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By Tgreen, March 17, 2011 12:53 am

Just a reminder, we’re coming up on the two days you are absolutely, positively, under no circumstances allowed to call out sick. Do you even have to ask why? First up, we’ve got St. Patrick’s Day on the 17th. Call out sick then and everyone you work with is gonna know you’re passed out on some bar, open tap crammed in your mouth.

I mean, we all know you’re the type who would invent an entire adopted family if it provided you with some new family members you could kill off when you want some time to attend their fake funeral. So it’s not a stretch to assume that when you say you’ve got some kind of bug on the 17th, you really mean the drinking bug. And your plan to eliminate this bug is to drown it repeatedly with Jameson’s and Guinness. Your fake cough, while impressively authentic-sounding, fools no one.

And if the 17th is bad, the 18th is worse. Call out on the 18th, even if you legitimately have coughed out a lung, tripped over it, fallen down the stairs and suffered two concussions and a ruptured spleen, and everyone thinks you can’t hold your liquor.

So be careful over the next two days. Your reputation is at stake, and considering what you did at the office Christmas party after totally ignoring my advice about that, it’s not like you have a whole lot of reputation left in the first place. Think it’s annoying when your coworkers think back to that night and call you the “Millimeter Monster”? Call out on Friday and see what happens.

See you in the office.

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By Tgreen, March 13, 2011 5:03 pm

I used to work at a place called The Voyager Company back in the mid-90s. We made CD-ROMs (remember those) back when CD-ROMs looked like they might be the future, at least for a little while. The place closed down in 1997, gave me a severance check I used to buy my first Jeep, and that was the end of that. Here’s a clip from an astrology CD we made:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzTI-2emGAQ

Okay, so maybe it’s not such a huge mystery why the place went under. Or maybe it still is. I worked there for about two and a half years, testing software, managing the group of testers, and maintaining the testing “lab”, which was basically a couple of long tables piled with several out-of-date computers. We did make some cool stuff along the way, and any job that forced me to watch Spinal Tap, Robocop and A Night to Remember multiple times as part of my regular duties couldn’t be all bad.

The problem was, or my problem was, anyway, no matter how interesting a job might look to an outsider, eventually the people on the inside are gonna be sick of it. Do the same interesting tasks, or look at the same interesting thing, every day and it’s gonna wear you down. At least I have to believe that or else I’ve got to take responsibility for how most all of my jobs have ended. But really, could you look at this every day for a couple of months and not go just a little insane:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUQN98dKfuE

The only reason I’m even thinking about this old job is because I realized recently how much it contrasts to the job I’m doing now. On the surface, the jobs look the same. They’ve got the same title and fairly similar job descriptions. But the main difference is that at Voyager, I was mostly helping artists make their art work on new technology. At my current job, well, I’m not. We won’t get into who I’m helping or what I’m helping them do, but there’s not a whole lot of art going on.

As I try to squeeze some form of creative activity into whatever time is left over after work is done, I find myself thinking more about jobs I had where I got to do the creative work, or jobs like at Voyager where at least I was able to contribute in some way to someone else’s creative works. I have a feeling this will all contribute to whatever decisions I make when it’s time to move on to the next thing. Assuming the economy allows for such thinking and doesn’t, as it does now, force everyone to take whatever they can get and be thankful they’ve got it. But yeah, when I watch a clip like the one below, and recall the crazy days and nights trying to force the technology to do what the art demanded of it, and ultimately succeeding, it makes, for example, banner ads feel a little lame:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPYOSLqN5Ns

That clips is from Laurie Anderson’s Puppet Motel. I worked on the Mac version of it my first day at Voyager. A couple of years later when we wrapped the Windows version, on the spur of the moment I decided it should be my last day. I stayed because it was raining out and I wouldn’t have had anything fun to do in the rain. This was seriously my thinking on the matter that day. And that thinking reminds me not to get too nostalgic over the Voyager job, or any other job I ever had, because no matter how good they might look in the rearview mirror, there wasn’t a single job I didn’t spend some time trying to figure out how to bust the hell out of at some point.

But hey, Voyager folks, don’t think I hated the place. I didn’t. You were all crazy talented and I consider myself lucky to have worked with you as long as I did. I sure can’t say that about some places I’ve been. Time to leave the mid-90s back where I found them as I contemplate my next move.

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By Tgreen, March 12, 2011 2:13 am

Yes, I know I should’ve posted this 2 weeks ago, but I was busy. So busy that I couldn’t take 5 minutes to slap together a blog post? Perhaps. So let’s not waste another moment. Here’s the deal. I’ve got a story, Cog in the Spring 2011 issue of The First Line. Until March 13, you can get a free PDF download of the issue. So click here and look for the Free Issue link. You’ll get a free PDF that has my story and several other fine pieces of fiction. And if you get there after March 13, you can buy the PDF, or a hard copy of the issue, and not only will you be entertained, but you’ll be giving some nice folks a couple of bucks. You can’t lose.

And to give you an idea of what you’re getting into, here are the first 2 paragraphs of my story:

Sam was a loyal employee. This wasn’t saying too much in an age when a loyal employee was mostly one who didn’t steal office supplies or badmouth the company on Twitter every other day. Still, such employees were getting harder to find in an age when a loyal employer was one who didn’t lay off half the staff every other month. Sam realized that for many it was all a game now, with some of his coworkers trying to screw the company before the company screwed them, but Sam didn’t play that game.

For one thing, he didn’t have time. His role as lowly cog in the great Transglobal Endeavours machine kept him busy for nearly 50 hours a week. He constantly referred to himself as a lowly cog, but in truth he’d worked at Transglobal Endeavours just shy of 5 years now and had officially figured out a long time ago that his entire division, and possibly the entire company, was made up of nothing but lowly cogs. He often wondered if it was appropriate to refer to anyone as lowly if everyone was lowly. He didn’t know what he was, really, and so he said cog because it was somehow comforting.

Wanna see the rest? Head on over to The First Line and get yourself some short stories. Thanks for stopping by.

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By Tgreen, February 13, 2011 12:39 am

Earlier this week I got this scene stuck in my head. I don’t know where it came from or why it hung around so long, but it kept playing over and over in my head until it became way more distracting than it’s worth. That happens every now that then. Lots of times a scene will show up from out of nowhere, with no warning, and after a little while if I ignore it, it goes away. But then there are the rare cases when the scene won’t go away no matter how hard I ignore it. Those scenes dig in and force me to pay attention to them. The only thing to do when that happens is to type the scene out and move on.

