Red Wolf and this puzzling inscription, “These Eyes See No Fear.” It sounds cool until you begin to ponder its meaning. Those eyes don’t see fear because we don’t scare anyone? Maybe it was supposed to be, “You don’t see fear in these eyes,” but the t-shirt printer was in too big a hurry to proof read. Regardless, it’s a dumb t-shirt.

Still, it was nice to hear all the enthusiastic howling as the game kicked off. It’s a meaty and threatening cheer, unlike the farmer’s call they do in Fayeteville. (“Wooo Pig Sooey?” How about “Heeeere, piggy piggy?”) Everybody was caught up in authentic Red Wolf excitement, in a packed stadium no less, even though the Lozerbacks were getting their bacon smoked by Alabama on national TV. At last, ASU had a true fan base, and all we had to do was trade in an old tired Indian for a red wolf.

The delicate facade began to crack about three minutes before halftime.

The game started at 3:30. As the game clock ticked close to halftime, I caught this comment from a woman seated behind me: “Well, I’m not even hungry yet! I hope I get hungry!” My first thought was, Well Christ, Lady! It’s ten minutes to four! Nobody is hungry. And then it occurred to me, the terrible, horrible truth. This was Jonesboro, Arkansas, dude. Five o’clock is dinner time.

Immediately, I envisioned The Cracker Barrel parking lot rapidly populating with SUVs and pick-up trucks. No, ASU, no! Don’t fail me now! Not at halftime, when the game is so close! Surely you can forgo one lousy dinner to howl your Red Wolves to victory! For God’s sake, would a Hogs fan leave at halftime to take advantage of the Early Bird Special at Lubby’s Cafeteria? Jesus, no!

Jesus, yes. When halftime was over, many of the Red Wolf “faithful,” including the Not Hungry Yet Lady, had vanished. Poof! My team had become cuckold’s to the blooming onion at Outback Steakhouse.

“Where did everyone go?” asked Angry Dad, puzzled.

It only got worse as the game progressed. The football game itself was amazing. The lead changed several times. There were heroic plays on both sides, and still the grandstands evaporated. The visiting team’s band, sensing their foe’s inexplicable betrayal by their own fans, pumped out their taunting tunes with more venom and vigor. Desperately, the ASU cheerleaders worked to coax a howl out of the crowd, but it was too late. Denny’s was serving breakfast all day long.

The final score was 30-27. The victor was Troy State. The Red Wolves fell in the last moments thanks to a botched punt return. Those who stayed, those who ignored their stomach’s demands, left disappointed but enriched with the knowledge that they had stayed to the brutal end, giving all they had to a team that must have wondered what the hell happened at halftime that made so many of their fans abandon them when there was so much football left to be played.


The next morning, me, my brother and Angry Dad decided on Cracker Barrel for breakfast. Parked in the lot was an SUV with a message soaped on the rear window: TROY OWNS YOU. Indeed. Indeed.

We entered the Cracker Barrel the same way one enters any Cracker Barrel, and that’s through the cheesy gift shop. What greeted us immediately was a colossal kick to the pills.

“You gotta be kidding me!” gasped my brother, figuratively massaging his nuts.

Displayed before us, like some kind of grisly shrine, was a mammoth display of University of Arkansas Razorback’s merchandise, available for sale right there in the Jonesboro Cracker Barrel, supposedly home to the Arkansas State Red Wolves.


My brother pointed to a ceramic dinner plate that featured a Hog in the center. “I want to buy one of those just so I can break it in front of the cashier,” he sneered. He didn’t do it, of course. Like me, he’s an Arkansas State fan, and we’re all talk.



***

Recently, I hacked my 1000th tweet on Twitter. If you figure that each tweet takes about 10 seconds to compose, that’s more than two solid hours of tweeting.

Despite all my intimate research, the Angry Czeck has yet to understand Twitter’s value – if it has any value at all. If you like to receive news the instant it happens, then you might like Twitter. If you want to read Kid Rock’s shameless trolling for cute fans, then you might like Twitter. If you are amused by pithy, 140-character bits of wit and insight, Twitter might be the thing for you.

I use Twitter to promote the Angry Czeck. I also use it to unleash something called Bursts of Anger, a rapid-fire salvo of fury that I attempted to launch in the early days of this blog. The format was a blogging dud, but it works good enough on Twitter.

About a month ago, I complete 100 Bursts of Anger. Some of these bursts are kind of funny. Others are lame and should be given to Dane Cook. I could allow these bursts to disappear in Twitter’s ether, or I can catalogue them here for your future reference. You don’t have to thank me. I just want your cash.

100 Bursts of Anger
(Plus more because I often lost count)

Burst of Anger #001: Expected to be lighter this morning, but scale said otherwise. FU scale! Your truth is a dagger in the belt of Brutus!

Burst of Anger #002: Nobody told me, but it was Ass SUV Parking Day at the parking deck this morning. Back up and park straight. Just once.

Burst of Anger #003: Santana and Kenny Wayne Sheppard are boring and overrated. There. I said it.

Burst of Anger #004: God curses Egypt with boils and plague, and the Angry Czeck with man boobs.

Burst of Anger #005: What is it about an “R” rating that compels some parents to think, “Junior has to learn about rape and murder someday.”

Burst of Anger #006: Cold-cocked a state senator this morning and stole his Mercedes. Wait. No I didn’t. Crap, my life is boring.

Burst of Anger #007a: Nothing beats sitting alone in a room lit by fluorescents, shirtless, waiting for the dermatologist to judge your moles

Burst of Anger #007b: Lost all my plans and schematics for the bank heist. Now I have to start ALL over. Stupid cleaning crew.

Burst of Anger #008: The worst invention ever? It’s a toss up between the Frisbee™ and wind chimes.

Burst of Anger #009: Mrs. Angry gets vanity sizing. Why can’t Mr. Angry have vanity sizing? “Why look! These size 28 shorts fit just right!”

Burst of Anger #010: Anger refuses to rest on Sunday.

Burst of Anger #011: Allowed a truck into my lane today, but didn’t receive a “Thank you” wave. I’ve been reduced to lesser Seinfeld plots.

Burst of Anger #012: Still rubbing the tear gas out of my eyes after the riot. Wondering what I should do with the stolen police car.

Burst of Anger #013: Got into an argument with Mom. Same old thing. I’m NOT a mercenary. I’m a soldier-of-fortune. There’s a difference.

Burst of Anger #014: This PC thing is getting way out of hand. http://tinyurl.com/ck9va8

Burst of Anger #015: Saw the Roach of Spring today.

Burst of Anger #016: I gots me an Alamo to avenge.

Burst of Anger #017: I should have printed a t-shirt that reads in Spanish: I don’t want a time share.

Burst of Anger #018a: Been in Mexico nearly half-a-week, and still nobody has called me “gringo!” What gives?

Burst of Anger #018b: Nobody wears sombreros in Mexico. I was promised sombreros.

Burst of Anger #019: Zorro is my defeated foe. You are weak, Zorro! WEAK!

Burst of Anger #020: Country Music + “Special Guest Jimmy Buffet” = Hell

Burst of Anger #021: Should have read the fine print on bottle of weed killer: “Will Triple Your Weeds Upon Application.” Now I know.

Burst of Anger #022: Must come up with a cooler defense of luscious chest hair than “Birds never nest in barren tree.”

Burst of Anger #023: is. Wait! Crap! That’s my ultra-witty Facebook update nobody has ever thought of before. Tomorrow: Song lyrics all day!

Burst of Anger #024: Jack Bauer infiltrates American Idol and tortures Paula Abdul for having a “fishy” last name.

Burst of Anger #025: I’m no Encyclopedia Brown, but I suspect that the N. Korean rocket failed to reach space because it wasn’t designed to. [N. Korea Rocket Shooting Edition]

Burst of Anger #026: Spoke with Arkansas State Senator Sydney Soresack today. First time I realized he’s Chinese.

