Black Belt Jesus

I was in the gym today, inflicting the regular Saturday chest workout on myself, when I noticed this bloke in a T-shirt with the words "New Life Martial Arts - Kicking for Christ" on the back. Really? I'm not into the WWJD (What Would Jesus Do) thing, but among the many possibilities that my limited biblical education would suggest, kicking someone's head in doesn't figure very highly. I seem to recall he was more your "turn the other cheek" kind of guy, rather than "you karate do or you karate no do, Daniel-san". Maybe I missed the bit where he backfisted a centurion before spin-kicking another and double-punching a third, all while naked from the waist up and displaying his rock-hard abs. It must have been in one of the Gnostic gospels I suppose, along with the parable of the nunchuks and the broken teeth.

The bloke in question was clearly a twat. Not just because he looked like a twat, but I saw him last week with his shirt off, flexing and posing in the mirror. This isn't something you see much in our gym (in fact he's the first I've observed actually take his shirt off to do it - we have a relatively low cunt-to-normal person ratio as a rule) and he's obviously a big fan of the tanning booth too. So in addition to kicking heads in for Christ he's also got the not-insignificant sin of pride to overcome. More than pride, actually - pompous, self-love would be more like it.

Isn't it amazing when you look at a lot of religious people how few of their natural desires have to be sacrificed to their beliefs? Just by attaching the words "for Christ" to the back end of any hobby or pastime it's instantly rendered holy. Want a new younger wife? Or three? Want to be able to have sex with underage girls? Welcome to the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints church - we're fucking kids for Christ. Want to be fabulously wealthy, live in a mansion and fly around in a private jet? Welcome to the new world of Prosperity Theology, just leave your large donation in the envelope provided. I'm driving a Ferrari for Christ. Fuck off! It's bullshit - you can tell all you need to know about people by watching how they behave. Sticking a fish on the back of your Porsche, or claiming that you're giving Lap Dances for Christ doesn't get you in the Fast Lane to holiness.

I'm fine with the whole martial arts thing of course - even Christian martial arts, I suppose. I just find the whole idea of attaching a deity to the back end to be laughable. At least it's all pretty harmless stuff, compared to Islam. How about blowing up buses for Allah? Beheading hostages for Allah? Keeping women brainwashed and wrapped up in stupid black robes with only their eyes showing for Allah? Honor-killing your daughter for Allah?

All sorts of things that any normal person in a civilized society would regard as vile and reprehensible have to be tolerated simply because someone is doing them in the name of their particular god. Let's drain the blood out of this goat while it's alive and suffering, because our god said so. Let's cut the foreskin off this tiny baby because our god said so. Yeah, "Mutilating Babies for Jehovah". Don't think I'll be seeing that on a T-shirt any time soon.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Equipment Excess

For many millenia, since our ancestors came down from the trees in fact, our species has been for the most part bipedal; that is to say, it has accomplished locomotion via its two hind legs. This seems to work pretty well as far as I can tell, and absent the influence of excessive alcohol intake, most of us find that we are able to navigate the terrain around us quite successfully. However, if you have been tempted to go for a walk in the country recently you might have observed the phenomenon of ramblers with what look like ski poles in each hand.

I'm sure these implements must have had a real function at some point in time, maybe for Scott as he was traversing the Antarctic or for Edmund Hillary making his way up the lower slopes of Everest to base camp. What I don't understand is how they suddenly became requisite equipment for a walk through a field to a tea shop. In the old days you might have seen some bloke with a walking stick in one hand as he strode over the hillside doing his best "One Man And His Dog" impression, but the stick was essentially ornamental, unlikely to be required for driving off predators. And at least it looked sort of "countryside", part of an ensemble that could be completed with a pipe, collie dog, beard and trilby.

Nowadays everyone's got to go to the "Outdoor Gear" retailer and get equipped for a major expedition before they feel they can leave the house for a walk. Better get the lightweight walking boots, Gore-tex jacket, breathable showerproof leggings, walking poles, GPS holder and silly hat - wouldn't want to be caught out unprepared in a rain shower would we? Might have to call out Helicopter Rescue to get us to the Little Chef for a pot of tea.

Yesterday the human race (or at least our local contingent) reached a new low. There was a middle-aged porky bloke walking past the local school dressed in full outdoor gear (walking boots, socks, hat, etc.) and using two poles to assist him in the difficult process of perambulation along the sodding pavement! There's nowehere nearby that would provide any excuse for "Everest Expedition" attire (at least nowhere that this fat fucker was going to reach), but rather than go for a walk as an anonymous person he chose to dress as conspicuously like an arsehole as possible. An arsehole on a mission.

Every hobby or pastime has its own specialist gear which appeals equally to the serious participant and the casual equipment fetishist. Some of us resist the temptation, usually because nature's own defence mechanism - shame - kicks in to prevent us humiliating ourselves by dressing like Wolf the Gladiator at the gym, Sherpa Tensing in the woods or Lance Armstrong when we're cycling to the pub. But there exists a significant subsegment of the population for whom "shame" is a foreign concept, along with "taste" or "moderation".

Lucky for Backcountry and REI that these people exist, because if they had to survive on the people who actually needed the products they sold to enable them to pursue their "extreme leisure" pursuits they'd be tiny specialist stores populated entirely by beardy weirdies and fitness bores. Of course it's the same with cars - when was the last time you saw a Trail-Rated Jeep Rubicon do more than drive over the grass verge or park on the field at the local fair?

