Unidentified Flying Objects and Pianofortes

Unfortunately, all the YooEffOh enthusiasts are wrong. No way would aliens smart enough to fly here actually make the trip, and here's why: FM radio. All those thousands of radio stations are blasting a wall of sound into space, a kind of Force Field of FM. NEW 105, ROCK94.4, YOURBESTOFTHEEIGHTIES 101.5 have been sending an electromagnetic shock wave into the rest of the universe for decades.

If we can barely stand it, what do you think the Little Green Women in flying saucers will think?

One horrific consequence of spending a lot of time driving is exposure to the idiocy of FM music stations. Hells Teeth, listening should come with a Government Health Warning, like cigarettes:

Caution: More than three hours per week exposure to FM music stations will cause your brain to mushify and leak out of your ears.

In my considered analysis, a big part of the problem is that the music on FM is all AT ONE VOLUME - LOUD. The reason is that most people are listening, like me, in the car, with all the associated noise competition. Radio stations know this. Then the ads play, and they're at VOLUME 11 so the message gets through. Ah, no. I don't want to lease a new Chevy Malibu at an all-time low price, thank-you. For the fifty-seventh time.

So one naturally hungers for music more in tune with one's soul. Music is meant to speak to the emotions, and emotion implies ups and downs - in strictly musical terms, piano through forte, soft through loud. Classical music (by which I mean everything from Baroque through mid-century Big-Bands) fits the bill. The nuance of volume changes opens a door to somewhere in our heads that standard FM music cannot.

If I were an alien, I'd be repulsed by mono-volume music and intrigued by vari-volume music. Life (and relationships) can't be lived at full-throttle all the time, so finding a tune (or a person) fitting the spectrum of emotions that fit mine is the thing.



Bottoms Up, Turn it up to Eleveners.

Wombatgram #20 - Relationship Arcs

Naturally, we're all different. Equally, we're all human too. So patterns will emerge despite our best efforts to be different.


Click on Wombatgram for better viewing.


Bottoms Up, Individualists.

The Long and Short of Strap-On Dildos

I'm in two minds about fishing. On the one hand there is the grouper sandwich and macadamia encrusted mahi-mahi. Mmmmm....mahi-mahi. On the other hand there are hooks and nets.

How is the salmon served again?

Fishermen are divided into two species - recreational anglers, that is. There are live-bait fishermen and artificial-bait fishermen. It's not a trivial difference. These are Old Testament/New Testament kind of arguments, unsolved by beer or beer-battered catfish. But let us not tarry. My fishy musings aren't for nothing, dear friends. There are sex aids afoot and what wonders lie before us!

Behold, the strap-on dildo. This piece of priapic pulchritude fills a gap - so to speak - when a penis is missing. One imagines that most owners are lesbians, but no doubt there's a big market for women who want to show their menfolk what it's like to have six or more inches of extruded polymer shoved up their butt.

Which isn't where I'd like to focus. What's interesting to me is that Mr P is always invited to the party, whether the participants like penis or not. Lesbians, are, presumably, those most likely to purchase a strap-on...which must pain them no end. Interesting that those with only sapphic attractions still like an ersatz bloke about the place; one held in place with buckles and straps.

Let's review: When a dick's not to hand, there are always artificial dicks, even if you don't like dick or the person to whom he's attached. Bravo, marital aid industry and UPS. You've done us proud. Even those of us who use live bait.




Bottoms Up, Naturists.

Supermarket for People

Everywhere. They're everywhere. Dating sites for this, dating sites for that, dating sites for the most obscure sub-groups of humanity...and some in which only one partner is human.

Ahem.

If the internet has become the most efficient way yet of delivering porn, one side-effect is the cereal-aisle choice of ways to find The One. Not only are we singles looking up at El Capitan when figuring out how to get the right squelchy one, the delivery system is now its own nightmare. Am I a J-Dater? Am I after a MILF? Can I narrow myself down dating only millionaire women?

Oh, darn. That last one is only for women looking for millionaires. Maybe the market niche for men looking to date millionairesses is ripe for exploitation.

