Sacrificial Bonfire

I was planning on writing a rather detailed entry about fighting smart, and how the kneejerk reaction of a lot of liberals regarding Judge John Roberts is like that one friend that you have, that one stupid friend, who starts pissing off people at a bar by staying inane things, and you know that this idiot friend of yours is gonna get his ass kicked, but so are you because he is your bud and you have to have his back. See, I was going to do that, but the Democratic leadership as well as the calmer heads over at dailykos already know about fighting smart and not making idiotic statements about "oh look at the briefs he wrote" (which were in private practice) or "oh look he's Republican" (like Shrub was going to nominate John Kerry--and by the way, when we get back in power in 2008 of course we're going to nominate our own whipsmart qualified judge who, you know, will be a Democrat) or "oh, look he's a white male" (because, even though I think Shrub is the worst president since Herbert Hoover, you can't really say that his adminstration isn't racially diverse).

So instead, it's back to doing that gabba gabba hey on random stuff. Like how I found out from Dubois last night that CNN Asia Chick got fat. And not like oh just a little bit puffier around the face fat, but wholly unrecognizable until she said her name fat. I seem to have a knack for dodging bullets (insert image of Asian with badass goatee and hip striped shirt--cuz striped is the new black--dodging bullets in slo-mo).

And yes, I had to shell out some moolah to replace a tire despite only a pinhole sized, well, you know, hole because the whole inside of the tire was absolutely shredded from driving on it with low pressure. But on the other hand, it didn't blow out on me last night in midnight in the shadier sections of Hollywood. Plus, since the only auto place that was open was the Sears automotive near 3rd Street Promenade, I had a rather nice lunch at Il Fornio, just a block away from the ocean. Nothing says simple pleasures like a mandarin orange sorbet with a chilled pinot grigio under 80 degree heat, gray skies, palm trees and Argentinian soccer playing at the bar.

So I guess that I can't kvetch that much about not finding that special girl with the anime eyes and glossy lips who can talk about absurdism and old school hip hop lives within 10 miles of Casa de Stark. But you know, I will anyways.

Shitlist

Hey Karl! 

Yes, this is another political rant, so for those of you not politically inclined, go ahead and think of cute widdle kittens what with the widdle paws and whiskers and whatnot.

OK, so this is yet another entry among millions I'm sure about Valerie Plame. And already, the Republicans are deifying Karl Rove--e.g. Representative Peter King from New York saying it was "gutsy" for Rove to out Plame--and vilifying Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson--e.g. Valerie as nothing more than a desk jockey who was guilty of nepotism and thus deserved to be "frogmarched" out of D.C. and Joe as a partisan lying unpatriotic sonofabitch. All you have to do is go to any conservative blog to see this.

Now, DailyKos as done a lot of analysis debunking these repo talking points, so my rant here isn't so much a policy wonk discussion, but more of a breaking it down so the average joe can understand sorta thing. Crap, part of my job as a litigator is to take complex issues and simplify them so that the average state court judge who worked in a small ass firm and got his J.D. from Upstairs Beverly Hill School of Law can understand it in less than five minutes (though I usually do so with much less extraneous asides than my blog entries).

So here it is. Let's assume that the Republican talking points are right: that Valerie Plame was a desk jockey, and that she abused her position within the CIA to get her husband that trip to Niger (though if she was just a glorified typist, I guess she was a very powerful glorified typist if she could get her husband that Niger trip). Let's assume that Valerie Plame deserved to be frogmarched out of D.C. for putting her personal aspirations in front of national security, that she engaged in nepotism of the worst sort.

The problem is that, even if we assumed all that, at the end of the day, it still doesn't justify blowing her cover--a cover that other CIA agents may have shared.

The leak of Valerie Plame's identity also exposed the identity of the CIA-front company, Brewster Jennings and Associates. In turn, this necessarily exposes the work of other CIA agents who had been using Brewster Jennings and Associates to risk--they can't very well run covert operations when it's suddenly become public knowledge that the company they've told everyone they worked for is a CIA front.

No doubt, there will be people who will still say Valerie and Joe are at fault for the outing--it was their conduct if nepotism and undermining the President that caused Rove to do what he did. Thus, we should blame them for the damage to Brewster Jennings. However, assuming that the constructive termination of Valerie's career was justified, that doesn't mean that the manner in which this administration constructively terminated her was justified. If the CIA or the administration thought she acted improperly, why didn't they quietly fire her so as not to reveal that Brewster Jennings was a CIA front? Or to put it differently, even assuming that Valerie and Joe were at fault for the termination of her career, they were not at fault for howher career was terminated.