Maybe walking poles are the modern incarnation of the Siberian Wandering Toilet, for use when you have to take a shit in the snowy wastelands. One pole is to hang your trousers on, and the other is to keep away the wolves. Perhaps they've been adapted for use in the suburban countryside - one stick to hang your Gore-tex breathable outerwear on, and another to keep other people's dogs from sniffing your arse while you take a dump. Just a suggestion...


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Scum Alert

It has been observed that car buying is one of the least pleasant experiences most people will have the displeasure to endure, and this is to no small extent because of all the cunts you meet along the way. Generally they work in sales, and although there are undoubtedly some very pleasant, honorable car salesmen out there (somewhere), in general you would be hard pressed to find a bigger bunch of devious, lying twisters.

I don't know about the UK, but here in the US you are better off avoiding the car-lot sales experience altogether by contacting the internet sales department at each dealer. The idea is that these people just field internet requests and they respond with simple quotes, usually much better than you'd get from the bloke on the forecourt because they are dealing with so many enquiries from people who are clearly comparing quotes between dealers that they need to be competitive, and they can't hard-sell you by e-mail.

So Mrs Bison decided that she wanted the Honda; I set to work e-mailing about 10 local Honda dealers and asking for their quote. Almost all of them responded quickly with a quote, but one just sent me a note inviting me to come in and show them what price I got from someone else so they could beat it. Yeah, right. When I followed up and stated that, no, I wanted a quote, I got an e-mail which included the following delights:

"The Internet Department at [Wanker Honda] operates completely different than any Honda Dealer! We have the lowest processing / documentation fees. Just $99 compared to $149 - $250. So you can see that your short drive to see me (2 minutes from Chesterfield Valley) is already putting $49 or more in your pocket. And this is of course before I get started on the best possible "Internet Price". I'm serious when I tell that I don't get beat by the other dealers when presented with a written quote."

Only a complete retard would fail to spot the obvious flaw here - since all dealers pay the same price then sure, this clown will "beat" the offer you get from anyone else, but only just. He won't participate in the process - won't even give you a price quote of his own, so why the fuck should I give him the last look? That privilege is reserved for the local dealer who did the test drive. And the processing fee? It's pure bullshit. Most dealers add one on but it's just an attempt to pad their margins. His "deal" is basically "I'll only fuck you three inches up your arse instead of six". The pitch goes on:

"...so in otherwords are you willing to drive all over town for the best possible deal because of an e-mail that you received stated one thing and after driving to purchase what you thought was the best deal actually was a bait and switch. [Wanker] Honda has the best selection of vehicles! If you view my website you will see that we have the cars in stock. When I say in stock I mean on my lot! One of the local Honda Dealers is showing cars on their website that they don't have or just coming in. The sales people and Internet Department were telling the buyer that they had the car! Then when they arrive the car wasn't there. They try to up-sale you to another model of car."

OK, spot the professional selling approach and fine grammar (if you can). This is the new car sales department and all I've done is request a price THROUGH HONDA'S OWN WEBSITE! In response I get this load of ill-written bollocks. It just gets better:

"At [Wanker Honda] we add the least amount of equipment to our vehicles. In most cases our customers want certain items. We put together a "Protection Package" and charge a small fee for it. One of our fellow Honda Dealers charges $895 for the same equipment that we charge $299 for."

Again with the rubbishing of the competition! And as for the "least amount of equipment", let's try zero. That's right, don't put any of the overpriced shit on the vehicle. It already comes "well-equipped" and I'll buy it "raw" thank you very much (just the way the other dealers quoted it) because I know the $299 is just to pad your margins again.

Bear in mind that I know the invoice price the dealer pays, plus I know that they have a 2% holdback on top. If there were any dealer cash incentives or rebates I'd know that too. I know what other people are paying, from internet research, and I know that I'll stand a better chance of a good deal at month-end when someone will be trying to hit their numbers. However it won't be at "Wanker Honda", where their "internet" sales department won't even quote you. This, by the way, is Honda, who I had alleged in my last post to be one of the better auto manufacturers when it comes to managing the dealer experience. Apparently not in all cases...

So I called "Wanker Honda" today and they still wouldn't give me a price, except to say that it would be between "MSRP and invoice" which means nothing, since only a moron would pay MSRP and almost no-one is likely to get below invoice on a new model Honda. They did say they would beat any price I brought in (documentation required) but when I asked by how much, they responded that if it was a good price they might only match it, not beat it. Hmmm. Seems like a bait and switch to me. In fact I'd be inclined to follow the only good piece of advice that "Wanker Honda" included in their e-mail:

"My question to you is ...... would you purchase a car from a dealer that lies to you from the beginning?"

And my answer to you is "No, motherfucker, I wouldn't."


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

The Hard Sell

Yesterday was spent trolling around car dealerships down on Manchester Road, looking for potential new vehicles for Mrs Bison, on account of her old Nissan Altima being a - what's the correct term? - ah yes, piece of shit. We had some idea what would be worth looking at but the purpose of the trip was to narrow that list down. After all, everything looks great in a two-inch square photograph on your computer but unless it's a Pontiac Aztek it's not until you stand next to some of these things that you really appreciate how ugly/plasticky/crap they are.

Times are hard in the US auto market. The credit crunch has slowed down the flood of people buying cars they don't need (with money they don't have) to a trickle, and a lot of dealerships are hurting for business. This is Memorial Day weekend so a lot of them had their lots festooned with balloons, and free hot dogs for potential customers. We didn't call at all of them but when you pulled up at most you could see the salespeople gazing hungrily at you, as though you were fresh meat and they were a starving carnivore. The scene was depressing - rain-soaked asphalt with blue and red balloons blowing sadly in the wind and a smoking hot dog grill; hardly a customer to be seen. You would barely be out of your car before they'd be on you. One dealer had construction going on and their lot resembled a building site, so they were billing this as a "Special Construction Sale". Any excuse...

