{"id":21,"date":"2008-07-14T13:49:49","date_gmt":"2008-07-14T18:49:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/?page_id=21"},"modified":"2008-07-14T13:49:49","modified_gmt":"2008-07-14T18:49:49","slug":"kill-myself-or-die-tryin-pt-3","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/?page_id=21","title":{"rendered":"Kill Myself or Die Tryin’ Pt. 3"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kill Myself or Die Tryin’<\/strong>
\nor<\/strong>
\nI Was a Turntable Tech for 50 Cent, Pt. 3<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/strong>By Mark Driver
\n(note: I know a lot of people bookmarked this page to avoid the former huge interface. There is, however, a new interface with a daily blog i started. check it out<\/a>!)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Next it’s the pathetic hangers on\u2014I mean the posse. Out of the limo. Like it was a fucking clown car. And they must have all just come from the same softball game because they’re wearing the same red-and-white jerseys. How cute! They match! And then, last of all, some twelve-year-old-looking kid in ridiculously oversized sunglasses comes out in a crushed baby-blue terrycloth-diaper ensemble, looking about as tough as Holly Hobby at a prison rodeo. Yup. Bonermaster D. oozes outta of the backseat grasping two gold-toothed walri with spare tires and strechmarks deep enough to give helicopter tours of that I swear were flippin’ me shit about my Louisiana birth certificate at the DMV the week before\u2014he barks some unintelligible bullshit and holds his arms out like a bargain-brand pharaoh, basking in the semi-threatening glow of unimpressed stage crew as a sycophantic toadie pulls his fluffy jacket from his Popsicle-stick frame and anoints his blackhead-encrusted forehead with basil-infused rosewater.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is the guy? Yo! Yo! MC My Fifteen Minutes. He struts up on stage with a limp that keeps migrating from leg to leg and it’s eight songs of landfill timewasting, showing off his generic lyrical unprowess and limp delivery before he karaokes his moderately successful radio jam from last summer, sending the crowd into a yawning frenzy of luke-warm apathy. This is live hip-hop? This is Star Search\u2026the audition round they have at yer local mall under the neon glow of Gyro Wrap and Panda Express while pregnant women with strollers attempt to cover the ears of their overfed youngsters and zit-licking teenagers with Metallica t-shirts, pocketfuls of stolen fake gold necklaces, and wind-up jumping penises from Spencer’s Gifts skulk around stoned saying shit like “hiz-souse” and “beeotch.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Cough.<\/span><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, MC Terrycloth Diaper’s posse is strutting around backstage\u2014which is really just a bunch of trailers screwed into a sidehill surrounded by cheap redwood decks\u2014and they’re yelling at a security guard outside the dressing room because the champagne’s not Korbel or some other bullshit. <\/span><\/p>\n

“You know who I am, mothafucka? You know who you fuckin’ wit?” says a fat kid dripping with gold, holding two bran muffins in each cheek and stuffing bananas in his pockets.<\/span><\/p>\n

“No, who am I fucking with?” said the security guard. “Please tell me.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“You fuckin’ wit Puppy Eyez. An’ less you really wanna make me mad, you gonna get on that little radio of yours and get us whatever it iz we bitchin’ about\u2026”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Are you on the bill today, sir?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“No, I ain’t on no mutherfukin’ bill.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“You’re not performing?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Hell, no.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Then get the fuck out of my face before you and your stupid friends are sitting out in the parking lot.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Man, fuck you!”<\/span><\/p>\n

And so ejected is another dumb kid who’s been watching too much television. Yes, little ones, you actually have to be a celebrity before you start acting as childish as one.<\/span><\/p>\n

Time to hit the Coleman in the van for another can of beer. <\/span><\/p>\n

The next performer whose name escapes me\u2014I suppose I shoulda taken notes, but that’s why I’m writing on this shitty website and not in Boring Stone\u2014tries to come on stage with forty of his closest friends, throwing a pouty chin of attitude when he finds out that there aren’t forty microphones to go around. He picks his eight top guys, like a kickball game at recess, “uh, you. You. You. No, not you. You.” And then he motions to the sound guy that only three of the mics should actually be turned on. Five of the dudes on stage are dancing, open mouthed, with dead microphones.<\/span><\/p>\n