So even if you assume that Valerie deserved to be "frogmarched" out of DC, as certain conservative blogs are saying, the Republican Spin on this is still ridiculous--they are in effect arguing that the wholesale compromise of a valuable CIA front company, as well as any ongoing and future operations run out of that front company and the loss of intelligence that could have been gained in those operations, is completely justified because one of their glorified secretaries tried to get her husband a high-profile trip to Africa. And liberals are accused of being soft on terrorism?

Please people, all that I ask is when you hear spin from anybody, you think things through, OK? That way, I'm not up at 2:00am in the morning seething about politics, and I can go back to seething about other things, like how my Financial Advisor looks like a younger version of Kelly Hu but unfortunately I can't tap that.

Please Don't Let Me Hit The Ground

Tonight I'll Think I'll Walk Alone 

Given that I was out last night, I make no apologies for blogging on a Saturday night. Plus, I got a lot running through my head. Anyway, time for yet another half-assed random list of shit that's keeping Marty awake these days.

1. An open letter to the partner at Gateway Gig who thinks he was doing Marty a favor: I really do appreciate that you told me the firm hired another associate who is supposed to start in August. Knowing how most of the partners really can give a rat's ass about actual firm administration, if you hadn't told me, I would've been sitting with my thumb up my ass, getting pissed off about reserving my time to do Gateway Gig's work and not getting any straight answers about whether they need me or not. Though for future reference, it would have been preferable had you told me this when I wasn't doing the post-urinal shake in the friggin' john. I'd rather not have my hand around my dick when you're laying me off.

2. So I've been off the Lexapro for the last month, and given my post-medication feelings, I can definitely say there was no placebo effect. The colors are brighter (and the darkness is deeper) without the Lexapro, I can feel inspired when I watch movies or listen to music, and, oh yeah, I'm a friggin' horntoad now. All I need is a gust of wind hitting me in a certain way, and BANG, I'm looking for some lotion.

3. For all those aspiring writers, at one time, you've probably heard "show, don't tell." Well, here's a perfect example, from one of my favorite writers, Michael Marshall Smith:

"You know how sometimes, when you're just walking around, living your life, you'll see someone on the street and fall hopelessly in love with them? How something in the way they look, the way they are, makes you stop dead in your tracks amd stare? How for that instant you're convinced that if you could just meet them, you'd be able to love them for ever? Wild schemes and unlikely chance meetings pass through your head, and yet as they stand on the other side of the street or room, talking to someone else, they haven't the faintest idea of what's going through your mind. Something has clicked, but only inside your head. You know you'll never speak to them, that they'll never know what you're feeling, and that they'll never want to. But something forces you to keep looking, until you with they'd leave so you could be free.
The first time I saw Rachel was like that, and now she was in my bath. I didn't call out to hurry her along."

Much better than saying, "I was so lucky to have Rachel in my life," no? I'd stick a skewer through my hand to write like that. And hence you see once of Marty's writing inspirations.

There Is A Light

And In The Darkened Underpass . . . 

So, Marty's financial advisor got a case of the smarts and decided that she didn't want to date her clients. Which means I won't be able to say "Yeah, she's putting my assets into a Roth IRA" as a euphemism for anything. The lawyer side of me is frankly a bit relieved--I've seen business actions go completely bugfuck because of soured relationships. The "man she has an ass you can bounce a stack of quarters off of" side is disappointed--I mean really disappointed. Think when the waiter brings by the dessert plate and shows you a mouthwatering cheesecake with a fresh strawberries and creme and says it's all yours, and just when you're going to bite, he takes it away and says he's oh so sorry, another table actually had ordered the cheesecake before you. Man, why do I keep using food imagery to get across romantic and sexual points? Excuse me, it's time for my daily binging and purging.

The Financial Advisor and I got into a rather interesting discussion about the genders. She apparently keeps getting into situations where her male friends or her clients become romantically interested, so she talked to her guy friends about why this might be. It seems that guys are always optimistic, and much more direct in their communications, whereas chicks don't feel comfortable being direct and hence tend toward giving "hints." And that's where the problem arises I told her.