Of course there were exceptions - some manufacturers just do a better job of putting out good product and managing their dealer experience. At Honda, for instance, there were no tacky balloons or "Memorial Day weekend sale - everything must go!" signs, but plenty of customers.

By the end of the day we were ready to test drive a couple of things. The hungry salesman at one dealership accompanied us on the drive and when we returned he attempted to close the deal. Apparently their General Manager was there to make sure "all deals went through". In spite of my pointing out that we hadn't driven other potential options yet and therefore had not decided to buy this one, let alone to buy it from him, he continued to press us to buy it. I'm not sure whether this reflected his stupidity, or that of his usual clientele, some of whom would presumably fold at this point and buy something.

He kept pointing out features and trying to see what it would take to get us to buy. I pointed out that there was nothing he could offer that would make me buy without more reseach.

"What do you need to know?"
"If I decide to buy this I'll put it out for bids through the internet to make sure I know what the real best price is, and I'll check dealer rebates."
"Why? All the dealers get the same price so we can do anything they can do. We'll beat any price."
"Sure you can, but until I know what that price is, what's the point of negotiating?"
"We'll give you the best price."
"And how will I know that? Will I just trust you to be kind to me?"
"I'll show you the paperwork, what we paid for it and everything."
(This works on some people who don't understand about dealer incentives, holdback, etc, but I wasn't going to get into a debate about it.)
"No. If I decide to buy this I'll come back when I have the information I need and then we'll talk."

Obviously he couldn't just let us walk off.

"I'll just have to go inside and tell my boss and the General Manager"

This usually results in someone in a less cheap suit and cufflinks coming out to repeat the same sales pitch over again, so I gave the salesman some advice.

"No problem - you do what you have to do. Just understand that if they come out and try to put the hard sell on me I'm going to tell them to piss off. OK?"

Not surprisingly no-one came out. We then went to the Honda dealer and drove something nicer that didn't come with a pushy cunt attached. This morning Bison Daughter proceeded over breakfast to put the bite into us about how we needed the EX-L model with the leather. She exhibited a level of persistence and reasoning that was quite remarkable for a ten year-old; I think she picked it up from the dealers yesterday. Certainly she doesn't miss much - her closing argument was: "You may as well pay the extra for the EX-L because you said putting money in the stock market is like pissing it down the toilet." Makes you proud...

By the way, I found this Car Dealer Confessions gem today which is absoultely on the mark. In fact I actually had someone years ago ask me for my watch as a deposit when I was buying a used car. Now him I did tell to piss off.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Ride 'Em Cowboy

Half the news this last week seems to have been devoted to the decision by the California Supreme Court to overturn laws that forbid recognition of same sex marriages. In other words "you can't stop two blokes marrying each other because it's not fair". What complete bollocks. It's amazing that what started out decades ago as the plea to "just decriminalize what two consenting adults do in the privacy of their own homes" has now become the strident demand that we all join in pretending that two men or two women should be able to get "married" and this should be regarded as "normal". We can't have brides and grooms anymore, it might offend all the gays, so we'll have to change all the traditions that have endured for millenia to pander to this politically correct bullshit pantomime. Fuck off.

Why are we supposed to pretend that wanting to bone another man in the arse is normal? Being acceptable and being normal are two very different things. I mean, I've heard it said that we shouldn't discriminate against someone simply because they are oriented to fancy their own sex, and that's great, but have you seen the gay pride marches? Those people are fucking weirdos. Thousands of freaks and semi-naked people dressed up in leather gear with studs. And assless chaps. Is that what being gay is about? There are apparently numbers of other men, who dress up in women's panties and practice auto-erotic strangulation while they pull themselves off - fine, knock yourselves out, I support your right to do it. But I don't expect you to force the schools to teach kids that it's just another normal choice. "Hey kids - you ever wanted to wrap a piece of electrical flex around your neck and jerk off while you turn blue? No, you're not abnormal. It's just part of growing up - we all do it, dude."

If the so-called gay community really wants to be treated just like any "normal" segment of society why don't they act normal? You don't see me and my heterosexual mates all getting on a float in Times Square and dancing around telling everyone how much we like to shag women, do you? "Yeah, hetero pride! We like tits and vaginas! And watching football!" Wouldn't be allowed, for a start; we're not supposed to be proud, remember?

Now in the hierarchy of "victimhood" the whole gay and transgender thing seems to be the trump card. Take the story about the muslim woman who wanted a female driving instructor but was sent a bloke in a skirt. He had a certificate stating that he was a woman, and his birth certificate had been changed to make him female, but he also, very crucially, had a penis. Look at the photo for fuck's sake - it's a bloke. Now the woman's husband is being criticized for complaining! Listen carefully, motherfuckers, if you have a penis you're a man. If you cut it off you're still a man, only now you're a man with no penis. This isn't rocket science, so don't insult our intelligence with all this pseudo-psychological mumbo jumbo. These people are mentally ill, that fact should be readily apparent. I would have thought that the desire to have your dick cut off and its skin turned inside out and shoved up you would practically be a diagnostic test for insanity, one of those "now we know for sure" indicators that someone's gone utterly looney tunes.

