Worst. Olympics. Ever.

Saying that the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics was a disaster is nothing new. People have been saying it would be a disaster since before it started. But I’m going to go on record and say it was the “Worst Olympics Ever.” That includes Olympic games held in Nazi Germany and any future Olympic games that may be held in North Korea. The 2014 games were a testament to ineptitude, a political device meant to showcase the glory of Russia to the world, but came across instead as a vanity project for President Vladimir Putin’s massive ego.

Here’s a list of reasons why this was the worst Olympics ever:

1.) Stop the gays – OK, this is an obvious one, so I thought I’d get it out of the way first. Russia has been no friend to homosexuals, as Putrin has enacted numerous bits of legislation under the guise of “traditional family values” which are nothing more than laws targeting the country’s homosexual population. The sad part is that the U.S. Republican party does pretty much the same thing when railing against gays in America. Traditional Family Values include one man marrying one woman, and each being miserably depressed, never divorcing, and being involved in alcoholism and extra-marital affairs. You know, good old fashioned American values. I suppose Russia has more in common with the U.S. than we realize. In any case, Russia seems mired in the past, enacting outdated legislation and systematically targeting a minority demographic. The rest of the world is slowly moving forward, but Russian seems hellbent on going backward.

2.) Kill the dogs – Sochi has a problem with stray dogs. There are so many that dog kill squads have been ordered to wipe out the masterless mongrels. It’s pretty fucking sad that they would rather kill dogs than attempt to adopt them to families. I’m a realist, I know that not all of these dogs would be able to find homes and many of them would be put down in shelters. But for fuck’s sake, at least give them a chance before murdering them. Some reporters have lamented becoming somewhat attached to friendly strays, only to notice after a few days they are nowhere to be found. If Putin hates dogs this much and hates gays this much, I wonder how much he must hate gay dogs? Maybe he was raped by a gay dog as a child? His anger must come from somewhere.

You Just Wasted $35

I wish I could see my movies here.

People are assholes.

There is no sense of common courtesy anymore. Everyone just cares about themselves and nobody gives a fuck about others.

That much became clear to me recently when Mrs. Brik and I went to the movies. The film itself isn’t important. What is important is how it got disrupted by a couple of big fucking douchebags. We were watching the movie and having a good time. More than anything, just getting out of the house, regardless of what cinematic turd we watch, can be an enjoyable endeavor. This movie has been out for a while, and the theater was only about 20% full. We were not in the last row, but near the back and no one else was behind us.

The movie was only 95 minutes long. These two assholes walk in, I shit you not, 60 minutes into the film. They drop themselves into empty seats two rows behind us with a mighty thump. I thought the chairs were going to break. They start chomping on some popcorn so loudly it sounded like they were grinding nuts and bolts from ACE Hardware. Seriously, I have never even noticed people eating popcorn around me in a movie before this. I couldn’t hear Mrs. Brik chewing popcorn next to me. But now I can hear these two fuckers chowing down two fucking rows back! Jesus Christ.

For the first 5 minutes or so, they were just eating loudly. It was annoying, sure, but maybe they had traumatic brain injuries or something and didn’t know how to eat in public. But then, as the movie entered the third act, they decided it was time to start talking.

Believe me when I tell you that these guys NEVER shut up during a movie.

They were chatting about everyday crap, gossiping about some bullshit friend/relationship drama, and occasionally laughing. And not a normal hushed chuckle like you’d expect when your friend makes a witty one-liner about the movie. Oh no, not that at all. The guy would guffaw and the girl would hysterically cackle, and both of them would do it as loudly as humanly possible. It wasn’t directed at the movie either, because it would be during a lull or in the middle of an action sequence. It was clearly tied to their bullshit banter.

It goes without saying that I was super pissed off. It took me right out of the movie; I could no longer follow it. All I could manage to follow was that Brenda was dating Barry and Barry was also with Shaniqua and Barry’s baby mama Rene was trying to win him back but if Rene’s dad Leroy found out he would probably kill Barry. THAT’S what I got out of the final third of the movie. I couldn’t tell you what the fuck happened on screen.

WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOUR GODDAMN MANNERS?! WHO THE FUCK RAISED YOU TO ACT LIKE THAT?!

These assholes got plenty of “shushs” from the other people in the audience, and one guy even got up, walked back to where they were sitting, and told them to shut the fuck up. So, they were not just bothering me. They quieted for maybe a minute, two if I’m being generous, but then got right back to the cacophony of verbal diarrhea.

