Don’t get me wrong, I did have good parents. A lot of times they went without so that I wouldn’t have to. My Dad worked VERY hard for us. And my Mom did what she could. I love them very much for this. I just wish that the outcome could have been different.

I’m not exactly sure where to begin. Oh well, please just bear with me. As you know, I love my parents. But, I never really got along with my mother. I remember from a very young age that I didn’t like her. I don’t know exactly why, I just know that I didn’t want her there. I remember telling my Dad that he should leave her, and marry me. As a little girl, of course, I didn’t know that this wasn’t allowed. So don’t think I’m demented. I remember always being Daddy’s girl. I loved him with all of my heart. I loved Mom too, just not like that. I always felt as if she would be happier without me around.

My Mother and I fought constantly. My Dad always said that it was because we were so much alike. And that it didn’t matter whom they are, when you place two women in one house, they’re going to fight. I never understood this. I think that it was because, deep down, I knew my Mom didn’t want me. She was the one that always had to put up with me. She was the one to always correct me. My Dad wasn’t around that much. He didn’t have the time to be bothered with punishing me. I think that has a great deal to do with why I resented her so much. She was the one to always tell me, "NO." Plus, I think that my Mom was jealous of the relationship I had with my Grandma. I always got along perfectly fine with her. I was around her all the time. She should have been my Mom. She was the one that was always there for me to talk to. She always cared, and tried to guide me, even if she knew that I was in the wrong.

Well, when I was about ten years old, my Mom was diagnosed with cancer. She had to have a hysterectomy. This scared me so much. It finally didn’t matter how much I didn’t like her. It only mattered that if something went wrong, I’d miss her a great deal. I remember being at home without her. My Father had given me a letter from my Mom. I read this every night. The letter told of how much she loved me, and if something were to happen that I should never forget. I’ll never forget those words, or that time in my life. I just wish that she could say the same.

Now let’s visit somewhere in the area of my twelfth year. My parents are fighting. My Mom wants a divorce. She caught my Dad cheating on her. This was a very ugly time in my life. I had to make a decision. Who was I going to live with? I looked at whom I got along with better, I chose my Father. Needless to say Mom wasn’t too pleased. She decided to throw in my face that I must not love her. I chose my Father because I knew that I would get to do what I wanted. He was never around. She made me feel so guilty, telling me that she would have stayed if it hadn’t been for the cheating. Sure she would. I might have believed her if she hadn’t been cheating also. She cheated on my Dad during the whole marriage with other women. My Dad does it, and she wants a divorce. Said the pot to the kettle. Oh well, such is life.

After my Mom left, I barely saw her. She was always too busy. She had gone to stay with my Grandma. I had to get my Grandma to come get me just so that I could see my Mom. To me, that’s just not right. She always threw in my face that I had made my decision. So I guess to her I didn’t need a Mom. I’m just so glad that I had Grandma.

Without parental supervision I was trouble on two feet. I starting smoking, drinking, and doing drugs. My Dad cared but wanted me to learn on my own. He knew that if he had told me not to do something, I’d only want to do it more. I have learned a lot. I hardly do anything anymore. I taught myself by watching others. I was forced to grow up quickly, and in a way, I’m glad. It’s made me strong, and that is what my Father wanted. He didn’t want me to have to rely on anyone for anything. He always told me that someday he wouldn’t be there, and that I would need to fend for myself. I just had no idea it would be so soon.

What has happened to my life? It went from a wonderful thing, to a nightmare. My Mom is living with her girlfriend, who hates me. My Dad is with his girlfriend, who doesn’t like me that much because I’m not one of her own children. I’m just without anyone. I went from having my Dad right by my side, to having a Father that doesn’t even acknowledge I’m still alive.

In July of 2000, my Father decided to help my Mother. Don’t ask me why, I’ll never be able to understand. He sells her his house, my home. It doesn’t matter to him because he is living somewhere else with his girlfriend. So, I lose the only place I’ve ever known. She decides that I can’t stay there until I find a place. I had nowhere else to go so I leave Ohio. I left my job, my home, and a lot of my stuff. And here I am in North Carolina.

