Jeff Johnson's Blog: Will Fight Evil 4 Food, page 10

‘Ronavirus and… Guns

This will hit a few people in the penis, no lie, but stay cool, keep calm, and keep reading. I look at social media (a data harvesting experiment gone mad) and of course I talk to people. I know people. And here’s something I’ve noticed- the people around me who are freaking out the hardest about the coronavirus, covid-19, are gun owners. And I’m not talking about nightstand packers, I’m talking the AKs and the big fucking truck stopper .44s. Let’s examine this. And piss people off on both sides of everything.

The gun crowd, well, most of them, deep down, they have those guns because of the government. A huge number of them voted for Trump, which is a logic paradox, but it should be duly noted that Trump does not want their guns. He doesn’t need them. He wants to diminish their wages, fuck up their air, poison their water, and so much more, but they can remain armed. Check that box, all good. Let’s push past that to the root- Fear. Heavily armed people are afraid of something. The government is number one on the list. And a con man carnie is at the helm. Even if these same people voted him in, this has my attention. Guns=Fear.

G=F

So a certain percentage of our population has the night wiggles. The nether tingles. That Bad Feeling. Is that wrong? No. They should have that feeling. So maybe the gun people have this one right. But what does that mean? Are the rest of us the dumbasses this time? Me, with my brazen ‘I’ve been uninsured forever (I currently have good insurance) and I lived. Fuck this shit. Gimme that toilet seat, pussy.’ I honestly feel that way. If the Corporate Media message is Be Afraid, that’s fucking old news, same story all the time, thank you no, wasn’t going to be afraid of Arabs, Mexicans, Republicans, Democrats, Drugs, Russians, or any of their other dumb shit so why should this be any different? Admit it. If you got this far, chances are you feel a little bit the same. America is burned out on Fear. Some people can really absorb that shit and a growing number of people can absorb no more, and some people never bought any of it. But the message, the panic button siren that sparks unity in the herd, well. It’s all fucked up. So fucked up that we have to look for outward signs to project the behavior of the people around us.

On a side note, I’m betting the gun people have lots of toilet paper right now.

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Above is a novel of mine that has a shit ton of guns in it. Check it out, or wander over to my website and shop for other books for your quarantine needs, some of them gun free .http://www.greatpinkskeleton.com

North American Airports Rated For Hygiene

In the last ten years I’ve spent some time in airports good and bad. Given the current situation, I’m still going to fly, of course I am, but there are a few airports I WILL NOT enter until this coronavirus shit has passed. American airports are… different than the airports around the developed world. Rated, a comically bad one and then a good one, so don’t stall out after JFK, which admittedly reads like the opening of a trashy horror novel. The airports on the do and don’t list are-

JFK (RATING- turbo disgusto Reaper anus) I spent eight god damned miserable fucking hours in this vile shit hole dumpster when a producer I was working for thought he’d save a couple bucks. I can understand running a struggling company, but I can’t work for people this broke anymore no matter how much I like them because wildly depressing shit like JFK happens. Everything is sticky in this wretched place. The overhead lights blink like they do in B movie insane asylums. No one knows what they’re doing. The stale air smells like feet, rotting teeth and BO, with splashes of cheap wine vomit and Eastern European colognes. No smoking of course, but if you want to light up, just step into the men’s room! Just watch out for the people trying to take baths in the sink. They don’t try to bum a smoke. They just want one drag. Ew!

HARTSFIELD-JACKSON ATLANTA INTERNATIONAL (RATING- sweet as honey pie with lipstick frosting) I was just there on business, this time on a well compensated venture that even came with a healthy per diem (because I eat food like a real person), on business for a different production company looking to inspire my undying loyalty. Impressive. SO much art! And the food! Clean, nice people, and everything works. It’s almost as if the Japanese had a hand in building this place. Plus, the dude who picked me up from the car service led me straight to a smoking area, fast. You can get in and out without a hassle. This is important. Easy access to ground transport cuts down on how early you have to be. Atlanta is a dirty place, but the airport is not.