Anyway, this week a secretary was asked by one of my colleagues to find something by way of entertainment for a team meeting in Dallas. They suggested a rodeo so she searched for rodeos in Dallas on the internet, and up popped this homo-rodeo. She didn't quite believe it so she clicked on the link and sure enough there were two naked blokes in cowboy hats. What the fuck is wrong with you people? Why do gays need special rodeos? When I go out I can watch a football game, have dinner, sit around and talk with friends, see a movie, or any one of a dozen other things, and never once think to myself "Oh, wait, I'm heterosexual. Let me see if there's a special heterosexual burger available at this place". If sexuality really doesn't matter then what's with the gay rodeo? Unless it's all assless chaps, YMCA costumes, Freddie Mercury moustaches and anonymous anal sex?

At the end of the day this isn't about disliking gays. (I won't give you the "some of my best friends are gay" line because it wouldn't be true, at least as far as I can tell...) But don't tell me that a man in a dress is a woman, and don't send two men down the aisle and expect me not to laugh. Out here in the real world all that bullshit just doesn't fly.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Just Lie Back And Relax

Today was one of the two scariest days of the year. It was time to go to the dentist. I don't know exactly when this stopped being a minor event and was transformed into a full-scale, R-rated, fear-fest but I think it goes back to when I was a kid. Back in the good old days our mum would take us every four months to Mr Wilberforce, who would look at my teeth, tell me they were OK and send me on my merry way. Then for some reason he fucked off and we got this psychopathic cunt called Kilroy who started drilling holes in them. I vividly remember him one time filling a large molar and telling me in advance that since it was not a deep cavity I wouldn't need an anaesthetic injection. "If you start to feel pain just put your hand up and I'll stop."

So he started drilling and it started hurting; I put my hand up. "No, it's not hurting - I haven't gone that far yet." He drilled some more (did I mention that he was a cunt?) and I put my hand up again. "Not much more to do now - it's not worth stopping." And so on, until he finished. I think I must have been about eleven. If I could track down Mr Kilroy today I swear I'd put him on the ground, step on his bollocks and ask him to put his hand up when it started to hurt. "No, I don't think it hurts yet - I don't have my full weight on them. Let's try this. Cunt." At least he knew how to put in a filling - that bastard's still in there.

When I left home I pretty much avoided going to the dentist unless I did something stupid like drunkenly breaking a tooth. (There was this party trick involving biting a chunk out of a beer can that seemed a lot more sensible when my brain was suspended in alcohol.) Coming to the US didn't help because everyone here is brought up to be a tooth-nazi, with a pathological obsession with straight, white teeth; I, meanwhile, subscribe to the Austin Powers school of seduction - never mind the teeth, it's all in the accent, baby. The first time Mrs Bison went to the dentist here he replaced every filling in her head and I thought "Fuck that - if he sees my teeth he'll be planning a new BMW". Consequently I left it about eight years between visits. And I didn't floss either.

Mrs Bison subsequently found this really friendly dentist and eventually I was persuaded to go, just for a check-up. Now life isn't fair, so apologies to all you poor bastards whose teeth require caps, bridges and extensive underpinning, but I escaped with just a bloody enormous descale and clean. And it's been like that every visit since (only with smaller cleanings - it really helps if you don't leave it eight years between examinations). Nevertheless I still dread going to the dentist. I hate sitting in the chair and opening my gob so he can start working his way down the line with his little poky metal stick, prodding and scratching, looking for decay. I dread having to have a filling, or having to have one replaced. (They're all more than 25 years old now, so it can only be a matter of time, surely?)

I don't need sedation, gas or tranquilizer darts, but the feeling of walking out and knowing I don't need to go for six more months is pure joy. And these are the most friendly, kind people you could wish to have fuck with your teeth. It doesn't make much sense - I'll willingly go into the gym (which is almost next door to the dentist) and do squats, which are an exercise in total body pain, and are doubtless screwing with my joints, but the moment that whiny drill thing gets near my teeth I lose all my sense of humor. It's just a different kind of pain, I suppose.

Anyway, I've seen Marathon Man, so don't tell me not to be a big pussy. I have a feeling Mr Kilroy saw it too. Probably many times. So put your hand up if you enjoy going to the dentist. Yeah, thought not.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison
Sweetshop Dentist Image Copyright © T.Anderson

Dead Cat Club

While I'm fully aware that I'm living in a country where a significant segment of the population can be accurately defined as "having more money than sense" (and in many cases very little of either), every so often something happens to remind me just how vacuous so many of my fellow US denizens are. There was some story on the local news tonight about adult canine cell therapy, some highly expensive treatment for arthritis in old dogs which is aimed squarely at the "nothing's too good for Fido" brigade. I can't really describe the treatment because I didn't watch the whole story - I had a rather more pressing appointment, consuming the curried flesh of a chicken with rice and a naan. Nevertheless it makes you wonder about the kind of people we live with when you hear crap like that.

This whole business of pets amazes me - people will come up with almost limitless ways of lavishing affection and care on a dog or a cat, out of all proportion to what it is. I grew up with pets and we liked them. The dog was an untrainable food-vacuum, given to consuming anything within reach, including birthday cake, lard, horse excrement and its own vomit, but it was still our dog (except when it shit on the carpet; then it suddenly became mum's dog). The cat had few redeeming features, unless one includes sticking its pink anus in your face when it jumped on your lap, bringing up furballs while you were eating or dismembering a mouse in the living room. There's no excuse for mistreating a pet but then again there's no excuse for being the kind of sad motherfucker who refers to their animals as "four legged kids". No-one who has had a child (at least no-one who's suitable) could possibly look at a fucking cat and equate it with a kid.