Two days after arriving in this beautiful state, I’m in a car accident. A truck hit me, and my car was totaled. I live out in the country, and to get to town without a car is almost impossible. There is one place to work near me. It’s convenient that they’re not hiring. You need a job to get a car, and a car to get a job here. So that left me needing a little help. I go to my Father. He informs me that he’ll help me get a car. WONDERFUL! Problem solved! So, now it’s time to get the car. Dad says that he can’t help. His girlfriend doesn’t think that it’s a good idea. Great! Thanks Dad!

I go to my roommate, he agrees that I can stay and clean the house until I can get the job at the gas station. They still aren’t hiring. So now, he’s decided that he no longer likes this agreement, and wants me out. I have no car, no job, and no one here to go to. Once again, I go to my parents. They inform me that they wish they could help, but there’s nothing that they can do for me. Ouch, that hurts.

Oh well, guess Dad was right. One day he won’t be here for me. I just wish that it wouldn’t be now. The thought of not having anyone, and not knowing where I’m going to end up, is driving me crazy. I’m scared. I know that I’ll be okay, I’m just so afraid that I’ll fail. I’m so afraid that I’ll make one little mistake, and end up on the street forever. I would have never thought that this is how my life would turn out. I want so bad to just go back to being a little girl. Having the chance to hug my parents again. To have them love me. I guess these are things I thought would never go away.

Tom was a bouncer at a local club. It wasn’t a real hot spot, few things in Iowa are, but for the area, it was about the only "happening" place that could be found for miles. For that reason, the club he was in was populated by a younger crowd for the most part; college kids really, a class of society that Tom truly despised. Of course, there wasn’t a whole lot that Tom LIKED in the world. He was a gruff sort of guy, a self-proclaimed cynic, though whether he knew what that word really meant or not was a subject of some dispute. Most would call him "hostile" or "abrasive" instead. "Part of the job," would be his reply to that. At least his verbal reply, if he chose to go that route.

He wasn’t all that bad a guy. Not unduly mean, didn’t go seeking out trouble, and was a great guy to have in your corner in a pinch. Good guy to go hunting with, to watch football with, all of that. But he was certainly an acquired taste. A blue-collar roughneck, through and through, not to put too fine a point on it.

In any case, he obviously worked nights; that was his trade. So he found himself sitting at home most afternoons, not doing much of anything. Watching daytime talk shows, sports, whatever tripped his trigger. This tended to leave him in a perpetual state of constant irritation. There just isn’t a whole lot to do at 3 PM on a Wednesday, save sitting on your ass watching Springer, something that Tom had been doing for almost 3 years now and was frankly getting a bit tired off. Besides, they made it so the camera points upward during the fights instead of focusing right on them, which was really frustrating because, what else is the draw of Springer? Not to mention the fact that Tom was the sort that liked to get up and do things. So he was usually, at least during the day, in a pretty foul mood.

This wasn’t helped that much by his living situation. He had a girlfriend and a son. His girlfriend worked odd hours, being a nurse at the ER of a local hospital. Molly was a sweet girl, a bit on the ditzy side, but like Tom, had sharpened senses, was a stranger to blind panic, and was generally a put-together sort of person. And they had a son together, a bright six-year-old named Eric. Blonde hair, blue eyes, fairly tall for his age. He was also a bit on the girly side for Tom, though most children under the age of 15 had that effect on him. Tom loved Eric, to be sure, but the two didn’t get along great. Tom was a stickler for order and discipline. Eric, like most 6 year olds, had other ideas.

But the two lived together on decent enough terms, generally steering clear of each other. Eric had grown to be fairly independent, almost more so then his mother, and he knew that during the day his father was a person to generally be avoided if possible. They played together now and then, threw the ball around, whatever, if Tom was up for it, but Eric knew better then to nag. He had received more then his fair share of spankings due to that. Besides, as Molly worked until afternoon most days, they were pretty much stuck with each other a lot of the time. They tried to make the best out of it.

