I have this theory about why so many marriages fail.  Actually, I have several theories (please refer to Why Marry? and Why Marry? continued)…

So, one of my other theories has to do with the way we treat weddings- as a society:

• When a couple decides to marry, they throw an engagement party (yay!)
• The pending matrimony is announced in the newspapers (fame!)
• Then, sometime before the wedding, someone throws another party for the Bride (yay!)
• As well, someone throws a party for the Groom (hurray!)
• The couple instructs everyone what gifts to buy them by registering at their favorite stores (presents!)
• All the girls go buy pretty new dresses!  And shoes!  And sticky bras (yay x3!)
• Professional primpers are brought in to make sure everyone looks flawless (glamor!)
• A professional picture person is hired to capture every glorious moment (paparazzi!)
• Exclusive transportation is retained so the captivating couple can travel in style (yay!)
• A fabulous mountain of pre-approved gifts grows as guests enter the reception (yay!)
• Mr. and Mrs. X dance the night away among their adoring friends and family (awww!)
• The big hurrah is followed up with an extravagant honeymoon- romance abounds (woo hoo!)

… But that’s not what marriage is about.

The special day comes and goes.  Mr. and Mrs. X return from their honeymoon to a mountain of bills, the obligation to write 231 thank-you cards, work, expectations, 3 sets of dishes, 2 blenders, 4 coffee makers, a new Family Roster, and a bunch of people asking when the “bun” will be put in the “oven”.

By the time the former Bride gets around to posting their overpriced pictures on Facebook, the rest of the world has moved on and the few compliments she gets pale in comparison to the droves of people who turned out to worship her on her wedding day.  And now the former Groom’s friends want him to tell them about the bikini-clad blondes he saw on the beach… And soon the wife is nagging her husband to pick his wet towels off the bathroom floor… Where did all the good times go?

The way we do marriage, we are set up for failure.  Think about it: the cake, the toasts, the fantasy-coming-true… Nothing gets any better than that!  At least, not with a typical All-American Material Mindset.  It’s all downhill from there…

Ah, but I’d like to propose a solution:  a change in procedures, to ensure a more realistic outlook and firm commitment from the participants.  I’d like to suggest that couples who plan to wed be required to give away 50% of their money and possessions.  This act of charity will not only benefit those less fortunate, it will also cut down on the excess of coffee makers at the new marital homestead.  Additionally, it exhibits a willingness to sacrifice for your mate- an imperative component of any stable marriage.  Furthermore, I’d like to introduce a new ceremony:  the ceremonial fist fight in which the happy couple beats the hell out of each other while their friends and families are free to observe, cheer and throw things.  I realize this sounds harsh… but really, don’t people end up doing a lot worse to each other in a metaphorically similar forum as they tread through a less-than-blissful existence together?  (think of the phone calls to Mom, the arguments in front of the kids and the time you threw that wine bottle…).  No party afterward- no parties allowed until the one year anniversary.  Then go for broke- after it’s earned.

Under my New Plan, couples would think seriously before initiating or accepting a marriage proposal.  They would start out with less stuff—meaning, they’d need to work together to provide for each other.  They would begin their journey broken and bruised- learning immediately the importance of apologies and healing wounds instead of carving new ones.  Let’s start with the hard stuff and celebrate the actual accomplishments.  Really- it makes sense, doesn’t it?

Coincidentally enough, my mom just announced her own engagement.  While she doesn’t doubt the intelligence behind my theories, she is not interested in the style of ceremony advocated above.

My Swollen Left Eye

I finally hit forty thousand words on my NaNoWriMo novel. Admittedly it seems that life has gotten in the way of me reaching fifty thousand before the twentieth, as I hoped I would. Nevertheless, I am still content with having ten days to write ten thousand words.

My victory over the forty thousand word limit came with some bitterness, though. I went to a friends party last night and ended up getting into a fist fight with a guy I use to know in high school. Not sure who won, though he was bleeding and I was not. Unfortunately, I woke up this morning with my left eye swollen. I couldn’t open it initially but the swelling went down eventually. Now it’s better, but red as hell. I’m just happy it didn’t bruise.

