humor
Workplace witticisms, job jokes and career quips; who says work can't be a laughing matter?
Ramblings of course.
I have things to do things to write but there is chocolate eclairs staring at me that I am going to murder without ap care in the world. I often wonder what it might be like if I just wrote unhinged without a filter (wait you don't do that already?) whether in poetry or story or nonfiction or satire. I try not to hold back but often feel I do maybe hold back. Sanction order and delicately drape security rails around the most heated words. Breathe with me for me. Breasts heave. Heave ho breasts they go. My eyes are sore because I cried quietly about something someone wrote and I wish sometimes I had thicker skin but then where would I be? Maybe my writing would be more technically proficient. But would it have heart. That feels clichéd to reason on that. Fricassee is such a fun word by the way. And hey hey I rhymed. I had an idea for steak for yourself challenge that involved going back in time and stealing Shakespeare for a few weeks, then stealing Macbeth and claiming it as my own work then centuries later as a moderately succesful writer on some writing platform stealing from myself, that is my Shakespeare self. Then I could win surely. Or maybe I'll just steal from my own self and play by the rules. Boring. We have an extra dog staying with us as my step daughter got married last week and she's away on her honeymoon. The extra dog is warming my right foot. I just need an extra dog or one of our own dogs to warm the left. Sports talk part sports talk part. Do you remember when I got a Top Story for written a poem about bee cum? It fucking happened and I can prove it. I would say humbly I don't know why I thought of that but my level of agency is a lot higher today. I definitely wanted to mention and remind that I got a Top Story for a poem that includes references to bee cum. I did the finger test On my tea, sewer rats. It's cold so I'll have to microwave it. It'll never taste as good as it once did but sometimes life is like that. It's been decidedly overcast here. So thats pretty uninspiring. I wandered lone as a cloud as a stupid fucking wait a mum is just doing the school run and she's shouting the most insane and nonsensical crap to her kids beneath our window. Someone shoot her? I asked that as a question because I'm not making requests. If you have nothing better to say, write it. Write the wrongs and wear the thong. Sometimes I... Nah. As far as writing exercises go. I'd say this is a success. It's writing, Jim, but not as we know it. Some tips as we move forwards. 1)always read prompts 2)don't be a sad fucking sack and blame others success when you don't win. Don't claim cheating when it's not their fault they got chosen. 3)write from the heart, the mind and like your hungry or something. 4)don't overthink it 5)scrap the first ten drafts. 6)use your original draft 7)shake hands with beef. 8)it hurts my eyes that I haven't formatted this numbered list properly. But I can live with it..can you? 9)tell me something disgusting in the comments section. 10)tell me something numerical in the comments section. 11)what does? 12)only use punctuation when you feel comfortable using it, don't feel badgered into it or peer pressured into it. 13)punctuation is a natural thing. We all do it..some better than others. 14)smile 15)or don't. 16)I am not a life coach. 17) don't be a fanny (British colloquialism) unless you enjoy being a fanny. 18)don't smell like a fanny. 19)unless you... Get the picture. 20)give yourself a handshake and a coin of small monetsry value if you read this far. Profundity is only overrated if you don't know how to spell it. I will never be anything. Other than me. Unless I go back in time and steal from Shakespeare. Can you imagine stealing from Shakespeare and then laughing about it? I've been feeling all kinds of things. I want to say a happy wholesome and warm hello to all my friends. You all know who you are. Which is a nude way to avoid listing all of you. Nice not nude. Correcting as we write. That is the modern way. Maybe I will do that one day. Write a story where the corrections appear as you read through it. Meta as fuck. But not Facebook steal your data meta. They are just fucks. Fin. Please note that all punctuation was harmed in the writing process. With extreme persecution. For anyone that cares. The artwork was originally intended to be a space scene like starry night with swirls and shit. Then a horse appeared (I've been trying to perfect horses so I was elated) then I fucked too much with the horse and then it became shapes again then I flipped it upside down and the black hole became more like a ball and the horse became more like a muscular naked foot kicking the black hole ball. You're welcome. In all seriousness, you should read the following pieces.
