It seemed very odd, my bulb not working, because honestly I liked this light. It’d been very reliable, illuminating the darkness for me hundreds of times… hundreds of thousands of times probably! Well, for as long as I can remember, let’s just put it that way. Since I was a kid… there was me, the darkness, and my light bulb. Simple as that. I’d be hanging around in some darkened, dim, dingy, drab, dull place, thinking about nothing or some synonym of nothing… and ZAP! the light bulb would go on, everything becoming perfectly and pleasantly clear. Good times… really good in retrospect. No more though.

I’m still here obviously, and so is the darkness. But the bulb? It just hangs there, dead and stubborn as all hell. 

I know what you’re going to ask and the answer is yes. I shook it… not even a hint of that musical “tinkerbell humping an ice chip” sound. The filament is fine. And yes, I checked the screw thread and the foot contact. I looked it over, wasn’t much else to do… I had to squint, obviously, but I looked, believe me. There was nothing wrong with that bulb, except for the whole “not working at all” thing.

Truth be told until today I had basically given up. I’d accepted that my light bulb wasn’t coming back. I’d sunk into reminiscences… all the good times we’d had… all the times we’d laughingly beat back the darkness, feeling clever and accomplished. I’d begun trying to conjure the bulb’s warm light in my mind. I ran down a list of all the things that made my bulb such a very great bulb. I did every pointless weepy god-damned thing a person does when faced with a feeling of inexplicable loss, and the bulb, like all dead things, didn’t notice or care. If it had had a gastrointestinal track (and wasn’t under vacuum) it might have farted a little.

Today though… today I looked at the bulb again.

I promised myself it’d be the last time, the casket viewing, because as much as I missed my light bulb I didn’t want to be one of those nuts who keeps a corpse in the house, all dressed up in an easy chair, with lipstick and a hat on, pretending the awful stink is potpourri. I had to let the thing go and accept my new seat in the shadows. So I approached the bulb (with a decorum befitting a one-person wake for an inanimate object)... picked it up gingerly, lovingly… I rolled it gently over my palm… and I squinted at it as hard as I could there in the dark. Which is of course when I noticed…

My light bulb was a HUGE dick.

Now don’t get all “uh-oh! I didn’t sign on for this!” I don’t mean that literally. I’m not trying to cleverly explain to you that I was standing there in the dark “gingerly and lovingly” rolling a huge penis over the palm of my hand. What I mean is that, standing there, squinting, I realized my light bulb was a HUGE dick… as in GIANT asshole… as in a schmuck, a creep, a real honest to goodness glass bastard.

Though it admittedly took me far too long, today, I finally noticed the not so subtle cues my light bulb had been offering me all along. Go ahead, take a look at the photo above and see for yourself. Can you believe the balls on that bulb?! Imagine me there in the dark, all sniveling… “oh light bulb, please don’t die, what good times we’ve had!  I can’t go on without you!” and the damned thing just sitting there, laughing at me the whole time… un-fucking-believable. 

Well I’ll tell you what, even without this prick light bulb I managed a little epiphany. It’s not exactly brilliant and shining, it hasn’t left me feeling “clever and accomplished,” but seeing as how it could very possibly be my last, squinting and in the dark as I am, I feel compelled to write it down-

Q: How many light bulbs does it take to screw a person?

A: Just one.

There is, it would seem, a solitary archetype by which we can (and do) judge all else. When we seek to make a comparison, be it in the human particulars of mental state, physical prowess, emotional weight, or indeed in the broader strokes of the metaphysical, we can, without fail, single out this entity and be sure that any comparison drawn will be understood by our audience as suitably pointed and dramatic. This archetype would seem to represent the extremes of anything and everything. It is, essentially, the purest, most extraordinary, most weighty point of comparison available in human discourse; the pinnacle, evidently, of all namable qualities: the Muthafucka.

The Muthafucka has many names- the Mother Fucker, the Mother Fucka, the Mothafucker, the Muthah Fucka, the mutha fuck, and even, to those well acquainted with this monolith, the casual- Mutha or Mother.

Time and time again, in the mouths of the man on the street, the Muthafucka’s name is bandied about and celebrated as the be all and end all of experience. The Muthafucka far outweighs pretenders to the throne like “the witches tit,” “balls,” “the bag of hammers,” “hell,” etc. Muthafucka outweighs these and the rest of what I call the “hopelessly specific” by a sizable margin.

