Old Houses Suck

You might have heard people talking about how cool it is to own an old house, especially if they're creepy or remote, but nothing sucks worse than having to DIY dangerous shit on a regular basis. I do alright for myself in life, but I'm not wealthy in the slightest. When my roof is leaking, my ass gets to go upstairs and figure out where. Recently the electric went out in the hallway. Breaker keeps shutting everything off. Not a huge deal, but it does kind of suck taking a shower in the dark (hallway light, basement lights, and bathroom light are on the same circuit.) Nothing makes me want to pound someone's face more than when they give me this smiley "Look it up on Youtube" response to everything. First off, jackass, everyone with the internet has heard of Youtube, Google, and thirty other services you think you're cool or smart for mentioning. Second, we're talking about electricity, and there is only so many things I'm going to try before I call in a professional, which I personally don't want to pay for. When you're telling me how to change out a circuit breaker and you neglect to mention basic safety, I'm going to assume you didn't properly Google shit.  

In short, buy a new house. You'll be dead before any major problems occur. 

 Notice no one on the set

 of his show is happy 

when he shows up. 

The Grossman Festival of Fantastic Film and Wine

I confess; when I get new readers from another country, especially one I know little about, I read up on them. A shocking revelation for the internet, I know, someone who admits they don't know everything. Today, for the first time ever, we welcomed to the Anti-social club, Slovenia. And you can always measure a countries worth by the horror films they put out (no U.S. bashing!) 

Now my Slovenian readers are laughing right now, because they probably know where I'm going with this. It's safe to say that pretty much the entire world has been upstaged by The Grossman Festival of Fantastic Film and Wine, which specializes in Fantasy and Horror. You would be correct in asking if I have not previously blogged about my hatred for wine snobs, but these people aren't Americans trying to pretend to be well cultured, and I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that they actually enjoy their wine. The winners get various "Cat" awards, such as the Vicious Cat, Noisy Cat, something I can't pronounce, etc. They also have make-up workshops, piercing workshops, horror bands, rich Slovenians drinking wine, but mixing freely with everyone else. It's just awesome.  

My words cannot describe how awesome a concept this is, so here is a playlist of the 2013 festival:
Festival Playlist
Festival Site

It's Called Bluegrass Because of Blue Grass, Idiots

I don't know how many articles I've read about Bluegrass musicians that have to give a few sentences or a paragraph about the origins of the name, and then get it wrong. Being as this is Wiki Wednesday, I thought what better way to settle this apparent dispute than to type Blue Grass into the site? Herein lies my treatise on the subject.

The first thing that pops up is, "Bluegrass refers to several species of grasses of the genus Poa (with the most famous being the Kentucky bluegrass.)" Clicking the Kentucky bluegrass link takes you to the Poa listing, so I can understand a little confusion at first. The next one is the "Bluegrass region, a region of the United States centered in Kentucky," and might I add, it doesn't go much beyond the state of Kentucky since it's surrounded on the north, east, and west sides by a river. Then we have, "Bluegrass music, a form of American roots music." You know, I almost understand the common oversight, since this article states it's a form of American roots music (50 states and 14 fucking territories), which is a bit worse than saying, and I quote, "Bluegrass was inspired by the music of Appalachia," (13 fucking states and more than half of the goddamn east coast,) and the article more or less buries the origins reference without ever mentioning an actual location. However, it does finally agree that it was more than likely named after The Blue Grass Boys, Bill Monroe's band, which formed in 1939. 

As you may have guessed, the next entry in the grand ol' Wikipedia is none other than, "The Blue Grass Boys, the band led by Bill Monroe that defined the Bluegrass genre." Sadly, clicking it goes straight to Bill Monroe (the Father of Bluegrass, born in the state of Kentucky) and gives little coverage of the others members at the time. Let's see, you had, "banjo prodigy Earl Scruggs (NC), singer-guitarist Lester Flatt (TN), fiddler Chubby Wise, and bassist Howard Watts (both from FL) - sometimes called "the original bluegrass band." 

