From the Desk of Dr. J. Kaine

A monster. I guess that's kind of what I am. But anyone who'd say that doesn't understand. Can't understand. It's the sort of thing you can only understand by doing. People are so vile, especially women. What I do- it captures their physical essence in it's purest state. Because that's all they have is physical beauty. Inside they're ugly and worthless, just like all humans. So easily discarded. It started with Mary, y'know? She was so beautiful. I met her at a club or something. I guess it was a club. We had a few drinks, went back to my place, got a little frisky. It was just sitting there on the counter. I set her up and undid my pants. But she laughed. She laughed at me. Was she some kind of fucking size queen? Did it curve funny? I didn't understand. I was drunk. It was just sitting there on the counter. Blood. She was gone. A knife? I don't know- didn't know. Didn't care. I showed her. And I was left with what mattered, the most beautiful woman I'd ever met. Not physically. I mean, she was okay. Nice ass. But now she was free of that ugliness that'd marred her. So.. I didn't stop. What did it matter? She was gone. Is that wrong? It didn't feel wrong.

A monster. I guess that's kind of what I am.

Then there was Teresa. Nice latina. It came easier that time. She didn't even do anything. I just needed to see that beauty again- to touch it, feel it, taste it. I don't remember what I did with Mary. A river? It all seems so blurred now. They all do. Mary, Teresa, Kate,.. Bridget, was it? B-something. I kept the knife. Yeah, it was definitely a knife. The news said so. 10 stab wounds? Was it really that many times? I was drunk.

It wasn't supposed to be any different with her. I met her at a club, like always. They'd only found Mary. No one'd figured out how often I was doing it. So easily discarded. Like pieces of trash. People are so vile. Anyway, I met her at a club, like always. Her name's Jane. She was the most beautiful of them all. Physically. I didn't really pay much attention to her personality. I guess I stopped doing that after Teresa. Anyway, she invited me back to her place. We were kissing. Really good, too. She's the first living flesh I've enjoyed in a long time. She promised to slip into something more comfortable as she lifted off me. Fucking cliché.

I fingered the knife, and got up. I found my way to her room. She was looking towards the wall. It would be so easy. So easily discarded, I lifted my hand up. She whirled around. Click. A gun?

We stared at each other. First there was anger. Surprise. She was the first one who'd known before it happened. The first to resist. Then there was confusion. It dawned on me. I knew the gleam in her eyes so well. I broke the long silence.

"W-.. were you going to..?"

"Y-.. yeah."

It's the sort of thing you can only understand by doing.

So, yesterday I was eating at this unfortunately mediocre restaurant. The service was slow, and the food wasn't worth the wait. I won't mention the name or nature of the restaurant, mainly because it's irrelevant, but I guess I'm supposed to protect the anonymity of the innocent?

Anyway, as I was preparing to leave, I went to the soft drink fountain for my usual final refill, regardless of the fact that I never finish said refill, and I noticed a peculiar little piece of paper taped thoroughly to the root beer pedal. It read, quite simply, "sorry out of service". That's it. No punctuation, no capitalization, no grammar anywhere. I think we're lucky we got spaces. Now, the establishment being what it is, that is, mediocre, and myself being who I am, that is, a vindictive grammar fascist, I did what I had to. I took the sign literally.

I approached the cashier, put on my best smile, and said in all seriousness, "Excuse me, when is sorry going to be back in service?" The young woman behind the register gave me a blank look, obviously the nature of my joke had gone over her head, as she wasn't given any context. She blinked and said, "I'm sorry, what?" Without missing a beat, I gave her an incredulous look and replied "Oh, you're Sorry? You don't look out of service."

You can see where this is going

The conversation escalated beyond what I could have possibly expected, eventually with a manager being called to help console this raving lunatic of a customer. It climaxed and ended when I demanded to know who or what sorry was and when they would be back in service, upon which I left in quite an unpleasant huff, the employees scratching their heads behind me.

I checked back in on the restaurant today. A small comma had been penciled in between the words 'sorry' and 'out'.

