First, let me thank you more than I can express. We only have so much time in our lives and whenever someone takes just a few invaluable, irreplaceable moments to read what I've written, I am honored. I take that trust seriously and have striven to make it time well-spent. So, a big thank you to you for reading.

As of late, through my writings and my internal voice, I feel as though I have been straying from my goal of compassion. I feel the pull to become more partisan. Assumptions and talking points are creeping in on the edges and it's clouding my thoughts. I still think politics is important, but I need to take a break and recalibrate how it fits into my life. Of course, I have to answer the same question for writing and blogging: How will they all fit into my life, if at all?

Some transitions we are dragged into complaining and resisting. I've had my share of those. In 2011, I had my fill of them. I have to say, however, 2012 is looking up.

Being free from the obligations of this blog is a concept I'm very excited about. I think the last time I made a decision and felt the wonder of so many possibilities was when I quit college, and while this doesn't match that in terms of pure ecstasy, it feels right.

The domain www.LarryNocella.com will still be active and probably host another, much more looser blog (in form and content.) ROFL blog will stay up for now, so feel free to explore.

Again, thank you so much for your time and kind words these past five years. May you be as blessed as I have been.

Peace,

Larry Nocella

p.s. Some of the greatest hits from the years:

I'm Depressed, I'm Here Get Used to It!

What I Learned From Catching a Foul Ball With My Butt

The Bravest Act

Hell is for Real: A Teen's Astounding Story of His Trip to the Abyss

What I Learned about Freedom from Hockey Fights

If the Greatest Generation was so Great, Why Did They Have to Kill Half Their Generation to Prove How Great They Are?

Nazis Always Think They’re Fighting the Nazis

Loving Music as Opposed to Stalking It

When is it okay to cheer or laugh that someone died? Or, are The Darwin Awards funny?

World Peace Through Violent Video Games

How I almost died and Why I volunteered to not become a millionaire.

Preventing Vietnam War Part 3: Iran - with Secret Weapon Paparazzi.

# # #

Effective Immediately, everyone needs to stop quoting the movie Network where the character Howard Beale goes nuts and says he’s mad as hell and he’s not going to take it anymore. (Link.)

That clip has been the rallying cry for too many political activities. You know who else was mad as hell and wasn’t going to take it anymore? Osama bin Laden. Who know who else? That asshole in Norway who killed dozens of people.

Who know who else? Whatever terrorist somewhere in the world just planted a bomb that will explode later today, killing people he’s never known, who have no power to change whatever he’s mad as hell about.

All these bad guys are driven by anger. And yet people keep calling for more anger. Then they wonder why the world is so cruel.

I’ve got it, people. We’ve got it. The entire world has GOT IT. You and everyone else is mad as hell and you're not going to take it anymore. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And where has that gotten us? To a place where everyone is mad as hell. And no further.

Einstein said, "the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result." Now he was a genius, so you should pay attention to him. Actually, come to think of it, he was wrong, because when you roll dice you usually get a different result than before. That’s what drives the whole game of craps.

Okay, maybe philosophy wasn't Einstein's strong suit. So let’s just ignore Mr. Supposed-Brilliant-Mind's error and pretend it never happened because it’s getting in the way of his genius image and my point, which is that everyone has been "getting mad as hell and not taking it any more" for years. Everyone does it and golly gee, it seems like we’re still having trouble coming together in peace and harmony.

But wait, you say, what if we see an injustice? Aren’t we allowed to get mad and not take it anymore? What’s the alternative? Let’s consider our options in the chart below.

As you can see, Howard Beale and most others have been "mad as hell and not taking it," and yet we seem to be heading in the wrong direction.

To represent the "mad as hell and taking it," quadrant I offer the iconic image of an individual whose primary agenda appears to be suggesting others "get brains," (a pro-zombie platform?) when he seems to be short one himself. He makes me think of that breed of person often angry, and despite claiming to love America, hates most of the innovative ideals that make America awesome. He equates dissidence with treason. This breed seems to spend most of their time shaking their fist at the television news and doing little else. This fellow might need to read his own sign, but he deserves credit for having more initiative than most other morans. His endless rage, unexamined by him, amounts to "taking it."

