Model Minority

Yep.  It’s been give or take a week.  I’m sitting in my office before the 2006 Labor Day weekend with a surprising little amount to do - moreso than usual that is.  So instead of replying back to high maintenance clients who get paid twice what I do, I’d decided to wrap up this purposely neglected bit of web self indulgence.  A new show is going up in February 2007 so I’m going to a different blog site to do any shameless self promotion - friendster as I prophesized has become an obese abusive spouse who I will no longer tolerate.  Right now - a stream of annoying commercials bombards my eyes on the left of the screen as I sit here typing away about stupid minutiae you shouldn’t even be wasting your time reading… which begs the question - What’s worse? My inane ramblings or people who actually come back again and again to read my inane ramblings?  This is pretty much the conundrum with these blogs… I mean you want to stop reading some of them but the emotionally self serving disasters… ESPECIALLY those kinds are just delicious carnage filled wrecks with screaming stupid sentences of indulgence and even as they defecate into your conciousness you cannot pull away because you must know… is this writer going to figure out how idiotic he/she is?  The answer … oh sweet Estelle Getty no!  No!  They keep going and the public humiliation is like sweet sweet candy - better than monkeys on skates.  So yes reader… enjoy this last cup of Vente size schaedenfreude as I take my leave.

PREVIOUSLY on my life in no particular rambling order - NOW with inapproriate Sexual Innuendo!

1.  Your gonna be a lawyer til the day you.  Deal with it.  Now take off your pants and keep your head down counselor.

Took the bar.  Passed it.  Took the moral character exam.  Passed it.  Signed a "Your a Lawyer" paper.  Framed it.  Soul is now on lien to the highest bidder.  The funny thing is that it’s not bad.  I don’t work 80 hours a week like my friends nor do I have a big enough ego to feel any need to advertise it.  Trust me - my ego is of enormous proportions but about this self-hating wretched soul sucking profession I can say, "Meh.  Beats writing standardized test questions."

Instance: I helped a very cute but obviously insane couple get their greencard.  I sat at their interview with the government officer in court.  Part of the process is the familiar, "How do we know you really married because you love each other", which is an insanely ridiculous and funny premise consider the loveless and spiteful relationships I have witnessed in the guise of "functional".  What can you offer as evidence of a loving marriage?  Why photos of course!  Which is why one day I’m gonna sneak in a photoshopped picture of the loving couple on a rainbow with carebears as the bridal party as Mufasa from Lion King smiles from above giving two thumbs up with his paws.  Is that loving enough for you?

Anyway, in this instance, the couple’s photos showed that they had a pirate wedding. 

"What do you mean?", you ask.

I mean they dressed up as f*cking pirates.  Well the bride, groom and the bride side all wore pirate outfits.  The groom side who were mostly relatives from Kosovo (like the groom) did not wear outfits.  Rather they have that puzzled look most people get when you realize your at a theme wedding.  And by theme I don’t mean a spring wedding or fall wedding or Catholic wedding but theme as in amusement parks like Renaissance Faire, Goth, Orthodox Judiasm and yes… pirates.

Officer looks over them and looks at me as if to say," Counselor.  Why are they dressed up as pirates?"  To which I glanced back and said, "How the hell should I know.  Just move on."

The officer then looked up and actually said," Wow.  This is a first.  Everyone dressed up as pirate."

US Citizen Wife:  Well only me, Yuri (the husband from Kosovo and soon to be greencard holder), and my family did.  Yuri’s family weren’t really interested in that.

Yuri:  No.  In my country, we have only small lakes and no bordering oceans so we have no concept of pirates.  The closest we have is gangs of drunk fishermen who steal your milk in the morning and leave half eaten fish heads.

Officer: Interesting.  (laughs)  Oh but I see your father got into it.

Yuri:  [confused] Hm? No he didn’t.

Officer:  But he’s wearing an eyepatch.

Yuri: [softly] He lost it in freak sheep herding accident.

Officer: [uncomfortable pause] Okay.  I’m just gonna approve this case.

Me:  Good idea.

2.   Welcome to downtown San Francisco - since we’re officially a protected sanctuary for homeless people and drug addicts, please be respectful as they urinate on you.

This by far is the one main problem with this city.  In my nearly cumulatice two decades of living in New York City I have never had to:

a. watch someone take a dump in the middle of the street,

b.get punched in the back of the head for not saying happy birthday to a drug addict,

c. or have a vagrant call the cops on me.