I knew I could rely on my mate Peter for a well-adjusted view on cats. He won't even consider dating a woman who has a cat, regarding it as the single most reliable indicator of inane stupidity in a female. Women who have cats sleeping in their beds are to be avoided, period. (I'll let him add his own particular take on this subject if he wishes - I'm sure I won't do it justice.) Anyway, today Peter sent me a link to the Pet Angel Memorial Center; below is a quote:

"We started the business because I don't have two-legged children," Pet Angel Memorial owner Colleen Ellis said. "All I have is four-legged children and I wanted her treated in the same way as the human funeral business."

Note that this establishment offers a whole suite of services to the bereaved pet owner, including viewing areas and memorial services. Viewing areas? You're shitting me, right? People are going to be invited to parade past a dead cat lying in state, dabbing sensitively at the corner of their eye with a linen handkerchief, all the time trying desperately hard to resist the temptation to start reciting the "Dead Parrot Sketch"?

“My girls lovingly called Presley the cat their “older sister”, after all, she was here long before they were. When she died, it was tough, we truly lost a member of our family that day. I was struggling with my emotions while supporting my kids through, what for them, was their first experience of losing a loved one. I was so glad someone was there to help me personally, and as a mother, get through a pretty rough time.”

Granted, you liked the cat. The kiddies were a bit upset that it met its maker - no surprise there. But spare me the "it's the end of the world - I don't know how I could cope" speech. What utter fucking bollocks. There is a world out there full of people being beaten, raped, stabbed, tortured, abused and killed. Every day that I wake up in my happy safe world I should be out of my mind with joy that it's not me. If you can't cope with your cat dying maybe you should get a little fucking perspective. Go out into the garden, dig a hole and bury it. Say your goodbyes and hope that a fox doesn't dig it up and leave it half-eaten on your lawn. That's the traditional way. Fuck's sake - if it's a fish you're just supposed to flush it away - does the funeral home have a ceremony where they place Goldie in the bottom of the pan and then pull the chain? Do the mourners file past to make sure he hasn't popped back up from round the u-bend?

Yeah, you can call me Captain Insensitive, but at least I won't be picking little turds out of a sandbox tomorrow, or walking down the road with a plastic baggie full of dogshit in one hand. And for those of you still looking for Miss Right, I don't care if she has tits like cherry-topped delights and is completely shaven, even if you haven't had it in months, if she expects you to share the bed with Mr Whiskers I suggest you move on. It's the right thing to do.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Half Way House

As every bloke knows, there are two kinds of lesbian in the world. There are the really attractive ones who look like women and who we all like to watch getting it on. (Don't pretend that you don't - I've never met any bloke ever who didn't appreciate a little girl-on-girl. It's as natural as liking motorbikes.) And then there are those other ones. You know, the ones that are all hairy, two hundred pounds, with crew cuts, Doc Marten boots and a desire to crush your penis underfoot. The subject is somewhat topical as the redheaded one from Sex and the City turned into a lesbian and pictures of her with her "partner" were in the news because the movie opened.

[Please note that any man who attends this movie under any circumstances will be required to hand in their testicles and undergo gender reassignment, as they will officially become a woman.]

Now I never got the whole Sex and the City thing - a bunch of ageing, neurotic, spoiled, shoe-obsessed New York bints looking for Mr Right - and I have to say that in a "who would I shag" list, of the four I'd have the redhead and Sarah Jessica Camelface in a photofinish for last place. Nevertheless she did at least look like a woman; her partner, from the picture I saw, is considerably more masculine.

Why do lesbians do this? Invariably in any couple there's one pretty one but she's hooked up with a boot-faced, broad-shouldered, big-boned harridan who looks uncannily like she's trying to be a man (maybe by smoking a pipe or having no breasts). This doesn't make any sense to me. I can relate to lesbianism on one level - I mean, I like women too, so I understand the physical part - but if you really fancy women why hook up with something that's obviously nearly a bloke. A man-substitute, if you like. What's the big attraction then? It's like the same thing, only without a penis, and that just means you have to invest in a plastic strap-on instead of taking advantage of what nature provided. In most lesbian couples there seems to be one "man" and one "woman". It's like "I don't want a bloke but I really like plaid shirts, hairy legs and heavy shoes so I'm going to shoot for a half-way option". If you're happy to wake up next to some gigantic snoring hairy-chested lump, does it really make it better if they don't have a built-in prick and balls?

This stuff can cause real problems. The Caliente Cab Restaurant in New York City just paid out $35,000 to settle a lawsuit from a lesbian who was eating there with her partner (after having marched in a gay pride event) and was refused entry to the women's restroom by a bouncer who was convinced that she was a man. This "woman" was dressed like a man - what was the bouncer supposed to do? You let a bloke into the women's restroom and all hell will be let loose, with claims for damages for emotional distress and harrassment. Seems to me that if you don't want to be mistaken for a bloke you shouldn't dress up as one. If a bloke shaves his legs and goes prancing down the street in an off the shoulder black dress and a pair of Manolo Blahniks he can hardly complain if someone things he's a woman, can he?

Apparently the Transgender Legal Defence and Education Fund filed the lawsuit. Well thanks a lot, you fucking weird bastards. Now we'll have blokes in the ladies room and men in dresses whipping it out at the urinal (assuming it hasn't been cut off yet), all in the name of political correctness.

