I keep forgetting to post this

Seen a while back while waiting on the freeway for roadside assistance: A large pickup truck, painted on the tailgate in huge letters with:

I’D RATHER BE CUMMIN THAN STROKIN

In or out of context this is a jarring thing to see on the road. I hereby provide context:

The owner of this truck owns a Dodge pickup which uses a Cummins brand diesel engine. He feels strongly that said brand of diesel engine is superior to Ford diesel engines, which are called “Powerstroke.”

I understand the intent of his message. Clearly he wants to indicate that his engine choice implies a sexual choice: he does not wish to masturbate, hence “strokin.”

However, the activities of “cummin” and “strokin” are not exclusive. Aficionados of masturbation will immediately object: Hey! We stroke in order to come! And then we’re cummin!”

Since I was stuck on the shoulder of Interstate 710 at Atlantic/Bandini at the time I didn’t have time to follow this gentleman and point out the contradiction inherent in his signage.

Perhaps he should have said: “I’d prefer to be cummin due to my conquest of a female human than strokin my own male member in order to achieve orgasm on my own, which is humiliating to me, and I feel the same way about my engine choice of Cummins Diesel over Powerstroke Diesel. It is the right choice for diesel engines without a doubt and gives me the same sense of control and desirability that mutually consensual coitus does over masturbatory activity.”

Or maybe he should of just gave the fuck up and not painted his truck with that sign.

Stereotypes seen at grocery store

cake yeah!

Very tall very fat gamer dude with long ponytail

Tough ‘n’ angry monobrow Santa Ana gangbanger with apologetic smiling girlfriend/sister

Two very sunburnt bro-dude gay guys, one of whom was drunk enough to eat a bit of the wrapper of his candy bar while staring at US Magazine on the newsrack

A guy who couldn’t find the beer and then announced that he was having one before he drove home

Doah (Hi Dasan!)

History Lesson: Let’s not play soldier.

Looking for information on military units like the one Bob served with in Vietnam is incredibly frustrating. Bob was in a special warfare unit in the Navy. This means that he was a UDT, or a SEAL, or a “Navy Scout” or something. So he was in one of these shadowy things like the “Maritime Studies Group” or “Studies and Observations Group” that were just killing machines. When you look for that stuff on the web there’s this mountain of macho horseshit to plow through. The official histories and some sites run by veterans are there, of course.

But good God, the fixation this country has on elite military units! Message board fights about who a real SEAL is, dissing of various public figures about their war records, lots of debunking of people who claim to be SEALs or Special Forces or whatever but aren’t. Every meathead in the country claims either to be a SEAL or claims to know all about them and have the real scoop, unlike those other poseurs. Regular soldiers aren’t enough; the poor bastards may get blown up, shot, underpaid, mistreated, and dumped to die but they don’t have flaming death’s head patches and special medals and really really cool face paint.

You know what that is? It’s pathetic. Bob killed so many innocent people and saw so many unspeakable things in his time at war that he spent the next 25 years marinated in Crown Royal and wreaking havoc on himself and everyone else. It was a nauseating, terrifying Hell that makes a very unlikely craggy cynical old bastard like Bob tear up and flinch when he sees a Vietnamese person to this day. Special Forces, in his case, meant an especially bad war that made him an especially bad person. If these web warriors and message board heroes had to see any of that they’d never stop shitting their Dockers. I suppose they have an image of a straight-jawed Hollywood actor heroically cutting down uniformed bad guys and saving his buddies. The reality was more like a gang of maniacs blowing up and burning houses and schools and hospitals, and one of the maniacs is you.

Dude Ranch Nation gives me ennui.

Junkie Nation update

Hurray, the new Microgram report is out! Highlights of this one include:

  • Heroin-saturated paper
  • Blotter acid with 5-METHOXY-ALPHA-METHYLTRYPTAMINE instead of LSD in it
  • Cocaine in granola boxes
  • Opium chocolates

Plus of course a dissertation on people who take multistate car trips buying the maximum quantity of Sudafed at each drug store.

It’s the bestest government publication ever. Infrequent, but syndicated as microgram so you can see when the next one comes out and click through.