Friday Night Lights

Hong Kong is in Paris. So I'm at home watching prime-time television on a Friday night. I don't own cable. Only a digital converter box, subsidized by the federal government. In fact, wasn't this program an initiative of the W. Bush administration? That might explain why my converter box sucks ass. I call it, "government cheese".

When I do watch regular TV, I mostly watch programs on NBC, FOX or KCET/PBS. Occasionally the CW during Top Model cycles. Tonight I'm watching ABC which, in my opinion, sucks ass also. It is Disney, after all. Yet I'm riveted by tonight's line-up. First I watched WIFE SWAP. Dude, for those of you who watch WIFE SWAP... how trippy. As you can glean from the title, the wives swap homes and families. The twist, however, is in the rules. During the first half of the show, the wife/mother has to live by the family's rules. In the second half, the family must live by the wife/mother's rules. I know it doesn't sound ingenious, but watching WIFE SWAP emoted very strong feelings in me. I felt uncomfortable the entire time, yet couldn't stop watching. It kind of felt like watching a gang bang.

Next I watched WHAT WOULD YOU DO? hosted by John Quinones. Man, I would love his job. I love that Candid Camera shit. I'm all about that, yo. The concept is what I personally call "human/social experiments" or simply "social science"... with a hidden video camera near-by. Yes, caught on tape. But not to humiliate people, I find that rude. It's about furthering the understanding of our culture and communities through the study of social psychology, and coupled with practical, real-world application in a natural but somewhat controlled setting so to evoke an uninhibited response. If you can't tell, I'm totally serious.

Tonight's show was excellent. It's like WHAT WOULD YOU DO if an attractive drunk woman asks you to breathe into her breathalyzer so her car would start? WHAT WOULD YOU if you witness a soccer coach overwork and berate a dehydrated and soon-to-collapse wimpy red-headed student in the park? WHAT WOULD YOU DO if you're in a pharmacy and overhear a fragile old lady say she's unable to pay for her diabetes medicine? WHAT WOULD YOU DO if you see a restaurant manager sexually harass a waitress? What if the waitress dressed like a slut? Yeah, they changed up the circumstances too. I LOVE that shit.

It's Chuck E Cheese, Bitch

Wicked picture, huh?

For my nephew's birthday, I treated him to an afternoon of Chuck E. Cheese.

Dude, I haven't been to a Chuck E Cheese in 20 years. I forgot how much fun it is. There is definitely something more appealing about hanging with white trash and immigrant kids than going to the some expensive children's museum that serves organic peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and soy milk for $20. The parents and children are grossly smug. Like you want to slap them in the face. But at ChuckECheese, it's very humble, affordable and fun... and I'm like the richest person there! I felt like we had limitless tokens, a sense of comfort and satisfaction that I have never felt before. I grew up frequenting CEC with about $3 max. It was always spent very quickly.

For lunch we purchased a small cheese pizza, an all-you-can-eat salad plate, milk and beer. I was the only one at ChuckECheese consuming beer, by the way. Before I purchased it, I had to agree to all these stringent rules, like not leave my beer on the table, take it everywhere with you, do not feed to children, etc. So when my nephew needed to do number 2 in bathroom, I brought the beer into stall, as I am a law-abiding citizen. It wasn't the best combination with bud light, but better than without!

After lunch, we played ski ball. I love that shit. In fact, we struck jackpot! The aisle I was playing on starting spewing tickets continuously and non-stop. I thought it was going to go on forever and I debated whether I should walk away... but I couldn't. I started looking around hoping no one was watching me. Everyone, however, was staring with envious eyes. I collected about 150 tickets before it finally stopped. We ran to our booth and counted the tickets immediately. My nephew and I counted together. When we reached past 100 or so, I felt giddy and light-headed.

We won 354 tickets total. We exchanged our tickets for a top, a mini soccer ball and a ring. Yeah, I know. It seems like a lot of effort for some cheap mini plastic toys. They're probably toxic too.

Here's a question: Why do parents allow their children to steal tickets? As my tickets spewed out of that defective but lovely machine and coiled along the ground, toddlers would come from no where and try to steal my tickets! I'm like, hey, those are mine! Then they look at me with fear and run away. Parents stand by silent. I'm like, dude, you need to control your kids. They should thank me for teaching their fucken children for thieves not to disobey the law.

Here's another question: Do you think parents realize that ChuckE is a rat? And his friends are street animals, including a cracked-out bird and a dingy mutt, both likely infested with rabies? I felt like, dude, whoever thought of this theme is laughing his/her way to the bank!

