Being Biracial

I know this sounds next to impossible, but I’m trying to rid my act of cliché trite material. That’s not to say lowbrow, as I honestly don’t think that’s the problem. It’s more the tired use of a joke than its FCC classification. No matter the topic, from traffic to sex, if the joke can be personalized somehow, that’s what makes it honest and true, and that’s what makes it funny. No matter what the bit is about, if it displays something truly about who you are, then the crowd will get behind you. Obviously it still has to be funny, but it won’t be misinterpreted as stupid either. I’m starting to feel that disconnection, that loss of self, in the material I would classify as racial jokes.

I’m Puerto Rican and Jewish, and that makes people think I’m going to joke about how I’m biracial and thus follow a very beaten path, but I don’t need to, and I don’t want to. Biracial jokes are formulaic in that they take two opposing stereotypes, one from each parent’s race, and place them together in perfect synergy, but that’s not why I don’t want to tell them. And it’s not because Juan Epstein from “WELCOME BACK KOTTER” was Puerto Rican and Jewish thirty years ago, either. No, the real reason I don’t need to tell biracial jokes is because I’m from Texas. That’s right: My mother is Puerto Rican, my father is Jewish, and they conceived, bore, and raised me in El Paso, Texas. And I can tell that no one reading this column really harbors any prejudices towards me, because if you did, your head would have exploded by now.

CEO of Toyota

It has begun. We were warned and now it is too late. The machines have taken over. Toyotas have transformed from reliable affordable automobiles to ungodly Hell spawn sent to Earth to uncontrollably accelerate you and your family to a fiery grave, cooking your flesh while pissing on your soul. Who would have thought the plot to a bad 80’s Emelio Estevez movie would be prophecy? I guess the Lord truly works in mysterious ways. May he have mercy on our souls…

I’m sorry did I get a little carried away there? Did that sound a bit alarmist? It must be the news rubbing off on me. For the past couple weeks, I’ve had the displeasure of watching news report after news report tell us about the Toyota menace. At first it was the Prius and faulty brake peddles. Then it became sticky accelerators. Yesterday, a woman reported that her Lexus unexpectedly and uncontrollably accelerated to over 100 mph on the freeway. According to her story, she called her husband on her Bluetooth as her car kept accelerating just to hear his voice because she feared it would be the last time. It was heart wrenching. I can only hope he told her, “Honey, I love you. Now put the car in neutral you stupid bitch.”

Look, I don’t want to sound like a dick here but, really, who gives a shit if Toyota has to recall some of its 2010 models because there is a chance the car might unexpectedly accelerate? I read that four people have been killed to date because of the sticky accelerators. Four people! Tragic? Yes. News worthy? Please. Four times as many people are killed by falling coconuts every year. It is true. Look it up. When you consider the millions of Toyotas that have been sold around the world, the odds of your Toyota getting the not-so-golden ticket are pretty damn slim. Don’t buy into the panic spread by sensationalistic news reports. They’re just looking for the ratings. If they really wanted to do an interesting story they would do a report on how many faulty Toyotas have bumper stickers which read, “God is my co-pilot.” Now there is a story I want to hear.

Now that I think about it, I want one of these 2010 Toyotas. I’m heading to my local dealership! Recall my ass! It is only a recall if you send it back. If you keep it, it’s an alibi. They may call it a sticky accelerator. I prefer to think of it as a lever of judgment. I would put 50,000 miles on it in two months just driving around town, looking for people in Ed Hardy T-shirts, crossing the street, waiting to be judged. It really would be the perfect crime. “Mr. LaCour, for the deaths of twenty-two young men attending the Daughtry concert on the night of February 27th we, the jury, find you not guilty. We do, however, recommend you remove the steer horns from the bumper of your Prius.”

Court is adjourned, bitches!

Bang

Last week, another school shooting rocked our country. A University of Alabama professor went on a shooting rampage, killing three and wounding three more. Allegedly, professor Amy Bishop was upset that she was not going to receive tenure and decided to get pro-active, giving new meaning to term, Crimson Tide. Are you like me? Are you starting to see a pattern here? Let’s recap:

Omaha, Nebraska Dec ’07: 19 year old Robert Hawkins carries a SKS assault rifle into a crowded shopping mall, killing nine people and injuring five more. Red Lake Indian Reservation, MN March ’05: Former student goes on rampage and kills 10. Hillsborough, NC Aug ’06: Student kills father then shoots two other students. Bailey, CO 2006: Gunman kills 6 female students after lining them up against a blackboard and sexually assaults them. (they still use blackboards?) Salt Lake City, UT February ’07: Student goes berserk, shoots and kills 5 other students. And let’s not forget April 16, 2007. Cho Seung-Hui storms around Virginia Tech, killing 32. It’s the deadliest rampage in U.S. history. Do the Asians always have to be number one?