But before I continue, I'd like to return to the previous genre entry, where Ralph Stanley of the Stanley Brothers, pretty much the second biggest Bluegrass band, ever, says the term came from deciding on the name of a music festival. "It was decided that since Bill was the oldest man, and was from the bluegrass state of Kentucky and he had the Blue Grass Boys, it would be called 'bluegrass." Well, if that doesn't make sense to me and the entire world, I don't know what would. And of course, it's quickly followed by someone adding, "The Oxford Companion to Music suggests an etymology related to the "Blue Mountains [sic] of Virginia." Thanks a lot, dickhead, since Ralph Stanley's from VA, I couldn't have guessed. Also, your vague and pointless entry often gets people confused and they credit the creation of the name to the Blue Ridge Mountains. When I think of blue mountains, I think of  blue grass. And when I think of a Ford Mustang, I think of orange juice. This is why I hate people. 

Moving forward, the last official entry under bluegrass is, "Bluegrass & Backroads, a television show about people and places in the Bluegrass region." Also known as Kentucky Farm Bureau's Bluegrass & Backroads, produced by Kentucky Farm Bureau Federation and Kentucky Farm Bureau Insurance Companies, based in Louisville, Kentucky, and you can watch it on Kentucky Educational Television.  

There are a few Other uses before we go. "Blue Grass, Iowa, a small city" no one has ever heard of, "Blue Grass, Virginia," an even smaller city no one has ever heard of and wasn't even named that until 1950, the "Blue Grass Army Depot in Richmond, Kentucky," which, while Richmond isn't a big secret, mentioning a chemical weapons stockpile will probably get my blog flagged by the NSA, again, and we have the "Bluegrass (Sirius)" radio station that was merged with one on XM, and "Bluegrass (train), a passenger train of the Monon Railroad," that I know nothing about and it doesn't even have a damn entry, so why is it listed?

In short, bluegrass music gets its origins from the name of a region in Kentucky. 

AR-15 vs. Having a Big Penis

First off, I support the right to keep and bear arms (and to have said right taken away if you're a complete idiot, like letting your kids play with them, shooting yourself in the foot, etc.) Second, I know how to shoot a gun, and take-down a gun, and reassemble a gun. Third, I've never had a complaint about the size of my penis.

Every time I see someone with an AR-15 it's usually the only gun they've ever fired, owned, heard of, looked at, know anything about, etc. They don't even own any oil, and if you have no clue why you would need it, well, stereotype confirmed. Your wannabe M-16 requires regular service and your ass wouldn't survive a goddamn week in the military anyway, so get off it. Stop adding scopes and bayonets and drink holders and everything else and learn to shoot the damn thing. Not saying it's a bad gun. Not saying everyone who owns one is a bad shot. But it certainly seems to be the gun of choice for those overcompensating for something. 

You don't need one for self-defense unless you're being attacked by werewolves on a regular basis. You don't need one for home defense when it would be cheaper to reinforce your door and call the cops. You don't need one for hunting unless you know nothing about hunting. 

The Lost Boys (1987)

It's Monday, and that means another Movie Monday Blog! Okay, it doesn't, but I'm still going to ramble about a movie. 

"One thing about living in Santa Carla I never could stomach, all the damn vampires." - Grandpa

The Lost Boys took everything awesome about the 80's rolled it into one, and became a triumph of horror comedy. What sets it apart from the other 500 vampire horror comedies of the time was that it fully updated the stale and overdone stereotype, while maintaining important elements of the genre. (Near Dark did the same thing in the same year, but everyone hated it, and eventually considered it a cult film, making them look like idiots; cred.) A simple story of a widowed woman moving with her two boys into their granddad's house to start fresh, is quickly turned sinister with the revelation that they've moved to the murder capital of the world, and that a local teen-aged gang might be to blame. 