Straight hardcore, yo.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then, about four songs into the performance, three guys from the group of forty who didn’t make the cut have somehow located their own mics and are trying to talk their way past the security guards so that they can hook up to the soundboard while their main man is in mid song. A fat, bald guard with arms like spoiled salamis holds them back. Apparently, the leader of the three doesn’t like to be touched and begins shouting dollar amounts paid for the various aspects of his slightly feminine sports outfit and, with a mental calculator of breathtaking acuity, begins to make loud statements about how long it would take a security guard to save enough funds to purchase a similarly feminine outfit on his own meager security guard wages. <\/span><\/p>\n

Straight hardcore, yo.<\/span><\/p>\n

Repeat this formula three more times. Who the fuck cares? The music is BAD. The sound is BAD. The performers are DICKHEADS. I grabbed two more beers and poured them into a big plastic cup, wandering back just in time to hear some piece of shit forcing the audience to chant his name before he’ll play his last song and vacate the stage.<\/span><\/p>\n

“What’s my name? Say my name! Say it! Everybody’s gotta say my name! Say it together! Together! My name! Do you know my name? Do I have to tell you my name? Who here knows my name? Then say it! My name! I ain’t gonna start the song until you say it! What’s my name?”<\/span><\/p>\n

I couldn’t take it. People had paid like $75 to get into this show. I was getting paid $250 and still felt ripped off. I had to get away from the stage. I went back to my tent, grabbed a book, and mentally prepared myself to eat more shit food. <\/span><\/p>\n

I looked at lunch. Same yucky hotdogs and same yucky hamburger pucks wheezing like sick farm animals on their steam trays. Half-eaten buns. Bacteria-riffic condiments. The mustard was floating an inch of gasoline, the ketchup contained someone’s fatal nosebleed. The relish was speaking French. The potato salad was chalked with drowning black flies. Someone had spilled a Coke into the potato chip bowl. Brownies topped with white flea powder. I had finally rid my body of most of the poison from the previous night. Laying the groundwork for any more rock-a-fire-Honey-Bucket-diarrhea explosions was out of the question. On the inside, those portable toilets were at least 200 degrees, full of methane, and shit levels were rising.<\/span><\/p>\n

Next door to the Mutilated Hall of Unnecessary Death, they were serving the “Good Lunch.” As Good Lunch is always preferable to Death Lunch, I walked towards the edible food but was stopped at the tent flap by a yawning teenage girl with stringy blonde hair and a clipboard who, completely impervious to my charm, demanded a meal ticket from me. Where does one get a meal ticket? The Command Trailer. All the way over there? On the other side of the security guards? Are those machine guns? Getting an edible lunch was beginning to feel like a drunken game of Resident Evil.<\/span><\/p>\n

I walked into the chaos of the command trailer, instantly spotting the busiest person: a harried kid drowning in lanyards and laminates that tangled down his black polo shirt as he barked archaic vernacular into a hissing headset. I stretched to my full height and girth and grunted, “I need a meal ticket. Now. I been on for six hours. I’m back on in twenty minutes.” <\/span><\/p>\n

He looked at my pass and shook his head, still barking like a seal into the tiny plastic mic extended before his frantic chapped lips. I remained in place, standing with my hand outstretched as he turned to face the other way. I walked to the other side of him and stuck my hand out again. He sighed, shoved his fist into a drawer, and handed me a red stub the size of a postage stamp. He dismissed me with an angry wave\u2026like I was gonna hang out in that trailer and bother him now that I had access to Good Lunch. <\/span><\/p>\n

I slunk away quickly, smugly presenting my ticket to the teenage girl and thus gaining entry to a crew-free, air-conditioned tent reserved for KUBE employees, industry scum, and all of their screaming kids. Oversized t-shirts, khaki shorts, pale knees, black shoes, pulled-up white socks. Jogging suits, frosted hair, prescription sunglasses. Straight off the street, yo. Yeah, Wall Street. Nice to see who’s really making money off of this shit.<\/span><\/p>\n