This particular scene really has nothing to do with anything I’m trying to work on now. Doesn’t really have anything to do with anything I was thinking of working on in the future. It just showed up and didn’t want to leave. So I typed it up. And since Molly asked so nicely, I’m gonna post it here. Maybe it’ll make some sense to somebody. It’s first draft writing, banged out in one late night and one evening. Not the kind of thing I’d normally share with the world. But I don’t know that I’ll ever use it for anything, so I might as well share…

George climbed the stairs on the side of the building and found the room in the back, overlooking the parking lot. The door was open. He couldn’t see anything inside from out here on the narrow concrete walkway, but he could hear Glen Campbell wailing about the pitfalls of being a Rhinestone Cowboy from a tinny radio speaker somewhere inside. He looked this way and that, peeked down at the parking lot one last time to make sure he was alone, and entered the dark room.

There were two beds. The one closer to the door was still made and the top blanket looked relatively clean and pressed for a motel of this caliber. The farther bed was a tangle of sheets and blankets, with an open suitcase balanced at the foot and a lanky man in boxers and a t-shirt sprawled across the rest of it. His name was Kyle and he looked up at George and lifted a hand in a lazy greeting. His other hand clutched a can of beer that was a close relative to the short lineup of empties on the dresser.

“Aloha,” he said before taking a drink.

“Why’s the door open?”

“Air’s busted. Gets too hot with the door closed.”

“Why don’t you call downstairs to get it fixed?”

“Why don’t you stop assuming I didn’t think of that already? They’re sending someone up.”

George shrugged off the backpack he’d been wearing and dropped it in the center of the made bed. “There any more of those?” he asked, gesturing toward the beer can in hand.

“In the bag,” came the reply, along with a nod at the small round table pressed hard up to the dresser. It held a paper bag with the top folded over, plus a Styrofoam container, a pile of napkins, and a couple of squat cardboard cups with lids on them.

“There’s ribs in that box,” Kyle said. “You can have ‘em if you want. They’re too spicy for me.”

“Where they from?”

“That place down the road. The one that’s open all night?”

George flipped open the top of the Styrofoam container and snatched up a rib, thick and meaty and glistening with a thick red sauce. He took a bite and the heat of a thousand peppers seared his tongue and nearly tore his head off his body. The heat flared, then subsided into a low, nagging pain. Whoever had created this sauce was a genius.

“Good stuff,” George said as he used his free hand to pull a beer from the paper bag.

“I like food that’s a little spicy,” Kyle said. “But usually I order something hot and you can barely taste anything. So I ordered the super hot or whatever the hell they call it. And I think that shit melted my fillings.”

“Look at you, outthought by a pit boss in some two-bit fast food joint.” George gnawed the rest of the meat from the bone and then deposited the bone in the small trashcan by the door. He snagged another rib before he took a seat on the edge of the empty bed.

“Where’s the rest of them?” he asked.

“Room on the other side of the place,” Kyle said. “They’re too loud.”

George nodded as he popped the top of his beer can. He gulped the contents of the can. It was still cold, but well on its way to lukewarm. George wouldn’t be able to drink another if he waited too much longer. He finished his first beer and second rib in a few moments, then mashed paper napkins between his sodden fingers to clean them. Once all remnants of the barbecue sauce were gone, he grabbed a second can and returned to his perch on the bed.

“You bring it?” he asked.

In response, Kyle sat up, reached into his open suitcase, and retrieved a small packet wrapped in a dirty towel. He tossed it across the gap between the two beds. It landed beside George with a thud. George drained half of his second can before he hefted the packet, testing its weight. It was heavy and solid, and the towel it was wrapped in smelled of old dust and mildew. He unfolded it, flipped it over and unfolded it again to reveal a dark hunk of metal. A revolver, .38 by the looks of it. The metal was dull and lifeless. George slipped a hand underneath it and lifted it from its nest in the towel.

“What the hell is this?”

“My uncle’s service revolver,” Kyle said, his tone somewhat defensive. “He was a cop once.”

“Once in the 1800s?”

“You asked for a gun. That’s the only one I could find.”

George turned his hand to view the weapon from every angle. It looked exactly like something that had been cared for once, long ago, then forgotten and neglected for more years than anyone cared to remember. It would have to do.

He flipped it to the side and snapped it open. The cylinder popped out and he eyed it to confirm his first impression that there were no bullets.

“You bring any ammo?”

“Couldn’t find any,” Kyle said. “We’re gonna have to buy some.”

“Gonna have to buy a kit to clean this fucking thing too,” George said. “Where’d you find it?”

“In the attic, in some old boxes. I didn’t even know it was there. Good thing I found it now, before my kid went poking around up in there.”

“You have a kid? Since when?”

“Since always. He just turned five last month.”

“Shit, I don’t think I knew that,” George said. He turned the gun around and looked up the barrel. “No worries about your kid hurting himself with this thing. Even if he could find a bullet for it, it’s so damn dirty it’s not gonna shoot anything. He’d be in more danger if he dropped it on his foot.”

He thought he saw something clogging the barrel, so he held the gun over the towel, pointed it downward, and tapped against the side. After three taps, some dark flakes fell out, along with the tiny, dried and shriveled body of a brown spider. George barked a laugh.

“Was your uncle Barney Fife or something? Did he ever use this thing?”

“My uncle’s dead twenty years,” Kyle said. “Gun’s probably been in that box at least twenty-five.”

“After I clean it we’re gonna have to shoot it. You know anyplace we can do that?”

“I thought we were bringing the gun for show,” Kyle said. “You never said we were gonna use it.”

“Probably we won’t. But if you’re bringing a gun, you’ve gotta be ready to use it.”

“And you’re ready to use it?”

“Right now I think I’m more ready than the gun is.”

“You ever shoot a gun before?” Kyle asked.

“Plenty of times. More rifles than handguns, to be honest. But I’ve shot guns like this before, over the years.”

“Ever shoot one at somebody?”

George leveled him a look that said there would be no forthcoming answer to that question.

“You know a place we can shoot this thing?” he asked again.

“Down by the river, probably,” Kyle said. “Go down there right after sundown and it’s not real crowded. Quiet too, but not so quiet a couple of shots would send anyone running.”

“Sounds good enough.” George rewrapped the gun, along with the spider’s corpse, and slipped the packet into the drawer of the nightstand between the beds. “I wanna meet the others. Introduce me.”

“They’re in room 211, around the front of the building,” Kyle said. “Introduce yourself. Don’t be shy.”

George was going to argue, but he was already tired of Kyle’s voice. He drained the second beer and added the empty can to the collection. Without another word he walked out of the room.

There were seven doors along this side of the building, then four more after George turned right, and then after three more doors following another right, he found the door to room 211. It was closed, like every other door except for Kyle’s. He could hear the TV from inside. He knocked.

A short, dark man with longish hair and a full beard cracked the door and peered out at George. He said nothing, and based on the small slice of his face visible through the space between door and frame, it looked unlikely that he was interested in speaking.

“¿Hablas Inglés?” George said.

A small shake of the head. “¿Habla usted español?”

George did, a little, but for now was going to play dumb. “No,” he said, with an emphatic headshake. A standoff, he thought. Mexican. How appropriate. He smiled.

The door was pulled open from inside and another man was revealed behind the first one. He was older, the hair at his temples white, his skin dark and wrinkled from years of exposure to the elements. His dark eyes narrowed and he looked George up and down.

“You’re el Blanco?” he said.

“I guess so,” George said. “Kyle’s friend.”

The man waved him into the room and shut the door behind him. The room looked much like the one he’d left Kyle in, but there were four other men lounging on the beds or on the floor or basically anywhere a body could sit. Any space not filled by a body was covered in grocery bags, some stuffed with groceries and some already doing duty as garbage bags. The room smelled of sweat and beer and junk food. And George thought he smelled the faint aroma of marijuana too. This was how he imagined a dorm room might smell.

The man who answered the door pushed his way back to a spot in the edge of the bed and joined his compatriots in watching the TV. Wresting was on, from Mexico, and the picture was so fuzzy and static-filled that George couldn’t imagine how they could follow the action. That was their problem. They were content to ignore him for now and he was content to be ignored. George turned his attention back to the older man, obviously the boss of this crew.

“You have guns?” George asked.

The old man shook his head. “Kyle said no guns.”

George nodded. At least they could follow orders. Or lie to him convincingly. For now he’d assume that first one.

The man fished around in a paper sack on the dresser and produced a can, which he held out to George.

“¿Cerveza?”

George took the can, which felt colder than what Kyle had been drinking, and thanked him. He looked at the can and all the words on it were Spanish. While George could understand it a bit if he listened, and could mangle it a bit if he spoke it, he couldn’t read a word of the language. He drank anyway, and it wasn’t the worst beer he ever had.

“You been to the place yet?” he asked.

The old man nodded. “Yesterday. It’s like Kyle said. Should be easy.”

“It’ll be the first easy thing, then,” George said. “But here’s hoping.”

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By Tgreen, December 24, 2010 12:03 pm

Some years get so hectic that the sound of “Ho, Ho, Ho!” is actually drowned out by the labored gasps bursting from your chest as you try to wrap up all your last-minute holiday errands. But no matter how crazy things get, your reward is a nice, relaxing Christmas with family and friends, right? Maybe. Or maybe instead you’ll end up experiencing something from…

Tgreen’s Top Ten Signs Christmas Isn’t Going So Well:
10. Accidentally gave wife’s gift to mom, and mom’s gift to wife, and neither one of them noticed
9. Egg nog + new Wii Fit = trip to emergency room
8. Mistletoe belt buckle attracts unwanted attention from your sister’s aggressive cat
7. Gingerbread house gets foreclosed before you can eat it
6. Slightly-confused aunt thought she was getting you tickets to Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, actually got you tickets to Batman & Robin: Turn Down the Bed
5. Everyone’s stocking stuffed with coal from mine in Chile
4. 1966-era fruitcake bought on eBay as a joke suddenly promoted to dessert
3. Children insist on marathon playing of A Very Bieber Christmas album
2. Best gift you got was copy of Sarah Palin’s new book
1. Most party guests spend day discussing next year’s trip to Mecca

Now go on and finish wrapping your presents, mixing your egg nog, trimming your tree, decking your halls, and be sure to have a Happy Friday and, of course, a Merry Christmas!

T “holly jolly” green

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By Tgreen, December 17, 2010 1:00 pm

Stumbled across an article recently that offered some advice on what not to do at your office holiday party. It offers some good advice, as far as it goes, but it could do better.

Office parties are a strange ritual. Sure, it’s a party, and who doesn’t love a party? Free food. Maybe free booze. What’s not to like? But it’s a party with the same miserable bastards with whom, through no fault of your own, you’re trapped for 8 hours or more every day. Are free cookies and some store-brand egg nog enough to balance that out? Unlikely. And since it’s Christmas, there’s a good chance some fat coworker is going to be forced into a Santa suit and that’s just bad for everybody.

Over the decades I’ve been to more than a few office holiday parties, and I’m going to take a moment to share some of my hard-won knowledge to help you avoid the pitfalls so many others before you have encountered. I hope it’s not too late to save some of you. Everything mentioned on this page stems from a 100% true story. Only the names have been removed to protect the guilty. So, here are some things to keep in mind for this year’s office party:

Just Don’t Go
You can’t actually follow that bit of advice, but I do need to include it because it’s the simplest, most effective way to get you through the holiday season without either completely embarrassing yourself or accidentally dropping a hand grenade onto your career. Now that we’ve gotten the most obvious and least likely bit of business out of the way, let’s see what else we’ve got.

If the party’s being held in your office, at least make sure it’s not anywhere near your desk
All day long you sit at that desk, marking time until the grim reaper pays a visit. If they throw a party there, how festive can you be when you’re sitting in the same damn seat surrounded by the same damn page-a-day desk calendars and clipped Dilbert cartoons and pictures of your coworkers’ freakishly ugly families? At this point the only difference between regular work day and party is that there’s alcohol. And be honest, there are days when the addition of alcohol wouldn’t mark a difference between work day and party. Make sure those party planners plan something down the hall. Not only does it give you even the slightest change of scenery, but it’s easier to sneak out when things get dull, and if the party’s in your office, trust me, that’s gonna happen real soon.

If you see a senior VP doing the Chicken Dance and walking drunkenly into a wall, you did not see a senior VP doing the Chicken Dance and walking drunkenly into a wall, and you are obviously mistaken
Does this even need to be explained? The stupid behavior of anyone above you in the food chain operates under a cloak of invisibility. You didn’t see it. It didn’t happen. Exceptions include drunken passes that you’re not interested in, drunken passes you are interested in but are sober enough to recognize as a bad idea, and anything that involves on-site nudity.

Drunk people can bounce way better than sober people
See that drunk coworker downing the one glass of wine beyond what can be consumed without falling to the floor? Well, stand back. That drunk will go all wobbly, drop to the floor in what looks like slow motion, and get there without injury. If you try to interfere, odds are good your sober body, which possesses few Gumby-like properties, will trip and fall and possibly end up in the emergency room with a busted ankle. Simple rule: let them drop, have a good laugh at their expense, and then assess the damage.

If your coworker disappears for a half hour and then returns with a mysterious stain at the bottom of his shirt, don’t ask questions
Of course you want to know the answers, but you can’t ask. If a brag-worthy story led to the stain, you’ll eventually hear about it. And if it’s a stain of humiliation, it’s guaranteed someone witnessed it and by next Tuesday you’ll read all about it on Facebook. But during the party, look at the stain, accept its existence, and move on.

If the intern, who may or may not even be of legal drinking age for all you know, wants to make egg nog with a booze:nog ration of 2:1, it’s not your place to interfere
People need to learn from their mistakes. If you tell someone that’s too much booze, that person might listen to you but won’t know why. If that person nearly gives the entire company a serious case of alcohol poisoning, a lesson has been learned that will not soon be forgotten. That’s why you’re here, to teach.

You don’t want to get stuck with the pink frilly underwear at the end of the Yankee Swap
I mean, for one thing there’s a 50/50 chance you’re not even the correct gender to wear them. And for another, even if they fit you like a glove, do you want to cover your underwear zone with something that was previously manhandled by one of your coworkers? I thought not.

If you look around the room and realize everyone you work with looks like a freak, you’re probably in deep denial about how much of a freak you actually are
Seriously, your company employs 50 freaks and one super-cool normal guy? You’re cousin Marilyn to your company’s Munsters? Not likely, freak.

If the party venue offers any games of skill, like pool, darts, beer pong or even full-contact Jenga, let your boss win
Sure, the boss might seem too drunk to remember your victory dance, but odds are someone will, and then you can kiss that bonus goodbye.

If the coworker you’re crushing on brings a husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend/significant other of some sort, you cannot spend the night hating that person and plotting their demise
That’s what the new year is for.

If Santa shows up, give him a wide berth
Otherwise this might happen:

And no one wants this to happen.

For yet another consecutive year, the mistletoe belt buckle is a bad idea
It’s offensive, a potential fire hazard and, most importantly, there’s a decent chance it’ll attract the exact wrong person, and then where will you be?

If you have any kind of resentment against anyone you work with/for/or above, steer clear of the scotch (Or, to put it more clearly, everybody steer clear of the scotch)
Too many people think free booze = drink the good stuff. But if you live a Miller Lite lifestyle the other 364 nights of the year, trying on the Johnny Walker lifestyle for 1 corporate-sponsored evening is not going to go well. If you don’t know Johnny, you’re gonna think he’s your new best friend and when he eggs on your every crazy thought, you’re gonna open your mouth and say them all. But Johnny’s not your friend. He knows this is just a one night stand and he’s gonna do to you what usually happens on any one night stand, and it won’t be pretty. If there’s anyone you dislike enough to talk trash about, and if you have a job there’s at least one person there who qualifies, stick to your usual. You might still wake up with a headache the next morning, but at least that headache will still be employed.

If you just don’t care anymore what you say, order up a gin and tonic
Gin and tonic won’t make you less likely to say something stupid, but you’ll look classier as you get there.

So there you go, some hard-earned holiday wisdom to keep in mind as you venture out there for some corporate-mandated holiday cheer. Enjoy the season, and really enjoy that gin and tonic if that’s the route you choose to take. Happy Holidays!

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By Tgreen, December 6, 2010 1:25 am

If I held my breath in the morning
would I wake up for a lifetime
Lose my job in this depression
well I don’t care ’cause I got your love

I squeaked in just under the wire this year, I’m not ashamed to admit. This year’s NaNoWriMo was a tough one. As I previously mentioned, I started the month more burned out than I realized, with barely the energy to come up with an idea in the first place. Then I fell behind after the first couple of days, and spent the rest of the month struggling to keep from falling even farther back. The job tossed me a couple of curveballs too (though not as bad as the ones they’d already tossed me in September and October), and I’ll admit I considered quitting a couple of times. Not too seriously, because nothing happened that really justified quitting, but it was an option I considered.

When you’re racing to finish a novel in a month, you will grasp at the thinnest of straws more than once. For me, the first set of straws was all about the plot. I didn’t have one, but I had some ideas. I started with a guy who gets fired from his job while the job keeps a dead guy on the books. I thought the dead guy might end up being more important to the story than he ended up being. He gets mentioned a lot, but, not surprisingly I guess, he doesn’t do much to advance the story.

For a little while I thought maybe the story would be about the fired guy and a friend of his giving up on the whole work thing and starting their own religion. That possibility gets mentioned several times, but becomes more something they plan to do after they finish doing whatever the hell the book is supposed to be about than something the book could actually be about. So that was no help. To get the whole religion thing started, I needed a character to suggest it, and for that I thought it would be easier to drag in a character I’ve used in a couple of other stories, since he’s been published before and has proven to be the type of character who would naturally be planning a religion as his next career move.

Since this character, Yank, besides being used in a couple of stories, is also one of the main characters of my previous(?) comic strip Greetings from Shokanaw, I thought he’d be a good source of comic relief. And maybe he was at first, but eventually he started turning from comic relief to the damn conscience of the story. I was too tired to stop him. As I followed the characters deeper into their plan to fight back against the inconveniences of unemployment, Yank became less punchline machine and more man with a point to make. I knew for sure I’d lost all control over him when this happened:

“You say you’re concerned about the people who work for you, but the first lie every employer tells himself is how much he cares about his employees,” Yank said. “It’s a lie they have to tell, and that they have to believe. They couldn’t get any real work done otherwise. Tell the lie, then believe the lie, and then you can go about your business. It’s how the world works. There’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

It was an important point to make in the story, and by that point Yank was the only one who could’ve made it, but comic relief? Hardly.

When this is over, over and through
And all them changes have come and passed
I want to meet you in the big sky country
Just want to prove mama, love can last

This book only got written because I got my upgraded copy of QuickOffice for the iPhone. No doubt my fellow commuters thought I was texting away like a 16-year-old girl every morning and every night. That actually would make more sense than what I was really doing. Who in their right mind writes a book on a cell phone during a crowded commute? Nobody in their right mind, I’ll tell you that. The bulk of the rest of it was written using Pages on the iPad. A small amount was written in Word on my MacBook, but rarely was I in the mood to sit in my office and type. Last year that’s where almost all the work got done. This year I’m so out of the habit of working in my home office, it was the last place I wanted to be after a long day at work.

And those long days at work, they were long. There probably weren’t as many of them as there were last year, but when they happened, they were like a punch in the face. There’s a reason for that, and I’m not going to explain it here today, but eventually I will. But basically, any time I got stuck with a long work day, besides having to do the work, I had to deal with the fact that it shouldn’t have been me stuck working late. That shouldn’t be my responsibility anymore. But it was, and it kept me from home a lot, so those long commutes became the place to write.

I think I would recommend the commute-writing for anyone who just wants to get into the rhythm of writing without having to think about it too much. Because if you try to think about it too much, I doubt you can get much done on a bus or a subway. When you’re sitting at home, at your desk, computer at the ready, you can afford to sit back and contemplate that next perfect word you’re about to release unto the world. When you’re jammed into a seat on the bus, half the time you’re typing to spite the situation you find yourself in. You’ll be damned if you’re gonna let your stupid commute to your stupid job keep you from getting something done. You’re a writer so goddammit, you’re gonna write. That’s how I did it. I’d sit down in the bus and within a minute I’d be banging out the next scene. Was it great stuff? No. But when you’re racing to 50K, nothing you write is great. The bus stuff was as good as the couch stuff. For what that’s worth.

And I’m not strong
And you’re not rich
And we’re not lost
Where we don’t live

For awhile I thought my main character was going to cheat on his girlfriend. Possibly with one of his coworkers. Maybe even with one of his girlfriend’s friends who was hanging around the story looking for trouble. No cheating ever happened. Stupid character had more integrity than I wanted him to. That happens sometimes. Possibly because the original plan for the book had him getting very little support from his girlfriend over his sudden unemployment, and ultimately that’s not how that part of the story worked out either. What’s the point in even trying to plan these things, even if the planning only happens a day or two before the writing, if nothing ever goes according to plan? WIsh I could answer that one for you.

So in the end I’m left with 51-or-so thousand words, and a story that turned out almost nothing like I planned. Par for the course, probably, if you’ve ever heard me discuss any of the other NoNoWriMo books I’ve written. As usual, I had some periods where I didn’t know what day it was, didn’t know when I was getting any sleep, didn’t know why the hell it was 2AM and I was still writing, didn’t know why I was bothering, and didn’t know if I was ever going to finish. Was it worth it? Not sure. But a couple of things happened at the end of the month to make me think maybe it was.

First off, the last couple of days of writing went better than they should have after the month leading up to them. It’s like some raw, creative part of the brain finally shoved everything else aside and took over. Every scene that needed to be written to get to the end jumped out at exactly the right moment. It’s as if I finally found the proper amount of exhaustion, frustration and anger to fuel the last 10,000 words. And then there was the other creative project I had going on in November, though “going on” is way too charitable a way to refer to it.

We can’t go on together
With suspicious minds
And we can’t build our dreams
On suspicious minds

You see, there was a December 1 deadline for a short story collection that I wanted to be in. The short stories had to be about people who worked in the courts, I had a big story about the courts, and figured all I had to do was edit out a piece of that story. I even knew what I wanted to use, and several months ago had pulled out 3 scenes that I thought I could edit together to submit. Then somehow I managed to blow several months’ worth of lead time and, if this submission was going to happen, would have to do this editing, and any rewriting, while working on the NaNoWriMo story. Somehow it took until well into November before I realized this was a bad idea. Then I read the submission guidelines again and convinced myself that the stuff I’d planned to use wouldn’t fit anyway, and gave up that idea.

Cut to November 29, when I remembered another part of the same story that might work. I ignored this revelation, because I was busy finishing the NaNoWriMo book. But the idea wouldn’t leave, and when I finished writing on the 30th, I was in such a creative frenzy I decided I’d see how much work it would take to Frankenstein something together out of this new idea. So I went back to this old courtroom story (coincidentally, my 2005 NaNoWriMo book), hacked out 3 pieces, put them together with just a little bit of new writing, and mailed that sucker out. This whole process took maybe an hour.

Do I think this story will get bought? Probably not. But I needed to feel like I was in the game somewhere, and this was my best chance. It was odd taking 5-year-old writing and stitching it together with new writing, because I think I’ve learned a couple of things in the last 5 years. I hope I have, anyway. But the insane creative part of my brain wanted to keep working, so I let it, and assuming the story gets rejected, I’ll post it to the Treetop Lounge eventually.

This last-minute frenzy taught me something, though. It taught me that if I take the time to work on something, crazy things happen that I wasn’t expecting. It also taught me that the stunts, like writing 50K words in a month, are fun but not enough. I need more. I need to be working on stuff that might lead somewhere. That might turn into something important. I know I can’t abandon the stunts completely, because that’s not in my nature, but I have to put in more time when there’s no stunt going on, because if I put in the time, I’ll get something good.

Previously, I’ve done this November mad rush and then sat back for weeks to rest from the abuse my brain took during the stunt. This time I’m trying something different. There’s a writing project with a February 1 deadline that I’ve wanted to try for a long time. Have tried, in fact, and failed. It’s time to take another crack at it, so this week my brain is gonna have to start being creative again because there’s another story that needs writing, and time is short. Unlike this blog post. Is it possible to write 50K words about a 50K-word story? If so, I may have just done it tonight. Damn.

T “if I’d stuck to Twitter this post wouldn’t have gotten so long” green

And I know that it’s been hard
And it’s been a long time coming
Don’t give up on me
I’m about to come alive

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By Tgreen, November 22, 2010 2:10 am

A few big events happened with this alleged novel this week. First, on the 15th we reached the halfway point of this contest. Second, on the 17th I actually reached the halfway point to 50K words. This officially put me 2 days off pace, but since I usually aim to write as many as 60K words, I was about 4 or 5 days behind. Still, given the odd directions this month has been taking, I’d take 2 days off the official pace.

The two other big events were probably the biggest ones since I first sat down at the keyboard on November 1. I started writing on my iPhone during my commute, which saved me from slipping even further behind. And somewhere around Day 19, I finally figured out what this book is supposed to be about. You might think that 19 days of writing is a lot to do before figuring out what the hell it is you’re writing, but I might say in response that this time around, 19 days was a goddamn bargain.

You see, last year my NaNoWriMo novel was almost entirely plot-driven. I knew that early on and wrote accordingly. I didn’t know exactly where I was going or exactly how I was going to get there, but I had a plot and any time I had my doubts, I had that plot to cling to. This year, I had some situations and some characters, but no driving force behind them. Not that I knew of, anyway. My characters liked to talk, though. They talked and talked and I let them do it in hopes that they’d get somewhere. And on Day 19 they did. On Day 19, one character looked back at all that had come before and proposed a plan. And another character went along with that plan. And before I knew it, I had a plot.

Best of all, it wasn’t like I’d stumbled on something that would require massive changes to the previous 18 days’ worth of work. Nope, this plot grew more or less organically from what had come before. I’m still not sure how that happened.

There’s one last event from last week that counts toward the full NaNoWriMo experience. I spent a couple of minutes at the bus stop Thursday morning trying to figure out exactly what day it was. Last year that happened several times. This year so far, only once. Still plenty of time for a repeat, though.

With just 9 days to go to the end of the month, my current word count is just 1 day off the pace to 50K. I’d like to think I can make it, what with the days off for Thanksgiving coming up. And now that I know what the book’s about, the writing itself should come easier. There’s just one problem, one flaw in the plan. When I figured out where the book needed to go, I worked it over and over and came up with a roadmap to the end that I was happy with. This lasted half a day before I realized that if everything happened the way I thought it should happen, the climactic action would take place without my point of view character present. He actually couldn’t be present, and if he couldn’t be there, I had no way of letting the readers know what the hell was going on.

And so I find myself with 9 days to go, maybe 18,000 words to write, and a plot that, if the reader is going to be there to see it, now requires my main character to go against everything the plot’s supposed to be about. There are worse ways to stack the deck against yourself, but maybe someday I’ll figure out the easy way to do things. And now, a bad excerpt from approximately the point where the plot reveals itself:

“Okay, we need to set some ground rules,” Walt said.

“Seriously? What do you think you have here?”

“Ground rules. What we discuss today doesn’t leave this table unless we mutually agree otherwise,” Walt said.

“Come on, is this really necessary?”

Walt just stared across the table at him, saying nothing. Kyle believed he’d sit like that all day if that’s what it took to get an answer.

“Okay fine. I accept the ground rules,” Kyle said.

“I’ll warn you, this might piss you off,” Walt said. “The first part, I mean. Don’t let it. Keep your head clear and hear me out. This is not a day for rash decisions.”

Kyle nodded his understanding.

“The company, it appears, is throwing in the white towel,” Walt said. “After years of mismanagement and braindead errors, the management team is giving up.”

“You guys are folding?”

“In good time, I’m sure. But first, they’re hiring a consultant to tell them every stupid mistake they’ve made. Every error and miscue, laid out for all to see. You wonder why they’d do this when they have an office full of people who’d do the same thing for free, but there you have it. Management is basically admitting they don’t know how to manage.”

“I wonder if this is why they want my severance check back so badly,” Kyle said.

“Probably, but not for the reason you might think. I’m sure they can afford to pay for this whether they have your money or not. But if the check is still out there, it’s just one more black eye that they don’t need their new consultants to see. One more question they have to answer. One more buck someone has to pass. But get the check back and, at least in their minds, it’s one problem moved to the solved column. Or more likely, one problem that never happened at all.”

“And just when I thought there couldn’t be any more reasons for me to hold onto that money,” Kyle said.

“Attaboy. But if you want to screw them, would you be interested in maybe a more proactive way to do it?”

“Like what?”

“The way I see it is, if they can afford to blow money on this, they could afford to not fire people like you. Their priorities are screwed. But if they want to blow their money on this, I was thinking maybe we could find a way to get that money for ourselves.”

“Meaning what?”

“Well, Kyle, have you ever had a burning desire to be silent partner in a consulting firm?”

Oh yeah, first draft writing fresh from the morning express bus. How can you not love it?

Be back soon. Gotta write.

Comments (0)

By Tgreen, November 18, 2010 2:54 am

I’d planned to write a couple of these updates before now. Perhaps as we ease into this one, the mysteries behind their absence will reveal themselves.

I hit NaNoWriMo Day 1 with the best of intentions. It was a Monday, so I spent part of the preceding weekend thinking in the most abstract terms about what I might want to write. I did this knowing full well that no matter what I thought about, until I started tapping the keys, it didn’t matter what was going on in my head. Nothing counted until the word count moved north of zero.

What I did not realize until my fingers hit the keyboard that night is just how burned out I actually was. I was running on fumes. Actually my fumes were running on fumes, which were running on fumes of their own, which were running on whatever caffeine- and sugar-high they could squeeze out of a vintage Reggie bar someone was selling on eBay. I had nothing. And this was a special kind of nothing that I recognized from my college days. I was burnt. Toasted. And my creativity had, as they say, left the building.

This didn’t stop me from writing, of course. Days 1 and 2 followed a pattern similar to last year. Wake up, go to work, work too hard, get home late, scarf down dinner, and write 2,000 words before going to bed at an obscene hour (there have been nights when I could’ve watched the closing credits of any permutation of a Conan O’Brien show before I wrapped for the night). It was Day 3 that jumped the track.

The math of NaNoWriMo has always been deceptively simple. A 50,000-word novel in a 30-day month equals about 1,667 words per day. I’ve always aimed for 2,000, a nice round number that would help me build a cushion against future delays. The problem this time around was that on Day 3, I only wrote about 1,500 words. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t be a problem, but on Day 4, I was going to a concert, so there would be no time to write that day. And as it turns out, drinking your face off then dragging yourself in to work a full day does not get many creative juices flowing. Simply put, by the end of week 1, I was so many days behind I’m pretty sure I was technically already a day or two behind for next year.

To make matters worse, I quickly learned that I don’t type nearly as fast on the iPad as I thought I did. Plus, the iPhone app I’ve previously used to write short stories nom longer worked due to an update gone wrong, so there would be no catching up on the bus or during a bathroom break at work. It was bad enough I was so burned out, but now my tools of the trade were abandoning me too. It was a given that I’d have to quit. The only question was how long it would take for me to admit this.

Then things took an unexpected turn. I found a chunk of Saturday where I got to write a lot of words in a row. And the app makers sent me a code to a new version of the app that didn’t crash every time I tried to type something. I suspect the original app was updated by longtime Happy Friday readers. Combine these two events and, well, I’m still so far off pace it’s no sure bet I’ll get to 50,000 words this month, but the chances are better than they were on Friday. This is good, since I hate to quit.

I’m hoping to find time for a couple more of these updates this month to talk about the huge difference between what I’m writing this year as opposed to last year, which also helps explain why there’s a much better chance of failure this time around. Until then, here’s a really bad excerpt, so you’ll understand that the literary world won’t be missing out when this novel never gets finished:

“Kyle, thanks for coming,” Tony said. “We didn’t call you away from anything important, did we?”

“No, don’t worry, I have the time.”

“Good, good,” Tony said. “I just want to let you know, you’ve been doing a heckuva job lately. Really great. Hitting it out of the park.”

“Yeah, Kyle, the company really appreciates what you’ve been doing. Excellent job, really. Kudos.”

“Thanks,” Kyle said, unsure if he should say anything else.

“You’ve been an integral part of what we’ve accomplished the last few months,” Tony said. “Couldn’t have done it without you. You should realize that.”

“I was just doing my best,” Kyle said. “It’s the only way I know how to work.”

“Oh, yes, I know that, Kyle. You’ve been like that since we hired you, and don’t think it’s gone unnoticed. You work hard and you get the job done. That’s the kind of thing we appreciate around here,” Tony said.

“No doubt,” Paul added.

They shared the same bland smile too, which Kyle wasn’t expecting. He looked down at the blank page of his notebook and then back at his boss, whose expression was unchanging.

“Thanks,” Kyle said.

“You should know this,” Tony said. “Too often, especially in today’s environment, we don’t let you guys know that we appreciate your efforts, and we really should.”

“Really?”

“Yes. It’s something we need to do more often.”

“Really? Wow. Thanks again. I have to say, when I got your email I was sure you were going to lay me off.”

“Oh, we are,” Paul said. “But we thought you should know how much you’re appreciated around here.”

“What? Appreciated? How is this showing me that?”

“Well, in a perfect world, we would have had this conversation a few weeks ago,” Paul said. “That’s what we need to get better at. The timing.”

“I can’t believe this. I thought we were done with this.”

“We are now,” Tony said.

“Not to sound like too much of a ghoulish ass, but I really thought that after Rudy died, we’d get a break from all this.”

“If only it were that simple,” Paul said.

“This has nothing to do with your work, Kyle,” Tony said. “This is just a math thing. We had to get the group under twelve, that’s all. It’s just math.”

Kyle had always hated math, and this wasn’t going to improve that relationship. It took him another couple of seconds to work through the list of his immediate coworkers to come up with a number already less than twelve.

“But without Rudy, we’re there right now,” he said.

“We’re keeping Rudy,” Tony said.

“How can that be? He’s dead.”

“Yes, that’s true. But Rudy’s a rock around here. He’s done amazing work for us. You know that. You learned from him. We all did. That’s not a resource we can just walk away from,” Tony said.

“Walk away from? He died. How are you walking away from anything?”

“We just want to respect the man,” Tony said. “He’s got an enviable work ethic. His attendance record is impeccable.”

“Not anymore,” Kyle said.

“Kyle, that’s hurtful, and frankly beneath you,” Tony said. “Rudy gave his all to this company. He had his surprise heart attack while working at his desk after hours. How do we just forget about all that just because Rudy’s dead? He’s left behind a legacy, Kyle. We have to honor the legacy.”

“But he’s dead. I have three projects due this week. How is Rudy’s legacy going to help finish those?”

“That’s something I’m going to have to figure out,” Tony said. “Of course I’d rather have you here to finish those off, but we can’t just walk away from a resource as important as Rudy.”

“If anyone walked away, Rudy did. Except he didn’t walk away. They wheeled him out. I was here. I saw it.”

“Kyle, please, don’t be rude. Have some respect,” Paul said.

“I just don’t understand. I’m a living, breathing man who can bang out those three projects in a couple of days. I don’t understand how I can lose out to a guy who died two weeks ago. Can you understand why I might have a problem with that?”

“Fair enough,” Paul said. “Just please believe me when I tell you that Rudy brings some intangibles to the table.”

“intangibles?”

“Yes, intangibles. This decision wasn’t made lightly. It was very close. We almost chose you.”

“Oh, good, I came in a close second to a corpse. Is there any chance I can get that written in a letter of recommendation? That’s bound to get me lots of interest out there.”

“Kyle, really. Have some respect,” Paul said.

“Respect, really? Why don’t you have some respect for me, Paul? You tell me you think I’m a good worker, so why not pick me over the dead guy? Maybe Rudy has intangibles, but at this point I’ve gotta beat him in tangibles, right?”

Tony chuckled. “That’s actually pretty funny,” he said to no one in particular.

Paul sighed and leaned forward until he was slumped on his forearms, which were crossed over each other on the table. He shook his head just enough to be noticed.
“You have to understand something, Kyle,” he said. “Your group has to have fewer than twelve people in it. There’s no way around it. That’s the new company policy. Non-negotiable. However, on the flip side, you can’t have fewer than ten. This is an old guideline and for now it’s equally non-negotiable. We’d love for you to be one of those less-than-twelve, more-than-ten, but there are a couple of reasons why Rudy is the better bet right now.”

“Seriously?”

“For one, Rudy no longer draws a salary,” Paul said. “That’s a huge savings right there. No salary, no retirement withholding, no taxes paid because of him. And even more important than that, Rudy doesn’t need any health benefits. That’s another huge savings right there.”

“It’s not a really good health plan,” Tony said. “I’m not sure if you ever had a reason to find that out, but it costs you and the company a ridiculous amount of money any time you have a health issue. So this is potentially huge.”

“Maybe if the health care plan was better, Rudy wouldn’t have died in the first place and you wouldn’t have to use his corpse as a way to save money on it,” Kyle said.

“We’re aware of the irony, yes,” Paul said. “But in the current economic climate, Rudy’s a better employee dead than you are alive.”

Kyle looked again at the blank page in his notebook and saw that it now mirrored his immediate future — big and empty. He wanted to take his pen and slash through this depressing page, but his arms were frozen from the shock he was still experiencing. His hands began to shake so he pulled them under the table to make sure no one could see.
“Is there any math that swings things back in my favor?”

“You’re single, right?”

“I live with my girlfriend.”

“Kids?”

“Not now.”

“You own your house?”

“Rent.”

“Any credit card debt? Other loans? Gambling habit?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Are you prone to sickness?”

“No more than average.”

“I see.” Paul looked off into space as if he were calculating something in his head. After a few quick seconds he snapped back to reality and shook his head.

“Sorry, but no, there’s no way. Rudy saves more money than you bring in. We have to go with him. We’ll provide a generous severance, though. It’s more than Rudy got.”

“That seems fair. Rudy left on his own. He didn’t deserve a severance,” Tony said.

“Good point,” Paul said. He looked back at Kyle. “See, Rudy isn’t getting the best deal either. These things happen.”

“This? This insanity never happened anywhere else, I can promise you that.”

“Kyle, I’m really sorry it didn’t work out. You’re a good worker. You have lots to offer plenty of other companies.”

“Not as much as Rudy,” Kyle said.

“Fair enough,” Paul said.

“I bet you do better on an interview, though,” Tony said.

“Oh good, there’s the second paragraph of my recommendation. This thing just writes itself.”

“I’m real sorry, Kyle,” Tony said. “If things get better out there, I’d hire you back in an instant.”

“Could I work for Rudy?”

“That would be up to him, I suppose.”

“Okay, we’re done here,” Kyle said as he pushed back from the table.

“We still have to work out things like your severance and your last day,” Paul said.

“This is my last day. And you can mail the severance to my house.”

“There’s also some paperwork to sign.”

“What do I have to sign? You guys just gave me the boot. Do I have to sign my approval of that boot?”

“It’s boilerplate.”

“Did Rudy have to sign it?”

“Kyle, this is not your finest hour,” Tony said.

“No kidding,” Kyle said. “Mail me whatever you need me to sign. If the check’s big enough, I’ll sign it.” He backed toward the door, leaving behind his notebook, since it was technically company property.

“Kyle, I was serious about hiring you back,” Tony said. “A couple of months, this all blows over and I’ll give you a call.”

“That sounds great, Tony. Should I send my resume to the morgue or the cemetery? Which one makes it more likely I’ll get rehired?”

Tony shook his head and sighed. “Good luck, Kyle.”

Who doesn’t love the smell of first draft in the morning? I’d better figure out how to get some vampires in there soon or I’m screwed. Thanks for reading. Be back soon.

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By Tgreen, October 22, 2010 1:58 pm

Hello and welcome to Happy Friday!, the weekly blog post that actually appears on a schedule so random that the odds of it actually appearing on a Friday are somehow even worse than 1 in 7.

This week Apple CEO announced record profits for the last quarter, saw the price of Apple shares go above $300, unveiled 2 new MacBook Air models, gave a sneak peek at the next version of the Mac OS, and then met with President Obama to discuss the economy and technology. And he did it all while maintaining one of the top 5 best farms in Farmville.

About the only thing Jobs didn’t do was head on up to his secret base on the moon. Or did he?

This week the Vatican announced that Homer Simpson is, in fact, Catholic, which makes sense because why wouldn’t Homer belong to a religion where they give out free wine every week? Though mostly I think the Vatican announced this just to fuck with the next Dan Brown novel.

It’s good the Vatican cleared this up, because this is exactly the kind of important issue Catholics the world over want the Church to spend time on.

Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione died this week. To honor his memory, men of a certain age will be flying at half mast this weekend.

Former President George W Bush indicated this week that he sees not privatizing Social Security as the biggest failure of his eight years in office. This is a surprising choice, since it doesn’t even make most people’s Top 100 list of his biggest failures.

I guess maybe he considers his second biggest failure to be not finding enough reasons to give speeches while wearing a flight suit. And his third not being awesome enough.

Radio host Rush Limbaugh this week spent some time talking about pictures of President Obama that made the President, in Limbaugh’s words, look “demonic”. Left unsaid was whether the demonic Obama in any way resembled whatever demon Limbaugh signed his soul away to in exchange for the big radio ratings and the gigantic bad of Oxycontin he used to have delivered to the house every month.

New research shows that the popular story of the Mayan calendar predicting the end of the world on December 12, 2012 may actually be based on a miscalculation. According to the latest calculations, the world won’t end on December 12, 2012 but will actually end on whatever day the New York Jets appear closest to winning a Super Bowl game.

It was announced this week that President Obama will be appearing on the cable show Mythbusters. Given the way things have gone for him since he got elected, the only way he could appear on a more unfortunately-titled show would be if he was a guest on something like Hooray For The Bestest President Ever Who Has Saved The World And Made The Universe Better For Us All, Yay!, and for better or worse, FOX News canceled that show as soon as Bush left office.

This week Sony announced it’s finally stopping production of the cassette Walkman, once someone realized the calendar hanging in the production factory was left over from 1987.

In a new memoir by a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, it was revealed this week that during the Clinton presidency, the codes required to launch a nuclear strike were actually misplaced for several months. Though the most logical conclusion to draw is that Hillary was holding on to them in case Bill got out of line again after the whole Monica fiasco.

Scientists revealed this week that they’ve observed the oldest object in the universe. To do this, they tuned their television to CNN at 9PM Eastern time and there it was, conducting an interview with Snooki.

In other science news, NASA recently unveiled the results of last year’s experiment to find water on the moon, and it turns out there’s a lot more ice and water up there than previously believed. Almost enough, in fact, to serve up cocktails to any aliens drawn here by this…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOVc4TMjHpk

Millions of TV viewers in the NYC area have been missing out on entertainment and sports programming since FOX pulled its channels from Cablevision due to a payment dispute. Picking a side in a conflict like this is kind of like trying to decide who to root for in a fight between the guy who raped you in the prison shower and the guy who shanked you in the prison cafeteria. In other words, you’re screwed no matter who wins.

Fast food mecca McDonald’s recently announce that it’s bringing back the McRib to most of its locations for a limited time starting in November. They’re so excited they’re working on a huge advertising push to make sure everyone has a chance to sample the processed pork sandwich. Of course, when you’re trying so hard to advertise, there’s always a chance you’re gonna burn through some bad ideas before you get to the winning one, as you can see here in…

Tgreen’s Top Ten Rejected McDonald’s McRib slogans:
10. McRib: Those rumors that it tastes just like Soylent Green are totally untrue and slanderous!
9. McRib: We devised a whole Man vs Food challenge around it that got rejected because it didn’t meet the “Food” criteria!
8. McRib: Now at least 87% mouse-carcass-free, give or take a couple of percentage points!
7. McRib: Each McRib grown organically in a lab in Brazil’s rainforest!
6. McRib: Buy one today or we bring back the Shamrock Shake!
5. McRib: The McRib’s special meat is even more special than the special sauce in the Big Mac!
4. McRib: Have It Your Way, as long as your way involves throwing a whole pig into a blender!
3. McRib: Buy two; it’s the tastiest murder/suicide method around!
2. McRib: You can’t handle the truth!
1. McRib: Guess who’s cornered the market on pig anus again!

And that’s all we have time for this week. Until next time, stop eating all the candy you bought to hand out to trick-or-treaters, put the finishing touches on that “The Situation” costume you’re planning to wear, accept the fact that just because you want a scary Halloween lawn doesn’t mean you can bury grandpa out there, and, most importantly, have a Happy Friday!