But how do you make a trendy film work? Simple, you put it in a setting everyone is currently obsessed with, which was the beach at the time (and saxophones), as well as a broken family, a pet dog, weird grandpa, and a house in the middle of nowhere. You add not one, but two Coreys, both familiar with the genre, one already a veteran. You add an older brother, the poor man's Josh Brolin, in Jason Patric. And of course, you add an awesome villain in the always creepy Kiefer Sutherland. The Frog Brothers were influential in my desire to become a vampire hunter and what would be more awesome than also having a comic book shop as a cover? Nothing. 

Bill S. Preston, Esquire

Will You People Die!

I am under no obligation to write a post every single day, but it has helped me to get some frustrations out. Today is no different. 

I still don't get the asinine people who frequent message boards about subjects they obviously don't care about or are against. I can tell you don't like something, but I don't really know why you've taken it upon yourself to harass others about something they obviously do like. To me, these people are about as helpful as the ones who give low ratings and vague reviews. They appear to have something to say, but it's the same as the last guy and even less helpful. I know, I've talked about these people before, but it seriously bothers me that every single message board or forum has this form of loser, that justifies their existence because they think they represent the opposite side of the coin, but it's not a coin, and the world is not two-sided, so they can stop. It's like when Republicans and Democrats argue which one is better and go down a list of what each party believes, when in fact each politician has their own beliefs that may or may not be in line. That's great you've found a label for yourself, but it's not as clearly defined as you pretend. I get that you think because you're on a specific "side" that it makes you smarter, but by default, you're an idiot because you gave into black and white thinking, i.e. false dilemmas. If at the end of your life your crowning achievement was crusading against something on reddit, congratulations, you're a loser and have wasted everyone's time, including your own.  

Lists of bullshit oppositions people created in their heads but have never existed and should not be considered opposites:
Religion vs. Science
Conservatives vs. Liberals
Creationism vs. Evolution
Gay Marriage vs. Straight Marriage
Rational thinking vs. Emotional thinking
Global Warming vs. Republicans

No one likes you.

Ragnarok Doesn't Happen In a Day

Normally, I'm all for heralding in doomsday, except when everyone keeps saying Ragnarok is apparently a 24 hour cataclysmic event that ends it all; it's not. Just a quick jab from Wiki states it is a series, as in more than one, and there are major happenings, including flooding of the world. That, at least, is observable. Even worse, references to Ragnarok are yanked out of a collection of Norse poems, written or compiled by the same guy. Are you getting the picture? There is always a pessimist in the group, writing books like Revelation, scaring the holy shit out of people. They are my kin. But while the world will not end in 24 hours according to Ragnarok, remember that every belief has zero faith in us surviving, but 100% faith in us screwing up the world. 

 McDonald's Drive-Thru is always open 24 hours.

Benefit

I'm going to a benefit tonight for someone who accidentally overdosed on drugs, which killed them, so this won't be a lengthy post. I just want to say that there is a reason why people do drugs and it's often mental illness, so the next time you decide to make light of someone overdosing, or badmouth all addicts, remember that it can always be someone very close to you. If you don't agree, I hope you are devoured by a thousand starving, miniature crocodiles.

You Don't Know Who the Guardians of the Galaxy Are

"This movie's gonna be awesome!"

"I can't wait for this to finally be released!"

"OMG! Guardians of the Galaxy trailer FTW!"

Just shut up. 

When the X-Men movies came out, people were stoked and it made sense, because they were arguably the baddest super hero group around, and if nothing else, people knew who Wolverine was. When the Avengers came out, you had Iron Man and the Hulk to lead it in, so even if you didn't know who the other characters were initially, you did by the time the film was released. I get that maybe you watched the trailer and thought, "That looks cool."

