Well, he’s back and I’ve got nothing. Not because I’m lazy or devoid of ideas, but because during his time abroad I started the Masters of Education program at Georgia State University. It’s not that the work is difficult, but it’s certainly time-consuming. Currently my penis-envy sized desk is buried in mountains of books, articles and other texts, framed by a “due date” list that requires an extension to my new dry-erase board.

So, dear readers, I give you one of my first response critiques for my graduate’s degree — specifically my EPSF 7110  course. It’s for my Multicultural Education and Society class and asks for me to evaluate and interpret a song that reflects the feelings of modern teenage students. I chose “I Don’t Like Mondays” by the Boomtown Rats and was shocked to learn that the story of the song’s origin come from my own university’s radio station!

Oh, and keep those Contrarian paychecks coming, please. They help cover my weekly whiskey bills.

——

Christopher S. Parizo

Song Lyrics and Society

EPSF 7110

June 25, 2011

“The computer chip inside her head gets switched to overload / and nobody’s going to go to school today, she’s going to make them stay at home.” With these opening lyrics, Sir Bob Geldoff of 1980s New Wave stalwarts the Boomtown Rats, begins the tale of a teenage female murderer.

Geldoff wrote the song while sitting in the radio station at Georgia State University in 1979. A telex machine printed the story of a 16-year-old student in San Diego named Brenda Ann Spencer, who openly fired a handgun at an elementary school, killing two children and wounding nine. The event marked one of the first school shootings in American history. But it wasn’t the tragic events that sparked Geldoff’s imagination, but rather the apathetic response Spencer gave to police and reporters when asked why she committed such a heinous crime: “Tell me why! / I don’t like Mondays.” This exchange is repeated throughout the song’s chorus.

Although the Boomtown Rats had a good deal of success overseas, “I Don’t Like Mondays” was the sole American hit for Geldoff and the band, only reaching #73 on the Billboard charts. Despite the song’s relative lack of U.S. impact, it has regularly featured in American media, such as in episodes of “The West Wing,” “House MD” and the movie The Breakfast Club.

The song’s speaker blames a technological flaw within the shooter herself (she happens to have a computer in her head instead of a brain). Beyond this device, the song’s lyrics describe a shift towards apathy that critics of American youth have trumpeted for generations. This is based on a common observation that the more society moves away from organic, human connections and towards technology, the greater distanced we are from human emotion. Geldoff himself comments on the irony of this in the song’s second verse by stating how the news came to him: “The telex machine is kept so clean as it types to a waiting world / And mother feels so shocked, father’s world is rocked and their thoughts turn to their own little girl.” Here, Geldoff imagines the response of the shooter’s parents, having heard the same news via the same cold telex message.

Geldoff continues his search for meaning in apathy with the third verse, which describes the schoolyard following the shooting. Geldoff writes, “All the playing’s stopped in the playground now / She wants to play with her toys a while / And school’s out early and soon we’ll be learning and the lesson today is how to die.” Geldoff tells us here that there is no ultimate truth to be drawn, no moral compass to be re-calibrated — the violence is merely random. This is reinforced in the song’s close, which concerns the thoughts of the police captain who takes the shooter away: “… the problems [with] the how’s and why’s / And he can see no reasons because there are no reasons. What reason do you need to die?”

Ultimately, “I Don’t Like Mondays” concludes “there is no reason to be shown.” Geldoff follows this logic by not explicitly stating the cause of teenage apathy; the listener needs to draw their own conclusions. Nor do the lyrics depict the actual school shooting. We do not get a retelling of the events of the tragedy, only the emotional reactions (and lack thereof) to the events. Still, Geldoff does hint at the cause in his references to our modern world. We live in a technologically-oriented culture of computer chips and telex machines — or websites and text messages — and each expression that employs these technologies becomes severed from its emotional tether. When the “human” aspects of human communication are replaced or superseded, it engenders apathy, which makes violence easier. Deeper meaning is eclipsed by the mode of transmission; the ultimate reasons behind violence are forever obscured by easy catchphrases and purely mechanical interactions.