One day, Tom was in a particularly foul mood. The club had come under new management a few weeks ago, and the manager was a real prick. He was the sort that Tom absolutely despised, a yuppie in lifestyle who tried to make himself out to be gritty and hardcore in personality. Because of that, he was a real asshole to the help, particularly the bouncers. Steve was constantly challenging them, berating them, trying to knock them down a notch to make them realize they shouldn’t act like they owned the place, as HE owned the place. Tom liked to think of himself as being a man of action, that the club floor was his territory, he acted as he saw fit to try and maintain order in a sea of sweaty bodies and booze. The new manager, on the other hand, saw the bouncers as his own personal thugs, and had begun to take the tone of a drill sergeant with the bouncers, trying to "break them in". This of course did not go over well with Tom at all.

The night before, the manager had been particularly nasty to him. While throwing out a patron who had been obnoxiously horny with a bartender, to put it mildly, the manager came over to the door after Tom had done his work and began berating him with the fervor that generally only comes where great personal wrongs are involved. "You fucking goon!" this and "You work for ME!" that, Steve was going all out. The worst part about it was that it was in front of a line of people waiting to get in and two other bouncers working the door. And respect, in Tom’s line of work, was everything. Tom could do nothing but take it, successfully stifling the near overwhelming impulse he had to take the fucking yuppie by his greasy ponytail and ram his head into his knee. Tom sat there and listened to the manager screaming at him about how the horny drunken patron was a big tipper and a personal friend of his and blah blah blah blah blah. What really got to Tom was that he had to sit there and take it, couldn’t argue with the guy as that would only set him off more, at which point those urges may very well become overpowering, and Tom needed his paycheck.

So he took it. He took it like a belittled and helpless man, and for the rest of that night he did his job and absolutely steamed over the incident.

And the next day, he was still steaming.

He hadn’t said a word to Eric all day. Eric, of course, new better then to speak unless spoken to when dad had that look on his face, so he went about his normal 6 year old activities without a word. Tom still hadn’t gotten dressed. He hadn’t bothered; he was still so upset. Eric wondered why his father kept saying things in an angry tone under his breath while watching Springer, apparently upset at the head of security on the show.

At around 3 PM, the normal time when Molly was due home, the phone rang. "For fuck’s sake!" muttered Tom as he hit mute on the remote and went to the kitchen phone, pushing past Eric in the process. When he picked up, it was Molly.

"Hi hun, just to let you know I’m gonna be here for another hour or so. Just got a few carloads of new patients and some of the evening staff haven’t shown up yet."

"Goddammit, Molly! I have to work in two hours!"

"Well," she replied, "That still gives you an hour when I get home around 4. Don’t be pissed, there’s nothing I can do about it."

"But it’s Saturday! I have to go in at least an hour earlier on Saturdays!"

"Well, you’ll just have to be a little late then, it can’t be helped. I have to go now, I’ll see you around 4."

With that, Molly hung up and Tom listened to the dial tone for a minute before slamming the receiver back onto the wall.

Steve will not be happy, Tom thought to himself. Great. Another fan-fucking-tastic night ahead!
"What’s wrong, dad?" said Eric, standing in the kitchen doorway. Tom glared at him.

"I’m gonna get fucked at work cuz of your dumb ass," was Tom’s reply. With that Tom set back for his TV chair, violently shoving Eric to the ground when the kid didn’t get out of the way fast enough, muttering curses under his breath the whole time.

Eric stifled a cry, collected his toys quickly, and went to his room.

Tom stewed in his chair for about a half hour more, until it was time for him to eat and then get dressed before his girlfriend got home and he could leave Eric with her and go to work. He pulled himself out of his chair, adjusted his only article of clothing, his underwear, and headed for the kitchen.

Two steps later he was on the ground, holding his foot and cursing wildly.

