Why?

Your eyes throb, and you know that if you take one more right hook you'll hit the ground. Fucker, here it comes, a wide sweeping haymaker that has enough momentum that it will knock you into the land where the little black spots come and your eyes blur and you know for a fact that you will not be able to get your head out of the way if he follows it with an uppercut.

You lean back just quickly enough, and you feel the air swing by your face. You can't hold your arms up anymore, your biceps feel like they've torn off the bone, and you know they're going to snap soon just like those steel cables that hold up the telephone polls do when a drunk driver hits them. You've got energy for one more good flurry, one more hard round, even though your lungs are bungee corded together and they won't expand nearly enough to take in the air you need. If you get hit again, you will die.

Use your leverage. You charge him, two gloves in his chest, and force him back against the ropes. The body, the body! Your hands go down, your forehead on his shoulder, and you start pounding; short, hard hooks straight into the sides of his stomach. His elbows drop, trying to cover, and you come in with one uppercut that has everything you got left on it, and it hits him right in the sternum, and you can hear it, the, "ooooooofff" as the wind gets knocked clean out of him, and his right knee buckles and his gloves drop and he falls off to the side.

You back off, and he is on his knees, gloves on the ground, a grimacing face buried. You did that to a man, in the oldest, toughest, most intense sport there is. It is a war where you will be buried, you will be killed, or you will win. You will ignore that pain, ignore that throbbing death in the back of your head, just so it is him on the ground and not you. And if you die tomorrow because of this fight, you will know that you die victorious, and he will not.


That, my fellow blogger, is why you would want to get in a ring or a cage with another man who wants to hurt you- because it is the only pure thing in this fucked up world of ours.

Night

We are raging and churning into the great American night and I've already had too much to drink. The windows are wide open even though a shattering rain is drowning the road, and the curves and turns gasp for air through their storm drains. Nickelback's cover of, "Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting" is hammering out of my speakers and we are rolling over the low hills of New Jersey like dead cavalrymen from another century.

As the streetlights glare, I wonder how much more there is. There are people in Marrakesh doing the same thing right now, people in Jerusalem.... and a bomb will explode and kill fifty eight people in Baghdad tomorrow.

We gaze at the same moon as Achilles and Cuchulain.

Quotes

"Man, you can take a nigga out the ghetto, but you can't take the ghetto
outta the nigga" - Hispanic friend on Michael Vick


"Every fucking white male in the country would want Hatton to win. That bar you guys were at for the De La Hoya fight? You'd get into a fight with black guys there this time." - Irish friend on the prospect of a Hatton/Mayweather fight

"These niggas don't know what to do with they money. I hate to say it, but you never see white boys pulling this shit." - Another Hispanic friend on the NFL



Good to see America has come such a long way, huh? Now, are we purveying the stereotype, are they doing this because of what they've seen, or are sports just fucked in general?

Either way, it's not good.

Vive liberte

Observations on Weddings

1. Tailors are the wizards of this century; the suit didn't fit before, but it does now, and you didn't cut it. As confused as I am about the whole thing, I tip my hat to you men and your dark magic.

2. Wedding cards suck. I'm a single guy who has been invited to two weddings for two women I know. Being the manly man that I am, I don't want my card to have bows and ribbons and shit on it, I just want it to say, quite simply, "Happy Wedding. Don't fuck it up" and then a spot for the money I'm dropping you. That's it.

3. I'm a single guy. If you're getting married, you better have hot friends. If you don't, hire some to keep me occupied, or else I'll inevitably end up drinking copious amounts of rum and falling down the stairs while probably swearing about some minority. If you don't want me to ruin your wedding, get hot girls there, or else all bets are off.

4. Wedding cards suck. I am a poet, albeit an unknown and sometimes crappy one (but a poet nonetheless.) I laboriously count stressed syllables, load up on alliteration, and try to make it as perfect as possible. And what do you fuckers do? You rhyme "sing", "ring", "thing", and... "ring" again. Fuck off.

5. Don't put rum in the open bar. My liver thanks you.

Rant

"It's this stuff, this gangsta stuff, the gangs getting into the sports that made me turn away from the NBA. I'm close to doing that now with the NFL." - a caller on Mike and the Mad Dog


"Man, I never see white motherfuckers doing shit like this. These niggas don't know how to handle their money..." - A Hispanic, former semi-pro football player who's a truck driver



Sometimes you wonder what makes people do things. Some guys have the world at their feet, they got life made in the shade, and yet... they still push. I'm not talking about pushing in a good way, either- some men can never be too successful, and will burn with a passion for power or money forever (though I'm not like that, I can understand where it comes from). No, what I'm talking about is the fellas who get so successful that they think they can't be touched, be it by man, law, or God. We've seen it all over in history- Louis XIV, Al Capone, Whitey Bulger, Sharpe James... all men who never knew where to draw the line. They amass so much money and fame that they believe that there is never a true threat to their lives, and that there is no way I, I, could end up in jail.

