Go to hell, boys.

We saw Cars 3 over the weekend. The last two animated movies we saw were Leap! and Despicable Me 3, and I wanted to see one that didn't end with a dance fight.

Cars 3 was fine. There's always something to enjoy in a Pixar film, if nothing else the art. Cars 2 had wonderful ocean animation (notoriously hard to do) and breathtaking city scapes. Cars 3 had racetracks, including an old abandoned one, that looked so completely real it was almost a shock when talking cars with eyes rolled onto them.

I have some gripes that were shared by others. For one thing, the gang from Radiator Springs has virtually nothing to do in this movie, just enough to ensure sales of the toys continue. I don't think poor old Lizzie had a single line of dialogue.

Suffice it to say it's the story of an aging star athlete who has to face the end of his career; not usually the stuff of kids' movies. Then again, the end of a loving relationship was the heart of Toy Story 3, and I don't even want to talk about Up. Is Pixar making movies for old people or children?

There is a serious plot point I want to address here, though, but to do so I will first have to issue a

Okay, here we go.

Disney can be proud of itself, I suppose, that like other great organizations such as the Boy Scouts, they're able to tell boys, go cram it, kids, no one needs you.

The plot of the movie has Lightning McQueen being outraced by a new breed of racecar; to get back in shape following an accident and get in racing trim he gets trained by Cruz Ramirez, a female sports car who -- surprise! -- wanted to be a racer but lacked the confidence.

Because if there's one thing all personal trainers who work for billion-dollar training facilities have in common, it's lack of confidence.

In the end, Lightning pulls out of a big race in the middle and, with the most bizarre use of rules you will ever see in a movie, gets Cruz into the race wearing his number 95 to finish. She had not even run a time trial, had never been entered as a contender in this race or a competitor on the circuit.  Lightning hadn't even crashed at that point, he just gave up.

The precedent this sets is ridiculous. As this is allowed, it will mean that every race team from that point will have four or five spare cars ready to go with the same number, cars with secret technological edges. If a squad starts a guy and he's having a bad day, they can freely substitute other cars as desired under this rule. It was stone-cold stupid.

But, okay, fine. By sharing the win with Cruz, Lightning gets to keep racing if he wants to. He is also going to mentor her the way Doc Hudson mentored him (although he was already a star by the time he met Doc Hudson in the first picture). And now Cruz Ramirez is the star if the Cars world.

And what's your problem with that, you big sexist bastard? you may ask.

My problem isn't really about the setup. Auto racing is one of few sports where women and men are able to compete against one another. I think it's safe to say that Danica Patrick, going by her record, wouldn't be a big star if she looked like a horse's patootie instead of the assistant DA on a Dick Wolf show. Never mind; we can certainly suppose that a woman can and eventually will win the biggest races.

My problem is just that the Cars world had been particularly special to boys. Ten years ago or so when Disney had princesses out the bazooty but was unable to make a successful film for boys (Meet the Robinsons: too creepy, Mars Needs Moms: don't ask), they had Cars. Whenever you saw Princess-themed Disney stuff, you saw Cars-themed Disney stuff too. They might as well have written "For Boys" on the Cars toothpaste, sheets, PJs, and so on. And now they've turned the wheel over to a female character.

It doesn't stop there, of course. They bought the Star Wars universe so that they'd have something boys would want to see -- and turned that over to a female character, too.

If they'd gotten involved with Marvel ten years later than they did, the first joint picture wouldn't have been Iron Man, it would have been Black Widow or Girl Thor or something.

And there's no reciprocity on this. In the girls' movies Disney has been making, men are shrinking to insignificance. Let's put 2010's Tangled and its Flynn Rider aside as an outlier (Disney was desperate to get boys to like the movie, which is why the title was changed from Rapunzel). In The Princess and the Frog, the prince is a numbskull; Ray the firefly is more useful and he's a comic-relief bug. All the men in Brave are total idiots. The two young dudes in Frozen are a two-faced usurper and a ludicrous nonentity. And in Mary Sue -- sorry, Moana -- the male lead is a god and still plays second fiddle to the spunky kid who is always right.

Non-Disney properties like Harry Potter and sort-of Disney property Percy Jackson do star boys, but make it painfully clear that their female friends (Hermoine, Annabeth) are the real brains of the operation. Annabeth insults Percy regularly in a way that would get a boy thrown out of school if he did that to a girl -- and the school would be right to do so.

The point is, by wanting to be progressive, Disney is stomping on the audience they were targeting in the first place. It's exactly what's been happening in Marvel comics: as Instapundit says, Get Woke, Go Broke. But Disney's properties have a lot of ruin in them; they can insult and ignore boys for decades without seeing a direct line to loss of revenue, and even then they'd probably still keep at it. Toxic masculinity is the crisis of the day to the intelligentsia. A woman I used to respect reposted this last week:

Now that's inclusivity -- she includes her beloved dad, the man she married, her male friends; all of us think a man who rapes is better than a woman who has sex. Every goddamn one of us. Because now it's fine to stereotype and stuff.

And this is why it's okay when boys are informed that they are nothing special, that girls are really better, just as they are being told in schools. When they let girls into the Boy Scouts last fall, I said that boys had nothing left they could call their own; everything had been taken from them. Now I see that Cars has been taken too.

I suggest rather that boys need good, manly role models; the Harvey Weinsteins of the world are not men of honor and dignity. But our broken families and our sick culture are incapable of doing this. It's a mystery to many why boys are failing to launch, not marrying, not becoming fathers, and adapting to life as losers -- except to Dr. Helen Smith, who explained in Men on Strike that this is a logical response to being shamed, overlooked, neglected.

The more militant may say Good, it's time the men got a taste of their own medicine. Well, these are their own sons, boys who came into the world not having subjugated anything, the boys who are supposed to be role models for the generation after them. Do they really think this is going to work out for society in the long run?

As Lewis wrote, "We make men without chests and expect from them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst." Get ready for more.

It's the real thing?

Diet Coke is now available in some perverse flavors. I was initially alerted to this alarming state of affairs in an article by the Great Lileks. Plain non-Zero Diet Coke had been available in regular and Lime, I think; now it comes in regular, Ginger Lime, Twisted Mango, Feisty Cherry, and Zesty Blood Orange. As Lileks noted on his own site, "it’s not often you get a chance to drink something that has 'Zesty Blood' in its name."