Finally, and this is the best part, they left the movie when there was about 5 minutes left. While I was able to comprehend the climax, a great deal was lost because I couldn’t concentrate on anything leading up to that moment.

As we were driving home, I got to thinking about this bizarre event. These two people paid full price for tickets and then bought popcorn and presumably soda to go along with it. That probably cost them around $35 total. And for what? To catch 30 minutes of a random action/sci-fi movie, and then leave just before it ends? They weren’t even watching it in the first place! And no, they were not just killing time in there until the movie they really wanted to see started, because this was the last showing of any movie for the day. I guess they could have finished the movie they came to see and then jumped into this one for the hell of it, but nobody does that. When your movie is over, you go home. If you theater hop, you don’t do it when there aren’t any other showings.

So, I’m not sure what these fuckos were up to. It seems like their sole purpose that evening was to blow $35 just to ruin a movie for some unfortunate theater goers. Why would you waste your money like that? Why not make some popcorn at home, order a pizza, and watch a Netflix all for $10 instead — AND you can gossip and laugh like morons to your heart’s content? They didn’t do that because they’re self-absorbed, oblivious assholes.

Fuck those fuckers.

This is why I stopped going to the movies in the first place. Guess I won’t be going back anytime soon.

Robin Hood is a Communist

Commie bastard.

It’s a well established fact that President Obama is a Communist. We also know that Communism is inherently evil because it stifles the independent spirit of mankind, and it does not allow for the growth of independent businesses. This is a bad thing, because businesses are people, too. But not the kind that are supposed to pay taxes. Anyway, what I don’t get is why Robin Hood is constantly getting portrayed as a hero. He isn’t a hero at all. He’s a villainous bastard. He’s a dirty, dirty Commie. He steals from the rich and gives to the poor. That’s the same thing as Obama wanting to “spread the wealth around.” If that’s not a Communist plot, then I don’t know what is.

Irregardless, You Sound Like an Asshole

I’ve been working on my Ph.D. in Internet Trolling for the last 15 years. In all that time, I’ve probably read a billion blog and forum posts. One thing I’ve learned from all that is people have terrible grammar. And I don’t mean the occasional typo or awkwardly phrased sentence. Hell, immune from that I am not. Ahem. What I mean is really fucking horrific grammar. The kind of stuff that makes you question whether you’re reading modern English or Celtic runes. It just goes to reinforce the fact that people are stupid.

Further reinforcing that is the constant use of fake words. It would be way too much work for the average mouth-breather to use a dictionary, so instead they type words they think are real. Unfortunately, more often than not, they turn out to be bullshit words that people propagate because they want to sound intelligent, but are too lazy to put any work into actually being intelligent.

My all time favorite most hated example of this is the fake word “irregardless.”

OK, so I guess you could say that “irregardless” is a real word, because it is something that people say. That’s like believing Bigfoot is real because a lot of people think he is. Just because you want something to be a certain way, doesn’t make it so. No matter how much you want “irregardless” to be a cool-sounding, super-fancy word, it never will be. “Irregardless” is not something you will find in the dictionary, except that it may be there to point you in the direction of “regardless” or “irrespective” which are, in fact, real words.

See?

Yes, that’s right, the words you are thinking of are “irrespective” and “regardless.” Putting them together does not suddenly create a new hybrid word that is more powerful than all other words combined. No, you just sound like Sarah Palin, making up bullshit words like “refudiate.” Clearly, you have no respect for the English language. You continue to rape it like it is some poor 13 year old Russian prostitute trying to pay off her father’s gambling debts.

I realize that I’ve probably just blown your mind by telling you that “irregardless” is not a real word. Of course, you may be thinking that “irregardless” sounds like a perfectly cromulent word, so why not just go ahead and use it? Well, the problem is that to people who have half a brain, you sound like a dumbfuck. Just because “irregardless” is a portmanteau of two real words doesn’t make it real by extension. Kind of like replacing a sandwich’s two pieces of bread with two pieces of fried chicken, and continuing to call it a sandwich. It is no longer a sandwich. It is a godless monstrosity meant to destroy mankind.

Oh, the humanity!

So, here’s a breakdown of why you shouldn’t use “irregardless.” Let’s start with the definitions of its root words:

Regardless: heedless, unmindful, without concern as to advice

Irrespective: without regard to something else, ignoring or discounting

Basically, the two root words mean the same thing. But when you combine them you form a double negative. “Ir” means “not” and “less” means “without.” If regardless means you are unmindful of something, and you put a negative in front of that, it changes the meaning. It now means you are mindful of something. You have changed the meaning 180 degrees. For example:

“I must make the decision regardless of consequences.” — or — I must make the decision despite the consequences.