But if I sat you down without access to the internet and asked who the Guardians of the Galaxy were, as in the individual members, only Marvel nerds would have been able to answer the question without resorting to shit like, "That raccoon guy." I get that a handful of nerds convinced a big studio to do this movie and I'm certain they pointed out the success of the Avengers to get it made, but no one ever talked about this shit before, and now they're apparently closet GotG fans who have read every appearance. People are so full of shit. 

Some of my favorite Guardians of the Galaxy.

The Crime Rate Has Decreased!

So the crime rate has greatly decreased in the past few decades here in the United States, yet every time something horrible happens, everyone gets bent out of shape and justifies their over-protection of their kids with it. These news articles about sick and twisted people are heavily commented on with the readers disgust and how you can't trust people anymore, etc. Yeah, it's bullshit. 

This crap has been happening since the beginning of civilization. It's nothing new, but to say that the world is a worse place is completely false. What has happened is that you no longer hear local news, but instead world news, and the number one attention grabbing headlines (that don't involve Kanye West and that rich girl he married) are about things like rape, murder and child abduction. Maybe most people read them because of the shock value, actually seeking a nice resolution? Maybe they don't? Regardless, try living in the real world, where none of this shit happens on a daily basis.

The music world is still a dangerous place. 

Karma Might Be a Bitch (A Retraction)

I once wrote about how stupid it is to believe in the western idea of Karma, that anything you do will come back to you, good or bad. Well, okay, I don't believe in that and am not retracting my stance, but something very ugly recently somewhat corrected itself, and since blogging is therapeutic, why not write about my side of the story, since I never have?

From the time you meet someone, their actions and interactions with you impact how you view that person. It can be one night, a week, month, several, a year, etc. that you spend with them, and either that relationship grows, stagnates, or dies. My relationship involving a few people grew rather rapidly. It was good, great, awesome relationship. Which then abruptly ended when false allegations were launched against me. By false, I mean completely fictional and not based on anything real, outside of someone's imagination.

I am Insanislupus, and I am half-beast, the missing link between man and wolf. I am rightfully viewed as the purveyor of manliness, so I don't blame people when they continue to harbor secret desires. However, completely making something up that has no basis in reality, spreading it around to try and get back at me for exposing you as a fraud, and actually getting a handful of people to think less of me, or stop talking to me altogether. Those people can fuck off.

Last paragraph, I promise. So when this lying, manipulative whore who acted like I was all over her, or whatever bullshit she said, was caught screwing around behind her boyfriend's back, the truth was finally revealed and all charges were dropped against me. Well, at least in some people's eyes, and that's what matters most. Those who stopped talking to me have yet to rebuild that bridge, which more or less means they feel completely stupid for taking the wrong side, and should. 

I lied. This is the last paragraph.

Pastor Jamie Coots

The snake-handling preacher died from a snake bite. He was from Middlesboro, KY, which oddly (for Kentucky at least), isn't in the middle, but deep south. While our state is known as the gateway to the south, and there are easily four distinct cultural regions (I'm from northern Kentucky), I am very familiar with his beliefs, in fact, my uncle-by-marriage's father died the same way. Glad that, because he was a religious fundamentalist that most had never heard of, everyone was nice enough to call him a moron and be thankful for his death. To them, I hope that some day, as you're dying, you're surrounded by people who verbally lash out at you for things that aren't their business. 
Don't get me wrong, snake handling is, in my opinion, idiotic, and not getting medical treatment for a snake bite is even more so, but people risk their lives every day, and often times the lives of others, yet no one is lashing out at them. Having unprotected sex can kill you, but people have no problem with that. If anything else, the man died doing what he believed in, and unless you're going to die in the name of being one of the biggest cocks on a comment thread, then shut the fuck up. 

WWICD?

Which Records Should I Buy First?

