Keeping us free

It's not the military dead or wounded that keep us free here in the USA. It's not active duty or reservists who help keep us free during the year and on Memorial Day.

No, the people who do the most to keep us free and who safeguard our rights are the ones who push the boundaries of the freedoms granted to us in the Bill of Rights in our Constitution. So given that, it's not the terrorists in the far off lands who we need to be fighting, it's homegrown terrorists like those in Operation Rescue, the right wing militias, activist conservative judges who make up new laws on the fly, and Christians who want us all to follow their interpretation of their fairy tale who we need to be on guard against.

The pissed off guy in Iraq/Afghanistan/Pakistan who's country we're occupying has every right to be pissed off at us. The children who's parent's we slaughtered so we could make sure the oil keeps flowing out of the Middle East have every right to be pissed off at us. The Palestinians who we keep under the oppressive thumb of Israel have every right to be pissed off at us. The men, women, and children who live under the harsh oppressive governments that we prop up so we can treat the world as our object to be plundered so that we can live 'high on the hog' can and should be pissed at us. That's where most of the military they want us to glorify today is stationed.

And they have no right to be there.

And I'm not going to support them while they are being used in this fashion.

And I'm not going to celebrate or remember them on Memorial Day.

Instead I'm going to remember people who tested the limits of our freedoms and who landmark Supreme Court cases made us all a little more freer than we were before.

UPDATE: Great minds think alike.

Re-captioned New Yorker Cartoon #18

"Next time you suggest I go with you to some god damn pretentious art gallery opening, I suggest you feel free to leave this child behind."

War, what is it good for?

Absolutely nothing.

Happy Memorial Day from all the men, women, and children who have died in the wars of terror and in the wars for corporate dominance. Go wave your flag at their graves while you're out waving your flag.

Excellent blog

Here's an excellent blog that is full of info on the oil spill disaster in the Gulf. It's full of pictures and sciency stuff.

Go.

Read it.

Bookmark it.

Blog roll it.

And leave comments.

Rest in peace

Iconic actor, director, and all around bad ass Dennis Hopper has succumbed to prostate cancer. My favorite performances of his include those he gave in Blue Velvet, River's Edge, Straight to Hell, Apocalypse Now, Basquiat, and Red Rock West. There was nobody quite like him and he'll be missed.

Sign of the week

Coats!

They're more useful than ever before.

Don't fence me in, because Fox News can't see me if you do

So Quitter Palin made her hubby Todd put up a fence to keep Joe McGinniss's prying eyes away from the nubile bodies of her children. How very "protective" of her.
The endeavor gave Todd something to do besides guarding the baby making holes of his screechy wife. And it kept him off his snowmobile, which the grass of Alaska is thankful for.

But honestly Quitter, this isn't about some well known author of true crime books peeping on you and Bristol, and Trig, and Skate, and Pony Boy, and Jimmy Sue, and Digger, and the rest of your clan. No one but you gives a shit about your kids, and by the way you chase the almighty dollar, I'm not sure you really give a shit about them either.

Everybody knows this is about you doing what you do best, playing the martyr. You did it so well during your abortion of a campaign with Old Man McCain, I mean how dare the press ask you what newspapers you read? We all knew you only read the ones that do stories about you, and only flattering ones at that. Your martyrdom grew after you saw that you couldn't cash in on your sudden fame if you stayed in office so you did what people like you do do best in the face of adversity, you quit your job and blamed the media and mean ol' liberals for making you do it. Hell girl, you learned the lesson that you've got to exploit the conservative dullards while the iron is hot.

What's going on in your neighborhood isn't about some old guy stalking and peeping on your kids, heck McCain did that enough to last them a life time. What it's all about Ms. Quitter, is the fact that you're afraid that you'll be exposed for the dolt you are. You spout aphorisms that you heard someone else say that got a huge response by the intellectual midgets you claim to represent. The fact that you speak in code and think it's the height of intelligence, is an insult to anyone with a gram of intelligence. You live in fear that your minions will turn on you and that the media you so love to despise but which you secretly love will actually stop treating you with kid gloves.

McGinniss's book will be what your 'news' network isn't, fair and balanced. It'll be full of those things you hate so much, facts. It will contain interviews with people who have known and worked with you. It will contain stories and anecdotes that can be double and triple checked.

Remember Quitter, you're a celeb now. You're fair game for whoever wants to write a book about you and your life. This is still, after all, a feee country where writers can still pick and choose who to write books about. You wrote a book about your life, so why shouldn't other people? It's un-American to deny someone the chance to pursue their work. You're all about being American aren't you Quitter? Or have you quit on that too?