Burst of Anger #027a: Following Newt Gingrich might have been a baaaad idea.

Burst of Anger #027b: Informed homeless dude that I don’t have cash. Was then invited to accompany him to an ATM.

Burst of Anger #028a: Steve Hannah, CEO of The Onion, never heard of Angry Czeck. Surprised. Angry. Deeply hurt. Finally, hungry for tacos.

Burst of Anger #028b: What good is following a porn star when all she twits about is buying a house? I demand cheekiness.

Burst of Anger #029: Jesus 1, Death 0 [Easter Edition]

Burst of Anger #030: Just shat a cinder block.

Burst of Anger #031: Following Jean Claude Van Damme not quite the “kick” I thought it’d be. More like a poorly executed Indian Burn.

Burst of Anger #032: Renting a boat and scuttling some pirates. Which way to Africa?

Burst of Anger #033: Up to 63 (sixty-three) followers. I’m gunning for you, Kutcher. Demi will soon groan the name Angry Czeck!

Burst of Anger #034: Putting Texas on eBay today.

Burst of Anger #035: Parked perfectly in my parking space this morning. I can’t hope to duplicate it. Life’s colors duller from here on.

Burst of Anger #036: Do. Not. Judge. Me. Bathroom. Scale. Damn your sinister numerical eyes!

Burst of Anger #037a: Decided to TinyURL tinyurl.com. Miniaturized half the Internet. Sorry.

Burst of Anger #037b: Broke two of my rules today: parked backwards and wore sandals to work. Three if you count the state senator I killed.

[Apparently skipped #038]

Burst of Anger #039: In five years, you’re gonna be real sorry you ain’t got no more new Grand Ams to drive.

Burst of Anger #040: Swine Flu appears to share many of the symptoms of Wine Flu.

Burst of Anger #041: AngryCzeck.com has just been optioned as a movie starring Rip Torn and directed by Michael Bay.

Burst of Anger #042: Opened up a Can of Whoop Ass. Stale again! Damn you generic Kroger brand Can of Whoop Ass!

Burst of Anger #043: Before news of Hugh Jackman nude scene, Mrs. Anger had no interest in seeing Wolverine. Now she does. Mmm-hmm. I see.

Burst of Anger #044: If you like actors raising their fist to the sky and screaming, “NOOOOOO!” more than once, then you’ll love Wolverine.

Burst of Anger #045: Wife stares at my stomach for a long time. She finally says, “We should go on a gym date.”

Burst of Anger #046: Play my new drinking game - take a shot every time a college basketball player claims his nickname is “The Chosen One”

Burst of Anger #047a: The Official website for National Day of Prayer Task Force offers a Prayer Guide for $8.95: http://tinyurl.com/cgne3r

Burst of Anger #047b: Celebrating National Prayer Day by commemorating Separation of Church and State.

Burst of Anger #048: Humiliated and defeated Kobra Kai today. I showed those arrogant California punks no mercy.

Burst of Anger #049: Once again, another Mother’s Day passes, and Mom fails to give me credit for the easy birth. It takes two to birth, Mom

Burst of Anger #050: Let’s see what the online porn-name generator came up with. “Tiny McSpeedy?” What the hell?

Burst of Anger #051: Okay, let’s see what the online Christian Name Generator comes up with. “Kris?” What the hell?

Burst of Anger #052a: How can “oe” possibly we a word, evil and sinister Scrabble for Facebook application?

Burst of Anger #052b: Took an entire bar of Irish Spring to wash my stomach this morning. Might have to take my gym membership more seriously

Burst of Anger #053: Parked my SUV backwards in a space for Compact Cars Only. Take that, America!

Burst of Anger #054: Had to decline that Supreme Court thing this morning. Sorry, Big O, but I hear good things about that Sonia chick.

Burst of Anger #055: Told Mom that I wanted either Destro, Storm Shadow, or Snake Eyes. She gets me Bazooka. Bazooka! Still mad at Mom.

[ #056 omitted for religious reasons]

Burst of Anger #057: The office is filled with interns, yet I have “phone duty.” What the hell?

Burst of Anger #058a: Wondering if the grass I mowed this weekend was really the twitching legs of spiders.

Burst of Anger #058b: Finally, something to almost be happy about - still no French permitted on the bridge of the USS Enterprise.

Burst of Anger #058c: I may be Big T-Shirt Guy at the pool this summer. Expect to receive nonchalant thumbs-ups from other Big T-Shirt Guys.

Burst of Anger #059: The last 3 bursts of anger have been #58. Excessive levels of awesome can cause lapses in memory and enlarged testes.

Burst of Anger #060: My trainer said “Take fish oil pills. It makes everything slippery.” On a related note, pooped in 8 seconds today.

Burst of Anger #061: Heard that Obama received an authentic, WWII white flag from France during his visit this weekend.

Burst of Anger #062: Totally emasculated by my bastard trainer today. Considering turning in my chest hair and becoming a eunuch.

Burst of Anger #063: Nearly crushed by a crop duster today. Not nearly as Hitchcock-ian as one might think.

Burst of Anger #064a: Racist invades Holocaust Museum. Muslim extremist murders army recruiters. I feel like I’m living a Fox News segment.

Burst of Anger #064b: The peril of twit-following a porn star is that it invites others in the industry to follow you - Confucius, 540 B.C.

Burst of Anger #065: “On the third day, God takes a second look at the budget and begins to quietly cut corners.”

Burst of Anger #066a: Wondering if the Iranians learned to count ballots in Florida. Almost certain I’m not the first to make this joke.

Burst of Anger #066b: Saw that look in my personal trainer’s eye this morning. The look that says, “You big pussy.”

Burst of Anger #067: Personal Trainer, “So, how’s your diet been?”

Burst of Anger #069: The 69th Burst of Anger is coincidental to the publishing of AC’s first (last?) sex post: http://tinyurl.com/plf9jy

Burst of Anger #070: Can’t get Jon Gosslin off my couch. Dude, no more “I hate my wife” stories, please. Trying to eat.

Burst of Anger #071: Must be something about living in a Carolina that makes married politicians horny.

Burst of Anger #072: The Angry Czeck Axis of Evil - Michael Bay, France, and King King Bundy. Don’t discuss.

Burst of Anger #072: Grabbed my own crotch in tribute to Michael Jackson. Hurts, but better idea than having Pepsi set my hair on fire.

Burst of Anger #073: Do NOT type “Billy May” in your update box.

Burst of Anger #074: B. Madoff in Prison, “How would you like to double your cigarettes? Don’t rape me and I’ll tell you how.”

Burst of Anger #075: The most popular search words to The Angry Czeck yesterday? “jessica lange boob” My audience is Mom, Dad, and creeps.

[What? No #076?]

Burst of Anger #077: Wife went to Branson and didn’t return with any items from my list: Grand Am, crystal meth, weird religious conversion

Burst of Anger #078a: I’m feeling small and insecure. Let’s kick Britain’s ass again! [Fourth of July Edition]

Burst of Anger #078b: Celebrating July 3rd by ignoring France’s contribution to the Revolutionary War. Try it. It’s easy!

Burst of Anger #078c: On this day in 1776, the nation would have to wait 198 more years for me to be born.

Burst of Anger #079: Found a biography of GW Bush at the library in the kid’s section. Seemed way too thick.

Burst of Anger #080: I’m no theologian, but I believe that it was Jesus who said, “Kill thy joe, resurrect some mo’”

Burst of Anger #081: I don’t know much about the devil, except that he’s red.

Burst of Anger #082: Nobody died all weekend. [MJ Death Week Edition]

Burst of Anger #082: Nobody asking Sotomeyer if the Supreme Court ever intends to reinstate Pluto as a planet. You fail me again, government

Burst of Anger #083: Just reviewed Anger Bursts #020-075. Think I might have been mailing it in #042 through #061. No refunds.

