Tuesday, October 31, 2006

how to build your own bona fide real life undead zombie

First, I should point out that any of you who wound up here in a search for that last minute costume idea for little Austin or Madison are in the wrong room. We’re going to be talking about how to turn your average human being into the walking undead, and only parents who want that sort of thing on a long-term basis for their child should be here. This isn’t the kind of zombiehood that scrubs away with a damp washcloth.

Next, I wanted to title this post “R. L. Camino’s Relatively Easy Zombie Recipe” but I thought that would A) draw too many folks in search of recipes for the drink “zombie”, or B) imply that I, a man who failed both high school and college science classes, figured out a way to make zombies through my own personal research and in my own spare time. I didn’t. The Internet figured it out and I distilled it down to a simple recipe and instructions that will be posted here directly. However, you can read my primary source for yourself here.

I should also point out that I’m in no way advocating that you turn another human being into a zombie. Don’t get me wrong, that would totally kick ass, but I’m officially telling you that, although there is no specific law against zombie making, there is probably something illegal within the process. So I didn’t tell you to do it or even how to do it. That was all the Internet’s doing.

By the way, here’s a recipe for the other kind of "zombie". Our zombie making, like anything else that requires effort, may also require motivation and courage, and alcohol at least gives one courage.

But that’s only if you’re going to make an undead zombie—which you shouldn’t, even though, again, it would totally kick ass.

Okay, let’s begin with a list of necessary ingredients, but don’t be that annoying bastard who starts asking questions this early on. The purpose of each of these will be revealed in time. Just shut up and write them down for now, even though you’re not actually going to be making a zombie:

1 puffer fish
1 marine toad
1 hyla tree frog
Some human remains (it doesn’t have to be much)
Some jimson weed (the amount will vary)
Salt (the ordinary table variety should work nicely)

Step 1: Combine the first four ingredients into a powder. I’m not really sure how to do that, as every source for the process I could find used a great deal of science in its explanation and science tends to make me sleepy or otherwise distracted, so just find a way to combine them and then turn them into a powder and you should be all right. Anyway, what you have now is called the “Haitian zombie powder”, and it relies on neurotoxins to make the intended victim appear dead.

I should probably have mentioned this before, but you don’t need to actually kill your intended victim before turning them into a zombie. If you’ve already done this, you’re screwed. It’s a popular myth that zombies are the dead come back to life, but that, in reality, is just an illusion, as you will see in a moment. So your intended victim, which you shouldn’t have anyway, is now nothing more than a worthless corpse. Way to go, dumbass. Now, let that be a lesson to the rest of you about not working ahead.

Step 2: Find some way to administer the powder unknowingly to your intended victim. This is where the whole zombie making process sort of runs afoul of the law, as the result of giving them the powder will be that they appear dead for a few days. Also, too much powder might render them actually dead, and, again, we’re not looking for corpses here.

Step 3: Everyone will be under the impression that your victim is dead. They will understandably want our to bury them, and you should allow this to happen. However, you will then want to dig them back up at your earliest convenience. Yes, it’s a bitch, but once you’ve come this far in the process you’ve really made a commitment. This isn’t like that gold fish you forgot to feed back in junior high.

Step 4: Greet your zombie. They will not be much of a conversationalist, as I’m sure you’ve gathered from television and film, but they will be rather mind-numbed and willing to do your bidding. Might I suggest that your first order be for them to refill their former grave.

Step 5: You will need the jimson weed, or “zombie’s cucumber”, as it is known in Haiti, to maintain your zombie’s cooperative and near vegetative state. This has the dual benefit of causing both an amnesia that keeps your zombie from recalling their pre-zombie days and hallucinations that only confirm that there is indeed some weird shit is going on and that their new master may in some way be magical.

Try, try, try to understand...You’re a magic man.

Step 6: Enjoy your zombie. The traditional thing to do at this point would be to sell them into slave labor on a sugar plantation. However, your local sugar plantation, if it is still operational, may be unionized these days. Also, any sort of legitimate employment will likely run one into problems with the I.R.S. or Social Security Administration.

Actually, step 6 depends on your original intention and is therefore subjective, though I dare say that a number of you first thought about things involving the naughty bits.