Eric, in his rush to collect his things, had forgotten to grab a few Legos he had near the kitchen door. Tom, barefoot, had accidentally stepped square on top of one of them. A stream of curses was flowing from his mouth. Following that was a command: "ERIC!!!"
Dutifully and with more then a little reticence, Eric emerged from his room and approached his father who was picking himself off the ground and still cursing. Tom looked up, saw Eric a few feet away, and with a noticeable limp, lurched toward Eric. In a flash, Tom had punched Eric in the chest so hard that Eric fell back almost a half dozen feet before hitting the ground. Tom limped his way over to the crying boy and kicked him once, this one not so hard, in the back.

"What the fuck did I tell you about cleaning up your toys and shit!!!"

Eric, through tears, apologized over and over again.

"You little shit!" was Tom’s acceptance as he limped back to the kitchen, punching a wall on his way out and leaving a dent.

Eric went back to his room, trying to not cry too loudly lest he anger his father.

In the kitchen, and while getting dressed, Tom started feeling overwhelming guilt for his action. He had never hit Eric before. Sure, he had come close, had spanked him often enough, even got out the belt once or twice, but had never straight out PUNCHED the boy. "Goddammit," Tom started thinking to himself, "it wasn’t the boy’s fault. I’m the one that stepped on the fucking thing. He didn’t deserve that." He was about to swallow his pride and go apologize to Eric, when he heard the front door open and Molly say, "Honey, I’m home! You can run to work now, you’ll only be a few minutes late!"

Tom was out the door in seconds.

At work, it was just as Tom had feared. Another reaming by Steve, for being 15 minutes late on a Saturday. The urge to tear the guy’s larynx right out of his fucking throat had to be quelled once again for the sake of job security. The only thing that kept Tom’s sanity was repeating the phrase "One of these days you Gucci fuck, one of these days" over and over again in his head while he was being berated.

The rest of the night went decent enough, though Tom was still madder then hell at the new manager.

At about 9 o’clock, while Tom was wandering the club, he noticed that drunken asshole from the night before entering the club. This time, Steve went to the door to personally greet the man, shooting Tom an evil look as he escorted the man to the bar and paid for his first two drinks. The man was obviously already drunk. Must have been club-hopping for awhile now. A black guy, pushing forty. Tom hadn’t a clue how Steve knew the guy. Fuck, for all Tom knew Steve had never met the guy before last night and just wanted an excuse to take a bouncer down another notch. The guy looked like trouble to Tom, already that plastered, disheveled, and now getting free shots of whiskey courtesy of Steve.

And it started going the same way it did the night before.

The drunk asshole started harassing the bartender again, a pretty college chick named Lisa. He would lurch at her, try to pork her, only to get shoved away by Lisa. He was talking way to loud, even for a club. He was yelling at other club patrons who happened to garner his immediate attention, spilling drinks, the whole schmiel. Finally, when Lisa was getting another whiskey and thus had her back to him, the drunk leaned over the bar, stretched as far as he could, and slapped her on her ass.

Lisa slapped the guy, he laughed, and she gave Tom that look. That "DO SOMETHING" look that people in his profession new all to well.

"Fuck Steve," thought Tom. "Fuck this guy too."

Tom made a beeline for the guy.

"What the fuck do you think you’re doing?" asked Tom as he shoved the drunk to force his stool to pivot and face him.

"I’m just having myself a good time!" slurred the drunk.

"We got rules here you asshole."

"Hey, fuck you Meester No Neck! You try and kick me out, your boss’ll fire your sorry ass, told me so himself!"

"I don’t give a FUCK, you asshole."

The drunk got to his feet as if he was looking for trouble.

"Come on, I’m throwing you the fuck out of here," growled Tom.

The next few moments seemed to happen over a period of hours. Tom grabbed the drunk by his arm, at which point the man dropped his drink and took to an inside pocket of his coat, producing a blade. "Awww fuck", thought Tom". As Tom started to dodge, the drunk was already trying to stab, a clumsy sideswipe to Tom’s midsection that is fairly easy to counter. Just pivot to the side, get behind him, and pull his arm behind his back. Problem solved.

