Reasons for not reforming (expanding) the United Nations Security Council

The U.N. Security Council has 5 permanent members--essentially the victors of World War II: U.S., U.K., France, Russia and China. The geopolitical and economic landscape has changed dramatically since the end of WWII, and there are good reasons to reform (i.e., expansion) the U.N. Security Council. There are a number of proposals on the table, one of which is to expand the current five permanent seats to nine. These "G4" countries are Brazil, Germany, India and Japan.

Here are good reasons not to admit these four countries as permanent members of the U.N. Security Council ;-)


Brazil

Oi! Como vai? We are Brazil, the famous Portugese-speaking country located in the Spanish-infested speaking pool called South America. As you know, we have the #1 football (known to the stupid Americans as soccer) team in the world. We have a very good economy (sometimes subject to hyperinflation) right now, one of the fastest growing in the world! We also have a very large population, over 191 million as of last count, out of which only 60 million live below the poverty line!!!

You may also have heard of our great nation through the movie City of God, which was nominated for 4 Oscars. Let me be honest with you: the poverty, violence, drug addiction, and police corruption depicted in the movie are totally false. This was a fiction after all, and we don't trust the Americans to tell us which of our movies are good anyway.

Instead, let me tell you why Brazil will become the next superpower that will once and for all end American hegemony in the Western Hemisphere! Our secret weapon is a little plant called sugar cane. Already, unlike the greedy Americans, we are self-sufficient for all of our energy needs thanks to this green weapon (it is not true as widely reported in the media that the great rainforests of the Amazon are being cut down to make room for more agriculture). That's why we don't pay $5/gallon like the gringos and our economy is free to grow exponentially (subject to the occasional exponential inflation).

So as you can see, we are becoming a very powerful nation, better than all those stupid Spaniard nations next door. We will without doubt eventually even surpass the evil and greedy Americans! This is why we respectfully ask the U.N. Security Council to admit the great nation of Brazil as a permanent member.

Tchau!

P.S. We also have the hottest girls in the world who love to wear the Brazilian football t-shirts (often wet).

Signed:

President of Brazil (not a military dictator)
Brazil's Football team (#1 in the world)


Germany

Guten Tag!!! We are the great nation of Germany located in the heart of Europe. Did you know that our blond-haired nation has the #3 economy in the world? Das ist gut! Ja! I know that you may not find that believable because our beautiful nation was almost destroyed during World War II. So it is quite amazing that from the ruble we have once again become one of the most powerful nations in the world!

But let me remind you, we no longer have aspirations to dominate the world and completely exterminate the Jews, Slavs, and other undesirable peoples. That was committed by the people known as "the Nazis" and very few Germans supported the Fuhrer evil Hitler. It is very fortunate that the Nazis no longer exist. Today Germany is all about peace. We love peace today just as much as the Nazis loved war. We are also very green because all of us believe that global warming is only human-induced (we love Al Gore) and will kill the planet and so we are the #1 nation using solar energy. Solar energy in the beautiful yet quite cloudy Germany, you may ask? How did we do it? We have the #1 engineers in the world (just a little better than our best friend Japan). We can build the biggest and best weapons machines and cars very fast, unlike anyone else--all precisely made to the correct specifications! Ja!

So, it is true that we started World War I and World War II, but those horrible things were not committed by true Germans. Today true Germans are all about green energy and peace (we also like to produce lots of bukkake videos like our friend Japan) and we will never start World War III. As proof, did you know that we have 2 million Turks (some of whom have been allowed to become German citizens, subject to tracing their bloodline to true Germans) in Germany and only 91.5% of our population is truly German? They are all ugly and undisciplined and bad engineers great people and Germany hates welcomes all non-German immigrants.

Das ist gut, ja!!!

Please accept the great and peaceful country of Germany's admittance to the U.N. Security Council.

P.S. One more proof we will not start WWIII: look at the friendly and peaceful eagle on our flag!

END OF DRAFT #2,
TOP SECRET
APPLICATION FOR GERMANY'S ADDMITANCE TO THE U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL
COMPLETED ON 2008/07/06 17:59:48 BERLIN TIME


India

Hello, we are the great nation of India! We need not to introduce ourselves. We are known around the world for having the #2 population in the world (after the despicable country of China), one of the fastest growing economies, Gandhi and peace, spicy cooking, and skilled engineers who work in technical support for Dell Computer Corporation and many other great American companies.

Let us first talk about the primary reason why India should be on the U.N. Security Council. Our country is all about peace. Did you know that India has 23 official languages and over 100 million Muslims? That speaks to our acceptance of diverse people. What about the caste system then, you may ask? The frequently mentioned article depicting the modern-day slavery of 160 million Untouchables is not true. First of all, we cannot speak of this issue personally as the authors of this application are all from the Brahmin caste and we are not allowed to touch Untouchables, but we have been assured that the filthy and disgusting "people" performing the work of sewer, garbage, and laundry cleaners receive over $.05/day. Secondly, these stories are told from their side. If we were born into such as a miserable caste, we'd be liars too. But no worry, they'll have a better chance in their next life, provided that they are subservient to us and they perform their duties as told. Perhaps some of them will be lucky enough to become a blessed cow.