Step 7: Let’s face it; you may soon tire of our zombie. Life with a zombie can become rather lonely after a while and the drawbacks may eventually outweigh the benefits. Indeed. What now, you ask? The answer is simple: time to break out the salt. You see, tetrodotoxin, the particular neurotoxin found in our puffer fish from step one, works by blocking the sodium channels in nerve and muscle cells. The folklore of zombiehood says that salt repairs this, though modern medicine disagrees. I know this because it was outlined in a short paragraph within in an attention-holding bright yellow box at the side of the main article. At any rate, just to be safe, those in the midst of enjoying their new zombie and having no desire whatsoever for it to return to its formerly coherent state should make sure that it subsists on a diet extremely low in sodium.

Actually, the best thing to do to rid yourself of your zombie is to either hold off on the jimson weed or just sell them to someone desirous of a zombie yet unwilling to follow through on steps 1-4.

That is, if you had actually embarked on this kick ass, yet probably illegal or, at least, morally questionable, though scientifically based experiment in the first place.

Monday, October 30, 2006

shanananananananaknees, knees.

Come on, you know you want to quit your job and live out that fantasy to play bass in the nation's #1 Guns n' Roses cover band.
Wait, maybe that's me.
No, couldn't be. I don't have a job to quit.
Anyway, methinks it would probably be a better gig than playing for real GnR right now.

southern nights

Glen Campbell was in town last night, and although I hadn't seen the Rhinestone Cowboy in a couple years, it was just like old times.

the glen and I

Saturday, October 28, 2006

oops

I neglected to mention that I will be blogging in a semi-professional manner over here all weekend.

Friday, October 27, 2006

what happens in tunica stays in tunica

Which is rather easy, as one is still in Mississippi and not privy to the hedonism offered in Nevada. No, I wouldn’t expect a Tunica branch of the CSI franchise anytime soon. In fact, the only sort of nightlife that non-gamblers like Mrs. Camino and myself could’ve experienced was a performance by Kenny G., and that, while certainly being something that one would wish to stay in Tunica for no other reason than the dreadful Kenneth’s act of musical necrophilia upon Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” a few years back, not to mention any other of his pieces of music selected at random, isn’t the sort of titillation that makes for good marketing.

So it was that we bypassed the claustrophobia of the casino buffet and drove fifteen minutes to Tunica proper where we dined in a relatively empty Mexican restaurant along highway 61. We later strolled through the casino for some people watching, but the hordes of half drunk gamblers sitting despondently in the unflattering light of the slot machines and the thick cloud of cheap tobacco smoke proved a bit more depressing than free entertainment should be. So we retired early. Besides, Mrs. Camino had to be up at a decent hour for her presentation.

That night Mrs. Camino dreamed of playing slot machines. She kept winning, but each time she won food instead of money.

I am not blessed with the gift of dream interpretation, but it seemed to me that she had actually been playing the vending machines.

tunica-church
While Mrs. Camino was at her conference I drove around in the drizzle looking at wide cotton fields dotted with pecan trees, pine trees, and the occasional shotgun shack or church. One is still in Mississippi. I then collected Mrs. Camino after her presentation and went to a park along the river where we happened upon the rare site of a live armadillo sniffing and snorting along the roadside for something edible. Bastard wouldn’t hold still.
armadillo
It sort of looks like a possum dressed up as a samurai warrior for Halloween, does it not? Yes, someone should have named them Mexican Samurai Possums, I think. It would have done wonders for their marketing.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

aerie girls lose again

Tuesday night viewers of the new CW network are well aware of the "aerie girls" and the keen insight they provide after shows like The Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars. However, the CW is finding out that the public doesn't care much for having teenage girls essentially give a recap of the program you've just been watching, and I doubt that they will continue to grace our televisions for much longer.
Ah, but there is often opportunity in the misfortune of others.
I had the idea to bring the aerie girls here to the humble Blog o' Doom to review posts every few weeks much in the same way they so brilliantly expounded upon the happenings of Veronica and the Gilmores. It seemed a win/win situation at the time, but...Well, you can have a gander at the failed experiment in these random scenes from the first and only episode:
aerie1
aerie2
aerie3
aerie4
aerie5
aerie6

Monday, October 23, 2006

nighthawks at the diner

I maybe only make a couple of late night visits to a Waffle House a year, but it occurred to me during the other night’s tarriance at said establishment that everything—well, the rigid floor plan, décor, and juke box selection complete with a handful of odes to the Waffle House itself, of course, but also the chainsmoking and sad-faced, yet sweet-talking waitress, the tables of chainsmoking older regulars swilling coffee, younger folks in from the bars to soak up alcohol with eggs and bacon, and the eerily quiet and David Banner-like short order cook with the shifty eyes who all the waitresses fruitlessly flirt with even though they know this is the sort of man who probably has the remains of a hitchhiker or two in the crawlspace under the house, but at least he has a house—is exactly alike in a way that makes one begin to wonder if the front door is nothing more than a teleportation device to the very same greasy purgatory under sickly yellow lighting or culinary hell, depending on one’s standards—which are hard to come by at that time of night, culinarily speaking.