When we're all in our dotage, I predict we'll look back on this time with amusement. Apart from the fact that our current state of connectedness will look as clumsy as Bill Gates trying to dance, internet dating will look spectacularly agricultural. Most of these places are great big classified sites with photos. They suit men because we can rifle through a ton of photographs to find the horniest looking women, and send them an email to spark their attention. NO effort required. Thoughtful interest in finding a real relationship NON-existent. Trolling for sex at a MAXIMUM.

Yes, I know. Relationships do start from dating websites. My point is that they're entirely unnatural. Are we really designed to meet people by way of a People Catalogue? Does the supermarket Dating Aisle sound right to you?

There are some folks creating more organic sites. My favourite is Barstalk. The idea of meeting people in real life is the BIG reason I like the idea. It feels much closer to the natural architecture of finding a mate. They use the internet as it should be, as a filter to discard those who aren't up for a drink. Not that drinking is necessarily the right connective tissue for everyone, but if you do drink and live in New York City, it's logical to see if there's someone out there who shares your bar preference or simply looks like a likely martini-partner.

Too many choices make life overwhelming. Simplicity burns away the fog of indecision. Dating can be simple too. Let it be so.




Bottoms Up, Captain Morgan.

Zombies Can be Gay, Right?

The meager circumstances of my life might be about to change. Blogging don't pay much y'all (as they say here in the South) so I've been busily diverting my creative goo into a screenplay. It's more of a treatment, in truth, which is what I might really be needing once it's made into a movie. Called "When Worlds Collide", I've cleverly weaved a number of popular themes into one.

The covering letter (39 networks, publishers and agents so far) in part reads like this:

When Worlds Collide is a funny and heartwarming story of two zombies. Zach and Augustus are two gay zombies recently fallen in love. With TriBeCa as the backdrop, they move into a cute loft to start their lives together eating brains and doing what zombies do. But there's a hole in their life. They want a family. So, given their keen sense of community, they do what any other gay zombie family would do - they adopt! In their case, a gorgeous little Venezuelan girl, orphaned at birth. WWC follows their antics learning how to raise a normal human baby in the midst of zombie mayhem. It's a triumph of the un-dead spirit!

Yes, it's a niche tale, but it has 'Indy cult film finds mainstream audience and fame for the writer' written all over its gorgeous derriere. See you at Cannes.




Bottoms Up, Zombie Lovers.

Why is Breaking Up Hard to Do? Wrestling With the Break-Up Monster.

Breaking up is hard to do. Only sociopaths and terminal masochists fail to find some kind of emotional turmoil when they want out. Detaching from another person is one of those life downsides we can only suffer through.

Sometimes it's a relief. When the inner voice whispers that the best option is termination, the pain of the act is tempered with guilty triumph. Afterwards, that is. Once the words are out there, the air is cleaner. One regains peripheral vision. Still and all, pinches of regret and dashes of sadness will adhere. We're meant to be with people, after all, and de-gluing feels like a step back.

Part of the reason break-ups are uncomfortable is that most of us aren't good at it. Facing someone with a parting can generate a vortex of emotion for which we're ill practiced and poorly prepared. Airline pilots spend time in simulators dealing with the kinds of horrid failures and tricky scenarios that are hardly ever seen in real life. But if the worst does occur, they have the confidence to deal.

Leaving a relationship isn't like that. We never know how the other person will react. We might even not know how we'll react. It takes time to build trust and confidence with another person; tearing all that hard work down can be utterly dispiriting. And yet it must be done. To avoid personal Titanic sinkings, we have to protect ourselves from bad relationships, slow down the ship, and head to warmer waters. Sometimes drifting for a while is the right course. Better that than having Hollywood remake your life as a tragedy.

So how can we get better at break-ups? One way might be to do it more often. I'm more and more amazed at how people cling to relationships that any outside observer can see don't work. We - humans - seem to think that the other person will magically stop the damaging/annoying/frustrating whatever that leads us to dissatisfaction. We hang in there on a hope and a whisper...a strategy that never works.

Western legal justice begins with the premise that a person is innocent until proven guilty. When we're talking about criminality and jail time I guess that makes sense. But should the same premise pertain when the worst that can happen is that we are without a regular Friday night date?




Bottoms Up, Heartbreakers.