The score? 
Kaine: 1
Unsuspecting Illiterates: 0

I wonder what would happen if we were to genetically engineer a set of identical twins, of average intelligence, and give them identical, controlled lives. The only difference being that one is raised Atheist, and one is raised fundamentalist Christian, or Muslim, or Jewish.

What would be different between the two? Which would be more educated? Which would be more pleasant? More happy?

This test would of course be highly "immoral" and in the terms I provided, rather vague. But the results would be interesting.

Freedom, under imperial law, is defined as the right to control property. Any sentient being owns the following: their life, their body, their soul, their mind and its products, and their actions. This ownership is inexorable, and can never be taken, only gifted, sold, or traded, with full consent.

The concept of ownership is a human artifice that holds power only because we give it such. When I do not steal from you, I am respecting and recognizing your ownership over something. When someone DOES steal from you, they are effectively declaring their irreverence for this concept of ownership, and thus the idea that they should receive its benefits becomes dubious.

All laws of reason can be traced back to or justified by this concept. Sustain the concept of ownership, so that the concept of your own ownership is sustained.

My brother, Stephen, and I were on a road trip across the states last month, and we passed through a town that will haunt me forever.
It was in New England, small, maybe 300 people tops, although the city seemed built for far more people. Families were actually renting out empty rooms, since they seemed to be in some pretty hard times. Stephen suggested we stay with a family for a night, get some rest in a real bed and put some money into their suffering economy. When we knocked on the door, we were greeted by a man in a plain, gray suit, and a gas mask, hooked up to a hose that ended in a small respirator-looking device that covered a child's mouth. We immediately covered our noses with our shirts, as if that would help, and asked if we needed masks too. The man shook his head negatively, gesturing for us to come in. We did so cautiously, and he showed us to our room.

The girl with that respirator over her mouth never left the man's side, I assume it was her father. She was breathing in her nose and out her mouth, into the device. Both of them seemed to have trouble with it, though. We didn't question it, though, the man didn't speak, and only established a fee for the night by pointing at a sign taped up to his wall. I had an understandably uneasy feeling about it, but Stephen agreed to stay the night. I guess he though it would be rude not to. We ate dinner with the family, four children and the two parents. Two little girls and two little boys, one little boy tethered to his mother with a similar device. The other girl and boy had no devices, and the rest ate awkwardly by removing the mask quickly and taking in a bite of food. I think I almost heard the little girl connected to her father choke. The creepiest thing is that none of them spoke, no matter how awkward or tense it got, no matter how hard Stephen or I tried to start a conversation, they never did say a word. After dinner, Stephen and I got ready for bed, and we agreed to leave the town first thing in the morning. Neither of us could take the silence much longer, nor could we stand the strange apparati they were using.

Later that night, I awoke to a soft sobbing, it sounded like a grown woman, as well as the sound of a shovel piercing dirt, and heavy, beleaguered breathing. I didn't dare check to see what was going on, I just rooted myself in the bed, and forced myself to sleep. I had nightmares after that, about a terrible figure who stood over my lying body as all life slowly drained out of it.

The next morning, we ventured out into the living room to say goodbye to the family and thank them for letting us stay in their home. I knew what was wrong, but Stephen was the one who asked. I wish he hadn't. I stopped dead in my tracks, and promised myself silently that I would grab Stephen and bolt if anything happened.

"Where's your other daughter?" he had asked. The little boy without the device looked up at him, smiling as if nothing was wrong, and answered. "Daddy said he needed more air."

Love is the condensed human experience
It inspires man to great heights
The more people you share it with, the better it is
It has its ups and downs
It starts with screaming
And it ends with screaming

He traveled up the stairs, the apartment complex's elevator was broken, had been for months, so the manager says. His name was Richard Jones, a crack police detective famous for his work on uncovering a good portion of a nation-wide drug ring. He was on the hunt now, on the way  to a crime scene. A murder. Nikita Weiss. A politician, shot in the head approximately five hours ago. An officer greeted him at the door, as he ducked under the yellow tape. The door had been gouged off its hinges, a small fragment of fingernail in the hinge, he made a quiet note of, he clutched his own broken fingernail, a silent reminder.

