Before we get to the Funbag, a quick reminder that the next reading for The Postmortal will be at 7 p.m. at Book Court in Brooklyn on Monday. Will Leitch will also be there as a special guest, and we can all tease him about eating raisins and fingerblasting himself to pictures of Ricky Ankiel. So join in the fun if you're around. It'll be hipsterriffic. Now, your letters.
Chris:
So there's this Washington Post story going around about a bat-shit German guy who killed his geezer wife and claims to be an Iraqi general. Thing is, I've SEEN this guy around Georgetown for years — I've walked past him at least a few times.
It got me thinking — how many times have I crossed paths with certifiable killers? It has to be a surprisingly high number, right?
It depends on where you live. If you live somewhere with a high murder rate... SURPRISE! You may have shaken hands with Monster Kody Scott. But if you grew up on the mean streets of Wayzata, Minn., as I did, that number is probably negligible (and I don't count military personnel, I'm talking people who have maliciously killed others). Since the year I was born (1976), there have been roughly 20,000 murders in the US per year, which would make for 680,000 murders over the course of my lifetime. That's a few hundred thousand murderers to potentially stumble across, so I guess you might shake hands with one of two in your travels. I went to school with a murderer.
In July, Mr. Ko was convicted of second-degree murder for killing Hyseung Lynda Hong, 26, in her Manhattan apartment in March 1998, slashing her throat in what prosecutors described as an attack intended to impress a jealous girlfriend.
I think I might have said hi to him at one point or another. I can't really remember. It's not a terribly comforting thought.
BJP:
One stat breakdown that you never see and (presumably) never will is dick size. Think about it for a minute. As an example, we don't know the breakdown of men with prostate cancer by dick size. Maybe the probability of a person with a 2-inch or smaller dick getting cancer is less than 10% but once you get into the 8-inch or larger category it is 85%. Maybe people with dick sizes between 6 and 8 inches have a higher likelihood of being psychopathic killers than all other sizes. We just don't know but maybe we should! Keeping track of dick size may save lives!!
Worth considering, no?
Indeed. Doing a sociological study of men by penis size could help destroy certain myths. For example, what if we found out that the majority of Corvette owners have HUGE dicks? Maybe they aren't overcompensating for anything. In fact, maybe they bought a sports car specifically because they have a huge dick but can't say anything about it in polite company? That would destroy conventional wisdom. You could do an entire dickonomic study on whether or not men with big dicks are smarter, better educated, wealthier, or blacker. You could also do a racial breakdown to see if what they say about Asian men having small penises is true (And I bet it is!). You could study mating habits by penis size. You could do a geographical study of penis sizes. What is the most well-endowed city in the US? Is it East St. Louis? I bet it's East St. Louis. Do men with big penises eat more tacos? WHY? It's all in play.
BJ:
Does it bother you at all that after 11am comes 12pm and after 11pm comes 12am? I have always thought this was retarded
So then, under your model, 12PM would actually be 12AM, and the PMs wouldn't start until an hour later with 1PM, yes? That does make sense. But if I tried to actually adjust to that, my head would fall off of my body. So the old way remains.
Jake:
Say you were given command of an NFL team. You are allowed to assemble your offense from any players you want in the whole league—even guys already signed by other teams. But because Goodell is a prick, you aren't allowed to have a QB. That includes guys like Brad Smith and Josh Cribbs who have played the position in college.
You are still allowed to throw the ball, but obviously that is a very limited option without a QB. You are able to assemble an elite team of tailbacks and run-blockers, but opposing teams are able to prepare for your team without having to worry about the passing game. How many games do you think this team could win? I think you could win four or five games.
Well, you'd still have a literal QB position, someone to take snaps. It's just that you'd be using a back or a wideout to do the job, which means you'd basically have an All-Pro football team run by an extremely inexperienced but presumably athletic quarterback (the 2002 Steelers, basically). If you had a Top 5 defense on the other side of the ball, you could probably get seven or eight wins out of it, or even more, depending on the schedule, because even bad QBs can make decent plays against shitty defenses (especially with all the rules against hitting the passer now). If Percy Harvin were your QB, you'd have a whole season to get him acclimated to the position permanently, and to install whatever rollouts and simple passes you think suit him best.
I'm the kind of person who gets extremely excited whenever a running back or wideout throws the ball, which makes no sense because why should I be excited about someone throwing the ball who clearly isn't as well-suited for it as the QB? I also get really fucking jazzed if a team's QBs all get injured in one game and the specter of using a skill player as an emergency QB becomes a real threat. When that becomes a possibility, I openly root for the last QB standing to get his knee blown to shit. Same with nonpitchers being forced to pitch in games, especially if it's Jose Canseco doing the pitching. Sports novelties are AWESOME.