DETROIT (RATING- spooky trough toilet) This airport has a herd in distress quality. If really broke aliens had to make a terminal complex to ship humanity off to work the lithium mines, they might build something like this. Its dirty, don’t get me wrong, but the Space-meets-Stalin brutalist element is also suffocating, so you might be breathing less.

PORTLAND INTERNATIONAL (RATING- fruit fly sweetsie boo) This might be the finest airport in the entire United States. Jazz piano, excellent food, great coffee, very clean, nice people, and it’s even beautiful. It smells good. It even has a so-so bookstore.

PHILADELPHIA INTERNATIONAL (RATING- Legionnaires’ Disease with all the trimmings) Let’s face it. Philly is crazy fuckin’ gross. The airport there is no different. It actually has litter, like the city itself. Just random shit, strewn about by pissed off wads. Cups, used condoms, menthol cigarette butts, Fritos, baby teeth, things that might be desiccated mice. The primary difference between Philly International and JFK is here, in the Birthplace of Legionnaires’ Disease, the people are loud, as in screaming in pointless rage or crying. The high point for me was looking at it from the departing airplane and knowing I would never, ever return.

DENVER INTERNATIONAL (RATING- drinky with a golden view) This is a fine airport to get hammered in. We’ve all had flight delays there. And they knew it was going to happen too, so they built this place to hoover in your money while they have you. And they did a good job! The food isn’t anywhere near the PDX gold standard, but they make up for it with bars with a view. I’ve had way too much fun in this place. I once got utterly trashed there with a business class dork in a suit, I never did learn his name, but for a Wall Street Republican cannibal he was okay. I’d be inclined to mug him in the outside world, but at that bar, with that golden view, he was safe, I was safe- it was like we were different people. When I was 17 I got arrested in this airport (juvie offense, ran away the year before), and even that was a pleasant experience (within reason).

SEA-TAC (RATING- gamer dork salad bar kale smoothie with a smear of Gates dough) This place isn’t bad at all. Clean, bright, infected as fuck right now so don’t got there, but in a perfect world Seattle would have been spared.

MONTEREY REGIONAL AIRPORT (RATING- magnificent) I’ll always love this little airport. It has a strange little bar, an historical exhibit, and it has a magical feel to it, like something out of a James Blaylock book. Just outside, right after you land, you can smell the ocean and some kind of inner gong thrums.

SUMMARY I could go on. Anchorage Alaska has a great airport. Dallas does too. San Diego. And some super shitty ones I didn’t get to- Chicago (yuck!) and EVERY SINGLE AIRPORT IN FLORIDA. I mean, look it up. Everyone who writes about travel agrees, its not just me. You shouldn’t even get on a plane headed to Florida.

Surf Tour Of The World – right now

It was early January 2006. The punk community was at a loss as to what the fuck happened in Fiji. The fringe tattoo world, the wino chefs, even the weed dealers had no idea. But surfers took note. A few of them bought newspapers and it’s entirely possible one of them even turned on a television. A bold coup came into focus in a Portland dive bar. The Surf Tour Of The World guys and gals, made infamous after fighting a pack of monkeys under a moonlit mango tree on a distant beach the year before, would invade Fiji en masse. Airline tickets had previous been way out of reach. So had the price of the swank resorts with umbrella drinks. All of it, these brave young men and women knew, was theirs for the taking.

And they did it. For two week, while the political bullshit of Fiji chewed along around them, they surfed. They drank umbrella drinks. They ate BBQ for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And all on a beach normally thronging with wealthy visitors, for a fraction of what they might normally pay. Six months later, such a trip would be unthinkable for any of them.