Our lower right quadrant doesn't make a whole lot of sense. If you’re not mad then are you really taking anything? No. You're just sitting there accepting.

The upper right quadrant is our winner: not mad as hell, and not taking it. What does that look like? Well, I guess it looks like intense civic participation: Sit ins, protests, hunger strikes, labor strikes, any form of protest that don’t involve killing people. You’re speaking up, you’re being disobedient, but you’re not acting out of rage.

I wrote the first draft of this a few months ago, before Occupy Wall Street got rolling, but I'd say, OWS is the closest I've seen in my lifetime to Not Mad As Hell and Not Taking It. While surely anger plays a part for some in that movement, anger isn't all they are about, as opposed to Mr. Moran. Their approach is, we're just going to sit here until you, well, until. They serve as a reminder that justice still needs to be done. (As of this writing, still exactly zero Wall Street bank executives have been prosecuted for tanking the world economy.)

Knowing that your agenda involves something substantial, like bringing criminals to justice (as opposed to telling others to "get brains") may not make you un-mad, but it surely makes you less mad.

Suppose that Norway asshole, instead of shooting people, had gotten naked and ran across Norway with a banner attached around his waist that read, "Ask me why I hate foreigners and love the Knights Templar!" Now THAT would have been an interesting take on the Nyan cat. Suppose he met the requirements for not being mad as hell, and not taking it. Maybe some people would have thought he was an especially devoted soccer fan, but still, one video of that would have gone viral and made people smile. Instead people are determined more than ever to resist his D&D fantasy. (Knights Templar, dude? How about more time with World of Warcraft and less time shooting people?)

The key problem is anger. What does being mad get you? Once I was mad as hell and decided to take it. I stayed mad. Once I was mad as hell and refused to take it anymore. I punched a wall and it hurt so bad I thought I broke my fingers. And it did absolutely nothing to solve my problem: girls still wouldn't date me on account of my temper.

There’s a reason mad means both angry and crazy. Because it’s hard to find one without the other. So how about we put all our energy into something like thinking, or communicating with grace. Or compassionate resistance. Or Occupying. Just stand there until someone figures out what you want. Or you figure out what you want. Or something happens. There's no law against just standing there. That doesn't mean law enforcement won't beat your head in enforcing such non-existent laws, but hey, try it.

Maybe you're skeptical. Maybe you think all this peaceful resistance is nuts and only going to work in a world where everyone is willing to listen. Then again, maybe the exact reason peaceful resistance will work is because the whole world has gone mad.

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

You've seen it a million times. Whether the person was revered, hated or obscure seems to make little difference. Once they're accused of some heinous act, a bunch of people will appear out of nowhere to support them.

It seems you could murder people, videotape the entire thing, have a dozen witnesses to your actions, and even admit to the crime. The next morning, inevitably, there will be a small crowd of supporters outside your home holding a nice banner that says, "We love you!"

I'm sure you've heard the one-liner when someone is waiting in a restaurant and they ask, "Who do I have to sleep with to get some service around here?" In the same vein, I wonder, "What exactly does one have to do so they will not find a crowd of supporters outside their home?"

Being a Pennsylvania resident, this question hit me recently as news of the Penn State football pedophilia horror broke (and as of this writing continues to break.) As of now, the accused pedophile himself (Jerry Sandusky) is caught, but the controversy centers around beloved coach Joe Paterno, whom the Pennsylvania Attorney General Grand Jury presentment paints as inactive to a degree bordering on (or equal to) a cover-up. (Click here to see presentment PDF.)

His backers claim he did what he was legally obligated to do. Apparently, "Promptly report all instances of child rape to the police, not your supervisor," needs to be added to the books here in Pennsylvania. Until then, while not criminal, Mr. Paterno's alleged inaction is morally indefensible.

I'm sure it must be difficult to learn that a person or organization you supported was raping children (or criminally and morally negligent by doing next to nothing to get such a crime to stop.) It must shatter your world. But isn't there a line that, once crossed, will make you turn against your team? Or at least that individual?