Anyway, it occurred to me that I should try this theory out at the interstate exit down from Casa Camino where a Waffle House sits on either side. One has to wonder what sort of dilemma this puts the regulars into. Obviously, they should stop at the one nearest them, but at some point during the hours of chainsmoking and coffee swilling they are each bound to turn a weathered face to the window and glance past those interstate lights in a gnawing wonder as to what’s taking place at that other Waffle House.
This wouldn’t happen if they subscribed to my teleportation device theory.

Friday, October 20, 2006

mark your evolutionary calendars

The human race, according to this article, will reach its peak in the year 3000 when we are all seven feet tall, coffee-colored, and have spectacular genitalia. After that we spend the next nine thousand years turning into chinless and technologically dependent housepets.

Then come the Morlocks.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

uri geller seeks a "paranormal protege"

I once rode in a reportedly haunted Miata. I didn't see or experience anything more than cramped discomfort. The Mazda Protege is a bit more roomy, but the skeptic in me believes that Mr. Geller will find nothing more than a sensible and gas efficient automobile.
Then again, Mr. Geller knows how to make these things happen.
Anyway, learn your own version of the spoon bending trick and you may just win the "huge", yet undisclosed prize that awaits the winner of Geller's "American Idol"-styled competition to find his "heir".
Yes, one would assume that Geller already knows who will win. So does Miss Cleo.
No, I don't know why David Blaine and Michael Jackson are pictured with Geller.
Yes, I too wish an asteroid had struck that very spot at the moment the picture was taken.

one toke over the line, sweet jesus

Dear Lord,

I don't know if you've noticed this or not, but you've heard very little complaining from your humble Rex on the subject of all these maladies you've seen fit to visit upon me. I know you certainly would have heard any and all complaints but I didn't know if the omnipotence thing covered stuff that didn't happen. This would include my not saying a word about all the allergies, the baldness, the bad back, the dizzy spells, the theme song to Matlock constantly running through my head, the toothaches, the stubby fingers, or the way that taxidermied deer heads sometimes come to life and tell me the most inappropriate stories when no one else is around. I have accepted all these things, God, because I know that you and Buddha and Allah and Bear Bryant probably get a kick out of them.
However, this new thing...
You forgot to mention the wide feet, the short attention span, the near-reclusive state in which you live, all the drinking, your crippling fear of the San Diego Chicken...
Bastard! You don't belong in my correspondences, Captain Howdy, and I expect you to be gone by the time I get back from fetching a drink to settle my nerves after seeing that.
Ah. That's better. Sorry about that, Lord. Anyway, I want it to be noted that I haven't complained once about any of these things. Well, I have actually complained about them a great deal, but it should be noted that it was never to you specifically. However, I really feel I should mention something now, as things seem to have gone a bit to far.
You see, I'm noticing an increasing number of gray hairs in my beard as of late.
That's a beard?
Quiet, damn you! It's only five days of one.
Ch-ch-ch-chia!
Ignore him, O' Lord.
Anyway, if it isn't asking to much...
Why don't you just photoshop it out like you do with everything else?
Lord, I'm just asking that you hold off on the gray hair for a while. I don't think it's...
Rex! You hast askethed a great deal of me this day...eth, but me thinkest I can doeth it for a large sum of cash...No checks...only cash.
Yes, I'm proud of you for finding Blogger's color chart, Captain Howdy. However, your sacrilege probably means that I now have to shell out for some Just For Men.
If you acteth now I'll also throweth in a good smiting down of the San Diego Chicken .
Thanks again, bastard.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

i am now 1 in 300 million and so are you

There's no way to be specific about these things, but I suspect that the 300 millionth kid is named Austin*. They are named Austin and their mother will yell that name in an ineffective, yet nasally way as Austin runs like a drunken Comanche up and down the grocery store aisles leaving a trail of candy wrappers in his wake. His mother will also briefly tear herself away from the cell phone to shout things like Stop it, honey or Put down those steak knives, Austin or Get away from that man, Austin; He smells drunk and it looks like you're either frightening him or making him very angry.
Yes, I went to the grocery store yesterday. Why do you ask?
Anyway, welcome to the world, Austin.



