You're Making Me Hate You Read online

  You might be asking yourself, “Then why do you want a private jet? Do you really want any comparisons to those skin tags?” Honestly? I don’t really give a shit because here’s the thing: I don’t plan on showing it off to anyone for anything. If I have my way, no one would even know I have one. The only people who would be savvy to this extravagance would be my wife and our immediate family—because no one is going to use it but us. I fly more every year than most families fly in their lifetimes. So if I could have my own jet, just like I own my own car: GOOD-BYE, AIRPORTS. SAYONARA, COMMERCIAL FLIGHTS. BEAT IT, ECONOMY CLASS.

  Hello, private terminals and minimal delays.

  I won’t have to deal with the smashing, the smushing, the ramming and the cramming, the arguments and the impudence. No more cattle-rustling comparisons and no more half-assed attempts to tuck my severity back in my breeches when someone pisses me off. Out with the exasperation of exit signs to baggage claim and the trampling that occurs once you’ve deplaned and set your sights on what’s next. All that will be left are the bare necessities: show up, drop your bags off, breeze through security, get on your plane, and get on your way. Planes aren’t too expensive if you’ve got the liquid assets; it’s the price of jet fuel that will knock your dick off. You think unleaded is pricey these days? Try working out how much juice you’ll need for a G5, and I don’t think they’ll take just any credit card. Unless you’re holding one of those nifty black AmEx cards—the ones my wife won’t let me have yet—you might be hitchhiking into Aruba. But I won’t care by then. I’ll pawn all my shit and give a little bit more just to be able to avoid the crowds and stampedes at your friendly neighborhood public airport.

  Sadly, until the day comes, I must consign myself to the Toxic Two-Step, snaking through the fuckers and trying not to kill everyone in a fit of white-hot fury. I have to pay the bills, and that means running the gamut to and from cities and principalities all over the world. I swallow bile and stow my carry-on while having to deal with these nitwits, for if airports are a Petri dish, then moronic behavior is the spore encrusted across its glassy surface. I guess we’re all guilty when it comes to flying from portal to portal, and everything in my body wishes I could be okay with that. But the more I brush shoulders with you people, the more I either want to run like hell or fight like crazy. My only solace is that being dumb is not contagious. If it were, I’d be rocking the hospital masks like everyone in Tokyo. Maybe that’s why so many of the Japanese wear those: they’ve been able to prove that the idiocy of foreigners can pass to one another and they won’t take any chances. Fuck the pollution; fight the delusion. Hey, it makes sense to me. I’ve seen men and women in airports try to bathe themselves using drinking fountains. Are you telling me it doesn’t scare you that that might be contagious?

  The wells might have gone dry on the human race. Airports are a vision of what might be, a glimpse into a future when our rulers or heads of government are the ones who only throw their own shit when foreign dignitaries are in town and, only then, when they are saluting these ambassadors. We might see a time when you buy a car either for driving it or fucking it—or both if you can be bothered to think practically. Devo called this shit years ago when they sang about “Devolution “and “Mongoloid.” Are we not men? Are we not devolving? If you’ve spent any time on YouTube or watching Tosh.0, you’ll figure out that bands like Devo are actually more like a modern-day Nostradamus than you’d like to admit. When that day comes, when we are nothing more than monkeys in designer jeans and ball gags just looking for another shiny ass to follow in contempt, it won’t seem like such a chore to go to places like the airport. Then again, airports might just be museums by then: a look into the past at a time when we as humans once had the faculties not only to control complicated machinery but also to fly. The bitch of it is … we’ll still be bitching about the wait in line.

  We’re fucked. Enjoy your flight.

  CHAPTER 4

  DYSFUNCTION OVER FASHION

  AS I WRITE this, I’m forty-one years of age (made official on December 8, 2014) and it’s quite invigorating to me how incredibly hostile I am becoming as the time peels a little more off my impeccable sense of patience. Seriously—I am a fucking war machine with bushy eyebrows and half a pack of cigarettes. I snap as the crow flies and the wind blows, and frankly I don’t really give a slick shit. The wife does, surely; she gives me the “Really, asshole?” look when I’ve crossed a line or I’ve gone on a wonderfully vile rant about the tiniest piece of stupidity I just happen to have noticed. So I am coming into my own with the whole Grumpy Old Man thing, and as you’ll read below, it’s getting easier for me to snap from one Slim Jim tangent to the next. Prepare to tear into the fucking spice.

