Slim In The Leg

Revised

Blake was walking up the stairs behind James at the Clinton-Washington avenue subway station. “What's with the hole on the back of your jeans?”

“My other good pair are crusted because of my unfortunate jaunts through heavily salted slush puddles. I really should wash them before the salt starts to eat through them. I can’t believe we got all that snow!”

“I can’t believe it’s gone already. When did you decide that the jeans were unwearable?”

James laughed and looked back. “I guess last Sunday. I knew that I couldn't wear the jeans again without washing them. The filth made me a spectacle.”

Blake scoffed as he shifted his messenger bag. “So why not wash them? You have free laundry at your place, right?”

“Well, you don't want to wash your denim too often. The oils and stuff in your skin makes the denim sort of custom fit you.”

Blake scoffed louder. “That’s gross, man.”

James and Blake walked onto the sidewalk toward the park. The snow had already melted. The ground was wet but the sun was warm and the sky was blue. “No, I insist that this is the best way to wear jeans.”

James stopped at the drinking fountain for some water. “Wear them at least three days a week and wash them at a maximum of once a month.”

“Why?!”

“Because, you start with a somewhat snug fit and they transform into a pair of custom fit jeans. The denim takes on your shape and it fits you better than it could ever fit anyone else. And, in fact, no one else should every wear your jeans. You should be able to wear them until the day you die.”

“It seems like if you wore them that much they would wear out a lot faster, though I guess you never know when you’ll die. Still, this assumes that a persons waistline stays the same through the ages,” said Blake.

“Maybe it's an incentive to age more gracefully. Having old denim to serve as a reference point through the decades?” James said as he pulled the Frisbee from his bag.
“Don't jeans change style over time? Like, wont those just look like cheap old shit in 5 to 15 years? Throw it.”

James threw the Frisbee to Blake. “Some things change, but the kind of fit that works for you never does”.

Blake catches the Frisbee. “Given the presumption that you don’t change.“ Blake threw the Frisbee and it hooked right.

James sprinted to catch the Frisbee. “A little incentive never hurt anyone.” He picked it up from the wet ground and threw it back to Blake.

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France Gave Us The Statue Of Liberty After WWII

And Other Crazy Things Palin Supporters Believe

Note: I encourage everyone to take a look at Sarah Palin's fan page on Facebook™ It's quite a freak show. My posts have been removed and I am banned from making further comments on her wall.

Republicans hate Free Speech, so you should go write something antagonistic and degrading on her wall right now. Make sure you do a screen capture, because they will remove it from the board within a couple minutes. If you send it to James.McSaddle@gmail.com I will post it on TheTruth.

Best of luck!

Palin Supporter: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door" This is the inscription written on the Statue of Liberty which was given to us by France, after we liberated that country. Think about this for a minute. Where else will the people of the world go if America becomes just like the country they are trying to escape?"

McSaddle: You sound about as smart as Sarah Palin.

The Statue of Liberty was a gift from France to celebrate the 100 year anniversary that the Declaration Of Independence was signed. You know, when THEY helped liberate us from Britain, not when the Allies liberated France in WWII. Maybe do a fact check next time?

The "huddled masses" poem, or "The New Colossus" was added years later to celebrate America's history of immigration. Also, it's not written on the outside of the statue, it's on the inside.

You should know that the Huddled Masses get a better deal in France, where they are secure in their economic well being and everyone has access to world class health care. The food is pretty good too.

None of this matters, because you come off as someone who calls french fries "Freedom Fries", who cheers on the Minute Men, and who purports that looking after the poor and sick is the same as socialism.

How many people in France go bankrupt because they can't pay for their medical needs versus that United States?

Sarah Palin: Clearly not a thinking person's candidate.

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The Republicans Lost In A Landslide

Because They Created The Mess We're In

And NOW They Want The Guy Cleaning Up Their Mess To Fail.

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Republicans = ♥ (Crazy > Smart)
The Most Abrasive Liberal Rhetoric Is Lukewarm Compared To The Right Wing
by Dr. James McSaddle

Florida Congressman Alan Grayson was criticized for calling out Republicans on their failure to to offer solutions to the serious and far reaching problems that face our current health care system.