See, Financial Advisor is attractive, smart, and fun to hang out with. A guy who is able to make her laugh is stupid if he doesn't try to tap that. And she's right, most guys are optimistic--and it's a real bitch of time trying to figure out if that optimism is well founded or just false hope. So when a woman tells a guy she's able "to keep being friends separate with anything else that might develop", or she's "not interested in focusing on romantic relationships now", that little spark of optimism in guys focuses on all the modifiers--"might develop," "now". To us, that's not being direct at all. When a woman tells a guy that she can't hang out because she's "busy", well, she could honestly be busy. Whereas to the chica, she's being as direct as she can and thinking that should take care of it. And therein lies the rub. The guy will keep sniffing around with this hope in his heart that something might develop later, the hope blooming and expanding and having a life of its own, while the chica is totally uninterested, and that leads to bad drama later.

Now lucky for the both of us that I was able to be direct and forthright, and forced her to be so as well. Situations where you're thinking "Oh my God she's so into me" while she's thinking "Gosh, I really like vanilla" six months down the line are awkward enough as it is, but doubly so if she's managing your money.

And what have we learned? Yes, I know Snoop Doggy Dog advised "Don't sweat the pussy," which is all fine and good advice. But we also know that in reality, if guys were truly able not to sweat the pussy, that male market in hand lotion would collapse overnight.

The practical lesson for the rest of us guys is to have the chicas define their boundaries as early as possible. Otherwise, you might think you're about to storm her castle when you're actually 50 miles outside her state line playing pinochle. Now, you have to be smart and simple about it--don't make it about you. Just lay out that you like her, you don't want to put her in an awkward position which is why your letting her know that you would like to be more than friends, but that if she doesn't feel the same way that you understand. And that if she wants to stop hanging out, you perfectly understand. That way you're defining your expectations without creating an ultimatum (which is a sure way dropping nookie probability to 0%)and allowing her a way out if she really isn't interested.

Financial Advisor's main qualm was that she wasn't comfortable with being that direct. Well, we're not comfortable trying to read women's minds. So if a man is honest enough to be direct with you and is polite enough to leave you an out, the least that you can do is be direct and honest with him, and define your boudaries.

If you think that the hints and such are a necessary part of the game, well, as a man you should be prepared to find out that she was thinking about how much she liked vanilla the whole time and start stocking up on hand moisturizer, and as a woman, you should be prepared for annoying phone calls from pissed off guys three months after you thought you told the chump (indirectly and never saying the words)"I'm not interested."

As for the Financial Advisor and me, I needed a financial advisor and was going to use her even if she had told me she wasn't interested, gay, had plans, was clinically dead the first time we spoke. We have fun when we hang out, so I see no reason not to hang out with her every once in a while (though not more than that because a man can only be around a tight ass like that before something bursts somewhere in his body). In the meantime, it's onward for me. Plus there's always that 22-year old file clerk in the office who has a female crush on Zhang Ziyi. Heh heh, girl on girl crushes. Excuse me while I get some hand lotion.

Too Drunk To F***

Marty's social life has taken a positive turn mainly because he had the balls to be direct and forthright regarding a certain financial advisor (thanks to Dubois, the Napolean of Dating Strategies), and now his dates in the near future are tax deductible! But we all know you don't come here to read about chocalate unicorns and happy sugar teddy bears and dancing pixie fairies and rainbow gumdrops. So since Marty has found out that Angry Yellow is listed as a Law Talking Person Blog on other links, he's providing some legal lessons Marty has learned from dumb ass opposing counsel in the past few months:

1. If you decide that you want to scam a homeowners association with a bogus discrimination claim followed up by some frivolous litigation, you probably don't want to have a current default $3.9 million civil judgment against your ass for securities fraud as well as an SEC lawyer gunning after you like Tom Cruise gunning after a believable beard.

2. If you're a lawyer, you probably don't want to accept the above-identified person as a client. You definitely don't want to sign a federal complaint containing wholesale (and easily discoverable because they're part of the public record) factual misrepresentations, especially since by signing such a complaint, you are attesting under the law that the facts contained in the complaint are true.

3. Wanna have a flurry of motions to disqualify you and your firm as trial counsel? Why don't you go ahead and negotiate a deal that falls apart and then represent the client in the ensuing litigation so that you can serve as both a material witness and trial counsel!!! And to further screw over the client, make harmful representations during the negotiation that your client did not authorize and are completely lacking in any factual basis!!!