  On a fairly innocuous evening in 2013 I was channel surfing on my couch, searching for something on TV that didn’t suck. Much to my dismay and discomfort, nothing fit that particular description, so I went to what I call my “second string sense of taste”; in other words, I was prepared to settle for anything that didn’t feature ice road truckers, “real housewives” from any state, cooking, dancing, reality TV “fighting,” or a creature called “Honey Boo Boo.” The pickings were slim, and I was on the verge of saying fuck it and reading a book when I stumbled on the 2013 Billboard Music Awards. The announcer said, “Performing tonight, Prince!” That was all I needed to hear. I dropped the remote control, mushed my second set of cheeks a little deeper into the upholstery, and prepared for a rare live treat from His Royal Badness. Long story short, Prince was amazing. He had an all-girl band that could smoke any other juxtaposed male set of wannabes from any state in the union, and he himself was just sexy enough to make me question my, ahem, system preferences. That was the good news. The bad news was I had to sit through a painful hour of the most torturous and hideous music known to man. I have done all I can to purge my mind and memory of that noise (which apparently sells a lot of fucking albums, sadly). But what I cannot get out of my brain are the various outfits these idiots draped themselves in that night.

  I’m just going to fucking say it: Justin Bieber wears clothes that make him look like he shit his fucking pants. These sort of britches look like a sleeker version of the saggy gold foil ones MC Hammer used to rock when he was selling Diet Pepsi. This fact doesn’t make them any more cool—they’re dumb. And it looked like he didn’t know how to walk or dance in them, because the little dipshit tripped and stumbled twice while he was onstage “singing” (read: lip-synching) and performing for a crowd that booed him—to my delight. Justin: between your massive sense of self-importance, your terrible attitude problem, and the way you treat your fans, you don’t deserve your fame. Take your fucking toys and go home; I promise we won’t miss you. While you’re at it, stick that bucket you pissed in over your head so we don’t have to see the painfully vacant look on your face anymore.

  The rampant trend of sad fashion was everywhere. Taylor Swift was in another gown designed to make her look less tall and lanky while also undermining her visible overbite. A host of hipster douches were acting rather bored while also making sure their “thrown together” wardrobe was high end and noticeable. Most of them had hair like tarantulas reaching for their prey. Between that and all the hip-hop artists trying desperately to outdo each other’s “electronic fashion” statements, it was a cluster ripe for the fucking. If these are the people leading us into the future of couture, I think I’d rather staple maple leaves to my junk and make my way through the world like a Nat Geo Wild star: forget Naked and Afraid; I would be “Nude and Ruthless.” No need for the clothes—just give me the spear and see what happens.

  Sometimes I think none of you have mirrors in your houses. And if you do, they are all lying to you or vice versa. I have watched the sea of fashion move wave after wave of chic debris onto our shores for years now. Some of the stuff has been cool. A small percentage is classic: no-nonsense, get-it-done, zero-frills functionality, and I like that. The rest, however, is a storm of ridiculousness tha
t has no purpose other than to give super-skinny bitches a job and a reason for you to feel like shit about yourself. High Fashion is ironically apt in its title because you have to be HIGH AS Fuck to think any of that bullshit is cool or worth the money and hassle. It’s designed for mannequins, which means it’s off limits to 98 percent of the human population. It’s pretentious, overly dramatic, and, more importantly, impractical in that it is not durable or appealing. And yet dildos with way too much money fuck each other over to have these opulent designers create looks for them. It all looks uncomfortable and depressing. You’d find better bargains at a K-Mart Blue-Light Special.

  Let’s stick with High Fashion for a while.