You would hope so. But of course, inevitably, there are legions of fans standing by Paterno, even rioting on his behalf. There's (finally) also a vigil planned for the victims of sex abuse. That's something to balance the outcry on behalf of Paterno's firing. No word yet if there will be a riot in the victims' honor as well.

Michael Jackson, the Catholic Church, Penn State football, Americans torturing suspects, and on and on. I'm sure you can add to the list. What is going on here? Is this a side-effect of humanity's tendency to clump? Is the pull of being in a herd so strong that you can't call someone out for being a monster? Or enabling one? It seems so.

So I ask again, is there anything one can do to wake up the next morning and NOT find a crowd of supporters on their front lawn?

Maybe I need to think about this differently. Is this phenomenon necessarily a bad thing? Doesn't it show that no matter what you do, even if you act (or are) evil, despicable and cowardly, you can always rest assured that a group of people somewhere will love you? That disturbing truth is horrific in its beauty, like the powerful grace of a lioness as she runs down a baby gazelle and kills him.

The good news is, no one should ever feel bad about themselves again. There's clearly nothing any of us can do to make everyone hate us.

Except change the design of Facebook. That really sets people off. Everything else is okay.

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

Now when it comes to calling life unfair, I burn with the passion of the converted. I look back at my ultra-naïve youthful self and laugh: "You once believed in the Tooth Fairy. Even worse, you clung to the idea that life could be fair!"

What brought me to this point? Forgive me for using a cliché, but it was a straw that broke the camel's back (for a more cruelty-free comparison, it was a drop that burst a hole in the bucket.)

So what was the small event with the big impact? I caught a foul ball at a pro baseball game. I wasn't that excited to get it and I'm still not that excited to have it. Contrast that with the complete insanity with which people catch (or try to catch) foul balls or balls thrown into the stands by players, "ball girls," etc. Just this past summer, baseball souvenir mania seemed to hit a fever pitch (Is that another cliché or a pun? Or both?):

1. First, a man tragically fell to his death going for a souvenir ball. (Link.)
2. Then Major League Baseball pushed hard on the story of the guy who caught Derek Jeter's 3000th hit, almost as if to quickly move on from the dead guy story, IMHO. (Link.)
3. Then another guy almost died. (Link.)

There is no shortage of other shocking incidents involving the rabid quest for baseballs:

• There was the woman who stole the ball from the kid. (Link.)
• Bartman: the bizarre, almost fable-like story of a fan who is blamed for his favorite team losing. (Link.)
• Just as this was going to "press," there was this incident: a man drops his child while trying to get a ball. (Link.)

The very first story hurts the most. How can life be fair, when a man falls to his death trying to get a ball thrown to him by a player? Absolutely nothing and no one involved in that incident was cruel or reckless or part of the "struggle for survival," any of the usual descriptions we use to explain away a horrible situation. If that incident doesn't prove life is unfair, then nothing does.

We all know that when you want something, you have to walk at it backwards, pretend you're not looking, then spin around and snatch it. The moment fate realizes you want something, it's going to dangle it in front of you and pull it away quickly, like a jackass on the playground who grows up to be a jackass at your job.

Or maybe that's backwards. Maybe we want what's hard for us to get, because if it's easy, we get it. Simple as that. So it's inevitable that something among all the things we desire will be difficult to obtain. And for the things we get easily? Shrug.

So what does this have to do with baseball? I presented all the examples of souvenir ball nuttiness for a reason. Those people clearly desired a ball strongly. They struggle and most fail to get it. As for me, I have very little interest in baseball and yet, of the very few games I've attended, without even trying, I caught a foul ball. With my ass.

No jokes, please. Oh hell. Okay, jokes are permitted.

Here's my story:

Everyone knows someone who promises you sports tickets like this: "My job gets awesome tickets for visiting VIPs but when no one is visiting, they give them out. If I can get them, you can have them!" And of course such gifts are free maybe once every five hundred years.

I suspect upper management is swiping them most of the time, but no matter. Such a five hundred year window opened during my teen years, so I ended up in some good seats a couple dozen rows from third base. It was a daytime, weekday game and not televised.