The Diet Coke website page about this flavor change reads like something a Baby Boomer wrote to try to appeal to those kids today. Makes you cringe a little. "Because cherries aren't so innocent." "Because road trips." "Because it's fizzing delicious." Because please stop.

Despite that, when I saw a stack of the new Diet Coke 12-packs in the store, I got a couple of them.

So, was the Blood Orange zesty? Did the Ginger and the Lime play well together?

First, the can.

Coca-Cola decided that part of their hipness would be reflected in the taller, narrower can. For the most part it functions adequately; the drink stays inside where it belongs, and when you want it to emerge, it does so in the usual manner. Great. Here's the problem -- the can is 6 1/8 inches tall and 7 1/4 inches in circumference (by my reckoning), as opposed to the industry-standard 4 7/8 inches tall and 8 5/16 inches circumference, used by all other canned sodas and most cheap beer. Can insulators, lunch totes, and the rack in my new fridge are all designed for the standard can, not this new thin can that looks down its aluminum nose as its squat brethren.

Falls right through.

It's a pain in the rear end, in other words. Good job there, Coke.

Okay, but we can overlook such inconveniences for mind-bending soda flavor.

Except that my mind remained unbent. The Zesty Blood Orange reminds us of why no one ever asked for an orange wedge with a Diet Coke. Unlike lemon, orange doesn't quite fit with Diet Coke. It's weird, and yet dull, like translating Lovecraft into binary code. As for the blood, it's got a bitter taste, which says Zest to me more than Blood Orange. It's not horrible, but it isn't appealing. It's hard to believe anyone at Coke Labs tasted this and said, "By George, I think we've got it!"

And the Ginger Lime is okay, but let me fix that: Ginger Lime. There. Because you can't taste any ginger in it at all. Because it tastes like the same Diet Coke Lime that they've been making since 2004. I don't think anyone could tell the difference in a blind taste test. There's no discernible ginger in there.

I guess I'll try the Cherry and Mango too, but my hopes have been dashed on the rocks of diet soda limitations now. I guess I'm curious about why the cherry is supposed to be so feisty. I can't imagine what could make a mango twisted. A bad childhood?

Maybe Coke will get lucky and Millennials will fall for this nonsense. I don't know. The thin can might make them feel taller and thinner when they drink it. That might help.

Fat.

It's been thirty years since Weird Al Yankovic released Even Worse, the album best known for its parody of Michael Jackson's song "Bad." And say what you want about Michael Jackson, he was comfortable enough to allow Al to do parodies of his songs, unlike Prince and George Michael, who refused. Jackson was a big fan of Al's. He may have also wanted the money that came from a hit parody royalties; Purina Giraffe Chow can run up quite the grocery bill, you know.

When you admire the work of a musician or band, you always tend to prefer the stuff that gets less airplay. You'll have heard the hits ten thousand times; your interest lies in the B-sides, the instrumental fillers, the stuff that never gets on the radio or in the supermarket. "Sure, 'I'm Too Sexy' is a great song," you'll say, with a little scoff insinuated, "but to get the real measure of Right Said Fred, you need to listen to their rendition of 'Cherry Cherry' or 'Fräulein Wunderbar.'" And then you wonder why you don't have any friends.

On that note, I've always preferred Al's original songs to his parodies. "The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota," "Generic Blues," "One More Minute," "Nature Trail to Hell," and what should have charted as a country song, "Good Enough for Now," are among his many excellent songs. And I'd like to thank Basil of IMAO for reminding me of the James Tayloresque "You Don't Love Me Anymore," which, as the penultimate song on the album Off the Deep End, sets up a practical joke that totally got me.

Today, though, I'd like to mention "Fat," the big hit off the Even Worse album and a takeoff of Jackson's "Bad." Yep, this is the one with the fat suit video, where Al became Fat Alfred. Apparently it's tricky to dance in one of those things: "I would turn and the suit would turn like a half-second later," he said.

While the video is terrific, I always admired the way Al put this song together. The lyrics are outstanding in that they use a ton of fat jokes, some I didn't even know, and as a Family Size kid I knew a lot of them. By my count, in a song just over three and half minutes (with Jacksonian repeats and dance breaks) there are 16 fat zingers, not counting little bits of side business like "Ham on, ham on, ham on whole wheat, all right..."

You've got some fat classics there, like: "When I sit around the house, I really sit around the house" and "all by myself I'm a crowd" and "Down at the beach... I'm the only one who gets a tan." And there are less famous ones, like "My shadow weighs forty-two pounds" and "When you're only havin' seconds, I'm have twenty-thirds."

And then you have improved versions of classics. "Got more chins than a Chinese phone book" is made into the slicker (and rhymier) "The pavement cracks when I fall down / I've got more chins than Chinatown." "Too fat to see his feet" is not much of a joke, but "When I go to get my shoes shined I gotta take their word" is, and it rhymes with the previous line.

It's not as easy as it seems to write words to a melody that have proper rhythm, length, and emphasis. Lyricists are often dismissed as the "words guys," a practice that goes back at least to the opera, where the jamoke who writes the book is nobody while the man who composes the music is a titan. But it's hard to make words scan right to someone else's melody, and to do it while cramming in every joke you can is an achievement.

The best thing about it is that by using the same brag approach as Jackson's "Bad," it's the singer who is obese, and he's proud of it. "My zippers bust, my buckles break, I'm too much man for you to take"; "the whole world knows I'm fat and I'm proud, just tell me once again who's fat." If the song had been outwardly directed, ragging on someone for being obese, it would have been cruel.

So we salute Al today for the thirtieth anniversary of one of his greatest parodies. Personally, as a writer and editor, my all-time favorite Al parody has to be "Word Crimes" (awesome video below), but that's another story.

My ancestry.

Every now and then I see these ads for Ancestry.com, and I think, You know, maybe I should look into this. Like so many of us in America, my knowledge of the family stops at the water's edge. Sometimes I wonder who were the nameless ancestors who fought and struggled and survived illnesses and famines and resisted the temptation to take an oath of celibacy down through the centuries, ultimately producing your correspondent—ta da!—dazzling suburbanite.

Damn, I hope the Chinese are wrong and our ancestors aren't always watching us. If that's the case, boy, when I go, am I going to get it.

