More 1/3 Baked Ideas

A little while back I wrote about a few 1/3 baked ideas I had. These are ideas that are not quite good enough to be 1/2 baked. Here are a few more which came straight from my brain. Results may vary.

A little while ago I was watching someone eat a Drumstick ice cream treat. As delicious as the whole thing is, my favorite part of the Drumstick is the very last bite; the bottom of the cone containing a thick layer of chocolate and a small bit of the remaining ice cream. From the moment I first bite into the top I can think of nothing else besides treating myself to that delectable combination of waffle cone, chocolate and vanilla ice cream (Caramel Drumsticks do not apply). It almost feels like I am cheating on the rest of the Drumstick by dreaming of another. Then I got to one of my more dangerous activities, which is thinking. What if they put out a version of Drumsticks where that last bite was all there was? It would just be a bin, a la Dibs, full of frozen Drumstick bottoms: tip of the waffle cone, thick layer of chocolate inside and just a bit of vanilla ice cream. Then I wouldn't have to eat the rest of the Drumstick while dreaming about the bottom. Heavenly deliciousness.

A few days back I heard a report on a local FM radio show I was forced to listen to at work regarding celebrity look alikes. These were not cheesy lounge performers mind you, rather these were sperm donors who look like celebrities so women can have children that look like they could be the offspring of said famous persons. This idea is quite creepy so naturally I had to draw it out to its furthest creepy extent. What if instead of getting the sperm of a celebrity look alike you could get the actual sperm or DNA of a celebrity? You want a baby from George Clooney? No need to have sex with him, just get a hold of a sample of his sperm and start having some of the best looking kids on the planet. Love Brad Pitt? Get a sample of his DNA and hire a shady lab outside the U.S. to clone him. My idea is to have a service by which one would procure said sperm and DNA samples from celebrities and sell them to potential stalkers, um, I mean really huge fans. A collection of good looking women surely could wrangle a sample or two from the best genetic specimens Hollywood and professional sports have to offer. It can all be done from other countries to get around the pesky U.S. legal system. Are there women who would pay into the six figure range to have a child that looks like their favorite stud? You know there are.

Those are my new 1/3 baked ideas. Check back for more ideas not good enough to be 1/2 baked at a later time when my brain sinks to depths which are more and more depraved.

Thanks for reading and big balls.

Another Viewing of the King

I guess the title is a bit of a misnomer considering there was not an actual viewing of Michael Jackson in the first place. Sure, you're thinking, another Michael Jackson story. But I swear this is an angle that hasn't been widely reported since his death three weeks ago. Everyone was so quick to focus on his music and his career that the last 17 years have been swept under the rug. The music was strong but I think people are almost as quick to remember all of the bizarre offstage antics during his life. But even to the extent these have been reported, hardly any attention has been given to WHY Michael Jackson was the way he was. I claim to have no inside information, nor do I pretend to have any definitive answers; all I have is my common sense and what I have observed of his life being very far removed from his world. This is not an attempt to disparage, slander, or spread gossip, but rather just throwing out a few theories.

We tend to forget just how young Michael Jackson was when he was Michael Jackson. The family moved to southern California from Gary, Indiana when Michael was a very young boy to strike it rich in the music industry. Michael and his siblings were pushed to great extremes by his father Joseph. It is very likely that Joseph abused Michael and his siblings in many ways including physically, emotionally and psychologically. From years of listening to the radio show Loveline, you knew if a woman called in and had a little girl voice she had been abused earlier on in life. I think part of Michael's voice comes as a byproduct of this abuse. Victims of abuse often are not able to interact well with others and have many true, meaningful relationships. It doesn't seem that Michael had any true friends, but simply an endless line of people who wanted to be around him or get something from him.

Due to the young life which was so structured in music I believe this is why he ended up in a state of constant youth. Michael grew up doing nothing but pursuing a music career and being at the whims of fame and his father. When he wasn't performing he was rehearsing. When he wasn't rehearsing he was recording. When he wasn't recording he was promoting. When he wasn't promoting he was doing his requisite schoolwork. There was no space in his life to be a normal kid, so he tried to be a kid his whole adult life. This isn't news. I do believe however that Michael Jackson always believed that he was a kid. Obviously he knew that according to his birth certificate he was an adult but always believed that he was no different from the kids. I believe that he did molest children but in a weird way, I also believe that he felt their equal and never felt like the responsible adult who should be looking out for them. In his own way, he felt like he was one of them and just acting out with his peers.