The cost of care is going up and the quality of care is going down. We have an inexcusably high infant mortality rate and too many people go bankrupt or die because of the dishonesty of the for-profit insurance industry.

Congresman Grayson's aggressive posture is far less offensive than the outright lie-mongering, distortion, and incitement to fear that have become a part of the Republicans "brand".

It's difficult to listen to G.O.P. leaders call Obama a fascist, especially when the Patriot Act and FISA permitted the federal government to conduct unconstitutional searches, seizures and surveillance against American citizens.

It's especially difficult to hear Republicans compare Obama to Hitler while their own political success hinges upon the effectiveness of their lies and intimidation. The best hope for the Conservative Movement is the prevalence and persistence of the willful ignorance a person needs to believe what they say.

Their constituency consists primarily of those whose psychology is so frail that they believe Barack Obama was born in Kenya and that the poor and sick should be sentenced to death for being poor and sick. Some of them show up with AR-15s and other implements usually reserved for the battlefield or the apocalypse.

Somehow for-profit insurance corporations has gotten a visible number of angry white rubes to yell, stomp, and spit on their behalf in the public square. . .I'll never quite understand it.

I know that the Republicans are keen on death and destruction, but it's intellectually dishonest, even for a them, to subscribe to and embrace this genocidal social Darwinism while doubting the validity of evolution.

They would rather be crazy than smart, they would rather cultivate sociopaths than intellectuals; they would rather the collect campaign contributions from polluters and let humanity die on an uninhabitable planet than work to limit pollution; they would rather spend a trillion dollars on a war of aggression than on creating jobs or improving education.

I don't think it's particularly partisan to think that the G.O.P. platform represents a gross and perverted value system.

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James McSaddle Is:
THE LAZARUS MAN
by Dr. James McSaddle

Clearly it isn't Robert Urich, or else he would have come back from the dead to try the new sliders* at Burger King.

However, I am back from an extended hiatus. Let me give you a few reasons why I haven't been posting.

1.) My short stories and essays have been for class and they are of very little interest to my readers.

And myself.

2.) My schooling is fucked, I've moved, and I have had to look for a 'real' job. I've even applied for jobs in politics despite my insistence that I would never again do so. Poverty has a funny way of making you do desperate things.

Some people become thugs and pushers, others become prostitutes, and if I get back into politics, I'll be doing a combination of such deeds, thereof.

3.) I am getting ready to spend five weeks in Europe.

4.) I started a novel. Yup, I did it. I was going strong late April, and then the above shit happened and I haven't even looked at it in a month. But, I am going to go at it again as soon as I am done with this post.

I've been wanting to write about Torture Gate, the Sotamayor appointment, American Democratic Socialism, Conan, and David Carradine, but I just haven't had a moment to be in my own head about anything.

I am again prepared to give you frequent assessments on the banalities produced by my cognition. If that's why you look at this blog, you're in luck, because I'm back.

If you don't like it, you can close this tab and go back to jacking off to bestiality porn.

*"Burger Shots" I guess are what they call them. They aren't great, I prefer a real burger myself, especially as they have sesame seeds on the bun.

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Empty Things & Hollow Rings

Things you
got goin'
ain't goin'
no place
at all.

Maybe
you ought
to go
and get
going on
getting
over
things you
don't get
and will
never
ever
have your
hands on.

And if
you are
fixing
some tricks
to make
it in
the mix;
get to
thinkin
sick things
to see
if that
which is
hollow
also

rings.

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True Revolution

Today Azlan is celebrating
liberation
from hostile occupying forces.
With a clearer head and mended soul
he climbs onto
and hikes over
the rubble
to see how he can clear it out.

Not soon enough
he will build
a new nation from what is left
and what can be made.

Since it takes less time to count blessings
than it takes to count the casualties,
Azlan makes a rare but sincere prayer
that the world would learn to remember:

True Revolution comes from within.

