Category Archives: Frustration & Complaint

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Good Riddance 2016 – Happy 2017

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Good Riddance and Welcome

Well the people who follow the Gregorian calendar can now officially say ‘good riddance to 2016’ — especially given that death has been  a big theme this past year. (If you follow the Chinese, Zoroastrian, Muslim, Jewish, Japanese Imperial or Mayan calendars, it was still a pretty shockingly crappy year from some perspectives.)

And I am not counting the long list of celebrities who shuffled off their moral coil, and there were many. Influential too, in all manner of subjects and areas of expertise.

However, we should not forget those who weren’t famous or successful who were killed, murdered or just plain suffered to death in just about every part of the world. Don’t forget, they are just as much a part of life as those n Hollywood or elsewhere. I know, the media doesn’t want us to focus on that so much, because it doesn’t get ratings. But try not to forget.

I wonder if there is a death counter to tally up all the people who willfully or less than willfully said good riddance to this mortal life. That would be a tough job for any computer, or even the best accountant, no matter how good the software. Do humans do a global death census? Maybe we should, but counting the dead is hard because they tend not speak up when asked.

2017 Has To be Better, Right?

2017 —  Will it get better? That is the question on so many peoples’ lips. If you are an optimist –gullible, on medication or otherwise — it can only get better. After Donald Trump‘s election, and countless other terrorist attacks in the name of some ‘benevolent’ god, life can only move toward the positive, depending on your point of view, of course.

For the bitter pessimists among us, we have to suffer through four years of Donald Trump and the inevitable talk shows that will tear him to shreds. We’re all losers here. There is still Putin, terrorists, and worst of all, Mariah Carey is making a comeback. Some in the media are asking, if she’s making a comeback, why can’t a benevolent god from ANY religion give her tongue gout?

Good Riddance Again?

The human memory is conditioned to blot out bad experiences (like murder, torture, losing money at gambling, or an overdone steak). We tend to remember the things that gave us joy and euphoria. Obviously that’s different for different people. But if we just learned to remember the awful stuff a little more often, maybe we wouldn’t fall into the same bad habits like betting on democracy, or your favorite sports team, or the mafia to get you out of a sticky situation.

My recommendation for the future is simple: Eat what you like, spend time with those who make you happy, quit your job if you hate it, and watch plenty of animated TV – way better than reality.

Faithfully without faith,

Nostradamned Ignorantus Biggus Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

How To Replace Democracy

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Stanko & Tibor - Gapplesoft & Democracy

Dateline: Early December. Wet weather lurks outside my door, while inside, it's getting mighty steamy. I left the shower running and the door open. I am trying to wash off the residue of democracy.

How To Replace Democracy

Does it sound like this post is anti-democratic? Do you think it will spiral into a rant about the failings of our democracy, where your fellow citizens, rich and poor, smart and dumb, well educated and not well educated (note to reader: being educated doesn’t mean you’re smart – look at that interracial-loving, open-minded, all-inclusive Bannon fellow), smelly and perfumed, hairy and non-hairy, are given the freedom and privilege to choose their leaders, no matter how well or poorly they are informed (I’m looking at you Facebook)?

It’s kind of ironic that some of the people who don’t like freedom of speech an despise the press, and are skilled at starting race wars, somehow got elected to powerful positions in the US of A. Especially that tanned, manicured and coiffed hairball, Mr. President Elect. He’d sue you nine ways from Sunday for calling him a short-fingered vulgarian (great blog). And his staff would have you water-boarded, electrocuted and deported just for saying he’s a nut bar. But that is the irony, or better yet, the sick coincidence of democracy.

So, What Are Our Options?

Having just reviewed Ancient Greek social and power structures and the democratic process they applied (I was helping my kid with her homework), it seemed like a pretty good idea at the time, but the Greeks kind of had segregated democracy.

If you were a natural citizen, male over the age of 18 and had done your military service, you could vote. Not the women, though. That would have been too progressive for a warrior-based society that was probably hairier and smellier than an Albanian metal worker’s armpit at the end of his shift. There were also other citizens who had to buy their way into voting. And of course there were the slaves and they had no right to vote ever.

Seems like a good idea, but not everyone is happy with it.

So what are the options for replacing democracy?