In the verbal coin of the land the Muthafucka is king.

Q: Is it cold out? Ask yourself, “how cold is it?”
A: Why it’s “Colder than a Mother Fucker!!”
Of course.

Q: Was that person you met attractive? 
A: “She/he was hotter than a Muthafucka!” 
Obviously. It doesn’t get any hotter.

Q: I wonder, how did you feel about Firefly being cancelled?
A: “I was madder than a Muthah Fucka!”
I’m sure you were but you’ll get over it.

Q: Did that movie frighten you?
A: “It was scarier than a Muthafucka!”
Indeed it was. I almost shat myself.

Q: How affected were you by that marijuana cigarette?
A: “I was higher than a Muthafucka!”
Fo’ real?

Anyhow, you see where I’m going with this.

The basic formula is as follows:

(Comparative adjective) + than a Mutherfucka!

It seems to work every time, without losing a whiff of its power. As a matter of fact, and this is a true oddity, even incorrect grammar works well. I might go so far as to say, if pressed under threat of physical harm, that the more glaringly wrong the word choice the more effective the Muthafucka comparison is!

Example:

Q: How was that yak testicle sandwich?
A: “It was gooder than a Muthafucker!”
Oh word?

How this “mother fucker” character, who would seem to be the manifestation of one of humanity’s last remaining powerful taboos, came to be so well regarded as to qualify as a unassailable counterpoint to every exclamatory comparison is truly a mystery. Perhaps the greatest mystery of the modern age. But I, for my part, am not too proud to offer kudos where kudos are due.

Whatever this entity’s true proportions, to rise so meteorically, against such seemingly stiff odds, this “Muthafucka” must be… well…
badder than a Muthafucka!

With that I return. Not with a trumpet and throaty throng but quietly, as though by moonlight, avoiding the squeaky step.

“Is that you? (groggily) What time is it?”

“Go back to sleep honey.”

I’ve sprung the trap and survived, and escaped, and so here I am. Home again. The trap is obvious, and in plain sight, but I am forgetful. Each time I look at it I see the glint on the teeth but not the teeth themselves. The glint is bright and shiny and I am a dim, dumb animal.  Probability, or Nature, or Destiny, or whatever you’ve labeled the comically inadequate mason jar in which you hold this concept- things take their course.

What can I say?

You turn your head sometimes, as if hearing a coo or whisper, and looking toward the window, expecting to see some winged thing perched on your windowsill, you see instead your own reflection. You see your life and it startles you more than any winged thing would. It is not what you expected to see, but worse it’s not even what you’d expect a life to look like. Its proportions are all wrong, its color off, its shape odd; In truth it looks like nothing you’ve ever seen before. It looks foreign, and in as much, frightening. But it is your life still, and it’s as if in this unexpected moment you were glimpsing it for the first time.

Of course this is all Balderdash, or Poppycock, or Bullshit, or whatever you’ve labeled your most treasured mason jar- you’ve seen this ugly thing before.

I’m forgetful, as I’ve already mentioned. When I momentarily see past the well-tooled facade, past the fortification of amusements and distractions, over and beyond the ramparts of routine, I get spooked.

More often than not I react to this reoccurring revelation in a predictable way. I cycle through my mason jars, popping their lids in quick succession- Confusion, Annoyance, Anger, Regret, Longing, Sadness. Their smells waft through my rooms, swirling, blending into complex and potent combinations. What began as merely disturbing, through my panic, becomes overwhelming. Like the dim, dumb animal I am I seek a dark place, hidden from predatory eyes, where I can gather myself and think.

Q: “Ever wondered what turns straight-forward drama into melodrama?”

A: “It’s the attempt at spreading a small portion of honest pain over every banal nook and cranny of the proceedings, creating a thin smear, rather than letting it lay, as a thick dollop, just where it naturally landed. That and the bad metaphors of course!”

So where was I?

Oh yes, In my forgetfulness I’d sprung the trap.

There is an incorrect assumption I repeatedly make, which is that through sheer force of will, given enough time and space, I can understand, dismantle, and rebuild existence into something which more resembles the existence of my imagination. Because of this I abandon things in an attempt to carve out that space and create that time. I stop, turn off, take a step back, begin analyzing and over-analyzing. Like a cat with a ball of yarn I smack at my existence with my thumb-less paws and claws and unravel it, only to find finally that my ball is gone, I’m tangled in the yarn, and there is nothing at the center. This is folly but it’s not the trap I speak of, not really.

