Nothing here. Next section.

the such:

pg. 178
The Pissing Grounds
by: Paul B. Whitley

Well, if we had been a week or so earlier then this wouldn't seem so late, but it still makes for a good story. April 15, 1998 was tax day and for the first time, I did my duty and I was less than thrilled. While I did get a return, it wasn't enough for me to give a damn about wanting to do jack shit with anything involving the taxman. In retrospect, I made a mistake, but more about that later.

My state returns (federal were actually worth saving) came out to be THIRTEEN DOLLARS AND EIGHTEEN CENTS ($13.18). Do you see the point either? While there are people everywhere who could use that money, I practically threw it away. On the form there are these boxes that offer you the opportunity to give that money to charity, which gave me a novel idea. Give everything to charity, with the exception of enough cents to make a mockery of the tax system, which is what I did. The endangered animal fund got $6.50 and the elderly/children fund got an equal amount. This left me with $0.18 that must be written on a check that costs more than a quarter to print out and mailed to me using an envelope and postage that is over $0.50. If you can't appreciate the beauty of this, then there is a problem. While I gave to good causes (hopefully), I also struck a blow in favor of those who hate to waste time with taxes.

pg. 99
That Happy Paired Off Lifestyle
by: styrofoamqueen

Deep inside, somewhere we may rarely visit, is the ingrained "White Picket Fence Dream." It has been silently infiltrated into our minds, and though we may not believe in it, we know it's there. according to this "dream" we're going to grow up to be educated, and rich and beautiful. we'll have two beautiful children, one boy, one girl, with shining blond hair, rosy cheeks, and blue eyes (even if you and your husband are both dark eyed and dark haired) oh, it has to be a husband. there's no room for lesbian relationships in the "dream" and gay men? forget it. anal sex is definitely out. dont you know the diseases you can catch from that anyway. you will have two perfect happy children. and you and your husband will be perfect and happy too. sex on a saturday night (no lie ins on sunday mornings, you have to all have a family breakfast, with pancakes, syrup and orange juice) no fights, no problems. you'll eat lunch out of brown paper bags, and it wont be junk food. no chance of getting malnutrition. you'll drink the right amounts of milk too. cant have those teeth and bones weakening now, can we?

Holidays such as Thanksgiving, and Christmas will be a joy. you'll have your equally perfect family round for a meal. there'll be no elbows on the table, no family feuds, no whining children with their cries of "i dont like vegetables" you'll all sit around like civilised people, and discuss current affairs, or Aunt Nancy's fabulous cornbread.

all in all, a very satisfying life, dontcha think?

no, neither do i. welcome to the 90s people. times of imperfection, interacial dating, and dare I say it...?

GAY SEX!

so why does the picket fence dream remain as a symbol of a desirable lifestyle? what is it that makes people want this disgustingly plastic paradise? have i missed out on some minor detail, a detail which actually makes that life worth having? if so, then please point it out to me

pg. 007
American Gothic
by: Dave Black

I had originally planned on running a piece discussing whether or not Jesus had committed suicide, but in lieu of recent events, I decided to sound off on something else. Not too long ago, a friend was slashed in a domestic altercation. While I never touched any blood except to wash off concrete, I believe that I have developed some sort of fear of blood in just a few short hours. This combined with a viewing of Scream 2 which I had seen minutes before the incident has provided me with a perverted sense of trauma. Enough about me, onto the topic.

The worse part about all of this is that there were two little kids who also witnessed this atrocity. Not only did they see a father bleeding, but they saw a mother arrested. I personally accept blame for the fact that they saw it and cannot begin to express the guilt that I feel. Furthermore, I would like to state to all of you naysayers who insist on blaming the man that it was not the man's fault in anyway. When he threw her out of his parents' house, she ripped off a screen and climbed through the window. The only thing he can be blamed for is turning his back on an obviously psychotic woman.

pg. 1812
Brossart Wit and Wisdom.
by: The Bathroom Bandit, an outside agitator at a major university in the Midwest."

*4* REALLY INTO IT

Wednesday, February 21, 1990: "Those boys are so obsessed with masturbation. They're really into it."

The sophomore English teacher said this when a member of her class screamed the word "boist" in the school library.

"Baste", "boist", and "bastage" were just beginning to become popular locally as code words for masturbation (as in sentences such as, "Chad got caught basting in the bathroom today.") The New Language--as the principal derisively called it--also brang many other touchy topics into the open (e.g., "Teenage pregnancy--it's a killer!")

The school probably still uses textbooks in which these euphemisms have been scrawled (that they're too miserly to replace).

*5* ...THINKING OF YOU

Tuesday, October 4, 1988: "All these dicks and weenie-tips. You are young men now and you should use the word 'penis' instead."

These wise words came from the principal, who called several male students to the office after a priest caught them passing notes in "prayer and sacraments" class. The notes contained humorous rhymes, including one alleging that a local car dealer "has a teeny weenie."

*6* A LACK OF UNDERSTANDING

Perhaps Brossart was the actual cause of the depletion of the ozone layer. Passing gas loudly and fluently seemed to be the number one pastime there.

For example, a quiet "church history" class was disrupted one day by students passing gas repeatedly. Snickers reverberated throughout the classroom each time.

The priest who taught the course finally became fed up and said, "The strange noises we are hearing in this class can be attributed to a lack of understanding about the anatomy."

Maturity at work, folks.

*7* BEATING WITH A STICK

Late in 1989, the biology teacher threatened to give 5 demerits to a student who spoke without raising his hand: "If I wanted you to talk, I would have beat you with a stick. The stick would be in the form of a little yellow paper bearing the number 5, meaning intent to disrupt class."