“I must make the decision irregardless of consequences.” — or — I must make the decision because of the consequences.

The entire meaning of the sentence has now changed. You see how stupid that sounds? That’s exactly what you sound like when you say “irregardless.” You sound like a pseudo-intellectual moron, throwing around words (real or fake) without knowing what the hell they mean.

What he said.

To my surprise very intelligent people such as professors, doctors, lawyers, etc all make this mistake. I think they say it because they think it sounds more intelligent. “LOL WELL I COULD SAY REGARDLESS BUT PEOPLE WILL THINK I’M EVEN SMARTER IF I SAY IRREGARDLESS NOT INSTEAD LOL!” Yeah, that about sums it up. People use the word to make themselves look smarter but end up looking dumber as a result.

Take “irregardless” out of your vocabulary. It doesn’t belong there in the first place. You might be an intelligent person (although that’s doubtful if you’re wasting your time reading this blog), but if you say, type, or think the word “irregardless”, you sound like an asshole.

Your Wedding Sucked

Wedding season is currently underway, and I thought I should make a public service announcement. I know that weddings are a weird topic for Awesomely Shitty, but I felt it was my duty to impart my invaluable words of wisdom onto you. I’ve attended a lot of weddings, including my own, which makes me practically an expert on the subject. So, if you’re planning on having your own, here’s a list of ways you can royally fuck up your wedding and piss off everyone.

1.) The ceremony is too long – A typical rookie mistake. Nobody wants to sit for more than 15-20 minutes watching the two of you stand motionless while some crusty old tool reads through a long-winded ceremony. The longer it goes, the more anxious people are going to be to leave, not to mention they’ll be furious. Of course you thought the 75 minute ceremony with Catholic Mass included was “beautiful.” But your 200 guests didn’t. They were hopelessly bored and contemplating suicide as a means of escape.

2.) The ceremony is too short – I know it seems impossible for the ceremony to be too short, but the last wedding I went to had a ceremony which clocked in at 5 minutes. At any wedding, the ceremony is the main event. The reception is the celebration of that. Obviously, the reception is the fun part with drunken debauchery and horny bridesmaids, but that doesn’t mean you should have the ceremony take two seconds. Put some goddamn thought into the readings, music, and vows to make it worthwhile. Otherwise, you might as well get married by an Elvis impersonator in Vegas.

3.) Somebody read 1 Corinthians – You know the one, “Love is patient, love is kind, love is cliche, love is etc.” Every wedding I have been to except for two (mine skipped it) had this. It is the most overused piece of shit reading. Maybe the sentiment is nice, but it’s hard to like it when you hear it all the fucking time. Love is great and all, but considering 50% of marriages end in divorce, is love really something we want to hear about at a wedding?

Rebecca Black’s Friday is Just as Good as Anything on the Radio

Gangfight.

The craze regarding Rebecca Black’s self-published music video Friday is sort of old news at this point, but since I live in a perpetual time-warp, I figured it would be OK to write about it.

When it was first published online, everyone was talking about it, and not in a good way. People were jeering at the shittiness of her singing, the ridiculously mundane lyrics, and the general ineptitude of the whole thing. I don’t disagree. I mean, she isn’t a good singer, the lyrics are terrible, and it was largely a rather lame affair. Although, the general naivete of the song itself was paradoxically refreshing.

However, I will give her this: the production quality was actually good. For a self-produced music video, the thing looked professional. It had nice film quality, good audio quality, and looked as if they had put some thought into the lighting, production, staging, special effects, etc. Plus, she managed to find a semi-legit rapper to be featured. Overall, Rebecca’s Black’s music video is 1000 times better than your own shitty YouTube audition tape featuring you crooning along with your out of tune acoustic guitar.

When people first heard her song online they said, “LOL THIS SONG SUCKS THIS GIRL IS STUPID LOL!” But if they had heard the exact same song on the radio they would have said, “LOL HOLY SHIT THIS SONG ROCKS! I NEED TO GO BUY THE SINGLE, DOWNLOAD THE ITUNES VERSION, BUY THE FULL ALBUM, AND IMPORT THE BOOTLEG VERSION FROM JAPAN! I LOVE REBECCA BLACK LOL!” When people hear independent music on the internet, they are immediately critical. But when they hear it on the radio, they automatically give it a ton of credit it may not deserve just because it’s on the radio, and therefore “popular.”

Can You Shut the Fuck Up While I’m Watching the Show?