Digital is convenient and nothing is better than being turned on to new music while on Youtube, except cramming thousands of songs onto something that fits into the palm of your hand. However, Vinyl has the same magic as a book and if that turns you on, then so be it. For whatever reason, I'm one of the few people my friends know who have vinyl, so I get asked a lot of questions. They might be detecting the bullshit, or feeling overwhelmed by the warehouse of un-played vinyl sitting in the historic apartments in the middle of the ghetto, of their hipster friends. I understand that, since I know it's impressive to walk into a music library. But what records should you buy?

Simple. Always buy the albums you listen to the most. I don't care if you own the files, the CD, whatever, if you're switching over to vinyl, it's that simple a decision. Don't be caught up in completing discographies. If you love one album from a band, but merely like the other ones, then that one album is a must, and the rest can wait. New albums are great, but don't be afraid to buy a used album. There's no reason to pay several times more for a re-issue, when someone else is getting rid of the original in great shape. They'll almost always sound the same and often don't offer anything new except for bogus remastering. Audiophiles are almost always full of shit and argue against this. Listen to your albums instead of them.

Everything Happens For a Reason

Yes, it does. But the reasons have nothing to do with your predetermined fate. You walk into a building, it explodes, and you lose your limbs. The reason it exploded was because someone planted a bomb in it. The reason you lost your limbs was because you were too close to the bomb. This had nothing to do with luck or happening for a reason. It wasn't even random. That was a hypothetical situation in case you were someone who walked into a bombed building and lost your limbs. 

I'm kind of tired of the saying, not because it's redundant, but because it's a cop out of people dealing with the shitty hand they've been dealt in life. It should be replaced with, first, taking responsibility for your own actions and, second, preventing it from happening in the future. Stop passing the buck. No one owes you anything, least of all some creator who obviously doesn't like you if you think they brought something bad upon you. They had no hand in making your life miserable; your life just sucks.  

This happened for a reason. The reason was that 

God magically planted a driver who didn't know 

what they were doing or wasn't paying attention.

You're Still Giving Entertainers Money

This is a follow-up to this post.

But my point remains, you're handing money over for nothing. If I walked up to you and said, I'm no longer going to walk down this street unless you give me $5, you'd keep walking. If a musician you barely know about asks for the same to further their music career, some people give them the damn money. You're not buying anything from them, you're handing them cash to further a career in a business they're obviously not good at.

Here's how it should work: Buy the latest edition of the Antisocial Club for $1, or the next week's for $5, or the next month's for $15.

Here's how it works for scam artists and the people that fall for their bullshit: Buy the latest edition of the Antisocial Club for $1, or the next week's for $7, or the next month's for $31, or give me $100 for no reason.

Here's how it works when you keep it real: Get the latest edition of the Antisocial Club for $0, or the next week's for $0, or the next month's for $0, or give me nothing, because I work and make my own money and am apparently successful at this very simple and basic aspect of life.

How Will You Die?

I visited my godchildren yesterday, four of them, and had them all engage in a conversation about how they were going to die. They have been around for several years now, from about 3 to 13 and I felt the conversation was appropriate. If you guessed that I am not serious, you would be correct, but this is a direct parallel to the way people talk about online games, apps, websites, etc. Recently, when Facebook turned 10, I started to notice a lot of articles online talking about it's demise, as if it wasn't the most popular social network in the world and near death. Why? It's popular because people like using it for various reasons. A lot of people are on it, and it is an extension of your social life, so unless you're a paranoid conspiracy theorist, or just don't like people, you have one. Even more annoying are the bands, musicians, artists, etc. who do nothing but benefit from a free service, yet won't shut up about how they hate it. No one knows who you are, so let's bash the very service that gives us more popularity and a way to connect with others we normally wouldn't be able to. How about those people die?

Here lies Facebook, 

just because you wanted 

it to die, it did. You're cool. 

