I Have Been Inside George Clooney

By now you have heard my tale of woe regarding the malicious prank pulled on me during "Black Christmas". As a result of the emotional scars suffered that day (and the physical scars on my resulting victims), I vowed to do whatever necessary to get my hands on the holiest of all electronics: The Nintendo Entertainment System.

Being that it was now 1988 and I lived in Stumblebum, I had very few choices. This being a recycling state, I could try and collect as many cans and bottles as necessary to claim my prize, or I could just bite the bullet and...gasp...get a job.

Let's put this into a little bit of perspective first. In early 1988 I was a wee lad of 12. I wouldn't turn 13 until the end of August, so I hadn't even achieved the rank of teenager yet. How in the hell was I supposed to find a job? Well, sometimes living in the ass end of a cow town can work to your advantage.

There was, in the sparse downtown area that my grandfather lovingly referred to as "Greater Metropolitan Stumblebum" a grand total of two job options; the local store (family owned) and a small restaurant called Granny's Place.

Granny's was well known to me as she had a small gaming room filled with all of 6 video games. (At the time that I started working there: Sky Shark, Ikari Warriors, Shinobi, Pole Position, Party Animal (Pinball) and Double Dragon. Being the kind of guy that would end up with Pac-Man and Adventure tattoos on my leg, you can imagine that I spent a great deal of time there playing the games. Granny's held a monthly gaming competition with fabulous prizes like waffle cones and milkshakes as the spoils and each month it was myself or one other regular who claimed the booty.

Granny knew who I was and appreciated the burning desire I possessed to claim a Nintendo for myself. After a few weeks of begging, needling and general cajoling, I got her to agree to take me on as an employee. By the time I turned 13 I was managing the restaurant.

Yes, you heard that correctly. At the age of 13 I was managing a restaurant. And yes, you're probably thinking correctly that this showed a horrible lapse of judgment on Granny's part. I wasn't necessarily a bad kid, (not yet anyways) but putting a teenager in complete control of a business intended to turn a profit is just, well, dumb.

Granny's quickly turned into a haven of free food for my friends and a refuge of general chicanery. My friends and I, though never intending any ill intent, were nonetheless a bunch of young hooligans and reprobates.

I managed to continue the charade long enough to get Terry hired as well, placing me in a position of authority over him which I loved to exploit for my own amusement. I would frequently assign him the shit duties just because I could. To his credit, he took it all with resigned humor.

Stumblebum was a town of about 30 people, a town so insignificant that we didn't even appear in all of the atlases of repute. Because of our minuscule populous, an average day there was spent doing very little real work. With the exception of the rush of ice cream sales after little league games, it was very rare to see more than one or two people there that weren't there just to visit and hang out.

I could regale you for hours with whimsical tales of our antics, but that would be foolish of me. Come on, I'm trying to run a blog here, and it would do me little good to throw all the great stories into ONE entry, now wouldn't it?

But there is one story that stands out from the pack a bit. A tale of intrigue involving Hollywood's cultural elite, sinister voodoo and an unfulfilled debt that I'm certain plagues the thoughts and dreams of at least one A-List actor currently working in the industry.

This is the tale of George Clooney's chance meeting with E.

Terry and I were tooling about the restaurant in our standard manner, i.e. doing nothing productive and ensuring the financial ruin of our employer. Having already taken care of our standard duties for the day, we were simply enjoying youth to our fullest potential.

I stood in front of Sky Shark, hoping to shatter my current high score, singing the jaunty tunes of the game as I played. Terry sat at the bar, gleefully snacking on whatever foodstuff he had snuck from the preparation area. I blasted another wave of enemy ships, oblivious to the world around me when I heard Terry call out.

"Dude, a limo just pulled up!" he shouted over to me, triggering a lapse of concentration and the untimely death of my fighter.

I turned to assault him with a barrage of curses but found myself stunned by the look of excitement in his eyes.