I used to think that most people were like me, you know, rich, handsome, dashing multi-millionaires with countless ladies swooning at their feet. It wasn’t until later that I realized most people were actually not like me at all. While I prefer to be quiet and pay attention to a movie or TV show, most people do not. It seems that most people do not have the ability to shut the fuck up for a 30 minute – 2 hour period of time.

Whether it’s a TV show, a DVD at home, or a movie in the theater, people are constantly talking. This drives me fucking crazy. It’s something I don’t do, save for the occasional joke or random comment. If other people made a comment here or there, things would be fine. But people don’t do that. They feel the need to have an entire conversation throughout the course of the show.

Watching TV or a movie is not the same thing as going out for dinner. There are other people around who want to concentrate on what they paid money for, rather than hearing your inane drivel. This phenomenon seems to be getting worse every day. What is so hard about being quiet? Why is it only I seem to be able to do it? Maybe it’s natural selection? Either I have progressed to the next point in evolution or everyone else has devolved back to the apes.

Case in point: Mrs. Brik and I were at a friend’s house watching the premier of the third season of True Blood. We are big fans and so are our friends. Our friends had also invited other friends, one of their parents, some siblings, and their significant others. It wasn’t a big gathering. There were about 10 people altogether. I thought, “Oh cool, there are a bunch of True Blood fans here. This should be fun.” Of course, these thoughts were entirely incorrect. What I should have been thinking was, “Oh fuck, there are a bunch of talkative retards here. This should be a disaster.”

And a disaster it was. Half of the people there had never watched True Blood before. Two of the people who had seen the show spent every minute explaining shit to the people who hadn’t seen it. “Oh, that’s Sookie. She’s the main character. She has the power to read people’s minds. She is also dating Bill, who is a vampire. She lives in Bon Temps, Louisiana. Jason is her brother. She works as a waitress at a bar called Merlotte’s. At the end of the last season…” It was annoying because this happened every time a new character, location, or supernatural power appeared on screen.

If you are going to watch a serialized show, it would only make sense to start at the beginning and not jump in somewhere in the middle. Don’t expect people to tolerate you asking, “Who’s that? What’s going on? Why are the doing that?” every five minutes. If you are guilty of this kind of thing, here’s a tip for the future. Either start at the beginning, or be quiet and just hope things will start to make sense. If you don’t follow my advice, expect to get bludgeoned.

Worse than that, was this one girl’s boyfriend. Apparently this guy is a world class expert on vampires. He wouldn’t shut the fuck up throughout the whole episode. Every ten seconds he would have to interject a comment or personal insight regarding the mythology of the series. Imagine these quotes in your best, lispy nerd voice.

“Oh, I see that silver harms the vampires in this. That’s kind of lame. I prefer the traditional way of killing vampires. You know, with fire or beheading.”

The “traditional way,” asshole? I could have sworn the “traditional way” to kill vampires was a stake in the heart or sunlight, neither of which you mentioned. Besides, there is no “traditional way” to kill vampires. They are fucking fictional characters. There are no hard and fast rules about how to kill fictional characters. I didn’t realize I was dealing with a vampire scholar here. Traditional or not, all I care about is that the show is consistent. If they set up rules in the show’s universe (e.g. silver harms vampires), they should always stick with those rules. Hell, they could say that vampires could only be killed by a wooden stake up the ass, but as long as they didn’t deviate from that rule, I could care less.

Here are some other annoying quotes from that guy:

“Can vampires cross running water in this show?”

“Are vampires stronger than werewolves in this?”

“Does garlic do anything to vampires in this?”

“Oh, they don’t turn to dust when they are hit with a wooden stake? That is really lame.”

“I don’t think that sunlight should kill vampires. It should be more like in Dracula where their powers are weakened.”

And of course my favorite, and most relevant, comments of the night:

“The opening to this series isn’t nearly as good as the opening to Dexter.”

“You know, the characters in Dexter are so good.”

“I think the sex scenes in Dexter are better.”

Wow. Way to have a hard-on for Dexter. Why the fuck would you compare the openings (or any aspects) of Dexter and True Blood? The only thing these shows have in common is that they are both on TV. Also, way to talk through the entire show, motherfucker. Would it have killed that guy to shut up for a fucking hour? How about ten minutes?

Between him constantly talking like he’s the godfather of vampires and the other people constantly explaining what the hell was going on to the people who hadn’t seen the show, I couldn’t hear a goddamn word coming out of the TV. I had no fucking idea what was going on in that first episode of True Blood. In fact, after we got home, we had to watch it online so we would understand what the hell happened. Suffice it to say, we did not return to our friends’ place for episode two.