I’m a busy guy, and my job requires me to think about some big hairy subjects (like how copyright might coexist with the giant photocopier that is the internet). Subsequently, my intellectual output in other areas is limited. But that doesn’t stop me from having ideas. The genius switch is permanently fixed in the ON position.

Here are a handful of mind grapes I’d love mash into brain wine if I only had the time.

Dichotomies of Evil: The Cosmology of Ronnie James Dio
This would be an academic overview of the mythological/metaphorical writings of the late metal vocalist Ronnie James Dio, whose peculiar — and often self-contradictory — prose is fertile ground for interpretation and analysis. “We’re a ship without a storm / The cold without the warm / Light inside the darkness that it needs, yeah.” Step aside, Chaucer, there’s a new bard in town.

“Pulling Out:  A Comparative Study of Post-Occupation Statescraft and Coitus Interruptus”
Just gathering the data.

A Bronzepunk Manifesto
This book will make the case for reviving the aesthetics of the ideogramic era, from Sumer to Anatolia. You can’t think outside the box until you INVENT BOXES.

“Comedy as Foreign Policy Wedge in the Post-Yakov Smirnoff Era”
Pretty self-explanatory.

“High Functioning Autism in the Realm of the Non-Arithmetic”
Not everyone on the autism spectrum is good at math. This essay, suitable for publication in any number of medical or psychology journals, will examine the origins of the misperception while describing a broader range of facilities and deficits experienced by those with this neuroatypicality.

Libertarianism is a Social Disease
A short tract on the virulent spread of this political “philosophy,” with practical examples on how to protect against infection and limit its spread.

“Aaron Sorkin is a Pox on Humankind”
Do I really need to write this?

“Privacy: Irrelevant or Utterly Irrelevant?”
This article will examine all the reasons why efforts to curtail data-mining technologies are doomed. Whether you’re a repressive government keeping tabs on your public’s every move, or a megacorp hellbent on increasing shareholder returns, there is little incentive to cling to archaic notions of privacy. Sure, some policymakers will try. And they will fail.

The Cases of “Night Court”
A compendium of the most significant rulings by Judge Harold T. “Harry” Stone, with historic and contemporary legal analysis.

Not Fat, Just Just Big-Souled: A Foodie’s Guide to Megachurch Eateries
From Starbucks to Applebee’s, faith is big business for chain restaurateurs. This is the first comprehensive guide to getting the most out of your megachurch dining experience. Physical edition comes with coupons and a temporary tattoo of Jesus riding a dinosaur.

The show was called “Small Town Gothic,” and it paid tribute to the back story of hauntings — those peculiar and offbeat little tales that give towns their character — rather than the paranormal investigation itself. Within each story, one investigator would play the “believer” while another would act as a skeptical historian. The two would dig deep into community lore, gathering tales of ghosts, monsters and general weirdness that accumulate through a town’s unique history. Using local archives, the tall tales would be separated from facts via historical record and personal remembrances.

We pimped this thing like a ho at 2AM. We made phone calls, got some feedback, had a lot of doors slammed in our faces and received several “thanks-but-no-thanks.” The commercial television market is a tough nut to crack, much more so than the music world (where I lived for many years). Whereas record labels seem interested in hearing what bubbles up from actual scenes (at least superficially), TV is much more self-involved and nepotistic. Production companies would rather rely on insider consultants than consider outside ideas, regardless of how interesting — or marketable — those ideas might be.

While pitching the show to production companies, I was shocked at a clause they all required us to sign which basically stated that they could legally produce the exact show we were pitching because they had the same idea before they met us. Meaning, each time we pitched a show, they could say, “Yeah, we already thought of that. Thanks. Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on your way out.” And then put it into production.

The best feedback we received was “you’ve got something here, but I don’t think that it’s fully developed. Come back to us when you have a polished concept and we can talk.” I took this to mean, “I conceive better television shows on the toilet.”