A split second into the maneuver, as the knife was coming at him, Tom was suddenly seized by an overwhelming pain in his foot. Right where the Lego had nailed him earlier that day, on the ball of his foot, he was suddenly on fire as Tom tried to put all his weight on the sore spot in an attempt to pivot away from the knife.

It lost him a split second.

Sometimes, that’s all it takes.

Before he knew it, the sudden mental focus on the pain in his foot was replaced by a sudden mental focus on the pain in his chest, as the drunken asshole slashed him shoulder to shoulder.

Tom fell to the floor in a second.

He watched with detached curiosity as the patrons screamed in terror, as the other bouncers suddenly jumped the man and proceeded to beat the tar out of him, as Steve headed out a back door, and as Tom bled liters from his chest wound.

"I don’t deserve this," Tom thought to himself.

"I don’t deserve this."

So have a looksee and maybe if we all join forces we can get her to clean her room.

The movie is a remake of the 1978 Warren Beatty movie Heaven Can Wait (itself a remake of a 1941 movie, Waiting for Mr Jordan) in which dimly amiable L.A. Rams quarterback Joe Pendleton (Beatty) is prematurely called to Heaven by an over-eager escort (Buck Henry, who co-directed) after a traffic accident. When archangel Mr. Jordan (James Mason) discovers the error, he offers to return Joe to his body, only to find that it has been cremated. On the verge of playing in the Super Bowl, Joe demands a fit body rather than the old about-to-be-murdered industrialist Farnsworth he has been offered, but he reconsiders when he sees environmentalist Betty Logan (Julie Christie) in Farnsworth's house. Assuming Farnsworth's body while keeping his sweet self, Joe hires his beloved coach Max Corkle (Jack Warden) to get him in shape (after convincing Max who he really is); sets Farnsworth's business on an eco-friendly path; and romances Betty. Farnsworth's homicidal wife (Dyan Cannon) and secretary (Charles Grodin), however, are still determined to succeed in their plan to kill him. When Mr. Jordan finally finds the Super Bowl body Joe wanted, Joe has to trade his old self for the new life ## but will he remember his love for Betty?

That's essentially the plot of Down to Earth, as well, with Rock as an aspiring Harlem comedian hoping to play at the "last shout at the Apollo" show.

I didn't like Heaven Can Wait very much but, compared to Down to Earth, it was a cinematic landmark.

I like Chris Rock. His HBO weekly is funny and the videos of his stand-up I've seen are good. He is, in the tradition of Lenny Bruce and Richard Pryor, irreverant and brave. Willing to call a "spade a spade", so to speak, he has generated critisms and accolades for his act.

What, then, is the problem?

Chris Rock can't act. He was atrocious. This could be overlooked if a tight ensemble cast had been knit closely around him. Consider Jerry Seinfeld, another stand-up comedian who can't act. Yet, Seinfeld worked. The cast here seems to have thrown up their hands in dispair.

This movie was dreadful, with cliched writing and awful performances across the board. Horrid examples of sexual, racial and urban stereotyping litter this nasty film like sticky popcorn under the theater seats.

The only funny moments are stolen by Eugene Levy(American Pie) who appears in brief snippets reprising Buck Henry's role as the over-zealous angel. Chazz Palminterri(Usual Suspects) also turns in an adequate stint as the head angel, playing it like a cool night club manager.

Unfortunately, these moments are as brief as they are rare and do nothing to save this movie.

Rock's days as a romantic leading man are hopefully over. I hope from now on he sticks to playing the comic relief for actors and doing stand-up.

Do not see this movie. Don't go to another movie in the same multi-plex as this movie. Do not wait and rent this movie on video. Your VCR will smell for weeks.

At this point in the review I rate the movie in whiskey bottles. I don't know how to halve a gif image and, frankly, even half a bottle would be a gift.

selah.

This is the result of exhaustive testing....Yes size really does matter.

Looks like the quarter pounder need a good wash.