Also, we have nuclear weapons which we shall never use (except on Pakistan) because we are all about peace. How can a country with millions of malnourished people afford to have nuclear weapons? The solution is spectacularly simple: the top two, maybe three castes have very smart people (and not all work in technical support for great American corporations).

India is a great nation and deserves to be a permament member of the U.N. Security Council.

Peace,

Signed

The Esteemed and almost divine Brahmin Members of the Indian Parliament


Japan

KONICHIWA!!! HAI, we bow to you, the great United Nations Security Council. We represent the humble yet very rich nation of Japan. We ask you respectfully to admit the humble nation of Japan to the great U.N. Security Council. We bow to you.

Unlike China, Japan is a very small country with lots of people and very few natural resources. Yet, we have persevered through atomic bombs (reminder: when America self-destructs in the next century, we must drop two Class Kamikaze hydrogen bombs on New York City and Los Angeles) to become the #2 richest nation in the world. How did we do so? We are the #1 engineers in the world. Unlike Germany (who we very much support for membership also) who has the #2 engineers in the world, we build very small things. We are very good at that because as we've mentioned we are a small country with lots of people. Of course, it is true that we are the smartest most humble Asians in the world (especially compared to the dirty Chinese and the dark-looking Philipinnos, Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Indonesians), but and the great nation of Japan no longer believes that Japan was destined to rule and enslave the world as foretold by our glorious poisoned (became mentally unstable) by the Americans former Emperor of Japan. It is not true that the Japanese people supported World War II and the Japanese Army created slave sex camps. As we mentioned, the Emperor of Japan became mentally sick.

Today, the great people of Japan are all about building tiny cameras and cell phones, engineering the best cars and earthquake-proof buildings, designing the coolest video games, having the most gruesome and violent beautiful cartoons called anime, and fantasizing over American Hollywood stars, such as the cute little Dakota Fanning enjoying American films.

We bow to you. Please accept the great and peaceful country of Japan's admittance to the U.N. Security Council. We bow to you, HAI!

END OF DRAFT #2,
TOP SECRET
APPLICATION FOR THE EMPIRE OF JAPAN's ADMITTANCE TO THE U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL
DIGITALLY STORED IN A TINY NIKON CAMERA (TO BE DUPLICATED ON A TINY CANON DIGITAL CAMERA)

John Murtha = George Bush on an Al Gore diet?

From the Wall Street Journal:

"If John Murtha were a businessman, he'd be the biggest employer in this town.
...
Johnstown's [PA] good fortune has come at the expense of taxpayers everywhere else. Defense contractors have found that if they open an office here and hire the right lobbyist, they can get lucrative, no-bid contracts. Over the past decade, Concurrent Technologies Corp., a defense-research firm that employs 800 here, got hundreds of millions of dollars thanks to Rep. Murtha despite poor reviews by Pentagon auditors. The National Drug Intelligence Center, with 300 workers, got $509 million, though the White House has tried for years to shut it down as wasteful and unnecessary. Another beneficiary: MTS Technologies, run by a man who got his start some 40 years ago shining shoes at Mr. Murtha's Johnstown Minute Car Wash."
...

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Amateur Night

I went to the Comedy Underground this past Monday. The last time I went there was in October with my girlfirend. The difference this time was that it was amateur night--the cover was only $4 and each act lasted only a minute or two. The show was from 8:30-10:00pm, so there must have been at least 30 or so comedians on the stage. Wow! A couple were really bad, most were mediocre, and a couple of guys were very funny. One of the better jokes I remember:

"I just read this study that masturbating five times a week can help avoid prostrate cancer. Shit, I got to cut back."

All-in-all, it wasn't a bad deal for $4, but it's also worth seeing a $15 show. Incidentally, the same very funny guy we saw in October, Jim Short, will be there again this weekend. Oh, and the waitresses are still as bad as last time. It took this one 15 minutes to notice us and the place wasn't even half full. The only good thing was that she forgot to ring up two of my beers (sadly, I don't think she was smart enough to undercharge to compensate for her mistake and hope for a bigger tip).

Lucky Toilet Timing

A good reminder for me--I got guests this weekend. Time to get those yellow & brown stains off. Ummmmmm, I'm looking forward to this one (positive attitude necessary)!

Thu Mar 1, 8:44 AM ET

TOKYO (Reuters) - Cleanliness has long been next to godliness for the hygiene-conscious Japanese, but fortune-tellers are now advising those who want to succeed in life to start by scrubbing the smallest room.

"Cleaning the toilet to attract luck" published this month is the latest in a series of books advising readers on how to attract good fortune using a brush and an array of cleaning fluids.

"Don't just wipe the floor, polish it," the book instructs. "It's important to maintain a positive mood while cleaning."

....

More here.

Poker Night

My girlfriend and I sometimes go to an Irish pub in Seattle called Fadó for trivia night. The goal is to correctly answer as many questions as possible. There is a host with a microphone who asks five questions in a row about a particular subject such as history or entertainment. The teams right down the answers on paper and hand them in at the end of each round. There are at least ten or fifteen rounds I think. It lasts at least two hours.

