SMJonesz

2nd Jun 2012

Hate is a strong word that I mean every time I say it

Girls.

Every episode of this show I watch ends with my face contorted into what I envision as a look that is the boiled down essence of abject horror. I should be clear, I am pretty confident that this is not the intention of the show despite having been told by others that I am supposed to hate every second of the show and that this is some kind of hipster irony thing. I will grant that the show is compelling, that I keep watching it. I’m also liable to strain my head at car crashes and look up pictures of men who’ve had their faces eaten off so I struggle to find that as a compliment. That is, unless the only goal of the creator is ratings. I don’t feel that to be the case though. The entire feeling of the show is that she should be celebrated for her witty and unconventional humor and style. Even in the show itself it feels like every episode is a festival to her “bucking” something or challenging some notion or concept I’m supposed to have. This becomes increasingly infuriating because I don’t have those. It’s like the show is constantly throwing in my face that I don’t understand New York hipster underground ironic subculture or something and I’m just like, “Yeah no shit, don’t want to, never claimed to”.

I mean, I really thought I hated people before. Before, I hated regular people. People with jobs and career goals and family plans and shit. Now I hate the other people just as much. I used to begrudgingly respect aspiring artists and other such late 20 do-nothings for at least trying something different even if that alternative was nothing. I hate this goddamn show for making me hate more things. Did it think that was something I needed? I hate everything you fucking twat! I had it covered. In fact, my whole day was already allocated to trying to spread evenly my attentions to hating things. Now it’s like I have to pencil in one more and my book is full. I’ve already written all the margins in.

I do have to commend her for making all these characters feel real though. I definitely hate people and I hate her show and I hate her characters. Very believable when they all have so much in common.

30th May 2012

Woke up attacking my CD rack with hot sauce

It shouldn’t be a crime and it’s not. That doesn’t make me feel any better about it though. I always tell myself it’s fine, that other people do it too. Just had to get one thing, that’s all. Wasn’t a big deal. Happens all the time to these people. I sit silent in the car, the previous track over, the next not having begun. I turn off the stereo and listen to the sound of the engine wind down before unlocking the door and stepping outside into the rain. It’s not a much of a rain, just a few fleeting drops now compared to the psuedo-flash-monsoon that had happened just a few hours previous. The sky is a gray green that looks, if it were tangible, to have the consistency of some kind of ointment for rashes. The kind you really want to grab at but refrain as a form of self torture or discipline. I double check my pockets one more time and click the lock button on my car keys, glancing over my Jaguar. Still hard to believe I actually get to drive this thing. I can smell in the air as I walk toward the door gasoline and permanent marker and bad Chinese food all mingling together to create this hybrid smell that in the right concentrations could probably be weaponized. I take a deep breath as the sliding doors open automatically at my approach and feel the almost clinical cold air rush past me into the humid void. I speculate at the cooling costs but quickly move on as I feel eyes on me. Already I am out of place, they and I can both feel that much. I ignore the glances and walk past the drones moving ever toward my mission, blinders on. I spot my target’s last seen position and close in on the package quickly with the precision of a man who has performed this hundreds of times. As I approach the area, however, I feel something is amiss. I look in all directions, first calmly assuming I had missed something upon my entrance, then with increasing confusion and dismay. Had I been wrong? Was there a mistake? Was I in the wrong position? No. I try to comfort myself with these thoughts but in the end, the truth is exactly as I had first feared: There was no Sriracha left in this store. The tag with an empty area above it confirms this hard pill. I am at my wits end. I can’t remember how many stores this makes. I am visibly shaken. I wander into chips and grab a couple bags with some spinach dip, attempting to walk off this horrible crushing of my dreams. It’s not what I wanted, hell, Tostito’s doesn’t even make a very good dip, but goddammit if I’m going to leave a grocery store empty handed. I’m making my way to the register when I see him. At check-out lane number 12, a man in a red pinstripe suit with jet black hair and a pair of shoes that were impossibly reflective. Strange in this area to see someone so nicely dressed but okay, maybe he isn’t from around here. Before becoming lost in thought I had forgotten to look away from the man and now as I approach the register and regain awareness I realize he is look back at me, smiling. Grinning. It looks as if his smile is about to peel off his face and engulf the rest of his being. Or rather, that the smile is the only part of him that really is him. But his eyes, his eyes are ice cold. A pale, dead blue, with nothing about them smiling. Uncomfortable now I shift my own look to avoid his now deafening stare. That’s when I finally look in the cart. At least 26 bottles of the stuff. Rooster sauce, and not a single other thing. I look back to him with a look in my eyes, questioning, pleading. He responds by not moving a single muscle in his face, maintaining that smile with a robotic stillness. I open my mouth to ask him, “Why?” only to suddenly realize that I have no mouth with which to do so. It also comes to my attention that a circle of employees are now standing around me. I can’t see their mouths moving but an deep chanting is coming from them. Their green aprons the only thing I can make out as my vision begins to blur and fade. I manage to get close enough to the smiling man to see his smile start to drip off his face into a puddle on the floor and he begins to reach out to grab me. With my last strength, I stumble towards the man in the suit and push off him with one hand, using to other to procure the delicious red condiment from the cart. I was going down but I had what I came for. I had won