The date was August 9, 1983 [game stats]. Greg Gross [info] (at the time playing for my team, the Philadelphia Phillies, now their hitting coach) knocks a pitch foul. Everyone around me stood up. I felt confident it wasn't going to come near me, but I stood up anyway, so as not to get hit in the head, just in case. As the ball entered the crowd a few rows in front of me, everyone was shoving and grabbing for it. The ball hit the back of someone's seat and took a crazy bounce. The feeding frenzy was on. People scrambled and flailed trying to snag the ball. In the chaos, the ball tumbled closer. Two or three more weird bounces and/or collisions with bodies and/or chairs, and just like that, the ball landed in my seat. To protect it, I sat down on it.

And that's how I caught a foul ball with my butt.

Totally awesome, right? Well yeah, I guess. Once the foul-hunters sat down again, I grabbed the ball and stood up with it triumphantly. That's tradition, right? Besides, I wanted to be on the jumbo screen, or on TV. But this game wasn't televised and whoever was running the camera for the jumbo screen didn't care to show me.

But so what? You're saying. You caught a foul ball. True, but I was thinking: hey, why aren't I on the jumbo screen? Because that's what I would really have enjoyed.

After the game, I gave the ball to my dad. He's the baseball fan. I've always been a follower of faster-moving sports, like... well, like anything.

After years of my dad holding the foul ball he finally insisted I take it back. You caught it, he said, you should have it. So I have it. Shrug.

I can hear you now: you could sell it on eBay. I could. eBay has created a reason for people to collect anything and everything, because surely someone else will pay more for it than you did, even if it is intrinsically worthless. What's that? No, I didn't intend that as a critique of "investing" in gold, but yes, it does serve as one. Can't a piece of junk just be a piece of junk anymore? Is nothing sacred?

I guess I could sell the foul ball and donate the money to charity, but no. It means something to me now: a reminder that sometimes clichés are universal truths, that life is unfair and the grass is always greener on the other side.

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

It's the screenplay for the movie Zombies versus Gladiators! (Click download button on right side to download the script.) Amazon has decided to test the waters of mixing the social nature of the internet with the process of making movies. Look up Amazon Studios in your favorite search engine. I tried my hand at one of their many contests: to rewrite another writer's script of Zombies versus Gladiators. You can read my effort, the full script for a feature film, here, for free. If you have an Amazon account, you can even leave a very positive, 5-star review. Negative reviews not permitted, sorry.

Below is my video where I did a writer’s pitch: a discussion where I talk about how I addressed Amazon Studio’s concerns with the original script. If you notice my crazy eyes, yes, I'm reading. Memorizing all that stuff is hard. Props to actors everywhere! (Hey, that was a pointless pun.)

Here's the link for the script again. Hopefully I'll have time to discuss the project more later, but right now I’m off the next large project! Thanks for reading!

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

The following is effective immediately!

12.1 The Analogy Police are Watching You!
Effective immediately, everyone needs to be less dramatic with their analogies. From now on, you can't compare inconveniences or rules or laws you don't like with genuine human suffering.

For example, you can't say someone is being like the Nazis, unless they're killing people. You can't say someone is being like Hitler, unless they're advocating genocide. And you can't say someone is being like Dick Cheney unless they're wiping their butt with the American flag, performing human sacrifices under a full moon and shooting their friends in the face.

The point is everyone is being a little overly dramatic with their speech. Even the slightest hassle gets compared to the most vile and violent human oppression and that's insulting to those who do actually suffer. Just imagine a Sudanese refugee comparing stories with a spoiled American.

SUDANESE REFUGEE: Dey destroyed my home and my people. Dey killed my brothers and raped my sisters. Dey made me starve. Tree-hundred of us boys walked fifty miles to avoid de fighting. Dozens died daily from the heat, malaria and animal attacks. We drank from festering puddles of camel urine. Of dah five hundred who set out, only ten lived to work in the gold mines for twenty years.

SPOILED AMERICAN: Dude, I know exactly how you feel. My government is proposing an additional three percent tax on rich people's gross yearly income. Not only that, brah, but they want us to stop using plastic bags. It's like an oppression-slavery swirly soft serve ice cream cone. You ever had those before? Aw, they're delicious! Anyway, I can totally relate to that story you just told that I've already forgotten about.