I promise, I’m not usually a violent man. Truthfully, I haven’t been in a fight since I was in high school. It was sort of fun in some strange way. I miss getting into fights. I know it must sound strange, but there is something archaic and yet brilliantly fun about breaking someone’s nose. We all have that little cavemen in us that craves violent and carnage. I’d be more worried if I went out looking for fights.

-Irish

Did you know that every day that I have a fight?  I have a fight with myself.  No some of you may automatically think like me and picture Jim Carey beating himself up in the bathroom in the movie “Liar, Liar”.  I want you to know that is not what I am talking about.  I don’t know if I could literally give my self a right cross to the face.

What I am talking about is that every day I fight myself the side of me that wants to do what I want and not what God wants.  I fight with the way that I spend my money, the way that I talk to my wife and kids, I even fight with weather or not I want to even spend time with Jesus and His word.  Because you know what it would be much better if I just slept in at least a half hour.  I deserve that don’t I?  I believe that this fight is what leads to affairs, divorces, abuse, addiction, and the loss of our families.  I even believe this fight is what is allowing men to stop leading the families that God has called them to lead.

Galatians 5:17 (NLT) “the old sinful nature loves to do evil, which is opposite from what the Holy Spirit wants.  And the Spirit gives us desires that are opposite from what the sinful nature desires.  These two forces are constantly fighting each other, and your choices are never free from this conflict.”

We are always going to be at odds with ourselves.  We are always going to be virtually in a fist fight with ourselves over what we are to do or not do in this life and our choices will always have some conflict.  But there is hope.  There is a way to deal with this fight.  It is to trust in the complete work of Jesus Christ.  It is to know that the distractions of this life were nailed to the cross and crucified.  We need to seek to learn from the greatest fighter that ever walked this planet, Jesus.

Let’s learn to fight and fight with the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ, because that will only be the way that you will ever be able to defeat, YOU!

I was working counter handout today when I noticed that three guys were getting into a rather heated verbal argument. It was one guy, who I will call “the jerk” versus two other guys who I will call “the drama kings.” One of the drama kings was an older gentleman and probably deaf. The other drama king was much younger, possibly the older drama king’s son. From what I could gather, the jerk did something disrespectful to the older drama king and the drama kings totally overreacted and started getting in the jerk’s face. Once they started throwing F-bombs, I called my manager over. The guys all went thier seperate ways and the conflict was temporarily resolved. The jerk got his food first and sat down in a booth with his girlfriend, who I will call “the most annoying girl EVER.” A few minutes later, the drama kings get thier food to go and as they walk by the booth where the jerk and the most annoying girl EVER are sitting, one of the drama kings punches the jerk in the face. Next thing I know, there is a full blown fist fight right in the middle of our dining room. Every employee and every cusotmer and a perfect view of these three guys going at it. Drinks and food where everywhere, the older drama king got knocked to the ground and I think a random customer got in on the action for no apparent reason. O ya, and we can’t forget the most annoying girl EVER who is screaming and calling names and only doing things to make it worse. Ironically, she was really the only person who deserved to be punched in the face and no one even touched her. Unfortunate. After what seemed like forever but was really only about 20 seconds, our male employees realize that this will just escalate if they don’t step in. So they go out there and pull the guys off each other and the drama kings jump into their car and book it. That’s right, it was a total punch and run. The jerk and the most annoying girl ever of course stayed to talk to the police and do everything they could to make sure the drama kings got arrested. It might work, my manager did take down the license plate number, but honestly, do you really want to mess with two random guys who are willing to punch you in the face just because you did something minorly disrespectful to them? Just let it go, people. All that to say, I was super stoked about the fight. Ridiculous and crazy customers are what keep me coming back to this job day after day. I’m a sucker for a great story

Balloon Boy Neighbor Fistfights with Media Outside Richard Heene’s Home

From The AP: A fight broke out between a neighbor of Balloon Boy’s Richard Heene and some members of the media

In the 1960s artists such as Janis Joplin and The Band toured across Canada on the rail carrier VIA. The artists would play venues in the cities along the rail route and would also perform intimate acoustic sets on the train.

