William Shatner

William Shatner

Cadence... is... shattered!
Dreamt of you in black and white
Captain of my heart


There is nothing better in the universe than William Shatner. I dare you to come up with one thing better than William Shatner. See? You couldn't do it, not one thing. I dreamt of him once in black and white; I had seen a Twilight Zone episode earlier in the evening called Nick of Time, the one where he and his wife start messing with the little devil fortune telling machine. William Shatner was HOT back in the day, and now he's just plain genius wrapped up in perfect comedic timing. We all should be so lucky.

Hedge Trimmers

Hedge Trimmers

Hedge trimmers buzz BUZZ
A companion all day long
Salvador sucks rope

Any time I take a day off, something like this happens. This just happened to be hedge trimming day, and dude had the damn trimmers going all day long. I should know this by now—any time I want a mental health day something is going to be happening on that day to make me need another mental health day very soon. Hedge trimmers, a wayward circus, a pack of wild dogs, crying third graders... the list goes on and on. I can't really blame Salvador, the man who does the lawn work around here. He's just doing his job. But today I would have told him he sucks rope.

The Mark Twain Stroke Factor: 2

The Mark Twain Stroke Factor: 2

Extended pauses
Neural pathways shutting down
Time for a long nap

All right, so Hal Holbrook was really great as Mark Twain, but I noticed he lost some steam after the intermission. And who wouldn't at 86 years old? I'm sure the guy really needed a serious nap, as did the rest of the audience who's median age was 70 years old. Well, and then one 10-year-old red-haired kid wearing shorts and a striped t-shirt. Yeah, that kid needed a nap too.

Patrick Swayze vs Eric Bana

Patrick Swayze vs Eric Bana

Guh-gung, or Buh-burf?
Heartbeats by Johnny and Hulk
Dancer trumps green angst

In Dirty Dancing, Patrick Swayze imitates a heartbeat with the sound, "Guh-gung, guh-gung." In the first and supremely shitty Hulk movie, Eric Bana imitates a heartbeat with the sound, "Buh-burf, buh-burf." Well, guh-gung is about as stupid as it gets, but not in comparison to buh-burf. What the hell was Bana thinking? "Hmm, let's see, I need something elegant, something simple, something with an urf sound... GOT IT!"

The Mark Twain Stroke Factor

The Mark Twain Stroke Factor

If Mark Twain strokes out
A black-clad manchild stage tech
will haul Hal stage left

This weekend I am going to see Hal Holbrook play Mark Twain in his one-man show, Mark Twain Tonight! He has been doing this play since 1954, and I am fearful that Hal will stroke out on stage; after all the man is 86 years old. I love love love Hal Holbrook, especially his role in the 1982 film Creepshow. He was so giggly while trying to lure his loudmouth wife Wilma to her doom. Keep your fingers crossed for Hal's continued brain health!

My New Cell Phone

My New Cell Phone

Yummy candy screen
possessing all knowledge
Mesmer flouts my doom

I have recently stepped into the 21st century and gotten a smart phone, one that has the lovely touch screen and can google anything anywhere at any time. The problem is that with the ability to connect to so much information comes the ability to look up stupid things at inapropriate times. Last night as I was driving home from work, trying to get onto the freeway during the after-work rush hour, I found it imperative that I look up the name of the thin membranes that cover the brain. This had to be known at all costs, traffic be damned. These types of phones should not be allowed to work while you are driving—unless of course there is an emergency. In which case the phone should have some sort of alert system that will turn it back on, like when you've had a wreck and the smart phone detects blood on its screen. In any event, I came closer than I would have liked to gently tapping the the back end of the car in front of me with the front end of my car, all because of my really smart phone. From now on the softly glowing candy screen will remain off during drive time. And if you are still wondering, it is the meninges that cover your brain.

Laundry

Laundry

A warm writhing worm
curling in hand. I shudder.
Empty dryer gloats.

A few days back I had to move the neighbor's laundry out of the dryer so I could put mine in. I do not like to do that, I don't like touching other people's laundry but it had been left there for quite a while. Well, this haiku illustrates exactly why I don't like to touch other people's stuff—because sometimes you grab somebody's thong and it just curls up in your hand like some angry, writhing worm or some grotesque piece of twine. I'm not sure how twine could be grotesque, but I'm going with it. Why were thongs even invented? They cover nothing and they are reduced to irascible pieces of elastic in the dryer. Again, just going with it. The worst part is that I now know what type of underwear the neighbor lady wears. I am so grossed out.

Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt


Married to broomsticks
Douchebag McGillicuddy
An acting liar


I truly believe that Brad Pitt's wife Angelina Jolie is nothing more than a couple of broomsticks lashed together and animated by some sort of Fantasia-type magic. Don't ask me how she gave birth, her children must all have splinters. And Douchebag McGillicuddy is my pet name for Brad. It's fitting, don't you think? My favorite part of this haiku is the last line, "An acting liar," because it can be read two ways. First that Brad is an actor and a liar, and second, Brad is the liar of the moment, like an "acting sheriff". I'm sure he's a lovely man, but you have to have someone to dislike, and Douchebag is the one for me.

Trust Me, Said the Spider to the Fly

Trust Me, Said the Spider to the Fly


You invite me in
Things on your desk, left as gifts
Your lure does not work




You know the type, they leave things on their desk as an enticement. "Come in and talk," they seem to be saying, but really they just want to wrap you up in silken strands of doom while they inject you with some sort of organ liquifier. I'll take a zero on that. 


Today was really the first day that I didn't have anything ready to go for this writing business. So far it's come pretty easily, but of course not everything I type is a true gem. Mostly it's silliness with an occasional gorgeous phrase that makes me really happy. But it keeps me writing and that's what this is all about. If I don't write, I am not a writer.

Haiku

Haiku


Syncopated whim
Each thought born in syllables
Precision wording



How late is this? I don't know, but hey, it's here now. So I'm sure you've noticed by now but my haikus are not true haikus—there are a lot of working parts in a real haiku, and they aren't really broken down into syllables. They are supposed be to broken down into on, or morae, or more easily, sounds. You should think of mine as little stories with a 5-7-5 beat. These started as a way to write something everyday, and I can't over think it now because I'll stop. So quit asking me about these haikus and just enjoy them damn it.

The Pecan Discussion

The Pecan Discussion

Pecans taste like dirt
"You have Pica?" my boss asked.
No, but I've had dirt


My boss was telling me about some cookie recipe, and he asked if I liked pecans. I said, "No, they taste like dirt." He said, "How do you know what dirt tastes like? Do you have Pica?" I said "No, but I've eaten dirt."

This conversation is 100% real. Just when I don't think I have anything left in me.

Jen's Math

Jen's Math

Math quiz, timed terror
What am I? An astronaut?
The moon doesn't care


I have trouble with the maths. It has been this way since I was in kindergarten, when the workbooks filled with pictures of nickels and dimes danced through my dreams and confounded my small and fevered brow. That timed terror thing? That's for realz. I remember my DNA practically unravelling while I had to come up with the right answers under the duress of the bell. Or maybe it was just my teacher barking, "TIME!" That part I don't remember. Don't get me wrong, I never got below a B in school, and I can subtract with out actually having to cross any numbers out, but that's about as much as I can do without being a miserable human being. Nobody ever said misery loves math.

Gojira Mind

Gojira Mind

You destroy framework
With agile questions and thought
Tail sweeps the wreckage


So I was telling a co-worker about my Poe ode, and he asked a question that made me question my Poe ode. Why do I tell people anything? Because I never learn, that's why.

Edgar Allan

Edgar Allan

Yeats called you vulgar
His verses I cannot name
Your tales though, by heart



Today is Edgar Allan Poe's birthday, he would have been 203. And what apropos weather, at least here in Portland, where it’s pouring rain. He wrote several stories that are synonymous with horror: The Fall of the House of Usher, The Tell-Tale Heart, and one of my personal favorites, Berenice. He is also credited with inventing the detective fiction genre. Not just contributing to it, but inventing it. And let's not forget one of his masterpieces, The Raven; probably the most memorable and quotable poem ever. And he did this all in an incredibly short time, because he died when he was just 40 years old. So happy birthday Eddie old pal. Yeats can suck it.

Nehi Mind

Nehi Mind

I have my mind set
But it is not yet made up
I need Blue Nehi


I never thought about it until a few days ago, but you can have your mind set, and still not made up at all. Isn't that weird? And Blue Nehi, well, just a given that it would help make up your mind. Only it's not readily available anymore, so I'll probably be in a state of limbo for a while.

Facebook

Facebook

Your trumpeting taunts
Presents what I do not have
What I cannot own


Okay, so this is a little deep and unhappy making, but for the most part true. It seems when I look at FB it's nothing but people having babies, getting married, buying houses and getting degrees. These are things that have so far eluded me. Well, except the degree part, I got one of those. For the sake of argument, let's say a secondary degree. Am I being small and petty? Yes, I think so. Argh. Maybe I am just having a bad year. Seventeen days in. Perfect.

MLK

MLK

You stand stone silent
Your words still echo here, heard
We try to do right


Okay, I am breaking from my traditional ridiculousness and writing something decent. Is it decent? I think so. The Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. is about the coolest thing I have ever seen. That is all. Except the banks are not open today so I can't get any quarters to do laundry. Damn.