You might already know where I'm going with this. Michael Vick was indicted this week for having dog fights on his property. Well, he's from the ghetto of Newport News, so I can't judge him for this because there are countries where it isn't looked down on, similar to the way Mexicans dig cockfighting. I could care less about cockfights, but I have a big soft spot for dogs, being as I have two. Of course, some folks probably have that for roosters, and fur does not make one animal more worthy to live than another. That being said, I could not watch a dog fight, and I am glad it's illegal.

What bothers me is what Vick did with the dogs that lost. "At the end of the fight," court documents say, "the losing dog was sometimes put to death by drowning, strangulation, hanging, gun shot, electrocution or some other method."

Hey Mike... you fucking kidding? In the first place, you're a cretin for doing this to these dogs. Dogs are long past the evolutionary point where fighting is a day to day thing, and some of them had to be starved to get them to fight more viciously. Secondly, how the hell can you kill an animal that is so bound to humans in so many ways so easily?

I used to play football. It is unlike any sport because of two reasons: the absolute violence of the game, and the extreme team nature (boxing is as violent, but there are only two men in the ring, making football unique). When you step on that field, it is a field of battle where not paying attention, not watching your buddy's ass, can get both one or both or you seriously hurt. You depend on the character of the guy behind you, in front of you, to do the right thing and take care of their job. No one is as important as the quarterback in this endeavor- he is the field marshal, the general with the binoculars who watches the flank and makes sure a slaughter isn't imminent. If I looked at a man and knew he was capable of such extreme acts of violence against relatively defenseless creatures... well, let's just say that it would not inspire unwavering confidence.

There is a complex that these athletes are getting, specifically those who come from this gangbanger mentality that thrives in the ghettoes. Pacman Jones, Albert Haynesworth, Marcus Vick, Ricky Williams... the NFL is becoming inundated with men who are more criminals than athletes. You throw them a couple bucks, some coke, maybe a gun or two, and all of a sudden everyone is invincible, and above the strong arm of the law.

Well, let me tell you, you dumb motherfuckers, there were a lot better criminals out there than you guys. You want a real gangster? How bout John Gotti? How about Mickey Spillane, or Jimmy Coonan, or Mickey Featherstone? How about Whitey? How about King Mike McDonald? These men ran cities and presidential elections, not fuckin' dog fights. If you're going to do this shit, then do it, have some ambition. You guys aren't even trying.

You know the only thing you have in common with these guys? You all get caught. You all end up in jail. And if those guys can get caught, you sure as shit will, because their setups were alot better than yours.

You want to call yourselves "Gangstas", more power to you. It ain't gonna be me crackin off in a jail cell, or having my mother weep over my closed casket. The worst thing is, jerkoffs like Vick and Pacman... you got little black kids with no fathers looking up to you all over the place. And this is what they see... and this is what they will emulate. One day, maybe these dipshits will realize that their actions go far beyond their basements and clubs.

I...

Am getting very philosophical and long winded when I am drunk. Although the last post doesn't make all that much sense, I got some great imagery in there.

If I should Fall from the Grace of God..

You know whats fucking bad? When something, a song, let's say, maybe one called, "Hey Ya", reminds you of some serious shit back in the day... and you turn it off, deaden yourself, and turn on, "The Irish Rover", and keep drinking. And you say, "Fuck this, I'll be dead eventually and this shit won't hurt."

Some people say this life is too short. I wonder exactly what life they're living when they say this shit..

When you think about it, it's only been five generations for me since my family came over from Ireland because of that fucking potato famine. I know the man who came here, he opened up a liquor store in Jersey City back in 1852. It seems like it's so long ago... but it is not. They were named Lynch, Burke, and McMachon, and they came over here because our boys were starving over there, and the English laughed from their high horses, caring little for my ancient brethern that starved while they drank.

Never wonder why I'm a Democrat. If you looked at me, you would know that Italian blood flows through my veins- my dark hair and skin gives this away quickly. But in my heart, in my soul, there is green blood that roars like a brutal tide, because the Irish has always been what I've identified with. When the pipes play amongst the cold March days, and our boys go marching down Fifth Avenue, you'll know who I am. My heart fades to a shade of Kelly green, one that has been passed down through the generations of people to show what the holiday truly means...