Oh well, I think I'll stick with my version of lesbianism for now. Just to reassure myself that I'm on the right track (and purely for research purposes) I typed "lesbian" into Google Images. And yes, "safe search" was off. It seems that Google agrees - all lesbians are young, pretty and very photogenic. Positively athletic too, by the look of some of the contortions. There were no women in plaid shirts or smoking a pipe, and none of these women stands any chance of being refused entry to the ladies room. And what's more, although they clearly are enthusiastic about shaving all sorts of things, none of them found it necessary to shave their heads. That's more like it...


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Watch Porn

The title isn't what you think - it's not an instruction or even a recommendation, but rather a reference to those color supplement advertisements from around 1978 with glossy pictures of the latest digital watches. I know I'm dating myself here but I remember the first time anyone came to school with a digital watch - it was one of those red LED watches that only showed the time when you pressed a button and I must have been about nine or ten years old. Soon after that the LCD watches came out, with the black letters on the grey background and I was hooked.

My parents used to get a Sunday newspaper which had a color supplement (I can still remember the smell of the ink) and there would be at least five color digital watch adverts in each week's edition. Around the peak of my interest, when I would have been about eleven, they typically had either an alarm or a chronograph (stopwatch to you and me, squire) and they cost about twenty UK pounds (or 19.99 to be exact). There was also this exceptionally cool one which had both an alarm and a chronograph, and I cut the picture of this one out of the magazine and kept it in my room, in spite of the fact that I knew there was no way my parents would spend the 29.95 pounds it cost.

So my Sundays invariably involved a few minutes perusal of the latest in "watch porn", since I had not at that age yet acquired access to real porn. I suppose had I had such access I may not have given the proverbial about whether my watch had an alarm or chronograph, or could even tell the time at all, but I guess we'll never know. In the end I got a Casio F100 for Christmas - it was black plastic and had a chronograph, which I used to play with in French lessons.


The problem with technology in those days was that it advanced so quickly that within very little time simple alarm/chrono watches were history and the new big thing was the calculator watch, mainly because it had loads more buttons. Unfortunately I'd used up my watch allowance and I stuck with the F100 until the black plastic straps cracked and fell off. That was another problem with technology - it was shite. Now fashion has gone full circle - digital watches were initially cool, but then became lame as people reverted to more classy analogue displays, and now they're cool again, so long as you get a chunky retro version.

At the same time as watch inflation was taking place, electronic calculator advances had transormed the humble green LED adding machine into a deg/rad/grad (what the fuck did they mean?) scientific beast, capable of more functions than the twelve year-old human brain could ever hope to harness (at least in our school). The most interesting calculator though was not the advanced scientific, or the chunky wedge-shaped Texas Instruments red LED monstrosity, but the Casio MG-880, the one with the game that you could play. This was the dog's bollocks - if you could get through levels eight and nine (I think) while hitting the high-scoring n symbols then you had style. In fact I think I can attribute my inability to this day to give one solitary fuck what Jean-Claude and Marie-France were doing "dans le jardin" to the corrosive influence of digital watches and calculator games. Those were wonderful times - kids today don't know what they missed.

Anyway, I'm going to see if I can find that 29.95 watch with the alarm and chrono that I always wanted. It'll be a collector's piece now, but at least it will have aged better than all the G-Plan furniture and Seventies music which were also in the color supplement. Of course, my very first edition of Rustler magazine would be a collector's item as well (circa 1981?) and I can still vividly remember Kitty in the center pages. Bet she didn't age as gracefully as the watch either - she'd be forty seven now. Or forty seven years, two months, eight days, five hours, three minutes and 27.02 seconds, according to my chronograph, but who's counting?



Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Gone But Not Forgotten, Yet

Today I'm mourning the loss of my workout buddy. He didn't die or anything - just moved away to Tampa, the lucky bastard, and he's been gone a couple of months already. Still, today's as good a day as any to remember him, partly because it was leg day in the gym and I really needed someone to give me a hard time about not putting more weight on the bar, and partly because he phoned me earlier, which elevated him to top of mind.

I've only had two workout buddies in the last decade, and they have to be selected carefully over time. This relationship is important and not to be entered into wantonly with just anyone who shows up at the gym. Jesus, I know people who've had more wives in that time. Obviously the role has a couple of basic requirements - he has to be able to spot you on the heavy weights and give you a combination of abuse and encouragement so that you'll try harder. It helps if he lifts similar amounts of weight as you, but it's also good if he kicks your arse on some exercises and vice versa, so there's always something to aim for.

So much for the basics - there should be any number of people who fit in that category so why are so few people suitable? Well, there are some other important characteristics:

• Not dressing in lycra or any other weird pansy clothing
  
• Wanting to work out at similar times of day as you
  
• Being the sort of person that you're happy to spend an hour or two with several times a week, that is to say with similar views on women, politics and life in general, but capable of shutting up and not talking all the fucking time
  
• Happy to check out the pretty girls in the gym, but ready to concentrate when you're lifting and you need him to spot you (we had a guy who lifted with us occasionally, when his wife allowed him out, who would be incapable of tearing his eyes away from women - you could have three hundred pounds stuck on your windpipe and he'd be gazing at some tits over the other side of the room)
  
• Not coming out with crap gym cliches like "it's all you"
  
• Not embarassing you by doing lame pansy squats or bench press that doesn't reach the chest
  
• Genuinely pleased when you hit a new personal best
  
• Good personal hygiene, i.e. doesn't smell like a three week old corpse or have breath like a dog's flatulence
  
• Comes with excellent stories of sexual excess through which you can live vicariously
  
• Won't puss out of coming to the gym because his girlfriend wants to do something on Saturday morning. (Typically girlfriends will test a bloke at some point to see if they are a higher priority than his workout - it's a control thing.)
  