4. If you see that a co-defendant has lost its motion for summary judgment because it failed to follow a California Rule of Court, and your own summary judgment fails to follow that same California Rule of Court but your hearing isn't for another month, maybe you want to correct your summary judgment so you follow that California Rule of Court. I'm just sayinz, bro.

A Little Less Conversation - A Second Interlude

And who says Marty isn't into Asian women . . . 

OK, I know, enough with the politics. So I'll take a quick break and revert to the Marty we all know and love before I finish off my l'il Dean-like rant. Anyway, it seems like summer is the time all the yellow sistas be jonesin' for the Starkster. For the most part, it's been women from Singapore, South Korea and China that hallucinate a "Get Green Card Here" sign above my profile in Match.com. This summer tho', so far it's been Americanized cuties from within a 15 mile radius of Casa de Stark.

I used to dread that giddy feeling with short bursts of hyperactivity and lightheadedness that comes with the beginning of possibility--I knew that it was all an illusion, nothing would come of it. I knew that I would come crashing down and I would be back to the mundane. Kinda like going to a five star restaurant, but instead of anticipating the meal, thinking about how the meal is all gonna come out in a steamy dump of a turd two hours later.

Obviously, I was a fucking idiot.

But there are signs that I'm not going to be in the short bus for much too long. Like I'm confident that, even though my future financial advisor kept saying how she tries to make all her clients her friends, it was her way of attempting to be cool and nonchalant while being totally into yours truly. Why? Because I doubt financial advisors spend an hour and a half drinking a small coffee out in the sun with their clients after finishing with the business portion of the meeting--especially if the financial advisor usually spends until 10pm in her office, and the ninety minutes worth of slowly nursing coffee will push back that 10pm time to 11:30 pm. I also doubt financial advisors, even slightly tipsy ones in martini bars, let potential clients put their arm around their waists when they first meet them.

So this is a long roundabout Marty Stark way of saying, yeah, I'm cautiously optimistic.

By the by, Financial Chick kind of looks like the above chica.

Juice (Know the Ledge) - An Interlude

By Any Means Necessary 

1. Apparently, we Asians just don't know how to take a joke. I mean, so what if the 49ers former P.R. head honcho put out training video which found humor in a Chinese guy saying "balls", or Abercrombie and Fitch thought a tee-shirt with slanty-eyed caricatures saying "Two Wongs Do Make A Right" would appeal the Asians? Gosh, it's just harmless fun--which begs the question why the 49ers didn't have a Jeff Garcia impersonator in wetback clothes saying "we don't need no stinkin' completed passes" or Abercrombie and Fitch didn't put out a Sambo line of t-shirts with Al Jolson prints emblazened with "WE LUV DEM FRIED CHICKEN". Unfortunately, we are viewed as harmless, so when we speak up, we're viewed as whiners. I betcha if we went around carrying baseball bats beating the shit out of any asshole who starts quoting Long Duck Dong, we'd be viewed differently. Asians need a Malcom X.

2. See, when Democrats like Senator Durbin use Nazi analogies to describe Gitmo, he should be censured, but when Republicans use Nazi analogies to describe Democrats, stem cell research, abortion, taxes and the environment, they should be given a complete free pass by the media.

3. Yes, Senator Byrd was a member of the KKK in his past, and he has since repudiated and apologized for his membership. For those of God's Own Party who try to use this as an example of their own moral superiority in race relations (oh look, we never had a Klan member in our ranks), hmmmm, I wonder how many of those 20 Senators who did not sign or co-sponsor the anti-lynching resolution were Republican?

4. I'm fine with those folks in Kansas teaching creationism, "intelligent design" or whatever piece of crap spin term they're calling fundamentalist dogma these days--so long as they teach all theories of "intelligent design", including but not limited to the universe originated from a lotus flower from the navel of a dude woken from a serpent (Hinduism), the universe originated from a golden egg (Taoism), and my personal favorite, the universe is a big fuck up by a male god--whose creation is also a fuck up (Gnostic Christianity). Let's see if those folks would push so hard for an intelligent design curriculum then.

American Idiot

This Is Billy Bob 

So I usually don't write about politics because I'm afraid if I get started, I won't stop and this blog will get transformed into yet another political blog in an over-inundated blogosphere of pundits. Anyway, there are already folks over at sites such as Daily Kos who do a great job of intelligently and vehemently advocating the progressive cause. But once in a while, something sticks in my craw, and since this blog is a self-serving indulgent diary/rant/exercise in writing, I gotta write what I gotta write, even if it is yet another political diatribe preaching to the choir. So hence this rant featuring Marty Stark's patented long-winded making a point by tortured analogy. Just warning you--for those not politically inclined, go ahead and daydream about cute widdle kitty cats. This rant was inspired by a diary I read on dailykos on why a red-stated voted for Bush despite taking up the keister by the Repos economic policies. The voter said God would take care of his financial woes and Iraq, so he had to vote for the truly God Fearing candidate.

