Tomorrow night is the show I’ve been waiting on and dreading. Sure, M. was sweet enough to get the ball rolling, but he could have just shot me when he had the Berreta in his hand that time.

Anyway, it is for a good cause and if I don’t stiffen a la my first attempts at stand-up comedy or projectile vomit on the audience, it should be a good time. One more time, check out this website: http://raptorhead.com/comedy.html.

In unrelated to my self-loathing pursuit of jolly laughter, I found out what my raise was the other day. Considering through the luck of the draw and a change in policy I’m getting it as of 1/1/06, rather than the June 1 date discussed at hire, it’s pretty goddamn sweet. Plus it’s more than I expected, and there appears a slight threat they might check it out in June anyway and see what’s what when I crack a year.

That and the fact that the other day the president shouts down the hall to me, “Hey, D., did you see The Aristocrats?” makes me think it was an OK idea to take this job. (Better yet, he followed that with greeting my somewhat intensely serious boss (who’s yet to see hear the dirty joke of a movie) with a riff akin to the opening, “So a man goes into an agent’s office…” For a split second I thought he was going to launch into it. Would have been awesome.)

Even further afield of unrelated, the Shitboard at the Comedy Studio continues to haunt my hopes and dreams. A boy named “BarryK” whose douchiness is so extreme it’s boring actually PM’d me “Your about as funny as a sunburn. In fact a sunburn is actually funnier then you.”

I only wish I still had nine-year-old nephews, so they could help me craft the perfect response. (Sidenote: he appears to have attended the high school my uncle taught at, but he’s so boring I can’t bring myself to do any due deligient like detective work.)

As M. points out, many of the arts include delusional dreamers with no discernible talent on one end and geniuses on the other. And, it seems like comedy draws out and tosses together the extremes even moreso.

I sure wish I could fly back to Boston and punch the kid.

I’m torn about the future of my relationship with M. Not because of the actual relationship, that seems pretty sweet. Nope, it’s a question of national lines.

The further this nation sinks into a rhetoric cesspool, the more I yearn to live abroad. Not so much that I believe that there is a governmental utopia waiting with open arms to embrace this weary little trooper. Nope. I’m not that naive. I just want to live in a soveriegn nation that isn’t so fucked up that shit is truth and truth is shit.

On the other hand, M. is proud to be an American (and rightly so, given he fought and worked for it for many years). So, he will stay here, as I, like Diogenes, carry a lamp not to find an honest man, but a possibly not completely, foul, dishonest government, and become a citizen of the world.

My bags are almost packed after seeing in rapid succession, Ann Coulter arguing with Arianna Huffington on what should only be called Fucking Hannity and Colmes, and the douche-y and occasionally (deceptively, mind you) not 100-percent-wrong Joe Scarborough arguing with a student at U. of Washington. The thing about the Scarborough fight was the bliss in which words were getting put into some peacenik kid’s mouth, in which gradually seemed pro-Hitler and anti-all Marines, everywhere.

(The saddest part was the kid was actually pretty well-spoken. His point was that he was not against Pappy Boyington. He was against the cynical manipulation in the modern world, where a war memorial has become an issue through it’s use to boost a pro-military stance and bolster an unpopular (rightly so) war. There was nothing slacker, dopey, protest-y about the dude. I believe he has read a few history books.)

So, in ripping the kid, Joe moves on to some fat fuck alumni, and they toss around and refute anti-World War II rhetoric no one ever actually said and jerk each other off to Pappy Boyington’s heroism. In the fucked up world we now live in this bullshit naturally segued into SHOCKING, U. of Washington’s pro-Commie memorial. Not only are the kids over there against great WWII heroes, making them essentially pro-Hitler and Holocaust, they are Communist-loving bastards to boot.

Then they show the so-called memorial to communists. It’s a goddamn tribute to the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War. Fucking A. Red-baiting in 2006?

I thought our national conscience voted and decided fighting facists in Spain was just swell.

The scary truth of all of this shit is M. is the one putting these images onto our TV. He’s driving me away. He clearly has a larger (crueler) motive. Why couldn’t he just fuck with my self-esteem like your average cruel boyfriend?

The post title is essentially my capsule review of Firewall. I’m sure others have written about Harrison Ford beginning to have that scruffy/doddery/old-man-spell about him, so I won’t go on about his wife around my age and non-adult kids in the flick. Afterall, Hollywood loves them some May-December casting bullshit.

