JC Penny's has a new ad to Sell Jewelry.
Ready? Here is their pitch in a nutshell... "All women are whores and they'll only be happy if you give them something shiny."
I mean seriously. I will admit I couldn't stand watching the whole thing because it was so damn OBVIOUS where they were going with the video, (that your wife is a whore and will only fuck you for diamonds) so I just skipped to the bit where they insulted all of woman kind so I could prove I was right. The whole thing was getting tedious about the time the fat guy said he was in trouble for telling his wife he'd like to fuck her mom. Just started skipping at that point. Evidently I missed the bit where the men were telling their wives that they're all starting to look like fat whores and if they don't get their shit together they are so getting dumped for a cocktail waitress. I don't need a 4 minute long video to lie to me by explaining that men are shallow and dumb and that women MUST HAVE SPARKLIES! Evidently they decided to just insult everybody. Love has nothing to do with a relationship, just us giving girls diamonds and girls remaining ornamental for us.
If I might point out a few facts. My own girlfriends, who are not whores by the way JCP, would be angry if I bought them any of that crap. Holly doesn't wear jewelry, and Syd if fucking particular about what she will and won't wear. If I bought her diamonds, Syd would cock punch me so hard that I would undergo a semi-spontaneous sex change because she hates diamonds. Dangling sparkly things before their eyes won't make them open their legs, I've got to be... you know... actually suave and shit. Seriously, you have no idea how much poetry I have to recite in a month.
Also, these dumb fucks claim that the vacuum in the video is "dual bag", which much hilarity is made over. It's a Dyson... THERE IS NO BAG IN A DYSON!!!!!!!!!!!
NONE! NO BAG!
That's the point about a Dyson you stupid shit eating horse fucking wife insulters!
As a guy I'm deeply insulted that they think I don't know what gifts to give and I'm doubly insulted that people who don't know anything about the equipment before them dare to insinuate that while I'm too dumb to know what to buy, I should listen to them. These shitbirds think a fucking Dyson has a bag, why should I listen to anything they say? Fuck, they might suggest white wine with beef next. Hell, if I listen to them I might end up not in some mythical doghouse but rather in the dark halls of Helheim trying to talk my way into getting someone to loan me an inflatable raft. Who knows where you might end up?
I mean, I hate to be offensive or anything, but fuck these assholes and fuck their mommas!
One might say, "Oh come on now, it's just a video, can't you laugh at the funny?"
To which I will say "Motherfucker, what month is it? Do I get amused in December? Is December a good time to fuck with me?"
After smacking One about the head I would add "And I would laugh if there was any funny. This shit, ain't funny. That joke is so fucking old that Moses rolled his eyes when Aaron told it to him."
I mean come on, this is like a bad stand-up routine from the 80s. "Men sure are dumb, eh? They sure give bad presents, huh? Women are only after one thing and that's a new diamond, am I right fellahs?" We've had mass media like movies and radio for about 100 years. A good deal of it has been recorded so clever people like me could spend their pre-teen and teenage years listening and watching that stuff. These jokes have been told, consistently, for well over a century. Nothing here is new. Not one fucking word of it. Every joke has been used over and over AND OVER! I've got an mp3 in my collection where a guy gave his wife a gift certificate for a boob job. That radio show is at least three years old I think, and the outcome of that one was fucking hilarious. This video, not so much.
Fuck that shit. And besides, who the fuck are women to be angry if they don't get the present they want?
If you want a diamond necklace, and you're dating a man, you have to tell him. You have to tell him in so many words. If you don't tell him, you can't claim you don't know men are stereotypically clueless because 100 years of really shitty jokes will prove you wrong. You have to tell him, and you have to use small words during a commercial break. I have no sympathy for hint droppers or women who complain "he should just know" because by now you either should know he won't or the problem is you. It's like voting, if you don't make your voice heard, your later complaints count for nothing.
And seriously, men only give vacuums and gym memberships? I mean... where do I even begin? OH I KNOW! I'll begin with the fact that I carefully listen when one of my girlfriends says she wants something, often I'll even make a note about it so I can get her what she wants.
Also, seriously, a Dyson doesn't have a bag! How can I give anything they say even the slightest bit of weight when they fail on the very basic facts that a Dyson's main selling point is that there is no bag in the thing? I mean some men might really be as stupid as they show here and some women might actually only judge love by the sparkliness of the rock it comes with, but Dyson’s don’t have bags!
What? Who do you think uses the bloody thing around here? ME! That's who! I know my fucking vacuums matey!
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
I've noticed
You know what word you almost never hear anymore?
Cunny.
No one seems to use that one outside of people writing something they want to sound like Victorian Porn. Which is odd, because I recall only rarely seeing it in Victorian porn. Seriously, try this, take a random issue of The Pearl and count how many times cunny is used. Cunny might turn up once or twice an issue while cunt is used constantly. Quim doesn't turn up as much as you might expect either, although quim does get more play than cunny.
For extra fun, try reading The Pearl out loud like you're one of those women reading a book for a children's TV show. Seriously, no greater hilarity exists than trying to keep a straight face while reading Victorian pornographic stories to a group with the same sort of voice you would use to tell little children about the adventures of semi-anthropomorphic animals.
While I’m on the subject, people should read out loud more. There used to be a thing about this, where a person would read aloud to the entire family. Of course in those days there was no internet, or Television, and heroin was still pretty pricey in those days before we got the whole golden triangle thing worked out. My point is that people should be reading more and shooting up less!
Also, just about everything I say is not safe for work in one way or another.
Cunny.
No one seems to use that one outside of people writing something they want to sound like Victorian Porn. Which is odd, because I recall only rarely seeing it in Victorian porn. Seriously, try this, take a random issue of The Pearl and count how many times cunny is used. Cunny might turn up once or twice an issue while cunt is used constantly. Quim doesn't turn up as much as you might expect either, although quim does get more play than cunny.
For extra fun, try reading The Pearl out loud like you're one of those women reading a book for a children's TV show. Seriously, no greater hilarity exists than trying to keep a straight face while reading Victorian pornographic stories to a group with the same sort of voice you would use to tell little children about the adventures of semi-anthropomorphic animals.
While I’m on the subject, people should read out loud more. There used to be a thing about this, where a person would read aloud to the entire family. Of course in those days there was no internet, or Television, and heroin was still pretty pricey in those days before we got the whole golden triangle thing worked out. My point is that people should be reading more and shooting up less!
Also, just about everything I say is not safe for work in one way or another.
Hard Boiled Christmas (Day Three)
Hard Boiled Christmas
A Jack Collier Mystery
By Brett N. Lashuay
Day Three: History
I don’t like leaving my office, and I don’t like leaving my office for work, and I certainly don’t like doing it in December. I have to leave my office of course, because I have to detect, which is how I earn my living. I don’t like leaving in December though. Above all the others, it’s the month when I try to avoid letting my spirit walk abroad among my fellow men, mainly because my fellow men are idiots. They bustle around like mad during the entire month telling me how Christmas is coming, as if any being in the
There are other reasons that I’ve decided not to go forth in life, but that’s a big one in December. The other being that I dislike the bite of winter’s chill. Of course that wasn’t much of an excuse today as the sun was shining brightly on the ground, which still didn’t have any snow. It wouldn’t be warm out though, it would be icy and cold. It might be warm when the sun shone in the car, or through the windows of some of the buildings, but as my window faced north, the sun never shined in it.
I stood up, thought about the Marley and the Webley-Fosbery in my safe and decided against them. I had no idea what I was doing yet, and therefore it would be tough for me to even be noticed by anyone, much less start to get shot at. Until I had some idea about where I was going and what I was doing, I wouldn’t need guns that I might pull out and increase my troubles with. I tapped the desktop, and tried to think of where the best place to start was. Of course things being as they were I thought about starting by talking with Solstice Yule. That was more because the old girl always cheered me up and had a wealth of great stories. The value of good stories can’t be understated, and in that light, she might have some information about Christmas in those stories.