Greg:
Hanging up on somebody used to be the equivalent of giving them the finger then disappearing in a cloud of smoke, leaving them alone with their rage and a useless phone in their hand. Nowadays, everyone knows all too well that cell phones - and iPhones in particular - drop calls all the time, so if you angrily hang up on somebody, odds are this person will assume the call got dropped and call you right back, completely missing the message you were trying to convey. The only opportunity for a true old school hang up is when both parties know full well that they are both using landlines - as someone who doesn't have a house phone, that means work calls only, and I don't have nearly the clout required to survive such a move at work. I look forward to the day when we come full circle and all have very reliable satellite phones, leaving no doubt that yes, I just hung up on you.
Well now, wait a second. I still think you can make it perfectly clear to the other person that you ended the call on purpose. If you ramp up to your hangup with, "You know what? FUCK YOU. This conversation's over, asshole," and then press END, the person on the other line would have to be a real idiot to be like, "Whoa hey! I think he lost reception!" The real crime of cell phones is that you aren't allowed the physical gratification of slamming the phone down. You can't be like, FUCK YOU, and then bash the receiver into the phone base. Now you say FUCK YOU and then thumb around for the end button for two seconds before pressing it angrily, which isn't anywhere near as fun.
Ever have a friend who ends calls too abruptly? My best friend does this all the time. We'll be talking and the conversation will end without me prepared for it at all.
HIM: So you're gonna be there?
ME: Yeah, I'll be there around eight.
HIM: Got it. (HANGS UP)
Whoa hey, I wasn't ready for that. You have to prepare me for the fact that you're about to hang up. There needs to be a "see ya" or a "good bye." You can't just cut me off like that. I HAVE FEELINGS, JEREMY.
By the way, I was in the store yesterday and there was a woman in the produce aisle screaming at someone in her phone. Real screaming. Just reaming the shit out of whoever was on the other end of the line. And I shouldn't point out that she was black, but MY GOD SHE WAS REAL BLACK AND REAL LOUD. And she was all like, "No! You are NOT listening to me, no you are NOT!" And I was like, "How could he not be listening to you? The whole fucking world can hear you." And she kept at it for minutes at a time while everyone else just stared and felt awkward and horrible. And I kept wondering why the person on the other end didn't just hang up. Who sticks around for that kind of lambasting? I would have hung up after three seconds. She was already yelling at me at top volume. What was she gonna do, yell more?
One other thing: I saw a guy in town today with an iPhone in his pocket and, extending out from the iPhone, a blue old school phone handset, so he's sitting in the middle of town talking on a handset going into his pocket. What a fucking asshat. I hope he got hit by a van.
Ted:
Carl Monday goes to my gym. I see him there on average once a week. Tuesday was "Shoulders Day" for Cleveland's premier investigative reporter. He also is the type of person that shamelessly fills up an entire water bottle with multiple people and mounting frustration waiting behind him. Each time I see him, I am torn between being nervous or being able to rest assured about my gym choice. On the one hand, I should feel confident because Carl Monday most definitely did his homework on choosing a place that could potentially be swarming with staph infections, steroids, bacchanalia in the men's showers, etc. Furthermore, I would assume management would recognize who he is and the potential embarrassment a douche like him could cause, forcing the club to maintain a high standard. On the other hand, I constantly think that he may be undercover and performing a year plus long investigation into some seedy actions or unsanitary conditions and that I am destined to get a staph infection. Either way, I need to join a new gym, right?
I think you do. Because what if Carl is always poking around the locker room to see if you're masturbating? What if he set up a camera in the steam room to catch you jacking off even though no one else is around and it's clearly off-peak hours? I wouldn't want some narc like that ruining my good time.
(NOTE: I accidentally left my gym bag in my car all weekend long, with the smelly clothes left to ferment for 48 hours in car heat, which is much worse than regular heat. When I took the bag in this afternoon and smelled it... Oh, man. That was something. Like someone drowned you in ammonia. Highly recommended.)
HALFTIME!
David:
Not that I give 2 shits about NASCAR, but I couldn't help but notice that despite losing his driver's license for 45 days, Kyle Busch is still allowed to participate in a Truck Series (?) race during that time. What the fuck? It seems like if you're not allowed to drive on a regular road, you shouldn't be allowed to drive really fast in circles professionally. My question: Is there an actual legal code that allows NASCAR drivers to break the law in controlled environments, or is it just a cultural understanding? And secondly, and more importantly, if you could participate in any recreational activity that, under normal circumstances, would find you afoul of the law, what would it be?
