Nike: It's Latin for Asshole

I've worked in a sports store for the past year and a half, and one of the few things I've learned is that Nike is a giant bucket of corporate scum. While you may look at me incredulously as I sit here typing this wearing my $85 Nike dunks, I assure you that I tell no lies. Well, I do tell lies, but I'm not lying about the Nike being scum part. I'm also a hypocrite. I'm also a flaming homosexual. What was I getting at?

Oh yeah, Nike! We recently got a shipment of shinguards from them. These shinguards are 8'' long pieces of plastic. They are shipped in a gigantic cardboard box with metal staples across the bottom. Each guard comes in hard plastic packaging. Each of the hard cases is enclosed in a plastic bag. Each of these plastic bags is placed with 2 more of identically-packaged guards and placed in…you guessed it, another plastic bag.

What do we do with all this plastic? Well what can we do? We take a big plastic garbage bag, put all the other plastic bags in it (yes, the shipment of about 20 shinguards fills an entire garbage bag with plastic) and toss it in the garbage.

Did I mention that this article isn't funny? It's sad. Not sad like The Notebook either, I'm talking real sad. Killing bunnies kind of sad.

Nike knows that plastic will never biodegrade. Nike knows that it
takes oil to make plastic. Nike knows that by packaging their little
$20 shinguards like this they're not only killing the environment
and wasting landfill space, but raising the cost of filling my gas tank to $42.17. I wish that price wasn’t exact.

Is it really important for you to know this about Nike? Not really. You’re better off focusing on the fact that they pay 5-year-olds 3 cents an hour to make your shoes.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go jump into my 15 MPG car, order some non-fair trade coffee in a Styrofoam cup and step on the skulls of the less fortunate while spitting on the homeless. I hope you’ve all learned something about environmental ethics.
-EK

Literary Criticism is a WASTE OF TIME

You know who writes literary criticism? People who wish they could write literature.

Sometimes literary criticism can be valuable; an obvious instance is an essay on an obscure but brilliant text that nobody has the patience to read and/or translate (e.g. Greek poetry, anything by Proust, anything written in India). Other times it can be a pretentious waste of time; for instance, anything written about symbolism, through a feminist lens, or about William Carlos Williams*. Often, however, it is worse. It is a morally corrupt exhibit of arrogance, elitism, and pettiness--sort of like everything Roger Ebert does.

Whatever one's opinion of Roger Ebert, it must be said that to his credit,

he has a truly comforting look in his eyes that just says, "Don't worry. I only rape minorities."

You're probably thinking, "Hey, reviewing movies for a living isn't that bad." Well, it is. But that's not what I'm getting at. I'm talking about critics who evaluate, instead of elucidate, great works and great writers--the people who, as Salinger's Franny Glass put it, "try to tear down the giants."

(At this point, if you're wondering who Franny Glass is, just close this page and find a copy of Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger, and quit wasting your time on this pointless blahg. I mean it.)

Let's make something clear. It doesn't take a degree in anything to recognize that literature is the written account of the millennia-long dialogue between artists the world, and, even more basically, artists and each other. Renowned critics point this out all the time in convoluted theses as if it took a Ph.D. from Yale to come up with it. In case you were wondering: Yes, 'renowned' in that last sentence was ironic. Nobody cares about critics, except other critics, and students who need to slog through their garbage in order to make a passing grade in a course built around a medium that was originally meant to enrich and entertain. A renowned critic is like an athletic cop--rare and entirely coincidental.

Appearances can be deceiving. In the case of Harold Bloom they are not.

So if literature is a dialogue, what can a critic add to it? Well, same as most of the things I add to real-life conversation: irrelevant tangents, confusion, needless sexual tension, and noise. Basically, people respond to critics in the same way they respond to me. In ascending order of frequency:

"Yeah, we know."
"Mmmbullshit."
"So?"
"Why are you sticky?"

These graphs came from God. The formatting did not.

I think these results are fitting. There is really no reason to take literary criticism seriously, and every reason to suspect it of poor hygiene. I've heard from several reliable sources that homeless people use their pages for crotch padding and to house-break (box-break?) their pet rats. I want to believe this. It would mean at least someone's found a good use for it.