"A limo?" I snorted out, not believing his line for a second. Seriously, this is Stumblebum in the middle of summer. Limos don't pull into my parking lot. Limos don't even drive THROUGH Stumblebum, let alone stop here.

"Yeah," he said, while straining to see out the window. There was a brief pause and then he blurted out, "HOLY SHIT!"

"What?"

"It's that guy from The Facts of Life!" Terry said, giddy with the excitement of recognition.

"Huh? What guy?" I asked, not knowing of any male characters from that show, before tossing out, "You mean Tootie?" Har dee har har, my cutting wit knows no boundaries.

I had no idea who Terry was talking about. At this stage in his career Clooney had done The Facts of Life but had not yet done Roseanne. He was still, for all intents and purposes, a nobody. Terry was intent that this was indeed "That guy from that show" and resolved himself to finding out for certain once he came inside.

Mr. Clooney stepped into our restaurant and made his way to a table, the look on his face indicating that he was every bit as starstruck by me as I was by him. In other words, he could not have cared less if he tried.

Within minutes Terry was excitedly bouncing to the dining room to get Mr. Clooney's order while I began preparing the grill area for whatever he might want. After a short while Terry returned to hand in his order.

"Yeah, it's him alright," he said. "His name's George Clooney. He'd like a gyro and a bowl of potato soup."

A simple enough order for us to fill. I set to work preparing the gyro while Terry enthusiastically poured a bowl of soup, which he delivered to our diner with thumb deeply ensconced. (This was a bad habit of Terry's, and one for which my father yelled at him countless times...Keep your damn fingers OUT OF THE SOUP.)

Luckily for us, George did not notice the thumb in his soup, or at least had the common decency not to mention it. And thankfully Terry had attracted his attention well enough that George did not notice his gyro meat accidentally dropping to the floor. I quickly stooped and grabbed the meat, brushing it briskly against my apron.

Most people have the designated "five second rule" when food falls to the ground, a mistaken belief that it takes a few moments for bacteria and other assorted ickies to make their way onto wayward food. This is of course crap, and seeing as how this food wasn't destined for me, I was adhering to the "five minute rule", which this discarded meat fell well within the boundaries of.

Just prior to slathering a healthy dose of cucumber sauce onto Clooney's gyro, I noticed a hair drop from my head into the sizzling pile of meat and vegetables laid out before me. A little bit of voodoo magic never hurt anybody, I figured, and I let the incident slide.

Terry delivered the hairy, filth encrusted gyro to George's table and we watched with giggly glee as he ate every last bite.

That's right, YOU HEAR ME CLOONEY? I fed you a dirty gyro filled with my hair. My hair is inside you now. Not many people can make the claim that they've been deep inside George Clooney, but I can.

And I can't help but notice that prior to being fed the grimy meat sandwich by yours truly, Clooney was nothing but a bit player, a nobody. But within months of his chance encounter with E, Clooney was well on his way to super-stardom.

Coincidence? Or was it perhaps a machination set into motion by yours truly?

Oh, it was machination alright. Again, you listening Clooney? I demand reparation! If it weren't for me and the potentially deadly foodstuffs I provided, you'd still be nothing. NOTHING.

Time to repay the favor, Clooney.

I Pick Things Up, I Am A Collector

At work, the cubicle next to mine is capped by a wall of Transformers toys, old and new piled on top of each other like a modern day tower of Babel. Don't take this to be a complaint. I'm a man who loves toys, and though I do rightfully complain that the majority of them are trapped in their cardboard cages, they're still awfully neat to look at. (He does let us play with about 10 of them.) The other day, while he was pulling his latest acquisition (a Galvatron, Cyberton edition) from the FedEx box it arrived in, a group of us started a conversation about the nature of collectors.

To begin with, we had to define: what is a collector? It's easy to say that a collector is somebody who just enjoys buying a bunch of some specific item. But seeing it that way is missing the whole idea.