Still there? OK. So my view on religion can be summed up by a joke my dad told me when I was a kid (which is weird because my dad leans conservative and, since English isn't his first language, his humor tends toward bad puns--but I digress). Now granted, I embellished the following joke a bit because my dad isn't that well versed in American culture, but it retains the same message. Ready? Here we go!

So there was this guy named Billy Bob who lived in a small, dusty Texas town. Billy Bob was a God fearing man of the Old Testament variety, believing in a wrathful God and salvation by Grace alone, not by deeds. He did consider himself to be rather progressive for a God fearing man, tolerating his Christ-killing neighbor from Jew York and the many cursed descendents of Ham that had started moving into the town. Instead of trying to drive them out, he spread the Good News of fire and brimstone to try to save their souls.

Now one day, there was a tropical storm coming from the Gulf, a nasty one reminiscent of the original flood. Even that fair and balanced channel Fox News was telling folks to get out, so Billy Bob knew this wasn't some pansy liberal claptrap to get the God fearing out of town and let the descendents of Ham loot the place while the good folk were out. Anyway, Billy Bob gets this idea to show the people of his town the power of Faith. He decides to stay in the town while the storm hits, and he knows that he will come to no harm because Billy Bob has Faith that the Lord will save such a God fearing soul. He has so much faith that he's taken the spark plugs out of his car and thrown them out in his backyard somewhere so he can't leave. Once the townsfolk come back after the storm, they'll see Billy Bob and come to their senses and realize the Power of the Lord and what he bestows on believers.

So Billy Bob sits on his porch, watching the black sheets of rain washing down the streets, smiling knowing that God has graced him. A line of cars move past his home, and his neighbor, who is from Jew York and isn't to bad for a Christ killer, sees him as he's rushing out of his house to get the hell out.

"Hey Billy Bob, you OK? You need to leave!" Jew York says.

"Nah, I'm fine here. God will take care of me."

"Look, I don't think God wants you to sit on your ass and drown. C'mon Billy Bob, pack some clothes and I'll give you a ride to the shelter."

"No offense, but only those who have accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior can divine God's will. Why don't you stay with me? I can baptize you and then you'll see what God will do for the faithful."

"Uh, thanks for the offer but no thanks. Good luck with that whole salvation thing."

So off his neighbor went. Now the rain kept pouring, and the town being situated on dust and all, well, wouldn't you know it but a flood started pouring through the streets in a couple of hours. Billy Bob ain't a fool, so he up he went to his second floor to watch the happenin's from his bedroom with his coon huntin' dog. Then he saw the sheriff coming down the newly formed river of brown water in a small motor boat. Now the sheriff, he's a descendent of Ham, the son Noah had cursed for being such a lazy shiftless good for nuthin' monkey of a man who had fallen asleep on the Ark when he was supposed to be keeping watch. Noah cursed Ham and his descendants by placing the mark of skin as dark as night on them. Now the descendants of Ham are in the government and whatnot, that's surely a sign that the Tribulations are near.

"Hey Billy Bob! What're you still doing here? You gotta get out! C'mon, get on the boat and we'll head to higher ground!"

"I'm afraid I can't do that sheriff. Y'see, God has a plan for me."

"God wants you to get your crazy ass drowned? I don't think so. Get into the boat, or at least let me get your dog outta here. No need gettin' a dog killed on account of your stubborness."

"Ain't stubborness, it's Faith." But the 'coon dog jumped out of the window, swam over to the boat. Well, the dog is just a dumb animal with no soul to save, so Billy Bob couldn't get too angry about that.

"Looks like you ain't got even the sense that god gave a dog there Billy Bob. I can't wait for you, I got other trapped people who actually do want to get out to help. I hope you come to your senses before we head out."

But Billy Bob's Faith prevailed. The flooding got so bad within the hour that Billy Bob had to get on the roof. Now Billy Bob still had no doubts that God would save him. And lo and behold, the rain had stopped. Then a chopper flew over Bolly Bob's roof, and he heard the voice of the mayor from a bullhorn. Now the mayor was educated in one of the secular humanist schools out on the East Coast, and was trying to push those secular ways onto the town--what with talk about keeping creationism and prayer out of schools.