No comrades here. But there’s a taco bar. Which, in my mind, comes very close to a regular bar. I load up a plate with gray meat, gray chicken, gray beans, olives, lettuce, tomatoes, jalapenos, green onions, sour cream, two taco shells and two flour tortillas, ensuring my cute little beer belly will stick around for at least another month. Hot sauce? Tabasco. Tabasco? Tabasco ain’t hotsauce. Where’s the Tapatio? Then I overhear a mention of a salad bar. Salad bar! I load up over there too. I shoulda brought Tupperware. Or at least trashbags. Who knows when I’ll be around this much free food again\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

To counter the threat of friendly conversation, I pull out the book I brought. It’s extremely well written and boring enough to be used as a topical anesthetic. I’ve been trying to read huge-selling popular novels so the ones I write will attain at least slight coherency, but all the books I’ve picked up are deadly ninja sleep aids. Everything is Illuminated<\/em>? More like Everything is Making Me Want to Take a Nap<\/em>. Let’s hear it for another book about a New York City writer! And, if you can believe it, he’s Jewish! What interesting and completely undeveloped terrain! Sure, the guy can write circles around me, but his book doesn’t contain even one picture of him eating the world’s largest taco in record time. Which, in my mind, makes him a complete fucking fraud. <\/span><\/p>\n

Fearing that any lapse into sleep might result in waking up with a mid-level marketing position in an urban culture division, I shut the book and looked around, silently assigning appropriate medals to the 2004 Total Jackass Olympics to be held in Salt Lake City, Utah, Total Jackass Capitol of the World. <\/span><\/p>\n

“And the bronze goes to the middle-age public relations lady in the brand-new Public Enemy shirt for using ‘Da Bomb’ four times in once sentence! Think she’ll hang it from the rearview of her Hummer?” <\/span><\/p>\n

“The silver to the fat guy with the jeweled watch belching at the caterer because the chicken piccata is too dry. Dispatch desert runners to Wolfgang Puck’s nearest stripmall monstrosity! He’s in danger of consuming less than 10,000 calories in one sitting!”<\/span><\/p>\n

And then, as my eyes dart for the gold, MC Terrycloth Diapers walks through the flap, intercepted by the Teenage SS with access control to all of backstage’s non-poisonous consumables. Meal ticket? <\/span><\/p>\n

“I don’t need no meal ticket. You know who I am?” <\/span><\/p>\n

Our gold medallist? <\/span><\/p>\n

“Ladies and gentlemen, please honor our champion jackass! It’s been a long and hard competition, and we have so many contenders, but few can truly be called a Gold Medal Jackass\u2014”<\/span><\/p>\n

Then a little kid sitting at a table next to me sees him and runs over yelling, “Daaaddddyyyyyy!”<\/span><\/p>\n

T.D. scoops the kid up and puts him on his hip. “Did you see daddy on the stage?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Saw ya on the TV, dad. You were on the TV!”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Did you eat lunch yet?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Yeah.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“What did you eat?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Ice cream.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Anything else? You gotta eat something other than ice cream, lil’ man. Baby,” he said to a corn-rowed woman across the table from me having a conversation with someone’s manager, “did he get any real food?”<\/span><\/p>\n

Goddamn it. Stop being decent! It totally messes up the calibration on my patented Hatemaster 200 Advanced Ridicule Machine with Optional Self-Serving Cynicism Fins. I turn my gaze downward towards my salad in shame.<\/span><\/p>\n

I fucking love bacon bits.<\/p>\n

I shoveled down the food and walked back to the cooler for another beer. Chugged the last one. Sadness overtook me and, unable to deal with any more backstage purgatory, I pushed by a security guard and walked into the crowd. It was as bad as I figured it would be. Shirtless guys on crystal meth, Asian dance troupes. Much too much unwanted cleavage (OK, if you have more than two feet of cleavage you really need to go to the doctor. Seriously. Especially if you’re a man.)<\/span><\/p>\n

The oppressive stink of rancid french fries and body odor. Suntan lotion and body odor. Cigarette smoke and body odor. I shoved my way into the overcrowded beer garden. 24-ounce cans of Miller were $8.50. I had only enough cash for one more beer and felt stalagmites pierce my liver and spleen as I hit rock bottom. I staked out an ass-sized piece of grass on a trash-covered incline and watched four cholos wander around the beer garden and pick fights with guys smaller and fewer in number than them. A girl from Enumclaw in a Mariners visor showed us her droopy tits. A sunburned ox in Docker short-shorts lit up a cigar about six inches in front of my nose, proving that no matter how disgusting a 105-degree day feels, you can always count on your fellow humans to make it worse. <\/span><\/p>\n