Most of my relatives have gone to their reward, and I think they suffered enough in life without me describing them now. So I think that rather than pay for a report on my gnarled and twisted family tree--the saps, the buds, the nuts--I'll just throw together some ancestors of my own. This list original appeared in installments on the old, defunct blog, but you can have it today only as a complete set for the one low price of free! Plus $76.99 shipping and handling.

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Harald "The Blue" Kjey (955-1000): Nicknamed for his inability to tolerate cold weather, this notorious Norske Viking kept raiding farther and farther south until he raided Antarctica, then had to start raiding north again, finally settling on raiding Portugal. Joined a millennial cult in A.D. 999 and prepared for the end of the world the following year. The world did end—for him—in 1000 when he attempted to invent longboat water-skiing using a cyclone to generate adequate speed.

Han Ki Pan Ki (d. 1367): Founder of the Ki Dynasty, which lasted from Tuesday, June 16, 1367, to Friday, June 26, 1367. Contemporary reports say this was a period of tumult in Nanjing, and Ki popped up one day when no one was looking and declared himself emperor. When this was discovered ten days later, Ki was put to the sword and the dynasty came to a tragic end.

Staunton Forbush Key (d. 1621): Passenger on the Juneflower, the little-remembered sister ship of the Mayflower, which got breathtakingly lost and ran aground off the coast of Jakarta. Staunton was last seen trying to bail out the ship with his "Big-Afs Hat" as she went down.

William "Orangebeard" Key (1662-1710): Notorious pirate of the Spanish Main, Orangebeard was best known for claiming to have captured and sunk an aircraft carrier in 1703. Historians find this difficult to believe, since it's unlikely his small fleet of sloops and caravels could perform such a feat, and since the first aircraft carrier would not be built for another two hundred and fifteen years. Orangebeard was hanged by his own crew when, deranged by scruvy, they mistook him for a piñata.

Florencia Boyardee Kia (1471-1509): Illegitimate daughter of Philippe Muscatell, Florencia was part of the Valencian Muscatell family, a Renaissance family known for its wickedness, political machinations, and devotion to the art of poisoning enemies. People seldom came over for dinner. The Muscatells were not powerful, but they were plucky. They tried harder. Despite their failure to climb in the world, they still racked up an impressive body count, as well as forced annulments, severed body parts, and grouchy attitudes. Florencia was a particularly enthusiastic participant. She was known as the Praying Mantis, partly for her mock piety, partly for biting the heads off her lovers. She was known to go about dressed as a Ragazza Esploratore, selling poisoned Ragazza Esploratore cookies, just for the hell of it. Florencia died when a piano was dropped on her by her third husband, Tango Cashe, who had just barely survived a terrible case of lead poisoning--some unknown figure had replaced his potato chips with paint chips.

Sgt. Henry "Hack" Key (1875-1917): Hero of the First World War. Hack told people he got his nickname from his artistry with the bayonet; in fact, he was a terrible golfer. Hack was very popular in the trenches, having taught his body lice various circus tricks to pass the time. Hack became a legend when, under heavy artillery fire, he saw an opportunity to charge across No Man's Land with his small group and plunge into the enemy trench. Unfortunately he was deceived, and what he thought was an unguarded trench was actually an open sewer, left incomplete when the French sewer engineers went on strike against Pierre François de la Brioche in 1902. Hack and his men were swept out to sea in a wave of effluence, never to be seen again.

Qetxztklsxeklskeezixskwelkszzqkkrzzzkltmyxzptlkzq “Sid” Key (c. 1312-1376): Aztec (possibly Mayan) priest. Sid got around. He was a freelancer, specializing in cutting out the hearts of sacrificial victims. Sid carried a valise with his knives from place to place, and could often be seen sharpening them on his days off. Sid claimed to be able to whack out a heart so neatly and quickly that the victim could go about his business for a day and a half before keeling over. Sid was well respected down at the Sacrificers' Hall, and was a champion Scrabble player, too.

Creon Acidophilus Key (1860-1936): Robber baron who had the temerity to invent something people wanted--an effective laundry soap--and had the revolting audacity to make money selling it. Creon went to Wall Street, using his business acumen to make more money. He also made powerful friends, who used to all hang around together at the Powerful Friends Club, where they could smoke cigars and chortle. Creon's money survived various crashes and panics, including the 1929 crash; it could not survive Lili Svordehagen, the lovely blond singer known as the Swedish Woodpecker; they married in 1901 and Lili set to spending Creon's money as fast and hard as was humanly possible. Creon died in 1936, but his money held out until 1938.

Sir Charles Merriwether Keye (1520-1600): Bold and mighty soldier from Squibbley-on-Ribble, Charles is best remembered for having raised a crew of bold and mighty fighting men to go to France and fight the Hundred Years' War. Unfortunately for Charles, it had been over for a hundred years by that time. News did not travel swiftly in Squibbley. Still, he and his gang took in the sights and had a lovely time, sent postcards back home, and set up a shop called "Chuckie's," selling blood pudding and raspberry fool and such to English ex-pats in Nantes.

Al-Halamabra Eid Al-Key (1002?-1050? maybe?): Arabic scholar who became convinced that the genie of the story "Aladdin's Wonderful Lamp" was real, and secured commissions to go looking for it. Over time, as his expeditions continued to bear no fruit, he became more desperate and would bring in other things he had found, hoping to mollify his patrons so they would keep funding him ("Look! The mystic coconut!"). Was ultimately arrested in the Baghdad bazaar on charges of rubbing things in public without a permit.

Don Key Jotee (1511-1592): Small-time Spanish nobleman; distant cousin of Sir Charles Keye, and just as unwilling to look at the calendar. Said to be the inspiration for Cervantes's famous delusional knight, Jotee in his dotage came to believe it was the tenth century and he was an adventurous knight in the age of chivalry. He took to riding around Spain with his faithful sidekick Pancho Sanza, attacking goats and chickens and trying to rescue people who were not in need of rescuing. Jotee was killed in his 81st year when the windmill he was trying to joust caught his cape in its swirling blade and swept him from his llama, hurling him a hundred yards to a croquet green. Pancho filled in the hole and went to find another line of work.

Matilda Maria Barilla Rodriga Vanozza Espinoza y Varga y Sangria y Eee Key Jotee Jones (1539-1571): Beloved daughter of Don Key Jotee, whose sad demise at the age of 32 is said to have begin her father's long descent into lunacy. Riding with her retainers one day at a good gallop, she was too close to a steep cliff; they tried to call to her: "Look out for the cliff, Matilda Maria Barilla Rodriga Vanozza" but had barely gotten to the "Varga" when she went over the side.