Burst of Anger #084: Nobody has taken up my offer to scratch my arm pits.

Burst of Anger #085: Nobody told me that my muscles would go away if I stopped working out. Who can I sue?

Burst of Anger #086a: My only hope to lose ten pounds is to get a tape worm. Looking for half-eaten hamburgers in trash tonight.

Burst of Anger #086b: All those moves I mastered in Nintendo Wrestling meant diddly in the Homeless Octagon this morning.

Burst of Anger #087: Dear Mr. Mean Airport Cop Who Put A Parking Ticket Under My Windshield Wiper, I wash my windshield with herpes.

Burst of Anger #088a: I don’t care about Toms Shoes. (There, I said it.) Furthermore, I thought Walter Cronkite died ten years ago.

Burst of Anger #088b: It occurs to me that I spend most my time on Twitter telling you how great I am.

Burst of Anger #089a: I will no longer read anything that begins, “It’s that time of the year again!”

Burst of Anger #089b: Watched a country music video last night. Thought, “Damn, this is a long video.” Turned out it was TWILIGHT.

Burst of Anger #090: Bill Clinton, “What do you think two attractive chicks might be willing to do if I sprung ‘em out of Korean prison?”

Burst of Anger #091: To the moron-loser who shot up a bunch of women because he couldn’t get a date: have you tried looking less ugly?

Burst of Anger #092a: Julie & Julia opens tonight. Didn’t they already make Mrs. Doubtfire? Is this Part 2?

Burst of Anger #092b: A-Roid’s pharmacist trumps Big Dopi’s pharmacist last night in New York.

Burst of Anger #093: Told the Chik-Fil-A cashier that she’s gonna be real sorry when Jesus drops by on Sunday and can’t get His chicken.

Burst of Anger #094: A homeless man dared me to scream like a homeless man at a Town Hall Meeting today.

Burst of Anger #095: Dropped by my local Town Hall Meeting to get in a little Judo practice. Hip tossed an old lady.

Burst of Anger #096: Learned that my parents looooove Glenn Beck. Would have rather learned that I was secretly the King of France.

Burst of Anger #097: Add “Prison Girl Uniform” to list of things Mrs. Angry refuses to wear.

Burst of Anger #098a: For the first time ever, I may be interested in seeing Barney Frank in wrestler togs.

Burst of Anger #098b: After seeing what happened to Senator Palpatine, I predict Sara Palin looks like Dick Cheney in four years.

[Inexplicably, there is not Burst of Anger #099]

Burst of Anger #100: I either have St. Elmo’s Fire burning in me, or I ate a tube of Ben Gay.

Yep, so that’s about it. 100 Bursts of Anger. (I’ve committed myself to at least 900 more.) Not exactly Stuff White People Like, but better than the Jay Leno Show, and NBC didn’t pay me a dime.


You can follow The Angry Czeck on twitter.com/angryczeck

###

United States President™ brand has lost too much value.

A couple years ago, a colleague of mine admitted to loving the President of the United States.

“I just love him,” she said, in all sincerity, regarding President George W. Bush. “I think he’s terrific.”

I didn’t think Mr. Bush was very terrific, but I didn’t have the energy to straighten her out. Who has the energy to take on the power of love?

The point is, love is rarely a word one applies to the President of the United States these days. Despite my co-workers admiration, it’s safe to say that a great deal of people didn’t like Mr. Bush very much. We mocked him. Sneered at his policies. Openly doubted his intelligence.

Somewhere down the line, we lost respect for the office of the Presidency.

Today, the President addresses school children on the Internet, and Conservatives respond as though he is trolling around playgrounds in a van offering crack to kids.

Today, the President addresses members of Congress only to have an elected lawmaker interrupt the speech by calling the President a liar. To his face. On national TV*.

Asshole

Since the founding of this country, the President, even the great ones, has been subject to ridicule and insults. Andrew Jackson was labeled a bigamist. Some called Abraham Lincoln an ape. But today, what Conservatives hurl at the President is nothing less than seething hatred that bypasses reason with barely a glance.

Our President has been called godless. Socialist. Communist. Weak. A Muslim (an insult?). A liar. A foreigner. A radical. People appear on camera to admit that they fear the President. Fear him! As though he were something that oozed out of a haunted lake.

There is a weird segment of this country that treats the President of the United States as an enemy.

Wasn’t there a time when the Oval Office alone commanded respect? After all, it is an office appointed by the will of the people. Us. And when we levy these blind, baseless, idiotic charges at our President, aren’t we really self-indicting here?

Insulting the President has always been a national pastime.

Once, my Dad took me aside and took umbrage for the way I treated President Bush on these digital pages. “Would you say the same things to President Bush’s face as you do on your blog?” he asked. I told him no. I said I would probably just ask him about his dog. After all, the President is the President, and he deserves respect.

Yet, my Dad’s words made me re-consider my editorial position. For example, it was unsavory for me (or anyone) to suggest that the President and his Vice-President were engaged in sexual congress together. I toned it down, electing to blast the President’s policies rather than the President himself.

We were all guilty – discounting those like my colleague who loved George W. Bush. Newsweek often ran editorial cartoons that likened Mr. Bush to a monkey. Late night talk show hosts challenged Mr. Bush’s intelligence every evening. We openly took delight when Mr. Bush tangled his words or choked on a pretzel.

Perhaps Conservatives are merely meting out their terrible revenge. And in their exuberance, they have taken it too far. For the sake of Pete, we’re demanding that the President produce a birth certificate? What next? A photo ID? For the love of St. Luke we’re brazenly calling the leader of the free world a liar before an audience of millions. Other countries are taking notice.

When Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi threw his shoes at President George Bush, I was appalled. I was insulted. You don’t chuck footwear at my President, asshole. And while I noted that al-Zeidi’s action was an expression of rancor that the Iraq War had afforded the people of Iraq, I also advocated that Mr. al-Zeidi receive the full harsh measure of the law.

You show respect to the President of the United States of America, bub.

Asshole, too.

The Presidential™ brand has taken a hit. Some will blame President Bill Clinton. More will blame President George W. Bush. Some might go so far as to finger President William Taft. Regardless, it is President Barack Obama who bears the slings and arrows of what has become a Nation that no longer respects the Oval Office.

We can only hope that leadership and decency restores luster to what was once a treasured brand.

* Excluding the FOX viewing audience, of course. Apparently, health care isn’t a big issue when stacked against the premiere of Glee.

sj3eda9qb6

President Barack Obama is to address the Nation’s school children on Wednesday, and predictably the Conservative right went absolutely nuts. The President wants to welcome the kids back to school! Jesus, no!

Completely paranoid and blinded by their own pettiness, it amazes me how these supposedly patriotic people show so much disrespect for the President of the United States. Since when is our President an enemy? As much as I loathed President George W. Bush, I’d have welcomed a speech from him to my children.

This is our leader, Angry Junior. What do you think?

But then you know what? The Angry Czeck got a hold of Mr. Obama’s speech, and I think the Conservative’s have hit on something. More than that, I’ve become a convert. The speech is laden with sinister secret messages and covert instructions – like a Black Sabbath album, which makes more sense now that I think about it because Obama is black.

Just read the speech, man! Obama is indoctrinating our children into some kind of Nazi Youth agenda! I don’t have any special high-tech equipment, but I strongly advise those who do to sweep this speech for subliminal messages. Not that I didn’t find a bunch already, and the only tech I used was my American smarts.

Check it out. You can’t make this shit up. These are Obama’s creepy words lifted straight from his creepy speech!

“When I was young, my family lived in Indonesia for a few years, and my mother didn’t have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school.”