Five demerits in a grading period was an automatic detention. Ten demerits meant two more detentions. An accumulation of 15 demerits would result in an in-school suspension.

So all you needed to do to get suspended was chew gum 15 times or defy the draconian dress code 8 times.

pg. ---
The Obligatory Poetry Corner

[face in the pillow: a love story]
by: R. Tissun Oan

Here I am rapist:
RAPE ME!
Grab me!
Strangle me!
Give me your love!
Show me how you care!
Put your body inside me!
Make me your BITCH!
Decide whether to look at my face.
Decide whether you'll bless me with murder.
Think about biting my cheek.
Think about how you'll curse me.
Curse me with a thought.
Your thought.
Give me some suicide.
Give me some guilt.
Give me some silence.
Spit on me.
Piss on my existence.
Piss on what I had.
Piss on what I've become.
You're the big man!
You've got your gun!
You've got your knife.
Go ahead

pg. 215
Dept. of Labor
by ben ohmart

I don't know if you've heard about this yet or not, but Congress won the majority vote for creating a new dept. for heralding in new babies coming from women's wombs. Where else would babies come from? Well, Congress had to word it just right in case later, through the miracle of science, there was found some loop "hole".

From now on, every woman wanting a "really good one" must go register with the Dept. of Labor. This is a simple release form in which the woman states whether or not she believes in the murder of her child. If she is fucked and found to be been slipped a growing child, she is then, with proper legal registering, in control of her body, and able to go to any doctor in the country and have her unborn child quietly killed. This dept. has been set up to help even the steam between opposing parties on this killing issue.

Already in affect for the past 11 weeks, already thousands of horny women and girls have sought the required forms before sexual intercourse or regular sex. This, however, has caused a run on forms and ink, most of which now has to be printed and imported from NAFTA friendly Mexico. But, the rate of AIDS has dropped because of it, also the percentage of babies born with AIDS and other misc. defects, since all parents or would-be lovers are instructed to enclose a blood test result and photo of the blood test being taken along with registration.

Like the hard opposition to the installation of this department, the rabble against freedom of speech and freedom of action re: every man, woman, and underage thing wishing to have a cherry popped has been simmering like boiled plasma. Mr. E. Gange, for the left wing of The People's Right To Get It On, has held a high honor in being a non-member of Congress who's been allowed to speak in the House. He has preached the gospel according to "right to privacy", brandishing the names and affidavits of hundreds of celebrities and unknown common people who are also outraged at the current "nanny state we've build for ourselves".

If up to this point you haven't finally been convinced that the media is in direct control of our daily lives, you better take a serious moment to think about what your doing HERE of all places. Even I thought that sometimes the people who run around spewing all these theories of conspiracy and so on may just be spazzing out, but a little while ago while doing some research on American cultural tendencies (read: sitting on my duff with the tube smiling upon what it had created , and saying "That's good.")I came across incontrovertible proof that people have no fucking clue what's going on, and we all suffer for it and/or perpetuate it. Now, I didn't find this out from some touching or poignant film, made expressly for that purpose. No, I was watching the local news and damned if I wasn't struck with the eerie feeling that we were either eavesdropping on some parallel dimension or an episode of Seinfeld. The story was about the efforts of the family of Martin Luther King, Jr. to open an investigation into to finding the real killer(s) (there's an obvious joke for this one, but it would be in poor taste.) That in itself ain't all that weird, you might say. What I can't believe is that MLK 's family is actually WORRIED that they might not get the case opened. This can't be happening, it has to be some conjured pseudo-drama for our benefit, because does anyone in this country think that the government has the guts to just up and so "No. Its not worth it"? Not that it isn't a noble pursuit, but I mean come on, its not really even open for discussion. Fuck blockbuster, I've get all the laughs and social commentary I need from channel 12. Its just one of those situations where even in worst case scenario they wouldn't refuse. What should upset all of us is that the show was put on for our benefit, just in case Reno was stupid enough to back out on this one, the outrage from the people would give her hell for it (Clinton being the first to sell her out and get the bandwagon rolling). This reminds me of an time several years ago, when an anonymous person sent a multimillion dollar winning mcdonald's stub thing to St. Jude's hospital. Now, the winnings are non-transferable, but it wasn't as though the clown wasn't going to cough up the cash. He had to or we'd have his wig for it, without a second thought. The point of all this really has not been about the evils of television, the media, and racism. No, rather it has been that you should safeguard your children, for the Clown is no one's friend. Barring Shakes and Homie.

pg. 1
Armchair IX: Armchair has a heart
by: The Armchair Critic

What do the following have in common? A nude Dennis Franz, a dead Meg Ryan, an almost silent Nicholas Cage, and a easy going Andre Braugher. All of these things can be found in City of Angels, and for the first time, I'm not complaining. Sure, unlike the original, Wings of Desire, color is dominant and the setting is changed, but overall this movie made me appreciate human nature. Now let me get into it.

Nicholas Cage is an angel. In the Wim Wenders original, it was plain to see the impediments of angels in the world of mortal. Color, taste, touch, and being seen by anyone other than children were not options. In the new version, angels are practically humans that don't age. Since they can't feel, but are able to hold matter, I see no difference. Everything that is explained through no blatant dialogue is blatant here, which implies that americans are stupid and I agree.

Another thing about this film is that Meg Ryan is selfish. Selfish selfish selfish. She wants Nicholas Cage and knows that he is an angel, so she manipulates him into becoming mortal. I suppose she is paid back for her duping of a celestial being when she is hits a truck on her bicycle only two days after the idiotic angel Cage becomes human. This my friends, is the greatest use of irony of all time. It brought a smile to my face.