Back to work. I pushed through more bodies, stepping on fingers whenever I could, and found the second stage. The festivities there had stopped. Time to load up the turntables, I guessed. I showed the guard my work pass and climbed up to the turntables, using a metal railing above a 50-gallon trashcan that, unbeknownst to me, was Sting Garden Central for cola-engorged wasps to congregate. Two stings on the back of my hand made the afternoon somehow complete. At least I’m not allergic.<\/span><\/p>\n

After packing up the first batch of turntables, I set off to find which piece-of-shit DJ stole the needle cartridges out of the arms. <\/span><\/p>\n

“Oh,” he said after I chased him down. “I thought they were mine. I have the same ones.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Great. I’ll be sure to tell the promoter that.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Eh, I would have stolen the needles too.<\/span><\/p>\n

By some accident, I got back in time for Ludacris’ set, the only highlight of the day. He was great. He fucking tore it up, good as any show I’d seen in a while. Running up and down the stage like a cross-eyed weasel, he was\u2014can’t believe I’m saying it\u2014entertaining? Even if Ludacris matched his competition for generic hip-hop costuming, all others sucked bloody kangaroo spines in comparison. Why? Maybe because he wasn’t a total shithead to an entire crew of laborers there to help him. Maybe because he was actually\u2014will he lose his ghetto pass for this?\u2014smiling and having fun. Maybe I just recognized more songs.<\/span><\/p>\n

But there was little time for further contemplation of the inverse mind puzzles presented by Ludacris. Drama was unfolding backstage. <\/span><\/p>\n

If you spend enough time in enough backstages (read: I’m cool and you’re not), you develop a sixth sense for impending disaster. Something bad goes down and it’s like stomping on an anthill and waiting for the humming hordes to swarm your shins from below. Trouble vibes fly from person to person like telekinetic insect signals. Of course, sometimes the trouble is as stupid as one of the acts refusing to play until they got paid. (God, I wish I woulda taken notes so I could name names.)<\/span><\/p>\n

Cut to a 105-degree day in an Eastern Washington desert. An embattled stage manager, attempting to keep a schedule at a huge summer rap festival, deals with a particularly distrustful musical ensemble.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager: <\/strong>You want a check.<\/span><\/p>\n

Band: <\/strong>Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager:<\/strong> Right now. Before you play.<\/span><\/p>\n

Band: <\/strong>Straight up. We gotta get paid.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager: <\/strong>You’re serious.<\/span><\/p>\n

Band:<\/strong> Do we look like we’re kidding?<\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager:<\/strong> No. Sorry. We’ll take care of it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stage manager walks down a ramp towards an intern with a clipboard.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager:<\/strong> These idiots want a check.<\/span><\/p>\n

Intern:<\/strong> I don’t think they’re written yet.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager:<\/strong> Tell Barry to write a check for these dipshits.<\/span><\/p>\n

Intern:<\/strong> Do they think we’re going to pull up the entire show and leave while they’re playing?<\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager:<\/strong> Just tell Barry to cut the fucking check. Now. <\/span><\/p>\n

To himself:<\/em> <\/span><\/p>\n

Stage Manager:<\/strong> Jesus Christ.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then…there are big emergencies\u2014like your headlining act not showing up.<\/span><\/p>\n

50 Cent. He hadn’t arrived yet. Thousands of angry youth in the crowd, sunburned, drunk, stoned, speeding, and chanting his name\u2014and Fitty was nowhere. Backstage, angry cavemen yelled into walkie-talkies while nervous interns shrieked at each other in shrill voices. The problem? There was a massive tractor-trailer wreck on I-90, Depressing Taco Memorial Highway\u2014the only road into the Gorge. 50 Cent was caught in the jam. Two hours away. He was scheduled to go on in 30 minutes. Darkness was threatening. You couldn’t cancel him. The place would explode. They had been chanting his name all day.<\/span><\/p>\n

The promoters vied for time. If you attended KUBE’s summer jam, you would have witnessed an onstage dance competition, which morphed perfectly into a backstage security situation as the contestants who should have been ushered back into the crowd made a break for the dressing rooms.<\/span><\/p>\n