Indonesia! That ain’t America, last I checked my Rand McNally. Remember when everybody said that The Birthers were crazy? Not so much anymore. And look! He didn’t say “where all the OTHER American kids went to school.” See where I’m going here?

Obama indoctrinates your children in a green energy labor camp

“I’ve talked about your parents’ responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don’t spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox.”

Not only is Obama trying to take over the family, he’s busting on big business! Big business, unlike big government, is the only institution the American people can trust! Obama’s twisted Socialist agenda never rests, even on a school day. I’m on to you, Frenchy.

“And no matter what you want to do with your life – I guarantee that you’ll need an education to do it. You want to be a doctor, or a teacher, or a police officer? You want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer or a member of our military?”

Ho ho! Here comes Obama, trying to replace our fighting men and women with learned egg heads with fancy degrees. Listen, Obama: it doesn’t take a professor to tell a soldier what heathen to shoot.

“You’ll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS, and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment.”

Oh? Is that so, Obama? What about GOD? Did you ever consider that God was already on the case? Of course not. What do you have against God, Obama, except that He isn’t Muslim and loves America?

“You’ll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies that will create new jobs and boost our economy.”

More big government meddling in private enterprise. This is clearly not the country our Founding Father’s envisioned (as in, they didn’t envision a 3/5 of an American to ever hold office), Don’t you have a car company to run, Obama? Stay out of my kids’ heads!

“So I wasn’t always as focused as I should have been. I did some things I’m not proud of, and got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.”

Not proud forging a birth certificate to make people think you’re American? Not proud of stealing this country from freedom-loving Americans? See I’m on to you, you sneaky sonuvabitch.

Obama’s school speech is as phoney as a birth certificate.

“Here in America, you write your own destiny.”

Obama hates God!

“Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book.”

By “book,” he means the Koran. I’m on to you.

“Maybe you’ll decide to get involved in an extracurricular activity, or volunteer in your community.”

Sure. “Volunteer.” Volunteer for the Obama Youth Club of Godlessness and Sorcery. No white people need apply. Because Obama hates white people, Christians, kittens, and America. Especially America.

Next on the Obama hit list.

“But the truth is, being successful is hard.”

Obama hates Capitalism!

“Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published.”

Obama wants you to ready the Godless Harry Potter series and not the Bible. He says it right there. And if you read between the lines, he also wants you to fire newborn babies out of homemade catapults.

“Don’t be afraid to ask questions.”

Yet another unprovoked attack on Christianity! Religion is people not asking questions. Obama is a pagan menace!

“So find an adult you trust – a parent, grandparent or teacher; a coach or counselor – and ask them to help you stay on track to meet your goals.”

Obama wants your children to ask a coach about sex and not God. What does this guy have against God?

“What is the dealio with this Obama guy?”

“I expect great things from each of you.”

Sure. Like dumping capitalism, surrendering firearms, rejecting the Lord, firebombing the oil industry, having homo sex and signing your Commie card. I’m on to you!

“Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.”

Obama rubs his anti-American Godlessness in our faces! If you listen closely, you’ll hear his demon-seed staffers chuckling in the background.

As you can plainly see, Obama’s devious agenda is easily decrypted by my powerful mind. Anybody who lets their kid watch this 18 minutes of mind control will end up paying for expensive sex re-education camps in the future. Keep your kids home and have them watch SpongeBob until this whole Communist mess blows buy.

***

It all started when I was born. Instead of being content with my newness, my body insisted upon obtaining life experience. Bones started growing. My big brain developed. My awesome cells multiplied. Once you start, there’s no stopping the engine. You just have to sit there and wait for the caboose.

Lately, I’ve begun startling Mrs. Angry with surprising revelations: I want a motorcycle. Or I’d like to buy one of those cool new Cameros and paint it a matted, bullet gray. I want to get into a bar fight (but I don’t want to get punched in the face). I want to fly (Balloon? Dirigible? Hang glider?) to Monte Carlo and play “games of skill” in a real casino – not Tunica where I shuffle from one $10 blackjack table to the next, frugally trying to make my $80 last the night.

“You’re having a mid-life crisis,” gasped Mrs. Angry.

What? No way. Don’t you have those in your 40’s? I’ve got five more good years in me. I don’t want to be that white-haired guy in the red Corvette, or the beer-gut hero who has to be pried out of his leather motorcycle pants. I don’t want to hit on Hooter waitresses or become a tri-athlete or join a rugby team or order boxes of ExtenZe™ online.

I just, you know, want a Camero.

“Where would you put the kids?” asked Mrs. Angry skeptically. Good question. I drive a 2001 Honda Accord now. Four doors. Four cylinders. Silver. It’s easily mistaken for a million other four-door silver Honda Accords. Mine is the one with the child seat in the back.

Where it lacks in room, it makes up for in vroom.

A couple months ago, my equally-as-old brother paid me a visit. He’s single. He owns a condo in downtown Memphis. He can handle a pool stick. When he’s bored, he joins a barbecue team or flies to Chicago with his buds to watch a soccer game. He is Bizzaro Angry Czeck.

“Let’s tear down the town!” he suggests, and I’m game because Mrs. Angry and the kids are out of town. I am ready to make a long-awaited appearance on the police report.

First, I take him to Buffalo Grill, a hamburger and beer joint. Not a bad selection. Except it’s five o’clock in the afternoon, and the only people eating at five of-the-clock are the elderly and exhausted parents with their kids. My brother and I look like wild-and-crazy guys that accidentally crashed the wrong party.

“Not much action here,” unnecessarily observed my brother. Luckily, the entire evening was stretched out in front of us like a $40 call girl! We were going to make the night our bitch!

Like the Duke Boys, we hopped into my Honda Accord and we headed to The West End, a dive that pretends to be a pub, but it’s really just a sports bar with leather sofas and chairs. The Cardinal game is on, so we figure we’ll knock down a few beers, take in a few innings, and maybe pass some oily winks to the waitresses. Why not? The Night Belonged To Us!

This. Will. Not. Be. Me.

It’s still kind of early though, and The West End is full of forty and fifty year old men puffing on cigarillos, playing table shuffleboard, and calling each other nicknames like “Hawkeye” and “Hunter” and “Duke.” They wear shirts that seemed to have been designed with a paint gun, and when the waitress comes by with drinks, they call her “Honey.”

“Egad!” groans my brother. I direct him to a couple of those leather chairs I mentioned earlier, and we wait for a waitress to take our drink order. When she arrives, my brother orders a beer.

“Do you have a Cabernet?” I ask. My brother acts like he was gut-punched by an invisible iron fist.

“You want ‘a Cabernet!’” repeats my brother. I don’t like the way he says “a Cabernet.”

“Listen,” I tell him, “I had a beer at the Buffalo Grill and now my stomach feels full.”

He just looks at me.

I’m beginning to appreciate Rod Stewart. Jesus, no!

His beer and my Cabernet arrive, and the wine tastes like something squeezed out of some guy’s armpit hair. I don’t want to admit the inferiority of my choice, so when I finish the glass I order a second. Meanwhile, Hunter and Hawkeye and Duke are getting louder and louder, overly-cheering the shuffleboard game. They spend a great deal of time re-adjusting their pants.

“What dorks!” I say.

“That’s our future,” jokes my brother, and we laugh like villains. I take another sip of wine. The baseball game isn’t coming on for another half an hour.

“Let’s get a six pack and watch the game at home,” I suggest, and my brother sighs. I don’t really understand why he sighed until we step outside, into the fading remains of sunlight.

Sunlight.

We didn’t even make it to nightfall! We slumped into the Honda Accord and chugged home, stopping first to fetch some Miller Lite because Miller Lite isn’t too heavy a beer. Later that evening, at one point, I said, “Wow! It’s almost ten o’clock!”

So I want a Camero.