"Billy Bob!!! We're dropping a rope ladder. You better get your ass up here. We can't wait too long. The eye of the storm is gonna pass mighty quick."

"Well then you just go on ahead. If you had Faith like me, you'd be all right. It's obvious that science can't save you."

"OK Billy Bob. This ain't every third Thursday of the month, so this ain't no town hall meeting. Not exactly the right time to get into this. We gotta go find other people who want to be saved before the storm come back."

Not more than fifteen minutes after the chopper left, the rain started pouring down again. The water just kept on gettin' higher and higher. Not even as the water rushed over his face did Billy Bob's Faith weaken. "Maybe this is the Rapture and God is taking me home" was his last living thought . . .

So when Billy Bob found himself in front of Saint Peter, he said "Oh Saint Peter, I just knew the Rapture was coming. I just feel bad for all those who will have to suffer through the Tribulation"

Saint Peter looked irked and said, "Rapture, Tribulation? Yeah, that's not on the schedule quite yet."

Billy Bob looked puzzled, and not just a little pissed off. After all, he had given his life to worshipping God and preaching the Good News, and here he was and it was not even Rapture. "Well, Saint Peter, if I can humbly ask this, why did the Lord forsake me even though I have been a virtuous man?"

Saint Peter sighed, and gave a cross look to Billy Bob. "Look you dumbass hick, God tried to save you THREE times--what do you think your neighbor, the sheriff and the mayor were trying to do?"

Thank you, thank you, I shall be here all the week!

It's Marty Stark, South Park style. 

From A Million Miles

The ocean is inside us--a single percent of salt mixed in with the water and oxygen containing hormones and neurotransmitters and enzymes, life within life. I've been trying to delude myself that I've been on dry land for the last several months, basking in the sun, watching all the dark things revealed under some blue sky and dying in the light.

I've been working dog hours and earning more money. I've been flirting with attractive Korean women in martini bars and the kewpie doll cute file clerk with a button nose at work. For the most part, this has kept me on even keel, distracted me from the oncoming tides.

But there are days like today, where anger from work, anger at fuck ups and incompetence--mundane anger but anger nonetheless--drains me so that when I arrive home, I can't keep my eyes on the sky and my body away from the tide. And as the ocean starts rising again, on days like today, I grab onto the past, hold it too tightly, using it not as hope for the future or something warm on a cold night, but instead as something I yearn for now. I want that Korean financial advisor with a coy smile at the end of the night to give me a call now instead of treating that memory simply for what it was--good conversation with little probability of leading to anything else, exercising my innate charm that had been so quiet with Her. I want to so take back the missteps with CNN Asia woman and have her sitting on my lap again instead of learning my lessons and moving on.

So tonight, I will hold my breath, shiver and hope that the tide recedes soon. And tomorrow, I will work my dog hours and earn more money and flirt more and live more and hope that is enough for now.

Forces of Nature

No, I haven't forgotten y'all, nor have I gone on some hypertension bender fueled by sodium, alcohol and loose women that caused a stroke and a temporary amnesia that has forced me into a two week adventure featuring gun-toting nuns and biker werewolves to recapture my memory. Nah, just been pulling dog days at the office and feeling the dread. All the homies be telling Marty it might be time to move on and do some writing. But in the meantime, I'm just trying to get into some breakbeat zen and figure out what to write. Yeah, this is gonna be one of those list entries to ease myself back into putting together words into shiny sentences. Because I'm in my materalistic American mode, here's the swag that is keeping Marty's dread at bay:

1. Samurai Champloo - Samurai stories put to hip-hop by the dude who did Cowboy Bebop. And at one point, people thought peanut butter and chocolate together would taste like ass. Suckaz.

2. The Complete Calvin and Hobbes Damnit, comic strips are too small these days.

3. The works of Richard K. Morgan Reads like James Cameron doing Bladerunner with John Woo as secondary doing the action sequences.

Brasilia Crossed with Trenton

Since I'm in the middle of my self-imposed purgatory, and nothing happens in purgatory (yeah, it's boring, but it's better than pitchforks up the tuckus), I figure that we should take a gander into the lives of Parallel Universe Marty Starks for shits and giggles.