Baron Kärll Freidriche vön Hämmerschlaw der Umlaut-Këy (1658–1723): Known to his countrymen as the Iron Baron (and to those outside his country as the Cranky Kraut), Baron Umlaut-Këy ruled his barony with an iron fist. No one knows whose fist it was, but the baron had it coated in iron and would whomp peasants with it if he felt they were not showing the proper feudal spirit. But the baron was not without his civilized side; he was a great proponent of universal literacy, as he wanted those "gottverlassenen Bauern" to be able to read his many orders. He spent large amounts of money making moveable-type printing presses available, but to his everlasting sorrow they kept losing the ë. Not to mention the ä, ö, and even the Å. Although not remembered fondly by his peasants, the Iron Baron did inspire a generation of heavy metal band names.

Infected Owl Kidney Ckey (1581–1644): A native of the Manhasset tribe, Infected Owl Kidney was adopted into the Ckey family by Dutch settlers trying to start the first shopping mall in the New World. Infected Owl Kidney was pleased to find a new home, having left the Manhassets in a huff--a "huff" being a small Manhasset conveyance drawn by a dozen trained raccoons. As Infected Owl Kidney told his new Dutch friends, "At least when your kids have an embarrassing incident they don't wind up with it as their name." Infected Owl Kidney never explained that, but did insist that the Dutch refer to him simply as "Dave." "Dave" helped the Dutch set up their shopping mall, but unfortunately the Manhassets wiped out the whole thing when they discovered there would be no
Arthur Treacher's Fish & Chips in the food court.

Shamus "Smilin' Shame" O'Key (1850–1886): The charmingest rogue in Killarney, Smilin' Shame O'Key was also a notorious confidence man. On at least seven occasions he sold St. Mary's Cathedral to gullible Protestants by saying, "Oooh, 'tis no secret 'round here that this town be turnin' Lut'eran any day noo." Other things "sold" by O'Key included several Trinity College buildings, the Blarney Stone, St. Patrick's crook, the skull of Brian Bóruma mac Cennétig, O'Neill's banner from the Battle of Farsetmore, the skin of "Old Slimey, Last Snake in Eire," Allihies' engine house, and the town of Cloughduv. In 1886 he attempted to sell a small skull of Brian Bóruma mac Cennétig to a traveler from Scotland, who told him, "Och, ye fiend, ye sold me that last year, 'n it was bigger'n that anyway!" To which Smilin' Shame replied, "Ah, well, ye see, this one is the skull of Brian Bóruma mac Cennétig when he was a lad." At which time the Scotsman, having heard that old joke before, promptly kilt him.

Barbara Hollinger (née Keystowycz) (1918–1962): Barbara Keystowycz changed her last name to Hollinger when she was nineteen and hitched a ride to Hollywood, chasing a celluloid dream. She intended to become a great star of the screen, of course, and to that end hung around every soda fountain in town waiting to be discovered. Much to her surprise, she remained solidly undiscovered. Barbara had been the best-looking gal in Busted Pump, Oklahoma, which is like being the tallest of Snow White's dwarfs. She had the face of a horse, frankly, and some other equine parts as well. Fortunately, it turned out she had a real talent for working soda fountains, and made a good living dispensing soft drinks to undiscriminating G.I.s on their way out to or back from the Pacific Theater. At least that's what they were told in Busted Pump, and if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for you. After the war she became a traveling saleslady for a plastic novelties corporation. Sadly, Barbara came to an early end while driving east along Route 66 in her Impala. The coroner's ruling was "Death from overdose of kicks."

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He's not alone.

Thijs was very disappointed that, before the new year was even a month old, his resolution had failed. 

Notables were "Litter Block Five" and "Prison Tails."

Although still remembered fondly by some fans, so-called Kittens in Prison movies never
had the kind of following that other "exploitation" films enjoy. 

Bright, sunshiny friggin' day.

Blarg.

Pardon me if I growl and spit.

Growl. Spit.

Thanks.

Sorry, but Wednesday was a beautiful sunny day and it kind of sucked. It sucked for various reasons, some mildly bad, some more bad; none awful, but all sucky. With your patience I shall briefly describe the reasons, in no particular order, in sections I shall label Trash, Blood, Dog, Envy, and Elvis.

TRASH
Yesterday was recycling day, which means bottles and cans and paper -- all things that are reusable and lightweight. Last Wednesday it snowed; no pickup. The two Wednesdays before that it was windy, and my crap blew all over the street and I had to go chase after it. Trash can blew over, cans and stuff everywhere. The week before that, same thing. Yesterday there was no snow, so of course there was wind, because it's winter and everything sucks. But I said Aha! I said. I will use my heavy trash can, the mighty can that I use for trash instead of the lightweight one I use for recycling. Contamination be damned! So later I was working in my office upstairs when I heard the thump outside... of the heavy can blowing over and my crap blowing all over the street. Which I had to chase after.

BLOOD
I had a bad experience over the weekend at a blood drive. I don't want to get into it here, as I filed a complaint and am expecting to hear back, but I thought I was treated pretty roughly for a guy who has been a steady donor for a long time and have previously endured poor treatment with little complaint. I've sat outside in the rain because the Bloodmobile had no room and no one thought to bring an extra tent for the people waiting; I've had phlebotomists so concerned with where they were going to drink after their shift that they lost track of me and my draw stopped after half a pint and they had to throw it out (after I'd been lying there quite some time in pain, and for nothing); I've started a drive and I've given at drives and I've invited friends to give blood with me and I've even subjected readers of this blog to entreaties to give, and I've never gotten any reward more than one coffee cup, one plastic bottle, and a bunch of Oreos. But I will not be treated like cattle. (These examples, by the way, are all about the New York Blood Center; I've also given through the Red Cross too and they've never been anything but nice.)

DOG
Once again, Tralfaz the big dog cannot sleep through the night, and wants to go pee at two or three in the morning. He is four years old; he is too young for Depends and too old for Pampers. The vet thought it was anxiety, and wanted us to dope him up, but we have been reluctant to do so. So one of us, often me, has been taking him out when all the world's asleep. Broken sleep is among the things for which I too have gotten too old. We're trying different things, but nothing has helped and so there's no end in sight.

