The Last Word

Issue #468

September 2013

Our Annual Back-to-School Issue!

Brewin up mischief in Milwaukee!
After spending your life savings of 99 cents on this zine, you dont want to read about insignificant things like, say, Obamacare or the imminent government shutdown. Instead, you want me to tickle your bip bone by talking about my uproarious road trip to Milwaukee, which lasted from August 15 to 17. More specifically, the people demand that I discuss bunker blasts. Because theyre funny, you see. On the way to Milwaukee, I detected one solitary backdoor breeze. And it was an LAP! We stopped at the Kwik Trip gas station in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin, to refuel. While I was standing outside the car at the gas pump, some guy farted really loud. I guess thats why they call it a gas station! After visiting the Milwaukee County Zoo, we arrived at our motel in Wauwatosa. We had reservations, but the inn offered accommodations that were far less adequate than had been advertised. When I went on a family trip to Milwaukee when I was about 8 years old, we visited a museum that had a three-quarter-size replica of an old Milwaukee neighborhood. Well, our hotel room on our recent trip was about like that: three-quarter-size, if that. Plus, it had only one bed (which was about the size of an ironing board), so I had to sleep on the floor. But no bother! At least I got to be amused by the fact that the toilet broke. The tinkletorium began running incessantly, and the flusher handle conked out, making it so the toilet could not be flushed. Its probably for the better that I didnt have time to use the swimming pool at this motel, because I later saw a review by a customer who said the pool had urine content. (Urine is pee.) I went to a couple baseball games where the Brewers hosted the Reds. The games provided hilarity in their own right. I call this outing the Eddie Money trip, because of a downright rip-roaring celebrity look-alike I saw at the ballgames. During the first game, I heard a guy behind me declare, Its Eddie Money! I looked over into the aisle, and sure enough, there was a stadium staffer who looked just like the 80s rock n roll singer! I thought Id bust a bile duct laughing! Also during the first game, somebody threw a beach ball onto the field. This is the first baseball game I can remember attending in which fans threw debris on the field. I know there was a Reds game at Riverfront Stadium back in 1988 in which angry spectators went into the restrooms, yanked the rolls of toilet paper off the walls, and threw them on the fieldbut I wasnt there. (That was in the era when the Far Right made it treacherous for me just to leave the house.) When the beach ball hit the field in Milwaukee recently, I saw an event staffer confiscate it. As if that wasnt enough, people threw items at other fans. I saw a wad of paper sail through the air and bean the man in front of me squarely in the noodle. Sometimes when you go to sporting events, you hope the game reaches a reasonable conclusion. Isnt that the whole point of a game? Thirty-inning baseball games usually just bore even the most diehard fans. Theres a reason football has a rule against delay of game. But I wished this game could go on forever: Id never before been to a game where I saw an Eddie Money look-alike, beach balls pelting the field, and garbage being thrown through the stands. The following day, we goed to downtown Milwaukee and found the Fonz statue. People come from all over the world just to see it. There was a family there taking pictures with it.

Then we went on a tour of the Miller brewery, where they offer beer samples. What a wonderful way to wring free beer out of one of Americas biggest breweries! The tour and the beer cost nothingits all at Millers expenseso what more can you ask for? During the tour, I saw another funny celebrity look-alike. This one strongly resembled Jack Kemp, best known as Bob Doles running mate in his ill-fated 1996 presidential bid. And he loooooved the free beer! I saw him guzzle an entire cup of beer like it was water. After that, he was utterly sloshed. He stumbled and staggered down the steps, and other folks almost had to assist him to keep him from falling. He made a real spectacle of himself. He was completely wosted.

Just prior to the brewery tour, however, the mischief rating went up when we drove into a lot at the brewery that was restrictedthus violating an Allowed Cloud. The second baseball game was almost as much of a barrel of guffaws as the first. Eddie Money was sighted again, and the fans a couple rows in front of me got hit by items thrown from the stands above. Sleep that night was a chore because of idiots at the hotel slamming doors and screaming all night. As a result, I kept dozing off on the way home. But I did notice near Lafayette, Indiana, that the Tea Party was making fools of themselves as usual. That was one of their nationwide days of action for impeachment of President Obama. I saw them holding signs from an overpass above Interstate 65 saying BENGHAZI and the like. In light of the Benghazi talking point being long ago discredited, nobody honked in agreement. I counted precisely 4 people at the Tea Party rally. Incidentally, the Tea Party gasbags claim to have saturated I-894 in Milwaukee that morning. Thats a bluff, because I traveled the whole length of I-894 and saw no sign of those sore losers. All in all, a swell time was had in Milwaukee. I now plan to visit Colorado and cover it in the next ish! If my Western tour is ruined by illness, Ill cry like the macho superman I am.