• Not being a steroid user
  
• Not being a twat
  
• Not wearing shorts so that his junk is hanging over your head when he's spotting you on the bench
  
• Laughing out loud with you at the weird fuckers who show up at the gym
  

I'm sure that's not an exhaustive list but it gives you some idea why there are so few people around who you'd want to count as a gym buddy. In fact I've decided that it would just be easier to move to Tampa than find a new one, a decision made all the more potentially attractive by another day of wind, rain, tornadoes and generally piss-poor Missouri weather.

Anyway, the gym was pretty empty today. There was the strange bloke in the matching lycra outfit, but there was no-one to look at and communicate with one raised eyebrow the question "what the fuck is wrong with him?" The blonde trainer with the great arse was in as well, but there was no-one there to notice and let you know with just a slight incline of the head that he'd be very happy to have her stand over him on the bench and maybe sit on his face. Yep, life at the old gym just got much duller. I'm keeping up the routine, though, because when I eventually get down to visit Tampa I'm not going to be the one taking abuse for lifting like a giant puff...


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Not Worth The Wait

I've lived in St.Louis long enough to realise that we have one of the shittest airports in the civilized world. It wasn't that long ago that your only option for food inside security was a tiny Taco Bell counter with about six tables outside, and it's not much better now. Fortunately, since I live here, I have the option to leave if things get ugly, but there's one way in which the airport can screw me regardless. It's the baggage claim. I try hard never to check a bag, for all sorts of reasons - it can be lost, ripped up (thank you, New Delhi airport) or covered in unidentified liquids - but the worst part about checking a bag is that on returning to St.Louis, instead of walking straight out of the airport and heading home, I have to wait around at the convenience of the useless bastards who run this piss-hole of a terminal.

Yesterday I got off the plane at 6pm. My luggage came through on the carousel at 7pm. I know there are way worse stories of luggage delays (step forward anyone who's traveled through Heathrow Terminal 5) but the thing is that other airports are designed to get you your bag much faster. If you have to wait it means they fucked up. At St.Louis this is as good as it gets - an hour wait means that everything is working fine. Forget about attracting new employers to the city - their first experience of St.Louis will be standing in a morass of obese humanity, milling around one of two carousels, waiting for a bag that never comes. By contrast my outbound flight was to San Diego - I just had time to walk to the carousel and withing two minutes my bag was there. And it's not just smaller airports either - Chicago O'Hare, one of the busiest airports in the world, can have my bag waiting when I get through immigration. If St.Louis ran O'Hare you'd be timing your bags with a fucking calendar.

The saddest part of this whole thing was that the bag I checked was golf clubs. I hardly ever play golf, am shit at golf, hate people who talk about golf and refuse to dress like a golf wanker. Nevertheless I recognize that given the occasional need to play it for business it would be better if I were capable of hitting the stupid ball more than twenty yards off the tee, and approximately forwards, so I decided to bring my own (cheap) clubs in order to remove one of the possible sources of varability in my game. Big mistake. I played two games and while the first one could be described as "poor but with occasional decent shots" the second was clearly in the category of "absolute gash - shite of the highest order" or "would have done better to kick the ball forwards - what a twat". I may as well have left my clubs at home and got back an hour of my life at baggage claim.

What made the whole thing worse was that my designated cart partner during the "utter shite" game was one of those "serious" golfers with perfect attire. He looked like he'd just stepped out of the pages of a golf fetishist's catalogue - he even had his name monogrammed on his bag, for fuck's sake. It was like pairing a thoroughbred racehorse with a blind, three-legged donkey. Every time I stepped up to the ball I tried to remember the sequence of movements that made it go forwards, but invariably I ended up hitting it a pathetic distance, or sideways, or in the water. In fact my first shot off the tee was a pathetic distance sideways shot into a lake; I should have taken the hint and just fucked off back to the hotel there and then. I couldn't even bring myself to exchange light-hearted banter with the refreshment cart wench - I didn't have the right. I felt like I had "Total Cunt" indelibly printed on my forehead.

And the more I played like the proverbial wet fanny the more I wanted to beat my playing partner to death with an iron. (It would have to be an iron - I had already effectively demonstrated that I couldn't even hit the ground with a wood.) It wasn't his fault, but he ponced around, hitting his expensive clubs huge distances in perfect straight lines. And then he made the almost-fatal mistake. He gave me some advice. Well thank you Mr La-Di-Da Golf Weenie, please critique my pathetic attempts at this most important of games. (I won't say sports, because it isn't one.) How about we try one of my games? Like weightlifting, or shooting, or soccer, or karate. Yes, how about hand-to-hand combat, right here by the - whatever it's called - tee box or green or fairway thingy. Come on motherfucker, have a go. Let's see how far your perfect back-swing gets you then.

Of course I maintained appropriate decorum and finished out the round as befits a professional. If I could just have got him to stand at right angles to my shot I'm pretty sure I could have got him with a golf ball in the nads though. An hour at baggage claim for that - I should have "Total Cunt" on my forehead. In fact I may have to get a hat made specially for my next golf game.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

It's An Emergency

I just have to ask - is it just Americans who are complete pussies, or has the same thing happened to the British since I left? I remember when a visit to the Emergency Room meant that you had an arm hanging off, or an axe sticking out of your head. Or possibly that you'd inserted something inappropriate in your rectum and got it stuck. It was a place you only went if you really had to, and as if to encourage you in that way of thinking hospitals arranged for giant queues which you could only bypass if you were at the point of exsanguination or cardiac arrest. Nowadays people seem to trot down to the Emergency Room for what appear to me to be trivial reasons. For instance, every year that vomiting bug seems to go around - you know, the one where you puke and shit yourself empty for about 24 hours. It's been a couple of years since Bison Daughter brought that little treat home to us but whenever it goes around you hear people talking about how they had to take their kid to the Emergency Room to get an IV.