Match Game

Match Game

Gene's weird microphone
Dumb Dora was really dumb
Game show host says "blank"



I loved this game show; Gene Rayburn rocked that crazy microphone—you know the one, the same one Bob Barker used. Brett Somers reminded me of some greying bird from an Edgar Allan Poe story, and Charles Nelson Reilly was pretty much always topped with a captain's hat. Ah, good times.

Milli Vanilli

Milli Vanilli

In a golden cage
Songless birds sing for a key
Girl you know it's true

I saw a show recently about the tragic side of fame; one of the people they focused on was Rob Pilatus from the group Milli Vanilli. These poor guys, they got rooked when they were just kids. By the time they found out that they weren't going to record their voices at all, they had already spent the producer's advance and had to go through with the charade. They called their situation living in a "golden cage". Rob Pilatus struggled for years with drugs and died of an overdose in 1998. Fabrice Morvan is still hot though. Too soon?

Dixon Ticonderoga

Dixon Ticonderoga

Sharpening pencils...
Who has pencils to sharpen?
Automatic lead


Somebody in the next cube was sharpening pencils. A) Who even has regular pencils to sharpen? and B) Who has a full-fledged electric pencil sharpener? At work? Automatic pencils are one of the greatest joys of my life. They never get too short to use, they never have a blunt tip, and I suppose in a pinch they could be used to poke out an attacker's eye. "You're trying to get me Mr. Criminal-attacker-man? Click-click-click, BAM! Now how many eyes you got Mr. Criminal-attacker-man?" Seriously.

The New Mr. Bell Has Been Getting Into My Mother's Garbage Can

The New Mr. Bell Has Been Getting Into My Mother's Garbage Can

Multiple white bags
Surreptitious cat poop dump
You live in the Bell's


So my mother has called me a few times over the last few days telling me that somebody has been leaving bags of cat poop in her garbage can, and she is absolutely sure that it's the guy that lives in Mr. Bell's old house on the corner. Whaaaaa? My mother has a story for all the people that live near her, but this one is pretty good. Apparently when our dog Sammy was still around, he would go and poop in this guy's yard, then this guy would bring it over and fling it into my mother's yard. Because that's what neighbors do. Instead of saying, "Hey, your dog is pinching multiple loaves in my yard, can you pick them up?" flinging is more appropriate. This is the connective tissue in my mom's reasoning, this is why it has to be the new Mr. Bell secreting cat poop into her garbage can. But why would this guy take the time and make the effort to collect the cat poop, put it into a bag, and then put it into my mother's trash? What kind of dis is that? My mother is never happy when I unravel her hypotheses.

Medusa

Medusa

Snakes undulate right
Spider legs curl, scrabble left
Each morning anew


The other morning I woke up with parts of my hair in right angles—literally the ends of my hair were pointing toward the ceiling. It was so bad that I fixed my hair before I put on my makeup. I don't know if that's ever happened before in my whole long-legged life. I wait for the moment when I no longer care if my hair causes other people to turn to stone.

Jerry Orbach

Jerry Orbach

A Baby Daddy
Gilded, talking candlestick
Killer detective

Who doesn't love Jerry Orbach? Nobody, that's who.

Matlock

Matlock

Milk and sugar suits
Banjo folly counteracts
80s lawyerin'


This morning's episode was called "The Magician", and the cable description said that Matlock uses "legal legerdemain in his defense of a magician who's trying to escape charges of murdering his ambitious assistant." Yes, I read the description and committed it to memory. I have Matlock on in the background when I put myself together in the morning; I really wish I could actually have a TV on in the bathroom but ever since everything went digital, there's no chance of me being able to watch it on my tiny 5 inch black and white. Oh, and the milk and sugar reference is to the seersucker suits he always wears. Seeeeeeersucker.

Wolverine

Wolverine

White streaks down your sides
Built like a coffee table
In Hell's front office


I really like the wolverine; I saw a documentary about them on PBS and it was quite mesmerizing. They have a reputation for being fearsome creatures that will bite your face off should you give them the chance. I would surely walk out of Hell's front office if one was there, holding coffee and coffee table books. I'm just not sure how long they would want to stay in furniture position, you know?

Nessie Called

Nessie Called

Loch Ness Monster called
Sounding much like Rip Taylor
The phone spewed glitter


The best part about this haiku is imagining the Loch Ness Monster calling from beneath the lake, busily chatting away while sporting a handlebar moustache and wearing a wacky toupee. I have no idea how his plesiosaur flipper is holding the phone, but then again, how did he put on the toupee? I so wish I could draw this.