The trivia tournament is on Wednesday nights. Some time ago I read about a weekly poker tournament on Fadó's Web site but for some reason I never bothered to check it out. I used to play poker every night for a few weeks a couple of years ago on Yahoo Games but haven't since. I was taking a break from work yesterday afternoon and saw the tournament was on in the evening and decided to give it a shot. It starts at 6:30 so at 5:00 I went online to refresh my game-play. I got into it again after a few tries.

I got to the pub just before 6:30 and grabbed a seat at one of the three or four available tables. Each table has eight players so I think there is a maximum of 32 players. I think there are probably 25-28 players. Each player gets $500 in chips and the play continues until there are 16 players left. Actually a player can move to a different table at anytime because some tables might empty out sooner and moving evens out the number of player/table.

I started out slow and lost a few bucks the first few rounds but was soon winning a few. There are no staffed dealers at the table--the players take turns dealing. I was a little shaky doing that since I've never done it before and needed assistance from other players. Most of the guys and gals there were pretty nice although there were a couple of stiffs who actually cared about nothing else but winning the grand prize of a $25 gift certificate! I don't think they were having too much fun. One big baboon got mad at me for beating him because he thought I was playing dumb, which I was at times just to make it more fun.

I was probably second in the money count at our table when we split up to join the two final tables. I lost the first hand when the guy who was ahead of me went all in on a pair of kings. I had one ace and was hoping for another one on the final two cards. I didn't get it. Oh well. By that time I had played for 2 hours. So I think the play could have lasted at least another hour and a half. That's a lot of poker, but the time goes by really fast. I enjoyed it and I'll be back hopefully next week.

By the way, Fadó is a chain, which surprised me when I found out that it was one because it doesn't feel like it. Part of it is because it's downtown and on the first floor of a larger building; it's also well done inside (lots of wood) and feels hospitable.

Comedy Improv

We went to a comedy "improv" show in the U-District last Friday. We've never been to one before and we had nothing to do so we drove there for the 10:30pm show. We had about fifteen minutes to spare so we stopped at the Irish Emigrant. Not really a very special bar--it's almost a sports bar--but it was close by and we needed the beer. The female bartender had the voice and attitude of a sorority girl: a crackly voice and a demeanor slightly on the rude side; acting a little bit masculine by pretending to like sports ("I love to wear baseball hats" + the crackly voice) , but not too much where it'll turn the guys off. Well, everybody's got to do what they got to do...

Back to the theater where we got there just on time. There's actually a bar there and we were going to drink there before the show but it is very small and right next to the entrance where someone is always coming in or out. The good news is that you can get a drink anytime during the show. We took full advantage of that unusual (in the U.S.) perk.

An improv comedy show is just what it suggests: the comedy is improvised based on audience suggestions. For example, a few of the skits involved asking the audience random questions such as "What's in the room?". My girlfriend yelled out "elephant" and so one of the words to be used was elephant. A member of the comedy group would wait outside until there were five or six such random words and then he (unfortunately there were no female performers) would have to guess what the words were in a two minute game of pictionary. The difference between a regular game and this one was that they had to do it in the form of a conversation.

And it was conversation that was really the highlight of the show. The audience would choose a random topic--one was taxidermy--and the members would strike up a conversation. Five were lined up facing the stage and one was in front of them and facing them. After one of them started talking about the topic at hand, he would randomly point to anyone else who had to immediately pick up the storyline without pausing (even when in the middle of a word!) and without straying off course to the point where the story no longer made sense. That takes a lot of talent and they were all very very good. Is it as funny as regular stand-up comedy? I think so, but I could see myself going to see a different comedian almost every week, whereas I'd probably get bored seeing improv too often in succession.

After the show, we stopped at another bar for a couple more. This was a punk kind of place so we were not dressed accordingly, but we didn't care. We talked about whether the people there were dressed like that because that was their style or because it was to fit in. I think they think they're original, but the power of the latter is frequently underestimated: I believe that probably less than 5% of the population truly doesn't care what other people think and isn't influenced by others (at least in terms of choice of wardrobe). If that wasn't the case, why would they all kind of look the same (at this bar or most other bars, workplaces, etc.)?

Striptease is an Art...

I agree 100% with this one:


Tue Dec 5, 1:08 PM ET
OSLO (AFP) - Striptease is an art and should therefore be exempt from value-added tax (VAT), according to a Norwegian appeal court ruling, a copy of which was obtained by AFP.

"Striptease, in the way it is practiced in this case, is a form of dance combined with acting" which compares to other stage acts that are exempt from VAT in Norway, three judges ruled unanimously.

The verdict upheld a May 2005 ruling of a district court in favour of Den Blue Engel (The Blue Angel), a company that runs the Diamond Go Go Bar in Oslo, which refused to pay 25 percent tax on entry fees to the club demanded by Norwegian tax authorities.

Lawyers for the Blue Angel argued that other stage performances, such as sword swallowers and a comic making saucy jokes, were not subject to VAT.

The Diamond Go Go Bar's striptease shows were not vulgar and were performed by professional dancers, lawyers for the Blue Angel maintained.

The court ordered Norwegian authorities to meet the Blue Angel's legal costs, estimated at some 160,000 Norwegian kroner (26,216 dollars, 19,675 euros).