Or a motorcycle. And I’d like to go skydiving just once. And dye my hair blue. Not bright Anime blue, but real dark blue. And I want to own my own tuxedo and learn to play craps. And if that’s having a mid-life crisis, then baby, I’m having a mid-life crisis.

I hope it comes with a Camero.

###

On August 5^th, a missile materialized out of the Pakistani sky and blew Baitullah Mehsud into itty-bitty terrorist chunks. Mr. Mehsud wasn’t especially well-liked. He was widely vilified by Pakistanis for his messy suicide bombings against civilians. The CIA accused him of masterminding the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. There are unconfirmed reports that Mehsud left the top unscrewed on the red-pepper flake container at a Chucky Cheese.

He was a very bad man.

Mehsud was messily eliminated via “fire from the sky” – a missile fired from a military drone. These drones cruise high above Pakistan and Afghanistan in what we’re told are missions to seek and destroy high-value al Qaeda targets.

President Obama approves of these missions. He said so on the campaign trail. He’s given the thumbs-up for more drone operations. Al Qaeda thugs squirm beneath their own skies, wondering if the next run to Taco Bell will be their last.

The hits keep coming. On Thursday (August 27), two missiles allegedly fired by a U.S. drone struck a militant hideout, killing six fighters in Pakistan’s South Waziristan tribal region. Boom goes the dynamite!

We’ve launched more than 50 of these attacks since last September, killing about 480 people, including al Qaeda chemical and biological weapons expert (and scumbag), Abu Khabab al-Masri. Even with sticky pieces of Mehsud’s corpse atop the body pile, Pakistan isn’t exactly thrilled with an omnipresent robot patrolling their borders.

You want some of this?

Me, I like that our own military troops are far from danger as we drop Kung-Fu death blows from the sky like Zeus. I derive pleasure by imagining how nervous these al Qaeda creeps must get every time they emerge from their caves for sunshine. (“Dude, it’s your turn to get the beer!” “No! It’s your turn!”) I even like the message we are sending to Pakistan: You guys suck, so we’re doing the terrorist-killing for you.

Yeah, I like military drones. I like them in Pakistan.

I won’t like them when they are hovering over the Mexican-U.S. border in search of illegal aliens and drug runners. I won’t like them when they are cruising over the highway monitoring speed limits. I won’t like them when drones are flying over my neighborhood, making sure I’m not smoking a big J in my backyard. I don’t have to consult my crystal balls to know that that day is a-coming.

Today, hysterical conservatives are screaming that the threat of universal health care is a harbinger of a government take-over. Where were these conservatives when the government was eavesdropping on the phone conversations of American citizens? Where will these conservatives be when airborne drones monitor every booger we pick? Will that be too much government? Or will they simply supply the usual cop-out: If you’re not doing something wrong, you have nothing to worry about?

The military’s airborne drones are clever tools that save lives, eliminate dangerous foes, and look cool in an army recruiting television commercial. That they are directed against our enemies is a good thing.

That they will one day be directed at us is only a matter of time.

****

I kind of like the Town Hall Criers.

The yellers. The screamers. The sobbers. I kinda like them. I don’t want to hang out with them. Or share a park bench with them. Quite frankly, I don’t even want to share a Denny’s with them. But I like them anyway.

I like them partly because of my special mandate to accept anger in all forms. And these clowns seem angry. Spittle flies from their lips. Their faces become red valentines of hate. They often break down in tears. How can I keep my head high in fury while dismissing the Town Hall Criers? I can’t. You’re in the club, bro.

And by expressing their anger, the Town Hall Criers have underscored the undervalued value of rancor: Rage makes people think.

Make no mistake, I believe most of the Town Hall Criers are imbeciles. They recklessly evoke the name of Hitler, applying it to our Nation’s leaders without really understanding the implications. They shout Socialism so much, you can almost see Newt Gingrich pulling the strings. And worst of all, they mistake single-minded rudeness for patriotism.

If you support government sponsored health care, then you hate Capitalism! You are a foe to freedom! And you know who else hated freedom? Hitler! Yes! Hitler! He took over the auto industry too! Boo! I’m scared! Boooo!

Yeah. I know. And still, I kinda like these guys.

I like them not for their heroically miniature brains, but because of what their ignorance has exposed: Health care is a bitch. It’s a kick to the pills for which no amount of ice can reduce the swelling and the ache. It’s as confusing as the disclaimer copy for Cialis. I’d have Lou Ferigno punch me in the face ten times rather than figure out how to pay for the resulting reconstructive surgery.





Before the Town Hall Criers colored their first Hitler mustache on a picture of President Obama, our elected Senators were hardly reading the measures the universal health care advocates were cooking up. Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas claimed she hadn’t read the bill because “it wasn’t finished yet.” What the hell are you waiting for? Half-an-hour before the vote? Sen. Lincoln, fearful of becoming the next You Tube sensation, also postponed all her Town Hall meetings until after August. Perhaps she will have an opinion by then.

The Town Hall Criers, for all their misinformed bravado and scare tactics, are making our elected officials work. We’re all paying attention. Better yet, we’re asking all the questions that we should have asked at the very beginning. Why are we rushing this bill? What are the costs? Is there a better solution than just making up a whole new system? Is tighter regulation a more logical answer? Or should we forget these lukewarm half-measures and experiment with a Canadian-style system?

As an added bonus, Town Hall Criers are forcing us to ask questions about ourselves: Does the government still represent the people? Are we really a nation comprised of paranoid hillbillies? Do we view good health care as a right or a responsibility in this country? Can Senator Barney Frank hold his own in a fist fight?





Ask the Angry Czeck about universal health care, and I’ll tell you how I like the idea. Everyone in the word’s wealthiest country should receive excellent health care. Furthermore, our citizen’s are getting older, medical costs are out of control, malpractice suites are ridiculous, and Grey’s Anatomy is still on the air. Our health care is not the best in the world. But it’s also not the worst, and that’s got to count for something.

Meanwhile, the Town Hall Crier’s are still crying, still spreading around dumb rumors, still masking their ignorance with patriotism and still displaying a level of intelligence that makes me believe that the real problem might be our education system. Their colorful Made-For-YouTube highlights make me cringe. I thought Jon Goslin and the Oldsmobile Alero were America’s biggest embarrassments. Turns out, we can set the bar lower.

Still, I kinda like these guys.






*****

I hate college sports.

Wait. That’s too harsh. It’s not even quite true. I hate Hitler. But college sports simmers close to the top, right there with Grey’s Anatomy, backward parkers, and wind chimes.

College sports sorely displease me.

But much in the way that I am sorely displeased with Jessica Simpson – I still sort of want to hang out with her. You know. Because, you know.

I like Arkansas State football and basketball. (Go Red Wolves.) I went to college there, so that’s my excuse. I know people who are nuts for Duke, and they’ve never been within 700 miles of North Carolina. That’s just wrong. What has Duke done for you? Listen, Chief: Duke doesn’t care about you or your family.

That’s not where my soreness comes from. What chafes my privates is the Lie Of Big Time Amateur Sports. Bowling isn’t big time (a sport for which Arkansas State excels). Football, basketball, hell even lacrosse is big time, and there’s nothing amateur about it.

Ask somebody why they love college sports, and you’ll likely receive this vein of bullshit: “It’s pure! The kids play for the joy of the game!”

Joy? Maybe. The kids seem to like it. Pure? No way.

I lived in Knoxville for a year. It’s home to a college called The University of Tennessee. They love their college football team in Knoxville. (A squad called The Volunteers, which further cements the amateur myth.) The local economy relies heavily on the football team to have a good season. Fewer people spend money downtown during bad years. You can imagine how dimly the Knoxville Chamber of Commerce views a losing season.