*If you happen to have a kid named Austin and are at all offended by the familiarity invoked by the use of this name, then pretend I said Herbert**.
**If you happen to have a kid named Herbert, then you really don't love them anyway***.
***However, I have no doubt that a Herbert would conduct himself more like a proud and sober Comanche.

Monday, October 16, 2006

a bit about marriage and a new candidacy idea

I'm given to understand that there is an amendment dealing with marriage on this year's ballot in Tennessee. I also gather that it is a simple Yes/No question and therefore leaves one unable to write in the name of Rex L. Camino, but I will not let that keep me from trying. It would certainly kick ass to be the first write in candidate in history to win on a Yes/No question, but I'm sure "the man" has ways of thwarting me on this. He always does.
But I digress.
I don't know if marriage questions ever end up on the ballot in India, but this story leads me to believe that they are far more liberal on the matter.
Will this inspire any Vol fans to propose to Rocky Top? Only time will tell, but I hesitate to link to the article for that very reason.*
Anyway, I babble on about marriage here because today happens to be the seventh anniversary of my wedding to the lovely and talented Mrs. Camino.
Happy anniversary, dear.



*It's not like Vol fans can read anyway.**
**Oh snap. Oh no he didn't.

Friday, October 13, 2006

ramblings for friday the 13th

There are ten* Friday the 13th films, and I won’t try to give you the impression that I’ve seen them all or even a significant number of them. Personally, I prefer suspense to blood and gore, and these slasher films at some point shifted focus from trying to scare the audience to seeing how much carnage the audience could stomach. Besides, the whole masked killer thing really impedes the believability here.

Look, I don’t know if you’ve ever chased youngsters around a summer camp with an axe, chainsaw**, or garden weasel to punish them for their recreational drug use and pre-marital sex, but the wearing of a mask really dulls one’s senses in these situations.

And don’t even get me started on ergonomic disadvantages of the clown suit.

You know, Freddy Krueger had it right with the fedora, the comfortable sweater, and the killing implements conveniently affixed to a leather glove. It’s convenient and still leaves one with the benefit of peripheral vision. However, it’s still about the carnage in the Nightmare films.

The Scream films were a little better in that they had the element of satirizing the genre, but are their even eyeholes in that guy’s mask? Am I to also believe that one would not get entangled in a cloak?

I don’t know if you’ve ever chased youngsters around in a full cloak, but…nevermind, I’ll keep that one to myself.

It is interesting to note the evolution of the slasher mask here. After watching the original Friday the 13th movie any kid could walk into a sporting goods store, purchase a hockey mask and instantly have his Jason costume for Halloween. That’s great for promoting the film, but the hockey mask industry sees all the profits. This isn’t so with the Scream franchise. Their mask may be the least functional of all the masked killers, but you at least have to pay them anytime you want to don one.

Keep that in mind when embarking on your own slasher franchise.





*Do we count the Freddy vs. Jason film? If so, that makes eleven. However, I don’t really think it belongs, as it seems like a feeble attempt to piece together has-beens for the sole purpose of swindling those sad fans that still cling to the genre. It’s sort of like the Velvet Revolver*** of horror films.
**Sure, chainsaws are scary and all, but can you really sneak up on somebody with a friggin’ chainsaw? Are we killing Helen Keller here?
***I’m no gun aficionado, but I can’t quite see the purpose in having an actual velvet revolver****. Sure, it would feel cuddly soft to the marksman who wields it, but wouldn’t firearms forged from sturdier materials be more effective. I mean, you couldn’t even hit somebody over the head and knock them out with a velvet revolver.
****For that matter, what is the purpose of a “def leppard”*****? I feel sorry enough for leopards as it is, as they are easily the most overlooked of the big cats. Lions are the kings, cheetahs are the fastest and therefore more popular of the spotted big cats, and tigers are more often the cartoon spokespeople and get to eat the occasional “magician” in real life.
*****And what is with the spelling? Am I to believe that this is also a “special needs” leopard on top of the hearing disability******? I’m saddened even more.
******Still, I suppose you can sneak up on it with a chainsaw*******.
*******Yes, one should really stop after three asterisks.