FOB Marty Stark
Divergence: 1974
Technically, he's not a FOB since he never got off the boat. Instead, his dad decided to stay in Taiwan rather than going to New York Polytechnic for his chemistry doctrate. This means same sex schooling until university, and no dates due to that same sex schooling. Well, that no dates part isn't that different from this timeline, is it? Anyway, FOB Marty did extremely well on the exams, got himself a sweet civil service gig, and got arranged to be married to a bucktoothed horsefaced chick from Kaoshung who sorta looks like Mao Tse Tung in drag.

Right now, FOB Marty is totally oblivious that the gravity that weighs down his shoulders and presses his breath out in deep sighs is the soul-sucking ennui and quiet desperation that is a 9 to 5 job, perfunctory sex to create more FOBs (though femme Mao does give good head), and a wardrobe of cheap monochrome suits. This is all he's ever known, so he doesn't know anything different. He's sucking down some really bad Taiwanese beer watching dubbed repeats of JAG in Mandarin, not knowing that if he ever went into that club that he passes by everyday and hears New Order's "Bizarre Love Triangle", his mind will blow a fuse due to the newness, the beat, the song he's never heard.

Starving Artist Marty
Divergence: 1993
Starving Artist Marty decided not to take the LSATs. Instead, much to the despair of his parents, Marty applied to MFA program at the University of Iowa and, with help from Elizabeth Cox, his creative writing instructor at Duke, got in. Starving Artist Marty hasn't talked to his parents for years. He has, though, gotten several of his short stories published in various small press literary magazines and published two novels--works of quiet absurdism overwhelmed by the blase detail of the everyday ordinary. He has a small cult of fans, and critics have favorably compared him Pynchon. The total net income from his literary efforts: $10,000. To supplement his income, he manages a Borders in Cedar Rapids and writes crappy Stargate novelizations under the pseudonym Marty Stark.

Right now, Starving Artist Marty is sucking down some MGDs, discussing the latest episode of Lost with his girlfriend, a plain looking woman with mousy hair, bad glasses and a penchant for comfortable shoes who Starving Artist Marty met in the science fiction section of his Borders. Inwardly, Marty sighs at the thought at perfunctory chunky sex, and begins fantasizing about the cute pixie-like blonde chick in the record department. No love handles like bratwurst has she. Marty is convinced that if she didn't have a boyfriend, she'd be his. He knows this because of the one thirty minute conversation he had with her about trip hop.

Senior BigLaw Associate Marty
Divergence: 2001
Senior BigLaw Associate Marty decided that $180,000 a year was worth days of ass-reaming and the type of stress he imagines shopkeepers behind in payments to the Russian Mob have. So Marty stayed instead of saying aw fuck this noise.

Right now, Senior BigLaw Associate Marty is driving down the 101 and craving sucking down a six pack of Sapporos at home. He has had a total of 4 hours of sleep in the last week. He hasn't been home in three days (there are showers in the office and he has brought a change of clothes). He had been working for two solid days on a fifty page memorandum of points and authorities for a motion for summary judgment which his partner told his was a complete piece of shit (but which his partner noticeably did not make any changes). As soon as the motion for summary judgment was filed, he had to turn to two opposition briefs due Friday that he hasn't started on. The partner wants a draft by nine in the morning, so Marty should be pulling an all nighter, but Marty's head is just cotton right now. So Marty is driving home, trying not to fall asleep, and get maybe two, three hours of shut eye. Marty starts thinking about the business plan all senior associates have to draft if they want to make partner. Hah, what a joke. For the past three years, he hasn't had enough time to fuck, much less pimp himself out to get clients. Marty is thinking of this when a car in the right lane swerves into Marty's car, some bitch not checking to see if she had clearance. Marty swerves, but with his nerves deadened, Marty swerves directly into a pylon holding up the San Antonio Road overpass. Marty last feeling is one of flying, pain, and perhaps not oddly, release.

I Am Like This When The Police Finally Find Me

Yes, I know, my entries have trickled down to one a week. I have only myself to blame for my no highs no lows only a dull medium lifestyle that I have these days. The upside is that there are no feelings like dark reptilian things barely seen in murky waters swimming around my conscious. I may never be Marty Sunshine, but it is a nice change not to have black sheets of rain falling in my head.

Anyway, back in my days of being a public policy/psych double major (oh Spin Doctors, so cruelly cut down by your own lack of talent when people realized that all your songs had the same exact goddamn harmony), I read about this study done back when colleges were allowed to lie and pretend electrocute people and generally fuck with your mind.