So here's my message to all literary critics and would-be literary critics: nobody is listening. If you want someone to care what you have to say about literature, write some literature. If it isn't any good, don't worry; it just means you don't really have anything to say after all.

Right of What?

In today’s hustle-bustle world of cell phones, laptops and the internets we have to be constantly ready to update our lives. In with the new and out with the old, that’s what I always say. Anything you’ve had for more than two weeks isn’t worth hanging on to. I tried this strategy with dating once and got the clap.

One of the most outdated things in our world today is driving rules. Think about it. We’ve been mindlessly obeying this “stop on red, use blinkers” shit for too long. Well I’m happy to say that recently I’ve seen people take the law into their own hands and change these prehistoric rules to something that fits the modern lifestyle. These new right-of-way rules are, like all new things, much better than the old* (seriously, Jurassic Park 1 – not enough velociraptors, 1st generation Gameboys – didn’t even have color, and does anyone even remember the first two Reichs?)

One of the most common of these neolawisms is the rapid-left-on-green. This is a complex trick in which the driver of a car turning left ever so delicately slams the gas pedal to the floor at the exact second the light turns green in an attempt to make his or her (haha, just kidding) turn before the driver going straight through the light hits him in a totally sweet and hopefully fatal collision. This one is best executed (and I stress that word) without a signal.

Next there is what I have dubbed the “size matters” rule. This is when the driver of an SUV or truck assumes right of way in all situations by citing the “if you get in my way you’ll die” clause (Peter 4:12-13.) Sometimes it can get tough to find a good moment to enact this move, but I assure you the opportunity is always looming in front of you.

Still at a loss for when to try it? Alright here’s a good example: You come to a 4-way stop sign. Under the archaic rules of our Founding Fathers you would stop and let the person who reached the sign first go through. Under the “size matters” rule you take a quick look to see if your car is bigger than the others currently at the intersection. It is? Good, keep going. Don’t brake. Braking is a sign of weakness. Try to keep the car above 50 MPH, because once you’ve hit that speed the bomb is armed and if you slow down the bus will explode.

The final rule I care to talk about today is the “cell phone > laws” rule. There’s no word to describe this other than “fucking great.” I’m aware that “fucking great” is, in fact, two words, but that’s how awesome this little maneuver is. Pretty much this one says that when you’re on your cell phone you have the right to do whatever the fuck you want. And I mean anything. Try it out! Drive through a red light! Turn British and drive in the other lane! Ever drive at night with your lights off? I call it “Funsploring.” Now remember with this one, cell phones can do a lot of things besides call people. Why not try text messaging? How about playing Tetris? The possibilities are endless!

So faithful young drivers, let’s get out there and show the road who’s boss! We’re not going to sit around and follow the driving rules put into place by ancient and mythical men such as Benjamin Franklin, Socrates and Jean-Jacque Rousseau (that’s French for ‘Don’t-Want Shower’.) The choices we make are our own and we’ll be damned if “the threat of imminent death” is going to stop us!

* If I have to tell you not to try these you should probably just go die in a car accident.

-EK

Senior Year is Amazing

Everyone needs to know this.

It's been a secret for too long.

Senior year is the best year of your life. Your whole life. It's better than the last year, where you're so close to death you spend most your time watching the Price is Right and tripping on DMT. It's better than the first year of marriage, when you basically have a lot of sex and burn out all the emotional currency you've been given to last a lifetime. It's better than the age of four, which, as I recall, involves shameless nose-picking, awesome cartoons, and soccer as it was truly meant to be played. Senior year is better than all of these.

I'll be honest. The best part is the sex. Think of the most dispicable fantasy you've ever had. Now multiply it by two and add in a tub of rubber gloves. It's that good. Basically as a senior you can walk down the hall, point your finger at any underclassman, do the tiniest of pelvis jabs, and you've got someone to objectify for as long as you fancy. It's that easy. And the best part is how the absolute casualness of sex makes it really meaningful. There's no more of that grimy emotional babble leading up to it. Sex is just sex. Imagine eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. How sweet is that? It's like sex, practically. Now imagine eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich made out of paper. That's sex in a relationship. Paper is for writing. Sandwiches are for eating. I don't know what I'm talking about. I lick toasters.