SUDANESE REFUGEE: But der is so much wealth in your nation. Your basic conveniences are considered riches in many parts of dah world.

SPOILED AMERICAN: Are you kidding me? We're slaves! We can't even use the kind of light bulb we want. And shoot, there's so many types of coffee, I can't decide. It's slavery, I tell ya! Oppression!

SUDANESE REFUGEE: I walked all dat way for this?

So remember, effective immediately, you're no longer allowed to compare taxes to slavery, or environmental regulations to living under the Nazis. When you do, you sound far more dramatic than a high school kid who can never get a date to the dance, who the girls think smells funny and who thinks he'll never find love. Now I'm allowed to use that analogy... because that used to be me.

Sincerely,

Larry Nocella, CVO
Chief Vidiocy Officer
www.LarryNocella.com
ei@larrynocella.com

If you need to review all the items that are effective immediately, click here.

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

If we humans stand any chance of evolving, we need to clarify our notions of bravery. Courage has been defined by Hollywood culture as something that occurs in split-second intervals, a flashy physical activity that looks a lot like an action-film sequence.

Define bravery, and it too often goes like this: Diving into gunfire to save a wounded comrade! Leaping from a speeding car as it goes over the cliff! Crashing through a burning building to save a crying baby / adorable dog / nubile lass! CLANG! KERASSSH! BABOOOM! YEEEEHAAAA!

I'm tired of our stories and myths defining courage in such a limited way, rooted in rare situations of war, disaster or violence. People who act heroically in those situations will often humbly say things like, I don't feel brave, I just did what I had to do, it was all a blur, it was over in seconds, I didn't even think about it, anyone would have done the same thing.

This isn't to take away from their exceptional behavior, but exceptional behavior only occurs in exceptional moments. How many times during our lives will any of us be exposed to live gunfire, a cliff-bound car or a lightly charred nubile lass? Does that mean we'll never have a chance to learn how brave (or fearful) we are?

I've never believed that the only way to be brave is to pursue a law-enforcement, military or rescue career. I think there's so much to human experience that courage can manifest in many other, more subtle ways. Further along this thought-path, it's rarely made sense to me when awards are given for split-second actions. I'm much more impressed with sustained action. Instead of the reflex that comes from the result of training or primal sub-conscious automatic survival instinct, I'm more impressed with sustained and repeated courage across the span of a lifetime. When you have to time think about what's happening and time to back down or run, but you stand your ground? That's bravery.

At the end of all these thoughts, I realized that loving someone is a brave act. I think it might even be the bravest act we can do.

Yet as soon as I think that, I feel the mental gravitational pull of the action-film definition. How can love be brave? Almost everyone loves something. Shouldn't bravery be a rare thing?

I don't think so. Just because we have gotten used to the presence of a miracle doesn't make it any less miraculous.

Now of course I don't know you, but I can almost guarantee you don't think of yourself as especially brave. To do so seems a bit arrogant. Let me save you some potential angst and tell you: you are brave. I'll bet you love someone and I'm going to remind you how courageous that is. It's like you're walking on ice you think is thick and solid, but I'm about to point out how thin it is.

You know, deep in your heart, that those you love are temporary. They are all mortal and one day they will die or be killed, by disease, by age, by a madman, by one (or more) of a thousand things in a million ways. That loss will cause you immense pain. Yet you keep on loving them.

Are you nuts? Why bother to love anyone? They are going to be gone someday. There is no doubt. None. So why do you keep doing it? You know the ice is thin, but you keep walking. Are you crazy?

No. You're brave. You face not the possibility of pain, but its inevitability. Yet you keep going. You keep loving.

As I was writing this, I stopped and thought about these things and scared myself. Everyone you and I love is going to leave one day, either by natural or unnatural causes. There is no doubt. It's so unpleasant to think about we often avoid it just to stay sane, and yet, I think we should face it just for an instant to appreciate it all.

We know how fragile life is and we continue to love. What kind of madness does it take to allow our hearts to be captivated by something so delicate? You know you're going to get hurt. It's going to happen. It's a question of when. It would be much more logical to love something eternal, like a stone, death or taxes. Or better yet, a plastic bottle.

But no. We keep loving.