"It's about time you got here, Rick." he nodded to his partner, Ernold. Ernold was a good cop, straight and narrow, unlike a lot of them. Cash tends to speak louder than morals to most. "Any leads?" Ernold nodded, "Two. We're having trouble getting ahold of the first, he's a two-bit thug, been in county a few times." Richard mulled over this, gesturing for his partner to continue. "And we've traced the other's credit card, he's in Connecticut now. Put out word in that jurisdiction, leaving the state doesn't look good on his part, eh?" Richard nodded. He had been consdering going to Connecticut for a while. He had friends up there. Powerful friends.

I love you.

He clutched his head. It, and his arm, hurt like hell. "Rick?" Ernold asked concernedly. The pain faded, but its sharp sting lingered longer than he'd like. "I'm fine." Richard shrugged it off. "So, what can you tell me about the victim?" Ernold looked over some notes. "She rented out this apartment two weeks ago. Here every other day. Looks to be in her late twenties. She's a politician, of course, and you loved her." Richard blinked. His head hurt again. "What was that last one?" Ernold looked at him again, his tone calm, his tone wasn't asking a question, but he heard one. "You loved her, Rick, why'd you do it?" God, what? He clutched his head. "Wh-what?" He asked one more time, trying to shake the pain. "Nevermind, it's on the report, you'll read it." Ernold said. His words matched his lips again.

His head, and his arm still hurt like hell. He tried to adjust his coat, do anything to look casual. Look like he wasn't in wracking pain. I love you. His hand gripped his .45 absentmindedly. Still warm. Still warm. He recognized that stinging pain. But he was off that stuff. Off it for months.

"You wanna take a look at her, Rick?" Ernold asked. He thanked his partner with a short nod, more grateful to take his mind off the pain than anything. Ernold lead Rick past a door into the apartment bedroom, and there she lay. Beautiful, crimson-lipped Nikita. And the pain returned. The pain in his head, in his arm, and now in his heart. It took all his strength to keep from crying. Lost time. Lost time. Still warm. I love you. That's what he had said.

He had said I love you, and pulled the trigger.

I love the Enzyte commercial. You know, the one where they interview random people on the street asking them if they "got bigger", as if that meant something. And every time they want to say penis, they give you some kind of attempt at a sly wink and use the words "that certain part of a male body." But my absolute favorite part is the hypothetical conversation between a man who's interested in Enzyte and his significant other. He informs her that he's ordered some male enhancement pills. She reaches over and grabs his arm, asking "Male enhancement- like building more muscle?"

Nice save, dear.

And then he says "No, male enhancement." with that same pseudo-sly wink, as if that changes the meaning of the phrase.
God I hate that wink.

I want to open a series of parody restaurants, right next to their serious counterparts. For example, right next to Ruby Tuesday, I'd open Sapphire Wednesday. And next to TGI Friday's would be TPI Saturday's (Thank Ptah It's Saturday). The food at these stores would be slightly better, and slightly cheaper, and eventually they would replace the old restaurants in the public mind.

I respect the good Dr. Steel on several levels. I respect him as a fellow artist, a colleague and a rival (both in world domination and in dubious doctorates). And I respect him on that level that only a man of higher thought patterns can respect another of his kind. I have no doubt that at times I will be accused of imitating Dr. Steel, and indeed perhaps on some level I am. But let's be reasonable here, world domination through charisma and keen science are NOT original concepts. They've existed in fiction for as long as science has been a concrete idea in humanity's head, and they've stewed in the brains of many a would-be dictator. Dr. Steel and are I just some of the first to bring this fiction to fact.

Honestly, I have nothing against him, and he's got a damn good head start on me. I won't be ashamed or disappointed if he beats me to the punch. He's a great musician, and the man is damn charismatic. But  is he really the right choice for the Earth? How much does he know about economics? How well planned is his new world order? How will he control rebellion? How will he maintain an army of robots when he can't even keep together a robot band?!

And besides, to we really want a bumbling lunatic with his palm over the globe? NO! He talks about aliens which can easily overpower us and barking at business meetings. I on the other hand will be well prepared for aliens, and am well beyond barking!

Mostly!