Other games we played: air hockey and fuze ball with hockey players (is that table hockey then?). My nephew was addicted and couldn't stop playing. I was surprised and secretly delighted how naturally adept he was with such games. I kind of feel like air hockey and fuze ball are for older kids, not for my five year old nephew. But he obviously is far more superior in adoitness than other children his age and beyond. I'm not sure why, but I like it.

My first heavy metal concert

As a social experiment, I agreed to accompany Pure White to see the following bands:



Can you believe it? It was actually fun. Here are my keen observations:

1) Heavy metal enthusiasts have perfected the head nodding as well as the devil's horn hand sign.

I wish I could easily whip out a devil's horn sign but it's not instinctual for me. I actually have to think about it. And the head nodding... dude, who said white people don't have any rhythm? They do when they jam to heavy metal, that's for sure. But I do worry for their brains... all that nodding, especially the head twirl, cannot be good for the preservation of brain cells. For true enthusiasts, I recommend fish oil pills before attending a concert. Also, ear plugs are key.

2) Speaking of devil's horns, is that why every lead singer sounds like Satan? I'm sure it's no coincidence that Lamb of God sung a song entitled, "Take a Walk with Me in Hell."

3) There were only like ten women in attendence. When Pure White and I arrived at the Wiltern, I was the only person in the women's security line and had to wait for Jeff to be cleared. The lead singer of Machine Head also made a comment about naked heavy metal chicks... all 17 of us. Ironically, despite the lack of female presence, I still had to wait in line at the women's bathroom!

4) Mosh pits are fascinating. There's a certain synchronicity to the hyper-aggressive ritual. At first glance, it seems violent and scary. But after a while, you realize that, what all those stupid boys are doing is simply pushing each other in circles. I now see that moshing is actually a form of dance. In fact, I couldn't stop watching it from above. What's even more intriguing is whenever someone from the audience began to body surf on top of the crowd, the big black body guards in the front row would immediately stop it. Yet they never stopped the moshing. So it made me think that the Wiltern's liability insurance probably doesn't cover negligent falls from body surfing. Injuries from moshing, however, are probably cheaper to insure. God, I get sick when I realize how much I think like a lawyer.

Overall, my first heavy metal concert was enjoyable. I don't know if I would go again, but I'm glad I went. Thanks, Pure White!

Trapped in a Cuckoo Nest aka 4 year old bday party

Everyone knows I adore my nephew. He turned 4 yesterday and today is his big birthday celebration. The theme is Cars from an ostensibly famous Disney movie. I don't know, I haven't seen the movie nor have I read about it in the trades. So I asked my sister (his mother) if kids are going to come dressed as cars. She said no. I thought to myself, what kind of booty theme party is this? Well, actually, I think I said it out loud. Regardless, Christopher and I were excited all day. We love birthdays. I teased him all day that it was really my birthday and my party and my cake and my gifts and my guests. He didn't believe me and responded that the guests are "my people." He also insisted that it's a 4 year old birthday party and surmised that I'm 13. He's a smart kid.

My excitement soon dissipated when the children and parents arrived. The once tranquil suburban San Jose home turned into a 1950's mental institution. I couldn't help but to transfigure myself from a normally outgoing party person into a quiet observer of a scientific social experiment. Let me attempt to explain:

(1) The four-year olds are the schizophrenics. They chase each other around, yell for no reason, and expect others to satiate their demands at once... or they will show you how crazy they really are. They tend to hundle in groups and when they do, they are extremely dangerous.

(2) The two-year olds are the sociopaths. They prefer to play alone and hardly notice each other... until one of them wants the toy of the other and then the blood match is on!! Having no ability to share, they will cry, scream, hit, kick and bite your hand off if you interfere with their primal interests. They look super cute, but I wouldn't trust them.

(3) The parents are the staff. Some are administrators, so they just sit around and complain (likely due to incompetence), and sometimes entertain the patients. These are usually the fathers. The others are the nurses. They feed, clean, and comfort the patients. These are usually the mothers. Both are overworked, understaffed and completely consumed. They often engage in shop talk.

(4) I am the hot Ph.D student who occasionally visits and studies the institution as part of a thesis. Everyone is cordial to the student, but no one can really relate to her. She can't relate to them either. So instead of engaging in trite small talk with the staff, or in a wacky incomprehensible conversation with the patients, she chooses to sit alone with her laptop and pretends to work on her thesis.

Unlike a true mental institution, however, there is no psychiatric medication available at a four-year old birthday party. Curses.