Sunday, October 08, 2006

a pirate looks at thirty-two

You know, just once I’d like for Jimmy Buffett to run into some actual pirates. I've never actually seen any myself but I’m given to understand that their lifestyle has very little to do with songs about cheeseburgers or fruity drinks or restaurant franchises based on said songs. Blackbeard once shot the kneecaps off of a cabin boy as an example to the rest of the crew when he thought they were going soft. Jimmy Buffett loses his saltshaker and proceeds to wallow in self-pity. About the only similarities I can see is that the two of them have boats. I have a bicycle and one testicle, but you won’t see me claiming to be Lance Armstrong.

Wait, there are two. Nevermind.

But I digress.

I am thirty-two today. Soon my age and waist size will be as one, though my waist size keeps creeping higher in what I can only assume is a valiant attempt at avoiding this inevitability.
Other than that, I can’t complain much.

Friday, October 06, 2006

mr. manning (have pity on the losing man)

Dear Peyton Manning,

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned this to you or not, Peyton, but I was actually the manager at a Books-A-Million for nearly half a year back in the thick of that Pokemon phase a few years back. It sucked, and I was witness to something really sad and pathetic during my brief tenure that will haunt me the rest of my days. I even fear that it will flash before my eyes just before death to fill a quota of “sad and pathetic” things in that proverbial slide show that greets us like the rolling of life’s credits just before our sad demise.

Anyway, trust me; this has everything to do with you. Just listen.

You see, these little kids would gather in the clearing around the magazine racks every Saturday to have their weekly Pokemon tournaments. Parents essentially dumped their kids on us for a day, Peyton. You know how that sort of thing would certainly bother me in most situations, but I’ll remind you again that I was in management and therefore had any number underlings to send out for dealing with children or the disgruntled.

One of the common problems the underlings reported back to me with there in that small office with my books and free coffee—and this is the sad and pathetic part, Peyton—was the despicable phenomenon of freakishly nerdy teenagers who would show up, compete against these little children in their Pokemon tournaments, and then sometimes even trash talk their recently vanquished enemies now squatting there on the carpet, many times in puddles of their own tears. Bear in mind that these freakishly nerdy teenagers drove themselves to the bookstore to do this. They had access to a car on a Saturday, Peyton, and they chose to spend it defeating small children in a pointless Japanese card game. I don’t know about you, but back in Alabama we went around either drinking or breaking shit when we had access to vehicles on the weekend. Sometimes both.

Hell, even if your Saturdays consisted of Archie chaining you and little Leroy—or whatever his name is—to a tree in the backyard and beating you with mannequins dressed up as linebackers until you both became better mealtickets quarterbacks you still had a more noble Saturday than the bastards I just spoke of.

Anyway, here’s what this has to do with you: You see, Peyton, The Titans secondary—hell, the whole defense—is sort of like those little children who get left at the bookstore. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know, but our secondary will impede your passing game about as effectively as a basket full of legless kittens. I don’t know why the kittens are legless, Peyton, but I’m here to tell you that there is no honor in exploiting the situation just to make your stats look good.

In fact, our secondary reminds me of my playing days back in high school. We were horrible, and each of the coaches would tell us about how much better their grandmothers would be in our respective positions. They would then add that their grandmothers were in wheelchairs. They would say things like you couldn’t cover my grandmother, and she’s in a wheelchair or the offensive line was blowing holes in the defense wide enough to wheel my grandmother through…and she’s in a wheelchair.

I don’t know why all the grandmothers used to be paralyzed, Peyton, but I always suspected it had something to do with all that Polio business back a long time ago.

Anyway, I came to hate and despise all those grandmothers. You see, Peyton, I was out there busting my ass. We sucked but we at least put forth an effort, and I never saw any of those chickenshit grandmas show up to try and take my job. Grandmas are all talk, Peyton. Remember that if Tony Dungy ever pulls that shit with you guys.

That being said, I really don’t think Lamont Thompson or any of his well intentioned, yet inadequate Titan brethren could cover my grandmother. She’s not in a wheel chair but she’s frail and she’s ninety-two. Hell, a wheelchair would probably speed her up a bit.

Anyway, you guys won’t need her. You may meet some resistance on the defensive line, but the pass threat will be enough to weaken that. Besides, one of our main run stoppers—a fellow former Vol, in fact—went batshit crazy and Tennessee Waltzed all over some guy’s unhelmeted face last week.
waltzing albert

This means that Albert Haynesworth will be gone for quite some time, and my sources at Titans headquarters tell me that their going to try to fill his vacated roster spot with someone who will help stop that nosedive in the ratings.
titan oliver?