Pick From 5 Hardships

  • Dictatorship/Fascism – Not as good as the marketing department makes it sound. Sure, the rallies are fun, but there are silly uniforms, secret police and usually some form of ostracization by the world community, which makes it hard to get Tom Jones to come to your country to sing at your leader’s wedding.
  • Communism – Usually results in bad haircuts, crappy clothing options, terrible shopping hours, and you’re made fun of by the rest of the global community, including the Chinese, for drab clothing.
  • Anarchy – Seems appealing at first, especially where inflexible work hours are concerned, but it makes getting an Uber really difficult because the driver is probably going to robbed or crashed into by some post-apocalyptic vehicle driven by a person with (see a trend here) a bad haircut. And good luck try booking an appointment to get a driver’s licence.
  • Monarchy/Oligarchy – See “Dictatorship”, subtract the global ostracization and add high fashion, probably some inbreeding and a lot of castles and oodles of snobbery based solely on being part of the “lucky sperm club.” Usually good for some tourism if it’s a monarchy (see England), and great for commercial thuggery if it’s an oligarchy (see Eastern Europe).
  • Domination by aliens – If they don’t do anal probes, enslave us or eat us for breakfast, this may be the most acceptable alternative to democracy. Would certainly spare us having to deal with the humans who call at all hours from call centers asking us if we’d like to pay more for cable and phone service.

So as we can see, all of the above suck just as badly as democracy, except with the current form of democracy in practice in some parts of the globe, chances are you can buy your way into power more easily, and your vote might count if it’s limited to your house.

With that in mind, I will expound at length in my next post about how and why warm sheep’s cheese is superior to most elected and appointed officials, and way better than a kick in the private parts with a steel boot.

Philosophically spent, and morally bent,

Aristotle “The Arachnid” Druker

How should we govern ourselves?(required)

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

The Burkini Conundrum & Other Garbage

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Stanko & Tibor - The Burkini Conundrum

Dateline: Late, late, late summer, in a dimly lit basement -  and a stinky, humid one at that. Reason enough to go to bed early.

The Burkini Conundrum (Not Really)

Very recently, there was a local Pokemon Go gathering and barely sentient people were milling around a public spot, blindly moving about like a school of geeky loser fish, in order to grab imaginary, virtual objects using a smart phone. No one was speaking, people were just staring at their screens. I am told there was fair bit of drool too.

What’s the message here? It would seem that reality sucks so bad, only some kind of virtual reality game with ZERO meaning for the greater good is the next best replacement for reality. And when you think about it, creating distractions that have nothing to do with reality is deeply embedded in human nature. It’s why we built the Coliseum, casinos, brothels, movie theatres, the Internet or why heroin and cannabis are still such popular drugs, and why the Mayans used cocaine. Day-to-day drudgery.

Unintelligent Design

So now we focus on The Burkini as a distraction, because the Olympics were too boring. Not enough Zika? Way too much Ryan Lochte? Have our collective mood-altering prescriptions run out? We need to argue over something that really isn’t worth it?

I’m starting to think the human brain is a miracle of Unintelligent Design. Let’s explore the following suppository. Not wait. That’s gross. Supposition, yeah that’s it. Shut up and read on.

I dare you to explain (intelligently) how any of the following could exist if there was actually intelligent design:

  • I have a spine like a melted accordion
  • I get pimples from eating ONE onion ring, which is highly unjust
  • When it’s warm outside my privates stick to my skin and I’m therefore uncomfortable for 3 months a year
  • IKEA gets away with selling crap furniture at exorbitant prices
  • People are STILL opposed to vaccinations
  • Why hasn’t Gwyneth Paltrow been imprisoned for criminally excessive stupidity
  • We humans commit genocide semi-regularly
  • Donald Drumpf
  • The burkini, and the banning thereof

None. None Blacker

And why are there black burkinis? Like it isn’t hot enough at the beach as it is that you need to suffocate the woman not just emotionally but physically, too? Why doesn’t it come with a built-in head shade? Or a heat expulsion flap? That is not intelligent design.

And if intelligent design actually existed, then why did a bunch of French bureaucrats decide to take time to draft legislation to ban it when maybe they could have spent the time, I don’t know, giving food to the poor? Or making cheese and wine free for a month? I think unintelligent design is the accurate descriptor.

Wisdom of the Masses

It’s like everyone is being guided by this invisible force of collective stupidity. Like a Simpsons episode. There could be a more complex, biological reason too, although the Royal Society for Semi-Legitimate Science and Bellybutton Gazing refuses to hear me out.

Maybe when humans are in close proximity to each other, like at an election rally, a night club, a public swimming pool, a sporting event, or in bed, our chromosomes cancel each other out if there’s an even number and we’re reduced to blubbering idiots. Or if there’s an odd number of chromosomes, the dominant chromosome with the lowest IQ wins and guides the pack. Like at an Australian Rules football match. Or a gathering of religious snake-handlers.

So where does this leave us? With no resolution for the burkini conundrum, nor anything of merit worth reading. But if you did take the time to read this, you have wasted a full 2 minutes of your time that won’t ever be returned, and I have fished through your wallets while you weren’t looking. Lots of unused condoms in there.

Cogitatively coagulated,

Isosceles of Sucrose

Crime, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

The Plan To Save America

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The Plan to Save America by Stanko & Tibor

Dateline: A June eve, colder than late October, my TV is now tuned to animation so I can ignore reality.