Brewin up no mischief in Kalamazoo

As the Occupy movement whisks its velvet hammer across the worlds landscape, I was hankerin to throw my support behind this years Occupy National Gathering in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Occupy Campbell County did indeed endorse the event, but I elected not to attend. Why, dare you ask? I expected the planning of this gathering to truly follow the Occupy spirit. Unfortunately, that didnt happen. More to the point, organizers of the gathering kept changing venues just because some right-wing public officials told them to. Initially, the event was planned for Upjohn Park near downtown Kalamazoo. But the citys parks board refused to grant the permit because of Occupys views. The parks board can deny all they want that they discriminated against Occupy for its views, but thinking people know better. On the other hand, since when does Occupy apply for permits to use public spaces? Occupy received its permit in 1791 when the First Amendment was ratified. In fact, it received it at the dawn of humanity, for free speech is a natural right. The court case spawned by the Occupy Cincinnati arrests also established a precedent upholding free assembly. When the permit was denied, organizers could have redeemed their integrity by going ahead with the event at Upjohn Park anyway. Revolutionaries dont just cave when officials tell them to. Butlo and behold

Occupy decided to instead hold its National Gathering at a site 4 miles out of town in Comstock Township. Now Occupy had been exiled to a rural area where far fewer people would be able to see their message and participate. But at least they were safe from being shut down, right? Wrong! Township officials then said they needed a permit to hold it thereeven though it was on private property, and Occupy had permission of the property owner. (Thats like the time the Tea Party circulated a petition to try to shut down the Occupy Tampa encampment, even though Occupy was on private property and had the owners permission.) The township curtly said there wasnt enough time to hold hearings to grant a permit. So guess what? Organizers caved again. Imagine that! Occupy sought a third venue, but at that point, I gave up on any serious desire to attend. But my heart really sank when I saw this: Food is being served downstairs. Downstairs? They moved it inside? Occupy National Gathering organizers surrendered twice? And moved indoors? Seriously, how do we expect to accomplish anything if we just pull out of each venue every time the city or township tells us to? This is Occupy. Lets fucking act like it. Were revolutionaries. We dont do what public officials tell us to. Did the colonists in the American Revolution do everything Britain told them to do? If a public school tried requiring me to wear a uniform, do you think Id do what the school said to do? When I attended community college in 2006, there was a vague dress code in the student handbook. I ignored it. If I was a union leader in charge of organizing a workplace in a socalled right-to-work state, do you think Id follow the unconstitutional right-to-work law? I go by the Constitutionnot arbitrary, unconstitutional statutes and diktats.

Despite the repeated caving by event organizers, the Occupy National Gathering appears to have been a success. Hundreds reportedly showed up in Kalamazoo from around the country and elsewhere. One can only imagine how prosperous it would have been if organizers had stood firm right from the giddy-up.

People get it done in Minnesota

Whenever school officials in Greater Cincinnati think they can nominate themselves as Masters of the Universe, people just sit back, watch TV, and accept it. Because libertea, dont ya know. But in Minnesotawhooooo, man! Many Northern Kentucky schoolchildren went back to school right at the beginning of Augustand nobody dared to speak a word in protest. But schools in Minnesota are just now moving their start date to before Labor Day, and the entire states citizenry is exploding in rage. When the school system of Northfield, Minnesota, proposed starting in mid-August, families mounted a protest that successfully killed the proposal. People rightly argued that an earlier start date would conflict with the state fair and programs like 4-H. Over in Edina, a group of 200 parents protested a calendar changesaying it would chisel away at family time. The debate is over. A longer school year has actually been proven to be a losing proposition for children and their educationbecause the human mind doesnt work that way. Weve had this argument for 20 years, and

the verdict is in. Students from states with a later start date perform better on national testsand have higher literacy rates too. This may seem counterintuitive, but it isnt. Its just like how a study proved that people who dont watch the news are better informed than people who do. The longer summer break fulfills a natural need for agricultural, recreational, and other activities. But heres a point far more important than this. Even if the schools in Minnesota that tried to start school earlier were right to do so, its clear that folks there arent as cowed by the school system as people are around here. People raised by suburban Cincinnati schools are afraid to speak out, because thats the nature of the peculiar institution of our local schools. The more I read what people around the country have said on the Internet about their own school experiences, the more I wish we had schools like the rest of the nation had. Locally, were experiencing the latest chapter of a region that educated its children by pumping them full of Ritalin and practicing authoritarian methodology. Cincinnati area schools pioneered zero tolerance and the thoroughly despisable practice of medicating children into compliance, and now were seeing how its turned out. Its an attitude of shut up and dont fight back.