Anyway, just bear in mind that any given member of our defensive squad could snap and go batshit crazy if the game gets out of hand and that a stomped-in face equals no commercials.

Well, you’ve been kind to listen, Peyton, and I only ask that you go out and get really drunk Sunday morning or try and pass with your feet or let Archie play or do something along those lines to keep the game interesting.

Please.

Sincerely,
Rex

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

making a difference in one child's life

Now, I’m no Ms. Marple, but the sound of children playing in the cul-de-sac outside my window these last couple days leads me to believe that Rutherford County’s fall break is upon us. These days are really the only thing I miss about teaching. Ah, to get paid to do absolutely nothing.

That pretty much covers all your employment situations, doesn’t it?

I suppose it does, but there was something extra special about getting paid to teach without having to do any actual teaching.

That’s pretty much true for every day you were in the classroom, isn’t it?

Probably. But you digress.

These sounds of happy children don’t bother me so much, as happy children tend to keep to themselves and even ignore me. It’s the children with that contemptible mix of unhappiness and talkativeness that I make every effort to avoid. I remember one such child at a birthday gathering here at Casa Camino for one of Mrs. Camino’s relatives…

(Rex looks up from the keyboard and stares at the bare wall to his right for a minute or so)

Anyway, that pretty much covers that story. I’m not sure there’s a moral to be had there, but…

You appear to have just thought about the story without writing it down.

Ah, so I did.

Well, I seem to recall that this particular child was the offspring of either a distant cousin of Mrs. Camino or some random passerby looking for free beer, margaritas, and trays of Mexican themed appetizers that, though quite tasty and much appreciated, seemed oddly out of place at a gathering for a family of Welsh descent.

I had been watching the child as he went from adult to adult asking questions about everything and talking about his sad little life. His parents seemed to encourage this, as they were obviously suffering a sort of fatigue from the child and were hoping to pass him on to others for a while. I did well to avoid him as I semi-mingled while hovering around the food and drink before sneaking upstairs with some beer to watch football in the comforting solitude of the Rexroom.

The kid, as you may have guessed, saw this and followed, and the only things worse than being in the company of an annoying child is being the only person in the company of said child.

Kid: (looking around) You have another room upstairs?

Rex: No, this is actually part of the neighbor’s house and I’m afraid they only invited me over. You’ll need to go back down at once.

He didn’t, of course, and I spent the next half hour having to explain the various contents within my fortress of solitude, hearing all about how bored and unhappy the child was, and then explaining to him the dangers of coming between a man who had been drinking and his televised football games.

Other adults eventually trickled upstairs, drawn perhaps by the increasing volume of the television that did little to drown the kid out. I was no closer to my desired solitude, yet I was grateful to have to a wider audience for the kid to choose from while dispersing his annoyances. He soon began a routine that he had tried quite unsuccessfully on me only minutes before. He spoke it like he knew it was his best material, and I suspect that he launched into so quickly with this new audience as a means of erasing the utter failure it proved on me.

It was one of those “everybody at school says I’m stupid” bits that stupid kids so often bear as their mantra, and the husband of one of Mrs. Camino’s friends listened to it and then spoke at length about how no child is stupid. I searched in vain for my cheesy little Wal-Mart keyboard to accompany him with some serious, yet comforting background music not unlike that found on any given eighties sitcom. It was unfortunately buried somewhere in the attic. Anyway, women swooned and remarked on how sweet his words to the annoying kid were, though I noticed that this only emboldened the kid and re-energized the annoying tendencies that had actually been waning a bit before someone went and paid attention to him.

Still, I was glad that other adults had been absent during my handling of the same situation, as they appeared to show a higher tolerance for this sort of thing.

Kid: All the kids at school say that I’m stupid.

Rex: All the kids?

Kid: Yes. And then they…

Rex: Well, Gerald…

Kid: My name’s Kevin.

Rex: Whatever. You see, Gerald, if all the kids agree on something it forms what adults like to call a “consensus”.

Kid:
What does that mean?

Rex: It means that you should accept the situation and consider your options. Sure you don’t want a beer?

Anyway, You can see that I’m not completely heartless. I went on to explain to him how one goes about taking all their anger and hate and rolling it into a tight little ball to store deep within their soul and then survive off for the majority of their formative years. I explained that beer aids greatly in making it through this time, but he insisted on letting his dislike of its taste get in the way.
Ah well, you can lead a horse to water.