Reportedly, there’s an airplane runway just outside the city limits. A booster of the football team is rumored to own it. If you are a high school kid, and you play football, and a rich guy arranges for you to fly into his city so that you might meet the coach of his favorite college football team, are you really pure anymore? Or are you wearing a new dress and riding in a limo with Richard Gere?

All right, maybe that’s nitpicking. I’m sure all-star English majors are flown onto college campuses too. But let’s explore the college campus more thoroughly. Generally, you find the football and basketball teams ensconced in finer quarters than, say, the engineering club. Class attendance is mandatory, but you know. Come on. Practice wipes a guy out, right? Somebody will take notes. And should your keg-and-stripper party get out of hand, the campus cops are more than happy to look the other way. After all, the chief has $200 on the game.

College sport fans are pretty good.

You know what? Big time college athletes deserve the perks. I’m sincere. After all, the universities that pamper the athletes are making a mint off them, too. The English Department isn’t filling up the stadiums. Somebody is getting rich, and the athletes are moving the turnstiles.

Should we just outright pay the”student” athletes? Yes, Jesus, yes! And then at least we won’t be hypocrites demanding that our “student” athletes make good grades and behave like temple virgins while we sell them out on t-shirts. So the game would no longer be played by math majors. Was it ever?

But now the game is pure. You bet.

It has been announced that the University of Memphis basketball club will be stripped of its wins stemming from it’s glorious 2008 season. The team won 38 games, went to the Final Four, and were defeated by an even bigger Big Time program, Kansas, in the final game. There was much cheering.

The media gushed. How did Memphis, a b-list player in the NCAA, suddenly manage to build a squad that rivaled the Dukes and Tar Heels and Longhorns of this world? The coach, John Calipari, was known to be an incredible recruiter, but come on? Memphis? Not exactly Georgetown.

I don’t know if John had access to a private airplane with a private landing strip, but he might have known somebody who would fraudulently take a recruit’s SAT test.*

Pure.

Now University of Memphis fans are staggering around Beale Street, pretending that they never suspected that maybe, just maybe, John Calipari’s magic dust wasn’t 100% pure. I mean, why wouldn’t the country’s top prospects reject Louisville or UCLA or Florida for a school that hadn’t had much success in college hoops since, well, since the last time the school forfeited a Final Four season, 1985? Was the tour of Graceland really that overwhelming?

People love college sports. There’s a romance to the concept. We like the stories ESPN invents about the hardworking kids who “play the game the right way.” Exactly what that way might be isn’t very clear.

Not really interested in his ethics.

Call me callous, but give me the pro game. The game with the best athletes. The game that won’t break my heart, no matter how many felonies are committed. Give me the game that I don’t have to pretend is some kind of sanctuary for good sportsmanship, fairness, and (trying not to laugh) academic achievement. The game that understands that it is a business rather than some kind of church.

Pro baseball is Roid Ball. Pro football players are pot-heads who run over pedestrians with enormous SUVs. Pro basketball players aren’t much better. I know. But to tell you the truth, I’m not getting a better vibe from the “amateurs” either. Plus nobody waxes poetically about the pro players’ sterling love of the game and their fidelity for sportsmanship. We pay pros millions of bucks to play ball, and that’s it. No illusions here.

This year, like every year, you’ll find the Angry Czeck rooting the Arkansas State Red Wolves to its few but satisfying victories. In fact, I will follow the team closely and with great interest. I will hope that they somehow upset Nebraska and Iowa this year. If they do, I’ll become an insufferable braggart. And if they don’t, well, a victory over Troy State will have to do.

I am sorely displeased with college sports, but, well, you know.

* It should be noted that John Callipari, who now coaches for the University of Kentucky, has not been implicated in the scandal. Nor was he directly implicated in the scandal that stripped his University of Massachusetts team of its victories in 1996.

XOXO

I don’t remember Republicans being so whiny.

When Glen Beck started sobbing on TV, I thought it was an anomaly. The GOP is like Conan: It never cries. It smirks, yes. Shrugs in the face of doom. Continues watching cartoons in the wake of despair. But cry and whine, never.

And yet, whining has become the key tactic for the Republicans. They didn’t get the man they wanted behind the Big Desk, so they emotionally (and moronically) question the winner’s heritage. They didn’t get to keep the status quo, so they shrilly scream socialism. Its not just beneath them. It’s beneath all of us.

This is the Party that leads with the gut, for crying out loud. Who knew that the gut was such a baby?

Perhaps this is the real Republican Party.

And after eight brutal years of enduring iron-fisted GOP rule, I sort of forgot how Republican politics work. I simply got used to pointy-headed Democrats being ignored by Bush and his pals. But this Health Care debate has re-educated me, and I think it should do the same for you.

Allow me to break it down:

How A Republican Survives a Democratic White House

1. Whatever a Democrat claims, counter-claim the opposite. With enough practice, this can become as reflexive as breathing or polishing your flag lapel pin. For example, if a Democrat says a program will save the taxpayer money, immediately insist that it will actually cost them money. If a Democrat claims that proposed legislation will increase air quality, don’t waste a second saying that the bill will most likely kill us all. Don’t bother with research and the messy facts that accompany it. Just say the opposite. You’re on Fox & Friends, so it must be true.

2. Make everything about The Troops. If you catch a Democrat taking a leak, he or she is pissing in the faces of our Troops. If you spy a Democrat baking a pie, you can bet it’s not baked for The Troops (it’s probably intended for Al Qaeda). By contrast, everything Republicans do is for the troops. If a Republican wears deodorant, it’s for the troops. If a Republican bangs an intern after church, it’s for the troops. See how this works? You can never claim too much patriotism.

3. Repackage the blame. Republicans recently blamed Obama for resorting to the “politics of fear.” What a masterstroke! Republicans invented fear politics, but now the Democrats are the fear-mongers! Forget that you can’t speak for three minutes on Fox & Friends without calling the President a Socialist. Never mind that you ominously whisper “nine eleven” every time your party’s sinister policies are questioned. You’re just telling it like it is! Obama says that healthcare today is pricey and that maybe we should fix it. BOO! You’re scaring me!

4. Insist that Christianity is under attack. Yes! Attack! You don’t have evidence of an attack, just that gut feeling we were talking about, so it must be true. During a debate (one in which you have failed to monopolize the microphone), claim that the Founding Fathers meant for America to be Jesus Country. Time your hissing perfectly when your opponent reminds you that neither Adams, Franklin, or Jeffereson held stong religious beliefs. Then shout, “Christianity is under attack!” (For bonus points, claim that it’s impossible for a white man to get a job in this country anymore.) This makes the crazy Christian Fundamentalists happy, because it means that they’re a big step closer to unloading their illegal cache of automatic weapons on the non-believers.

5. Say something completely crazy. You already have the mouthpieces in place: Glen Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh. All you have to do is make a nutty claim, and one of those guys will likely broadcast it to an audience of millions. For example, claim the President is not an American. Demand to see his birth certificate. When it is produced, pretend you didn’t see it. Keep claiming the President was born in another country until the Nation’s morons accept it as fact.

6. Nothing is too trivial to compare to Hitler. There is no greater evil than Hitler, so make sure to attach the Furor’s name to everything you dislike or fail to understand: universal health care, gun control, abortion, open diplomacy, or Sudoku. You know what Jesus would do. If a Democrat proposes it, you know that’s what Hitler would do.

7. Become hysterical at Town Hall meetings. Let’s face it – Town Hall meetings are laaaaaame. Spice it up by denying mental patients their medication for a week, and then unleash them before cringing Democrats! Make sure you don’t stick to talking points. Just grab the microphone and start screaming. Use words and phrases like “family values,” socialism,” and “Nazis.”