At the center of life is a terror, a mystery, a question, a void. It is huge, and it has a gravitational pull of sorts, and were you to face it and stare into it every day you would not be able to function. We build a barricade against it with whatever materials we can scrounge because were we faced with it continuously we would not be able to attain even the most paltry scrap of contentment. That’s what Happiness, or Peace, or whatever you label your half-full mason jar really is- moments of distraction strung successfully together. If you can string those moments together for an entire lifetime you are a genius, a giant, a lucky son of a bitch.

So the trap is simply this: forgetting the void. When you do that you are apt to start misinterpreting your own defenses against it as something holding you in rather than something keeping it out. Happiness is being successfully distracted from the void, by projects, jobs, entertainments, passions, dreams… the trap is forgetting the void exists.

I’ve spent many an hour in my life scrutinizing my defenses, becoming dissatisfied with their materials, and tearing them down, only to see the void rather than greener grass, and be reminded why I’d built them in the first place. I’ve spent many an hour rebuilding my defenses from the wreckage of older ones. A real time waster let me tell you.

So the lesson, which my forgetfulness forces me to re-learn continually, is this: defenses need only be judged by a single criteria- their effectiveness. No matter what they look like, no matter from what materials they are cobbled, no matter whether they are the shape and proportions you imagined them to be when you were a mere emotional zygote, they need only work. If they do, leave them alone and keep on keepin’ on.

With that I return. As a cobbler returns to his shop on a grey monday morning.

(The bell on the door jingles. In you step.)

“Hi there. What can I do for you?”

-

Related: Dissatisfaction, Dexterity Puzzle of the Mind.

See what fun we are missing with our humorless sloans?

Alright I take it back, we lost nothing, the invention of the toilet was a win-win.

For a bit more info on the “potty” check out:
Musings of a Privy Digger and 1earth’s page on chamber pots.

The lyrics are as follows:

————————————————-

Take take take take take it off…
Take it off, take take take take it off
Take it off, take take take take it off,
Take it off, take take take take it off,
Take it off,
Take it OFF!
Take that suede-front off
Take it OFF!
Take those contacts off
Take it OFF!
Take that horsemeat off
Take it OFF!
Take those shell-toes off
Take it OFF!
Take those track fleas off
Take it OFF!
Take that doo-rag off
Take it OFF!
Take that moth-rag off
Take it OFF!
Take those fat laces off
Take it OFF!
Take that bomber off
Take it OFF!
Take that BVD off
Take it OFF!
Take those Converse off
Take it OFF!
And those Gazelles too
Take it OFF!
Take that Kangol off
Take it OFF!
Take that Jordache off
Take it OFF!
Take that Afro off
Take it OFF!
Take that jheri curl off
Take it OFF!
Take that Le Tigre off
Take it OFF!
Take those acid-washed jeans, bell-bottomed, designed by your mama…
off? Please? Please…

————————————————-

So, where do these street-pariah’s stand today? To find the answer I tapped a fashion designer who, wishing to remain anonymous, we will call “Da Brat.”

Da Brat and I conversed briefly on the subject and the results are as follows…

Suede-Front
We were almost, but not totally, in agreement on this item. Da Brat said “I like a suede-front on a man” to which I would have to qualify, “a man over the age 60, with a shuffling walk, maybe.” The populous at large don’t wear them, which would seem to point to a ruling of whack, unless you are forward-thinking and assume that if no one is wearing something it’s cool, in which case the suede-front is pretty fly. Ya heard?

Contacts
Da Brat and I were in total agreement here: Even for fake-tanned, dyed-blonde asian girls who want to look like they are fresh from a crashing Malibu surf colored contacts are whack with a capital, Billy Joel style, ack. ack. ack. ack. 

Horsemeat
Horsemeat? Da Brat and I were similarly mystified by this one. “A Leather product of some kind? Pleather? Fur?” In so much as neither of us were up on our 1989 slang enough to positively identify this item we will have to say whack, if only because it sounds gross and we both like horses.

Shell-Toes
Da Brat had a definite opinion on this one which sprung forth without hesitation, “they are only cool on people who never stopped wearing them in the first place.” I myself recognize them as classics but also recognize that they have too much baggage to be fresh again any time soon. So we are gonna have to go with wic-wic-whack. 