This afternoon I took a nap and had a dream about the night sky suddenly flickering and turning off, and then the giant image of a black woman's face with a earpiece stretched across the entire black expanse, like an impossibly large television monitor. "Wow, um, sorry about this," she said. "I'll turn down the lights and, uh, thicken the atmosphere, I guess. Don't worry." Then she disappeared. Dark fog spread over the empty place where the sky had been. She didn't want us to see what had been behind there. Everyone panicked. I sensed this although I was alone on a deserted island somewhere due south of Japan. Then the monitor in the sky turned on again and I could see the face of a young white man. He made me think of Emperor Augustus. "Hello everbody," he said. "Just stay calm. This will all be over in a minute--" then he stopped. The voice of an old man came from off screen and the young man's eyes grew wide. The old man was saying, "Sir, our scanners indicate a person on the Isle." The young man spoke up again in a soothing voice, speaking only to me. "Please stay right where you are. This is a delicate situation. Near you should be an old wooden chest and a metal sphere. Please do not touch either. I need the chest for my own purposes. It's one of the originals. I, uh...carved it...myself. Just stay there." Then he stood up and the screen went blank. I walked over to the sphere. I had the sudden urge to destroy it. I lifted it. It was heavy. I carried it over to the chest, dropped it, and opened up the lid. It started to vibrate and tick. I was scared. I put the sphere inside and shut the lid, then lifted the chest over my head and hurled it into the ocean. Just as I did I saw lights coming over the horizon. Then everything went white.

Did you know rabbit meat has been known to cause hallucinations? The finest rabit meat comes from the Southwest United states. The rabbits there like to feed on peyote seeds. I found this out. I found it out a while ago.

Bitter Rantings of the Real Eli

Everyone’s always going on about how great senior year is. You’ve all heard the speech. “Yeah man, it’s great. You don’t have to do any homework, there are parties all the time and girls flock to you like burnt-out celebrities to Scientology.” What a crock of shit.
The closer we get to the end of senior year the more I can feel my once shining beacon of a soul sinking into the vacuous abyss of mediocrity. With this in mind, I thought I’d spend some of my last few miserable moments in high school dispelling some myths and wallowing in self-pity.
First off, let’s talk about homework. I’m not going to lie, as a senior, I do less work than a Frenchman on Bastille Day. Boy does that give me a whole lot of free time. Just think of all the ways I can spend it! Seriously…just think for a second, because I’ve been at a complete loss all year. In all honesty, I spend most of my time watching Nickelodeon and beatin’ it (although never at the same time.)
Alright, so the only thing you have to look forward to during the week is sleep. That’s not all that bad, is it? There’s always the weekend. Let me tell you about all the crazy ’07 parties there are. Just give me a second to think of one. Hey! Don’t stop reading, seriously, I’ll remember one soon. What? You’re leaving? Damn!
Let’s face it, the class of 2007 at ARHS is no partying bunch. Well, unless your idea of a party is a handle of Popov vodka, a 2-liter of coke and a few tabs of rohypnol (I’m not naming names, I’m just pointing fingers.)
Well, let’s brush aside the whole party catastrophe for a minute and we’ll talk about the girls. Yep, getting girls as a senior guy is about as easy as picking out lesbians at Smith College. Well, maybe that’s pushing it a little. The point is you have your pick of the cream of the crop, lines upon lines of gorgeous, interesting, 15-year-old girls. Wait? Did I just say 15-year-old girls? Oh shit, that’s right, they are 15! Well that’s a tough one. Personally, I like to know that something (no, I don’t mean “someone”) has hit puberty before I put any sort of appendage into it, but some people just can’t afford to be picky these days. Oh well, you can always try to pry an older one away from the 22-year-old UMass kid they’re putting out for. Oh, did I forget to mention that even though you’re older the girls aren’t any less crazy? My bad.
Well fuck, is there anything to like about senior year? If you have any sort of personality then the sad answer is no. Eventually everyone discovers that they are surrounded by idiots, who think that the cleverest idea ever for a senior prank is covering our school in graffiti and cutting down a tree outside the cafeteria (granted, those trees smell terrible…yet strangely familiar. Hmm…) On that note, I wish a happy senior year upon the entire class of 2008 and I bid farewell to my classmates in 2007, because let’s face it, are any of us really ever going to come back to Amherst?
- EK