These are just seven of the twenty-three shootings involving schools or teenagers since 9/11. Just three days ago, The Department of State issued a Worldwide Caution to update information on the continuing threat of terrorist actions and violence against U.S. citizens and interests throughout the world. U.S. citizens are reminded to maintain a high level of vigilance. Apparently that vigilance ends just on the edge of campus.

Are you following where I’m going here? Since September 11th, 2001 the only Americans who have been hurt by terrorists just happen to be in the terrorists’ backyard. Here in the good old United States of America? Nada, zip, nothing. Now I don’t know if it’s the wire tapping, water boarding or any other infringement on the Constitution but I’m not real worried about being taken out by Osama bin Laden here on the mainland. Sure, the Christmas Day underwear bombing attempt by Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab was disconcerting but do you know what scared me the most in the whole ordeal? The motherfucker was an engineering student!

These images the news keeps showing us of bearded terrorists swinging from the monkey bars don’t scare me. The grainy YouTube videos of dudes in sandals shooting AK-47s don’t scare me. What do scare me are all these little fucks in our schools, hopped up on anti-depressants and Starbucks feeling a little down because they’re not popular or rich or both, ordering a goddamn assault rifle on-line, walking into Albertson’s and plugging the patrons. And now we have to worry about the teachers too?

What ever happened to school spirit? The University of Alabama just won the BCS for Christ’s sake! It’s not like she had to teach at Washington State.

I think the government should start a new kind of terror alert. It can go to orange every time school lets out.

Feel me?

Ka Boom

Humor is an effective tool for dealing with the insanity of day to day life. Ask most any comic and their answer will, in a round-about smart-ass way, point to my point. Life is too weird not to laugh at. Prior to stepping on the stage, I would randomly hear the complement “you should be a comedian.” Kind words alone were not enough to persuade me to become a comic. I needed an extra push. A push that would happen during a trip to Alaska in the Summer of 2007. It was such a strange, eye-opening, horrifyingly beautiful experience that it just about spun my head around. By the time I returned to California, I was ready for anything Hollywood had to throw at me.

My system practically went into shock my first week in Anchorage. My smog-spoiled lungs didn’t know how to react to the oxygen-rich blue sky and I hacked up a few reminders of home before I adjusted. Once I did, I was better able to take in the surrounding beauty. The dying brown foot hills I was used to seeing were replaced with snow-capped mountains. I saw Bald Eagles and Blue jays instead of pigeons and telephone wire bound sneakers upon tilting my head upward. It was such a refreshing contrast.

I decided to become more familiarized with a bike ride around the park. Fuck Texas. Everything is bigger in Alaska. I rode around aimlessly for miles and miles without covering the same track twice. When I came to a secluded, woodsy area I heard a rustling. Being baked and paranoid and from California; I could only assume the source of the noise was a moose with a rifle lurking in the bushes. As I nervously peddled faster, the noise continued to follow and intensify. Turned out to be a couple of gnats copulating in my ear. Can’t say that I blame them. My ears are larger than average. It must have seemed like a penthouse to them.

My internal clock had to adjust to the constant presence of Sun light. There is something liberating about heading home from the bar at 3 am with your shades on. I think the desolation had an effect on the population. I’ve never seen so many discarded liquor bottles. Entertainment was scarce. I was taken aback after witnessing a “rat race” at one of the many town bingo parlors. They take a live rat, place it on a roulette-style wheel, spin it, and bet on which numbered hole the startled rodent will run into. It’s the only game that can be rigged with cheese. There was a lot of positive buzz going around about a certain Governor Palin. In retrospect, I can see something was off about this beautiful place.