The Worse News Program Ever?

My girlfriend and I were flipping channels and for some God-forsaken reason we stopped on Q-13 Fox. The only time I watch Fox is for baseball and football, and I used to watch it when Married with Children was on back in the 90s.

But the local news on Fox is terrible, the worse possible I'm pretty sure. And it was the same in New York: sensational, bullshit, and very unworthy news. In 10 seconds here's what we saw: a 5-second "advertisment" for a segment, to be shown after a short commercial break, on date deadlines for mailing holiday packages, and a "pet walk forecast"--the prognosis for tomorrow was "dry paws"!

Does this signal the downfall of American civilization, or just that our pets will stay dry and that Aunt Bertha will get her fruitcake on time?

The Good News about Going Nuclear

SEOUL (AFP) - North Korea's nuclear test has boosted condom sales and bookings at South Korean "love" hotels," a newspaper has said.

Experts told the Chuson newspaper Thursday that the developments reflect widespread jitters over the October 9 test, with many people seeking solace in sex.

Convenience stores reported that condom sales rose by up to 28 percent in the week after the test, it said.
......
Read more here.

Geek Time=Fun Time

But only with my girlfriend. And she is better because she doesn't care about going after the points sometimes. :-)

Aaaahhhhaha, hahahaha, aahaha, ha

My girlfriend and I opted for comedy last Friday and it turned out to be a good choice. We looked up the schedule in the Seattle Weekly and chose the Comedy Underground near Pioneer Square. The place was almost full but we managed to get decent seats 15 feet from the center of the stage.

The first guy--we forgot his name--talked mostly about differences between eastern Washington and Seattle on the Iraq issue. His bumper sticker changed from "Bring back the troops" to "I support our troops" to "Send our troops to Iraq". Something along those lines (as you can see, or will shortly see, telling good jokes is not my speciality:-).

The next act was Tina Kim (pictured above). She had some really funny jokes about her Korean mother. What I remember most is her story about being short on cash and going on Craigslist where a guy offered to buy her underwear for $300. She met him, paid her the dough, but then never wrote back. So she's thinking, what the hell, why isn't this guy writing back? What did he think of my underwear? So she ended up writing to him. He finally answered that it didn't enough. Something along those lines...

The next guy, Jim Short (pictured above), an Australian living in San Francisco, was the funniest (my girlfriend preferred Tina Kim). Honestly, I don't remember any of his jokes, I just know that I was laughing hysterically. True, I already had three beers by the middle of his show, but my judgement is known to be... judicious when under the influence. Wait, wait, I got one: he used to live in Texas and he told people he was from Australia. They'd say, that's like in England, right? Pretty close, only it's about a hemisphere away. Something along those lines...

I almost forgot (again): our waitress was a blond-haired stuck-up bitch! She'd first tell us to watch our chairs because they were (supposedly) blocking her path to other customers. Then when she took our order she'd get down on her knees so as to give the impression that she was paying close attention to our needs, and to show off her breasts (nothing special) in hope of a bigger tip from me. Then she charged as $32 for 4 beers and one dirty vodka martini. She said the martini was $12 because it was a double shot. I didn't contest the charge and actually gave her a tip. My girlfriend was asking why did you give her a tip? I said it was only $4. That's over 10%, she said. Then I realized my folly: the bitch had successfully worked her tricks on me!

I plan on going back because the comedy is great, so blond-hair bitch: that ain't gonna work again. In the words of George W. Bush, "Fool me once, shame on.... shame on you."

To Serve and Protect!

From Agence France-Presse:

NEW DELHI, India (AFP) - Police in the western Indian city of Nagpur have begun kicking couples out of public parks in a crackdown on "indecent behaviour," a report said.

The police have rounded up 54 couples so far on accusations of behaving indecently in public places, the Press Trust of India reported.

"There's no restriction on visiting or sitting in the garden in a proper way but if someone is found sitting on someone's lap, we will take action," Additional police Commissioner Bhushan Upadhyaya said.

...

Borat

That's the name of the reporter that Sasha Baron Cohen plays in his comedic sketches I mentioned earlier. I came across a NY Times article about him today. In hindsight, I'd say he should have used a fake country as his target, but he's still my favorite current comedian.

BTW, his movie is coming out in November!



September 28, 2006
Kazakhs Shrug at ‘Borat’ While the State Fumes
By STEVEN LEE MYERS
ASTANA, Kazakhstan, Sept. 26 — There is no Running of the Jews here. No one greets you with the expression “Jagshemash,” which is either nonsense, garbled Polish or mangled Czech; it’s hard to say. The country’s national drink is not made from horse urine, though fermented horse milk, or kumys, is considered a delicacy. (It tastes like effervescent yogurt.)

There is almost nothing, in short, remotely truthful in the satiric depiction of Kazakhstan popularized by Sacha Baron Cohen, the British comedian who plays a bumbling, boorish, anti-Semitic, homophobic and misogynistic Kazakh television reporter named Borat Sagdiyev.

And yet Borat — Mr. Cohen, that is — has managed to infuriate and confound the country’s officials. Their attempts to respond, to set the record straight, have resulted only in more attention here, where Borat’s antics, shown on British and American television and on the Internet, now make the rounds like samizdat from the long-gone days when the country was part of the Soviet Union.
...