I tapped my desk a few more times, just to make sure it was going to be properly supplicant to my will and not move around. Sometimes you’ve got to beat a desk by tapping it in order to make sure it won’t roam around the office. I didn’t think that going to see old Solstice was my best first choice though. It was just possible there was a better first move. I pulled out my cell phone and dialed Noonan’s desk number. After a moment he picked up and barked into the phone.
“Noonan.” He said.
“Hi Tom.” I said.
“Oh, hi Jack.” He said, his voice becoming more friendly as he spoke. “What do you need? The place is a madhouse this morning. Feds started showing up about four a.m. As you can imagine this Christmas thing has everyone in a tizzy.”
“Well that’s why I called.” I said. “If you could manage to gather up a copy of everything you can get your mitts on and meet me in the
“I’ll need about an hour, at the very least.” He said.
“Okay.” I said. “I’ll be somewhere in the middle.”
“As always.” He said and hung up.
I understood he was rushed, but it wasn’t fair to say that I was always in the middle. Usually I sat on the side near the window, it was just this time I wanted him to be able to find me more easily. Even as a metaphor it was unfair. I hadn’t been in the middle of anything in years, not since the last time I had anything to do with Christmas and her group as a matter of fact. There had been jobs here and there had been jobs there, but I was not always in the middle. Usually I was at my client’s side, helping them through their dilemma. Sometimes I was right in the bed with them, but those were extreme circumstances and exceptional clients. I did not end up in bed with the insurance companies, not the whole company at least.
I stepped out of my office and into the waiting room, where Debbie was madly typing away at the keyboard, doing whatever it was she did. She stopped after a little while and looked up at me, setting her hands flat right in front of the key board in an odd position that always made me think she was about to bow. It must have been my years in judo, the position looked like the position you put your hands in to bow to the sensei at the beginning of the lesson. Her eyes flashed with boredom as she waited for me to get my nerve together and tell her that for the first time in three weeks I was going to go out and do something to earn a fee. It was a big moment for both of us.
“I assume you noticed that the Fat Man came to visit.” I said, as if she hadn’t been the one who announced his arrival to me.
“Yes.” She said with a single nod of her auburn locks.
“Well he came with an offer.” I informed her as if she were the boss. “He wants me to find out what happened to Christmas.”
She then looked at me, and I knew the look well. She was about to ask, neigh demand that we just close up the office and run away to
“Okay, so where would you start investigating?” She asked, proving once again that I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.
“Well I guess I start by getting some information from Noonan.” I said sitting down on one of the waiting room chairs. “Then I suppose I look around a bit, and try to figure out who would do this.”
“What about the police though?” She asked. “Can’t they do it?”
“Oh sure they can.” I tilted my head and looked at the tiles in the ceiling. “But I’m going to guess that it’s not that simple. I’m going to guess that we’ll have to dig deep to find the one who did this. I mean just think of the list of suspects we can name off the top of our head.”
“Okay.” She nodded at me with determination. “Name them.”
Shit. She would make me actually make a list off the top of my head. I took in a deep breathe and let it out, to try and mask the fact that I was stalling for a name. One came to me though, and once I got the list started I found I could let it wind out.
“Church for a start.” I counted him off on my fingers. “He’s the ex-husband. He didn’t take the divorce well, as you well know. He hasn’t bothered her lately that we know about, but he’s still a violent thug. I don’t rule out the Fat Man, he might be trying to cover his tracks.”
“Why him though?”
“She got out of line and he wanted to teach her a lesson. Someone got over excited as people so often do around Christmas. He didn’t mean it to come out like that, it just did. So he wants to throw people off the scent by letting it be known he’s hired a specialist to look into it.” I waved him away and started on my other hand, “Of course that just starts the list. One of those dipsticks that’s been trying to make it look like people are attacking Christmas for years, why not do it themselves and blame whoever they wanted. Or it could have been any other number of nut bags, lunatics and fruit loops, the world is full of people who love her so much they’d have to kill her to prove it. Then you’ve got the fact that Pat was struck by a car this year and Easter had that accident of hers. Thanksgiving went missing too if you remember. Any number of delightful folk could be at the bottom of this, we’ve just got to dig deeper into the shit than anyone else will.”
“That’s why I love working for you.” She said in a tone so dead it might have come from a crypt. “You have such a warm and sunny view of humanity.”
“It goes with the territory.” I reminded her.
“No.” She said shaking her head. “You think that everyone in the world is trying to kill the rest of the world, or at least do horrible things to them.”
“You exaggerate.” I admonished her as I got up and put my coat on. “Why some of them are merely trying to rip everyone else off. Some of them just want to exploit, they aren’t all sadists and murderers.”
“That’s what I mean.” She smiled nastily at me. “You have such an optimistic view of humanity.”
“Humanity is doomed and we both know it.” I told her. “It’s just a question of how long it takes for them to get there and how many other kinds of life they’ll take out on their way down.”
“You really have to go.” She pointed with her left hand at the door. “I don’t think I can take much more of your warm sunny optimism. I’m going to be infected by your unwavering belief that everyone is good and true. After that I might just start handing out my number to any fellow I see and believe him when he says he loves me and of course he’ll call.”
“Well.” I got up out of the chair. “We don’t want that.”
I opened the door, put my hat on, and let it close behind me. The pneumatic tube hissed softly as the door slowly closed after me and finally clicked shut as I got to the stairs. I began to descend down to the ground floor, where it would only be a short walk before getting to my car, and then the mall.
I wondered as I got into my car if anyone would be following me yet. Usually, there were people following me if I went to pay the gas bill. Some people say its paranoia, but I say the gas company wants to make sure I mail the damn thing. I tried to look for any cars that didn’t belong, for anyone that looked comfortable and settled. Were there any cars that had donuts and coffee in them? I hoped that the bastards didn’t have donuts, since I didn’t have any donuts. Of course it could just be that I’m paranoid, it’s been mentioned before, but then I got used to people following me from past jobs. I didn’t see anyone who might be a follower, no one with donuts. The bastards always had donuts, and I never have any.
This is part three of twenty-five, come back tomorrow for part four and every day this month until we're done to see what happens next. If you get lost, one of the tags here should help you. The HBC tag will take you to the story while the Jack Tag will take you to Part One of every story we post here.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Cartoon Review: 'Twas The Night Before Christmas
Let me explain how I’ve been feeling the last couple of days.
I’ve wanted to bite someone’s face off. Not anyone in particular, I’ve been sort of hoping someone deserving would raise their head above the parapet, but they’ve all heard about “How I get” in December. I’ve sort of got an idea that everyone wants to stay the fuck out of my way, so no taste of the sweet tang of blood for me. I would like to pour my frustration into a Christmas Special, tearing apart your fluffy memories like a large dog with a stuffed toy. Problem there is that Big Blue is still sitting in the corner waiting for the new Motherboard (which is going to be awesome) to show up. I don’t want to load the Viao up with a lot of software just to then have to re-load a bunch of it next week. I’ve decided, therefore, to revisit what is possibly the meanest, nastiest cartoon review I did over at retroflix last year. However, instead of a simple cut and paste job, I’ve decided to re-edit the whole thing to reflect my true feelings.
This is going to be mean, nasty, not nice, honest and truthful. So pretty much it’s just another post like normal. Let's get going with a review of...
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas (1974 Dir. Jules Bass & Arthur Rankin Jr.)
Evidently there is only one Trundle in Junctionville, they don't even have numbers or street names.