The Federal Porn Allotment

I just thought of an idea thats utterly, utterly stupid. But since the Tea Party has made a national pastime out of breaking the stupid barrier, its only fair that I fight stupid with stupid.

The Tea Party is made up of the same control freaks who tried to take Playboy off the shelves 15 years ago. They thought MTV was porn. They thought R-rated movies were porn. They supported wielding the muscle of government to censor what people could read and watch. Theyre the ones who got the federal law passed requiring libraries to censor Internet access. Because libertea. These days, they try couching their causes in economic termsprobably because they figured out people would just flout their social engineering restraints. Generally speaking, they began to realize that government inaction cant just be violated like an unfair government action can. Hence their more recent war against the poor. They hate welfare. They hate food stamps. They hate Medicaid. They even hate homeless shelters. Because libertea. So I just thought of an idea that would send the Tea Party screaming into the night: a Federal Porn Allotmentor FPA for short. Under the FPA, every adult in America with a personal income of under 133% of the poverty level would be entitled to a monthly $10 porn allowance. This stipend would be redeemable on any legal pornography website. Its the Tea Partys nightmare come true. Its welfare and its pornall rolled into one! Im not being serious, of course. Butoh myit would be uproarious to see the Tea Partys reaction if something like this was enacted! The FPA isnt designed to be a Bizarro Tea Party proposal that has the same basic elements of irrationality as the existing Tea Party. If it was, it would require folks to download their free porn from the least interesting category on Clips4Saleand then view it only if it was something they didnt want to see. If it was something they might actually look at, theyd have to delete it. (I still think its hilarious that theres a newsgroup called alt.sex.fetish.startrek.) In the meantime, you can bet your bippus that more than one Tea Party follower has an entire bookcase full of flash drives containing smut that theyve downloaded. Theyre like the kid in school who called everyone else a druggie even while they spent each weekend getting wasted themselves. The Tea Partys #1 rule is: Do as the Tea Party says, and dont do as they dooz.

People drank beer at school

Since this is our annual Back-to-School ish, permit me to regale you with another heehaw-inducing story of school hijinks. It was 1994. The Last Word was in its second year. The toilet-like miasma of fascism loomed over the region. And a mysterious beer cloud hovered over Northern Kentucky University. Its true, its true, its all true! People drank beer at schooland got away with it.

What prompted the interest in clandestine boozing? Historians believe that this was right after the university erected posters all over the school showing a traffic light that changed from green to yellow to red and bore a preachy message against alcohol. Others believe it was when student radio station WRFN yanked the song I Cant Dance by Genesis because of the line, Young punk spilling beer on my shoes. NKU administration was a wholly owned subsidiary of the Prohibition Party. One student in particular liked to carry around a plastic mug with a lid. I always saw him darting across campus grasping his trusty mug. Occasionally he dropped by my gang of cronies for a little chitchat. Now, remember, this was when I had that huge throng of followers on the knoll near the box sculpture. This was where folks burned leaves and buried items in the grass. One day, I declared that somebody should bring beer to school. I said that with a hint of seriousness. Surely, it wouldnt seem to accomplish muchbut then again, why not? I suggested it just because it would be funny to doand because there was a school rule against it, of course. Not long after that, the young man with the plastic mug walked by me on campus. He paused for a conversation. He took a sip from his mug. Its beer, he said, smirking from ear to ear. And I truly think it was beer. I dont think he was joking. I seriously and honestly believe he filled his cup with beer before he brang it to school that daybecause I suuuuure smelled beer! I dont know whether this took place before or after the segment on Cops in which a guest at Six Flags Over Texas smuggled a can of beer into the park by hiding it in a cup with a plastic lid. The incident at NKU might have been inspired by the scene on Cops. Whats next? Are we gonna throw records at a complete strangers car? This wasnt quite as guffawy as the time I found a pile of empty Budweiser cans in the cafeteria restroom when I attended the dreaded Bishop Brossart High School. Does this mean high school kids drank beer at school??? Why, yes! Yes, it does!