Nope, what yanked my chain was the part of his administrative assistant. That’s whats got me all wound for days. Harrison is the head of security for a 27-branch bank that’s in the middle of a merger. In other words, he’s an executive with a giant-ass house on the water, expensive car and nicely tailored suits. Quintessentially, LaLa-Land’s depiction of the white-collar working man with a bit of a money clip jingling in his pocket.

Of course, Mr. Alpha-male, white-collar, banking dude has a secretary, who’s clearly the Gal Friday, helps him out of a jam, thinking on her feet, prescient and helpful as all shit type. You know, pretty much every exec’s wet dream of competent, friendly with a sense of humor, just young enough and plain enough to not be his wet dream of dick sticking, ’cause that would be another movie.

So, people who write movies sometimes no shit about the real world, and there’s a pivotal scene where he goes seeking out this admin chick’s help. He rolls on up to her apartment, and the hallway opens to cramped, numbered, thin, wood door portals to a littered, ghetto-reeking hell. The wrong door, the neighbor across the hall, is shrieking poverty immigrant stereotype of anonymous doors in slums across any major city. He hits the right door and begs for a ride, in her beat up, shitbox, he needs to roll down the hill, while she pops the clutch, junkety ass heap of a car.

Fuck you Hollywood. I’ve been doing that admin gig for a bit now and fuck you, you know what? I own a fucking convertible. I own a condo. I rent nowhere near the littered ghettos of housing projects.

Why might all this be? Because, sure, I’ll give you a bit of soul-mashing from making the copies, printing, fetching, filing and whatever bullshit. But, it ain’t frying fries or cleaning toilets.

Check your facts, dudes of movie writing. A bank exec over 27 branches would have someone making his copies probably making more money than the humps on your crew. Yeah, LA PA may be a creative artiste living his/her NYU dreams of someday working for some movie making big deal, but they likely be living lower than the chick at the bank. It might be hell in corporate America, but not that hell.

I’m too tired to assiduously avoid “blogosphere” “memes.” God, I can’t even fucking believe I typed that sentence, quote or no quotes. I’m not even a big fan o’ Scoble, given he works for the man whose software I begrudgingly use.

But, what the fuck right? Today’s word of the day is brrreeeport. Count me among the lazy and mildly unimaginative, but hip to what the kids do on the internet.

Maybe it’s the “mild heart attack” of Attorney Whittington down in Texas. Maybe it’s the dull throbbing ache of many a painful VD of February 14’s past (like ghosts of Christmas past, but with more crying). Or maybe it’s the frightful level of domesticity I have achieved with M.

I dunno.

But, honestly, I just can’t get juiced for the Hallmark of hearts and flowers. Sure, we had dinner. And, I tried to accuse him of flirting with the waitress to add a little spark to the night. All in all, though, we’re talking Tuesday in February. What’s so fucking sloppy kissed wonderful about that?

By the way, and completely unrelated, the evilest, darkest, wickedest, fucked upped part of my soul is kind of hoping Cheney inadvertently croaks the guy. I know, I suck, wishing something like that on a guy who ain’t done nothing against me but be a Republican Texas lawyer. But, still and all, if’n it’s manslaughter, even this fucked, Teflon-sliding bunch of humps in the current Executive Branch Administration might have to face some music. Fucking A, I mean, perjury, influence peddling and assorted other flavors of malfeasance don’t stick. Maybe a chilling body might.

I never really forgave James Brady for stopping with his own body the bullet meant for Ronnie Reagan. But, shit, despite getting shot, this man has a fine sense of humor.

You just gotta have love and respect for Jim and Sarah Brady’s take on the VP’s fun with guns.

So, the Veep went hunting his buddy’s face. What a rascal, our Dick.

The knee-jerk, bleeding from my 2004-four-more-years-of-this-bullshit, martyred stigmata liberal in me would love to whine about guns, gun safety, gun control, saving cuddly animals and why can’t we all just get along rainbows and unicorns. But fuck that shit.

Why the fuck are we as a nation paying out hard-earned income taxed dollars for this old geezer to spend the weekend shooting at things? Read the fine print in the article — security and medical personnel were on hand to help the poor schmoe with the VIP buckshot-riddled face. Why were security and medical personnel hanging about at the ready? Because Cheney is a frail old coot with a heart kept throbbing by batteries and the blood of welfare babies.