The take away lesson- the average American is continuously exploited by big business. The entire capitalist machine evolves like a hyper parasite second by second, the self-perfecting harvesting orifice, but right now we can see gaping holes in that mechanism. The media Fear weapon occasionally works too well. Toilet paper hoarding is an incredible example of so many social deformaties, but it means one thing above all others at this hour- Sally forth, dear reader, and see the world. Airline ticket prices will drop, I suspect, for the next ten days. Gas prices will make that trip to Yosemite much more affordable, and the hotels are empty. When the herd freaks out, the time is right for adventure. Go get some!

Coronavirus Survival Checklist

3-9-2020 -Disco time, my fellow dog mammals. Rise and shine. Here is your coronavirus checklist. But who needs it, you ask? Is it me? My fellow Americans, have you ever been so poor that you lived for a week on a three pack of ramen? Ever sucked down a ketchup packet for extra calories? Used super glue because stitches are like a 500 bucks a pop? Then you have the immune system of a junkyard dog. So you will need these items, because your time has arrived.

-A RED SHARPIE

            To write on your face with. Warning glyphs and slogans, like ‘Me Rabies’ and ‘Fuckareel’ will deter the other survivors in the new wasteland.

-LUBE

            If I need to explain this, skip it.

-ASPIRIN

            This is the only pill that actually works. Period. Just watch TV. Everything else gives you- dry mouth, sudden death, lymphoma, brain rashes, you name it. Aspirin. The universe pill.

-TOMAHAWK

            These are far more versatile than most people imagine.

-HAIR CONDITIONER

            I once knew a guy named Scotty who was shot in the head execution style in a motel room. It was a .22, so the bullet entered his scalp, turned south at his iron melon and traveled down the length of his spine and exited beside his tailbone. Scotty woke up hours later, put HAIR CONDITIONER on the entry and exit points, toilet paper over that, and used scotch tape to hold everything in place. He was fine.

-NAILS

            This just sounds like a good idea. A dozen nails. Sharp. In case someone is following you.

-TAPATILLO

            Don’t sacrifice your quality of life. If it comes to cannibalism, I’ve already decided I will only eat women and I’m starting with the ass. With TAPATILLO.

-PARAKEETS

            A surprisingly sturdy and companionable bird.

-TWEEZERS

            Fuck your Swiss Army Knife genius. You went to Harvard and I still kicked your ass. All you need is the TWEEZERS. The end of society as we know it is dirty business. Tweezers and DB go hand in hand.

Advice a) The easiest place to carry food is in your stomach.

            b) As always, avoid the cops. They will be the second hardest gang in the apocalypse.

            c) Cat food taste better than deer, don’t go Rambo.

            d) 50 gallon trash bags are good cover and good insulation. Stay close to them.

Travis Wayne Johnson Day

March 4th would have been my little brother’s 49th birthday. Hard to believe. His story was cut short by a variety of things- depression, cocaine, anxiety, secrets, and shitty people. And me. He stole money from me to fuel his self-medication and I was pissed. So when the darkest hour came for him, he was too ashamed to call. He died, because that’s what happens when the last person you have in the world is a thug you stole from.

Or so I believed for a long, long time. But the truth is, dear reader, you can’t take responsibility for a suicide. You’ll want to, because that’s the only way to make sense of it. But it wasn’t you. Statistically, you almost certainly know someone who took their own life, and if you’re any kind of person at all, you’ve wondered what you did wrong, how you could have helped more, why you didn’t notice shit had gotten that bad, and on and on and on. If you fucked up, then go ahead and feel it. Breathe that black shit in and let it change you for the better. But even if you didn’t, you still have to swallow it to be done with it.

For my part I’ll remember the good times. He was sad and desperate at one point and I invited him to Portland, and for more than a year he lived under my wing. He told me several times it was the best year he had as an adult, and in his will he left everything (not much) to me, just as in my will I’m leaving everything to Sylvia (I’m going to live to be 100 and die in a shootout with crooked cops in a whorehouse). But the darkness caught up with him and he moved back to Orange County and fell right back into his old life. And here I go again, writing this. I should have made him stay, as in made it more fun, more rewarding. I should have paid for him to go back to school. I should have bought him a better car than the piece of shit Mazda I got him. I should have sent him on vacation, which is probably what he actually needed, someplace cheap like Belize, where the terror and sadness could have evaporated out of him on the beach. Where he could have rested instead of gotten beat to death by an exhausting world. But I didn’t. See paragraph two.