ENVY
I was working on a book written by a guy who has become a millionaire cranking out volumes in a popular series. I think they're cute, but formulaic, and I've seen the quality plummet and the political correctness rise as his books go on. But what really bugs me is that he is so goddamn rich and popular now that he can put out garbage like this last book, which really was lousy, and he and the publisher know it will sell like crazy. And I imagine it must make other writers of quality fiction, writers who have slaved away in obscurity for years, sink into an impenetrable morass of envy, sin, and loathing. Not that I know anyone like that.

ELVIS
I had one of my all-time favorite sandwiches for lunch Wednesday, the peanut butter and banana sandwich. That would refresh the day! I always think of Elvis when I have one, although he liked his with bacon, too. Lately, though, I find that PBB causes me indigestion. (TMI follows!) Maybe the binding quality of the banana is duking it out with the laxative quality of the peanut butter, a free-for-all in my GI tract. It makes me wonder how Elvis ate the stuff he did. Then I remember that when Elvis was my age, he was dead. So that doesn't make me feel much better. As Lewis Grizzard once noted, Elvis Is Dead and I Don't Feel So Good Myself. And guess what? When Lew was my age he was dead, too.

While there were genuine reasons for my discontent, or at least proper targets, I know the bulk of my problems remains between my ears, not in my gut or anywhere else. If my character flaws were not running rampant, half these things wouldn't bother me. Sometimes I have a very hard time with gratitude. Sometimes I just can't let go of things.

Sometimes the best thing I can do is look at the nightstand clock and say, well, at least I didn't die or kill anyone today.

Return of the superpants.

A year and a half ago I wrote a very thoughtful, thoroughly researched blog entry about Superman's pants. In it (if you don't want to experience the magic yourself) I wrote that while for decades Superman had the circus-athlete-type tights outside his pants, in recent years and in recent films the tights have gone away. "On the one hand, it's fun to change the look of a well-known character, to help keep it fresh. On the other hand, it's a well-known, trademarked character. You can't dump on success."

The gang at DC Comics has either been moved by my entry -- or not, since I didn't do too much to defend the tighty reddies -- or just decided to go with Supes Classic, because the tights are back. "The Red Trunks Return" DC trumpets, in the one thousandth issue of Action Comics.

Hooray, Superpants!

Artist Jim Lee says, “There’s no better way to celebrate Superman’s enduring popularity than to give him a look that combines some new accents with the most iconic feature of his classic design.” So, there you go.

A curious thing about those trunks I didn't know until recently: There was a rumor that a lawsuit between DC and the estate of Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel caused the trunks to disappear. In brief (har!), DC's argument with the estate was that continued royalties did not apply since Superman was an evolving character and in effect not the same one artist Siegel had originally drawn -- and to prove it, they dropped his pants. (So to speak.)

I don't quite believe it myself. I think Occam's razor applies here; the simpler answer is that DC originally got rid of the tights because they had long been a source of jokes about superheroes, especially Superman, and they wanted to make Superman cool for an older comics audience. For the most part the costume didn't change -- you'd still know who it was -- but it was different in a more adult way.

Then again, we're still talking about a universe where grown men run about and stand around in spandex and masks, and are taken seriously.

That aside, the question on everyone's mind must be: Will trunks make a return? Probably not to their former widespread glory. Even in the 1940s, other prominent heroes like Green Lantern, Captain Marvel, and the Flash just had pants. (In those days, Wonder Woman wore a short skirt.) Batman had the tights, of course; even when Neal Adams did his famous run on Batman in the late 1960s and into the 1970s, bringing him back to his pre-Robin dark avenger days, he had 'em.

But I suspect, being the coolest hero of all, Batman will continue to wear a lot of black as he has done in recent years, eschewing the blue and gray, and skip the trunks. Besides, as he has not the benefit of superspeed, Bruce Wayne must like being able to change into uniform more quickly without that extra layer.

I'm always a fan of the classics, personally, and so I salute the superpants' return. The Superman costume always looks better with the extra splash of red. Keep 'em flying, boys!

And congratulations to Superman's Action Comics, continually running since 1938. Most periodicals that were running when those tights first appeared have gone to the great publishing morgue in the sky.

Muddy for nothin'.

You can't tell me dogs have no sense of humor.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. 

Snow, like a lot of things -- TV series, workplace love affairs, comments threads, all-you-can-eat Buffalo wing night -- may start off delightful and end up disgusting. Here was the backyard situation yesterday morning:

What you see is muddy turf with patches of snow and ice. Most of the snow melted in the warm weather this weekend, but the areas that had been pressed down by feet (human, canine, or other) had turned into ice slicks, upon which my boots could find no purchase. When I took little Nipper dog out back to play, I knew was going to wind up looking at the sky, with muddy pants, if I was not careful.

Now, about those funny dogs of mine.

I knew older dog Tralfaz could pull jokes when one night I sent him off the porch to go pee and he paused, then immediately bolted around the back of the house. I followed, afraid he'd caught the scent of a skunk or something, calling his name. By the time I got to the backyard he had completely disappeared. Fearing he'd run into the woods, I walked around calling him for a while -- only to find him later grinning on the porch, where he'd gone after running around the house. I could almost hear a Scooby snicker.

He's tried that since but now I'm onto him.

In the yard yesterday, when it was time to put on Nipper's leash and bring him in, Nipper decided to bite the leash and try to pull away. I managed to plant my feet firmly in all that muck, refusing to let him get free. This is how it played out.

The thing is, he never lets go. When you play tug with him, you may distract him to get him to let go, or you may win the fight and pull the toy free, but he never just lets go. Yesterday he let go. I hit the mud hard.

You can't tell me dogs don't have a sense of humor, and a good one. Our nearest relatives may be primates like chimpanzees, but their idea of a good joke is to throw fecal matter. Dogs can do better pranks than that.

As I think about it, though, it occurs to me that comments threads may indeed be proof that chimps are our closest relatives.

Perspective.

The Big Peep.

Casual readers of this site who happen upon days when I write about Just Born's famous Peeps may think I am obsessed with their marshmallow goodness, but I maintain that is not the case. I just like to keep up with what they're doing. In a world of Hersheys and M&M Marses, it's nice to shine some light on the little guys.

Snappy duds. 