I think it was Columbia University who did this study, but I could be wrong--whudya expect, I learned about this over a decade ago. So the psych flaks paid students to come in and take a pill. All the students were told that the pills were vitamins. Half the students were given vitamins. The other half were actually given caffeine pills.

So each student was left to himself for about 15 minutes, and then another psych flak came in. The psych flak said he was also a student participating in the vitamin study. Then half the psych flaks started acting pissed, getting angry that they were being kept waiting. The other half started acting giddy, making paper airplanes and doing other things what were considered wacky back in the 50s. After a while, the students were asked to record their feelings.

Out of the students who really were given vitamins, almost all of them reported feeling a little annoyed by the other student, regardless of whether they were in with the pissed flak or the giddy flak.

Out of the students who were secretly given caffeine pills, the students who were with the pissed flaks felt pissed, while the students with the giddy students felt giddy.

OK, so what does this all mean? Well, that whole mind/body duality thing should be shaking in its boots. You got all these neurotransmitters, enzymes and, to quote Begbie from "Trainspotting", "it's all fookin' chemicals" coursing through you, and it's the environment that determines how you perceive the effect of all these fookin' chemicals. Without that flood of oxytocin and dopamine that your brain releases that floods your body like a rush of warm, you might still think that pretty l'il Asian thang on the dance floor shaking her rump is hawt, but only in an analytical way, much like you would think "the apple is red" or "quadratic equations are hard."

The problem with shy people is that their threshold for these neurotransmitters is too low, so that even a small influx shorts the fuse and leaves them looking for a corner to hide. The problem with moody people is that a shift in the wind sends these chemicals pouring through them like beef through the intestinal tract of a Berkely vegan. So if you're shy and moody, well, you're fucked.

So what does this have to do with me? I've been trying to lay low, intentionally trying to keep those fookin' chemicals at bay. I've been trying to envision those chemicals, those hormones like the sea, and trying to force a low tide in the summer. And slowly, the sea has receded into the distance, leaving bare rock in the sun, and all those dark things that had been swimming in the sea lay open, gasping and dying in the hot sun. But I know that the tide will be back eventually, and where there is sun now will be underwater later, and the large predators that have been in the sea for millions of years will be back. So for now, I'm just trying to enjoy the land and the sun. And preparing harpoons. Big fucking harpoons.

Clint Eastwood

I was going to say dealing with stupid opposing counsel is like trying to teach a dog algebra, but with a dog, you expect it to look at you quizically, pant, and then proceed to lick its balls or its ass. You don't really expect that with opposing counsel though.

Anyway, I spent a thirty frickin' minutes explaining to opposing counsel how the treatise says we can do something, the law doesn't prevent us from doing something, so going to court to tell the judge tomorrow that we can't do it is stupid. And I got him to admit that he doesn't like what we're doing because it makes him do more work. Yet, he's still going to court tomorrow morning.

Yeah, it is nice to know that there are folks who are dumber than a bucket of mice out there. At the same time, it sucks to know that they are wasting thirty minutes that you will never ever get back in your life.

Tie You Up Until You Call To Me

For the past couple of nights, every time that I logged on to blog, I'd get random IMs from folks needing relationship advice. I know, if they need relationship advice from me, you know they're in trouble with a fucking capital TROUBLE. I guess that's just the karmic cost for having a blog that regularly and in nauseous maudling detail describes Marty's Adventures in Lalaland with stalkers, co-workers, chicks who live with their fiances and generally bad social decisions.

Anyway, I admit that I'm not just a glass is half-emtpy sorta guy, I'm a hey the glass is half empty who the fuck drank my water outta the fucking glass I'm gonna kill that fuck no I don't want to calm down get outta my way aaaaaaaaaargh type of guy. But lately, I've been realizing that, in reality, I am a lucky guy.

Like this week, I did my taxes, and I could've bought a luxury sedan with what I owe the federal government, state government, and hospitals (I'd like to say that I'm exaggerating, but sadly, I am not). But I still have enough in my savings to take a year and a half off if I wanted to.

Like some of my medication cuts my IQ down 'bout 10 points. But that just means I may not be Einstein, but at least I'm still Oppenheimer.

Like I don't have any job security right now. But in a pinch, I know someone who'll give me a six-figure-job in a heartbeat.

Yup, just call my Lucky Marty.