He ain’t Teddy Roosevelt. His candy ass is rough riding only as long as a defibrallator is rolling inches behind him in a tricked out Secret Service Escalade that maintains just enough distance for him to make pretend he’s a rugged outdoorsman. Seriously, it’s 2006. The gentleman hunter image is a throwback to at least a century back, when Mother England filled imperialist dens and museums with taxidermy exotica. You figure he was going to catch and release the quail or does he need them for food?

No wonder most of the world hates our U.S. guts.

While I’m at it and speaking of the world at large. Thank fucking god I was out of the country when the two-fer of wristslashing depression occurred, the appointment of Sammy, say good by to rights and all that sort of messiness, Alito and the State of the Union Address. I saved myself a fortune on psych bills and Prozac by missing them both entirely.

Happily, I can report, though, that the whole Danish cartoon thang wasn’t actually causing that half of the planet to burn out of control, as Western press might have you believe.

Just like here, the local Malaysia papers were full of local crimes, drownings, domestic murders, car accidents and completely misreading other governments and cultures. Only difference is, they don’t delusionally believe their press is anything but controlled.

I just wrote a prose poem to a shitty day, complete with the drama and tension of a co-worker fucking my mojo up. (Past readers can dig how much I like the joys of office bullshit.)

It ended with Old Man, Control Freak, Landlord Nick instructing us on how best to mind the house more than our own naked asses while showering.

Then, I accidentally closed the browser, because I’m stupid. Fucking universe, I fucking hate it all the way through, including Danish cartoons featuring religious idolatry, which really should make me laugh. Nope, just a big ball of hate.

Just to cheer myself up, here’s a couple of pictures I took at Penang’s Botanical Gardens:

I started uploading the millions of pictures I took. I’ve also ruminated on what I should write, so expect something lengthy soon.

Meanwhile, the beginning of the pics can be found here:

http://dee-rob.com/coppermine/index.php?cat=4

First, I think Barbara Boxer wants me to like her. She sent me email explaining why Samuel Alito wouldn’t be a good Supreme Court Justice. But, I already sent her an email saying the same thing. It’s like she wants me to think we’re all cool and shit.

I don’t know, though, Barbara and her aides write a good email. But, like, I don’t think GWB would, like, be her myspace friend or anything, so I don’t think he’ll read her email. And, all the other guys on the Senate who are on myspace and friends with George, they probably won’t read it either.

Fucking myspace, I mean, U.S. government.

That all worries me.

Then, there’s the trip to Malaysia. Sure, warm tropical beaches, chicken satay, exoticism, photo ops, that’s all cool and stuff. But, there’s also the matter of the relatives dropping by from miles around to celebrate the new year and view the return of the prodigal. In terms of numbers, I figured my family was off the hook crazy by weight and volume of activity around a holiday. M.’s done that and survived.

No he’s topping me on the occasion of the Chinese New Year. There ain’t gonna be cat-swinging room for all the aunts and cousins who will be around. In their midst will be I, who, I believe, to them will be”the chubby white chick” with awesomely horrific attempts to stammer out Mandarin pleasantries.

Yup, more worries.

Finally, there’s work. What can I say? I want to slack, I yearn, I pine, I howl at the moon in vainglorious attempts to harness a slacker mind. I just can’t fucking do it. Perhaps the torment that was my mother and her attitude toward work was rubbed a bit to ingrained into my hide. I lean toward not exactly workaholicness, but giving a bit too much of a shit all the same.

And, yet, I plan to leave for a bit on a true blue real vacation (something I took precious few of in my last stint working for the man).

Worse yet, I leave immediately after sitting for a yearly review that has been calendarized at a time when I haven’t worked for a year yet. One of the self-evaluation questions asks as to how I have fostered camraderie and work and play well with others. (OK, fostering camraderie is in there, but working/playing isn’t. Artistic license.)

The only answer I can think of so far is, “Since joining this organization I have fostered a sense of camraderie and esprit to corps by not stabbing anyone.” (Of course, lacking historical context, they likely couldn’t match my level of amusement if I were to write that.)

So, yeah, worry, worry, worry.

Politics, travel with my boy-o, work, what’s not to obsess unhealthily about?