The Japanese are an inscrutable people. In fact, I feel like I’ve never heard the word “inscrutable” used without reference to the Japanese. Sometimes, their entire culture seems like a version of the “idea balls” discussed in that episode of South Park. Just random combinations of things. …And so, I am proud to bring you the latest iteration of weird Japanese culture — kittens, sitting inside bowls… on a TV show.
Today is the start of the first full day of Passover. Passover is the best Jewish holiday — although this isn’t saying a lot, considering that one of our other holidays is basically “A Day of Feeling Guilty About Everything…”
Hi, Batman! It’s me, Oliver. As a resident of “Gotham City” (which most people call “Manhattan,” by the way), I had a few quick questions for you. Possibly, you could take a few seconds out of your busy life as playboy-by-day, crime-fighter-by-night, in order to answer them…
I’ve been homeless for about two weeks now. The thing about being homeless is that it’s dehumanizing. Okay, wait. That’s a really dumb and obvious way to start this essay. …The thing about being homeless is that it’s dehumanizing, but you still retain the core of your essential personality, which is weird.
(1) “Now let’s blow this thing and go home!” (2) “Great, kid! …Don’t get cocky!” (3) “You came in here, didn’t you have a plan for getting out?” (4) “It came from… behind!” (5) “He made a fair move. Screaming about it can’t help you.”
(1) “…I am your father!” (2) “You came in that thing? You’re braver than I thought!” (3) “We’re starting for the target shaft now!” (4) “Into the garbage chute, flyboy!” (5) “No reward is worth this!”
Arcade games mirror life: life, which — no matter how much we want to avoid it — can only end with one inevitable result. Or, as an eminent poet once put it: “…For I haue dyscust/ We ar but dust/ And dy we must.”
Alien 3 is a movie that is actively trying to break your heart. The director wrings pathos from the oddest of images: a shot of a dog’s eyes; the image of water running over a knife…
(1) Girls wearing six-inch tiny black leather backpacks to clubs. ( 2) Going to clubs. (3) The use of the term “Psych!” in middle school. As in, “Oliver, dude, you’re really awesome…” (beat) “…psych!” Totally annoying. If you can’t trust a simple declarative sentence, then what can you trust? (4) Techno.
Around the time I turned 22, things changed for me and my name. …Girls would have this response when I told them my name: “Oliver? I love that name. That’s such a cu-uuuute name.” And/or: “I love that name! I have a cat named ‘Oliver’!” According to my independent, unverifiable research, about 34% of the girls in the New York City metro area have cats named “Oliver.” I have been unable to figure out why this is or what this means.