This is probably the main by-product of a hugely liberal city… which I love except for its love and understanding creating some sort of entitlement bubble that has created an uber elite class of vagrancy.  I swear I have never seen a more prouder and abnoxious group of drug addicts in my life.  It’s the only place where on a bright sunny summer day, drug addicts come unto the street to enjoy some good weather and heroin free basing out in the open air.

Which is why I moved to a much more expensive but necessary apartment near the water (apparently the homeless cannot cross or be near running water) overlooking the bay bridge and the east bay full of wonderfully homogenized young urban professionals who will NOT make eye contact with you no matter how far you pull down your pants and dance.  And god knows I try every single day.

3.  Scientists say babies cry when you smile at them because they think your gonna eat them.  You know what I say?  Pass the baby sauce.

I’ve lost count how many people I know have had babies the past two years since I got here.  Or have gotten married which is close enough since that’s pretty much tilling the soil before you start planting.  Or will be getting married.  Or are seriously thinking about getting married. Or logging on date sites for $30 dollars a month while some white haired kook tells you that your an emotionally barren spineless f*ck up that will decimate the womb of any women where my seed finds purchase.

Whoa.  Where did that come from?

I’ll tell you where that comes from - there’s only so much happy I can drink from my juice box before I hear the drain of fluid that is my hope sucked up through the straw of life.  I love you all but don’t underestimate my capacity to generate spite… oh sweet spite now with the taste of lymon… that’s lemon and lime you tards.

4. Confessions of a Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Gamer.

Okay.  I have a surprising amount of free time.  I am not athletic.  I do not like the outdoors - I actually LOATHE the outdoors as you damn well know.  I have a very fast computer.  I do not have a crippling drug addict, whore habit, or expensive hobby.  And most importantly - I am NOT having sex.  NOT At all. None whatsover.  I do not know why.  I’m not even upset about it.  I’m more just resigned to it like people who live near the subway and hear the train go by. "Oh… there goes the Number 9 train - still not getting laid." 

I honestly have stopped wondering why in the same way people from Idaho stop wondering why they’re f*cking boring.

This and many irrelevant reasons is why I have become addicted to this thing called World of Warcraft.  There.  I said it.  Am I ashamed?  Yes.  Will I stop?  No.  Hell No. In fact, I will lock you in a closet full of rabid pandas with box-cutters if you even try and get me to stop.

What is World of Warcraft?  Well NY Times did an article… some guy died playing it non-stop for 48 hours.  There is a whole sub-industry of kids who get paid to play this game for 12 hours a day in China.  All this is explained and more if you go to wikipedia.  But, its hard to explain so I won’t bother… its even harder to explain the relevance of conversations like this I’ve had online while playing the game. 

Me: What’s next?

Nerd: The map says we gotta go to this place of called the Dungeon of Infernal Darkness.

Me: The what?

Nerd: Dungeon of Infernal Darkness.

Geek: Can Darkness be infernal?  I mean.  Fire gives off light last time I checked.

Nerd: Maybe it’s dark as an adjective meaning bad or evil.  You know.  Like darkness of your heart.

Me:  Great.  We gotta go to some dungeon that is filled with evil fire.  F*ck that.  Why are we always going to places like Dungeon of Infernal Darkness, or Forest of Eternal Damnation or… or…

Geek: The Tower of Gargantuan Sodomites.

Me: YES.  The goddamn Tower of Gargantuan Sodomites.  Why the f*ck are we going to a Tower filled with Gargantuan Sodomites.  Why aren’t we going to places like the Castle of Taking it Easy, or the Waterfall of Butterscotch Wishes?!

Nerd: Who the hell would make a waterfall of butterscotch wishes?  That’s stupid!

Me: WHO THE F*CK MADE THE TOWER OF GARGANTUAN SODOMITES!!  Explain that reasoning to me!

So.  Yeah.  Now you know.  Lets move on. 

5. What’s next?  (if you care that is)

Well the aforementioned show I wrote goes up in February.  It’s with the Thunderbirds, and it’s going up on here.  It involves my last writing partner whose doing all the animated shorts which is bound to be a huge draw and will dwarf my meager writing…

Uber artist on my last show already allowed me to use this beauty here:

It has no literal refernec to what I wrote but I thought it captured the spirit of it.  Which is why it has served as our initial bit of promotional material.  Jeremy, your bound to read this so yeah - I’m gonna be taking advantage of your talent until you only have nubs for hands.  NUBS!