Track Fleas
Track fleas? Again no clue. Da Brat and I decided to approach this one as though what they are referring to is a track suit of some kind and go from there. Under that assumption the consensus is that though you still catch a D-Train straggler wearing a pink velour Juicy Couture number the plain fact is they are whack. That being said, they sold a shit-load at least twice in the past 20 years so expect them to make a return before too long. Not that that return will nullify their whackness. 

Doo-Rag
The doo-rag is back in a big way with all kinds of loser celebrity-types rockin’ them in both the classic over-the-noggin style, as well as the Dexies Midnight Runners’ loose-around-the-neck style. Once Nicole Ritchie and other deadweight c-listers have been caught in the pages of In-Style magazine wearing something, well, word on the street has to be that that shit is WHACK!

Moth Rag
I had to seek a third and fourth opinion on this one but none of my sources were able to positively identify what exactly a “moth rag” was. The best guess we heard was possibly a wig or a weave. If that is correct then it is perfectly relevant to todays rampant celebrity fakery. Remember crack is whack, and so are weaves, wigs, and extensions. Da Brat’s final words: “Sounds pretty cool whatever it is.”

Fat Laces
The simple answer here is that unless you are a member of a japanese break dance crew or an aged b-boy being wheeled around a cardboard-floored nursing home then you have no business wearing fat laces. Just say no.

Bomber
Da Brat seems to think baggy oversized bombers are cool again. I haven’t seen one anywhere, not with an 8-ball on the back, not with top-gun style patches, not Bruce Sterling “pattern recognition” style, not even an embroidered Avirex (course, it is summer) so I’ll go ahead and agree that they must be dope again. 

BVD
Hmmm. This one has me somewhat mystified. Underwear? Giant white XXXXXL tee shirts that end somewhere below the knee? I don’t know. I have to beg off on this one. No clue. Da Brat concurs. 

Converse, Kangol, Jordache
I have decided to group these all together because they are all pretty much in the same boat of relative whackness. All these brands have been trying really hard at making a resurgence, to regain even a milligram of the coolness which once swirled around them like a swollen, money-bearing cloud. Problem is all three were so successful in their respective moments as to have become very nearly cliche. Converse and Kangol are perhaps a little better off in that they have been adopted by so many different subcultures of people that they are very nearly meaningless at this point, the first step toward injecting them with new life. Jordache, however… well, one word: wiz-ni-iz-nack! Especially, as Da Brat points out, with Elizabeth Hurley as their spokes-meat.

Gazelles
See the entries for both shell-toes and fat-laces. It’s just too soon. Why do we have to so mercilessly pummel the b-boy fashions? Can’t we let them be for a while? Go grab up some Kangaroos, K-Swiss, Diadoras, or hell even some Doug E Fresh style gucci loafers. Give the b-boy sneakers a rest… A’ight? 

Afro
Da Brat seemed irrationally exuberant in her approval for afros “on blonde girls.” I myself am almost completely ambivalent toward them. I think the afro is a style which needs to be taken on a head by head basis. ?uestlove’s fro for example: fresh. Yo mama’s fro: Whack.

Jheri Curl
I am convinced this one has hit the mat for good. The jheri curl has been so mercilessly lampooned by everyone under the sun for the past 15 years that I just can’t imagine anyone trying to rock it again. Unless it’s some ironic Williamsburger of course. I won’t put anything past them. Then again you’d think the same would be true for the mullet, and yet it lives on totally without irony. Da Brat’s take on jheri curl: “Only cool in a London nightclub.”

Le Tigre
See Jordache comments above. Not even that cool in the first place. Off-brand Izod wanna-be whack-attack now and forever. (Even if I do have a 7th grade class photo of myself wearing an turquoise Le Tigre polo shirt with a bangs and a black rope necklace. Aw shit!)

Acid-Washed Jeans, Bell-Bottomed, Designed By Your Mama
Clearly these are the freshest of the lot. Or the whackest, depending on your outlook.

So overall of the 16 our 2006 revised judgement breaks down to 11 still whack, and 5 fresh or indeterminate. Course, that’s only our take, your tally may come in very differently. Beyond that you can be sure that in redoubling the overall whackness of the Take It Off list nearly 20 years on there will be those who instantly regard its items as doubly cool. Such is the precariously subjective round-a-bout of fashion. Please feel free to enlighten us if you have any further insight into the matter. Pos, Dave, Maseo, and Paul included. And thanks to code-name: Da Brat for participating.

Signing off.