Fresh off his recent performance at Pop Montreal, Jon McKiel is resurrecting this “green” mode of touring as he heads out on his own VIA sponsored rail tour. Jon will perform in seven cities along the rail route as do daily acoustic shows on the train. The tour will finish in Jon’s home province with a performance at Nova Scotia Music Week.

While out on tour, Jon will be dropping by the CBC on October 23rd to do an interview with Tariq Hussain. During the interview Jon will discuss the recording of his new record tentatively titled “Tonka War Cloud.” The record, which is nearing completion, is being engineered by Diego Medina and will be released in early 2010. Jon recently did a live acoustic video for the first single off the record, “Fist Fight.” The tour dates and the “Fist Fight” video can be checked out here:

Oct 17 2009 Calgary, Alberta (Local 522)
Oct 18 2009 Calgary, Alberta (Local 510 matinee show)
Oct 21 2009 Victoria, British Columbia (Dab gallery)
Oct 22 2009 Tofino, British Columbia (Maquinna pub)
Oct 23 2009 Kelowna, British Columbia (Streaming cafe)
Oct 29 2009 Waterloo, Ontario (Trepid house)
Oct 30 2009 Wakefield, Quebec (Black Sheep Inn)
Nov 06 2009 Yarmouth, Nova Scotia (Nova Scotia Music Week)

JON MCKIEL – Fist Fight – from Mitch Fillion on Vimeo.

Do Progressives need to learn how to fight? Progressives (and I count myself among them) do fight, it’s just that too often the fight is among ourselves.

Meanwhile, the opposition goes to town. Whether it’s the birthers, tea parties, or disrupting town hall meetings, the Right acts…and we react.

I’ve seen a lot of media about why progressives, liberals, whatever…always seem to be on the back foot. All I know is, it’s time for that to change.

Progressives in the US stand to lose the battle over healthcare reform because there was no unified game plan ahead of time to fight for what we wanted (single payer, universal care). And I guarantee you, whether reform is passed or not, conservatives will claim victory. And well they should. They were better organized.

It’s true they hijacked the discussion on healthcare with half truths, faulty rhetoric, and straight up lies.

And no one, least of all me, wants to match them lie for lie. I don’t think progressives have to go that way. Yet the infrastructure they’ve built to spread their doctrine on a number of issues (the stimulus will bankrupt America, Obama was born in Kenya, the death panels) merits some scrutiny.

Believe it or not, I receive some of their stuff via e-mail. One thing you realize right off the bat. Conservatives never admit defeat. When the stimulus bill passed, they didn’t waste time with recriminations or blame passing. They told their followers, “you made a difference”. And then prepared them for the next battle. Sure, there may be some behind the scenes finger pointing, but when you’re fighting and fundraising at the same time, it pays to give the rank and file a sense of purpose.

Progressives can learn from this. The most important lesson, in my humble judgment, is to act rather than react. We can make fun of birthers and hostile healthcare reform opponents, but our message gets lost. The fact that, with few exceptions, there was little vocal presence in favor of single payer at most town halls to date points up the depth of the problem.

WE NEED TO LEARN HOW TO FIGHT!

That means fighting to win, and fighting not with fists, but ideas for the long term health of the nation. We are engaging in battle on the enemy’s terms when we don’t stake out clear positions and act on them before they do.

We also need to fight with every means at our disposal. That means, and I’ve said this many times before, engaging progressive people of color on a level we don’t now see. We have groups of white progressives, black progressives, Latino progressives, etc.

How about groups of integrated progressives? They are out here, believe me. If Barack Obama’s election is to mean anything in the long run, more groups of integrated progressive Americans need to be formed, and plans to take the fight to our opposition put in place.

Or am I just nuts? You tell me.

From: Wanted to Trade RP, the WoW blog I contribute to. This was written by Hillary:

I’m going to post a quick story, though, that I may eventually fiction out as an in character exchange, but for the time being, our readers should enjoy the absolute asskickery that is our author Bricu. The Feathermoon folks gathered at a park mid-Seattle. There were burgers, watermelon slices, salads, soda, and all around awesome food. Mid-meal, a gentleman that later identified himself as Grizzly walked up with a boombox propped on his shoulder. It was INCREDIBLY LOUD. One of our attendees had small children about, and respectfully requested that Grizzly lower the volume to not disupt the kids. This was about the time Grizzly’s intoxicated status became evident. We’re pretty sure he wasn’t on booze, but whatever it was, he was pretty fucked up. He began to rant how the park was his domain, we should RESPECT HIM, and then he started standing on picnic tables, his boombox on his shoulder, blazing awesome-tastic radio edited hiphop. Bricu tried to talk him down, but to no avail; Grizzly would have none of it.