This has got to be the ultimate “Santa is just a cock bite” tale out of all the stories that ever emerged from the maw of Rankin & Bass over the years. Santa cancels Christmas for a whole town because of one editorial letter in a local rag. Not because of snow, or fog, or even because he hates the color red, but because of 27 words in a stupid newspaper letters column. Yeah, one stupid letter. We're also going to get a very strong attack on intellectuals and anyone who doesn't blindly follow the groupthink. One geeky looking, obviously educated kid is going to be blamed by a town of nitwits for destroying Christmas. Seriously, it’s like every Fox News December broadcast rolled into one neat package. I think this must be where Bill O’Reilly got the idea for the whole thing. The problem is, as if often the problem when really stupid people try to attack smart people, they just make complete asses of themselves. It's amazingly stupid, badly thought out and full of logical inconsistencies. But let me begin at the beginning…
Yeah, so, what are you wearing?
We start on Christmas Eve, a humble Arian clock maker named Trundle is sitting up thinking about the problems he's having. I think part of what's worrying him is how creepy his kids look. They don’t look wholesome, they look like the sort of thing that could inspire a J-Horror flick. The mouse that lives in his house is also sitting up worrying. It seems that they don't know if Santa Claus is coming, because of the already stated dickness of the fat cookie-eating child-molesting freak. The story actually seems to begin in October or possibly early November. The people of this town don't fuck around when it comes to writing letters to Santa. The big day is 2 months off and their letters are not only sent, they're being returned! Returned, you say? Oh yes!
And then a great comet will come and crash down upon us!
Everyone writes letters to Santa. Adults, kids, mice, I must assume that the mold growing on what's left of thanksgiving dinner is also writing letters which are being returned to the fridge. So, Santa is a real person. Everyone got that? Not only real, but he receives and returns letters. His number, as we’ll see in a moment, is in the phonebook. You have to remember this because it makes some of the later statements made extraordinarily stupid. Exactly the kind of dumb idea an idiot would come up with to say how those so-called smart people really aren't that bright. You have to be really stupid to think this is clever.
Here it is... SW Bi-curious female seeks couple for experimentation!
Father mouse decides he's not going to just take this laying down so he calls the North Pole and asks what's up with Santa. Allow me to scream for a moment. YOU CAN CALL SANTA ON THE PHONE! The reason I’m hammering away at this will become clear in about two paragraphs. The mouse on the phone answers that Santa didn't like that letter in the Junctionville register. Evidently, one letter can turn Santa against you, so watch you’re fuckin’ ass kids! So… Santa is a real person who receives and returns letters, and has people to screen his calls. As another author once (sort of) said, this must be distinctly understood, or nothing insulting to your intelligence can come from the story I am about to relate.
The action switches to the town hall, where the pillars of government are also shown to be idiots. Lazy, stupid, saying things like "citizens aren't allowed in here, this is public property" and using long streams of big words until they get confused with what it was they were saying. Also, they’re clearly supposed to be Democrats because none of them have a wide stance or interest in young boys. So anyway, Josh Trundle, the clock maker has an idea to make Santa not be mad at them. It seems Santa's whims might be turned by a new clock tower that plays a recording of a song begging Santa not to abandon them. Texting him “I <3 U” or e-mailing him an mp3 won’t do it, got to be a huge clock. Evidently there will be no gifts for anyone if Santa doesn't show on the scene. I never thought I'd say this, but if ever there was a town in need of a frickin' Wal-Mart, it's this one!
For one brief moment, Trundle shows his true face!
While that bullshit is going on… the mice find the letter in the newspaper and it's a bunch of big words stating that Santa is fraudulent myth and that the reindeer are fake too. Only… you know…. THEY CLEARLY AREN’T! They answer the fucking phone and send your letters back! With horror the mice realize that it's Albert who did it. Albert wears glasses, uses big words, reads books, and is clearly evil! Damn educated liberal bastards! The father starts to admonish Albert, saying he only thinks with his head and there fore has trouble believing in things he can't see. But you can see Santa in this! He exists! You can call him on the phone and have your letter from him returned. A really horrible song, encouraging us to try and think with our hearts. He also suddenly turns into a fuckin' leprechaun for some reason that has never really been clear to me. We're being actively encouraged to believing in things that don't exist. Except they do exist in this cartoon's world! The argument about faith is meaningless because in this world it would be as stupid as saying China doesn't exist! I might as well claim Gordon Ramsey doesn’t exist. Actually since Ramsay’s people won’t even send me a return letter and have a court order saying I’m not allowed to call anymore it’s less sensible. Santa will at least take your calls and doesn’t get the courts involved. Albert isn’t an atheist, he’s a lunatic. He’s claiming people who clearly exist don’t and they’re only answer is to tell him to accept Jesus or pay the consequences.
I'm just going to bury this thing and pretend none of this ever happened.
Anyway, they go right on attacking the damn educated liberal and smacking him with a stick until he falls into the groupthink. They even come right out and say "Here is how you ruined everyone's Christmas with your opinions." Hey, fuck you papa mouse and fuck your Gestapo! If your stupid holiday couldn't stand up to questioning then I say it's time Santa's regime of terror was challenged! Poor Albert is being blamed for everything, even though it's clearly Santa who's being the passive aggressive cunt here. A little kid drew a picture of Santa when he thought Santa cared about him, when it was proved that Santa couldn't give two shits about him he threw his picture into the sea. Is Santa the douche blamed? NOPE! Way to team kill there papa mouse, you want a flame thrower so you can take everyone out? Albert is blamed because they're too afraid to say boo to Santa. I'll say it. SANTA! You listening? You're a cockbite!
We're not just creepy, we're recreating Nazi propaganda posters!
So Father mouse shows Albert the clock that Josh is making and when Albert starts asking how the clock works the father can't even understand the words. He's been around a clock maker his whole life, he even works with him, but father doesn't know how a clock works? Can’t even keep up with some very basic clock making terms. And yet Albert is the dumb one, right? Yeah, because knowing how things work just makes you dumb. I say again, in this world Santa clearly exists, so the argument that you need faith is stupid. You might as well have someone in this story not believe in toast and then demand that they have faith in the toast. If these people weren't so stupid they might have been able to make their point without leaving these huge idiotic gaps in the story, but they started with a dumb shit idea and just went with it. Stupid, fucking, idiots.
That's right, your clock is broxorz! Where's your Santa now?
So anyway, the big day comes and they’ve built the clock in about an hour and a half. I dunno, after paying attention to politics as I have for the last ten years, the fact that the governing body could commission a clock and have it built as quickly as they did shows some can do spirit. Junctionville’s Mayor for President! You know, in 2016 when Obama’s all done with it. Do they get a thimble full of credit though? No, they’re just political hacks, so screw them in this special’s eyes. Josh tries to start the clock, but it goes haywire. Trundle is disgraced and for a brief and shining moment the blame for all the world's ills are shifted from Albert to Josh. A stupid song is then sung about miracles happening, but only if you hope and pray really hard. Josh sings with his freakish children, and the mailman who brings past due notices at like 10 at night… on Christmas fucking Eve! Even the mailman is out to screw with them. DAMN! You know what? These people look freaky. Rankin & Bass pioneered the idea of getting the Japanese to animate for them, and as a result you can really see the Anime influences in the badly drawn people.
If everyone else in this town weren't so stupid I might be able to ask some of them for help.
The story is quickly turned towards Albert again. We are once again shown that all the wrongs in the world are truly the fault of smart people with glasses. He sings the last couple of words of Trundles annoying song and breaks down crying. It seems Albert wanted to look at the clock and accidentally broke it. Father Mouse thinks about killing him for a moment, and spouts about how talking mice are proof that evolution is just a hoax and that we need to believe in a great creator who loves us but toys with us out of boredom or some shit. I don’t know, I started a drinking game half way through this and I had to break for a week because of the alcohol poisoning so things are a little fuzzy. Albert says that he doesn't know if he believes, and then claims that Copernicus knew how to fix clocks, but grabs a book on Astronomy. Clearly, now that he's been brought into the fold he's become as willfully stupid as the rest of them. Now, I know Copernicus was an Astronomer, but I can’t help but feel one of his astronomy books are probably more about… you know… astronomy. You know, instead of how to fix clocks. I’m just throwing it out there.
