I decided to start off the New Year by dealing with some questions a lot of people have been asking me:

What do you do?

Where are you from?

Who the fuck are you?

Allow me to introduce myself.  My name is Max, and I’m looking for a good bad time.

Read more

I’ve recently jumped onto the Mad Men bandwagon.  I don’t watch TV, so much as pass out drunk in front of it.  I haven’t parked my ass in front of the tube so eagerly since Deadwood.  The writing on Mad Men is brilliant. Read more

I was pushing through my AM workout when the song came on.  Stone Temple Pilots. It’s the song that always comes on at the end of the night.  The lights above the bar come on and it’s time to go.  Party’s over . . .

Suddenly I’m transported back to 1997.  The alarm comes on to Stone Temple Pilots and it’s time to get up.  Time to go to school.

Party’s over.

Another one in the books.  I’m done early tonight, too.  Home and showered before 6:00 PM?  I can’t remember the last time that happened.  The pool was closed today, so no cardio at lunch.  I’m flaking on running tonight, too.  Fuck it.

I’m sorting myself out, staring at a piece of paper that is supposed to become a list of the things I need to do this weekend.  Brakes.  Plug wires.  Oil and fuel filters.  Christmas cards and shopping.  What the fuck happened to Thanksgiving?  I still have food in my teeth . . .

Then reality sinks in, and I realize making lists is fucking futile. Read more

A Bastard Game Supplemental:

I realized today that I left something out of my Bastard Game articles (One/Two).  The following falls under the guidelines outlined in Part Two, to be used as as a discretionary Tactic.

On Lying:

Lying exists in a touchy moral gray area.  Depending on the circumstance and severity, there are arguments to be made for the Pros and Cons of lying.  No moral ambiguity exists when it comes to Game because it is a Con.

Bastard Game is a little different in this respect – it isn’t intended to be a put-on at all.  You don’t plug in a series of behaviors and hope for a result.  Instead, you cultivate a series of behaviors for the sake of aesthetics.  In this case, the aesthetic is the “swaggering alpha male” who will just as soon turn women away as unzip his fly for them.

Why would he want to do this?  Because he can.

Sometimes breaking hearts is more fun than winning them.

Read more

I saw a hawk at the landfill this morning.  I noticed it out of the corner of my eye.  It was gliding above the grass and scrub brush that surround the mountain of waste.  It was almost motionless in flight, shifting only to adjust its course.

Nothing looks majestic when viewed over a trash pile.  The bird dipped its wing and slipped out of sight.  It’s hard to be awestruck when you’re standing ankle deep in garbage.  I marched back to the truck and kicked the mud off my boots.

. . . But the image of the bird was tattoo’d on my retinas in TechniColor.  It looked so solemn on its silent patrol.  I saw it in a flash – the feathers of its wingtips spread, each one distinct from the next – and was immediately filled with longing. Read more

This weekend marks the One Year Anniversary of FuckingInappropriate.

To celebrate, I’m digging through the archives to bring you some stupid shit FKIN Favorites from the old Daily Inappropriation.

Also, yesterday was my Birthday.  Since I didn’t celebrate it – I had to get up at 4 AM – I’m probably going to be drinking a lot of whiskey soon.  That means I’m not going to get anything else done this weekend – including writing, or reorganizing my shitty layout.

Enjoy! Read more

“Which one of you is going Infantry?”

The senior NCO was a little guy, shorter than me, with a shaved head and wire-rimmed glasses.  He was constantly in motion, hustling back and forth through the office.  My eyes fixed on the Ranger tab on his arm.

“That’s me, sergeant.”

“You’re up.  They want to talk to you first.”

Read more

I fucking hated adolesence.  Looking back, it seems I spent most of it gut sick with anxiety.  If given the chance to do it over, I’d pass . . .

I remember cold days in late October.  I was bruised from elbow to ankle, covered in mud and old sweat.  I took my beatings.  Then I packed my pads into my locker and walked the two miles home.

I could hear the shouting from outside.  Locked in my room, I turned up the volume to drown out the other noise.

They will never make Master of Puppets again.

Read more

I was walking down the street this morning when I saw a homeless man.  He was leaning on a shopping cart full of cans, reading a newspaper.  We made eye contact and he smiled and nodded to me.

“What’s up?” I said.

“Just reading about myself in the newspaper,” he replied.

I glanced over his shoulder.  Sure enough, there was a picture of him camped out in the woods.

“Hard way to make it into the paper,” I said.

He laughed.  Paused.  Laughed again.

“I like the way you put it.  Thanks, man.  That made my mornin’.”

“Sure, man.”  I smiled and nodded to him.  ”Stay warm.”

I don’t care what awful confluence of circumstances and fuck-ups lead him to where he is.  He was polite to me.  That made my morning.