After about ten or fifteen minutes of rudeness and disruption with most of our attendees incredibly uncomfortable by this stranger’s presence (he was not very subtle when he scoped out the lady’s purses), we called the Seattle police. Grizzly did not like police. Grizzly was shit out of luck because we’d had enough. As his sour mood and antics escalated, so did our calls to the authorities. He knocked over a trash barrel, started punching lit grills, and then got into people’s faces trying to intimidate them. To his credit, he was successful on the intimidation account. I was one of the folks that he decided to talk shit to, and it wasn’t fun. None of us had any idea who this guy was or what he was capable of. All we knew was he was ON something and hostile.

Thirty minutes passed, then forty, and still no PD. Our calls to 911 revealed that public disruption wasn’t an emergency situation and they’d get there when they could. Well, then Grizzly hit someone. He walked up to the chillest person there, slapped him across the face for absolutely NO REASON and talked a bunch of smack. He then swung on Tarquin, the event’s organizer. Bricu stuck himself between the men, yelled at him to stop. Grizzly took a couple of swings at him, Bricu Matrixed out with a pair of dodges, and then single shot him onto the pavement with a crack to the jaw. The nerd pigpile happened at that point – Bricu sat on his back, another gentleman restrained his arms while yet another sat on his legs. Another 911 call yielded the desired results, and the PD showed up about four or five minutes later.

I think perhaps my favorite part of this whole debaucle was Zalbuu, the Wildfire Rider’s angry priest. He was the guy sitting on Grizzly’s legs as we waited for the police. While he had this dude pinned, his cell phone rang. He picked it up, and all the rest of us can hear?

“Mom, this really isn’t a good time.”

And despite all this–and my right hook–I’m not settled with this. I haven’t hit another person–excluding my brother–since the 7th grade. I do not believe in violence. I really don’t. I cannot for the life of me think of a better way to have handled this. Grizzly got upset when I moved the cherries we had laid out away from him. If we started packing all of the food, he would have gotten more upset. There were kids there when he started (thankfully, before the slap, they were taken to a car so they didn’t have to see this). We called the Police. Hell, I called the police five times.

He could have had a gun or a knife. He could have really hurt someone. I jumped in because I thought I could take a punch better than my friend. I doubt I could have handled a stabbing….

There is another problem here that I am struggling with. I feel pretty good about the punch itself. It was one punch–the pig pile had other restraints and holds involved–and that’s a pretty damn macho thing. The base, reptilian part of my brain thinks that’s really cool. I’m old enough (and mature enough) to know it isn’t. What it means is that despite all of the skills I have developed at working with people, I had to resort to a method that doesn’t sit well.

My Dad always said “You never start a fight, but you always finish one.” I finished one. I still don’t feel good about it.

prickly fingertip satellites
orbit quickly today
around my heart
bumping my brain,
releasing rogue pheromones
that gallop off into the sunset
before i even get a chance
to decode the trigger.

Whilst in the archives, I grabbed out my random guy getting taken for a ride on Centre St in Hillcrest. The younger man started a fist fight as I was walking by. I pulled out my handy dandy Canon and started shooting. He even looks up at me while giving the old guy a bloody lip. I must say, when he wouldn’t let go of the car, as it drove away, I was in shock. I forgot I was even taking pictures, then grabbed one as they drove past me. The younger man’s legs dangling in the street. Kiddies, don’t do drugs, please.

*** All images have been taken by Melody Hall and are copyright.

On a somewhat personal note, we really struggled this past month with whether or not to play competitive soccer once again.  If you’ve been following our twitter feed, you might already have known that.