While meeting the locals, I was duped by a shaved Yeti, cleverly disguised as a young Eskimo woman. Fellas, if you have a fluctuating nostril hair fetish, stop reading this right now and book yourself a flight. It’s similar to the flow of jellyfish tentacles. As time progressed, the situation became more bizarre. It went from “oh, you like to drink. That’s fine” to “oh, you saw the devil when you were five. Inter-es-ting.” I thought this chic was crazy when she told me that she had a dream where she shot my girlfriend in the head and woke up feeling relieved. I knew she was crazy when she told me she dreamed that I defended her honor from the animated Gods by using the power of the Sun to melt them. I did what any concerned, rational guy would do. I dropped her off at work one day, and by the time I was due to pick her up, I had driven half way to Canada. With Bob Dylan in my ears, and determination in my eyes, I drove 3,400 miles back to the familiar brand of chaos in Southern California.

A month or so before I fled, I got to see an inspired set from Bill Hicks’s childhood best friend and writing partner, Dwight Slade, at the local wallowing perch, Chilkoot Charlie’s. Nine bars rolled into one. Described as a “Disney World for drunks.” Watching Slade control the room with his free-flowing energy was just what I needed. I had seen other awesome stand-up performance before this, including the Master, George Carlin, but something about that particular set made something click inside of me.

The five day trip home gave me plenty of time to think. I had this nagging urge to do what felt right. Comedy. I didn’t hit the stage for another year, but hadn’t I had the Alaskan experience, I would probably still be a funny carpenter rather than a broke comedian.

Saints Win

First off, I would like to say congratulations to the city of New Orleans, the Saints and the Saints’ fans for their first Super Bowl championship. Coming from Seattle and being a Seahawks fan, I know how it feels to wait and wait and wait for gridiron success. It must feel great…I wouldn’t know.

There, now that I got that out of the way, I have a question. To all these so-called die hard Saints fans I have had the great displeasure of having to listen to this week: Who were the Saints offensive starters in 2005? Better yet, who was the starting quarterback? Surely a die hard fan that goes around rocking a Drew Brees jersey and throwing up the middle finger yelling, “Fuck all you Saints haters!” has got to know the history of this historic team, right? Right? Well I think we all know that, in 2005, most of these Saints fans were Steelers fans. And every time I see one, I wish I had a blow gun. What really kills me is that the loudest ones seem to be the most fair weather. My local sports bar has plenty of them, leading the “who dat” chant and sporting the Reggie Bush jerseys. Last year it was Ocho Cinco.

Of course this is nothing new. Every year in every sport, the band wagon gets full of sheeple who don’t have the fortitude to pick a team and stand by them, even when they lose. I assume it is the same phenomenon that compels people to buy Ed Hardy, Starbucks and iphones. That heard mentality that makes me wish we were an actual heard and lions were there to pick off the weak ones.

I understand that any big game is more interesting if you pick a side and I have no problem with those that do. Shit, I was rooting for the Colts. But don’t call yourself a fan. Don’t say, “We won!” No, THEY won. YOU are just a fair weather dipshit.

And another thing I want to address is this notion that the reason the Saints had such a huge following this year was because of hurricane Katrina. For one thing, that was five years ago. And although I’m sure it added to the story, natural disasters are not a catalyst for national support in the sports world. I don’t remember seeing too many Sedale Threatt Laker jerseys after the Northridge quake in ’94.

The truth is that it was the perfect storm for band wagon jumpers. You had the sympathy factor for a city that is trying to rebuild after a hurricane. You had the fact that they had never won the big game before. You had them playing against a team who’s quarterback is generally regarded as the NFL equivalent of Ivan Drago. They have, arguably, the coolest colors in the league. And most important, you had a chant which gave white people permission to use ebonics. And let’s face it, white people LOVE to use ebonics. So there you go.

If it seems like I am bitter about this whole thing it is because I am. You see, like I said earlier, I am a Seahawks fan and 5 years ago it was our turn to be in the big game. We were playing the mighty Steelers in our first Super Bowl. We all know how the game turned out. A Super Bowl turned into a homecoming for Jerome Bettis in Detroit. I think I counted 5 Hawks jerseys at Ford Field that day. Even the refs had terrible towels and after decades of mediocrity, our big day was squashed by the power of the crowd favorite. So the Saints victory is bitter sweet; bitter towards the spineless, mindless, faithless lambs who jump on band wagons. Sweet for the patient, loyal, faithful fan who still rocks an Aaron Brooks jersey.

Go Seahawks!