Purely a time killer meant to distract you.<\/span><\/p>\n

More videos on the Jumbotron. The stage manager was pacing back and forth, chewing his wrist like a starving zoo hyena. “Anyone got ideas?” <\/span><\/p>\n

“Maybe we could play a movie on the Jumbotron. Krush Groove or something,” said a woman. <\/span><\/p>\n

“Nah, legal would freak. We gotta stall. Anything else?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“We could get a DJ from the second stage,” I suggested, getting a ‘fuck you who the hell is this guy’ look from the stage manager, who then softened and smirked.<\/span><\/p>\n

“OK. Find one,” he said. His walkie-talkie blooped in his hand and he spoke to the voice on the other end. “Yeah, I’ll authorize it. Send the helicopter for him.” <\/span><\/p>\n

While I went to find the DJ who let me borrow the test record, helicopters were dispatched for 50 Cent.<\/span><\/p>\n

I found the DJ sitting on his records by the metal detectors. Even though he was a performer, he didn’t have the clearance to get backstage. What bullshit! The beer distributor’s daughter and all her friends were all sitting on the mainstage and giggling with their full-access passes, and this kid couldn’t even score an extra ticket to the show. Just 20 minutes in front of 200 people at the second stage, that’s it. He looked bored out of his skull, probably just waiting by the fence for someone famous to walk by.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Thanks for letting me borrow that record earlier,” I said.<\/span><\/p>\n

“No problem. Hey, you think you could get me backstage?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Yeah,” I told him. “But you gotta spin in front of 40,000 people.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“What?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“Grab your records. Let’s go.”<\/span><\/p>\n

He ran out onto the stage with his crate of records, set them by the turntable, and threw both his arms in the air. The crowd, probably assuming 50 Cent was next, went crazy. He put his headphones on, cued the record, and a huge grin spread across his face. <\/span><\/p>\n

Even the stage manager, his entire production crumbling around him, laughed at the DJ’s glazed smile. “Jeez. You think that kid’s stoked?” <\/span><\/p>\n

He spun for a half hour before they physically pulled him from the stage. There were more dumb videos.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then, as the sun set behind the stage, the crowd began to realize they were being fucked with. The crowd did not like being fucked with.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Fit-De-Cent! Fit-De-Cent! Fit-De-Cent! Fit-De-Cent!”<\/span><\/p>\n

Teeth gnashed. Portfolios plummeted. Guards greased their slivered batons with fear-induced palm sweat. They pushed their face shields down and turned to face the spiraling mob. Snipers took their posts in the rafters of the stage and brought their crosshairs upon the largest men of the front row. Our financial rulers aimed their SUVs towards the exits, ready to let us battle the plebeians whilst they counted their coinboxes in the safe isolation of the scorpion-laden desert. We locked the children into PA crates, whispering our prayers of peace and silence to calm their frantic tears as we clasped the latches on their hinges. We, warriors, knotted our penises in preparation for combat. Virgins tentatively opened their legs. On the prerecorded telephone commands of celebrated action-director John Woo, four thousand doves were released into the air from a makeshift steeple whilst the youngest man amongst us chanted spells of protection from his Bible, his hand shaking as he lifted a submissive fist towards the heavens, asking our savior to, if nothing else, let us all die with honor.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then, as the twilight clouds broke and a single beam of yellow sunlight broke our eyes, a white rental van screeched into the backstage lot. Two HUGE bodyguards came out with hands in their jackets, psyching themselves for a run\u2014possibly the first such activity in their entire obese lives. Fitty was out of the van behind them. Bald, with a boyish face and shirtless under a white cotton jacket, he didn’t seem nearly as stressed as the chumps around him. He laughed into his fist as some frantic female coordinator rattled off a bunch of nonsense at him. He was more than smooth. He was smoov.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Yeah. Yeah. Whatever. Let’s do it. I wanna go.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Formation set, his crowd sprinted up the ramp that led to the stage. A soundman slapped a mic in Fitty’s hand. The lights were cut. The DJ ran out and took his place behind the turntables. Fitty strutted front and center and put his hands on his hips. White lights were brought full house.<\/span><\/p>\n