  Every time I watch the Haute to Trot come sashaying down the model’s runway, I get the sense that if IKEA or Pier 1 Imports made clothing, this is the shit they would foist upon us. I’ve seen it all—from too many feathers and not enough cuffs to glitter literally coming out the wazoo … of the men. Everything is brittle and glued together. It’s a fucking surprise that any of it makes it past one long stride of the legs. But there they go, staring blankly ahead like a sexbot with smushy bits, hell bent on getting to the end of the ramp so they can stop, strike a pose, toss a fleetingly judgmental glance over one shoulder, then streak back to the curtain so they can be fitted for the next impossibly temporary outfit they will present on the catwalk. The upper 1 percent sit ringside like tourists at a prizefight, oohing and aahing at each delectable bit of thatch and patch, punctuating every slice of excitement with a final look of bored enthusiasm that translates on TV as “we’re only really here to CNBC (see and be seen), so try not to stare as you’re paying absolute attention to us.”

  What a load of bull fuck …

  Never in my life have I seen anything on those runways that makes me want to wear it. Never in my dreams would I be caught dead in any of that shit. So why is it such a fascination for so many people who, on any other day, would scoff and mock right along with me? Those Bravo Network shows do huge business, so I know there’s something crazy going on out there in TV Land. Is it because the stuff looks so dramatically foreign that it would be like dressing up to star in a play? Is it so people can feel like they’re living out a Dr. Seuss fantasy of some sort? Am I reading too much into this? Should I take the tablets, Tiger? Did you get that last reference? Did you know I could juggle four chainsaws at once? Did I ever tell you about the time I lied to you all about being able to juggle four chainsaws at once? You remember that time I lied to you about juggling chainsaws? Am I rambling? Then why haven’t you stopped me yet?

  Let’s get off the ramp and onto the street for a while. That’s where the heart of real fashion comes from, the reservoir of inspiration and reality coming together to make a Reece’s Cup full of tight-fitting kick ass. But I’ve found it sucks just as bad at sea level down here too. There is a remarkable phenomenon going on in the “Indie” scene in which men are tight-rolling their pant cuffs halfway up their calves, only to wear crappy dress shoes with no socks on. This, quite frankly, is a dick move. You all look like cunts. I’m sorry—I’m sure you were all very proud of yourselves for not only dressing on your own this morning but also putting a lot of thought and care into this pathetic ensemble, but as my British friends would say, “You really look a prick.” And they wouldn’t lie to us: they’re British, therefore they do nothing wrong … unless you count the Spice Girls. But that was the nineties—nobody can possibly remember that far back. That’s like trying to remember Thursday … good luck with that.

  It’s beyond me who comes up with these horrific ideas. I believe that somewhere in Miami there is a Masonic-like temple filled with bell-end fuck-ups with nothing better to do than send out the ugliest shit imaginable. Every six months these ball bags take turns spinning a giant Bingo drum full of worst-case fashion scenarios. They pick two—one for each coast, knowing that these ideas will slowly work their way inland, colliding in the Midwest, where trends go to die. By the time these ideas are “hot” in Des Moines, Iowa, the couture conspirators go back to the big spinning drum of shit and start it all over again. That’s why fashion doesn’t last long in the Heartland: if you can’t wear it at work, we don’t really give a shit. But New York and LA have never really cared about things like dress codes or wearing clothes that cover the bottoms of your ass lips. It’s stuff like that that makes me happy Carrie never wore Crocs on Sex and the City: housewives all over Chicago would still be rocking that shit to this day, slurping cosmos out of old Barbie and the Rockers Thermoses on their way to get their nails done.

  As I said before—or, more appropriately, “hinted at”—I am now forty-one. That means not only am I “seriously ancient,” as my son, Griffin, has pronounced, but it also means I can remember trends that go back four decades … and that shit wasn’t pretty. I was a sad participant—albeit an occasionally reluctant one—in the following: polyester, bell bottoms and flares, spandex, parachute pants, neon colors, aqua socks, JNCO jeans, wallet chains, silvery short-sleeved button-ups, tie-dyed anything, high waters, corduroys, more spandex, and pink. Just simply the color pink: yeah, I remember that, and I still have a T-shirt affirming that “Pink Is the New Black.” Obviously that T-shirt was very mistaken. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. There are some things in life you’ll have to accept: Corey Taylor had a mullet, wore shit clothes, and, at one time, adorned his body with the color pink.