Its been a few years since we last played and last summer we almost got involved again.  This past month has revisited the trials and tribulations of what soccer means to us as the same opportunity to play has arose.  We are passionate about the game.  We have the time to play.  But this summer doesn’t seem in the cards either.  First off, the price of $200 to join is about $100 too much for what we think its worth.  Also, the fear of the unknown is also a bit of the problem here since we’ll be joining a crew that we know nothing about and if you knew why we left the game in the first place, you’d understand our apprehension.

We were playing in a “fun” league that was getting borderline serious ofver the course of the season.  The teams and play was getting more and more intense as the season went along.  This was hampering the “fun” factor for us as we were simply involved for some competitive good times on the pitch while trying to stay in shape.  The final straw involved a match with a fist fight on the field that had some serious blows.  Then another incident involving players spitting at each other.  Where had the “fun”gone?  Woodpeck left after that match and hasn’t looked back yet. 

The itch to play is still there.  Our fitness is top notch though our skill set understandably is getting rusty.  If there’s a fit out there that doesn’t cost us an arm and a leg, we’ll hopefully find it.  Close to getting us back into the beautiful game. Close.

Waking up is a fist fight. Or a forced march. Or a hangover.

It starts at 6:30 when it’s still dark. I’ve slept four, maybe five hours. Sally has slept three. Snurp is on my chest, kneading, purring, drooling. I roll over to escape, and he bounds off the bed towards the door and meows. He’s ready to go outside.

Eli, the four year old, appears.

“Dad, dad” he whispers. “I brought you two race cars.”

“Eli, it’s 6:40,” I grunt. “I’m not playing race cars right now.”

Slade grunts, too, and starts smacking. The baby is hungry. And it’s still dark. And I’m still exhausted.

Christ.

Chuck, 100 pounds of lazy canine, appears. He’s breathing on me and wagging his tail, which is going thump, thump, thump as it whacks into the wall.

“Go away,” I command forcefully, and Chuck slowly moves away undisturbed.

But my elevated voice, and all the commotion, does disturb the border collie, Wiley. I can tell because he’s itching. He does that when he’s nervous. His tags clink as he itches. Clink, clink, clink.

“Wiley,” Sally yells, “Stop it.” He obeys. Wiley always obeys.

Snurp is meowing again. Sally lobs a pillow at him, which doesn’t deter Snurp, who is soon back on the bed, purring, kneading, drooling, and meowing.

Eli returns.

“Mom, mom,” he says. “I’m hungry. What’s for breakfast?” Sally tells him it’s too early, that we’re still trying to sleep, that he needs to go play with race cars in his room. And he does, for three minutes.

Slade, who has been nursing quietly, starts grunting. This time it’s gas. He rips one and then another and then another as loud as a grown man.

Eli returns.

“Dad, dad. I brought you five race cars.” He dumps them on the bed.

Wiley itches and Snurp meows and Chuck’s tail goes thump, thump, thump, and I give in. I get out of bed.

It’s not even 7:00, it’s still dark, and I feel like I’ve been slugged in the stomach.

Christ.

I need a bucket of coffee.

Yea, its real, true, and disgusting. Some chick was on stage and she was on there for a hot ass minute and gets mad and pushes her. Its best you fast forward the shit to like 1:50 but if you want to get to where he actually punches her, fast forward to 1:56. His rapping was horrible but  I had to wait and seen when he did it so I can put that in this blog. This fuck is fucking horrible and this just adds onto my reason to why I find Gucci Lame disgusting. Wait I mean Gucci Mane. This fuck needs to crawl under a rock. That is what security is for when you’re performing. So he pushes her then punches her like pushing her wasn’t enough.

What’s more fucked up is that that was one of his fans. I’ve been saying this shit all this sick fuck don’t give A DAMN about his fans, just like Lil’ Lame, I mean Lil’ Wayne. I don’t even think Lil’ Wayne would punch his fans.

So this is what you bitches like, a woman beater? He mauls his fans all because she was on stage? Yea the stupid bitch got fly but he did not have to go to the extremities in punching the ho’ in her face after pushing her. Pushing her wasn’t even right, all he had to do which he didn’t even have to do was pick her up and sit put her down there with the rest of his fans. Well I guess he don’t care about one less fan, well its probably more than just one. I hope justice serves for the fuck cause regardless if she was on stage or not, she did not put her hands on him so he didn’t even have to go that far.