Being childlike also led him to be so dependent on others. Combined with his ability to buy whatever and whomever he wanted, did he really know how to do anything you or I would do without thinking? Could he cook? Do laundry? Mow the lawn? Wash a car? I think this led to his constant posse. He had handlers who took care of every grown up aspect of his life. This led to money being spent and eventually do his drug habit. He never had anybody to step in and say no to him because everyone around him was making money off of him being the celebrity he was. When people are on the payroll they are unlikely to stand up to you. His handlers simply allowed him to drift deeper and deeper into his habit and provide him with drugs. It was a very symbiotic relationship; they keep him high, he keeps them paid. It worked very well until 3 weeks ago when it all ended. We are still seeing the fallout from his death as it is now being treated as a criminal matter. Will we find out that certain people had something to gain from his death and planned it out to look like an accident? Time will tell.

I think the best modern comparison we can make to Michael Jackson's life (to the extent which it is possible to compare anyone's life to his) is Howard Hughes. Both grew up with wealth and in families which did not nurture them in a healthy way. Both had great success early in life (Michael with music, Howard with business). Both had fortune beyond anyone's imagination and pursued their own whims and interests with child like zeal. Both felt very isolated and lonely due to their celebrity and financial status. Both fell into drug habits which were perpetuated by a small group of handlers who were on the dole and didn't want to shake up the situation even though it would have been in their benefactors' best interest. Both died shrouded in mystery and will live on somewhat infamously even though both were arguably the best contributors to their respective pursuits as any of their contemporaries. Perhaps this will be the subject of a more in-depth treatment later on. For an honest, complete look at the life of Howard Hughes I would recommend HUGHES, The Private Diaries, Memos and Letters by Richard Hack. The parallels are a bit eerie.

Unfortunately, I believe Michael Jackson didn't get to live the type of life I'll bet he wishes he could have led. He wasn't free to do whatever he wanted, be with whomever he wanted, or go wherever he wanted. He was crippled by such an unusual, chaotic and traumatic childhood which caused him to not develop much of the adult sensibilities that most enjoy. He was forced to live in his own private world and those that were let in weren't the best influence on him. Perhaps if he was Michael Jackson, kid from Gary, Indiana he would have gone to school, went to college, met someone, had a nice career in another industry and settled into a "normal" life. Michael Jackson should have had the type of life that was so good that almost everyone would have wanted to trade place with him. Instead, he had the type of life that nobody would trade for. Regardless of what one might think of him Michael Jackson was a human being and now is no more. That's what's saddest of all.

Thanks for reading and big balls.

Bizarro World

Over the last few days something has really bothered me. No, it's not the economy or the lack of exciting NCAA Tournament games. What's really got me puzzled is just how many celebrities positively refuse to acknowledge the existence of anybody who has a camera unless it is held by someone on the red carpet.

So many celebrities will go to great lengths to keep from being photographed and I'm not just talking about at their homes. Whether it is to the grocery store or the park, they try to throw on their invisibility cloak and escape through the streets of Los Angeles or New York unseen. Perhaps I'm missing something, but living your life in a city built on celebrity probably isn't the best way to fly under the radar. Think you're going to go unseen in a city of 8 million people who all know what you look like? Then I've got a little bridge in that same city to sell you.

Don't get me wrong. 250 people crowding around Octo-Mom's SUV or dozens of cars driven by paparazzi clogging up Mulholland Drive are both out of control situations that deserve to see people cited by the police. But beating down a photographer on your way out of having a $50 salad at The Ivy? Give me a break. Drive a car with tinted windows to the closest fast food drive through if you don't want to be seen. It is very annoying when celebrities complain about all the attention they receive from paparazzi yet spend their time congregating in paparazzi hot spots like The Ivy, Mr. Chow, or shopping on Robertson. You can't have it both ways.

And speaking of hypocritical, what kills me is the whole premise in the first place. By nature, the job description of a celebrity is to be as popular as possible. Not only can the paparazzi make a celebrity more popular by artificially inflating his or her importance, but the sheer amount of attention a celebrity receives is directly correlated to how popular they are. The worst day of most celebrities lives is the day they leave the house to run errands and nobody cares enough to take a picture of them.

The fact is that, unless hounded to the degree specified above, a celebrity should be gracious when people are interested in his or her life. The only reason the paparazzi take pictures of celebrities is because they can sell them to media outlets. The only reason media outlets will pay for the pictures is because people want to see them. By definition the amount of money a star will make for a movie or show depends on how many people will want to go see them. If a star acts like a jerk and pushes away the media, fewer people will see their movie or watch their show, thus costing them money. Perhaps celebrities should look at playing nice with the photogs as an investment in their future. Oh, and the fact that someone actually cares about what they are doing; that sounds pretty good to me. If celebrities take that for granted, and keep dodging the flash bulbs, they may find that pretty soon there will not be any more flash bulbs to dodge.