Children get excited for the great taste of smack.
Father Mouse then goes and talks to Josh and tells him the whole story. When they discuss how sorry he is, they even use words like "He has repented" to express his sorrow. Not, he's sorry, or is trying to make amends, but repented. Like all you damn lefty liberal hippy liberal lefty commie liberal educated liberal egghead lefty's will have to repent when the day of JUDGEMENT IS UPON YOU! Believe in the power ofJEBUS! SANTA! Things don’t have to be “consistent” or “logical” or even “not fucktarded” because the all powerful Santa will come and he will smite you down with his fiery breath! Praise Santa!
Ia ia Santa f'thagn!!!!!!!!!
Mice? He's being drawn by mice?
Now here is the thing, Albert fixes the clock! He manages to save the day, he fixes the clock, because he was smarter than the rest of this dumb fuck town put together. I’m sure having all his fingers because he never held an M-80 just to see what would happen probably helps, making him a rarity in this town. What credit is he given? NONE! Not the mouse, he did nothing. It's a mirable! PWAISE JEBUS! It's not a guy trying to fix things because he has to repent for having an opinion that went against the rest of this tiny minded community. Anyway the song plays and the entire community starts to jump up and down excitedly, because the clock works. These people are a little too invested in Santa if you ask me. This town needs an intervention, because they are seriously pushing the co-dependent angle if you ask me. Santa hears the music and since this jackass's moods turn on a dime, he comes to the town.
Look at that exhaust tail. Santa is a major polluter.
It's now that the rest of the poem is spoken by Trundle. When we see the sleigh, it becomes clear to me that the first artist thought Santa's sleigh was lead by mice. Not joking here, someone clearly added antlers at the last moment. No one, on the entire staff ever once bothered to look at the model sheets until the cartoon was already in production and then suddenly realized that the Korean company that their Japanese counterpart hired hadn’t actually been briefed on the whole Santa myth. I mean… how do you even begin to not hate these people?
Seriously, he's dropping like... nuke dust on the entire town! That can't be healthy.
Albert comes in just as Santa comes down the chimney. Now if Albert were anything like the mouse of science and research this story presented him as, he would have investigated this question a long time ago and would have seen Santa. However, such thought wouldn't serve the tiny minds that wrote this hugely anti-intellectual garbage. They know nothing about how the scientific method works, so they just made him look dumb and then screamed “SHUT UP HIPPIE!” at him. This is one of the worst straw man argument I’ve ever seen constructed.
I'm quite happy to report that when the spring melts came the river rose and this town was flooded out of existence, only Albert survived because he was the only one who didn't believe bricks could float.
Santa delivers the loot to the Trundle house and then vanishes into the night. Evidently he only forgave the one house that made the clock for him. I can't think of any other reason why he suddenly showed up, filled two stockings and then left. Clearly he still hates the rest of the town because they put no effort into wooing him like Josh did. While he leaves, he sprays some sort of chemical, or possibly radioactive waste on the town. Something sparkly falls from the back of that sled and seeps into their water supply. How else do you explain the way the children look? Santa is a dick. I wish there really was a war on Christmas, then I could join and shoot Santa.
I’ve wanted to bite someone’s face off. Not anyone in particular, I’ve been sort of hoping someone deserving would raise their head above the parapet, but they’ve all heard about “How I get” in December. I’ve sort of got an idea that everyone wants to stay the fuck out of my way, so no taste of the sweet tang of blood for me. I would like to pour my frustration into a Christmas Special, tearing apart your fluffy memories like a large dog with a stuffed toy. Problem there is that Big Blue is still sitting in the corner waiting for the new Motherboard (which is going to be awesome) to show up. I don’t want to load the Viao up with a lot of software just to then have to re-load a bunch of it next week. I’ve decided, therefore, to revisit what is possibly the meanest, nastiest cartoon review I did over at retroflix last year. However, instead of a simple cut and paste job, I’ve decided to re-edit the whole thing to reflect my true feelings.
This is going to be mean, nasty, not nice, honest and truthful. So pretty much it’s just another post like normal. Let's get going with a review of...
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas (1974 Dir. Jules Bass & Arthur Rankin Jr.)
Evidently there is only one Trundle in Junctionville, they don't even have numbers or street names.
This has got to be the ultimate “Santa is just a cock bite” tale out of all the stories that ever emerged from the maw of Rankin & Bass over the years. Santa cancels Christmas for a whole town because of one editorial letter in a local rag. Not because of snow, or fog, or even because he hates the color red, but because of 27 words in a stupid newspaper letters column. Yeah, one stupid letter. We're also going to get a very strong attack on intellectuals and anyone who doesn't blindly follow the groupthink. One geeky looking, obviously educated kid is going to be blamed by a town of nitwits for destroying Christmas. Seriously, it’s like every Fox News December broadcast rolled into one neat package. I think this must be where Bill O’Reilly got the idea for the whole thing. The problem is, as if often the problem when really stupid people try to attack smart people, they just make complete asses of themselves. It's amazingly stupid, badly thought out and full of logical inconsistencies. But let me begin at the beginning…
Yeah, so, what are you wearing?
We start on Christmas Eve, a humble Arian clock maker named Trundle is sitting up thinking about the problems he's having. I think part of what's worrying him is how creepy his kids look. They don’t look wholesome, they look like the sort of thing that could inspire a J-Horror flick. The mouse that lives in his house is also sitting up worrying. It seems that they don't know if Santa Claus is coming, because of the already stated dickness of the fat cookie-eating child-molesting freak. The story actually seems to begin in October or possibly early November. The people of this town don't fuck around when it comes to writing letters to Santa. The big day is 2 months off and their letters are not only sent, they're being returned! Returned, you say? Oh yes!
And then a great comet will come and crash down upon us!
Everyone writes letters to Santa. Adults, kids, mice, I must assume that the mold growing on what's left of thanksgiving dinner is also writing letters which are being returned to the fridge. So, Santa is a real person. Everyone got that? Not only real, but he receives and returns letters. His number, as we’ll see in a moment, is in the phonebook. You have to remember this because it makes some of the later statements made extraordinarily stupid. Exactly the kind of dumb idea an idiot would come up with to say how those so-called smart people really aren't that bright. You have to be really stupid to think this is clever.
Here it is... SW Bi-curious female seeks couple for experimentation!
Father mouse decides he's not going to just take this laying down so he calls the North Pole and asks what's up with Santa. Allow me to scream for a moment. YOU CAN CALL SANTA ON THE PHONE! The reason I’m hammering away at this will become clear in about two paragraphs. The mouse on the phone answers that Santa didn't like that letter in the Junctionville register. Evidently, one letter can turn Santa against you, so watch you’re fuckin’ ass kids! So… Santa is a real person who receives and returns letters, and has people to screen his calls. As another author once (sort of) said, this must be distinctly understood, or nothing insulting to your intelligence can come from the story I am about to relate.
The action switches to the town hall, where the pillars of government are also shown to be idiots. Lazy, stupid, saying things like "citizens aren't allowed in here, this is public property" and using long streams of big words until they get confused with what it was they were saying. Also, they’re clearly supposed to be Democrats because none of them have a wide stance or interest in young boys. So anyway, Josh Trundle, the clock maker has an idea to make Santa not be mad at them. It seems Santa's whims might be turned by a new clock tower that plays a recording of a song begging Santa not to abandon them. Texting him “I <3 U” or e-mailing him an mp3 won’t do it, got to be a huge clock. Evidently there will be no gifts for anyone if Santa doesn't show on the scene. I never thought I'd say this, but if ever there was a town in need of a frickin' Wal-Mart, it's this one!