So we gave up. Why bother? A colossal effort with little to no reward. Yet despite all this, I’ve spent the last year mulling the show over in my head, removing certain parts and altering others. I’ve spent countless hours in the shower (where amazing songs, lyrics and television shows are formulated and ultimately dried off with your towel) re-conceptualizing the show, and I came to a simple conclusion regarding pitching paranormal TV programs:

Fuck it. Fuck it all to Hell.

So anyway, here I am. With a television show I’m all set to pitch, but with no inclination to run around town, call around the country, sign ridiculous documents and all the other crap. Instead, I’m pitching it here, and tagging production companies. This is my show. Starring me and my friends. Production companies: you want it? Email me. You don’t? Go make a show about auctioning storage spaces — there’s four of those on right now, and surely the world needs another.

My show is called “Ghost Skeptic,” and it stars a dashingly handsome, likable and cocky teacher by day who spends his nights investigating supposed haunted locations around the country (world?). It begins with the following monologue:

My name is Chris Parizo. I spent my life studying the tales of ghosts, specters, and haunts. For years, I investigated the paranormal, searching for the unknown and unexplained. I spent hours with the latest equipment in hundreds of haunted locations and have come to one conclusion: ghosts don’t exist. But I want to believe! That’s why I’m offering this challenge. Send me to the most terrifying locations in the world, places where people dare not tread, and let me enter alone. Armed with a “panic button” as my only protection, and with my associate Darrell Hazelrig guarding the perimeter, I will venture into the world’s most dangerous and frightening haunted locales. And I will do it alone. This is “Ghost Skeptic.”

The gist of it should be clear from the opening. Basically, it’s “Small Town Gothic,” but we’ve succumbed to the paranormal investigation stuff. Act I will establish the location’s backstory: its history and the people who nurture the legend. Act II will focus on the archives and records, separating fact from folktale. Act III will be me scared shitless in the dark, doing my best not to press the panic button and alerting Darrell to switch on emergency lights, thereby ending the investigation. All of this will conclude with a wrap-up where I channel my inner Anthony Bourdain with my self-reflective and self-righteous philosophies of the paranormal. There’s another element that I will answer for anyone interested, but right now I’m too busy making fart noises with my mouth to get into it.

You’re frothing already, aren’t you!?!? This is just the greatest television pitch in history, right!?!?! You’ve got a great big boner and it has “Ghost Skeptic” written all over it, don’t you!?!?!?

Meh.

So that’s about it. I think it’s a good idea and it’s definitely something that I would watch. Hell, I’d even buy a t-shirt. Consider this an open call to all production companies: I’m tired of calling and emailing you; now it’s your turn.

And if you’ve already come up with this idea, kiss my ass. Give me executive producer credit and $20,000 so Darrell can get some new editing equipment and we’ll call it even.

“You know, not exactly forgotten,” said Graeme Ryder, PhD making air-quotes with his fingers in a press conference Monday, “We’re just kinda saying that these days it seems like the original meaning has been, like… literally forgotten, you know?”

“Of course,” Ryder assured the audience with a chuckle, “we all still totally know what the word means.” However, when pressed by reporters on the actual meaning, Ryder appeared literally brain-dead. “It kinda means ‘really’…” he said, his voice modulating upward as if asking a question, “but just sort of… different, you know? Like, extra-really. Stronger somehow.” He assured reporters that his organization was looking into it, with books and things.

Monday’s announcement from the EWSI has literally set the academic world ablaze with real flames, like, literally licking up the sides of it. “I’m stunned. It’s like I literally have no idea what is happening,” said an incredulous Linda Snell, head of  the English Studies department at Harvard and literally the queen of these kinds of things, like with an actual crown and everything. “It’s like I’m hearing the words, but they’re literally going in one of my ears, out the other and boom, falling right onto the floor. I, no shit, literally want to die right now. Like lie down on the floor of my office and literally die.”