All this time, your whole life, you've been so brave. It sounds amazing, ridiculous, exaggerated. You look at yourself in the mirror and you wonder "Am I brave?" If you love someone, you are. If you put your heart out (sensibly) you are. Courage is all around us and within you.

This isn't to say in a blithering emotional gush that everyone is brave and dilute the meaning of bravery, because it is possible to be cowardly regarding love, but oddly enough, such creatures seem to be in the minority. The fearful run from love, or chase others away. They choose to love no one because they fear the hurt, they hide behind a thousand schemes. The foolish love too easily, and their love becomes an artificial thing, robotic even.

Instead of heroism being defined as split-second action, I vote that we admire our courage and realize how brave we are to love. The miracle of love is around us all every day, and you are part of it making it happen. Imagine where we could go, where our world would be if we all deeply and openly appreciated that.

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

11.1 American (Idol) Justice
Effective immediately, the millions of legal experts who issue confident verdicts without ever having entered the courtroom of a high-profile trial will be called for jury duty. This will save the rest of us the trouble of having to pretend we're paralyzed, dying, and mentally ill all at the same time in order to escape it. These self-proclaimed legal superstars can even keep the five-bucks-a-day stipend.

Face it, armchair jurors: you watched the same TV show as the rest of us and came to a conclusion you liked. Your only regret is that your vote didn't count. It's exactly like American Idol with one small difference: for the court case, those exploiting children are defendants, not on the judges' panel.

11.2 Workin' toward the Bleak End
Effective immediately, everyone who is knee-jerk anti-union must report to work on the weekend. After their fifteen-hour day (no bathroom breaks, please) they will be required to write an essay about the fact that big business didn't grant two days off out of the fictional goodness of their non-existent hearts.

A sane(ish) work-week tradition was won by determination and often with the lives of the working poor. So the next time union-bashers get weepy about firemen, police or soldiers, they'll have to also remember the workers who did more with less and had a larger, longer-term positive effect.

When will union-bashing dolts have time to write an essay? On their days off, of course! Oh wait, they won't have any, since they've forsaken all the benefits organized labor earned. Well maybe they can get some co-workers together and petition management. Oh wait. Never mind. Well I'm sure if they go to management one at a time, they'll be heard. What's that? They got fired for being trouble-makers? Well now they can have the privilege of working more than one job! Uniquely American, isn't it?

11.3 Inc. For A Day
Effective immediately, I've decided to become a corporation. This shouldn't be a problem. Since a corporation is legally equal to a person, a person is therefore legally a corporation. That means you're a corporation, too.

Hey, if people can get fake boobs, penile implants and tattoos on their taint... What? Oh they can't, you say? Better check your Twitter account, I just sent you a picture. What do you mean you can't make it out? A portrait of George Washington, what else? You friggen commie.

As I was saying, I'm a corporation now, damn it. Care-free days ahead! I keep all the rights from when I used to be just a human being, but now I have none of the legal responsibilities. None I can't ignore anyway.

It's like being a rich asshole's bigger asshole kid, all the time! I can leave a mess where I want, destroy whatever property I want, and heck, maybe even a kill a few people. Best of all, I can spend like a drunken intern at a bondage club.

When I get in trouble, I just run crying back to Ole Pops Government to bail me out. And he always will, because I'm his favorite.

Sincerely,
 
 
(The human being formerly known as) Larry Nocella (who - I mean, that - is now known as) Larry Nocella Corp.
A Division of Lar, Inc. LLC, a subsidiary of Lar Global
www.LarryNocella.com
ei@larrynocella.com

If you need to review all the items that are effective immediately, click here.

===

Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

I once went to a Roger Waters (of Pink Floyd) concert where he sang his song "Mother." The lyrics ask a lot of questions, and the projection screen behind him "answered" each question with writing on "The Wall." When he sang, "Mother should I trust the government?" the screen behind him answered, "No… fucking… way." And the crowd went nuts.

In a visceral, abstract way, it was fun, but beyond that, it was weak. Too easy an answer, but one too many people use. Yeah, fuck the government, dude! Okay, let's assume that's done. The government has been fucked. Now what?

Um. Er. Well.