  I’m not proud of it. But I stand by my units.

  I also remember weird fads like friendship pins: little safety pins with different colored tiny beads on them. In third grade that was the rage; people put them on their shoes and on the breasts of their shirts. If you didn’t have one or no one had given you one, you were deemed a loser—quite harsh for kids under the age of ten. And kids knew if you made them yourself and put them on your own shoes. Kids are prescient when it comes to covert operations like pretending you have friends and have no proof of such relationships. These same people probably passed that trend on to their own kids in the form of friendship braids or bracelets. When those same children grow up, they will pass something on to their children, like friendship chastity belts (being a dad, that’s not a bad idea …). These adults will then force their husbands to go to Jared’s and put together obnoxious charm bracelets with stuff like hearts, footballs, and the Eiffel Tower on them … then pay way too much for said trinkets. Like I said, we’re all stupid and none more than men when it comes to keeping members of the opposite sex happy—or at the very least to keep them from screaming at them in the car on the way home from dinner on their anniversary.

  The last time I really gave a shit about looking cool was when I was fourteen. I still had very little money, and it was kind of a chore to find things that felt in style. My mother and her best friend came up with a solution that to this day makes me cringe: they took my mother’s best friend’s daughter’s jeans and simply tailored them (no puns, please) to fit my scrawny ass. Yes, friends and enemies: for a full year of my life I wore women’s jeans to school because I couldn’t afford men’s jeans of any kind. Was I ashamed? Duh. Did the other kids find out and fuck with me? Seeing as the other girls had the same style jeans as I did, that would be an emphatic “yes.” Do I miss wearing women’s clothing? Not really, because I wear them every chance I get. Might this be why I have a deep-seated hatred for fashion of any kind? Most likely, yes. Do I want to talk more about it? I’m sorry, but our time’s up for today. But I feel like we’ve made some really important strides toward what the underlying problems are.

  Lady Gaga wears meat suits and smears mascara on her face. The critics rave and call it art. Britney Spears shaves her head and starts wearing hoodies while doling out the accidental VJJ shots. People call her crazy. The Red Hot Chili Peppers go out on stage dressed as light bulbs and pose for photos wearing socks and nothing else. They are labeled cutting-edge frontrunners. JT and Ms. Jackson (if you’re nasty) let a nip slip during a one-sided Super Bowl half-time show. Parents—
well, at least the mothers—everywhere are appalled. Miley Cyrus plays on MTV in what can only be described as a bizarre anime circus stage show, complete with wrecking balls and uncomfortable twerking. Need I say more? I believe we’re all on the same page about how fucking banana sandwich that little girl has turned out to be. It’s like the more famous someone gets, the more their fashion radar goes awry and it’s the Emperor’s New Clothes in 3D, showing our idols for who and what they really are as they run ridiculously through the streets. We all follow along, but the kicker comes in the strangest form, because most of us might be mocking them, but the rest are taking notes and smartphone pictures so we can get the look right when we get home. Are we that fucking ignorant? The million-dollar answer is apparently, or else I wouldn’t have this chapter in this book.

  Look, we’re humans. We are spectacular at being brilliant and buffoonish simultaneously. In fact, if Lenny Kravitz went on YouTube and told us all to paste palm fronds painted with iridescent moles onto our asses, every ball bag in a café on Manhattan Island would look green and eerily shiny the next day, and housewives up and down Rodeo Drive would be plunking down heavy plastic to buy and don what would essentially add up to an oversized disco salad. That’s just how we roll. We chase trends like dogs chase cars. We bite into fads the way kids bite into taffy—with no regrets and no thought about what this will look and feel like in retrospect. I’m sure most hippies look back and sigh sadly, wishing they’d just stuck with the mod look of the early sixties instead of the floppy pant legs and scratchy threads of the later sixties. But when you’re that fucking high, I suppose it’s a wonder you remembered to get dressed at all. So we’re all susceptible to fawning for shallow flattery. That doesn’t mean we’re not stupid for it.