Outside of academia however, the announcement was met with a resounding whatever. “Yeah, I heard something about it on the news,” said Alice Aldridge, 23, of St. Cloud, MN. “I couldn’t believe how serious they sounded and stuff! It was literally like a bomb had dropped or something.” Asked if a bomb had dropped, Ms. Larkin’s eyes literally popped out of her skull and she proceed to literally laugh her head off, like plop, clean off of her body. “No you idiot, a bomb didn’t, like, drop on anyone!” she scoffed, giving this reporter a playful shove. “What are you, stupid?! I said it was literally like a bomb had dropped.”

"My autozombiography drops this Fall, vageniuses!"

Bangst: the sensation of losing one’s identity upon encountering someone with a haircut similar to one’s own. Bangst reaches epidemic levels at rock shows in Brooklyn.

Dreambag: a gorgeous but douchey person whose douchiness is initially obscured by beauty but gradually becomes undeniable.

Dylan’s Law: when a musician’s fans are so rabidly reverent, they actually drain talent from the musician. Had Bob himself not been subject to Dylan’s Law, this would not have happened.

Fauxsure: when exes get together under the pretense of “closure,” but only succeed in prolonging inappropriate and hurtful attachments.

iFugue: dissociative state induced by listening to music through headphones for extended periods, wherein  one’s own actions — and indeed, the universe — seem controlled by the music.

Prestalgia: premature wistfulness for something that has not ended yet but perhaps should have, coupled with the strong desire that it would end already, so that proper nostalgia can commence.  R.E.M. and “The Simpsons” widely inspire prestalgia.

Slaydar: the innate ability of former metalheads to detect the presence of other former metalheads. See also: Treydar.

Smartyr: a fairly (but not extraordinarily) intelligent jerk who imagines their intellectual superiority is the reason nobody likes them. [Editor's Note: I think I have this syndrome.]

Speakeasily: what an ordinary drinking establishment becomes when militant grammarians dominate the conversation with discussions of grammar peeves.

Treydar: the ability to sense the presence of jam-rock aficionados. Unlike Slaydar, Treydar is not innate; it is developed at four-year universities in New England.

Vagenius: one who is especially knowledgeable about and skilled in lady-pleasing. Those who believe they are probably are not.

Today is the day you’ve been waiting for, my dear patrons. That’s right, it’s a new nomination for the Fuckwit Librarian of the Year Award!!! It seems to me that 2010 has been somewhat light on eligible candidates. I wonder if our budget worries have taken too much attention away from our normal duties, so we don’t have time to fuckwit it up the way we usually do. Before we get to today’s nomination, however, let’s review the scant field this year:

-The current front-runner is Amanda Marie Cortright, who was busted for stealing almost 1,500 items from the library system she worked for. Cortright was enough of a fuckwit to tweet about reading books she had stolen and use her own email address to set up fake accounts through which she checked out the stolen items. Well done, Fuckwit!

-The only other nomination so far is Me, and that was just a joke. I had run out of barcode labels, you see, and couldn’t add any new items into the catalog for a week and a half. It really wasn’t such a big deal. Oh, and that’s not me in that linked picture. Not yet.

So needless to say, the contest this year is badly in need of excitement. Enter Barbara Wilson of the Birmingham Public Library in Alabama. Here’s the deal: the library Wilson works for, like most libraries, provides computers for patron use. As some of you may have heard, the internet can be used to view pornography. I imagine it would be a rare public institution that provides access to the internet and does not find that access used for looking at naked people. It has happened at my library, though thankfully not when there were any other people around. The thing you have to understand is that as long as the individual viewing the content is of legal age to view said content (the age varies depending on the state you live in), the patron is not breaking any laws. Therefore, unless the library has a policy specifically forbidding the viewing of adult content on their machines, the patron who chooses to do so is within their rights, unless anyone sees what is being viewed and is offended. It’s all about the other library users. The times that I have noticed someone viewing or having viewed adult content at my library have all been times when there was no one else in that part of the library. Except our cat, and she’s not easily offended.