For one brief moment, Trundle shows his true face!
While that bullshit is going on… the mice find the letter in the newspaper and it's a bunch of big words stating that Santa is fraudulent myth and that the reindeer are fake too. Only… you know…. THEY CLEARLY AREN’T! They answer the fucking phone and send your letters back! With horror the mice realize that it's Albert who did it. Albert wears glasses, uses big words, reads books, and is clearly evil! Damn educated liberal bastards! The father starts to admonish Albert, saying he only thinks with his head and there fore has trouble believing in things he can't see. But you can see Santa in this! He exists! You can call him on the phone and have your letter from him returned. A really horrible song, encouraging us to try and think with our hearts. He also suddenly turns into a fuckin' leprechaun for some reason that has never really been clear to me. We're being actively encouraged to believing in things that don't exist. Except they do exist in this cartoon's world! The argument about faith is meaningless because in this world it would be as stupid as saying China doesn't exist! I might as well claim Gordon Ramsey doesn’t exist. Actually since Ramsay’s people won’t even send me a return letter and have a court order saying I’m not allowed to call anymore it’s less sensible. Santa will at least take your calls and doesn’t get the courts involved. Albert isn’t an atheist, he’s a lunatic. He’s claiming people who clearly exist don’t and they’re only answer is to tell him to accept Jesus or pay the consequences.
I'm just going to bury this thing and pretend none of this ever happened.
Anyway, they go right on attacking the damn educated liberal and smacking him with a stick until he falls into the groupthink. They even come right out and say "Here is how you ruined everyone's Christmas with your opinions." Hey, fuck you papa mouse and fuck your Gestapo! If your stupid holiday couldn't stand up to questioning then I say it's time Santa's regime of terror was challenged! Poor Albert is being blamed for everything, even though it's clearly Santa who's being the passive aggressive cunt here. A little kid drew a picture of Santa when he thought Santa cared about him, when it was proved that Santa couldn't give two shits about him he threw his picture into the sea. Is Santa the douche blamed? NOPE! Way to team kill there papa mouse, you want a flame thrower so you can take everyone out? Albert is blamed because they're too afraid to say boo to Santa. I'll say it. SANTA! You listening? You're a cockbite!
We're not just creepy, we're recreating Nazi propaganda posters!
So Father mouse shows Albert the clock that Josh is making and when Albert starts asking how the clock works the father can't even understand the words. He's been around a clock maker his whole life, he even works with him, but father doesn't know how a clock works? Can’t even keep up with some very basic clock making terms. And yet Albert is the dumb one, right? Yeah, because knowing how things work just makes you dumb. I say again, in this world Santa clearly exists, so the argument that you need faith is stupid. You might as well have someone in this story not believe in toast and then demand that they have faith in the toast. If these people weren't so stupid they might have been able to make their point without leaving these huge idiotic gaps in the story, but they started with a dumb shit idea and just went with it. Stupid, fucking, idiots.
That's right, your clock is broxorz! Where's your Santa now?
So anyway, the big day comes and they’ve built the clock in about an hour and a half. I dunno, after paying attention to politics as I have for the last ten years, the fact that the governing body could commission a clock and have it built as quickly as they did shows some can do spirit. Junctionville’s Mayor for President! You know, in 2016 when Obama’s all done with it. Do they get a thimble full of credit though? No, they’re just political hacks, so screw them in this special’s eyes. Josh tries to start the clock, but it goes haywire. Trundle is disgraced and for a brief and shining moment the blame for all the world's ills are shifted from Albert to Josh. A stupid song is then sung about miracles happening, but only if you hope and pray really hard. Josh sings with his freakish children, and the mailman who brings past due notices at like 10 at night… on Christmas fucking Eve! Even the mailman is out to screw with them. DAMN! You know what? These people look freaky. Rankin & Bass pioneered the idea of getting the Japanese to animate for them, and as a result you can really see the Anime influences in the badly drawn people.
If everyone else in this town weren't so stupid I might be able to ask some of them for help.
The story is quickly turned towards Albert again. We are once again shown that all the wrongs in the world are truly the fault of smart people with glasses. He sings the last couple of words of Trundles annoying song and breaks down crying. It seems Albert wanted to look at the clock and accidentally broke it. Father Mouse thinks about killing him for a moment, and spouts about how talking mice are proof that evolution is just a hoax and that we need to believe in a great creator who loves us but toys with us out of boredom or some shit. I don’t know, I started a drinking game half way through this and I had to break for a week because of the alcohol poisoning so things are a little fuzzy. Albert says that he doesn't know if he believes, and then claims that Copernicus knew how to fix clocks, but grabs a book on Astronomy. Clearly, now that he's been brought into the fold he's become as willfully stupid as the rest of them. Now, I know Copernicus was an Astronomer, but I can’t help but feel one of his astronomy books are probably more about… you know… astronomy. You know, instead of how to fix clocks. I’m just throwing it out there.
Children get excited for the great taste of smack.
Father Mouse then goes and talks to Josh and tells him the whole story. When they discuss how sorry he is, they even use words like "He has repented" to express his sorrow. Not, he's sorry, or is trying to make amends, but repented. Like all you damn lefty liberal hippy liberal lefty commie liberal educated liberal egghead lefty's will have to repent when the day of JUDGEMENT IS UPON YOU! Believe in the power of
Ia ia Santa f'thagn!!!!!!!!!
Mice? He's being drawn by mice?
Now here is the thing, Albert fixes the clock! He manages to save the day, he fixes the clock, because he was smarter than the rest of this dumb fuck town put together. I’m sure having all his fingers because he never held an M-80 just to see what would happen probably helps, making him a rarity in this town. What credit is he given? NONE! Not the mouse, he did nothing. It's a mirable! PWAISE JEBUS! It's not a guy trying to fix things because he has to repent for having an opinion that went against the rest of this tiny minded community. Anyway the song plays and the entire community starts to jump up and down excitedly, because the clock works. These people are a little too invested in Santa if you ask me. This town needs an intervention, because they are seriously pushing the co-dependent angle if you ask me. Santa hears the music and since this jackass's moods turn on a dime, he comes to the town.
Look at that exhaust tail. Santa is a major polluter.
It's now that the rest of the poem is spoken by Trundle. When we see the sleigh, it becomes clear to me that the first artist thought Santa's sleigh was lead by mice. Not joking here, someone clearly added antlers at the last moment. No one, on the entire staff ever once bothered to look at the model sheets until the cartoon was already in production and then suddenly realized that the Korean company that their Japanese counterpart hired hadn’t actually been briefed on the whole Santa myth. I mean… how do you even begin to not hate these people?
Seriously, he's dropping like... nuke dust on the entire town! That can't be healthy.
Albert comes in just as Santa comes down the chimney. Now if Albert were anything like the mouse of science and research this story presented him as, he would have investigated this question a long time ago and would have seen Santa. However, such thought wouldn't serve the tiny minds that wrote this hugely anti-intellectual garbage. They know nothing about how the scientific method works, so they just made him look dumb and then screamed “SHUT UP HIPPIE!” at him. This is one of the worst straw man argument I’ve ever seen constructed.
I'm quite happy to report that when the spring melts came the river rose and this town was flooded out of existence, only Albert survived because he was the only one who didn't believe bricks could float.