More at NYTimes.com

Cool Dude?

I was crossing the street today in Belltown. On the other side of the street was a guy with straight long hair, sunglasses, and tattoos on his arms. He was wearing dark jeans, a t-shirt, and an iPod. Pretty cool dude. The only problem was he was waiting for the pedestrian signal to change to "walk" from "don't walk" when there was absolutely not a single moving vehicle in the vicinity. Cool dude: try using your head a little bit more. You can do it!

The Funniest Guy in the World?

I can't think of another comedian as funny as this guy, maybe with the exception of Richard Prior or Eddie Murphy.

See more of him on youtube.com

That's the place I went to last night. When I got there at about 10:30, it felt a little like one the Hollywood parties Charles Bukowski went to during the shooting of the movie Barfly, as he described in the book Hollywood: a splintered party.

This place was definitely not a dive (thus the name High Dive?). Everyone was standing around talking in little groups, dressed casually. First order of business: beer, at the rear-end of the bar. A little conversation with my girlfriend about vodka--I told her French vodka is bullshit, and Polish vodka is the best. I don't understand how people can buy French vodka. It's like buying Polish wine. Doesn't make sense, right?

We went to the front of the bar where we eventually managed to secure a table just to the left of the stage. As the next band played (pictured above; I don't know their name), a few girls in hippy outfits--except for one who looked like she was dressed for ballroom dancing--started dancing in the front. Meanwhile everyone else was standing and watching, and not right next to them, but about ten feet behind them. If you looked down from the bar's ceiling you would see this big gaping hole as if there was a toxic spill there. It looked very bizarre to me but then I was on my 3rd or 4th beer.

We danced a little bit and it was a lot of fun (6th beer).

We played some pinball before we left. A girl came up and asked if she could slap my girlfriend's ass. I said sure, and you can slap mine too. Satisfied, she left. When I went to the bathroom I looked for her but couldn't find her. My girlfriend and I got in a fight about that on the way back. I guess I was trying to steal a trick or two from Bukowski...

------------------

I liked Hollywood a lot. It's another of Bukowski's books that you flow through, although it's much softer in tone. It's all about his experience--and he really shows the inside of Hollywood--during the making of the movie Barfly, which was also good, but I see why it wasn't a huge box-office hit and it took three phone calls to find it in a video store. It's a story about a drunk: Charles Bukowski. Most people, myself not included, don't find that interesting. I think one has to be a fan of Bukowski to really like it. Micky Rourke and Faye Dunaway give really good performances. I'm glad I saw the movie first, and then read the book--I sometimes prefer the opposite order.

Living on Skid Row: Factotum by Charles Bukowski

Book Review
Factotum by Charles Bukowski
First Published in 1975
This Edition Published in 2002 by Ecco (HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.)

This is my fourth review of a book by Charles Bukowski. The day after I started reading it, I found out that a movie based on the book with the same name was being released starring Matt Dillon as Henry Chinaski, a.k.a. Charles Bukowski. So far the reviews for the movie have been average. Some of the reviewers on Yahoo suggested seeing Barfly instead.

As for the book, it is another masterpiece. Both the dialogue and narrative are amazing. Factotum is the story of Bukowski's life in his twenties and thirties, when he was travelling across the U.S. picking up whatever job he could get. All of his jobs were low-paying and in most cases he would get fired or be laid-off not very long after starting.

Here are snippets of some of the more memorable passages in the book:

"I got a job in an auto parts warehouse just off Flower Street. The manager was a tall ugly man with no ass. He always told me whenever he fucked his wife the night before.
‘I fucked my wife last night. Get that Williams Brothers order first.’
‘We’re out of K-3 flanges.’
‘Backorder them.’
I stamped ‘B.O.’ on the packing slip and invoice.
‘I fucked my wife last night.’
I taped up the Williams Brothers box, labeled it, weighed it, and affixed the necessary postage.
‘It was pretty good too.’
He had a sandy mustache, sandy hair and no ass.
‘She pissed when she finished.’"

**********

"I always walked to my room, it was six or seven blocks away. The trees along the streets were all alike: small , twisted, half-frozen, leafless. I liked them. I walked along under the cold moon.
That scene in the office stayed with me. Those cigars, the fine clothes. I thought of good steaks, long rides up winding driveways that led to beautiful homes. Ease. Trips to Europe. Fine women. Were they that much more clever than I? The only difference was money, and the desire to accumulate it.
I’d do it too! I’d save my pennies. I’d get an idea, I’d spring a loan. I’d hire and fire. I’d keep whiskey in my desk drawer. I’d have a wife with size 40 breasts and an ass that would make the paperboy on the corner come in his pants when he saw it wobble. I’d cheat on her and she’d know it and keep silent in order to live in my house with my wealth. I’d fire men just to see the look of dismay on their faces. I’d fire women who didn’t deserve to be fired.
That was all a man needed: hope. It was lack of hope that discouraged a man. I remembered my New Orleans days, living on two five-cent candy bars a day for weeks at a time in order to have leisure to write. But starvation, unfortunately, didn’t improve art. It only hindered it. A man’s soul was rooted in his stomach. A man could write much better after eating a porterhouse steak and drinking a pint of whiskey than he could ever write after eating a nickel candy bar. The myth of the starving artist was a hoax. Once you realized that everything was a hoax you got wise and began to bleed and burn your fellow man. I’d build an empire upon the broken bodies and lives of helpless men, women, and children—I’d shove it to them all the way. I’d show them!"

**********

"Jerry was small and round, very round, a snug type. She pushed against me.
‘Jesus, it’d cold. Put your arms around me.’
‘Laura…’ I said.
‘Fuck Laura.’
‘I mean, she might get mad.’
‘She won’t get mad. We’re friends. Look’ Jerry sat up in the bunk. ‘Laura, Laura…’
‘Yes?’
‘Look, I’m trying to get warm. O.K.?’
‘O.K.,’ said Laura.
Jerry snuggled back down under the covers. ‘See, she said it’s O.K.’
‘All right,’ I said. I put my hand on her ass and kissed her.
‘Just don’t go too far,’ said Laura.
‘He’s just holding me,’ said Jerry.
I got my hand under her dress and began working her panties down. It was difficult. By the time she kicked them off I was more than ready. Her tongue shot in and out of my mouth. We tried to look nonchalant while we did it sideways. I slipped out several time but Jerry put it back in. ‘Don’t go too far,’ Laura said again. It slipped out and Jerry grabbed it and squeezed. ‘She’s just holding me,’ I told Laura. Jerry giggled and put it back in. It stayed there. I got hotter and hotter. ‘You bitch,’ I whispered, ‘I love you.’ Then I came. Jerry got out of the bunk and went to the bathroom. Grace was making us roast beef sandwiches. I climbed out of the bunk and we had roast beef sandwiches, potato salad, sliced tomatoes, coffee and apple pie. We were all hungry.
‘I sure got warmed up,’ said Jerry. ‘Henry’s one good heating pat.’
‘I’m plenty cold,’ said Grace, ‘I think I’ll try some of that heating pad. Do you mind Laura?’
‘I don’t mind. Just don’t go too far.’
‘How far’s too far?’
‘You know what I mean.’
After we ate I got into the bunk and Grace climbed in with me. She was the tallest of the three. I’d never been in bed with a woman that tall. I kissed her. Her tongue answered. Women, I thought, women are magic. What marvelous beings they are! I reached up under her dress and pulled at the panties. It was a long way down. ‘What the hell are you doing?’ she whispered. ‘I’m pulling your panties down. ‘What for?’ ‘I’m going to fuck you.’ ‘Laura is my best friend. I’m Wilbur’s woman.’ ‘I’m going to fuck you.’ ‘What are you doing?’ ‘I’m trying to get it in.’ ‘No!’ ‘God damn it, help me’ ‘Get it in yourself.’ ‘Help me.’ ‘Get it in by yourself. Laura’s my friend.’ What’s that got to do with it?’ ‘What?’ ‘Forget it.’ ‘Listen, I’m not ready yet.’ ‘Here’s my finger.’ ‘Ow, easy. Show a lady some respect.’ ‘All right, all right. Is that better?’ ‘That’s better. Higher. There. There! That’s it…’
‘No hanky-panky now,’ said Laura.
‘No, I’m just warming her up.’
‘I wonder when Wilbur’s coming back?’ said Jerry.
‘I don’t give a damn if he never comes back,’ I said, getting it into Grace. She moaned. It was good. I went very slow, measuring my strokes. I didn’t slip out like with Jerry. ‘You rotten son of a bitch,’ said Grace, ‘you bastard, Laura’s my friend.’ ‘I’m fucking you,’ I said, ‘feel that thing going in and out of your body, in and out, in and out, in and out, flup flup flup.’ ‘Don’t talk like that, you’re making me hot.’ ‘I’m fucking you,’ I said, ‘fuck fucky fuck, we’re fucking, we’re fucking. Oh, it’s so dirty, oh it’s so filthy, this fucking fucking…’ ‘God damn you, stop it.’ ‘It’s getting bigger and bigger, feel it? ‘Yes, yes…’ ‘I’m going to come. Jesus Christ, I’m going to come…’ I came and pulled out. ‘You raped me, you bastard, you raped me,’ she whispered. ‘I ought to tell Laura.’ ‘Go ahead, tell her. Think she’ll believe you?’ Grace climbed out of the bunk and went to the bathroom. I wiped off the sheet, pulled up my pants and leaped out the bunk.
‘You girls know how to play dice?’"

**********

"‘Chinaski, you haven’t been pulling your weight for a month and you know it.’
‘A guy busts his dammed ass and you don’t appreciate it.’
‘You haven’t been busting your ass, Chinaski.’
I stared down at my shoes for some time. I didn’t know what to say. Then I looked at him. “I’ve given you my time. It’s all I’ve got to give—it’s all any man has. And for a pitiful buck and a quarter an hour.’
‘Remember you begged for this job. You said your job was your second home.’
‘…my time so that you can live in your big house on the hill and have all the tings that go with it. If anybody has lost anything on this deal, on this arrangement…I’ve been the loser. Do you understand?’
‘All right, Chinaski.’
‘All right?’
‘Yes, just go.’
I stood up. Mantz was dressed in a conservative brown suit, white shirt, dark red necktie. I tried to finish it up with a flair. ‘Mantz, I want my unemployment insurance. I don’t want any trouble about that. You guys are always trying to cheat a working man out of his rights. So don’t give me any trouble or I’ll be back to see you.’
‘You’ll get your insurance. Now get the hell out of here!’
I got the hell out of there."

**********

"But in spite of the unemployment checks and the backlog of racetrack money, my bankroll began to vanish. Both Jan and I were totally irresponsible when we were drinking heavily and our troubles kept arriving by the carload. I was always running down to Lincoln Heights Jail to bail Jan out. She’d come down in the elevator with one of the dyke matrons at her elbow, almost always with either a black eye or a cut mouth and very often with a dose of the crabs, compliments of some maniac she’d met in a bar somewhere. Then there was bail money and then court costs and fines, plus a request by the judge to go to A.A. meetings for six months. I too gathered my share of suspended sentences and heavy fines. Jan managed to extricate me from a variety of charges ranging from attempted rape to assault to indecent exposure to being a public nuisance. Disturbing the peace was one of my favorites too. Most of these charges did not involve actually serving any time in jail—so long as the fines were paid. But it was a huge continual expense. I remember one night our old car stalled just outside of MacArthur Park. I looked in to the rearview mirror and said, ‘O.K., Jan, we’re in luck. We are going to get a push. He’s coming up right behind us. There are some kind souls in this ugly world.’ Then I looked again: ‘Hold you ASS, Jan, he’s going to HIT us!’ The son of a bitch had never slackened speed and he hit us straight on from the rear, so hard that the front seat collapsed and we were thrown flat. I got out and asked the guy if he had learned to drive in China. I also threatened his life. The police arrived and asked me if I cared to blow up their little balloon. ‘Don’t do it,’ said Jan. But I refused to listen. Somehow I had the idea that since the guy had been in the wrong in hitting us, that I couldn’t possibly be intoxicated. The last I remember was getting into the squad car with Jan standing by our stalled car with the collapsed front seat. Incidents such as this—and they came along one after the other—cost us a lot of money. Little by little our lives were falling apart."

**********

"The Florida State Department of Employment was a pleasant place. It wasn’t as crowded as the Los Angeles office which was always full. It was my turn for a little good luck, not much, but a little. It was true that I didn’t have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition. I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?
My name was called. The clerk had my card in front of him, the one I had filled out when entering. I had elaborated on my work experience in a creative way. Pros do that: you leave out the previous low-grade jobs and describe the better ones fully, also leaving out any mention of those blank sketches when you were alcoholic for six months and shacked with some woman just released from a madhouse of a bad marriage. Of course, since all my previous jobs ere low-grade I left out the lower low-grade.
The clerk ran his fingers through his little card file. He pulled one out. ‘Ah, here’s a job for you.’
‘Yes?’
He looked up. ‘Sanitation Worker.’
‘What?’
‘Garbage man.’
‘I don’t want it.’
I shuddered at the thought of all that garbage, the morning hangovers, blacks laughing at me, the impossible weight of the cans, and me pukeing my guts in to the orange rinds, coffee grounds, wet cigarette ashes, banana peels and the used tampax.
‘What’s the matter? Not good enough for you? It’s 40 hours. And security. A lifetime of security.’
‘You take that job and I’ll take yours.’
Silence.
‘I’m trained for this job.’
‘Are you? I spent two years in college. Is that a prerequisite to pick up garbage?’
‘Well, what kind of job do you want?’
‘Just keep flipping through your cards.’
He flipped through his cards. Then he looked up. ‘We have nothing for you.’ He stamped the little book they’d given me and handed it back. ‘Contact us in seven days for further employment possibilities.’"

**********

"I found a job through the newspaper. I was hired by a clothing store but it wasn’t in Miami it was in Miami Beach, and I had to take my hangover across the water each morning. The bus ran along a very narrow strip of cement that stood up out of the water with no guard-rail, no nothing; that’s all there was to it. The bus driver leaned back and we roared along over this narrow cement strip surrounded by water and all the people in the bus, the twenty-five or forty or fifty-two people trusted him, but I never did. Sometimes it was a new driver, and I thought, how do they select these sons of bitches? There’s deep water on both sides of us and with one error of judgment he’ll kill us all. It was ridiculous. Suppose he had an argument with his wife that morning. Or cancer? Or visions of God? Bad teeth? Anything. He could do it. Du mp us all. I knew that if I was driving that I would consider the possibility of desirability of drowning of everybody. And sometimes, after just such considerations, possibility turns into reality. For each Joan of Arc there is a Hitler perched at the other end of the teeter-totter. The old story of good and evil. But none of the bus drivers ever dumped us. They were thinking instead of car payments, baseball scores, haircuts, vacations, enemas, family visits. There wasn’t a real man in the whole shitload."

Booze & Bitches: Women by Charles Bukowski

Book Review
Women by Charles Bukowski
First Published in 1978
This Edition Published in 2002 by Ecco (HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.)