More Monkey Movie Reports

This film tells the story of two siblings who lose their parents at a young age. The female grows up to be the responsible one and her brother grows up to the be screw up. But when he shows up out of the blue to see his sister after a long period of absence, we find out that both of them are pretty much screw ups. The moral of the story here is be your self and be true to your self.

Good performances all around, especially from Laura Linney, who I'm ready to declare a national treasure by the way, and Mark Ruffalo, who has been consistently good in everything I've seen him in.

I highly recommend this one in spite of it having that awful Broderick Jessica Parker in it.


Fresh off the boat Indian guy meets two women who don't know about each other. Each woman uses Indian guy for different reasons. Indian guy falls in love with one of the women and after much mistaken identity and boinking occur, he finally gets his gal.

I really love this movie, I love it so much I bought the DVD. It's fun, funny, and it's downright sweet. The leads are cute as buttons and the supporting cast is stellar. Sure, it's formulaic but it worked for me.

The Bollywood inspired songs and dances rule and come on, who doesn't love Heather Graham when she plays porn actresses? And Marissa Tomei? Forget about it, she's beyond cute. She's in a whole new area of cuteness, one that will be named for her one day.

Some might call this film sappy and silly. And those who do would be sticks in the mud. It's funny, fun, and engaging.

Shape up you tubby bitches!

From the 1913 edition of the Journal of Health and Longevity. More to come here, on my scan blog, and on Facebook because some of the stuff in this publication is too good not to share.

Stupid shit people have said to me (part 1)

I'll admit it, I get around. And when I'm around people talk to me. Unfortunately for me sometimes they say some really stupid shit. So the stuff I haven't forgotten, either on purpose or not, I'll try to share with you from time to time.

Doesn't that make you happy?

I knew it would!

A girl I once dated asked me what I thought the strongest muscles in the human body were. I thought for a moment and then I answered, the jaw muscles. She shook her head and said I was wrong. She then informed me that the strongest muscles were the biceps because they were the 'power' muscles that people used when punching other people.

I told her that the amount of force used by the jaw muscles when chewing or ripping food was way more than that generated by the biceps. She rolled her eyes and said, "But you cain't hit nobody with your jaw muscles, now can you?"

I sighed heavily and then changed the subject.

We broke up a few weeks later.

The case of the disappearing front lawn

I know the excitement from the previous one was wearing off, so it's garden update time here on Monkey Muck! We made a space in the front yard to grow some watermelons and pumpkins. We did this by digging up some of the grass and laying a good thick layer of leaf mulch over it and then dumping a couple bags of topsoil over that. I transplanted some of the watermelon plants that were growing in one of the backyard beds, we moved them so we could plant corn in it's place, and I added some seeds in case the transplants don't make it. Watermelons are on the left and on the right I planted pumpkins. I also planted some Japanese egg plant seed around the front edge of the pumpkin mound.

The tomatoes and cukes that Sparky planted out front are looking good.

We've been enjoying the lettuce we planted but the spinach has been a disappointment. Sparky planted some onions in that bed and she's going to plant some lettuce seeds so that we can have more in a few weeks.
Potatoes, that's them in the right hand corner of the picture, are looking good.

My daikon radishes are growing like crazy. I pulled one today and it is delicious.
Our carrots are coming along nicely. We've almost gone through our first planting of onions, lucky for us we've replanted a slew of them. So we'll have many more to come in a few weeks.
I've had to stake all the tomatoes last week and I had to tie some of them again today because there has been so much growth in the past week. Our peas, squash, cabbage, and most everything else is taking off too.
Little soon to be tomatoes!
Squash blossoms!
And the potatoes and carrots that we're growing in containers are coming along swimmingly.

The herb garden is growing nicely and the two blueberry bushes that my friend Keith are coming along as well. Sparky is going to plant some red radish seeds, along with that lettuce I mentioned, and more cilantro.

And that's the way the garden grows, for now.

Shocking video of President Obama's early years!

Forget the birth certificate thing, forget the Muslim school controversy, this video shows that President Obama is nothing but a pawn of the tobacco companies! Click it and watch, you'll be amazed and disgusted.

Teabagger Jesus got a gun

I disagree

At a fundraiser for Sen. Boxer (D CA) President Obama said that he needs allies in Congress who have passion. I disagree.

What he needs to do is to grow a pair, stop his pussyfooting around, and to become the socialist they love to claim he is.In the darkest days of the Great Depression, which by the way was one in a series of many that this country went through almost since the day it was founded, but it was the last major one thanks to the reforms enacted in it's aftermath, FDR stood tall in his wheel chair and he governed not in his self interest, or in the interest of his wealthy white friends. No. He chose to stay true to the people who elected him. Which is what Obama should be doing.