If this is what the rap and hip-hop industry feel is a way to get an image then, they got life all fucked up. Gucci Mane is a sad, disgusting, fuck. If you a fan, I could give a fuck about how you feel right now. Kick rocks.

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So..I saw the Kid Rock fight and have only a few things to say about it.  First thing, Kid Rock kicks ass for being in a waffle house.  Actually..Kid Rock sucks but Waffle House is the king of diners.  The amount of ass you can pull out of Waffle House is endless..I once had this 45 year old woman from Arkansas going down on me in a Waffle House bathroom…amazing, especially when you can have breakfast and sex at the same time.  Have you ever gone down on a girl while licking syrup and egg whites off of a woman’s vijay-jay and then having her give you a blumpkin with her aluminum fronts on.  Out of this fucking world y’all.

Secondly, Kid Rock fights like a girl with no arms trying to tie her shoe.  Fucking classic!!! I would bet that Screech Powers would roll up Kid Rock, tea bag him, then bend him over and show him who the REAL Uncle Cracker is…No wonder why Pam Anderson left him, it gets old fucking Kid rock in the Ass.

I’ve gotten rid of George which is fantastic. I very calmly explained to him that I just couldn’t handle the stress of a relationship while working at this high stress level job. In reality, work is easy. And as soon as I find someone who’s not lame, I’ll be dating again.

In other news, I missed a killer fist fight last night. Wayne and Blake beat the shit out of each other. It’s been happening every so often since they broke up. Why they still talk when they seem to do nothing but fight is beyond me. The problem is, Blake is still in love with Wayne while Wayne can’t make up his mind. One week he’s telling me how much he loves and misses Blake and the next week he’s telling me about how he never loved Blake and certainly doesn’t now. I think I need to get more straight guy friends. For one thing, there’s less drama, and for another, straight guys know other straight guys. Gay guys, not so much.

• We got an APT in Lubbock now.
• She punched my face…
• My head + my pillow = The Great Sleep
• Who know La would win it.
• A cig tastes great in the morning!

Four days from the Scarlot Harlot’s Birthday on January 23, 2003 in Austin,  Tx, Dave Attel visited the Bad Girls, Good Women for his Comedy Central show Insomniac. The night before filming, some folks came to scout the situation. At this time I was one of the few people who actually knew who this guy was and my biggest fear is that he would be a big asshole or prima donna. David Cross had been a huge asshole to me one night at EMO’S. I wasn’t really sure who Cross was in the dark club but noticed everyone was buzzing around him. He snubbed me celebrity style when I tried to make small talk. I also saw Kyle Gass from Tenacious D play that same night.

I could NOT stand for Dave Attel to be on his high horse. He didn’t show up with the scouting crew so feared he might be somewhere getting a pedicure and and having his chihuahua fitted in a silk kimono rather than chain smoking, hanging out all night taking shots, telling sex jokes to weirdos and night owls. 

Just saw a rerun of the Insomiac Austin Episode.  Long story short. Attell showed up hooted and hollered and had a grand ole time. Being a roller derby fighting nut, I attacked him from behind. HEe hee. He started it! @#$%!!!  I punched him a few times and then it all turned around and he was choking me. It was a very Andy Kaufman moment for me. (This clips shows me Kaufman taught the Scarlot Harlot a thing or two about shit talking.)  Almost seems like Dave and  Scarlot Harlot  went to the roller derby fighting prom. He definitely didn’t have a Cross moment, not even when we broke his microphones. Uh…I mean 2 microphones.

Scarlot Harlot always wants to be on the cover of a badass rock magazine but being on the main menu of Comedy Central’s web page for a whole day was AWESOME!!! The party we had when the Insomniac   Premiered that shook the foundation of Ego’s. Too bad you can’t see the girls gone wild photos from than night. You should have been there. :> 

The only thing my mother said when she saw the clip, “Oh no, you have a hole in your panty hose.” I guess me attacking a comedian just seemed inevitable. HA!

 Thanks for reading!!!! XXXOOO, Scarlot Harlot

See also: Scarlot Harlot Attacks Ruyter Suys

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