I’ve decoded your schemes and plans, Grand Ol’ Party. Something else to whine about! Why can’t you man-up and take your ballot-box whoopin like men. I mean, we Democrats were nothing but dignified in 2000. We were so gracious, we let you have another four years so you’d have a do-over. But you screwed it all up, and now we’re in charge. If you don’t struggle, it won’t hurt so much

Really, it’s getting embarrassing for you.


***

I am standing in the bathroom searching my body for ticks.

Ticks and I go way back, back to when I was a kid scouring the woods around my house. Yet, I never got used to their crusty bodies and their unquenchable thirst for blood. When I’d find one attached to my skin, I would claw and scratch at it until the insect was finally dislodged. No calm plucking. Not me. I know how their sinister existences play out. Why, a tick might hunch on a blade of grass or a low hanging tree limb for two, five, even ten years until a snack of blood like myself comes strolling by. The eerie patience of the woodland tick!

I find one almost immediately, right in the Junk Jungle.

Egah! I claw at it savagely. I imagine a haze of chemicals descending upon the Earth, a green cloud of death choking the strange life out of these disgusting parasite. But I know that, even on a small scale, this is not going to happen any time soon.

Not on The Patrick’s organic farm.


*


I met Eric Patrick in Memphis, when he and his wife lived a couple blocks from me. He was a corporate accountant for a very large company. He was also building his own sailboat.

“How to you make a boat?”
Eric shrugged. “I found the plans online. It didn’t look hard.”

Online, building a particle accelerator may not seem too hard, but Eric wasn’t intimidated by the task. He bought the materials, assembled his tools, and built himself a sailboat. As sailing vessels go, nobody was going to write a poem about Eric’s boat anytime soon. It looked like a homemade sailboat. I noted that the cabin seemed unfinished, and I asked him if he had any plans for making it more comfortable. You know, like adding a bench or something.

Eric looked at me, genuinely perplexed. “No,” he decided. “Why would I do that?”

Eric is the only Pragmatic Romantic that I know.


**


However, Eric is not totally without bursts of pure romance.

He and his wife, Audrey, named his organic farm Foggy Hollow, an allusion to the white mist that settles on his land. He and I walk the grounds of Foggy Hollow in his boots – I don’t own boots, so I wear his. The ground is spongy beneath our feet. It’s been a wet summer.

“This is where we’re growing lettuce. And here are the watermelons,” he says, pointing to random patches of land. It’s hard to tell what I’m looking at. An organic farm lacks the aesthetic quality of a more traditional farm, with its nice neat rows of plants. An organic farmer cannot use pesticides or chemicals that will strip the soil of weeds and bugs. So everything looks overgrown and random, even though I know it isn’t. Eric doesn’t really do random.

Eric hands me a small ear of corn. The weather has been rough on corn, but I take a bite, and the corn is sweet and delicious. I ask him about subsidies and grants, and he responds, “A change we can believe in!”

Eric is a big Obama fan. You can tell because his Toyota Prius bears a couple Obama campaign stickers. Apparently, the new administration has been generous to organic farmers.

“I’m getting a grant to build a conservation fence,” he tells me. “Right now, there’s a whole lot of grant money available to organic farmers, but there’s not many around here. So I get what I want.”

Eric believes in what he says and what he practices. While others are content with talking about preserving the environment, Eric is, well, starting an organic farm. With a conservation fence. And plans for making his own electricity by building a hydro generator from the crystal-clear creek that runs through his property.

There is a great deal of property, too. Only about half of it is flat. Carved out of the rolling Tennessee landscape, Foggy Hollow looks nothing like the flat corn and bean farm I spent part of my childhood on in Illinois. I try to convince Eric to buy a four-wheeler. Not only for the fun, but because it would be a help on the land. Eric hems and haws and keeps claiming that it would run out of gas. The joke’s not funny the first time, but he says it at least twice. I sense something deeper. Finally, I discover the real reason for his reluctance.

He doesn’t want another gas-powered tool on his organic farm.

***


Several years ago, for reasons lost in the ether, I paid The Patrick’s a visit to their Memphis house. Eric was outside, as usual, doing outside stuff. That’s yet another point of difference between he and I. Eric loves being outside, loves the heat, the bugs, the wind. Me, I like climate control.

I found Eric doodling with what appeared to be weeds in a hanging pot.

“Tomatoes,” he explained. But he was all excited and giggling. He spent the next ten minutes telling me about his damn tomatoes. I don’t care about tomatoes, but I tried to share his enthusiasm. He’s a friend. But it’s impossible. Eric was goofy for his tomatoes. Later, I related the story to Mrs. Angry, then forgot about it.

I didn’t realize that I had witnessed the genesis of Eric’s obsession with organic farming.


****


Audrey has been married to Eric for eleven years. With him, she has moved to South Carolina, Memphis, Hattiesburg, and two places in Nashville. When Eric announced that he was giving up the secure lifestyle of corporate accounting for organic farming, she didn’t flip out. Instead, Audrey embraced the idea and became a farmer’s wife.

I watch Audrey shave a fresh zucchini with a cheese grader. She wears an apron. When dinner is ready, she rings a big bell in the backyard to summon her husband to the table.

Audrey used to work with Mrs. Angry at Youth Villages in Memphis, helping troubled inner-city kids learn how to balance a checkbook and apply for a job without setting the neighbor’s cat on fire. She used to spend her free time at coffee shops sipping java, or perusing the aisles of trendy bookstores. Now she spends a great deal of time prying produce from the earth and driving her oldest son, Liam, thirty miles to school. If there was an adjustment to be made adopting the organic lifestyle, it doesn’t show on Audrey.




“We love it here,” she says simply, and she’s especially proud to lead us on a hike atop their hill, which boasts a splendid panoramic view of the hollow. There’s not another house to been seen. Like me, they once lived in a neighborhood where houses were built nearly wall-to-wall.

I wait for Audrey to admit a single regret, or to utter a selfish complaint. When none is forthcoming, I goad her. “Don’t you miss neighbors?” I ask like Iago. “Wouldn’t you like to wake up without having to shake spiders out of your shoes?”

Audrey laughs and continues with the making of her homemade pizza. She is youthful and merry, and she seems to gain energy from long hours. I realize then that no amount of goading would yield the response I expected. Audrey really did love it here on the farm.

*****


Eric is having trouble making the CD player in the aging Nissan Altima work. The machine stubbornly spits out the compact disc with Eric’s every attempt. The car has more than 160,000 miles on it. Eric expresses some minor annoyance.

“There’s a great song about chickens on this CD,” he says between clenched teeth, and I decide that this would be the quote that sums up my weekend at Foggy Hollow.

There’s a great song about chickens on this CD.

We’re on our way to the Cumberland River. Eric’s eldest son, Liam, and my eldest son, Angry Junior, sit in the back seat, engaged in the critical talk of 6-year-olds. Trailing behind the car – upon a steel-mesh cart that normally hauled organically grown squash, corn, and tomatoes – was a large yellow kayak.




Even though the CD player isn’t working, I tell Eric I’m glad we selected the Altima over the Prius. I tell him I don’t want to get beat-up over the Obama stickers.

“You’d be surprised,” Eric tells me. “There are a lot of hippies that come out here wanting to get back to nature. I’ve seen Obama signs.”

That might be true, but mostly I’ve seen muscle-shirts, the Stars-and-Bars, and strange skull formations. Or maybe that’s just what I wanted to see. Eric has nothing but positive things to say about his neighbors, who aren’t all farmers. One, for example, repairs boilers.

“Boilers?” I repeat. Who in the hell has a boiler?

Suddenly, the CD player comes to life, and Eric has his chicken song. And he’s right. It might be the best song about chickens ever. If there’s a better one, I don’t want to hear it.

We launch the kayak on an inlet where many men are already fishing from their Ranger boats. We look a little out of place – two men and two small boys – paddling clumsily in no definitive direction among those who fish in silence. As it turns out, kayaking is work, and I decide to let Eric do most of it. Farming is like a membership to Gold’s Gym. After two months working the land, he had lost 15 pounds.