OK, but now I’ve strayed from the point. Wilson works at a library, and people were looking at porn on the computers. Wilson’s lawyer says the patrons would “engage in acts of public lewdness,” and that they would “become belligerent when they (were) approached about it.” Wilson is suing the Library for “creating a sexually hostile work environment.” (I must note that if the acts of lewdness violated local statutes, the police should have called, and the situation dealt with by them, not the librarians. That said, if the lewdness was the viewing of content, read on…)

So the first thing Wilson got wrong is thinking that what the patrons choose to access has anything to do with us or our personal feelings about any content. Certainly, many librarians would be offended by images they see patrons viewing online, but it is not up to us what content people choose to view or how, as long as they are keeping within the limits of the law.

Second, it is not Wilson’s employer who is creating the hostile environment. Providing access to computers and the internet does not mean you are telling people to look at porn. It is the decisions of the patrons that Wilson is bothered by, not the fact that the library provides access. Wilson clearly does not understand that the whole point of libraries is to provide access to whatever content the users may require, for whatever reason they may have. It is not up to us to decide what is right or wrong for the individuals or the community. If you don’t get, you are clearly a fuckwit.

Congratulations, Barbara! You’re a contender!

PRINCE DECLARES, “SMARTPHONES ARE OVER”

The Purple One has seen the writing on the wall in the possible recall of iPhone G4s — the smartphone, Prince says, is over. He revealed this insight in an exclusive interview with the Financial Times to promote the packaging of his new album, FUTUREK00L, with every new IBM Selectric typewriter sold in 2010. “It was just a matter of time,” said the pint-sized genius, shaking his head as he got up to change the channel on his TV. “All those little pictures and colors are confusing people’s minds. Eventually we’re all gonna go back to those little phones that were the size of a bar of hand soap. They told the time, had a little calculator in ‘em, had the numbers 0 through 9… that’s all you need,” Prince snorted, noting that he wore out the numbers 2 and 4 unusually fast when he texted, requiring him to order a specially modified model.

———————————————————————-

PRINCE DECLARES, “MICROWAVE OVENS ARE OVER”

His Purpleness leapt out of irrelevance this week and shocked news outlets with an equally irrelevant proclamation — microwave ovens, Prince claims, are over. He revealed this insight in an exclusive interview to promote his new cassette JeHOVaHSeXXFuNKY, which will be distributed with every copy of The Watchtower, the official publication of Jehovah’s Witnesses. “Yeah… they were all the rage for awhile,” said the scarf-bedecked icon, easily slipping his 4-foot frame into the driver’s seat of his custom DeLorean. “But y’know…” he chuckled scornfully, “so was the Rubix Cube.” The Rock Hall Of Fame inductee predicted a faltering of the worldwide fast food industry if they continued to “go nuclear”. “People want their food cooked in real ovens, with heat. All these high-powered rays with their laser cooking gonna bring the Purple Rain, if you know what I’m sayin’.” No one did.

———————————————————————-

PRINCE DECLARES, “CREDIT DEFAULT SWAPS ARE OVER”

His Purple “Mountains” Majesty made a grand declaration today via ThaFruitedPlains, his home-published commodities tip sheet — credit default swaps, Prince decrees, are over. He revealed this insight in his weekly editorial, $PACEKI$$, along with an announcement that inside the sleeve of his latest long-player, PAIN2HEAR will be hidden five golden tickets. (The tickets, he also revealed, will be discovered by The Jackson Five, who will come live with him in his bouncy-castle home, where they will make music and be best friends forever and ever.) “The age of these complex derivatives is through,” chuckled the Lilliputian funk icon as he settled down to his loom, “People are gonna acknowledge that being long and selling short has an asymmetric risk/reward profile. The mispricing of financial instruments can affect the fundamentals that market prices are supposed to reflect.” He claimed this was all elementary, and could be revealed by long hours of play at an original arcade version of Asteroids!, of which he owns the world’s remaining 37 models.

For those just tuning in, Erik Prince is the Merecenary-in-Chief of Blackwater — the much-maligned private military company tasked by the US government to provide “security” in Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition to these dutiies, the firm also has a cozy relationship with CIA, which outsources to Blackwater those dastardly deeds deemed too politically perilous to, um, execute.