We had some good times. One night in a bar called the Hungry Tiger I taught him how you could aspirate a cloud of whiskey into a bigger bastard’s face and temporarily blind him. We wrote rude haikus with my old Portland Psychic Haiku group and read them to a bunch of pouty poet shitheads at a café one time. He enjoyed that. He taught me how the French occasionally use a mustard rub on New York steaks, something I didn’t know at the time. And he beat me at pool about a thousand times because he was so damn good at it. He also helped me write the lyrics to the rudest blues song imaginable. Disgustin’. It’s now in the Blues section at http://www.greatpinkskeleton.com

If he was alive today, I’d advise him to do what I did. Leave that broken, busted family behind and never look back. Find a happy part of the world and be happy there. Do things you like. Surround yourself with positive people. Live well. Cook. Read. Sing. Love. Dream. The good shit. And you know what? I took that advice myself, and I’m better off. Today, do something good for yourself, dear reader. You deserve it. Then repeat the process tomorrow. The good days can snowball into a better life, just like the bad ones back to back for years can turn into a hole you can’t climb out of. If nothing else, I believe in you. And chances are I don’t even know you.

The Groovy Deadline

Here was the puzzle- write the script for an internal proof of concept animation slash live action presentation with four sets, three characters, and it should use a detective. Deadline- 15 hours from when I put the phone down. Wrinkle- the visuals of the four virtual sets did not arrive until noon. Which gave me three hours to describe them, insert details, and finish. Upshot- done, and I made as much money as the advance on my last novel.

This is, strangely, exactly like all the other deadlines in all the other mediums. In visual art, tattooing and painting, you always get last minute changes, last second curve balls, late stuff, incomplete data, you name it, but I learned a long time ago that if you roll with it and deliver the goods like nothing bumpy ever happened it opens doors that lead to more and better deals. When I was finished I talked about it on the phone with the producer, because that’s faster than reading it, and then I took a nap. Then I set about parboiling baby potatoes in fennel brine and thawing the smoked pork chops. While I did I thought about this creative deadline business, a constant in my life for three decades, and how its changed over the years. One thing stands out- it got easier. Why? If you work with people who respect your time (as in pay well for it) you try harder for them. Just like in life itself! Full circle! You try your best with the people who treat you well. Shazam baby. Good actually making more good, proof of concept X 2 of a positive feedback loop. Seems like I’ve know this all along, but it also seems like I’ve forgotten this many times. Nice reminder. Smooth days ahead for us all if we can stick to these guidelines.

“The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it.” ― Henry David Thoreau

Get the Deadbomb Bingo Ray audiobook now! Because you should be staying home!

Crime. Vengeance. Love. Physics.

“This evil strut of a book is wildly smart, utterly warped, and exultant in its own mad glory.” —Warren Ellis, New York Times bestselling author

The infamous Deadbomb Bingo Ray is a high-level fixer in the City of Brotherly Love. He’s the man you call when you’ve crossed the line into hopeless and there’s no way back to anywhere.

Three years have passed since Ray burned a hedge fund manager on behalf of a pool of retirees, and now the money man is back for revenge. While Ray unravels the plot and orchestrates some payback of his own, he unwittingly steps into the ultimate high stakes game. Falling in love with the beautiful physicist trapped at the edge of the burn was just bad timing.

When the fuse is finally lit, getting killed isn’t high on the list of the worst that could happen in this dark and stylish noir.