If you can believe it, a driver's license is NOT required to be a NASCAR driver. I assume this is because NASCAR races take place on a closed course in a controlled environment, and because race cars are completely different vehicles from normal passenger cars, and because the law down South differentiates between "drivin'" and "racin'", with "racin'" falling under the purview of a 12-man committee of moonshiners and immigrant smugglers. But I think it would add a whole lot more spice to NASCAR if drivers who ran afoul of traffic laws were subject to the same license suspensions that you and I had to deal with. I'd love to see NASCAR drivers arrive at the garage to find a Denver boot on the wheel. Or seeing a driver with multiple DUI convictions forced to blow into a government-mandated Breathalyzer device every time he starts a race.
Aaron:
Do you think the President could acquire a bag of weed if he wanted one? If Obama decided one day that he could really go for a good toke, it would be extremely difficult for him to actually pull it off. Obviously a normal dealer is out of the question, because nobody goes near the president without being frisked by ten secret service agents. He could try to get one of his secret service guys who is actually allowed near him to pick it up, but to get that job, they have to take all kinds of lie detector tests to prove that they have never been tainted by the evils of illegal drugs, so the guy would probably wind up spending 200 of YOUR TAX DOLLARS on a bag of oregano.
Of course the President can acquire a bag of weed. I know Obama can be lacking in backbone at times, but even he has the pull to get his hands on prime weed if he needs it. He can probably ask a friend with a prescription. He can ask an aide, who would negotiate through a third party without the President's name ever attached. I assume that all you have to do if you're President is to ask and any number of shadowy government forces will set the process into motion. If a President can secretly bomb Laos, then getting weed isn't a problem at all. Same with heroin, coke, whatever. It behooves your Presidential lackeys to please you, lest they find themselves suddenly fired and with a story about their necrophilia habits planted in the Washington Post. Don't think it doesn't happen EVERY DAY in American politics.
Patrick:
Do you ever wonder whether someone you only sort-of know has based their entire opinion of you on one thing? Like ONE DAY you forgot to brush your teeth and all of a sudden they're like "Oh, you mean Patrick with the bad breath?" This idea terrifies me.
That's like when you get caught masturbating, as I was caught by my roommate's girlfriend in college. You go from "Hey, that's Drew," to "Hey, that's Drew who masturbates" instantly. AS IF NO ONE ELSE MASTURBATES! So unfair, I tell you!
The worst part about it is knowing other people are thinking that about you. I got so paranoid about people talking about me being caught masturbating that I once brought it up to a girl I had been hooking up with who had suddenly stopped hooking up with me (NOTE: If a girl suddenly stops hooking up with you, NEVER go back and ask why). And I was like, "Don't play coy with me! WHAT DID YOU HEAR?" As if that were going to help matters at all. Either she wasn't going to explain, or she was gonna confirm every horrible fear I had about being caught jacking it. Fantastic options right there. God, I hate old me.
Tarks Towel:
So, I have never understood the idea of a cold shower. If I am left frustrated sexually, wouldn't just a warm shower and jerking yourself while showering be more effective and accomplish the purpose at hand (pun intended)?
Most definitely. I think when most people say, "I'm gonna need a cold shower," they mean it as a figure of speech. I don't think any guy with blueballs has ever literally been like, "God, I'm so hot and bothered! I better go take a shower in subfreezing temperatures! That'll work way better than masturbating!" That would be idiotic.
I've tried doing the cold shower thing on crazy hot summer days, when it sounds like a good idea to take a cold shower but isn't all that fun in practice. I always step in try and convince myself it's refreshing, only to turn the heat up five seconds later. I prefer comfort. Ever have your hot water fail on you before going to work? And you have to stand there just out of the shower's jet spray while you moisten yourself with a damp washcloth and try and at least partially cleanse yourself without freezing to death? There's no quicker way to ruin your week. So cold. So very, very cold.
Dominick:
Who would win in a fight: a gorilla or a polar bear? Alphas of each species. Also the fight is in a neutral location such as the Mandalay Bay events center so we could gamble on it. And in that case what are the money lines? I've discussed this with my friends for close to a decade and most people seem to think polar bear. Either way I think it would be a great fight.