I like the fact that they're always trying something new, those plucky R&D guys at the Peepsery. It may be the Dunkin' Donuts Peep doughnuts of some springtimes past, or Oreo Peep hybrid that supposedly turned your poop pink, or the Peeps Minis that were meant to be the non-seasonal anytime treat (and failed); the Just Born guys cheer the successes, shake off the disappointments, roll up their sleeves, and get back to it.

During the Christmas season we were introduced to Peeps Delights, although I didn't find them until I was looking for cut-price post-holiday wrapping paper.

The theme of the Delights is: Peep dipped in stuff. While the new Delights come in such flavors as Orange dipped in orange fudge and Coconut in dark chocolate, the ones I got were Sugar Cookie in white fudge and Cinnamon Roll in cinnamon fudge. I definitely see the holiday connection with Sugar Cookie; Cinnamon Roll seems like an anytime thing to me.

We submitted these to our taste tester (me). And the verdict?

Depends on the Delight.

I thought the Sugar Cookie was one was very nice; the marshmallow was light on sugar cookie flavor but the white fudge base more than compensated for it. That Peep would be welcome in any season.

The Cinnamon Roll, though, was not too pleasant, the cinnamon taste having an artificial tang and being a poor match with the marshmallow and with the icing. Since more Latin immigrants have entered the U.S. our food companies have been trying to cinnamonize all sorts of products, with mixed results. This, to my taste buds, is unsuccessful.

But keep at it, Peep scientists! Other awesome sounding wintery flavors of Delights included Hot Chocolate and Caramel. I see on the Peep site that a Strawberry Delight is coming for Valentine's Day; Chocolate Mousse and Blueberry are in the offing as well. Surely you'll strike gold with this line -- if we can all just give Peeps a chance.

Oops.

"I hate to say it, guys, but I'm getting the feeling that we missed Thanksgiving."

15 lightbulb jokes.

How many copy editors does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Merriam-Webster's Eleventh Collegiate print edition has "lightbulb" as one word, but the Web site now prefers it as two, as was the case in the past, so our use should depend on house style, which is a decision for the editorial director....

How many surrealists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Potato.

How many dentists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Just one, and it won't hurt a bit...

How many IRS auditors does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
None, as long as the lightbulb is a Democrat.

How many contractors does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
At least five, on accounta this here wiring isn't up to code, gonna have to pull out everything, take out the wall, prolly run you one or two grand, unless we find asbestos or anything, but shouldn't take more'n five or six months, now if there's water damage back there it could be another grand easy but too soon to tell...

How many stoners does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Dude, have you ever wondered... is a busted lightbulb really a "light" bulb anymore? Isn't it, like, a "dark" bulb?

How many llamas does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Two, if they're really tiny. Look, you knew that joke was going to pop up here somewhere; why not llamas?

How many liberal arts PhDs does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
The so-called "lightbulb" is a white power construct that reinforces whiteness in the public sphere, elbowing out colors considered "dark" or "dusky." Those invested in the white male power structure demand the outlay of money for this whiteness, knowing that dark is free to all, at night. Requiring others to "buy in" by "buying light" is forcing acceptance of the paradigm of white power in a male-dominated zeitgeist. 

How many cats does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
We can watch you in the dark...

How many vegans does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Did I mention that I'm a vegan?

How many aliens does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
One: the bulb acts as the probe.

How many Buddhists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
One... with everything.

How many celebrities does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Don't we have people for that?

How many writers of girls' books does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Hey, baes, no big, know what I'm sayin'? Any sista can do what any mista can do and better, amirite? Half a grrrrl is all it'd take, hear me? Take about fiddeeen to a buttload of boys to do what half a fearless femme can do, yknow? 

How many taxpayers does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Any one of them will do; he just holds it in place while the government screws him. 

As the bed is, so the head is.

An acquaintance of mine who lived in some dire circumstances in her youth always makes her bed right upon rising. It's in part an act of gratitude for having a bed of her own, something that was not always the case. Also, she tells people, "As the bed is, so the head is," meaning that there is a direct connection to one's daily mental state and starting the day with an act of ordering chaos, knowing that the properly composed bed awaits upon completion of the day.

Uh-oh.

By nature I'm a slob, and if left to my own devices the bed would look like Oscar Madison's all the time.

How did he ever lure a date from his little black book to his room with a bed like that? He must have just gone to her place instead.

Never mind him; I am a slob about the bed, but my wife isn't -- or wasn't. She always insisted on making the bed right away. Once we got Dog 1, things changed. Now we had a critter who had to go potty NOW, especially when we got him as a little pup, and there was no time to waste on neatness. So, the bed would usually get made... at bedtime. It only got worse when Dog 2 joined the pack.

This stuff plays on my mind sometimes.

A few days ago I was looking in the mirror and saw a face that was not my own looking back. In this dream I was a different person, a bit younger and in good shape, and I and my surroundings were completely pin-neat. I'm sure this comes from reading too many comic books in my youth: I somehow realized that I had switched bodies with some other guy and in time it would be rectified. That made me a little sad, because this person clearly was much more together in every way than I, the slob, am. But what made me sadder is that I realized that in time my old habits, my way of thinking, would ruin this body as well, putting on weight, biting the nails, dressing in sweats all day when possible instead of the neat suit I had on.

After I woke up I considered that maybe the "my body is a temple" people had something. If I treated myself the way I would a borrowed car, I might take better care of myself. And that goes for my surroundings. I wouldn't leave books all over the place if I were staying at someone else's home. And I would definitely make sure the bed was made in the morning.

But, in the end, my habits are mine, and are thoroughly ingrained, and no matter where you go, there you are. I've turned over new leaves before, and next thing you know they had turned themselves back. I've tried to run away from me sometimes, but I always took me with me. So I can't say my dream got me to change the bad habits of a lifetime.

I will say that as I write this, the bed is made, and I did it myself! And that's all because I'm writing this, and I was darned if I would do it while the bed was mocking me with its hollow beddy laughter. So for today, the bed is neat, and I hope the head is too.

And if not, I guess I can blame the dogs for that as well.

Mega billions!

I'll give you four reasons why Jeff Bezos is the richest man in history.

1) He not only saw a need that could be fulfilled on this new Internet thingie, but he did it well.