Santa delivers the loot to the Trundle house and then vanishes into the night. Evidently he only forgave the one house that made the clock for him. I can't think of any other reason why he suddenly showed up, filled two stockings and then left. Clearly he still hates the rest of the town because they put no effort into wooing him like Josh did. While he leaves, he sprays some sort of chemical, or possibly radioactive waste on the town. Something sparkly falls from the back of that sled and seeps into their water supply. How else do you explain the way the children look? Santa is a dick. I wish there really was a war on Christmas, then I could join and shoot Santa.
Hard Boiled Christmas (Day Two)
Hard Boiled Christmas
A Jack Collier Mystery
By Brett N. Lashuay
Day Two: The Fat Man
In the morning I came to my office a little later than normal, but not by much. Debbie was already at her desk typing away on the computer like a maddened grain counter who had to keep moving the abacus beads or someone would know they weren’t really counting. I’ve never known what it is that she types on that computer. I’ve certainly never asked her to type anything for me since I have a computer in my inner office. She might be doing e-mail, or writing the great English language novel, or having arguments about whether the PS3 is better than the Wii on some internet forum. I’ve never had the courage to actually look because of my suspicion of what she’s doing. If you knew Debbie like I know Debbie, you’d get yourself down to the clinic and have a full check-up done. You would also think that probably she’s just blindly hitting keys because she thinks she has to be seen to do something, just like me. Both of us were desperate to look busy in the eyes of the other while avoiding eye contact.
It’s fortunate that she has known me as long as she has, because it means that she didn’t ask me how my night was, or whether I saw the news, and wasn’t it terrible and all that. She knew how we celebrated the arrival of the shows around here, we don’t. She also knows that it’s not because I’m an old scrooge, but because of the memories. Memories can hurt a person more than bullets sometimes, mainly because a bullet has the common decency to actually kill you if it gets a good hit. A memory can bleed you out for decades.
I nodded to her and she nodded back, letting out a little burp and putting her hand to her mouth. I noticed the crumpled bag that had held her breakfast in the waste can and walked across the wood floor to my office. The door opened and I blessed Debbie’s little heart silently as my eyes fell upon the bag on my own desk. There were a couple of asiago bagels and fluffed cream cheese in the bag, and they were still warm. How she always manages to know when I’ll be in will always be a wonderful mystery to me, much like what she’s typing on the computer.
I looked out the window behind my chair and it might have been late November. There was no snow, only the white dusting that the road had from the salt that had been put down the last time it had snowed, and I could only see a few decorations from this vantage point. If I turned my head I would be able to see the town square, and thus could see the place where the town had vomited up all its decorations in a heap with no sense of consistency for style or fashion. That is why I was looking in this direction, so I could see just a few decorations. There was a limo driving along the street, but I didn’t think anything of it, though I probably should have. I sat at my desk, which put my back to the window, and began to spread the fluffed cheese on my breakfast.
I’d gotten half of one of my bagels down when my door opened and Debbie squeezed through a crack that was far too small for her. It wasn’t that Debbie was all that expansive, but she clearly had wanted to keep the door opening to a minimum lest the miasma that had entered the outer office enter my inner sanctum. She closed the door and pushed herself against it, looking afraid.
I think I already knew what it was when she came in. It was trouble, and we were in it. We were in deep trouble in fact. I think I should say that I knew who it was. It was a person who represented trouble so wide and so deep it would be able to swallow up even his enormous ass. You’d have to have a considerable sized crevice of trouble if his huge ass couldn’t block it up. I recognized the fear in her eyes and leaned back, trying to think what I could grab quickly.
“What it is?” I asked, deciding that I needed more things on my desk that could be improvised as weapons. I looked at the small row of knives that sat on the table to my right, the ones the Harkers had sent. They were too far though and the layer of fat was probably thick enough to protect his vitals.
“The Fat Man is here.” She told me.
“Casper Gutman?” I asked.
“Not that Fat
“Oh.” I said, trying to be cool about it. “The Fat
“Yes.” She said nodding.
“Sometime I would like to be wrong.” I sighed and put my hands flat on the desk and banging my forehead against the blotter gently. “Just once, to see what it feels like.”
“What do you want me to do?” When I looked up I could see the look in her eyes that said she wanted me to break the window and fly away, taking her with me.
“Let him in.” I said, leaning back in my chair.
“You sure?” She asked.
“I’ve only got a plastic knife with cream cheese on it at hand to fight him off with.” I said, brandishing my insufficient weapon. “We might as well let him in. If he tries to get heavy, I’ll fight him off.”
“Right Jack.” She nodded. There was courage in her heart and Egg McMuffin in her belly.
I hoped she didn’t really expect me to fight him, because we’d both die very quickly if I did. One does not just up and decide to fistfight the Fat Man. He’s got too much power, too much influence, and little trolls that can leave you in a ditch. One would have to have a plan, and an army, and weapons and it wouldn’t hurt if he’d been dead for a week before hand. Even then, it would be a dicey proposition.
The door opened, and while I would have sworn the door was far too narrow for his huge bulk to get through, he managed. He’s always had a knack for getting through narrow passages though. He came through, and two of his little helpers came in with him, meaning there was one more somewhere. The Fat Man wasn’t wearing his costume when he came in, but a rather subdued charcoal gray suit. He looked far more like the businessman and part time pimp that he was, rather than the jolly old fat fuck that the world thought of him as.
He walked across my floor, which actually creaked as he moved, and sat down in the oversized red leather chair I keep for customers. There are actually two chairs, one of red leather that sits to my left and a chair covered in blue and bronze brocade that I keep to the right. Most people walk to the chair on their right, so they tend to take the red leather chair, which means I can sit in the blue chair to read knowing that less people have sat in it. The red leather chair is also significantly larger and possibly more comfortable to most people.
Despite the red chair’s large size though, he still barely fit in it and had to cross one leg over the other because there wasn’t enough room for both of them next to each other. Fortunately, the red leather chair was built back in the days when they knew how to make a damn chair, so it could hold up. He sat back and looked at me for a long time before speaking, which was one of his many tricks. He would wait for you to start the talking and then he’d use whatever you said to pass judgment. I knew his tricks though, and so I sat back and ate my bagel.
After a little while he made a motion with his mouth. It was hard to tell if he thought he was smiling or just showing me his teeth for a moment in a motion that was base and animal. Seeing how we felt about each other though, I guessed he was showing me his teeth. He would be showing me his teeth because it was like him to be more aggressive in private. He had to pretend to be so kind and loving in public that he felt he had to make up for it by being a ruthless and judgmental son of a bitch in private.
Still, this was my office and if he didn’t start talking soon I was going to get up and leave for the bathroom. That would be dangerous, as if would mean turning my back to him, but it was dangerous to face him too. When the Fat Man comes near you, you are surrounded by danger. He’s like a mix between Wal-Mart and the Godfather, only more ruthless and dangerous. I’m not saying I was quaking with fear, but there is something to be said for being careful.
“I suppose you’ve heard about what happened?” he finally asked after showing me his teeth again.
“Yes I have.” I looked around. “Where is Joe?”
“He’s out front.” The Fat Man waved hand. “He doesn’t like empty hallways.”
“So there isn’t anyone aiming a high powered rifle at the back of my head?”
“Not this time.” The Fat Man said, and showed me his teeth again. “I want to talk to you about what happened.”
“If you want to confess you’ve got to go to the police, we’ve talked about this in the past.” I said, trying my luck. Caution has its place, but I’ve got my reputation as a tough guy to think of.
“I didn’t do this.” He said, barely registering my crack. “I want to know who did.”
“So why not have the lollipop league here do it?” I said pointing at his enforcers, who are short even for short people.
“Hardrock and
“So you’re serious about wanting to protect your meal ticket?” I asked with disgust.