KittyBjorn

KittyBjorn

Slip your arms through it
You will appear NORMAL, swear
Cats like restriction



I cannot take credit for this one. I was discussing with a co-worker how my cat is being more needy than normal and I was thinking of finding some sort of backpack unit to tote him around in. That's when the co-worker said "KittyBjorn" and "You will appear NORMAL." Basically I am a verbal scavenger—I wait for people to drop these bon mots and I piece them together in a 5-7-5 fashion. I picture a rather large buzzard (me) picking the meat off of an alphabet (other people's words). This is how my mind works.

Raptor

Raptor

They float in circles
Tips of wings against building
They eat pigeons too


Honestly, didn't it have a chance to be really beautiful, this haiku? But I couldn't leave it without a gruesome bird-on-bird scene of violence—the elegant bird of prey noshing on the strangely-shaped rat of the sky. I used to see these red-tailed hawks circling outside of Big Pink from my ninth-story window, and their wing tips would brush the side of the building ever so slightly. And then I would see them tearing into a pigeon on the top of another building. It was awesome.

Kraken

Kraken

Your beak does not squawk
Under the sea you break crabs
and old sailor's hearts


So when I had this haiku up on my white board, a co-worker asked as he pointed at the words, “It breaks crabs?” I said, “Yeah, it breaks crabs!” very tersely. It breaks really big crabs. All right, it probably doesn’t break crabs at all because it’s so terribly enormous, but the notion of this massive many-tentacled beastie gingerly picking up crabs and smiting the carapaces off them brings me much joy. Who wants to think of a Kraken capturing a whale and pulling it under to smother? No thank you sir, I shall picture Ole Krakie making a Crab Louie Salad and crushing wayward sailing ships that happen to get in its way. I shall picture him breaking sailor’s hearts—old-timey sailors that have ships and eagles tattooed on their chests and wear striped shirts and white pants long after Labor Day. Not only are the sailor’s hearts broken because they can’t capture and kill the Kraken, but also because he’s destroyed their ship. And their pants are getting wet. And they are wearing colored underwear.

Hadron

Hadron

Faster than light quarks
Spears says time travel is real
Bring the Fritos bag


This one is a little late, and terribly early at the same time. How apropos for a haiku about time travel. You all remember the video of a drugged up Brit-Brit saying that time travel is real? Okay, so there's only a tiny bit about time travel at the end—most of the rest is her saying "HUH?" in a very annoying manner and shaking her head like some sort of quixotic duck, but that's how this haiku began: Brit knew what was what long before anyone else did. Fast forward about five years when the scientists manning the Large Hadron Collider discover that time travel may be possible, but only for a tiny particle called the Higgs singlet. Well, harumph I say! If Britney was able to discern that time travel was possible five long years before the people in Geneva did, I am getting myself ready to be shot into the future. Or better yet, the not-too-distant past. Specifically 1986. And I will have my Fritos bag at the ready, as an homage to the corn-chip loving songstress, and probably because time travel will make me hungry.

Sitcom

Sitcom

I heard a Sasquatch
He screamed from an inkwell night
Seinfeld was on though...

When I first thought of this haiku, I wanted to use Frasier instead of Seinfeld. I like Frasier, it is a guilty pleasure of mine and I have been waiting for the Hallmark channel to stop playing all the Christmas crap so we can get back to the Frasier-starts-at-9pm schedule. Kelsey Grammer has the voice of a fallen angel and I would gladly follow him into hell to hear him tell me “You have a hideous muffin top in those jeans” in his dulcet tones, but I thought that most people would be more apt to get up and investigate a screaming Sasquatch if Frasier were on rather than Seinfeld. Then I thought even more people would get up to search out the origin of a sudden and sharp, loud cry from a Bigfoot if it was a Niles-centric episode. But people would stay put for man hands, for close talkers, for the summer of George. They would remain in their seats for cutting up a Snickers with a knife and eating it with a fork, for digging up a dead parrot, for “Jimmy likes Elaine” in the third person—even as some sort of North American ape howls from the night. In the end Frasier just didn’t make sense. There’s only so much a limping old man and a couple of fops can do to make people sit and watch, so Seinfeld won. Plus it gives me an excuse to write a whole haiku about Frasier later on. It feels like a win-win to me.

Silver Bullet

Silver Bullet

Menacing Preacher
Werewolf hidden beneath cloth
Marty got you good!

Do you remember this movie? A Stephen King horror flick from 1985, with dear Corey Haim in his souped up wheelchair and Gary Busey before he went completely b-a-n-a-n-a-s. Megan Follows was the very angry sister with pantyhose, and the preacher, oh the preacher! That guy was menacing, as my haiku suggests, and he had weird cheek bones. But Marty got him in the end with a well-placed silver bullet in the right eye, after another well-placed firework took out his left eye earlier in the movie.

I like the scene in the swamp the best with the vigilantes because they are all a bunch of crybabies that get eaten by the werewolf. And because it's a swamp. In Maine.