Too late! The warlords have taken over. Some billionaire paid off security dudes and purchased all the food from the store. Did you try to stop them? Well that's why his hired security detail kicked your ass. And so on.

You wouldn't know it from my writings, but I'm actually not in love with politics. I feel more like I'm in a torrid romance with it, a volatile love-hate affair. Our relationship would make a great black and white art film with subtitles. Politics and I would alternate between screaming matches, steamy sex, brooding and smoking in outdoor cafes. It would be tedious and repetitive, but film critics would love it. Normal people with tastes uncorrupted by overexposure would hate it.

On one hand, I see politics as a beautiful emergence of the human animal from primordial reflex. Instead of resolving conflict with physical violence, we use politics to sit down and talk or take a vote, so the largest number of people are happy. Some might end up unhappy, but at least no one ends up dead.

On the other hand, I see politics as annoying, a tangled bureaucratic nightmare where a bunch of petty jerks try to boss people around for no good reason.

But no matter how discouraged I get by the bad parts, like the beret-wearing fellow in the previously mentioned art film, I always come back. I take very seriously Jefferson's comment that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.

That's why I see participating in politics like all my chores. Even if I don't like it, I have to do it. The price for a clean home is taking out the trash. The price for a healthy body is eating right. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. I stay vigilant by following what's going on in the halls of power. Then I send a letter, make a call, write an email, vote, and every now and then get in the streets with a sign.

This July 4 weekend, while I don't expect everyone to be as geeked-out as myself on politics or news, I would like to suggest everyone pay a little more attention, or if you already are, get more people to do so. I know there might be a lot of groaning, but that's because making politics boring, petty, confusing, etc. is all part of the powerful's plan to shut people up.

There is a reason you're encouraged to laugh at or dislike every aspect of government, unions, working people, the poor and lawyers. It's all part of the grand plan of the powerful to remove the limited options the less fortunate (meaning, you) have to exercise power.

A popular meme is "government is the problem." This was famously said by Ronald Reagan, who once held the highest position possible in government. He might as well have just said, "I suck so bad that I am the leader of what causes all the suckiness." The truth is, government is NOT the problem. Government is essentially what makes civilization run. Without civilization, well, me might as well not be a unique animal and just be like fish in the sea, the strong eat the weak and nothing ever changes that.

I want to see people pay more attention because some of the ideas being kicked around in politics, based on this "government is the problem" mentality are darn scary. Most of all I cringe whenever they discuss raising the retirement age to pay off their drunken spending. I'm trying any way I can to avoid being a cube jockey one second longer than I have to. Elevating the retirement age is just one more obstacle in my way.

I want to encourage more people to get into politics because I think most people are like me: we work to live, not live to work. However, some of those in power (and an army of duped workers hoodwinked by illusions of honor and responsibility) want us to work until we drop dead.

Economics, however, is only part of the issue. There's also a lot to be said for human evolution from ignorance and the expansion of the human family.

Back when the Republican party co-opted the Tea Party movement, a lot of teabaggers said, "This is the first protest I've ever been to." That really bummed me out, because a lot of those people were old (as in ancient) which indicated that they lived through the civil rights era, the Vietnam war era, and several other key events (9/11, Iraq War, Afghanistan War, gay rights) in U.S. history and they never once openly petitioned their government. Not once.

What finally got them off their complacent asses? When the president tried to give them cheaper, more reliable healthcare. Well, technically when some lobbyists hyped them up through a propaganda network (Fox News, of course) and convinced them that more accessible healthcare was somehow bad.

Now I don't expect everyone to agree with me, so if I'm voted down, I'm voted down, but I would much rather lose a fair vote, and not have pro-powerful agendas pushed through without any resistance or awareness from thinking, working people.

If you haven't interacted with your government until you've got one foot in the grave, I'm sorry to say you haven't been eternally vigilant. That doesn't mean it's too late to have an impact. No one lives forever and no one can live up to Jefferson's ideal, but like most ideals, its worth comes in reaching for it. Get involved no matter what your age. If you enjoy Independence Day, please do what you can to make sure it retains its meaning.