The entire Gorge went apeshit.<\/span><\/p>\n

Except for the huge cannon shots that ended each song, it sounded awful. But the mob ate it up and sang along and all riots were averted. Jumbotron big, 50 Cent was ripped and lookin’ great, if a tad oily. And there was no attitude. No lame posing. Dude was pure hardcore. He didn’t have to pretend to be anything. You could see it in his face. It didn’t say, “Hey y’all gotta give this street thug some muthafuckin’ respect.” It was more like, “Holy shit, five years ago I was eating frozen chicken gizzards out of cardboard boxes and huffing shoplifted spraypaint from Home Depot and NOW I’M FUCKING RICH AS HELL, NECK DEEP IN PUSSY, AND ALL THESE PEOPLE LOVE ME!” Seriously, he was one happy guy. And he should be. Good for him. <\/span><\/p>\n

It still sounded like shit.<\/span><\/p>\n

Too much sun, completely dehydrated and oversleepy, I waited alongside the crew for the stupid music to stop so I could load up the van and drive those hours back to Seattle.<\/span><\/p>\n

With the end in sight, a feeling of calm came over us all. I sat on a crate, swinging my feet and kicking the box’s black front with my heels. Next to me was a lumberjackish man with a Wilford Brimley mustache.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Can’t stand this rap shit,” he said, taking off his hat and wiping his forehead.<\/span><\/p>\n

“It’s giving you a job,” I said.<\/span><\/p>\n

He spit on the ground. “If not this shit, then it’s something else. All the shows I do suck. Except for CCR. That’s a fucking band. Nice guys, too.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Fitty continued to talk from stage. He should probably fire his speechwriters. “I been all over the world,” he said. “I been to Holland\u2026and Tokyo\u2026and England\u2026and Amsterdam\u2026and Japan\u2026and y’alls the best crowd ever!”<\/span><\/p>\n

Whoa. Holland and Amsterdam. Tokyo and Japan. You should have visited Europe, The Netherlands, Asia, and Nippon while you were at it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Mustache can’t let the comment pass either. “I can barely keep my kids in shoes,” he grumbled, “and this piece of shit has been to Tokyo and<\/em> Japan?”<\/span><\/p>\n

“That’s a good point,” I said. I dug in my backpack. I had something to offer. I made the most sincere face I could muster and asked, “You wanna buy some homemade absinthe?”<\/span><\/p>\n

====<\/span><\/p>\n

Answers to Emails:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Yes, Digital Underground did play. They opened the show. I’m sure they were great. I was off working at the second stage and didn’t catch them. I got nothing against the group, although they Dflo’ed away with one of my keyboard stands, lied about it, and then left it hidden in one of the dressing rooms\u2026the tracking down of which added another hour to my day. No hard feelings, though.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Here’s my proof, fucker. A million dollars, huh? Go ahead and send it to the PO Box, Mr. Nathan “I freeze my own urine and use it for margaritas” Stenson.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

3. Yes, I’m a racist. I’m a big fucking racist. I hate all blacks because my ancestors\u2014who came from Norway and Mexico\u2014are genetically superior to any person who came from Africa and, for that matter, any country that isn’t Norway or Mexico…because you know what GREAT musical legacies my countries have laid down. (I’m thinking Emperor, Burzum, Mortiis, Brujera, and Os Mutantes here. Period.) You’re right. Because I don’t embrace and smooch some bigass sell-out musical money-making blowjob festival, I totally HATE all black music, and, by that extension, all black culture. Yes, my friend of tender sensibilities, you’re right! It’s all about race, right? I mean anytime you make fun of anything where black people are involved, it’s not because there is true bullshit involved…it’s because of racism. It has nothing to do with SHITTY ARTISTS and TOTAL FUCKING PRICKS acting like COMPLETE ASSHOLES when they should be stoked that people want to listen to their music. I mean, black people aren’t suffering artists or computer nerds or romantic fuckups or punk rockers or intellectual lovers or doting parents or crushing debaters or literary geniuses or pissed idealists or nihilistic drunks or lost souls or concerned citizens or boring shitworkers or yammering sportsfans or conservative middle-management pinheads or normal everyday people like you and me. They’re TENDER and SPECIAL and they CAN’T UNDERSTAND SATIRE directed against IDIOTS who happen to share the same race. Like when I say Donald Rumsfeld is a LYING, CYNICAL PIECE OF SHIT whose abstract, aristocratic concepts have KILLED THOUSANDS OF INNOCENT PEOPLE, now I have to apologize to all the white folks, right? Because any time I criticize anybody whose blood comes from Northern Europe, it’s because I’m judging all white people. Right?<\/span><\/p>\n