To be honest, I've been drinking, and women, in general, have got me tremendously upset...

Summer

I was driving home tonight with the windows down, feeling the hot, humid Jersey summer wrap my truck in heaving sweat. Flogging Molly's Drunken Lullabies played softly on the radio, a good acoustic version that tapered and flowed with the road.

Shit like this, these old Irish songs, make you realize that no matter how fucked up things get, no matter how bad your life is, you still got it easy. So your girl doesn't love you like you thought, or your car got impounded, or you got locked up for some charge that will be gone in a year. It still doesn't compare to all of the things that those before us had to go through to survive. Your love may be lost, and she may never return. You may have fucked everything up over over the past five years, and wondered how you came to this point of being half drunk and lonely as shit at a compartively young age. You might wonder how you got to where you are, or how the next fifty years will play out, or wonder if you will even make it long enough to worry about such things.

But you listen to these old hymns, these songs that are so cheerful, so beautiful, even though the men who sang them had such horrific lives. How many of them watched their fathers get killed in battle, how many of them saw their mothers starve on gray streets, fading into an obscurity of the poor dead who owned nothing in life, and even less after. How many had harder lives than us....

We are amongst the fortunate. We have a good country, a good, stable base where we can move up in the social classes without paying for it in blood. Even the poorest have food and a couple TV's- rarely in history have the poor had both food and entertainment.

I don't forget this, though it may sometimes seem like I do.



And by the way, to that cunt that reviewed this site and said, "I expected it to be funny", GO FUCK YOURSELF. This didn't say, "Comedian's Ramblings: This is the story of a really fucking funny guy who you never heard of but will make you piss yourself laughing every time you come back to his awesome blog." No, bitch, it said I'm cynical and I drink too much. If you thought a barrel of laughs came with it, then who's the fucktard?

Hounds at the Stage

"Look at these fucking guys trying to pretend they're not perverts. We're at a strip joint- we're all fucking perverts. They should embrace it like I do."



Hours into the bleak South Jersey night, we are in search of a strip club that serves both naked women and booze, which is harder to find than I thought. I may or may not be very fucked up, and that Amy Winehouse song is stuck in my head as I lazily hang my cigarette smoking arm out the window... "Try to make me go to rehab, I say "No, no, no."

The place is called "After Dark", and it is the most ghetto strip club I have ever been in. There is one white broad there, and the guys who run this place know their customers- the rest of the girls are black and Hispanic. The guy who walks around like he owns this place is a grimy looking Italian with gold chains strapped to his neck and a tremendous gut that hangs over the front of his black pants. This place is like stepping into an episode of "Miami Vice", minus the "Miami" part.

These girls know their shit though; I watch in awe as one climbs nearly to the ceiling on the pole, then slides twenty feet upside down with her legs spread. I have a big problem with strippers that don't try, and just expect you to throw your money at their heels because they're (almost) naked. I don't pay to see naked girls, I pay... well, yea, I pay to see naked girls. But still, they have to do something and make it worth it. It's similar to how I hate that now at every Dunkin Donuts they have a tip jar that gets filled with change every day. You fuckers pour coffee, and that's what you get paid for, and I'm not giving you my thirty eight cents because you... pour me a cup of coffee. Maybe if they ran it more like a Hooters, with hot young blondes behind the counter instead of old hairy Indian men... I might write them a letter about that.

I go out for a smoke later on, and of course this damn stripper ruins everything. She's sitting on the curb in her knee high boots, talking to some sympathetic soul about her two year old son as she smokes her cigarette. It's easy to forget sometimes that they are people, as they prance around on stage and beg for your money, pushing their breasts together in a vain attempt to feed their children. It always makes me feel bad when they start talking, because you realize that this is their life, their whole existence, sitting outside dressed like a hooker staring into the American night yapping to some frat boy who feels bad for her in his overly drunken state. I have a good time until this shit starts, and then I just feel like an asshole. If the girl is ugly, then it's easy to brush it off... but if, as a few can be, they are truly beautiful, then I despise seeing that hollow look in empty eyes that they all have.

It strikes a deathly fear in me because if I ever had a daughter, I could not handle her living a life that resembles this in any way. It's bad enough that I'd be passing on these genes that are prone to addiction, violence, and constant turmoil... if you put that on a chick that had smoking good looks like I'm sure my daughter would have, it would be a dangerous combination.

It's worth not having kids over shit like that.