My former sketch comedy partners in crime are putting up what may be the very last stage production in NY (the current creative team assure me or threaten me that film versions will continue).  I helped create this bit of comedic fury and part of me is sad to see it go after 5 years.  Our first show occurred in 2001.  In fact, we posted our first audition call in Backstage on 9/10/2001.  The two other creators and I wondered if it was such a good idea to put up a comedy show in NY 3 months later.  Credit stubborness, we moved forward and can look back at a body of work which contains scatological humor (both definitions), incest, homicidal pizza delivery boys, bad family role-models, drugs, mental illness, inappropriate dream sequences, badly timed political humor, rascism, sexism, mysogyny, and plain mean spirited sense of humor.  It’s helped made me the shell of a man I am today.

Also, although they don’t have a website I can plug, HonkBark who put up MidSummer earlier this year will be putting up another theatrical opus next year.  An original play by fresh new playwright whose gotten a lot of critical acclaim.  If you google HonkBark you should get a couple of relevant links in NYC.  I’m definitely going to be there.

Last bit of tidying up… I started this blog to talk about the show I did last year called the Las Vega Nauts and I never finished wrapping it up so a few last blurbs.

Todd Brotze and Max Bernstein - The former played the main hero and the latter played the reformed villain who would make 2/3 of the titular title.  On-stage they were phenomenal (spelling?) and off-stage equally so.  Todd in fact was one of only two people praised in an otherwise mediocre panning of the show.  Todd of course tried to downplay his part and raise my worth - but then he went ahead and used the review on his resume.  God I love actors!

Max in particular saved the show when in the second night of performances, when the original actor playing the role he would take on, decided that this was the night he was going to pass out from drinking and missed the entire 1st act.  As I sat outside the theater which had been holding the start of the show for 30 minutes smoking my 8th cigarette wondering a) how I can write a major character out of show and b) how fast I could run away from the theater; my stage manager came up and said that I was voted to take over the part.  So I drank two beers, put on the costume (which I still have in my closet), tried to memorize lines which ironically I WROTE, and jumped on stage for two quick but agonizing scenes.  That drunk actor showed up for the second act, performed competently, and was promptly fired.  Max took over the next day and even learned all the fight choreography in an hour.  I still cry when I think about that perfect crescent kick Max managed that somehow comparatively looked like a dog lifting his leg to urinate when performed by his predecessor.

Okay. DONE.  Thanks to everyone who let me know they’ve found my rantings diverting reads.  I’ll let you know the link to the next site where I’ll start writing about the new show.

Everyone else who for some reason still gets those annoying friendster updates telling you

HEY! SANG JUST UPDATED HIS TRVIAL BLOG!  CLICK HERE AND ENJOY HIS INSANE AND RIDICULOUS BAD PROSE! MARVEL AS HE TRIES TO MAKE SENSE OF THE BANALITY OF HIS LIFE!  CLICK HERE TO SEND HIM A SMILEY FACE BECAUSE YOUR LIFE IS THAT EMPTY YOU VAPID WHORE!

but still clicks it anyway and reads it anyway I just want to say… hi! 

That’s it.  Drop a line and say hi.  But do it soon because sooner or later I’m gonna get into one of my moods and start burning bridges.  And you know how much i LOVE burning bridges.  You’ll go… hey… I haven’t been across to Sang town in a while.  I should go see it.  And you go to the body of water that separates us and to your shock there are just burning embers and a rotting wooden carcass where once stood a structural engineering marvel of friendship and trust.  But no more!  And you will look to see what could have caused this catastrophe… And there I will be… across the way… over the now formidable impasse… insane with imagined slights and delusional with a half bottle of jager smelling of gasoline dancing.  Dancing away!

"Yeah!  Taste the ashes!  Taste and revel in my pain." I’ll laugh.

You’ll explain, "Jesus Sang.  I just lost your email.  You’re kind of taking things out of proportion."

To which I’ll reply, "Your momma takes things out of proportion."

"What does that even mean?", you query.

"… uh…hmm…uh…ahh suck it!"

Indeed.  Suck it.  Suck it my dear dear friends.

Hasta and Talk soon!