“Inventive and comic…A rare treat.” —Publisher’s Weekly

“A fast-paced, quick-witted neo-noir caper packed with cons and double crosses, larger-than-life characters, and vivid language.” —Library Journal

“Narrator Johnny Heller cops a delightful and sidesplitting ‘wise guy’ attitude as the infamous Philadelphia fixer Deadbomb Bingo Ray…Heller navigates this stylish noir with ultimate vocal skill. Deadbomb Bingo Ray lives up to his name as the game reaches an explosive climax. Fans of the genre will love Ray, and Heller is drop-dead great in this enjoyable romp.” —AudioFile

“Hard-boiled, hilarious, and as serious as a straight razor…More good ideas, great jokes, and splendid writing on one page than most books have in a full chapter. Read it.” —Tim Hallinan, author of the Simeon Grist, Poke Rafferty, and Junior Bender series

“Deadbomb Bingo Ray is a shot of…muscle-noir…with a bounce and a turn of phrase that elevates it above the pack. If this guy’s under your radar, recalibrate!” —Sean Doolittle, author of The Cleanup and Lake Country

KINGDOM on Netflix – a review

South Korea is quickly becoming a serious player in world zombie action. Kingdom, now on Netflix, is a great example. Based on the webcomic by Kim Eun-hee (he also wrote all six episodes), it’s the story of a feckless sissy prince, a gruesomely fucked up king, a smoking hot bimbo queen with dead eyes and a foot for a heart and- a whopping shitload of fast, crazy hideous formerly poor people turned zombie. Finger sniffing wussy crown prince Lee Chang sets out to investigate a mysterious sickness sweeping his land of beat to shit workers and discovers that a kindly nun turned cannibal to feed the starving masses and snap- disaster happened. Shit is deeply nasty in the kingdom. Will the crown prince set aside his cornholed nature, forget his courtly finishing school adult babyman shit, pick up a sword and join the common people? As with the magnificent Train To Busan, we want the hero to bite it mouth-to-curb style if he can’t set down his elite status halo and at least pretend he’s a real person. No more spoilers.

Kingdom has incredible set after incredible set. Its beautiful. Like Rampant, another visually pleasing but less developed K-Zom, there’s good swordplay and splendid period costumes. The zombies are, frankly, visually more impressive than the Walking Dead zombies. They drip. The glisten. They make freakish chattering noises and harrowing mews. And like in Train To Busan, these are turbo zombies. They move fast. They swarm. And the hats. The people of Joseon Dynasty may well have had the most incredible hats in human history. I am seriously not kidding.

I saw season one of Kingdom last year in Tokyo, and when I did I was impressed by the social subtext. The Walking Dead is, in so many ways, about how dangerous people are. Negan was just a dirtbag until the ZA and then he got to become his old real world tyrant boss. Train To Busan and especially Kingdom are different. More poignant. They highlight the shocking divide between the classes and how when the shit hits the fan, that shit is wet and fresh and full of corn and kim chi and it hits everyone in the mouth. And now, at last, it’s here in the States on Netflix. Just in time for the exhausting run up to the elections. The gods of television just might be democratic socialists.

And the hats. I can’t mention that enough.

Mirth, Reason and… The Hustle

The hustle. You know the game. Look for the best window in the room and go on through it. I just finished writing the script for a romantic comedy with a good friend of mine, an accomplished writer from back east, and let me tell you what, we laughed an unreasonable amount. We cackled. It took a long time too, but we delivered it on motherfuckin’ Valentine’s Day, just for additional style points. Panache counts.

This is a money gig. First time I ever worked for any time with another writer, too. Generally, I try to be an okay guy to the artists and writers I know. Don’t step on people, they will remember, and help when you don’t even need to because they’ll remember that too. Just the other day I sent along a couple of cool residency programs I thought looked pretty good to a newish writer I know and low, they were far beneath him. It reminded me of my early years, before I understood the value of information great and small, and no one as vain as I am likes looking at pictures from puberty. It’s just rude, I tell you. The truth is if you want to make your bacon off dreams alone, you have to stay low the ground and sniff out the truffles, AND you have to cover some serious territory. The only thing beneath you is the ground. Where the truffles are. This is where the fun is! And ultimately why your hardest working peers become your trusted friends. They’re somehow less exalted (makes no sense, I know), and that feels good to be around. The opposite of this, ‘humble’, is often a serpent’s favorite disguise in the arts, this is generally known, but ‘real’, well. Absolutely priceless. Real is honest. And honesty has Game.