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God's Wrath Spared The Rusty Pelican

The Gulf Coast of Mississippi is a poorer-man’s west Florida. Before the casinos set up shop in the early 90s, the Biloxi area enjoyed miles of white sandy coastline near water. Most days it looked to be a mosaic of blue and silver glass beads.

After the tide rolled back near dusk, I would collect seashells. I always checked them for crabs. Once, I reached my small, wet, and sandy hand into a conch shell and a gray little bug pinched my fingertip. I yelped, but I didn’t cry, it didn’t hurt too bad. I learned that the hazards of the ocean were different than the hazards of the West Michigan lake shore. I took special note of the washed up jellyfish and Man o’ Wars that rolled in with volumes after every real storm. Those worried me more than the stingrays or the small gray finetooth sharks, because they are nearly invisible. I figured that if I got a shark bite, at least I would have stories to tell. But, I didn't and I don't. Except for the crab, the Gulf’s predators never made prey of me.

Across from the place where you could once rent Sea-Doos, there was a souvenir shop and an old shrimping boat that was washed to shore by Hurricane Camille. Shrimping boats could be seen off in the blue-gray horizon each dawn. To get the freshest catch you would meet shrimpers at the docks at 8 A.M to buy the world’s finest shrimp dirt cheap.

Grubby shrimpers with more scars than teeth would sometimes slice one open in front of you to show you how meaty they are how easy the vein came out. Because of the availability of fresh ingredients, shrimp gumbo was served everywhere. They best might have been the Rusty Pelican, a dive restaurant near my grandparents home.

The sign out front had a large cartoon pelican, and it said in bold letters: PO-BOYS, GUMBO, CHICKEN, FISH, SEAFOOD. A Po-Boy is a large submarine sandwich with thick bread. The best one at the Rusty Pelican had fried crab cakes and was served with a hushpuppy and about a pound of salty carnival fries that were perfectly accompanied by a few splashes of malt vinegar. If you had room, you could also get a slice of Key Lime Pie.

With the humidity, white sand, and bounties of citrus, you would think you were in one of Florida’s finer vacation destinations if not for the prevalence of the Confederate Flag and middle age men going into town without shirts and/or shoes.

At a small market in Pass Christian with my grandparents, I remember a black man in a straw fedora coming into the store, and continence of the old fat man at the register changed completely. With his dry blue-gray eyes he followed him through the store. He stepped a few feet and pulled out a small wooden bat, like a little leaguer might use, out from behind a tall garbage can and he leaned it out of view where he stood near the register.

While grandpa was looking over the booze, the black man made his way through the store. He picked up a bag of potato chips, and a couple of big bottles of beer.

Grandpa paid for his bottle of Seagram’s 7, a copy of The Times-Picayune, and a 3 Musketeers for me, and we headed out. Before we could get to the door the black man went to checkout and man behind the counter told the black man to empty his pockets. By the look of his brown furrowed brow, he was perturbed, but he was used to things and he politely complied. With his chapped hands, he reached into his pocket and laid out on the counter a red Bic lighter, rolling papers, tobacco, his I.D., and a small wad of bills. "I ain't got nothin," he said.

He hadn’t stolen anything. The man behind the counter rang him up. When grandpa and I got back to the car where my grandmother was waiting, I buckled-up in the back seat while my grandfather told her about how Ray shook the man down. “Nigger shit”, said my grandmother. “It’s always nigger shit”.

I didn’t know what she meant. I still don’t.

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Re: Small, Dry Places

Mr McSaddle:

You'll have to go someplace bigger
and less dry
to see how hot you really get.
And if you really put yourself into it
and I mean
REALLY
put yourself into it
you can burn that place down too.

Best Regards Via Seance,

Robert Frost

The Punishing Netherworld

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Small, Dry Places

Some things burn too hot to be in small dry places.
The rooms burn down and all that is left
are the dropped and slacked jaws
of
the assimilated, associated, and confused
pacing about the rubble and orange-hot cinders.
coughing clouds of soot and smoke
as they openly wonder how they will build it again
exactly as it was before.

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