It was probably a low blow, but I hated the man. He was a disgusting creature of fat and excuses. He’d destroyed more lives than even Church had managed over the years. At least with Church you could tell yourself that he was looking out for the overall good of the people, this fat fuck was just out for himself, like all businessmen. Of course then there was the question about the kids, there had always been the question about the kids. If I had a gun in my front drawer I’d have pulled it out and tried to see if I was faster than Hardrock and
“Yes.” He growled like a great bear that had been prodded. “She’s been hurt and I don’t want any thing else to happen to her.”
“Because you’re going to have a hard enough time whoring her out to every jackass who can pay as it is.” I said baiting him a little more.
It’s a good thing that my desk is quite a heavy thing, even if it’s not as big as some. It means that the Fat Man will have to get up and take three steps to get to me the day he decides to bitch slap me back into the Stone Age. He looked like today might be the day, but I think he realized how exhausted he would be by the time he got to me and decided against it. Counting on his laziness might just be the better part of my valor. He then looked a little more disgusted than angry. He then just looked sad, either for himself or her I couldn’t tell.
“You haven’t seen her.” He said, in a much softer tone than I’d ever heard him use. “Her face is smashed and cut up, you can’t even recognize her. They nearly choked her to death with those lights. They don’t even know how long she’ll be alive at the moment.”
I took in a great deal of air through my nose, which was a mistake. With all the food and the talk I had only just noticed the smell of his cigars, which now filled my lungs. The reek was terrible, but I had to pretend like it wasn’t a problem. I looked at him and let the air out through my mouth, trying to blow my bagel breath up my nose.
“You know.” I informed him. “I’ve never liked you.”
“You did once.” The Fat Man said showing me his teeth again, maybe that was as much of a smile as he could manage when he wasn’t on the show.
“Not for a very long time.” I said shaking my head. “I don’t believe like I used to.”
“Are you saying you won’t work for me?”
“I’d work for her,” I said trying to keep the disgust off my face, “But only if she asked nicely and paid nicely. I wouldn’t work for any of you sons of bitches if my life depended on it.”
“Your life could.” The Fat Man said.
“You might remember Church tried that road once.” I growled, showing my own teeth, “Smith tried it once too, and while they are still around, so am I.”
The Fat Man seemed to be taken aback a bit by that statement. It was good to remind him of the fact that Church and I had gone head to head before and unlike most people who challenged Church, I was still around to talk about it. Still being around after tussling with Church made me an object of fascination and wonder. It also meant that I couldn’t just be strong armed into things.
“I don’t even want this for myself.” He said putting his chubby hand to his chest in a sign of apology for asking. “I want it for her, I want it for Christmas.”
“So what do you want for Christmas?” I liked getting to ask him what he normally asked everyone else.
“I want who ever did this found and brought to the police.” He said looking at the floor. “I want her to be safe. I want people to know that whoever did this has been caught, but I want her safe.”
“Okay.” I nodded to him and if I’d been alone I would have slapped myself. If I were alone I wouldn’t be agreeing to take jobs though. “I’ll find out who did this. You are just paying me though. I’m not actually working for you. You don’t get in my way, you don’t dictate anything.”
“I’ll have a retainer to you by tomorrow.” He said brightening up, now that he could throw money at the problem he was sure it would go away.
He stood up and didn’t extend his hand to me, which was fine because I didn’t want to shake his pudgy hand anyway. It was rude, but it was sort of expected because we did hate each other to a degree. I’m not sure if I still fully blame him for breaking me and Christmas up, but he certainly had a hand in it. I watched his immense bulk leave my office and listened for the outer office door to close.
Christmas. God damn it. Even laid up in a hospital, unconscious and near death, she can still come into my life and cause me hassle. This was going to be a hassle too, no doubt about that. Just the idea of having to work on another of Christmas’s problems brought the last time to my mind, Church, the Fat Man, all of it. There wasn’t a part of that job that I thought was worth remembering, besides the time Christmas and I had together.
Damn it.
I pulled the bag towards me and got out another bagel and the cup of cream cheese. If I was going to have to work, I wanted to be able to do it on something like a full stomach. Not that I was going to taste any of it now, I was too distracted to taste anything. I could have been eating fruitcake with candy cane icing for all that I was enjoying my bagel.
This is part two of twenty-five, come back tomorrow for part three and every day this month until we're done to see what happens next. If you get lost, one of the tags here should help you. The HBC tag will take you to the story while the Jack Tag will take you to Part One of every story we post here.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Hard Boiled Christmas (Day One)
Hard Boiled Christmas
A Jack Collier Mystery
By Brett N. Lashuay
Day One: Christmas Again
I was sitting alone in my dark office, on a cold night in December, looking over my options and trying to decide what to do with my life. The last year hadn’t gone the way I would have liked. Even though as I was going over our annual books, it looked like it had been a fairly profitable year. The Office of Jack Collier, Private Investigator was doing quite well. It just wasn’t a good year for me personally. It wasn’t that it had been a particularly bad year as such, it was that beyond work there wasn’t much of a year at all. If the last year hadn’t happened, I would personally be in the exact same spot I had been this time last year.
I had spread my options out on the desk before me. My desk isn’t exactly huge, it’s not one of those massive things that you think of when you think about an antique desk. When you see CEOs in the movies sitting behind their desks, they look much more impressive. They have bigger desks than I do. It’s an old Victorian relic though, and thus it’s solid enough to take the weight of two lonely people who have surrendered to the urge of physical contact. It can take the regular pushing and gruntings of a pair of people who needed to feel something from another person just to make sure they were still alive and not in some purgatorial existence or thrust into a sensationless limbo. I wish they would find another desk though, they keep messing up my papers when they do it here.
My desk is big enough for the year’s options to be spread out before me. On the far left of my desk was a portfolio of low risk, high yield stocks and bonds that I could invest our year’s profits into instead of giving myself and Debbie a nice bonus. Next to that on a small sticky note with the words ‘real estate’ written in ball point pen. In the middle of the desk, were the bills that needed to be paid this week. Next to that I had another sticky note with the word ‘Paris’ written on it. On the far right, was my Webley-Fosbery fourty-five automatic revolver loaded with six hollow point bullets that I had personally dumb-dumbed to my own specificaions.
This is not to say that I was contemplating suicide, just that I was admitting it was an option. I’m not as smart as some people, so I need to see all the options before me to make an informed decision. The idea of investing Debbie’s annual bonus money was frankly as horrifying as putting the barrel of the gun in my mouth and airing out the back of my head. I had already written the checks and put stamps on all the envelopes, which was always the last thing I did before mailing them, so they were ready to go. To this end, I was pretty much done considering my options and I had selected going on as I had before. I leaned back in my chair and sighed, looking at the portfolio and then the revolver.
I sat forward in my chair and snatched the gun off my desk, broke it open and emptied it. I then got out of my chair and walked over the the big safe that sat on the floor in the corner. I opened the safe, took out the smaller fire safe, opened it with my key, and deposited the gun with its smaller and more regularly used brother. I closed the fire safe and returned it to its shelf in the larger safe, closed the door and twisted the knob around to zero. I then stood up and walked back to my desk, picking up the prospectus and tossing it back in the second drawer on the left. I picked up the two pieces of paper and crumpled them between my fingers and tossed them into the garbage.
I looked at the envelopes, filled with bills and checks. It is proof of a civilized world that there are such things as credit and payment through the mail, but sometimes I’d rather just slip Detroit Edison a packet of used bills in a plain envelope. If for no other reason than it would get me out of the office and I could meet people who didn’t need to employ a private detective. Instead of such a personal being though, I was a private detective living in a civilized world. That is what I was doing in my office at that advanced hour of the night.
I refuse to take my work home with me, and I refuse to make Debbie do the monthly bills, and I’m a particularly lazy beast who lets the bills pile up until the pile threatens to topple over. It wasn’t an issue of money as the bank balance was as it always was. There was enough to pay the bills, enough to pay Debbie her pittance, and enough to pay myself. There was even enough to give ourselves a nice office party once in a while, and a decent annual bonus for Debbie to take her vacation in March when she usually went on one of her trips. That is the reason that investing all our profits was not a realistic option you see? I cannot deny Debbie her time off or her trip.