Collecting is not a hobby or an interest. To those with a collector's mind it truly is a way of life. Collectors specialize in some specific area. The cube next to mine: Transformers. In my past I was a major Star Wars collector. This has changed over the years, but we'll get to that later.

Collecting is more than indiscriminate purchasing. It is comprised of several different rituals, all working together in harmony to produce a positive outcome for the host.

In order to be an effective collector, you must do a great deal of research and study into your field and determine where your area of specialization lies. I mentioned earlier that I used to collect Star Wars. In the realm of Star Wars, I was focused on primarily vintage (1970's and 80's) action figures and playsets, with a special interest in anything with Darth Vader. To this day, nothing makes me happier than a nice sculpt of Vader.

So, knowing that my primary interest lay in vintage figurines, I had to learn the relative value of all of the figures, carded and loose, as well as variations in production, who the rare figures were, and how to spot counterfeits and tricks. At the time I collected the holy grail of Star Wars figures was a carded vinyl cape Jawa. They're really easy to counterfeit, all you need to do is trim a vinyl Obi-Wan Kenobi cape.

Armed with knowledge, a collector next has to determine their personal methods for pursuing their interests. For me, the thrill of the hunt was the majority of my enjoyment. There is a certain rush of adrenaline one gets when finding something they really desire after poring through some dusty collection, whether it be at a garage sale or a flea market. It's the thrill of knowing you have found something of great personal value, yet trying not to appear too excited, lest they decide to jack the price up on you.

Even once you've found items and built your stash, what is your intent? Are you collecting for future value? For sentimental value? Are these items that you intend to leave in their packaging, or do you want to open them? Again, we're all different. I was an opener. Of course, I had some items that remained in boxes, but all in all I'm a very tactile person, so holding and touching my treasures resulted in the greatest pleasure for me.

This whole conversation was made more interesting by the introduction of Doodface's collecting interests: nothing. To him, the concept of dedicating so much of your mental and physical energies to a hobby like this is just not part of his mindset.

That's not to say that either side of the equation is better. As humans, we all seek something to provide some level of interest or comfort in our lives, it's just the means that we undertake to achieve that can be quite different.

To one with no real interest in collecting, the whole concept can seem pretty alien. Who cares about G1 Transformers? What makes an Alpha Black Lotus so special? Who cares about blue Snaggletooth?

If you have no vested interest in hording or collecting of any sort, the above questions matter very little. To a collector, they mean a lot.

I'm not even that much of a Transformers fan, myself, but I get giddy with glee every time a new one arrives, because I understand the sense of joy and fulfillment that comes with a new acquisition.

I mentioned earlier that I had given up on Star Wars collecting (aside from an occasional Vader) some time ago. This was due to a fundamental change in the nature of collecting. For some it was a boon, the dawning of a golden age. For others, such as myself, it signaled the end of an era. The entity of change? The internet. More specifically, Ebay.

It used to be that the pursuit and procurement of collectibles would take dedication, a willingness to "hit the bricks" and scour all of the local shops and haunts looking for an elusive item or a fantastic deal. Now all you have to do is logon to Ebay and rest assured that some guy out there has bought every item in stock at your local store and is willing to sell it to you at three times market value.

No, thank you. Where's the reward if you don't have to work for it?

Since the dawn of the internet age, I have turned my interests elsewhere. I now hunt three primary things: movies, video games, and information.

Movies and games have long been an interest of mine, so that's really just an extension of an old hobby. But information has proved to be a fun and rewarding hobby. I love to learn, so going on the hunt for information is a natural extension of my interests. Plus, it gives me the ability to spout out interesting tidbits of knowledge at inappropriate times.

It's also allowed me to channel my interests for others. Anytime somebody has some obscure bit of information they're looking for, I'll give you one guess who they come to.

So what about you? Are you a collector? Does all this talk of little plastic action figures and robots get you excited, or would you be just as happy to look at a rock?