I make up a fictional mission to amuse the kids: We are on a quest to find a rogue Indian warrior, Chief Hippopottimo, and convince him to bury the hatchet and smoke the peace pipe with his White Father. We scan the wooded banks for signs of native activity – a smoke signal, perhaps. Eventually, we beach the kayak on a rocky shoal along the Cumberland, and we test our courage in the chilly waters.

This is how Eric relaxes. Apparently, Audrey had to force him to unwind on Sundays, or he’d be out in his fields pulling weeds or doing whatever organic farmers do. As a result, Eric has learned deeper things about himself. For example, he has gained a new appreciation for country music.

“I identify with it,” he admits. “You know, about working the land and freedom. Not the religious stuff.”

Eric isn’t a spiritual man, yet he seems to have found a kind of spirituality all the same. He has a profound respect for the power of the sun. He has made peace with the forces of weather and he has forged an alliance with the strange organisms that make his soil fertile. Eric has found his place in the world.

It’s just not my place, apparently. Every time we pass a boat, I shout, “Ahoy!” Eric tells me that shouting “ahoy” at a guy will get you beaten-up quicker than having an Obama sticker on your car.

******

Mrs. Angry is in her element in calf deep water, hunting for crawdads.

Bordering the back-end of Foggy Hollow is the cleanest stream I’ve every stuck a toe into. It looks like the saline solution I soak my contact lenses in. It is home to a colorful ecosystem of aquatic things that fascinate my sons. Mrs. Angry bounces from rock to rock, gleefully capturing enormous crawdads.




I stand in the center of the creek, barely moving. I don’t want to slip. I don’t want to get wet. I wish I can check my Facebook account. Suddenly, Angry Junior screams, “Snake!” and instead of fleeing to the house, Mrs. Angry and Audrey attempt to rustle it. Eric sits on the shore, his feet in the water. Huck Finn grown up.

Eric is not a hippy. Not exactly. But he definitely isn’t an accountant, although by his own admission he was pretty good at it. Nowadays, he dreams of ways of engineering a solar-powered tractor. Every Wednesday and Saturday, he and the family load up the Altima and drive to Nashville. There they sell their hard work to the city folk who like the idea of organic food, but lack the fortitude to grow it themselves.




I’m not even one of those guys. My philosophy is more chemicals, more irradiation, more hormones. Hell, if it’s good enough for the FDA, it’s good enough for me. To Eric, that makes as much sense as shouting “ahoy” from a kayak.

Mrs. Angry wants to take the kids and visit the chickens. Audrey wants to start dinner at the house, and I nearly break my neck joining her. The house sounds air conditioned and tick free. I see Mrs. Angry and Eric across the field, on their way to the chicken coop, with my two kids and the two Patrick boys trundling behind. I think that maybe it wouldn’t be bad living out here, on the land, making stuff grow. Instead of sitting in a sterile office, staring at my computer all day, dreaming up ways to sell stuff.

And then I feel something crawling in my pants, and I hurry to catch up with Audrey.



##

Eric and Audrey Patrick live outside of Nashville on their organic farm they call Foggy Hollow. You may purchase their chemical-free produce at Franklin Farmer’s Market on Saturdays, and the East Nashville Farmer’s Market on Wednesdays. Eric doesn’t write nearly enough posts on his Foggy Hollow blog, which you can access here.


*

The Angry Czeck has a friend who is several months pregnant with her first baby. If she’s anything like me and Mrs. Angry, she and her husband probably bought a lot of expensive books that pretends to prepare people for parenthood. Bah! Says the Angry Czeck. Raising kids isn’t rocket science. If caveman and the French can do it, so can you.

Still, a rookie parent could always use tips from a mystical guru. I’m willing to share with you my extensive knowledge, and my credentials cannot be questioned, as I have two kids myself. Stop listening to your mother-in-law and tattoo the following to your brain:

Ten Things The
Angry Czeck Says
You Need To Know
About Kids

1. Kids are easy to trick and to fool. Thanks to limited experience with humanity, kids are greatly susceptible to half-truths and lies. For example, my eldest son has been under the misconception that his great grandfather was a talking orangutan. He got this idea from what he foolishly perceives to be a trusted source of information: me. Now he tells all his friends that he’s only a couple generations removed from a monkey! That’s the best kind of fun.

2. Kids are bouncy. Children can do things that would kill or maim an adult – like leaping off furniture, ramming themselves into walls, and deflecting rocks off their heads. I don’t have a degree in science, but I happen to have it on good authority that children skin cells are of a similar consistency to a rubber tree plant. As a result, kids are difficult to break and can be molded into a variety of fun shapes. Buy that Sit-n-Spin with confidence, Rookie Parent!

3. Kids don’t care how naked you are. Whether you’re fully naked in the shower, or partly naked while dropping a deuce, your kid won’t give a damn. In fact, you’ll likely get a visit from your kid the moment you’re in a stage-of-undress. Sometimes, you can very well be naked with another naked person. In which case, immediately refer to Point Number One.

4. Kids think you’re indestructible. It’s always wise to keep your abdominal muscles flexed when you have kids in the house, because you never know when you’re gonna receive a running head-butt to the bread basket. Furthermore, children rarely comprehend the true temperature of fire, the hardness of a baseball, or the sensitivity of your nuts. If you dislike pain in any form, I recommend the big bottle of ibuprofen.

5. Kids think Scooby Doo is real. That’s unfortunate, because you know otherwise and you may begin to question your kid’s intelligence. It won’t help that your kid eats Hungry Hungry Hippo marbles and talks like Kirk Douglas. Relax. Get off the phone with the Special School. As kids age, they become smarter and they adopt more elegant speech patterns. The challenge is to remain smarter than your kids. Once they surpass your IQ, it’s game over.

6. Kids will eat all your chicken nuggets. Science has yet to record how many chicken nuggets a kid can eat at once. However, it has been well-documented in the field that while a kid may eat a prodigious amount of chicken nuggets, keeping them them eaten (rather than, say, in a semi-liquefied form on your brand new couch) is another story entirely.

7. Kids and your cell phone are mortal enemies. The cell phone is a device that takes your attention away from your kid. Therefore, expect at least 18 years of never finishing a telephone conversation. Kids will resort to any tactic to separate you from your cell phone, including dumping your expensive phone into the toilet, swimming pool, sewage pipe, or onto a busy highway. You may temporarily fool a kid with “their own phone” (usually a brightly colored toy phone painted like SpongeBob), but it will not be long before your kid recognizes this pseudo-phone as worthless crap.

8. Kids can be sonsuvabitches. This is not an indictment of the mother’s lineage so much as the gentle observation that kids, under any number of circumstances, can elect to become insufferable bastards at a moment’s notice. Whether you’re shopping at the grocery or attending a tragic funeral, one cannot predict when your kid might start screaming for soft drinks, throwing shoes, or punching you in the butt. NOTE: This is when people without kids start glaring at you. Don’t hesitate to give these people The Finger as you drag your kid to “time out.”

9. Kids want to smoke your cigarettes. Whatever you’re doing – fireworks, booze, hookers – your kids want to do it too. Unless you want to come home from a hard day’s work to find your kid wearing your ball-gag, nipple-clamps and leather chaps, try to keep the checkered elements of your life under wraps.

10. Kids are lousy conversationalists. I don’t know about other parents, but I find myself answering the same damn questions all damn day long. “For Christ’s sake, yes! The sun is hot!” If you’re having a kid and expecting to have Voltaire for company, I’ve got disappointing news for you, Chief.

There you go, Rookie Parents. Excellent advice and insight that should get you through the next five our six years with all your limbs intact. Don’t send me any questions, because I won’t answer them. But if you send me cash, I promise to spend it.



*#*