Henry Ford didn't invent the automobile, but his assembly line model of auto construction changed not only the car industry but the industry itself. Likewise, Bezos didn't invent Internet shopping, didn't even try to jump into a pricey end of the market (books? books have terrible profit margins and most inventory doesn't make much money at all, if any), but his method of order and delivery was revolutionary. It has remained the best in the business. Has Amazon ever suffered a major data hack? When was the last time they had an issue with fulfillment? What new product can you not find at or through Amazon that you can find elsewhere? (Not many, I am certain. Okay, no cars yet, but give it time.)

2) He thought big.

I thought Amazon was crazy for branching out from their bookish roots into toys and things. I would have been thrilled just to have the world's biggest online bookstore. I think small. He was thinking big from the get-go.

Now, that said, I must add that I think that he really should do more to promote my books. You know, help a brother out.

3) He has what you want (besides cars).

Larry Miller says that "You can get anything you want, anything in the world you want, from Amazon, except an actual amazon."

This kind.

Bezos made deals with all those little e-tailers whose sites were overlooked but who had things Amazon didn't want to bother stocking. You need part #A82981UU901 for your vacuum cleaner? If you go to Amazon, where they already have your credit and shipping information, you can order it in a blink. It will come from Big Red Bob's House O' Widgets in Tuscaloosa. You get your part, Big Red Bob sells it to you, and Amazon gets a cut, and that's fine -- it's a win-win-win.

But never mind stuff like that; what about everyday stuff that you want? Stuff like this?

My wife is a fan of the Centrum VitaMints multivitamin in Wintergreen flavor. Really, she'd play them if there was Vitamin Strat-O-matic. The product still exists as of this writing, but no local retailers have it. I've been to two grocery stores, a major drugstore, Walmart, and Target, and I can't find it anymore. They only carry the Cool Mint flavor. (Which comes from the Coolius spicata plant in the Mint family.) Amazon? No problem. Bought four bottles, got free shipping. Amazon makes it easy.

4) He's not nuts.

Despite the snide fictional billionaire name I used in my blog the other day, Bezos doesn't seem to be crazy. Yes, he's wealthy enough to offer you $50 million to shoot your friend on his secret private island (and if you've ever been shot on the secret private island, you know how much that hurts). But he wouldn't. The craziest thing he's done is buy the Washington Post. And he's bald as a bowling ball and hasn't gone all weird about it, like getting a freaky toupee or hair implants. As a man whose hair is always heading for the doors, I admire that. (To me, the most cutting remark Bush made about Gore during the 2000 campaign was an offhand comment: "The man dyes his hair. What does that tell you about him? He doesn't know who he is.")

So I don't think Bezos will turn up in a Girl with a Dragon Tattoo type situation where he's playing the Most Dangerous Game, bow-hunting blond cheerleaders on his secret private island. I really don't get that vibe from him.

He's been at it so long by now that I think if he were a wacko, there's be a lot of stories around, like there were about Steve Jobs. And being crazy is not usually good for your business, not even in a field that loves eccentricity.

💻

Now, many of my friends, mostly on the left but not all, think that Bezos doesn't deserve all that money. I agree that no one deserves that kind of money, not even if they saved the planet from Martians. So what? No one deserves most of the horrible diseases; no kid deserves cancer. It's fun to call for the guillotine, but life's not fair and we know it. I'm sure Bezos does a lot of things with his dough I would find commendable, and many that would make me sore. So what?

One day, Jeff Bezos will die, and like all of us, I believe he will have to answer for his sins. Like other Silicon Valley types he may think he can cheat the Reaper by uploading his consciousness as software, maybe to Alexa's central system. It looks unlikely. The best he probably can do is create a machine that acts as if it thinks it is Jeff Bezos, and I don't see any good coming from that for any of us. He'll still be kaput.

So anyway, rich or poor, we all have to go to the weigh station eventually. St. Peter may ask why he didn't do more good with his money. If he stomped on little guys for the fun of it, or abused employees to squeeze an extra personal million out of them, that'll be a big problem. If there is testimony from the ghosts of blond cheerleaders with arrows stuck to them, the chute to the incinerator is waiting. And if Bezos is asked why he didn't do more to promote my books...

Well, I'd rather have spent my life as a trash-eating street bum than have been him at that point. I'm just saying.

It's the taco the town.

1. 
   

Getting along.

[A slightly shorter version of this entry was originally posted on my old, defunct blog; unfortunately the problems noted in it don't seem to be in danger of changing or improving anytime soon.]

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a day when we should reflect that our official culture, especially the universities, are dedicated to judging people on the color of their skin and, except for a couple of extra-double-naughty sins, not on the content of their character.

But I was pondering the most famous quote of that other King, the late Rodney King: "Why can't we all just get along?"

A lot of people made fun of that, but I never thought it worthy of mockery. Really, why can't we all just get along? Aren't we taught to do that from the time we're small? Why all the fighting?

You think about that when you're young, and you think about it again when you're older and you get tired of all the B.S. But I'm coming around to an idea that I think is not only realistic, but is one of the unique building blocks of American exceptionalism and the secret to her success: Fighting is not good, but it is necessary.

In the Federalist Papers, James Madison wrote famously that a separation of powers in the government was necessary so that they would fight each other for power.

Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.

It's not a bug, it's a feature.

A quick skim though the twentieth century shows you the worst of what happens when men fight, but the most horrible examples started with men getting along. The powers of Europe fought World War I, for example, because each nation was united in its desire to fight, the old guard and the new progressives alike---the old guard from national pride, the new progressives as a means to remake the world.

Fascism got its name from the fasces, the bundle of rods that were weak individually but mighty together. Even if they were friendly, smiling fascists who would never lead their nation to war, they by definition required all those rods sticking together. So conformity had to be enforced. "Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." Beware any politician who says things will be sunshine and lollipops when we all pull together (i.e., do things his way), because the only way to get us all pulling together is to engineer strong and evil consequences for those who don't.

America's founders said it would be better to have an arena where everyone can fight, and factions form as needed to stop any person or group from taking over and killing the rest.

So we should strive for peace, for getting along, but be aware that human beings are not made that way, at least not in this world. 

Jesus said (in John 14:27, KJV) "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you." The world's peace is at best fragile, or requires placating evil, but Jesus tells us his peace is of a different and better order. It is our best hope until men become like angels or someone puts the angels in charge.

Mud and ice.

Boy, the weather changed fast.