Is purpose something that finds us?

(Is purpose something we really need, or only think we do?)

-Does it search for us? Where does it come from?

-If we yearn for it, call for it, does it find us easier?

-Or is it like a wood nymph, invisible when looked at directly but seen in the corners of the eye when the mind forgets to think about it and wanders off to a new demesne?

--Like the thought on the tip of the tongue, stuck in the frontal lobes that can't be retrieved until you forget that you can't come up with it, on to splurge forth when you are eating your desert or contemplating whether to wash your hair a second time before mauling in the conditioner. Reaching for it just pushes it away. Maybe, maybe not.....

If we search for it, how do we know what we are looking for? If we know what we are looking for, doesn't that require that we have found it? Purpose isn't a rental video or a loaf of bread or a microbrewed ale that you're not sure what you want until you peruse the selection. You know purpose when you have it, (don't you? do I?) Or do you only know when you don't have it?

Is laziness a personal shortcoming, a disease, a defect, to be avoided, or is it simply lack of purpose? Depression, procrastination, mistakes, video games, MTV, are all lack of purpose, no? Modern life floods the sensors that detect purpose, strive for purpose, want it, ask for it, seek, need, relish in it. TV? Who found their purpose on TV? If a purpose is related to TV, it always has to do with being inside the TV, not from televisionary receipts. If you lack purpose in your life, go outside.

Purpose sought but not found: is the journey the purpose, the ends irrelevant to the means? Is my purpose to wonder what my purpose is? We only know what we know because we know it, nothing more. How can you find purpose in a slough of arbitrary meaning? Even more important, how can purpose find you?

Is purpose a decision? a gut feeling? love at first sight? I know there is no meaning in life, but I still want to do something with it. Is direction different than purpose? Can one have purpose without a plan? Are purpose and goals two sides of a coin or separate entities related to achievement?

I sure hope you aren't disappointed that I don't have the answers. I know what I want to do in life, I know what I like to do in life, but I don't feel as though I have any purpose. I have done things on purpose, but most of what I do just happens. I try to let myself be me as free as possible. I've gotten in trouble that way, but for the most part, I'm a good person and good things happen when I just let me be. My life has meaning, my life has direction; so what if I have no purpose?

Or perhaps I don't believe I am worthy of having a purpose. The ultimate low self esteem characteristic. Goals? Yes. Achievement? Why not? Purpose? I'm not worthy!!! Perhaps I need a lack of purpose to drive me to do stuff. That brings me back to the sought-but-not-found bit. But if this is the case, why the hell do I feel that the reason I waste time playing computer games is that I have no purpose? Am I not looking hard enough or am I concentrating too much?

Fuck it. If any of you all have any extra purposes, DCC them to me in chat sometime. I'll put them to good use, I swear.

---

Let Me Kill

i want to go on a killing spree
i don't want to need an excuse to murder
genocide is my reason
is that excuse good enough for your laws?

i feel like i know what it is
to kill
to murder
to walk on the blood of the ignorant
to walk on the blood of the world

i want to feel the misery
to make lonliness inevitable

seems like i've done this before
the memory
so real
so close

like a movie in my head
stuck on repeat
again and again
blood on my brain

i don't want it to go away
i only want to embrace

why does it seem so right?
what makes me want to do these things?

---

Return The Favor

i want to cut you with the knife you put in my back
i want you to see what's in my head
i want you to see yourself from the outside

you know what's wrong
and you know what's right
you keep it buried
and you pretend it's a lie

what you want will destroy what you need
if you let it
if you indulge yourself

see it from the outside
see it from inside me

i'm not talking about what you think i mean
i'm not talking about me
i'm talking about the things inside
the things that create greed

go ahead
kill me
just fucking do it
you won't feel guilty

will you?
can you read yourself yet?
this part is easy
the next step isn't quite so...

i can't take it anymore
i have to leave
get out of my life
i know what i need

what's that?
you want to hear the next part?

fuck it
i can't trust you

here's your knife back

---