I was just putting the stamp on the envelope for my landlord when the phone rang. It wasn’t my cell phone, which means it wasn’t one of the four people who might actually call me on my cell, but rather the office phone. I had to leap up and run across my office to the waiting room and jump to Debbie’s desk to pick up her receiver. The phone in my office only rings when Debbie puts a call through because I’ve never bothered to have her set up the phone system beyond the voice mail if we don’t pick up.
I walked to the outer office quickly, so as not to miss the call. This meant throwing open the door to my inner office and half leaping across Debbie’s reception desk. I snatched the phone on the third ring and raised the reciver to my ear.
“Hello?” I asked as I picked up the phone, not bothering to announce the company name. Debbie does the phone answering in this office and if she wasn’t going to be here after hours just because she wants to get home at a reasonable hour, I wasn’t going to do her job for her.
“Jack?” The voice was familiar, but not immediately.
“Yeah.” I said, figuring that I might as well admit that much.
“It’s Tom Noonan.” Detective Tom Noonan of the local constabulary said.
“Hi Tom.” I said, while trying to remember if I had anything to cover up. “What can I do for you?”
“You haven’t been out and about tonight have you?” He asked.
“No.” I said and decided to lie instead of tell the truth of how lame I was. “I was just kicking up my feet with a bottle of rye and a grateful client.”
“So you don’t know then?” His voice had an edge of worry I didn’t like.
“Know what?” I asked, a cold tumor suddenly forming in my belly.
“Officially I’m going to have to ask you about your movements tonight.”
I knew, at that moment I knew. Sure, it could have been anyone. There are hundreds of thousands of people he could be calling me about. There was only one that mattered though, only one that he would ask me about in that way and there was only one reason he could be asking like this. I could feel my heart groan, my feet sigh and my shoulders grumble. I was going to be involved with her again and all my efforts to avoid her would be for not. She was going to be re-entering my life again, and there was nothing I could do about it. I knew that whatever it was, I was going to be involved one way or another.
“I was at the office all day.” I told him. “Debbie can verify that up until about five when she went home, around seven-thirty I got hungry so I ordered some Thai food, it got here at eight. I ate, and I’ve been sitting here paying the bills and going over the accounts.”
“You mean you’ve been working on something?” he almost sounded hopeful about that.
“No.” I said, “I mean I’ve been writing checks and stamping envelopes.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” He said, with a resigned sigh.
“Maybe you should tell me what happened.” I wanted to ask if it was about her, but I just couldn’t.
“It’s Christmas.” He said, and my heart would have sunk into my toes but fortunately there were a lot of organs blocking its passage. “She was attacked. She’s down at Saint Joe’s right now.”
“What the hell is she doing at Saint Joe’s?” I asked. “She lives in
“She was found in the Wiegand's nursery parking lot.” He said and then began to rattle things off like a cop would to another cop. I’ve never been a cop, but appreciated the compliment. “She was found about nine o’clock, but we estimate she was dropped there between eight thirty and nine. She was attacked with something like a baseball bat or other large blunt object so it probably wasn’t done there. They went over her pretty good. Smashed both legs, left shoulder, ribs, smashed up her face so bad you can’t recognize her, then they did some carving with a knife as well. She’s in intensive care right now, they don’t even know if she’ll last the night. They even strangled her a little with some of the string lights up on one of the trees. When they found her, she still had the lights around her neck.”
“You said dumped?” I asked, trying not to sound like a snoopy private detective.
“Her car is nowhere to be found.” He said. “I probably shouldn’t even be telling you all this, but… well you know.”
“Yeah.” I said flatly. “I do know.”
“You’ve been at the office all night?”
“Yeah.” I said. “You want to come over and grill me a little?”
“I don’t think so.” He said. “Give me a call tomorrow and maybe I can give you a better idea of what went down.”
“Thanks Tom.” I said, trying not to sit down because I knew I’d never move again if I did.
“You going to look into this?” He sounded like he didn’t even want to broach the subject. “I mean, we sort of said.”
“I know.” I felt like I’d been shot and was losing more blood by the second. “I don’t know if I can do that again.”
“Yeah.” He sounded like he had a similar wound. “Well, if you change your mind, let me know.”
“Sure Tom.” I told him, not only was I loosing blood, but they were giving me a transfusion of ice water. “And thanks for telling me before the news did.”
“You only heard it from me first because you didn’t turn on the TV.” He said. “They’ve been all over this since it happened, they were called first.”
“They usually are these days.” I looked out the window to see if anyone was watching the office. “You sure you don’t need a real statement from me?”
“Yeah.” He said. “I’ll have to go see Church though, that’s going to be fun.”
“Good luck.” I didn’t see anyone in the windows, but that didn’t mean they weren’t there.
“Thanks.” He said. “I’ll talk to you later.”
“Yeah, bye-bye.” I then hung up the phone and sat back down in my chair.
Christmas. Damn.
As much as everyone loves her, very few people actually know her. I knew her, and I loved her once. The problem with her was that she made everything more difficult, being the persona dramatica did that. There was an unending list of dramas in her life, a continual procession of issues and problems. Most people just saw her show and thought that was what she was like. I knew her as a person though, and because of that the tragic side of her life was a bit clearer to me. The divorce, the addiction, the pain, the suffering was all there if you looked. People thought she was just a beautiful creature, who could create a month long anticipation for her show. Sometimes, if a person really loved the show, they’d start getting excited before Sam Hain closed his show. I knew her though, which meant that I knew the truth.
Christmas… son of a bitch.
I felt some anger then, all of the sudden, just like that. She could do that to you even if you were careful. Just thinking about her could bring up feelings you didn’t know you still had anymore. You’d be going along in your usual dull haze of gray, and there she would be, a bright shining light. She would remind you of how you used to feel around her, even if you couldn’t really feel that way anymore. She could even make you feel things that you’d thought yourself incapable of. She could do things like that, even if she weren’t really around. Except it was all a lie. She would leave a moment later with the promise still unfulfilled on your lips, like a kiss that had almost been given.
I thought of her, lying in a parking lot and I got angry. Someone had done something to her and they were going to have to pay. I thought about grabbing my gun and going out into the night. I figured I could be on the street with gun in hand in under two minutes. Except my guns were locked up in the safe. I would have to open the big floor safe, get them out of the fire safe, find the bullets, load them and then go look for someone to shoot.
It was a lot more effort than I wanted to take at the moment. I’d either get frustrated because I can never open the safe in a hurry, or I’d get the guns out of the safe and would have calmed down by then. The guns were a long way from me, and I would likely give up instead of expend the effort. This is one of the reasons the guns are in that old safe, so that I can’t just grab them and go. An unloaded gun in a safe doesn’t go off at inopportune moments.
After a little while of standing there, I was calm enough to just go home. I checked all the bills, made sure I’d gotten everything, and left the office. The bills in hand I went through the waiting room and put my coat and hat on. I wound the old scarf a former client had given me as a memento around my neck and left the office, locking the door behind me. I slipped the envelopes into the mail chute and watched them sail away down to the basement.
I then walked to my car, got in and went home. I was late enough that most the shops had turned off their lights and thus the desperate displays of consumerism and cheer were muted. There were still reminders that it was that time of year, but it didn’t assault me like it would if they were on. If I was lucky, I would forget about all of this by morning.
I am rarely lucky though.
This is part one of twenty-five, come back tomorrow for part two and every day this month until we're done to see what happens. If you get lost, one of the tags here should help you. The HBC tag will take you to the story while the Jack Tag will take you to Part One of every story we post here.
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