After weeks of very cold temperatures and snow that refused to go anywhere, we hit a record high on Friday. Counting windchill, it was more than a 70 degree swing in three days. Parts of the state, like Syracuse, hit records for the date -- in their case, 62 degrees. It certainly felt like a record high here, but it wasn't like you could run outside and sunbathe -- it rained like crazy all damn day.

I think I spent the bulk of the day drying off dogs. My wife was at it with the good ol' Swiffer SteamBoost, but the mud and water splashed in the hall every time some puppy needed to visit the great outdoors. The snow was melting at the fastest pace I have ever seen. This was tragic for the big dog, Tralfaz, my fuzzy chum who, if forced to choose between me and snow, might very well pick snow. Our last outing Friday night we visited his domain, the snow fort at the end of the driveway created by our plow guy. It had been reduced to a single manhole-size splotch of snow. Tralfaz laid on it, covering it almost entirely, rolled on it, tried to bury his face in it as he does with snow. It was the saddest thing I have seen in a long time. By Saturday even that was gone.

Saturday morning I took baby dog Nipper (90+ pounds of fun & muscle) out to the backyard for his early morning romp, and I had to cut it short. The yard had gotten so muddy it was sucking the shoes right off my feet. No kidding; and I was wearing a pair of rubber moc boots Mrs. Claus bought me for Christmas, or I probably would have had mud inside my socks. It made me think of this meme:

No kidding; thanks to TV we kind of thought quicksand could pop up anywhere -- in the woods, by a pond, in the supermarket parking lot, in aisle 5, you name it.

It also brought back a memory of the time in my youth when I drove three of my friends in my dad's economy car to play toss the ol' football around in the park. We got in a pickup touch football game with some other guys. After a while we discovered that, not only had the park been subject to at least a week of soaking rain, but the rain had also caused the sewers to back up, resulting in that odd odor that got stronger as the game progressed. I don't remember if we won, but I do remember being in that small car with three other big, filthy, sweaty guys, smelling of sewer. I had to clean out the car and then hose myself off before I could even get in the house. It was a little more than 50 degrees, not the kind of weather you want to be running cold water on yourself off the backyard hose in your underwear. I'm not sure my mother didn't toss my jeans directly in a Hefty bag on the curb.

So when I told Nipper it was time to go in, it was time to go in.

Later on Saturday the rain cleared off, the wind picked up, and the temperature dropped like a stone. It fell below freezing by eight in the morning; it was 19 by six p.m. Fortunately there was not a lot of water on the streets to freeze, but the yard, such a sodden mess, became icy enough to send out young Wayne Gretzky to practice hockey. This morning when I took out the boys it was 9. Glad I had my long thermal underpants on.

It's been such an odd couple of days that it seems to have shut up the climate deniers and the climate cultists all at the same time. No matter where you are on such things, if it makes for a peaceful and quiet Sunday, it is a good thing.

Would you....

This meme and ones like it have been making the rounds, and I thought I'd share my thoughts, or whatever they are.

Fifty million dollars to shoot your best friend in the leg. Seems tempting, especially if you are the kind of person who is not that close to your friends.

Most of the responses I saw to this -- and that's what I get for looking at comments sections -- were along the lines of either "I'll split the money with my friend and he can afford the best doctors" or the more generous "After we get my friend the best medical treatment we'll split the rest."

Some people try to alter the implied context here, assuming perhaps they are dealing with magical fairies who will have to abide by every word of the agreement:

"I'll shoot him... with a BB gun!"
"I'll shoot him... with a Kodak!"
"I'll shoot him... underwater!"
"I'll name a serial killer as my best friend and I won't care if he dies!"
"I'll name the person with all the money my new best friend!"

These people would be paid off in Monopoly money.

To play the game we have to take it on its face value -- say for some reason an evil and eccentric billionaire (let's call him Beff Jezos) decides it would be fun to see if he can bribe people to use deadly force on their closest friends, maybe to prove people will do anything to get rich. We will assume that he's good for the money and will pay off. The meme doesn't specify the type of gun, although the image shows a rifle; clearly it has to be something of a type and caliber that would be seriously dangerous. Further, we can stipulate that the shot would have to be taken at a reasonable distance; people trying to cause a flesh wound from right next to the friend are essentially playing Operation: The Wacky Doctors Game, and again would be paid in toy money.

Most of those writing comments were willing to accept these conditions, which surprised me. Either they knew nothing about guns except what they'd seen on shows like 24, or they had handled firearms and figured they were good shots and could avoid hitting anything serious.

The problem is, with a leg, everything can be serious.

Jack Bauer would plug a guy in the leg to stop him without killing him, but real-life cops know that the word for shooting a guy in a leg is: Kill. Yes, they train to hit the central body mass and not the legs, but that doesn't mean legs are made of Play-Doh. A shot to the femoral artery can be deadly in minutes.

Okay, so you're a great shot. Mr. Jezos ("Beffy" to his pals) hands you a .30-06 and stands your best friend at the 50-yard line and tells you to shoot your BFF in the leg -- take as many shots as you need. And you're thinking, Don't hit the femoral artery or Bill/Joe/Alice/Jezebel could bleed out before help arrives! (Jezos is not paying to have medical staff on hand -- that's not part of the deal.) Here's the location of the femoral artery:

Thanks to Kenhub for the art.

Yeah, I'm sure you'll totally miss it, no problem. And you won't hit the bone either, which could slice the artery, although the femur is the largest bone in the body. And if somehow you cut that huge artery but manage to save your friend's life, you can help him or her pick out a really expensive prosthetic.

And then there are infections, chronic pain, and other fun effects of taking a bullet in the leg. If people survive the injury they may get better, but they surely don't all get well.

For me, what it comes down to is: Why are you letting someone pay you to do something reprehensible? We all do things we don't want to do for money -- that's why it's called work and not play. But we would say we wouldn't want to do anything cruel or evil for money. And here were all these people ready to do just that. How much more would Beffy have to pay for you to not tell your friend about the deal until after the shooting? How much extra to shoot your friend in the arm, too? How much more to shoot your mom in her leg? To shoot a stranger in the head? At this point it's just negotiating the details.

It's fun to think of ways to spend fifty million dollars, but that's the wrong end of the equation. Never let anyone pay you to do something revolting. It does things to us. In this example, the shooter's injuries may wind up more painful and long-lasting than the injuries of the victim.