I don't want to sound too much like an old git but "back in my youth" my parents would no sooner have taken me to the ER if I puked for a bit than tried to teach me to fly. Puking is just something kids do (especially if, like me, they drink stream water) and I don't recall anyone I went to school with needing to get intravenous fluids for a case of the squits.

Mrs Bison recently had a cold, a fact that she shared with another mother at the school last week. This woman had had the same cold but had gone to the Emergency Room the previous evening. For what? If someone showed up at the ER with cold symptoms I'd be inclined to send them for a psych evaluation. What goes through your mind when you're sitting there thinking "my nose is a bit blocked up" while someone gets rushed by you on a gurney with six gunshot wounds and a bag of plasma in one arm. Or are the ERs so full of people with the shits and the flu that there's no room for the seriously ill?

I'm aware that there's a male bias against going to the doctor - we'd all rather risk death than show up in the waiting room with unworthy symptoms. I think it goes back to the pussy thing - you don't want to be sitting there looking a bit shivery while the bloke next to you has an eye missing and the one over the other side of the room has his bloody stump of an arm in a sling. You feel like the doctor is judging your maleness by your ability to withstand suffering before coming in. When he says "Now what seems to be the problem Mr Smith" he's really asking "Now Mr Smith, do you have a valid reason for being here or are you just a pansy weasel homo?" If you're not careful you'll respond to the subliminal question without realizing it - "I'm not a homo, Doctor, I really do have a very sore throat."

It's not just blokes though. Mrs Bison insisted that I get this hideous looking mole checked out because it might be cancer. I was more inclined to wait and see if it grew to the size of, say, a beer bottle top, and then worry about it. I knew if I showed up I'd feel like a pussy and they'd cut it off no matter how safe it looked, just to avoid any liability. So I ended up with a hole in me for no good reason. However, if I suggest that she go to the quack then suddenly it'll wait for a day, or seven. Which means that she wouldn't be seen dead in the ER for anything short of, well, death.

So if you're one of those ER frequent fliers then maybe it's time to take a couple of aspirin and stay in bed for a day or two before calling out the Medevac helicopter to deal with your rampant piles. Either that or stop shoving inappropriate things up your anus...


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison

Flying Rules

Why do they have all those silly rules on planes? Flying is generally a miserable pain in the arse at the best of times, made worse by the tiny seats, lack of food and endless, meaningless bloody security. Once I’m stuck in my pitiful seat I need to do something to pass the time, and there aren’t too many options. In the period prior to take-off they won’t let you use electronic appliances – why is that? Are they concerned that you won’t pay sufficient attention to the announcements regarding the location of the emergency exits, the use of the life-vests or what to do when the oxygen mask drops from the ceiling? (Here’s a suggestion – how about “Shit Yourself”)

Let’s face it, in the event that the plane goes down you’re going to die. On the positive side it will be quick, since you will be immolated in about ten thousand gallons of burning high octane aviation fuel. Don’t worry about scrambling for the exits – you may as well pass the minute or two prior to your death by doing something productive, like having a wank.

When I got on the plane back to St.Louis on Thursday, my entertainment consisted of a newspaper, an MP3 player and a candy bar. Once I’d read the newspaper and eaten the candy bar we were about ready to take off, so the rest of the flight was given over to the appreciation of fine music and, since I was confined to the middle seat (as Northwest Airlines hates me), refusing to grant either of my neighbors access to the armrests. Consequently, when we got the announcement about twenty minutes prior to landing that “all electronic appliances must be switched off” I was left with precisely fuck all to do. Twenty minutes in those circumstances seems like forever. You can’t sleep because your seatback has to be upright; you’ve already read the paper and eaten the candy and you’d sooner attempt masturbation that converse with the losers that the airline in their infinite wisdom chose to seat next to you. You could always reach for the inflight magazine and ponder the sudoku puzzle which is inevitably to be found therein, but what kind of sad wanker does that?

Just to rub salt in the wound the flight attendant will now come down the aisle and attempt to collect your newspaper that is stuffed in the seatback in front of you, since this will save them time later. No, I’m sorry, I’m going to keep it; there may be an article on gardening or bird-watching that I skipped over before but which I will now choose to read rather than sit here for twenty minutes and do nothing.

I just don’t see what’s the big problem with letting people listen to their bloody music while the pilot attempts to land the plane. If he fucks it up we’ll all die anyway; at least I’ll have something to take my mind off the sensation of my skull being crushed under steel and my skin being roasted at about a thousand degrees centigrade. I’m increasingly convinced that rules at airports and on planes are made up by people who have never set foot in either, probably a whole bunch of them sitting around a conference room table in some government building, biding their time to retirement and their gold-plated pension, utterly immune from any consequences for their idiocy. Let’s face it, if you get to the point where leaving the plane through the emergency exit is necessary for your survival you don’t stand much of a chance. Even if you make it as far as the exit you’ll be confronted with that flight attendant whose job it is to usher you all to safety but whose colossal hips will keep you from getting out of the door. Next week I have to fly to the West coast – that means about four hours of flying time. By my calculations that means six magazines, two newspapers, eight candy bars, an Ian Rankin book, thirty minutes of music and an in-flight movie. And I'll skip the wank...


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison