i was at a mosque recently, which has to be the weirdest place to be dead. they just have walls of crypts stacked on top of each other like high school lockers. and just like high school, there’s a cool area to have yours. of course it’s much more expensive. “i think as tim’s expired body slowly decomposes, he’d love to face the western sun. he always loved a sunset. of course we’ll pay extra …it’s what he would have wanted.” did tim actually write down “i want my lifeless body stored in a vault until the end of days. and if you can, get me one with a view …you know, for my incredibly dead body”? if so, i hate tim, and i hope his body is particularly mistreated by

whatever manages to sneak into the vault. and clearly, judging by this photo i took while at the mosque (in the outside cemetery — probably for those poor assholes who can’t afford a crypt with a view) i saw this. you’d like to think your tombstone receives some sort of ceremony before it is installed. “quiet, everybody. here comes the tombstone” not even close. it is handled by maintenance workers in the same way as a sprinkler head. just throw them down anywhere. that’s no way to treat betty d. davis. she’s forever young for god’s sake. but that’s what she is to them – just a heavy piece of concrete to haul around during their shift. “shift’s over? well, leave this crap here and let’s get out of here. right there! yes. just throw all that crap on top of it. i don’t care if she’s going to join jesus. i’m going to join not being at work anymore.”

steven hawking is so smart that if you mention his name people assume you are fairly bright. he’s written a book that is essentially “space for dummies” that only geniuses understand. he’s discovered particles around black holes that only exist mathematically. hawking radiation is named after him. he’s been divorced and charged with domestic abuse. and the majority of this he did from a wheelchair while speaking through a computer (with an american accent even though he is british — usa!!) he was diagnosed with ALS right about when he started to really gain momentum with physics and his life’s work. the computer to help him communicate wasn’t operational until about a year after he lost the ability to speak. for a while, he had an assistant who could interpret what he was saying. he’d sort of screech and meow and the assistant would translate “he said this sucks” and then eventually he lost the ability to even meow. so over a year went by where he couldn’t communicate at all. imagine having some answers to what the universe is and not being able to convey them. most people can’t imagine not being able to get their stupid ideas out there (this for example) via a thousand different outlets and yet no one has anything to say worth hearing. you have knowledge of how black holes work, how the universe may have been created, and what it looks like – and you’re trapped inside your body forced to listen to celebrity gossip and small talk? “sometimes if the freeway is backed up, i take surface streets” no one cares or has ever cared about that sentence. ALS would be a much better disease if it was more selective, like if you only got it if you said too many boring things. “the store brand yogurt is okay, but i think…” “whoa, dude – are you sure you want to finish this? you don’t want to get lou gehriged.”

even if you’re the most avid anti-gun person, you would still have to admit that shooting a gun is pretty fun. for some reason, seeing a bullet go into a target or person or animal or can at any distance brings us a certain amount of joy. there’s a recoil, a little puff of smoke – it’s nice. but on the other side, no matter how much you love guns – you’d probably think twice if you could look down at humanity as a whole and ask yourself, “should all of them be allowed to own a thing that propels a piece of metal right through another person’s body?” even if you own several gun racks and lack room for a pro-gun bumper sticker on your vehicle because of all the other pro-gun bumper stickers already on it – you would still pause for a moment. if you were in charge, would you let people have guns? they can’t even be trusted with spray paint. they’ll huff it until they pass out, or they’ll spray it onto buildings and such. they walk along looking down at their phones and step off the curb just in time to see a bus coming …repeatedly. “but the second amendment!” right. it is a sweet amendment, but it was written when they had muskets. not a real threat of drive-by’s and school shootings when you have to hand make each bullet. now we have guns that shoot hundreds of bullets per second. “guns don’t kill people. people kill people” true, but that should be edited a bit to “people kill people …on accident …a lot” and with the way this population is getting out of hand, maybe everyone should have guns. in a mandatory way. the murder rate might not go up, but the manslaughter rate definitely would.

people always site the bill of rights as the greatest document in american history. it’s pretty great. you get a lot of rights when you’re in trouble. the freedom of speech allows you to say nearly anything you want in public, and on the off chance you are lenny bruced and sent to jail, your bail can’t be set too high, you get a fair and speedy trial, and you have the option to just keep quiet …which would be odd for someone who went to jail for talking. the third amendment keeps the government from storing troops in your house against your will. that was the third most pressing concern when they wrote the bill of rights. “i’m sick of soldiers living with me!” “don’t worry. we’ll handle it.” that doesn’t concern us too much now, but it would suck. “this is PFC dutrow. he’s going to be living with you for a while.” “what?! as you can see – this is a studio apartment. what about my cats?” “thanks for serving your country.” part of the first amendment allows freedom of the press, which if they would have had the foresight to see how that turned out, they may have revised a bit. when it’s just someone dipping a feather into some ink and scribbling onto parchment, they might be more concerned with writing only the facts. without TV, there weren’t a lot of celebrities, so they probably didn’t have to worry about people camping outside their houses or writing that they were gay just for the hell of it. no one was popping out of trash cans with cameras “gotcha, george washington!” “damnit! i’m wearing my fake teeth and this stupid wig, and they still found me!” …yep.