The Politics of Food

So I went to Panera Bread today, to get some soup bowl bullshit for my assistant. I've avoided Panera so far, despite its rapid growth out of nowhere, because new things make me uncomfortable and I hate to spend money on food that may or may not suck. However, I've been there twice this week (both times picking up food for someone else) and I have to say this: Fuck Panera Bread. Fuck them right up their tight, pretensious asses.

See, now I'm pissed off about politics and culture because a fucking fast food chain tried to make me feel inferior. I'm not inferior to you, sandwich joint. I am superior. Because I have a dick and thumbs and money to burn somewhere else.

Let me explain that, it was a bunch of nonsense.

When you think of a person identified as "a liberal" what do you picture? I would bet dollars to dimes it was one of two things. Either a tall, slim, perhaps vaguely ethnic (but probably more white than not) male with too much money and a flowery tongue. The kind of man that is intelligent, intellectual, charming, and maybe just a little bit too rich. He's confident bordering on arrogant. That, or you pictured an uneducated, hemp wearing, jobless loser that smells like patchouli and failure.

Now, picture "a conservative". I'll bet it was a stodgy old man, white of course, maybe with just the hint of a southern drawl, again probably too rich and well dressed. He misses the way things were "back in the day", hates fun and has a summer home somewhere along the coast of God's Waiting Room. That, or he was a redneck halfwit sporting a camo hat and an entire wardrobe purchased from Army surplus stores, missing at least half his front teeth, and swilling lukewarm Coors Light (despite it being clearly intended for cold consumption).

Here's the problem with those things, aside from the fact that you're picturing people at the opposite end of the socio-economic spectrum regardless of which political alignment you look at: You're fucking wrong.

You're fucking wrong, because there is no difference between those two. Their beleifs are so close together they could fingerblast each other. The real difference between the two is, and quite frankly always has been, who gets more power in making laws. That's it. The rest is just bullshit.

The real differences exist in the people themselves and the kind of horseshit they'll put up with. Go to a small town diner. Like the one here in Milford. Fox News is on every television. There are pictures of Regan and Bush Jr. (and Sr. come to think on it) just fucking everywhere. If you walk in there wearing denim and a t-shirt, nobody bats and eye. If you walk in there looking like a colored person, they might look up. If you walk in there with a septum piercing and death metal bandshirt, they might chuckle. These are just people eating. The owners and the managers are the ones promoting all the bullshit on the walls. Maybe a handful of regulars. The rest of them don't really care. Unless you strike up a conversation. Then, they'll ram all their cracker-jack fucking ideas down your throat until you regurgitate the Tea Party.

That's actually something I appreciate about conservatives. They're mostly, well conservative. They don't bring it up until you do. And you do. Because you're a liberal. And that makes you kind of an asshole. Again, this is a difference in people ( by and large, there are clearly exceptions).

Now leave that diner and walk into Starbucks. Try not to kill yourself. Hear that bullshit music they're playing? Some fuck-off indie pseudo-rock that sounds somewhat like a wild boar fucking a guitar? See all those funny words on the menu that might be English, or Italian, or just a crock of shit somebody made up? Take a deep breath through your nose. Really let that pretension sink in. Try to lock eyes with the guy in the horn-rimmed glasses with the Mac laptop in the corner, pretending to work on his novel and surreptitiously glaring at you for not already admiring what a fucking literary genius he must be just by nearing his essence. If you hang out there for more than ten minutes, I guarantee someone will start talking to you. And what do they want to talk about? Probably politics.

Punch that guy right in the throat and leave.

Now, there is something in there I appreciate about liberals. They are, for the most part, concise and blunt. They tend to use facts to their advantage (while insisting time and again that they are, in all reality, facts if somewhat skewed toward their own opinions). They tend to avoid slipping into name-calling and scare tactics (although they are still using the tried and true blame-the-other-guy method). I appreciate a logical argument. Just not when I'm trying to eat.

I'm not really sure where I wanted to go with this, and i'm sure I've gotten off-topic, if I ever had a topic.

My point is this: if you identify yourself as 'liberal' or 'conservative' and you don't fit into those stereotypes I mentioned above, you are a jackass. That should be your political affiliation. Jackass. Don't simply mold your beleifs into an already established (however vaguely) set of ideals. Create your own. Be an individual.