The Death of Golobulus

The teenage years are a rough time for any male; a tsunamic flood of hormonal and physical metamorphosis that renders the majority of us into confused drooling monstrosities. It was much the same for me, finding myself overwhelmed by the thirst for carnage and blood that ravages the minds of the demented. For my part, my pubescent transformation resulted in the ultimate obliteration of many an unfortunate toy.

There were only two "races" of action figure spared from my genocidal tendencies: Star Wars and Transformers. These both ranked as sacrosanct, outside the bounds of even my most homicidal urges. Sometimes they'd even be brought along for the sheer joy of the kill, to laugh alongside me as their plastic brethren departed the earth.

Without question the most frequent targets for my destructive actions were the good men and women of the GI Joe unit. Wankers, the lot of them. I had no qualms whatsoever in proposing and carrying out creative methods of execution, all for my twisted amusement.

For every termination there were two important parts; the determination of method and the reading of the last rites. Every toy sentenced to death would have their charges read out before them. Occassionally I would allow them to argue for clemency, though I'm afraid that the majority found that justice's ears are firmly plugged.

The methods varied. Duke found himself bound a pair of bottle rockets, launched into the stratosphere only to suffer a violent explosive episode before plummeting back towards the Earth at terminal velocity. Gung Ho found himself strapped to the outside of a helicopter on its way to a head-on collision with a tree. He found the pilot of said vehicle to be a terrifying master, indeed, as his splintering crash had to be repeated seven or eight times until the headsman was satisfied.

Another Mengelian experiment in which I took joy was the grafting of the limbs from one victim to the ample torso of another. To facilitate these actions would require a blowtorch and a great deal of creativity, heating the limbs on victim number one until soft enough to be pulled from the torso, only to attach the limb to his compatriate and let the bubbling plastic cool. Many a mutant was created in such a fashion.

Ahh...the mutants. Herein lies my finest hour.

Golobulus was the mutant leader of Cobra-La, the original incarnation of Cobra, the primary nemesis of the GI Joe universe. Good old Golobby was a serpentine mutant, half man, half snake. He came into my life not as a single figure, but as part of a three pack of Christmas joy, accompanied by Nemesis Enforcer and Royal Guard.

To his credit, Golobulus was a pretty cool figure, what with his segmented mutant body and accompanying baddies. All in all I was rather fond of the lot of them.

But fancy can be a fickle thing, and the following summer I found a death sentence handed down from the high courts, boldly stamped with Golobulus' name, his two henchmen named as accomplices.

I'd love to say that I argued eloquently on their behalf, acting as an informal Clarence Darrow with the hopes of swaying the opinion of the judiciary. I'd love to, but it would be a bold faced lie. In truth, I relished the idea of their forthcoming execution and quickly set to work with determining the means and timing of my justice.

And so it was that one fine Spring morning, Golobulus and his crew found themselves wrested from slumber and carted off to the nearby baseball field. I dragged them off to a little used nook and laid them on the ground before digging them a shallow grave with a garden trowel. A grave, I might add, that they WATCHED me dig. I made no reassurances that they would not occupy this earthen stronghold posthaste.

At the appointed hour I read the charges against them and informed them that they had been sentenced to death. A sentence to be carried out immediately. They were stood before their future grave and the ceremony communed.

Their death was to be in two stages.

Stage 1: Artillery fire. A BB gun provided the small birdshot pellets that would tear their tender flesh to shreds, or at the very least dent their tough plastic casing. This stage would cease when the final accused dropped into the plot behind him.

Stage 2: Chemical bath and immolation. Once the accused had been fired upon and laid to rest in their shallow grave, they were to be bathed in WD-40 and set alight, to smoulder and boil into a formless blob of plasticized chemicals.

When the acrid black smoke finally cleared I offered the cermonial "Ashes to ashes" speech and then covered their remains with the dirt used to construct their grave.