By Paul Stewart7 days ago in Journal
Confession Is Not a Performance
Confession is not a performance. It is not a speech you rehearse so the priest will be impressed. It is not a therapy session with a stole. It is the sacrament in which a baptized person names their sins out loud to a priest and receives absolution. The Church has kept this practice because it does what private regret cannot do. It restores the soul. That is why ordinary Catholics still get in the line, even when the line is short and the hour is inconvenient.
By Overdrive Records13 days ago in Journal
The Mass Is Not a Meeting
The Mass is not a meeting. It is not a weekly gathering where Catholics share thoughts and then go home. It is not a lecture with better music. The Mass is the sacrifice of Christ made present. The Eucharist is the Body and Blood of the Lord. That is why ordinary Catholics, including those who grew up with cassette decks and parish basements, still come back for it. They are not there for the bulletin. They are there because something happens that does not happen anywhere else.
By Overdrive Records13 days ago in Journal
The Saints Are Not Museum Pieces
The saints are not museum pieces. They are not statues you walk past on the way to a better exhibit. They are not names on a calendar that exist to fill empty dates. They are men and women who lived, died, and now stand before God. The Church keeps their memory because their lives still argue with the way we live. Most of the time the argument is simple. They did the ordinary things we avoid. They did them long enough to become holy. That is why ordinary Catholics still learn their names and still ask them to pray.
By Overdrive Records13 days ago in Journal
The Rosary Is Not a Background Prayer
The Rosary is not a background prayer. It is not a string of beads you keep in a drawer for emergencies. It is not a Catholic version of a short verse you can scroll past and still claim you prayed. The Rosary is a full way of walking through the life of Jesus with Mary. Each decade asks you to stay with one scene long enough for the story to do its work. That is why it still teaches the Gospel better than a line on a screen.
By Overdrive Records13 days ago in Journal
Collecting Stories Without Realising it
Muddy kisses on the window. Plants beside the glass. Another call of ‘Mam’. Another question. These are among the ordinary details that found their way into Mam, Mam, Mam . Small things belonging to our summer days at home, familiar enough that I could have lived alongside them without recognising how much they had to do with writing.
By Laura Jane15 days ago in Journal
Creed and Nickelback Paid the Bills. That Is Part of the Story
The polite history of late 90s and early 2000s rock has a punch line ready before the needle drops. Creed. Nickelback. The format villains. The bands you are supposed to apologize for knowing. That punch line is easy and incomplete. Active rock after Seattle still needed songs that could live on a shop radio, a night shift, and a daytime hour. These two paid those bills. The sneer never killed the catalog because the catalog was never asking the sneer for permission.
By Overdrive Recordsabout a month ago in Journal
The Cassette Was the Real Record Label
The official history of heavy music likes labels, catalog numbers, and the day the CD showed up looking like the future. Fine. That history skips the actual distribution system a lot of us used. A TDK. A Memorex. A handwritten spine. A second-generation copy that already hissed. The cassette was the real record label. It got Slayer across a county line before the shop had the jewel case. It got Metallica out of a bedroom and into a dash. It turned thrash into a chain letter with better riffs.
By Overdrive Recordsabout a month ago in Journal
Load and Reload Were Not the Crime Scene People Pretend
The official story is a funeral. Metallica cut the hair. Metallica bought new clothes. Metallica made Load and Reload and the faithful called a priest. That story is tidy and mostly useful for people who need a villain. The tapes are messier. 1996 and 1997. Two records from a band that already owned the suburbs and decided to write like a hard rock band that still had a heavy right hand. Some of it is bloated. Some of it is costume. Some of it is songs that still work after the purity test got tired.
By Overdrive Recordsabout a month ago in Journal
Jason Newsted’s Metallica Years Still Get Argued Wrong
The argument about Jason Newsted usually starts in the wrong room. People talk about the mix on …And Justice for All . People talk about the cliff he had to stand on after Cliff Burton. People talk about the way he left. All of that is real. It is also a lousy way to hear the years he actually played. From 1986 in the live room through Justice , the Black Album, and the touring machine that followed, Newsted was the floor under a band that was changing address. Gen X heard that floor even when the first studio pass tried to hide it.
By Overdrive Recordsabout a month ago in Journal
