Monthly Archives: January 2012

Jan 25 2012

Personal Responsibility: Part Deaux

I want to first apologize for my last post, which was made in anger.  Oddly enough, it probably got more hits in the first 48 hours than any other post I have done.  Not surprisingly, nobody responded to it.

First, it was a little unclear as to what it asked of the reader.  Again, my apologies.  I was upset.  And over what you may ask?  I was upset that 59 year-old woman was going to jail for the mistakes of three adults.  Grown adults.  I understand they were 18,19, and 19 making them too young to drink, but unlike what the news article says, this does not make them minors.  It makes them not legally old enough to drink.  In the United States, you become an adult, a so-called, major at the age of 18.  As far as I am concerned, these “kids” were old enough to know better than to drink and drive.

The situation is an awful tragedy, and I understand that according to our current laws the woman is unquestionably guilty, but it smacks of one of those situations where I feel our justice system tries to make things right by performing the second wrong.  This woman may have bought the beer, but she did not force it on these young adults, and I highly doubt she told them to go out driving after they were good and toasty.  Regardless, her life is now over.  She will probably spend the rest of her life in jail for something she will undoubtedly punish herself for anyway.

I could go on and rant some more, but I will leave the situation with what I have said.  This is not really the place for this type of discussion. I apologize.

Jan 23 2012

Personal Responsibility: I Want the List

What is an adult of 18 years of age personally responsible for, in a legal sense?

What can we expect of someone who is an official adult to do for themselves and their place in society?  (Feel free to add what is not expected of them.)

Are these expectations different from someone who is also an official adult, yet age 30?  50?  70?  If so, why?

Mind you, there has to be a line in the sand.  None of the, well, it depends on the person in question. I’m talking legal responsibilities of a mentally normal 18 year old and their place in society.

For me:  If we have decided that a person is a legal adult at the age of 18, then they are responsible for their own actions, period. I personally hate the gray area between 18 and 21, when a person is an adult, but not allowed to drink.  Not because I want to see a bunch of 18 year olds running around drinking, but it suddenly creates a gray area where a person is an adult in every legal sense, but not responsible for their own actions.

Case in point:  Woman serves beer at her sons high school graduation.

All of the kids mentioned in this article are 18 and over, all legal adults, yet they are not considered responsible for drinking and driving.  The woman becomes responsible and will likely be sentenced to jail for the rest of her life.

This does not happen only to those under the age of 21.  If someone leaves a bar and does the same thing, the bar owner becomes responsible for allowing a legal adult over the age of 21 to drink and drive.

At what point does a person become personally responsible for their own actions?  When alcohol is involved, apparently, it is never.

Feel free to mention other ways a person is “magically” relieved of all responsibility under a particular circumstance.

Jan 22 2012

The Growth of TV In My Lifetime

DanLrene commented on my last post about how little TV I consume, responding in a nut shell, that reality TV is terrible and where has the real talent gone?

My response to that is:  It’s complicated and it’s simple.  Like a lot of “problems” I think I can point to the simple cause of the problem, but the solution is complicated.  The problem is the viewer.  I’m not so sure there is a solution because there are so many different viewers out there.  Essentially, the crappy Reality TV wouldn’t be out there if people didn’t enjoy it.

As far as talent is concerned, I don’t think the acting is of a lower quality on TV compared to twenty or thirty years ago.  In fact, I think the quality of the acting has gone up dramatically.  This may sound odd, but I think the quality of the writing has also improved.  (Especially for cable television, though I’m going to focus solely on network television here.)  Magical elements that were standard when I was younger, for example ex-military guys blasting “bad” civilians with machine guns and rifles and doing nothing but hitting the ground and killing no one, would be ridiculous today.  (I’m talking about the A-Team, of course.)  I could come up with all sorts of examples from my childhood, but I don’t want to pull out a dead horse just so I can beat it.

Viewers slowly demanded better, smarter, higher quality writing.  Shows like Law & Order and CSI came along and were plot driven.  Having the cheesy character archetypes (the smart character foiled against the dumb one, the scientist foiled against the magic/ghost/psychic believer) were removed from the equation entirely.  Instead we had shows featuring a competent crew of normal people just doing their jobs.

I enjoyed this TV trend for a while.  But like anything new, it eventually gets formalized, patterns emerge, and all these shows blend into each other.  The next logical step would be a show like NCIS, which has apparently been around for seven seasons, but I watched my first episode during a holiday marathon while staying at my mother’s this past Christmas.  I can see why this show has been successful.  It combines the plot driven procedural with the old character archetypes to create a solid formula for the show.

I guess that’s where I would say, “smart” entertainment has taken us.  And I put that in quotes because this type of show has a lot of flaws.  In particular, everything is wrapped up neatly with a nice little bow at the end of the show.  And we accept this even though we know the wheels of justice grind slowly.  So even though it is the smarter side of TV, it is a caricature of reality and I find it understandable why people might not enjoy this type of programming.   Alas, to me, the alternative is even more mindless.  The people who don’t want to think even this hard about their TV viewing.

Don’t get me wrong.  There’s always been mindless television.  The old-time variety shows where people would have a number of differing segments featuring comedians, singers, dancers, and other forms of entertainment were all mindless viewing experiences.  These died out in the late 70′s and early 80′s when I was young.  I’m also not saying the people showcased weren’t talented or unentertaining, I’m saying those shows didn’t usually get you thinking too hard.  They were barebones entertainment; a stage, some lights, an audience; go.

In the 80′s game shows were huge, fueled with mindless trivia, and gave housewives something to dream about.  And no, I’m not saying housewives are the ones fueling mindless TV, only that games shows are the precursor to modern Reality TV.  These were slowly replaced by the talk shows which probably started out smarter, but slowly (quickly?) devolved into simpler/base entertainments. They were also cheaper to produce.  These days, the only main stream game shows I can think of are Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy.

Any group of seven people with six firing brain cells knows most of the crap on the talk shows is director contrived and the people are hand chosen to be volatile or out right told to be explosive.  Alas, that still means one of the seven people isn’t thinking and actually believes what they see.  These shows are professional wrestling without all the steroids and slicked up biceps.  It never ceased to amaze me how many people followed Oprah Winfrey uncritically considering how many crazy people she would show case on her show, but that’s another post all on its own.  Anyway, once TV execs realized that such mindless drivel was eaten up by seemingly reasonable people and so cheap to produce, the next step was the Reality TV Show.  The Circus for the New Millennium showing off the freaks of society for all to see.

As far as I can tell, most Reality TV has done nothing but devolve back into game shows only they’ve removed the mindless trivia.  Unfortunately, we have 60-70 years of television data to use so we can pick out personality types that will conflict just so the directors can spice up the competitor pools.

I recall watching ten minutes of a cooking reality TV show in a waiting room; Worst cook ever or some nonsense.  A contestant was criticized by a judge and burst into tears on and then again off camera.  It was obvious this person was emotionally unstable and chosen for the specific purpose of using them for their emotional break-downs over someone abusive chastising them.

My response was:  Wow, this person needs therapy, and no one is helping them.  In fact, they are being put on display so their neuroses can be mocked by thousands.

The response of the other person in the waiting room:  laughter.

I have no words for why my response was so different than the other person, for clearly there is one.  I can only throw my hands up in the air and say, enjoy your circus freaks.  Fortunately, I have Cirque du Soleil, and cable television.

Jan 21 2012

In Medias Res

I watch very little TV.  I used to watch CSI, but I gave that up about four years ago.  I used to go on a Law & Order kick every 3-4 years and catch up, but I haven’t done that in about twice that time.  I don’t watch sit-coms anymore.  In fact, I watch very little TV that is on the regular networks.  From the four basic networks I pretty much watch Chuck because for a campy spy show, they do an amazing job at character development.  EVERY single character on the show has gone through a growth process which the writers have balanced really well.  I also like the campy product placement.  They have an entire electronics store to play in and yet they sit around eating Subway subs and talk about the menu options.  It’s hilarious.  The only other shows I watch are the adult cartoons:  The Simpsons, American Dad, and Family Guy.  I check them out on Hulu when I’m too tired to write or read.

Much of the way I watch TV now is called “mainlining”.  That is, I don’t waste my time watching it week to week.  I wait for the season to end, and then I take a day or two on a weekend to watch the DVDs or on a friend’s DVR.  A rather pleasant no commercial marathon.  As implied above, I watch much more non-network TV.  For example, I’ve seen:  Boardwalk Empire, Breaking Bad, Dexter, Games of Thrones, Justified, Psych, Sons of Anarchy, Supernatural, True Blood, and Weeds, in the past year.  I don’t mainline all of these.  I watch Psych on Hulu.  Supernatural with a friend.  And actually I’m two seasons behind on Sons of Anarchy, but I enjoyed the show, so I’ll catch up eventually.  I point this out to demonstrate that I only mainline TV about a dozen times a year.  Maybe fifteen.  I’ve never really counted.

So why go through and list all the shows I watch?  To show off how little I really do watch TV.  And even though I watch so little TV, I am absolutely, 100%, sick, and tired of TV writers using In Medias Res.  I’m sure you’ve all seen it by now.  This is when a writer starts the story out in the middle, then backtracks to show the story from the beginning.

I know they do it thinking they are creating a clever hook to keep the viewer viewing.  It makes sense.  They want your eyeballs. So they hook you with the excitement that’s coming up, and then hope that’s enough to keep you in the seat watching commercials for the first half of the show, and they hope you’re invested in the story enough to keep watching the latter half of the show.

So I get it.  I understand why they do it so much.  But quite frankly, if I’m mainlining a show, I’m already invested.  I want to see what they’re offering.  I don’t need the teaser.  Just get on with the story, because you know what?  It’s really hard to write In Medias Res properly, and watching these TV writers do it is insulting.  One scene is a stupid little teaser.  It gets annoying. It’s embarrassing.

If you want to see it done properly, check out Pulp Fiction again.  In Medias Res works best when you’re balancing several story lines that converge or intersect.  They are presented this way for effect because the stories may parallel one another.  Or they may be shown in proper temporal order, but that throws things out in terms of a linear story, so things appear to be messed up.  Or in the case of Pulp fiction, things are shown so the converging stories make sense while the temporal order is crazy.  In Medias Res makes for an intriguing and engaging plot device when done properly and in this way.

If you have one plot-line, showing things out of order, is generally useless and certainly annoying.  If these people were writing books, an editor would throw out all the “24 hours earlier” nonsense and tell the writer to fill it in as back story.  You start with the hook.  you move forward from there.  It’s sad that this technique probably works in terms of catching viewers.  I guess I’ll just have to put up with it until more people consume TV the way I do.

Jan 20 2012

Talking About My Brand

I really don’t like talking about myself in the “I’m so great” hype type of sense.  If I plan to self-publish, I guess I need to do a little chest thumping every now and again, but it really isn’t me.  One of the things holding me back from getting my work “out there” is I’ve been struggling with my brand.  I’ve been collecting all sorts of information on what I should and shouldn’t do.  All sorts of advice on how to market myself and so on.  I think the best piece of advice I’ve received is the traditional, “be who you are” advice.

I’ve been trying to pigeon-hole my first book in the traditional book way.  I’ve started the sequel and found I’m struggling with the “book” mentality.  I don’t seem to write that way.  I’ve written part one of book two and started part two.  Each of these first five parts taking about 100 pages as a substory all its own.

Let me back track about five years and start where I started writing again.  I started with a space opera that went nowhere.  I wrote 160,000 words in two years and no end was forth coming.  The problem lay in the way I was writing the darn thing.  The first “book” consisted of seven stories (novellas if you will) that were complete (in the first draft sense of complete) on their own.  Each told a mini-story about a series of galactic events.  So I had seven stories that I could put together and call a book, each progressing the over arching story, but the seven stories themselves didn’t tell a story.  That is, there was no reason to call those seven together a book as opposed to six or eight.  Essentially there was a missing layer of story that prevented the first book from being a book.

Then I switched to a fantasy story that I’d been wanting to write for nearly twenty years.  I’ve spent the last (going on) three years writing this story, I’ve found something similar happening.  The first book, while a complete book this time, is broken into three distinct story parts.  Each making sense on their own as a sub-story.

Over this same period of time, I have been getting more and more into Japanese Anime and Manga.  I really like the serialized episodic story telling.  Essentially, that’s the way I’ve been writing.  A story arc, followed by the next arc, and so on.  The nice thing about this type of story telling is that it goes on as long as the story needs.  It doesn’t force itself into a certain size, it doesn’t force itself to wrap up all the loose ends before the next arc begins.  Stories flow one into the next.  Unfortunately, I’ve been trying to write this way, only trying to press the story into a book form as well.

After doing a little research into the way things are being marketed on the Amazon Kindle, I’ve decided to release my work the way it ought to be released, namely, episodically.  More and more serialized fiction has been appearing on the kindle, so it seems there is a market for the stuff.  I had thought about this a lot last fall, but a couple of months ago, I heard an interview with Sean Platt and David Wright (actually the interview was with one of them and I don’t remember which one it was).  They’ve written a post apocalyptic serial that seems to be doing quiet well, and it’s exactly what I’ve been thinking about trying myself.

So when considering my so-called “brand” I think I will specialize in episodic fiction.  It just seems to make more sense for the way I write.  The nice thing about this type of writing is that I can take an episode and make it an aside to build the characters that support the protagonist.  A technique I really enjoy in the Japanese Anime/Manga story telling form.  It really gets the reader invested fully in all of the characters, and I want to do the same thing.

Jan 19 2012

Why Aren’t You Happy?

It’s funny most people really aren’t happy. All kinds of scientific research has gone in to finding out why the people of our culture are so depressed. I personally think the problem is our culture itself. No one is allowed to sit back and enjoy what they have. Everyone is expected to constantly strive for the next greatest thing, the next biggest item, the next whatever. We are taught to want to consume, consume, consume. At no point are we taught to use.

Most people I know have so much junk they don’t know what to do with it. We just went through the holiday season and each year during this time we’re forced to buy each other more junk. And we’ve been taught this is what we’re supposed to do. I haven’t bought my grandmother a Christmas present in over five years. She’s going to be 82 years old. What exactly does he need that she hasn’t already gotten for herself or someone hasn’t already gotten for her? She has now been living in the Home, and by that I mean a home using the capital  “H”. She has had to purge just about every unnecessary thing from her life and she certainly has no room for any more crap that I might want to buy her. She’s actually happier now, though I suspect part of that is she is now getting the care she needs, but invariably she is just happy to see me when I come visit. I don’t need to bring her any stuff to make her any happier. In fact, I doubt it would work.

I have another friend, not Trevor, but I’ll call this one Trevor anyways, that I talk about a concept we refer to as comfortable mediocrity. Trevor and I are both of the opinion that we don’t need to have a ridiculously large house, a whole lot of stuff, or more more more. We enjoy the stuff we have. We enjoy having our friends. What more does one really need? if you’re enjoying your friends, enjoying what you have, you will quickly find you don’t need anything more than that. We have both become very adept at creating our own fun.

I grant you I probably have fewer responsibilities than most people. I honestly don’t think it changes anything. If you are married, if you have children, you certainly have more responsibilities than I do. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, you have that much more to enjoy. I suppose the hardest part about having children would be to pass on this sort of mentality considering all the advertising they are inundated with that tells them to buy buy buy consume consume consume. I know as a child, I didn’t have this figured out.

Of course, I don’t think all drive for the next greatest thing should be given up. We all have to strive for something. We all need to have goals. I just think people should focus more on working with what they have, rather than worrying about what they don’t have.  I honestly think people would be happier.

Then again, I tend to be more intellectually motivated than the average person. Even if I had more stuff than I could ever want, if I weren’t learning something new, I would never be happy. I am very fond of saying, “my time is worth more to me than money.” I don’t think this is true for most people. I think most people have been trained to believe that money it is worth more than their time. I find this sad. We only get one life, I hate the thought of wasting it working myself to death all for a few bucks and a bunch of stuff I can take with me when I’m gone.

Jan 17 2012

Said vs. Asked

As I’ve traveled the path of a budding writer, I’ve read the opinions of a number of experts. I suppose the most notable would be Stephen King and his book “on writing”. In this book he trashes the use of “ly” adverbs being used in speech tags. For example:

“Wow! That’s amazing!” John said excitedly.

Not really a very good sentence I agree, as it is obvious that John is excited given the fact we use the exclamation points.  But when I’m reading, I don’t pay much attention to those “ly” adverbs. It appears that a lot of writers agree with Mr. King, so when I do my writing, I don’t waste my time with the adverbs. Efficiency, what’s not to like? I can get behind that.

I don’t recall now who it was, another writer complained about using asked rather than using said. He, or maybe it was a she, complained that writers would write sentences like the following:

“Where are we going?” John asked.

Their argument was the reader can see by the fact that there is a question mark that John is asking a question and thus, there is no need to say that John asked. They felt it was more appropriate to write John said.

I can’t say as I disagree with this author’s reasoning, however, it does not seem technically correct to me. After all, John asked the question. So technically John asked. He wasn’t just sayin’.

I certainly think this is just one of those silly academic questions. No one really cares.  When people read words like said and asked, the brain just skips over it all. But when I write, I’m just going to have to write John asked.

I don’t suppose anyone has any thoughts on the matter? Or is this as academic as I think it is.

Jan 16 2012

I’m Drunk! And it’s Better That Way!

I haven’t posted in eleven days.

This is no good.  I came home from the holidays sick as a dog and then I had to work eight days in a row so that the hotel I work at could allow its owner’s a short winter break of about four days.  Three really, but we all know we work that to trick four days worth of business.

When I finally got around to my own break, I found I really needed to decompress.  I didn’t go back to writing.  Embarrassingly enough, I looked to a video game I got for Christmas, “Dragon Age: Origins” & the expansion pack, “Dragon Age: Awakenings”.  Or maybe that’s the other way around.  As I said, I’m drunk and such details seem so insignificant at the moment.  I can’t tell the difference.

I gave up video games a good nine years ago.  I bought one or two more, but never played them.  That’d be Gothic 2 and Ice Wind Dale.  I never installed the latter.  The former, I played half way through the first chapter, and never even came close to finishing.  If I remember the walk through, there were six or seven chapters to Gothic 2, so barely made a dent in that one.  Anyway, the point is I stopped playing video games for a reason.  I have an addictive personality and I prefer to not let myself get addicted to anything.  That’s why every four to six weeks I give up caffeine for a week or so.  I don’t want it controlling my life.

The same with video games.  The RPGs (Role Playing Games) the computer companies roll out every few years are amazing!  I would do nothing else if I could get away with it.  Worse yet, the MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role playing games) like World or Warcraft, or EverQuest, or the like would suck me in like a black hole.  No one would ever hear from me again, if I let it happen.  I’m very good at the grind they offer.

But I try to not let it happen.  I try to keep my world, my own.  It’s so hard to not let someone else create the world and I just live in it, but I try to avoid that.  I try to create my own.

Why you ask?

I read that and the above as just drunken ramblings, for sure, but it’s true.  I work hard to be a creator rather than an imitator.  Not that there’s anything wrong with people feeding you content and you becoming a consumer; an imitator. I ask that of the content I create, for you to consume and enjoy, but it’s not me.  I’ve always bucked the system and become my own person.  That’s just who I am.  There’s nothing wrong with just sitting back and enjoying other people’s content.  In fact, I recommend it.  If not my own, then somebody else’s once in a while.  After all, it’s always good to see what others are creating.

The past 2.5 days I did nothing but consume these video games, and I am impressed.  How did we go from Pong to Dragon Age in 35 years?  Seeing such progress makes it really hard to create my own content, and yet, here I am.  Even drunk, coming off a more than two day bender of playing this video game and I can report that I wrote almost 2100 words this afternoon .  Sober words.  Good words; toward my goal of 25,000 for the month.

I just wanted to post to let everyone know that even when I screw up; even when I get stuck being a consumer like we all are.  I can still work toward my goals.  In the end, I can still be a creator.

Of course, I can’t wait to read this when I’m sober…

Jan 5 2012

Creative Content

I don’t have to tell you about all the creative content online.  That’s probably why you’re here.  Well, maybe not on my blog.  That’s debatable, but that is possibly why you’re online in general.  I have a friend who has never waded too far into the online stream.  For the purposes of this article I’ll call him Trevor.

For Trevor, the internet is just a tool.  And that’s okay.  It really is a useful tool.  Remember the days when you tried to order plane tickets over the phone by yourself?  No?  Lucky you.  There was a legit reason travel agents existed back then.  Wading through all the BS was a torturous prospect all eliminated now by the convenience of Priceline and other travel aggregate services.  Heck, you can even skip all that and go straight to the source and compare Southwest with Jetblue with only a few minutes investment.  In the “old days”, that could take hours if you chose to do this by yourself.

Typically, I see Trevor once a year.  We usually call a few times, but this past year I was too busy and when we when out to dinner, we hadn’t spoken in a full year.  We chatted over dinner and we usually come around to the online versus being not online debate.  He only bought his first home computer last year.  Mind you, Trevor is a chemical engineer.  By all accounts a smart fellow.  Most of his computing needs were served by his company laptop, so he didn’t really need a home computer.

Anyway, he said he couldn’t understand a lifestyle that “required” being online quite so much.  Not being the easily defensive type, I said it was a matter of perspective.  The reason I am online so much is because I couldn’t imagine going back to a “mundane” lifestyle.  Watching most TV doesn’t do it for me.  It’s too fast food.  I’ve listened to a number of interviews with Hollywood TV writers (something nigh impossible twenty years ago without the internet) and even they admit what they do is quickly written and boiled down to the lowest common denominator mostly because they have to get a TV show out in 7-10 days and what they find funny at 3am when they are pumping out these shows can come out flat once the final edits are done.  The reason shows on HBO and the other premium cable channels are often so much better is because HBO uses a hands off, let the writers create in their own time, sort of model.  Occasionally that means a season might be delayed six months, but hey, it’s about the content and the results speak for themselves.

I continued with Trevor mentioning some of the things I have said on this blog.  I love all the creative content online.  I don’t have to settle for McDonald-Land content on TV or other media sources.  I can go straight to the creatives and get the best stuff.  Sure some of it may be raw, it is often uncensored.  But that is the beauty of fresh original content.  You never know what you’re going to find.  And quite frankly, I’m adult enough to handle it.  Like yesterday, when I spent fifteen minutes on Youtube.  I learned Pole Dancing was a sport and there are some damn good competitors.  Will I ever see this on ESPN?  Not likely, though I suspect their ratings would go through the roof, at the obvious expense of an outcry from feminist groups.  Thus leading us right back to watered down unimaginative content.  Don’t get me wrong.  There’s a lot of crap on Youtube, but if you don’t find some amazing stuff on there, it’s because you’re not trying.

Youtube isn’t the only source of creative content.  With minimal effort you can find and invest yourself in one (or more) of hundreds if not thousands of online comics.  The boiled down stuff you get in the Sunday times are fine, but there is an online comic out the for everyone.  I probably shouldn’t waste my time mentioning, Schlock Mercenary, Ctrl+Alt+Del, and xkcd, but I will. Three of my personal favorites, which you’ll never find in a newspaper.

Pick just about any sort of creative content, and you’ll find it better/newer/fresher online. I don’t think anything I said will change Trevor’s mind about the online world, but I do feel he is missing out and I told him so.  We’ll probably both live for another thirty years, so I guess that is plenty of time to convince him that the internet has a lot more to offer than a few simple tools.

Jan 4 2012

15 Random Minutes on Youtube – Admire the Talent!

While on vacation a friend of mine told me to look up, “whole foods parking lot” on youtube.  The goal was to get me to watch a suburban rap song about the whole foods (super)market.

As an aside, I am a fan of rap music.  Mostly because I am in awe of the lyrical skills that are required to perform such an art.  You can quibble about whether or not rap is actually music.  You’re entitled to your opinion, but I hope you can appreciate the skill required to write such intriguing lyrics.  Alas, much of rap is meaningless chest thumping, which is why I’ve slowly been converting to the more clever suburban versions.  Here’s what my friend was telling me to check out:

Alas, once we all jump on youtube the alluring Gorgon’s song keeps us there for a few more minutes.  I have no idea why they decided I might be interested in such a video, but it appears they were right.  In the suggested viewing along the right side it seems I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to check out a video named, “man sticks his head up girls ass”.  I’d suggest you skip this one, but you probably don’t have any more will power than I.

Next in the intriguing youtube chain is “BEST POLE DANCE MOVE EVER”.  Being a guy I won’t even try to justify why I clicked on this video, but I was absolutely impressed!  The woman in this video has mad skills.

I’ve only ever been to a “gentleman’s club” once and that was with a friend who was performing an ASCAP investigation.  Yes, if you own an establishment that plays music, you should be paying ASCAP licensing fees.  If you’re not, my friend is the guy who comes to your place and discreetly takes notes so he can write the report that will be used against you in civil court.  Essentially, I was his cover.  I had to intercept the girls when they came to our table to try sell us their wares, I mean lap dances.  For the record, none were purchased.  The reason I’ve never gone to a gentleman’s club is because I don’t see the point in paying for nothing.  All legalities aside, why pay for pseudo-sex when you can just pay for sex?  Not that I’ve ever paid for sex either, I’m just sayin’.

Anyway, getting back to the talent on youtube, the next link that caught my eye, not surprisingly was the one entitled, “Mary Ashton – 2011 California Pole Dance Championship Contestant”.  I’m sure you’re thinking that everything a guy does on youtube devolves into some pornographic event.  That may be, but it’s not typically true for me.  What intrigued me about this link was the fact that there existed a pole dance championship.  I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised.  Pretty much anything that is talent oriented turns into a competition in one way or another.

If you actually took the three minutes to watch that video of Ms. Ashton, you couldn’t help but be impressed.  No joke!  She was amazing!  And somehow this skill is looked down upon because she is a full grown woman dancing around a pole, whereas a malformed fifteen year old gymnast is given a gold medal for less skill.  It’s a strange world we live in.