So far he's pissed off most every major voting bloc in the Democratic party. He's pissed off gays with is slow approach to repealing DADT. He's pissed off the anti war progressives with his foot dragging in ending the wars of terror. And now he's pissing off environmentalists with his slow response to BP's disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. No Democrat can win the presidency without the support of all three of those groups.

I'm off his bandwagon and I'm all in on whoever is the real progressive in the 2012 race. Obama himself needs to get some passion for actually doing what he promised on the campaign trail. We elected him to govern from the left, not from the back door of the Republican caucus. The teabaggers and the Republicans will never ever support anything he does so he might as well start doing things that will bring us disaffected left wing voters back into the fold. To hell with bipartisanship, last time I looked the Democrats were in charge of two out of three branches of government.

Man up Obama and be another FDR and not another Jimmy Carter.

He's probably banging some greenskinned babe

Damn Captain Kirk, he's never around when you need him.

A Monkey Movie Report

Sometimes a film comes along that reaffirms your love of movies. For me, this film is one of those films: I usually find films about a city to be self indulgent pieces of crap to be avoided at all costs. I could care less how much Woody Allen wants to fuck NYC or how Paris makes pasty British film directors jizz in their jeans. But when I saw that Michel Gondry was attached to this film I knew I had to at least give this movie a fair shake.

I was not disappointed.

Gondry's portion is in my opinion the high point of the movie but the other directors portions are definitely worth seeing. The film opens with Gondry's tale of a young woman who feels like she's in the way and on her way to becoming part of the scenery. So she does what any other woman in her position would do, she turns herself into a chair when other humans are around and she ends up in the apartment of a young male who takes good care of her. It's a trippy tale that's very entertaining.

I wasn't familiar with the work of Leos Carax and after seeing his story about a feral almost subhuman man who lives in the Tokyo sewer system and who comes out only to terrorize Japanese people because he hates them because in his mind they are too clean and too ugly I may have to search out other films he's directed. This one is a strange tale with an odd ending.

And finally Bong's improbable tale of two hardcore agoraphobics is a sweetly touching and fitting end to this movie about odd people in Tokyo.

I recommend this film highly.

What kind of Communist is the best?

Cute female Turkish ones of course!

The gals in the above photo are this week's brunettes of the week.

It puts the orange in the box

Are you deaf or something? I said, "It puts the orange in the box."

Okay. That's better. Thanks.

Kid's book remix

Text by Dr. Monkey
Pictures by Whoever Took Them in the First Place


Looking for a career in a dying dead end field? Looking for low pay and high stress? Or do you just want to languish in career purgatory for many years before you die well before you should? If you answered yes to any of those questions then a career in a department store is for you!

Department stores are currently looking to fill the following jobs:

Mystery shopper and Customer Service Specialist.
The duties of a mystery shopper include going into stores under cover (that's Chin Man Dang in the photo above in his trademarked old lady disguise), buying shit you don't need, and rating the experience on a scale of 1 to OhmygodIwanttoslitmywristsbecausethisstoresuckssobad.

A customer service specialist haughtily rings up purchases, answers questions with a maximum of eye rolling, and evades responsibility at all costs. Ability to insult customers without them knowing it and a relentless 'Carol Brady' shag haircut are a definite plus.

Window Dresser.
The position of store window dresser is perfect for those who's artistic ability has been nearly crushed by the indifference of others. If you spent hours drawing, painting, sculpting, or graphically designing things that no one cared about or was openly mocked by a close friend or family member then this position is for you.

Store Fetishist.
If you can tell who was wearing shoes, lingerie, furry costumes, and aquatic equipment simply by using your sense of smell, taste, or touch then the job of store fetishist is a dream job for you. This job is important because the employees in question will help in determining if anyone gets a refund when they try to return worn merchandise. This is an excellent job opportunity for newly released from prison sex offenders looking to make an honest buck before they busted again.

Store Hooker.
Most people working in a department store are very stressed out and they could use a 'release' during their stress filled shifts. That's where the store hooker comes in. Those employees who want a blow job, a hand job, some fanny fun, or a quickie can utilize the services of the store hooker during any of their breaks in order to blow off some steam and relieve their stress. Ed Dracman, store hooker for a department store in Bendover Falls, SD, is seen here negotiating with a young lady with 'daddy' issues who is looking for a spanking and a severe scolding while on her lunch break.

Mop Master.
Brilliant mathematicians who long to keep floors clean are encouraged to apply for the position of mop master. This position is for those who like working second shift, cleaning scuff marks, and mumbling that they will whip Matt Damon's punk ass for ripping off their life story and turning it into Good Will Hunting.