Full grown gorillas can lift upwards of a ton, depending upon whom you ask. They can weigh up to 500 pounds. The largest polar bear on record weighed over 2,000 lbs. So the polar bear has an enormous size advantage over the silverback. Polar bears can also run upwards of 25mph, although they shrink like bitches when faced with a little bit of global warming. The silverback would have advantages in terms of dexterity, what with its long arms and opposable thumbs. Do gorillas know how to do a choke hold? Because I could see the silverback jumping on top of the bear and choking the bear to death. But I think size would win out and the bear would eventually prevail. I assume Vegas oddsmakers would make the bear a favorite. Then I'd expect Simmons to bitch about that line being too high and declare, "Vegas clearly has no idea what to make of this matchup."
Larry:
How many pounds of deli meat do you think you could eat in a single sitting?
We get a pound and a half of ham from the store every Monday. And the deli guy always does a double take when I say a pound and a half, as if it was some kind of mistake. No, motherfucker. I didn't say half a pound. I said 1.5 pounds. GIMME GIMME GIMME. Then they slice it and it makes a huge tower on the scale and I have to hold myself back to not dive into the tower and begin making sweet love to the stack. And when we get it home I always eat about two-thirds of it right out of the bag immediately. Nothing can quench my insatiable ham lust. It's so good right when it's been freshly sliced. So salty. So hammy. I take a wad and stuff it in my foodhole like it's Red Man. It's a repulsive thing to behold. I could easily eat the whole bag in one sitting. Beyond that, I'd probably die of nitrate poisoning.
Our store has a deli kiosk, where you can order your shit on a touch screen and then come back after you've gotten all your other crap and your deli meat is waiting for you. When it works, this is the greatest thing ever. I just stroll on up past the old ladies, grab my meat, fart, and peel out of there. It feels incredible. But other times, the kiosk is broken, or the fuckhead deli guy never bothered to check the ticker tape printout. HAM FOUL. And the touch screen only includes slicing preferences for certain meats. If you order bologna, it asks you if you want THICK, MEDIUM, or THIN (there should be a SHAVE IT LIKE A PENTHOUSE VAGINA option, but I digress). But it doesn't offer the same options for ham, which means the fate of my meat is left in the hands of the slicer, who is always too lazy to go to thin slicing and always hands you back a pound of ham in three slices.
Ever have your deli meat go bad after three days in the fridge, when it gets all slimy? I eat it anyway. No shame.
Anon:
How long do you think it takes to film the average porn scene, (25-30 minutes)? I know the guys juice up with Viagra, etc. but I figure they can't pound away on some chick's ass for 30 minutes without blowing a wad.
I don't think it takes very long, because most every porn movie is shot on a low budget, so the emphasis is on getting to the money shot and moving on with your shooting day. Unless you're talking about an Andrew Blake movie. I assume it takes Andrew Blake 5 hours just to light one vagina properly. The man is an artist. Otherwise, I think 30 minutes to an hour would be about right. You have to set up the light, position the camera, get the actors in place, get them doing it, then change angles as appropriate (almost always to a tight angle, which makes no sense to me. I'd happily splurge on any DVD collection of wide-angle only porn). Also, everyone is probably on cocaine during the shooting, so things move fast, even if all porn scenes always go on too long.
Nate:
Given enough time in a coma, your muscles will atrophy. This includes your arms, legs, etc. What about the muscles needed to ejaculate? Say you wake up from a coma and A.) you physically can't rub one out because you can't move your arms, B.) even if you can move your arms, you can't ejaculate. I know the first thing I would want to do after a 15 year coma would be to wank. Maybe as part of physical therapy someone gives you a tugjob?
Well, the muscle that controls ejaculation would probably still work because I assume those muscles are involuntary and would continue to function while you were in a coma. You'd still pee while in a coma. You could still have wet dreams (oooh coma wet dream). You heart would still beat. Certain muscles would continue to be used. Your arms and legs are different because you consciously control them, so they would atrophy. So you could conceivably wake up able to ejaculate but perhaps too weak for a full on jerking session, in which case I assume you'd work up the strength to either use your arm or hump the rolling metal stand that carries your IV. Either way, that would be one big load.
Email of the week time.
Salmendav:
Am I the only one who hoards conversational nuggets? Let's say I have to hang out with my sister's new boyfriend who I know isn't into sports, or probably anything socially acceptable for that matter. I do possess however, the exciting knowledge that he has recently been to Florida. So the first awkward silence that comes along I tell myself, 'Easy cowpoke, let's save the big guns for a longer, more awkward silence'. And instead say 'I see you are wearing Wranglers, I like a man of substance and style'. Which means I will be asking about Florida in ten awkward seconds.
Good nuggets. LOFTY nuggets.