The ECT Plan

Another mass shooting, another terrorist attack, another reason there should be widespread, reckless, rampant use of electro-shock therapy.

Shock therapy is a grossly misunderstood and maligned tool for social equilibrium and lesson-imparting. Sadly, electro convulsive therapy (ECT), or ‘buzzing the brain goo” to the layman, has been given a bad rap in movies and the press as a way to “solve” difficult psychological issues such as aggravated fruit fondling, underground gerbil hurling competitions, spouse nagging and as a crowd control method at pop music concerts riddled with hormone-laden youth.

I say ECT could be used to settle the upcoming American election. Why you ask? Of course you’re not asking, because no one is reading this rant, except for the 4 incarcerated inmates at the Super Max Prison for Wayward Yoga Teachers. The “downward dog” takes on new meaning in that joint. But I digress.

ECT for You and Me

Let’s face it. Anyone who willingly votes for Donald J. Trump, be they male or female, young or old, rich or poor, tall or short, fat or slim, has essentially shown themselves to be in need of ECT-realignment of the cranial matter. I don’t mean it to be a punishment either. It’s required to restore some form of mental calm and synaptic equilibrium that is apparently sorely lacking in the country that somehow is responsible for the “infomercial”, yet gave us such gems as rock ’n roll and the blues.

Now before you say “you’re a lefty pink loving Hilary fan” — I say thee nay. I also think all her supporters should be subject to group ECT, preferably in an ankle-deep pool with 5000 piranha. They too are a little too fervent, especially those Bernie booster contingent whose idealism and dedication to the cause of fairness make my stomach turn and a little bit of acid reflux happens. Too much strident do-gooderism before breakfast is a little like having only dry whole wheat toast with low fat yogurt for breakfast — every day. And we know where that hellish scenario leads to: people wearing Birkenstocks with black socks, a definite sign of the apocalypse. The only way that is rectified is double ECT doses.

Fixing Democracy

So where does that leave us? Give up on democracy? Well, not at the municipal level. But at the federal level, I should be made benevolent leader for about 6 months with a team of Hawaiian surfer maidens as my staff, ready to zap anyone with an ECT if they so much as question my desire for beef or pork ribs.

Here’s my plan to fix everything:

  1. Ensure that all people across the country have unlimited bagels and chocolate and cinnamon danish to eat ever day. And we’d even make allowances for gluten-free danish until we could find an island to move the gluten-intolerant to. Not Hawaii. That’s for me.
  2. We move the US armed forces, every last one of them, to the Britain where they take over the island and stop the British from telling everyone what’s “proper spelling” and remove all the journalists and tabloid owners that make a living reporting off the Royal Family and place them all on the St. Kilda Island in the Outer Hebrides. Win-win for all of humanity.
  3. While everyone is still groggy from the post-ECT zap, we move everyone who wants to own a gun or hunts with a bow and arrow to the southern half of the country. Everyone who wants gun control and government mandated hugging and kisses we move them to the northern half. Each group gets access to the west and east coasts on weekends. Then we have the millions of illegal Mexican immigrants dig a deep trench about 100 miles wide, spanning from east to west, fill it with water and man-eating alligators and sea mines, so no one has any great desire to cross.

I figure the northern lefties will all hug and sing Kumbaya while the folks in the south will fire off their arms in sheer joy like it’s an Afghani wedding.

My guess is the people in the south will quickly kill each other because heat makes you do stupid things (see Middle East for reference), thus thinning the population, while the people in the north will nag each other to death with political correctness and too much health food and regulation, thus thinning their population, too.

When both sides of the divide are severely weakened after too much fried food in the south and too much organic buffalo cheese in the north, then we put them back together, hold an election and see if they have learned anything.

Chances are they won’t have learned a thing, but it would be a great social experiment. Especially since I don’t live there.

Oh and we lock Hilary and Donald in a closet, both naked, for 48 hours and see who comes out alive, because I don’t want to do any more comics about this buffoon. I need new material.

There. Problem solved.

Disgustingly cookie-filled and partially sane,

Jonah Buzzer Boy Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Trump Vs. The Empire

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Trump v. Empire

When will primary season be over? There's an election afoot, and that causes discomfort in many. Mostly it causes gas.

 Who Is More Evil? Hard To Say

If find the whole thing a little ironic. No, wrong word. Bizarre is le mot juste. Right now, everyone I know who’s following the American primary race is actually rooting for The Empire and not the Rebels. Let me explain.

The so called Establishment candidates, Hilary Bitter Clinton, and I guess Lyin’ Ted Cruz, are in a pitched battle for the leadership of their respective parties, to get a chance to become The Head Banana of the United States of Bananas. They are battling who? The Rebels: Bernie “Trotsky” Sanders, and Donald The Disassociated from Reality” Trump. And let;s face it – they are rebelling against the empires that are their parties.