Now that the heat is being turned up on Blackwater, Prince is considering dropping the US for the UAE, where local law makes extradition extremely difficult. America: love it or leave it!

Prince has also put his company up for sale. But his legacy is likely to live on, no matter who owns Blackwater. State-sanctioned murder is highly profitable, so the goon squad wont be putting down their infared assault rifles anytime soon.

When not engaging in political assassinations and the aggressive suppression of foreign undesirables, Blackwater henchmen enjoy target practice on hapless civilians, including women and children. According to a former employee who has testified anonymously due to threats on his life, company mercenaries kick back after a long day of civilian murder by by watching videos of their kills and other abuses in so-called “hot wash” sessions.

The company’s policies are part and parcel with its founder’s personal agenda, which concerns prepping the world for the imminent return of Jesus — by any means necessary. Another anonymous employee claims that Prince “views himself as a Christian crusader tasked with eliminating Muslims and the Islamic faith from the globe.” Sort of like Islamic jihadists, but with the religions swapped.

Keep in mind that our government still employs Blackwater. Meaning, your tax dollars are spent on contracts to the company. Somehow the Tea Party is cool with our money advancing hyperviolent Christian supremacy, but they can’t stand the idea of their neighbor getting a free health checkup. What would Jesus do? Apparently, murder some brown people.

Prince’s flagrant disregard for human life (to say nothing of international law) hasn’t gone completely unnoticed, however. Federal prosecutors are starting to play hardball with Blackwater, to varying degrees of success. Although Prince has yet to be charge with any crime, some believe that it’s only a matter of time before his “extralegal” activities catch up with him. Hence the move to the UAE.

But even if prosecutors target Prince, his unique relationship with the American intelligence apparatus means he’s still got some aces left in his deck. Government bodies that regularly engage in covert activities don’t like having their secrets revealed in the course of a criminal prosecution. All Prince needs to do is dangle this threat and the intel apparatchiks will make it very clear: do not bring this man to trial.

It’s called “greymail,” and all the cool kids are doing it.

Someday, humankind will evolve past the petty religious, territorial and resource squabbles that have defined our existence on this planet. Or maybe we’ll be put out of our collective misery by a space-borne impact object. As the great George Carlin once said, “I’m rooting for the comet.”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGK84Poeynk

www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Cd36WJ79z4

Thank you, Symphony of Science!

My journey has been one of photoshopped photographs, “ghost sounds” that were really pebbles thrown by other investigators and magicians’ assistants who tweaked EMF and K-II meters to light up like the Fourth of July. I have seen this behavior displayed by both weekend warriors and paranormal rock stars, each creating his or her own brand of falsification and misdirection.

A few noble personalities — such as John Zaffis, Kristyn Gartland, and Loyd Aurebach — stand out as honest folks, willing to share with me their truths (and myths). A candid conversation that I had with Dave Tango gave me some hope in a dying field. I assume these folks offered their views because they recognized a shared passion for the paranormal. They occupy a rare place in the industry as the few truthsayers in a field of hyperbole-prone, self-indulgent liars.

Then there are those tarnished and lost souls who pilfer and rape the paranormal, squeezing out every drop of it in pursuit of personal glory and sensationalism. They’re like the so-called “spirit photographers” and “mediums” of 19th century Spiritualism — taking money from Civil War widows armed with cheese cloth and papier mache masks. They are the people who stymie any validation that the field may garner from outsiders. They are fuel for skeptics and haters, and at this point, I can’t say I blame anyone for harboring negative views about the paranormal field.

It’s like meeting Babe Ruth, and he punches you in the face, sleeps with your mom, and eats all your candy.  And then you find out his bat is corked.

So, where do I go from here? Do I retire my fascinations and try to maintain what level of respect I have left for the field? Do I walk away from it, and just go back to the books that I’ve cherished since childhood? Or do I go all Fugazi on this bitch and DIY a new group that’s more iconoclastic in approach and definition? Do I even have the energy to even attempt that?

I’m not sure if I am willing to sacrifice a childhood love anymore than I already have.