This kind of thing really needs to stop. Nobody cares what you have to say. Even if you wrote your Ph.D. thesis on Traditional Methods of Killing the Vampire: A Retrospective Analysis, I don’t want to hear about it while I’m watching some awesome vampire-killing action. If you are talking non-stop about bullshit, it’s going to piss me off. It’s impossible to enjoy the movie or TV show when you are constantly yapping. Also, if you are too stupid to understand what’s going on and need to constantly ask for clarification, you need to step out. Maybe seeing the latest Michael Bay shit-spectacular is more up your alley.

In summary, can you shut the fuck up while I’m watching the show?

Fake Indie Movies (AKA Fuck You, Hipsters)

There are a lot of movies I hate. For the most part, Hollywood can’t resist shoving recycled garbage down the throats of the movie-going public 52 weeks a year. Since 2004 there has been a growing number of “indie” movies released every year. The indie movie trend really exploded with the release of Napoleon Dynamite. Since then the term “indie film” has been Hollywood shorthand for “quirky independent comedy.” Unfortunately, the majority of the movies being passed around as “indie” are nothing close to being independent.

A truly independent film typically has a lot of features you will never find in a Hollywood “indie” movie. For example, if the movie was ever released in a national cinema chain (e.g. AMC, Harkins), then it was likely backed by a major studio, and thus is not independent. Real independent movies are not seen in the same cineplex that shows the latest Michael Bay summer shit-spectacular. They may play in a small theater dedicated to independent films, but usually they just make the rounds on the film festival circuit until they are either picked up for home video release or fade into obscurity.

Real independent movies are way too hardcore for the standard movie goer. They are grainy, often black and white, have really low production values, do not star any known actors, and many times deal with social issues or are completely confusing mindfucks. Perfect examples of this would be the movies Eraserhead by David Lynch and Pi by Darren Aronofsky.

Tale of the iPhone

iPhone, you are a magnificent bastard.

So I finally broke down and joined the legion of iPhone carriers. My girlfriend is Original Gangsta, as she has the 2G phone. I’ve seen her use it for quite a long time now, and I decided that it was cool and I should get one of my own. The only problem was that I was still under contract with Alltel. That cell phone company has amazing service, but the worst phones on the goddamn planet. All their phones are cheap plasticky crap from 4 fucking years ago. I mean, seriously, if they had at least one decent phone, they wouldn’t have been swallowed up by Verizon. Anyway, I digress…

My contract finally ended, and the next day I was all set to make the switch to AT&T so I could get an iPhone 3GS. The “S” is for “suck” — err, I mean “speed,” the S is for “speed.”

Horrible Roommates

My roommate is an undeniably huge asshole. Here is a list of things that he does (perhaps intentionally, I’m not sure) to piss me off:

1. Throws twist-ties from plastic bags on the kitchen floor, even though the trash can is two feet away.
2. Spills juice / drops food on the floor and doesn’t clean it up.
3. Leaves 500 pairs of shoes in the entryway, strategically placed for me to trip over every time I enter or leave the apartment.
4. When asked to clean up his messes, he says that he will, but doesn’t do it.
5. When yelled at to clean up his messes, he assures me he will, but still doesn’t do it.
6. Takes 30 minute showers (with the temperature as hot as possible) and then runs the bathroom sink for 15 minutes (also with the temperature as hot as possible) while he shaves. After all of this, if I try to take a shower, the water is ice cold.
7. Doesn’t turn the shower all the way off, so the water is on all day long, which runs up the utility bill.
8. Runs the heater in the summer, and the air conditioner in the winter.
9. Starts talking and interrupts whatever I’m watching on TV without waiting for a commercial.
10. Slams cabinet doors, bangs pots and pans, and rattles around the kitchen in the middle of the night, waking me up.
11. Put knives into the knife block upside down.
12. Runs the dryer at 7am while I’m trying to sleep.
13. Leaves rotting food in the trash can so that the entire apartment smells like garbage.
14. Explodes food in the microwave, and leaves toast in the toaster for up to a week at a time.
15. Never turns off my DVD player, and it may remain on for up to 24 hours.
16. Is able to run the dishwasher, but unable to empty it.
17. Sleeps from 5pm to 2am, so if I watch TV with the volume on it always wakes him up.
18. Doesn’t understand why I am constantly annoyed with him, and spend as little time at home as possible.
19. Is generally inconsiderate, and has no idea how to live with other humans.
20. Thinks his behavior is completely normal.

Do you have a horrible roommate? Let me know what they do to piss you off.

Verdict: Shitty