Bering Sea Gold

I like the show. It's very entertaining and probably not even a realistic portrayal of sea dredging. That's fine, since I'm not one of the morons who sit on their couch and think they're going to do this for a living sometime in the future and make millions of dollars. Apparently they don't watch the show, since it certainly doesn't portray it as a lucrative business, or an easy lifestyle. Almost every interview on the show is about someone being broke. You have to watch the entire season before anyone makes any money, if they even do. They complain about the quality of work and the low pay they achieve for their troubles there. Even the people who have been doing this their entire lives aren't rich. So now these fans are going to move across the continent, where the weather is worse, the work is harder, and the pay is still very poor. They know nothing about boats, mechanics, swimming, the sea, gold, Alaska, etc. They don't any much money to get started either. 
In response, I have decided to produce a show called Covington Street Gold. In it, you have to go around and find people selling gold jewelry and other items on the cheap. At the end of the day, you go to Willie Lomax's Foo's Gold, the mobile pawn shop and exchange owned and operated by the only man to survive 50+ homeless years on the streets of Covington. He will offer you two dollars per piece of gold you bring him. Series premiere this summer. 

Foo's Gold may doze, but never close. 

Most Blacks Don't Look Like Samuel L. Jackson

Sam Rubin's retarded. Sam Jackson called him out on it. I thought it was hilarious and I've heard this ridiculous rumor of people confusing Larry Fishburne and Jackson, but they look nothing alike. Nothing! In case you're not hip to it, Rubin asked Jackson about "his" Super Bowl commercial. Only it was Fishburne in the commercial and not Jackson. Samuel L. refused to let up and called out the ignorance. 

I often heard the "all black people look alike" line growing up, and having classes in grade school with several blacks, I understood it completely. The only problem was, the majority of said black students were related. They were cousins, all sharing grandparents who had about a dozen children, and their children followed with not-as-large-but-still-large families, all of which stayed in the same neighborhood. Naturally, they shared a lot of features, but I noticed that there were other, white families, who had a similar story. Of course, the members of each of these families were said to all look alike, and no one was saying all white people look alike. My mother had seven brothers and sisters and shockingly you can tell they are related. 

My point, if I can be brief, is that while it's an almost extinct form, it's still racism and can be cured by only having basic slight observational skills. 

Laurence Fishburne (left), 

Denzel Washington (middle), 

and Samuel L. Jackson (right).

What To Do With Vacant Lots?

The city I am from has decided, rather than spend a few grand rehabbing a house and selling it, that it would make more sense to spend even more to demolish it and make it almost worthless. I can't blame them; they are dumb and can't help it. Then they ask the citizens what they should do with the soon to be vacant lot, or all of the other vacant lots they have created. Every hipster within a 100 mile radius wants to turn them into urban gardens, because they're so smart and cool and have no clue if there has ever even been a soil sample done, or if the plot even gets enough light, or if there is a Starbucks within walking distance. But when I am asked for an idea and it's not taken, I get mad. Don't ever waste my damn time.

Bad soil? No problem.

Little sunlight? No problem.

Starbucks five blocks away.

Fruit of the Loom

I used to wear Fruit of the Loom underwear, starting when I was a kid and everybody wore tighty-whiteys. I remember the doofuses that had to parade around in the commercials dressed like fruit. I even had the Underoos and have boycotted K-Mart ever since because they sold out of Incredible Hulk and never restocked, forcing me to wear ET. In my less particular adult life, I carried on with my preferred brand, until now. 

I don't know much about sewing, aside from it's probably someone in a third world country feeding two sides of cloth into a machine. How hard is that? Every shirt I have is coming apart in the armpit. That sucks, but isn't too bad when you're wearing it as an undershirt. The boxer-briefs I wear, all four pairs by said company, are all coming apart at the seem in the crotch. Now I could make jokes that there isn't enough room in there, and it's ironically happening on the low-hanger testicle side as it is, but underwear have one mission. That mission is to protect my vitals and with a gaping hole right next to them we can officially declare this mission aborted! Hanes, don't fail me now.

Warren Buffet wears Hanes.