Thank God that after 250 years of slavery and another 100 years of brutal repression coupled with systematic disenfranchisement and institutionalized debasement, those poor, helpless African Americans have a grad student like you to defend them. Hopefully you will keep speaking up in areas where they (I can use “they” because you feel that all non-crackers move with a unified spirit) have expressed absolutely no concern. And, yes, strange puritan of obviously loftier backgrounds than mine (to tell from the Ivy League school in your email address), thanks for pointing out my privileged white (tan, actually) existence. You continue on with your $45,000-a-year Master’s Degree in Lit Theory with emphasis in Third World Studies. I’ll just kick back, keep writing, and relax in my Lexus Hot Tub…flipping on the plasma while I eat my 579,842,759, 573,956,748,574,344,985,092,456,662,975,968th bag of ramen noodles. Crack an egg in! Add some frozen peas! Half a can of tuna! It’s a meal, yo!<\/span><\/p>\n

Duh, the cool kids don’t even notice race anymore. We just kiss and have sex with each other. Why do I even have to say this?<\/span><\/p>\n

====<\/span><\/p>\n

Whoa, it’s been awhile\u2014again! This time it’s really not my fault. The city of Seattle just announced that it’s going to join the rest of the civilized world and recognize same sex marriages\u2026and within the day the entire fabric of society collapsed. With the institution of marriage vandalized and decimated, the family as we knew it crumbled from existence, my neighbor soon after marrying a musk ox, my sister proposed to me, and then huge gashes opened up in the Earth’s crust down near Westlake Mall and we all beheld a pale horse in front of the Cinerama whose rider was named Death. Luckily my dues were still paid up for the Christian Patriot Militia Assembly and Supper Club. Tracking the sodomites down by wedding registries at Williams Sonoma, we traced them to their tasteful condominiums and massacred them pair by pair to make our God happy. Then we bombed some museums to glorify the name of Jesus Christ, and then we outlawed abortion and rap music and installed mandatory born-again prayer hour in school and ALL THE WORLD’S PROBLEMS SOLVED THEMSELVES AND WE ALL GOT OUR MANUFACTURING JOBS BACK!<\/span><\/p>\n

So now, patriotism and heterosexuality intact, I’m back and ripping through the first draft of my next novel\u201490% finished and doing my best not to look at my bank account\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Which is being helped by sales of Just Another Empire<\/a><\/em>. Again, thanks to anyone who bought a copy, and especially anyone who’s coming back to buy more copies. The supply is getting smaller and, unless I win the lottery or find another job\u2014each equally likely\u2014I don’t think I’ll be reprinting for a while. Though I’ve talked to some voices on the other ends of phones and I’d love nothing more than to send 400 books out the door, my maggot sense keeps going berserk; I’m not going to go into debt on faraway promises. I figure 1,000 books sold is a cool number.<\/span><\/p>\n

Class War Update: Laid off workers all fired up<\/a>!<\/span><\/p>\n

Also, I’m looking at getting certified to teach English to immigrants. Anyone teach God’s favorite language to dirty, disease-ridden foreigners for a living? Seems a little more fulfilling than writing catalog copy for DigiFuck Intl. But maybe I’m just being a na\u00efve again. You know us idealists…we never know when to sell out. <\/span><\/p>\n

Anyone with any experience here is encouraged to write: driver@blindwino.com.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Death To All Who Oppose Us,
\nDriver<\/span><\/p>\n

Hey Freeloader! <\/span>Buy a book!<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kill Myself or Die Tryin’ or I Was a Turntable Tech for 50 Cent, Pt. 3 By Mark Driver (note: I know a lot of people bookmarked this page to avoid the former huge interface. There is, however, a new interface with a daily blog i started. check it out!) Next it’s the pathetic hangers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":62,"menu_order":6,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-21","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/21","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/21\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/62"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blindwino.cyberphreak.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}