Another great Charles Bukowski novel--not quite as good as Post Office, but very entertaining nonetheless. Women is another thinly-veiled autobiography of the author's life in the late 70s when he is starting to become famous. The novel is strictly about his relationships with tens, if not close to a hundred women, most of whom he meets at his poetry readings or at the behest of the women themselves who write to him and want to meet him. Bukowski, a.k.a. Henry Chinaski, rarely turns anyone down, except the occasional hooker. The description of his encounters are very vivid and memorable:

"Upon awakening I got up and used Joanna's toothbrush, drank a couple of glasses of water, washed my hands and face an got back into bed. Joanna turned around and my mouth found hers. My cock began to rise. I put her hand on my cock. I grabbed her hair, pulling her head back, kissing her, savagely. I played with her cunt. I teased her clit for a long time. She was very wet. I mounted and buried it. I held it in. I could feel her responding. I was able to work a long time. Finally I was unable to hold back any longer. I was wet with sweat and my heart beat so loudly that I could hear it.
'I'm not in very good shape," I told her.
'I liked it. Let's have a joint.'
She produced a joint, already rolled. We passed it back and forth. 'Joanna,' I told her, 'I'm still sleepy. I could use another hour.'
'Sure. As soon as we finish this joint.'
We finished the joint and stretched out in bed again. I slept."

As always, booze is never far away:

"We drank some more and then went to bed. Her body was amazing, glorious, Playboy style, but unfortunately I was drunk. I did get it up, however, and I pumped and pumped, I grabbed her long hair, I got it out from under her and ran my hands through it, I was excited but I couldn't finally do it. I rolled off, told Cassie goodnight, and slept a guilty sleep.

In the morning I was embarrassed. I was sure I would never see Cassie again. We dressed. It was about 10 AM. We walked to the M.G. and got in. I didn't talk, she didn't talk. I felt the fool, but there was nothing to say. We drove back to The Lancer and there was the blue Volks.
'Thanks for all of it, Cassie. Think nice thoughts about Chinaski.'
She didn't answer. I kissed her on the cheek and got out. She drove off in the M.G. It was, after all as Lydia had said, 'If you want to drink, drink; if you want to fuck, throw the bottle away.'
My problem was that I wanted to do both."

The entire novel, however, is not just about sex and alcohol. There is a flow to the story and it's always interesting and rarely repetitious, whether he flies to a poetry reading, goes to the racetrack, or gets drunk with a new woman.

While Henry Chinaski has some serious shortcomings as a man--the foremost being that he cannot stay loyal--he does see beauty in women, and on the inside too. He fights his demons like any other alcoholic, but in the end he's almost an OK guy.

Puratinism at its Worst: Alcohol Laws in the U.S.

I was reading Women by Charles Bukowski today. At one point, Henry Chinaski--the same thinly-veiled autobiographical character seen in Bukowski's other books--runs out of liquor and has to wait until 6am for the store to open:

"Then we were out on the porch, wrestling. We tripped on the stairs and fell to the pavement. The bottle smashed and broke on the cement. She got up and ran off. I heard her car start. I lay there and looked at the broken bottle. I was a foot away. Lydia drove off. The moon was still up. In the bottom of what was left of the bottle I could see a swallow of scotch. Stretched out there on the pavement I reached for it and lifted it to my mouth. A long shard of glass almost poked into one of my eyes as I drank what remained. Then I got up and went inside. The thirst in me was terrible. I walked around picking up beer bottles and drinking the bit that remained in each one. Once I got a mouthful of ashes as I often used beer bottles for ashtrays. It was 4:14 AM. I sat and watched the clock. It was like working in the post office again. Time was motionless while existence was a throbbing unbearable thing. I waited. I waited. I waited. Finally it was 6 AM. I walked to the corner to the liquor store. A clerk was opening up. He let me in. I purchased another pint of Cutty Sark. I walked back home, locked the door and phoned Lydia.
'I have here one pint of Cutty Shark from which I am peeling the cellophane . I am going to have a drink. And the liquor store will now be open for 20 hours.'
She hung up. I had one drink and then walked into the bedroom, stretched out on the bed, and went to sleep without taking off my clothes.

I looked up California's alcohol laws and sure enough, business cannot sell alcohol between 2 and 6 AM. As it turns out, that's the same law as in Washington, except here we have state-run liquor stores. Looking at the length of that list on Wikipedia and the myriad of laws for each state, I don't think I've seen anything so ridiculous. I can understand that some states may want to control liquor sales in special circumstances such as in Utah where religion is involved (on the other hand, why mandate it on everyone?). But why restrict the hours. If there's demand, why shouldn't businesses be able to sell alcohol when they want to? I've been to many bars in Seattle that are full at 1:45 AM but have to close up. It doesn't make any sense. And what if my working hours are 6PM-3AM for example. Why can't I buy alcohol when I get off work? Seems discriminatory to me. Even if I don't work, why should the government tell me when it's OK to buy alcohol? I think I like Nevada's law the best:




As for the age restriction, it's another example of how politics can go wrong. You can vote and be forced into the military at age 18, but you can't be trusted to drink? See the article "MADDness" for more detail.