And for fuck's sake stay away from my food.

Yours,
-S.R.

Friends With Benefits

Be wary, I mean to talk about sex for a bit. I know, you're apalled. You're shocked to your toenails. Let me assure you this will be lengthy and uncomfortable.

Let me also preamble the whole she-bang (hah!) with a few things. Most importantly the phrase "friends with benefits" and how, despite now using it twice in a single piece, it makes me want to strangle someone with my bare hands. The most significant benefit a person can bring into my life is simply being my friend. I don't have many, because I don't have what I'd call casual friends. I have a group of people, more than a handful and less than a flock, that have become friends. These people are dear to me and, unfortunately for them, there's no turning back. I will go to great lengths for those people without exception, and gladly scrape the very bottom of my coffers (or closets) to help them should the need arise.

Smaller than that, and closer, are a few individuals that are dearer to me than all the other treasures this world has to offer, and for them I would snatch stars out of the sky if it helped to make one moment of their lives just the smallest bit brighter. So, in that way, "friends with benefits" is sort of a redundant phrase. Being my friend is a benefit, at least for me. I understand that friendship (which is another word I dislike, because it hardly seems sufficient to define those relationships) with me can be somewhat intense and I do try, though not as often as I should, to illustrate that there are boundaries and I'm not just trying to attract people for my own narcissistic reasons. But then, at least those small few in my tiny inner circle seem to have grasped that without my saying it. For that, I am sincerely grateful.

That said, the very second you tell me I'm in "the Friend Zone" is the very second you cease to be my friend.

I don't say this because I'm in any way upset that someone in the wide, wide world wouldn't go to bed with me. Make no mistake, I'm as certain of that fact as I am of anything. The thing that offends me about this Friend Zone horseshit is that you're assuming things on my part that, quite frankly, are probably untrue. You're assuming I want to fuck you badly enough that I've been nice to you all this time. You're assuming that's the entire basis of our friendship. Otherwise, why go out of your way to insist it will never happen? Are you clairvoyant, or just being a fucking twat? How do you know the future? See, things like that urge me to actually lose all that weight I keep joking about. Not because it would make me happy to be thinner, but because I know with a ripped body and my knack for charming words I could literally bed everyone that's ever scorned me in this way. And then promptly destroy them. That would make me fucking happy.

To me, outright denying that you could ever be brought to my level is like branding 'SHALLOW CUNT' across your forehead. I didn't ask. I didn't pursue. And now, I want to drown you in a sink full of lye.

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people I have neither the desire nor the intention of climbing into bed with, but I wouldn't reject the simple idea that it was possible. Because I'm not an asshole.

Clearly, for my married friends or those of you who are otherwise occupied, I'm not asking that you be willing to get a seedy motel and bang away while your wife or husband or boyfriend or goat is off on a business trip. I'm all for fidelity so long as you're happy (and as long as that goat isn't a total douchebag). And I'll stress that I'm not asking for a show of hands among my friends of who is totally down to make the beast with two backs right now, tonight (although, I wouldn't exactly ignore that show of hands, either). In addition, I am well aware that other people aren't as...Whitman-esque about their interpersonal relationships as I've found I am.

But for fuck's sake, you've tolerated all of the bullshit I regularly dish out and you're saying there's no way you'd do me? Nigga, please.

I love you, dearly, in ways I cannot readily describe. At least, not with any sort of sense, and not in any way that wouldn't reaffirm whatever misguided beleifs you may already have despite my infrequent assurances that I am not, simply put, putting the moves on you. If such a thing comes to pass, then so be it. There is no reason two functioning adults can't be friends and lovers and nothing more. In reality, there is nothing more. The rest is all obligation and finances to me, and I'm in no condition for any of those things. I'm willing to meet you halfway. I've already made a more significant commitment in calling you my friend than just about anyone else has ever made. That isn't arrogance, that's genuine adoration and a sincere desire to make you, all of you, as happy as is humanly possible with all of the skills and tools in my possession. I have a way with words, on occasion, but I have a very real, very physically intimate side that isn't exactly normal. It isn't exactly perverse either.

In all seriousness, this "Friend Zone" thing bothers me because it feels like a judgement and, honestly, if you're good enough to judge me then I'm too good to be your friend.

Now, show of hands, who wants a mustache ride?

Ridiculously Yours,
-S.R.