Fork Lift Jockey.
Like to ride machines that don't go over 10 miles an hour? Like to go up and down on something that's not an elevator? Does doing swan dives in to concrete floors appeal to you? If so then go get your fucking head examined.

Store Repoman.
Sometimes mommy buys furniture just to piss daddy off after she finds out that daddy has banged his secretary and got her knocked up, sometimes daddy buys furniture after he's been drinking and huffing model airplane glue because you cry all the time and are a little Nancy boy who doesn't like to play football or to wrestle, and sometimes godless liberal hippies buy shit they know goddamn well they can't afford just so they can lay around on it and grind their hippie stink into the fabric. And most all of the time people like that stop making payments on their furniture and it has to be repossessed. That's what the store repoman does, they take back stuff deadbeats can't or won't pay for. Prior experience working as collectors for local bookies and organized crime families is preferred but not necessary.

Store Rob Corddry Impersonator
The kids love the comedy these days and they love balding comedians from Massachusetts most of all. So it's just good business practice to have a Rob Corddry impersonator on the store staff.

If any of those jobs look like they are for you then please get your ass to the mall and demand that JC Penny's hires you before they go belly up. If the softer side of Sears is calling your name then heed it's call. Not many are attracted to a career in retail, most people just fall into it like someone who falls into meth addiction or the anus of a family values Republican. But you can be different, you can be the exception that proves the rule, you can be marked down, put on sale, and rung up. You can be a retail king! Or queen!

Or not.

It's up to you.

That big government that Rand Paul and other conservatives hate brought you this:

Cheap hydro electric electricity.
Lakes for boating and fishing.

Stunning mountain lake views.

If libertarians had their way no dams that generate electricity for people would have been built. No lakes would have been made to feed the system of TVA dams and therefore there would be no fishing, boating, swimming, or water skiing.

Big government works.

And when it's done right, like it was under FDR, it works for all Americans.

Ancient karaoke

No one rocked the white go go boots like Granny Karaoke did.

Amazing and true!

I bought 7 pints of fresh locally grown strawberries:
Cleaned them and cut out the rotten parts:
And I turned them into this:
Strawberry jelly!

Suck it corporate America and Monsanto, there's no high fructose corn syrup in my jelly you bitches.

More Monkey Movie Reports

I had seen this film years ago when it first came out on video but I had forgotten most everything about it except for the relationship between Gina Gershon and Billy Zane's characters.
It's based on a Jim Thompson story so if you are familiar with his hard boiled crime fiction then you know what you're in for. Gershon and Zane play incestuous twins who have a penchant for crime and grift. Rue McClanahan plays their guilt and drug addled mother and Sheryl Lee plays a female cop who may or may not be playing them all.

This film is full of twists, turns, smoldering sexuality, and more. I'm almost ashamed to say that I had forgotten how good it is and how good everyone in it is. The phrase 'hubba hubba!' was invented for Gershon and Lee's performances in this movie, both are knockouts who make great femme fatales. Zane and McClanahan are wildly over the top both both are oddly compelling to watch.

I recommend this crime noir film highly but be forewarned, it's full of murder and violence. And quite a bit of the violence is between a man and a woman and the woman gets hit and knocked around some. It takes place in the 1950's when guys were tough as nails and women were dames who knew how to take a punch or a slap. It's hard to watch Lee get slapped and knocked about but it's very germane to the story and faithful to the noir style the original story was written in and the film catches perfectly.

I was pleasantly surprised by The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I liked it a lot more than I thought I was going to. The story sucked me in and kept me interested.

Based on an F. Scott Fitzgerald story this film tells the story of a man who is born old and who gets younger as his life progresses. While he gets younger all those around him get older. In the wrong hands, like say those of the master of fake film sentiment Steven Spielberg, it would have been a sappy disaster. But director David Fincher pulled it off and made a very good film. Pitt is very good and despite my refusal to buy Blanchett as a 20 year old at one point in the movie she was good as well. The weakest parts of the movie are when we're in the present and Blanchett is on her death bed, had they cut those scenes out entirely the film would have been much tighter and more cohesive.

All in all though, this is one worth investing three hours in.

Brunette of the week

Teegra!

WTF London?

The organizers of the 2012 London Olympics unveiled their official mascots for the games.

They love spotted dick over there
but they didn't choose it to be their mascot.

Also not chosen was the honored British packet of fun known as the soccer hooligan:
You'd think then surely they'd go with the British binge drinker,
but you'd be wrong.

In the end it came down to

the Victorian era street urchin,

Kate Beckinsale's boobs,

and upper class inbred twits.

But in a move that shocked everyone, except for Ali G,

they went with the multi colored Cyclops penises with claws.

Well done London 2012 Olympic committee!