Years went by, and I relished the memories on countless occassions. I would even make constitutionals over to the ball field to revisit their eternal resting place. But as time wore on and my memory dimmed, I found myself unable to pinpoint the exact area of execution.

The knowledge of their forgotten grave began to eat at me, my brain shifting at odd moments to the spectral monsters that no doubt lurked the field in the evening. I wouldn't have been surprised to see the Mystery Machine pull up to investigate the scene.

And so, one August afternoon in 2003 (that coincidentally turned out to be the day of the great blackout) I took my stepchildren and brother-in-law over to the field with a metal detector in hopes of finding my forgotten prey.

We spent the better part of three hours combing the land, hoping that the BB's or metal pins in their joints would set off the detector, allowing me to glimpse with pride once more at the destruction wreaked upon those hapless victims oh so many years ago.

I regaled the children with tales of what we were searching for, pointing out the sites of various misdeeds of my youth. (Which included the area where Terry and I hid for another misdaventure.) We fervently struck at the soil at various points hoping to blindly stumble across the victims while I did my best to reconstruct the scene in my head.

But it was to no avail. The final resting place of the Cobra-La squad remains lost to the ages. I fear that Golobulus will never see daylight again.

The Hunt

I cannot even begin to count the number of times I have performed the ritual. Each time I feel its pending arrival, my hairs stand at end, electric energy flowing through my body, urging me to carry out the nefarious acts it knows will soon follow.

Everybody has their rituals, be it how they prepare their coffee, how they organize their desk, or...other things. But the rituals of others matter not I say, for my hungers find themselves unsatiated by standard fare, forcing me to seek out a darker object to satisfy my desires.

As has been noted many times before, the thrill of the hunt is half the excitement, and I will not lie, I enjoy haunting the Wal*Marts and the dollar stores in search of my elusive prey. I find that the quality of victim is little changed by the locale I find it in. They all ultimately provide the same attraction.

Once I have staked out my quarry and made my move, it's time to return to my sanctuary, so that I may carry out my actions in private, away from the prying eyes of those who could not possibly understand. The arrival at my home allows me to carry on the second, more ritualized aspect of the hunt. Namely, it allows me time to both prepare and execute the kill.

When the appointed hour arrives, I extricate my prey from its temporary storage and place it on the altar of sacrifice. Almost without exception they will stare up at me, frozen in terror, unable to move or scream.

I begin by removing whatever outfit they are wearing and placing it in a pile next to them. We wouldn't want to stain their clothing, now would we? Their naked frame remains before me, unmoving, yielding to my dark intent.

Now it's time to remove their eyes, damnable windows to the soul that would otherwise stare accusingly at me while I desecrated their home. Sometimes I'll use an implement such as a knife to remove their ocular apparati. Sometimes I'll just claw them out with my bare fingers, relishing the feel of them loosening then ultimately separating from the body proper.

The eyes are soon cast aside so that the real game can begin. But I am not an entirely heartless monster. This is the point in the ritual where I will apologize to my victim, explaining that life is a matter of survival of the fittest.

And now it's time for the kill proper. You might think from the above descriptions, that I would slash and cut at the soon to be lifeless frame, fetishistically thrilling with each downward thrust.

But honestly, I have no need for abject cruelty, so, having removed their eyes and leaving them unknowing of what will come next, I strike for the face. The intent is to burrow through the face into the frontal lobes of the brain as quickly as possible.

That I need to feast is without question. I have no desire to torment the victim. Sometimes I can make my way through the outer casing of the head in a simple crushing bite. If I (or they, as might be said) am unlucky, then a few blows are required before the fatal one strikes home.

Once I am assured that only a hollow corpse lays before me, I set to work, hungrily devouring all that remains of its mortal shell.

After all is said and done, I say a brief word of thanks for the sustenance that has been provided, then I dispose of the remnants and discarded bits.

The ritual is complete until next year, when the chocolate bunnies go on sale once again...