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Larry Nocella writes the blog ROFL: Random Outbursts From Lar! at LarryNocella.com. He's the author of the novel Where Did This Come From? The world's first CarbonFree(R) novel according to Carbonfund.org. The book is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook. It is also available for reading online. P.S. You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle eBooks. Download the FREE Kindle app for PC, Mac and smartphones. You can then purchase Kindle books or download free ones. Enjoy!

10.1 Blues Lyrics or Facebook Status?
Effective immediately, someone has to make a game show (or drinking game, or whacky morning drive radio bit) where contestants try to guess whether a statement is either someone's Facebook status or the lyrics to a blues song. Examples: I have nobody this weekend. Facebook status or blues lyric? I'm gonna get drunk! Facebook or blues? Some dork you barely know just scored nine million points in Bejeweled! Facebook or blues? And so on. If you can figure out a way to make money off this idea, remember you have to pay me a percentage. Or so help me, I'll defriend you.

10.2 An Orgy of Summer News Filler
Effective immediately, we need to help out our buddies in the mainstream media. They're always getting blamed for creating the 24 hour news cycle and its absurd rituals, but they're victims just as much as the rest of us. Can you imagine having to fill all that time with one inane story after another, without the assistance of the keynote speakers at the Conservative Political Action Conference?

Point is, even in a cornfield of insipid, there are limits to how much banality can be harvested. Combine that with the fact that it's been a while since someone squirted out nearly a baker's dozen worth of kids and that renegade inflatable bounce house stories died out faster than Newt Gingrich's fake presidential campaign, and you can see why our news media is hurting.

What's a filler-reporter to do? Golly dang it, it's summer! They should be relaxing, setting the video feed on auto-pilot to run the usual alternating stories about vacation traffic and the heat. But no, the 24 hour news cycle demands constant attention.

Let's help them out. The next time some woman uses her vagina as a Pez™ dispenser, let's all crowd around her crotch and turn the poly-birth procession into a parade. What will we use for floats? Renegade inflatable bounce houses, of course! Drop the kids in and they just fly away!

It's win-win-wind! The mother gets the attention she wants without all the parenting she didn't want. Inflatable bounce houses get free product placement. Ambulance chaser lawyers get another class action suit, and they can share the spoils with you! (And by spoils, I mean of the millions they win, you get, oh... at least a buck sixty-five.) Best of all, our reporter friends can run this story for weeks! It's a friggin' orgasmic collision of news filler!

Our over-worked media friends will have hours of pointless reporting at their fingertips, allowing them a full summer of free time to spend at the bar wondering if they really needed that Master's degree in Journalism.

10.3 Coming Out in favor of Man-Horse Marriage
Effective immediately, those of us in favor of gay marriage must admit to our hidden agenda. We have to confess guilt to what failed senate candidate J.D. Hayworth claimed: that pushing for gay marriage across the entire USA will inevitably result in people marrying horses. (Source)

Now before you go saying Hayworth was just another slippery dope using the slippery slope argument, I ask that you look deep inside yourself. Humbling, isn't it? Because your skin isn't transparent. But also because we know that we're busted. Hayworth was 100% correct. So let me say it outright. I am pro-gay-marriage. And I'm totally okay with man-horse-marriage...

...as soon as horses start driving to city hall, signing internet petitions, writing their congressmen, having organized marches where they demand the right to marry, vocalizing something other than snort and nay, and doing something with a marriage certificate other than chew it up, then yes, I will be backing man-horse marriage 100%.

As of now, however, I'm merely a sleeper agent. An advocate of human-on-human action, but ready at a moment's notice to gallop into Hayworth's horse-loving paradise. But that surely won't be the end of it. Soon I and my long-time-long-faced-companions will be thrusting deeper into the moral flesh of our nayyyytion, bringing to life the even more demented man-on-dog fantasies of religious extremist, presidential candidate and (apparently) bestiality expert Rick Santorum!

So there, I've admitted it all. I'm pro-gay marriage, but that's a mere sliver of my greater agenda. Now if only Santorum and Hayworth can admit that they're allowing their depraved obsessions to masquerade as morality, then everything will be out in the open.

Sincerely,

Larry Nocella
Equine Equalizer
www.LarryNocella.com
ei@larrynocella.com

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