AdBrite, making with light...

things

AdBrite, making things with light...Out of sight, making things with AdBrite... to the tune of an old Lite-Brite commercial Heres the latest poop on my war with Internet ad companies that cheated me out of my revenues. After Google AdSense closed my account because of my political views and stole hundreds of dollars I earned, the next ad server I tried using was AdBrite. Id tried in vain to remember their name before I put out last months issue of this splendid zine, but I couldnt think of it until later. AdBrite is the firm that suspended my account, lied about it, and bounced all my e-mails in which I told them to close my account for goodthus keeping me from getting the revenue I earned from them. Welp, now Ive discovered more proof AdBrite was a scam. It turns out that AdBrite ceased operations altogether early this year. But that wasnt the scam. The scam was that they didnt pay me my revenues when they shut down. Other people report being scammed by AdBrite tooafter I first realized it was a scam. At least one person reports that AdBrite closed their account, falsely accused them of invalid clicks, and refused to pay them the money they earned. Another person reports that a check from AdBrite bounced. In any event, who pays for AdBrites assfifery? U! Thats who! But rest assured, if I ever find a reliable and honest ad server, I wont have to keep charging for this zine. Also, some pointless insight I cant fit anywhere else: In light of this article mentioning Lite-Brite, I went on YouTube looking for that commersh. Someone posted this hilarious comment: I got a Lite Brite once from a visiting relative for now [sic] reason. Later that night I farted at the dinner table (LOUDLY) and got the Lite Brite

taken away for the rest of the week.

The inn thing

One of my fave hobbies is to look up bad reviews on the Internets of various products ranging from electronics to books to restaurants to airlines to (best of all) hotels. Thats right, peoplefaces. I like reading bad hotel reviews! And Im not talking about First World disappointments like not having VH1, or the jacuzzi having only bubbles and no jets. Im talking about the big stuff. One inn that had received disproportionately bad reviews was an Oklahoma establishment that allegedly ruined a childs birthday party. But this motel seems to have been topped by one in Niagara Falls thats garnered increasingly negative reviews including one that talks about how fire marshals had to shut it down. One guest complained that she found a condom wrapper in her bed. She concluded that someone must have broken into her room while she was out and did their thing in the bed. Another customer said the rugs had stained barf everywhere. Another reviewer said theyd made reservations there for a family vacation but arrived at the hotel only to be told there were no rooms available. They saw 5 other families in the lobby being told the same thing, and some got so mad that they called the police. This reviewer said they had to go back home because there were no other vacant rooms in the whole area. Also, according to this reviewer, one customer said he checked into his room, left for supper, and then returned to find his room was given to somebody else. A guest at a Michigan hotel complained that the clerk made him unclog the toilet himself when it got stopped up. A customer of a Chicago inn reported mucus all over the elevator doors, walls, and floor. A patron of a Missouri hotel fretted that there was bubble gum stuck to the smoke detector. A traveler at a Kansas establishment found dog crap in their roomwhich basically ruined our Thanksgiving. A visitor of a New Hampshire hotel found his bath towel smeared with shita good amount as if someone had wiped themselves with it. A guest at a Maine motel complained of bloody boogers on the wall. The jacuzzi at a now-closed Tennessee resort was said to have smelled like rotten eggs and pee. Another reviewer said of that establishment, The hotel sign says CHRISTIAN OWNED, but its really DEVIL OWNED. Another said they found a Coke bottle full of chewed-up tobacco in their room. On the other hand, you have to wonder how finding dog shit in a hotel room would ruin your entire Thanksgivingunless you ingested the toxic matter. I would think seeing dog feces in a hotel room would make ones vacation that much funnier. While were on this subject, Ive also found the airline complaint website where a tourist griped because a flight attendant blew bubbles with bubble gum that burst and stuck to her face, whereupon she scooped it back into her mouth and chewed it some more. (Always be suspicious when a person uses the word whereupon.)

Dont people have more important things to whine about? But you better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout, and Im telling you why: Ive read that some disreputable hotel owners are now fining customers who give them bad reviews. How do they accomplish this, dare peeps ask? Remember, hotels have guests credit card numbers. They just charge it to their card. This is credit card fraud, of course, but the fines run as high as $500. Moral of the story: Use an alias when you post negative reviews. (Also, this week I went to a local Red Lobster restaurant for an important family event and got shrimp that was thoroughly spoiled. This resulted in a bad review. But Red Lobster cant fine me, for I paid cash because in the 70s, thats how we paid for stuff. So ha-ha!)