Art pays. People say it doesn’t but it does. Tattooing. Painting. My friend Pete makes a pretty good living playing old swing and blues at bars, night after night, and he likes it. He’s a happy guy. A good guy. And he has Game. Writing is broad spectrum and pays in broad ways because of it. There are words everywhere, just look around. You’re looking at some right now. The truth is almost any kind of earnest work in the making of things will pay in some way if you work the angles. Game is part of the code. Mojo. Dedication to craft means feeding yourself and having a long table. Hustle is what makes the world go round. A great restaurant has it. A great gallery has it. A great artist, a great sculptor, a great pizza jockey. A great band. A great bookstore. And all that has to be smooth. When it is, and I try to keep it that way, it’s the best ride in town. When it isn’t you work at the laundromat. So word to the wise, my fine creatives. If you seem to be enjoying yourself, and I mean in the part of your soul that’s close to the backbone, you’re probably making two kinds of currency- money for a vacation and some glow for that all important life of yours. All kinds of artists and writers have put forth in various ways that the greatest work of art is your own life, a lifespan work, to be viewed by one at its conclusion. You’re that viewer.

I hope it’s a masterpiece.

The Oscars? Oh. Right…

The Academy Awards! What was it, really? A horde of finger sniffing brobots and Hollywood jizz toilets assembled to see their royalty on display? And the entire thing is on TV? Or was it something different? Everyone is going to have their own opinion. I didn’t watch the Oscars. I don’t watch professional wrestling, either, but I did watch everyone’s reaction, which was at least a little interesting. Generally, it’s the actors and actresses who get both the glory and the disgusted condemnation in people’s eyes. I always considered acting to be like photography- an almost-but-not-art. Not on the same level as, say, painting for example. I still feel that way. But there are real people behind the makeup. What makes them great, middling or suckdog is, when you think about it, strangely similar to the arts.

Maybe you can fake love, but it won’t be very convincing if you never really felt it, and I mean hard, like all the way down in the reddest part of your guts. And often. And big. A good artist loves his or her spouse and children. A great one loves that- and birds, the winds, the smell of baking bread and the morning light on the windows. Maybe you can fake compassion, but everyone will see right through it unless you see and feel and react to the world around you, inhale it, touch it- until you’ve looked into the eyes of people far different from you and felt, for a moment, something of their lives. You can mimic rage, but it will just seem like a tantrum if you never went out on a limb over dark waters for good, wholesome reasons and suffered bitterly for it. You can ‘project’ loss, but in the end it will ring hollow unless you really held something. All of it- warmth, joy, violence, shame and lust and love, the wildness of minds in transformation, those appear to be important for actors after all! That’s probably why there are so many more bad ones than good ones. It is a superficial goal as goals go, everyone knows that, but what no one seems to talk about it this- It’s their souls we’ll be watching- either rich ones full of life and admirable passions and bright light, great books and sunrises and private joys or… bland burps of expensive tooth whitener.

The exact same thing is true for artists, writers and musicians. So maybe ‘acting’ is, in the end, a real ‘art’. Or could be. Or might become. Or it is at its best moments. The real admiration was for the directors, for the most part. On a side note, Parasite really is a masterpiece. The Lighthouse. A few more. Definitely art. So a great deal of hard, difficult, soulful art is going on in Tinseltown (I think, anyway), but it makes me wonder. In acting school, do they teach people how to lead extraordinary lives of deep meaning or… do they teach people to pretend they already do? Inspiring to think about in any case, dear reader. These important things are undeniably difficult, but that creative road is its own reward.