More YouTube classics

Since you share the belief held by 100% of humanity that farting in school is hilarious, you have got to check out this clip I found on YouTube... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbjU3wmevSc Your face did not deceive you. Somebody ripped a bunker blast during class! Whats especially amusing is the reaction by the male teacher strolling about the room. At first, when students burst into laughter, the instructor gently tries to hush them. Shhh, shhh, he goes. But then you see him rubbing his nose in an effort to stifle his own laughter. He was clearly smiling and trying to hide it. See, even teachers think its funny when people rip stinkers in class! Whats astonishing is that whoever uploaded that video seems to act as if farting at school is a rare occurrence. A similar sentiment can be found on Internet message forums. I remember an entire thread titled, Has anyone here ever farted at school? When I was in school, it would be news if people didnt fart. But cracking bunker blasts never got old. It got funnier each time it happened. Its kind of like how youd watch a sitcom each week just to hear your favorite character utter their trademark catchphrase, and it never wore thin. Like how everyone waited all week to hear Arnold on Diffrent Strokes say, Whatcha talkin bout, Willis? and it kept getting funnier and funnier each time.

A person filling the air with a pooteroony isnt the only funny find on YouTube of late. Another laugh inducer is when a speech by an important public figure goes awry. It happened not long ago in Kansas City when the mayors State of the City address was decimated by an angry constituent... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlgUMAgACtE In case that video wont loador if your ISP blocks it like Zoomtown does to some websitesheres a synopsis: A man stormed the stage during the speech and declared, This man had just got through talking about exactly what the fuck he aint goddamn did! During this declaration, the mayor calmly looks at the man and appears to be trying to put his arm around him like theyre the best of pals. Best all, the hecklers profanity-laced pronouncement was broadcast live on overthe-air TVmuch to the FCCs chagrin. (The FCC that rubber-stamps the takeover of valuable stations by Don Wildmons cavalcade of stupid is the same FCC that has virtually no tolerance when it comes to overthe-air language. Because libertea.) Who needs comedy acts like Sarah Palin when youve got YouTube? (Also, somebody needs to tell YouTube to stop blaming the Firefox cache when the video portion of my clip of the Pauls Valley tornado wont appearfor I had the same problem on Internet Exploder. I had to upload this video again because YouTube wouldnt respond to my help request. After I uploaded the new copy, YouTube provided me with corrupted embed code I had to fix. But what else can we expect from YouTube, which accepts fourthparty copyright complaints, even though its parent company Google requires a court order for people to delete their own posts from 20 years ago that Google is Making Money from?)

Pay, pal!
I think we can chalk up PayPal as the latest entry on our list of services to avoidthough at least they havent been as flagrant as some other services. Theyre just inept. I had a PayPal account. But no more. My decision to flee PayPal came when they sent me an e-mail telling me that a very, very important payment (not for porn) did not go through, because there wasnt enough money in my PayPal account. Of course there wasnt. I dont use PayPal to hoard money. I have PayPal linked to my bank account. PayPals website says that if theres not enough money in your PayPal account to cover a payment, they just take it from your bank account its linked toand my bank account does have the money to cover it. Ive never had problems with this before. Nonetheless, PayPal e-mailed me saying they tried processing my payment repeatedly, it failed, and that it was now past its due date. PayPal not doing what it said it would do was thoroughly unacceptablesince were dealing with important payments here. So I e-mailed them about the problem. PayPal responded with a voluminous reply that didnt do anything to answer my complaint. In fact, this e-mail says that if I have no money to make a payment, PayPal will e-mail me about it immediatelynot after the due date. Then why didnt they? Thats right, it was because I had the money in my bank accountbut PayPal chose not to use it. So I responded, Then close my account. This reply has absolutely nothing to do with what I asked, and it's obvious PayPal is too incompetent for me to trust with my money. But that was minutes after I tried closing it myselfwhich didnt work. I finally was able to close it, and when the website asked me why, I said, You folks are absolutely incompetent.

What do you expect from PayPal, whose parent company eBay hired a Tea Party idiot like Meg Whitman? May the majority of their TV sets become Mountain Dewified.
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