So what is a person to do when Evil is Good and Good is Evil? The answer is simple: Eat. A lot. Preferably chocolate danish. And cinnamon danish will do in a pinch. But there are side effects to constant eating of life-affirming sugars and dough.

Unnatural Emissions and Omissions

Everything I eat makes me gaseous and bloated. No matter whether it’s carbs, fibre, protein, sugar-based confections like those delicious petroleum-laced snacks made by a faceless conglomerate that has various safety violations and a few environmental crimes under its belt, or even bacon, which technically speaking, is its own food group according the Grand Council of Baconistas.

To alleviate this blight, everyone says I should do a ‘cleanse’ and avoid all matter that causes gases to form in my belly. There are several problems with a cleanse. First of all it sounds like something a religious, fascist zealot would do, so right there you lost me. Second a ‘cleanse’ involves denying myself of things I like. Self-denial is something people who have too much time and wealth on their hands do. I don’t have the time to deny myself stuff because that would mean cleaning out the pantry.

And a cleanse is something vaguely associated with cleaning, an act I loathe because it means I have to wear rubber gloves and be exposed to chemicals that, while shifting my brain into an altered state where conversations with inanimate objects tend to be quite hysterical, tend to have a deleterious effect on my relationship to reality, and thus my wife.

Make  Me

Worse than that, why would I want to clean anything? Isn’t that why there are cleaning ladies? And by that I mean no disrespect to the legion of cleaning men, although that term does seem like a bit of an oxymoron, given the males I know. Unless, however, it’s a neat-freak man, with obsessive compulsive issues and no readily available medication, living in a clean apartment with fresh cut flowers.

Dare I say, it goes against my genetic code to deny myself those things which will lead to the joy of the palate and the bloating of the belly. Come to think of it, the DNA testing results from that guy with a limp and a patch over one eye in the back alley near the strip club was a little suspicious. The results came back with the proper 23 chromosomes, but 4 were still dormant, hence explaining my deep desire to nap every afternoon after lunch.

Well, seeing as this is all too absurd for even more words, I will cleanse my palate with something sugary and cleanse my mental pallet with some sleep.

Mightily Manly and Majestic,

Little Lord Fauntleroy Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

May The Text Be With Ewe. I Meant ‘You’

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Stanko & Tibor - All Text

Dateline: Somewhere north, dreary, rainy, late December, late afternoon, late for my latte, late with the latest comic. Must text my thoughts before the medication wears off.

To Text Or Not To Text. I’d Say To Text

First off, I haven’t seen the new Star Wars flick yet, but when I do, you can be sure there will be a comic about it. Probably something involving interspecies fondling, I’d reckon. However, until then, not an ounce of text, not a drop of sweat or electronic ink will be expended on the subject. But if Star Wars had used sheep as the actors, I think they would have gone with “May the Force be with Ewe.” Just a random thought from having taken a LOT of sinus medication late.

So often it is the case that we have reduced our lives from speech and complex sentences to this thing we call “text messages.” We are racing for the ultimate in brevity and at the same time, stupidity. It’s remarkable how with the advent of texting, we mobile device-addicted, semi-sentient, 23-chromosomed monkeys have managed to simultaneously make communication more efficient by reducing it to the textual version of grunts, and at the same complicated our lives with all the misspelling and consequent misunderstandings and inadvertent embarrassments that we transmit from device to device.

Silence Is Golden. But Gold’s Value Has Plummeted

In theory all this texting leads to less speaking, thus removing from the world vast amounts of noise pollution, and potentially thwarting the release of CO2 from all the exhaling we do when we speak. In theory, it should lead to more silence and less blathering and bleating.  And as the saying goes, silence is golden. But have you seen the value of gold in the last 6 months? Dropped like a stone. Why, Star Wars movie tickets for opening night had a higher market value.

Can you just imagine how much texting went on by all those hard core fan boys and girls before the official opening night? Real communication, like where people talk to each other? I doubt it. Well, until the movie started and then there must have been millions of people humming the movie theme and simultaneously wetting themselves with joy. Which probably limited some of the texts.

The human need to text, to let one’s thoughts run free through the electronic ether, seems to grow unabated. Those thoughts, about as deep as a thimble, escape virtually unchecked, and more often improperly corrected by the smarter-than-thou auto-correct feature every so called “smart phone” has enabled by default. We get the meaning across sometimes, and other times the word “important” is somehow auto-corrected to “incontinence.”  This does not help out in the world of intercultural business communication.

Steady As She Goes

The outcome of this need to communicate intense brevity – without the use of our voice boxes, and instead replaced by our not terribly dextrous fingers on tiny keyboards – will lead us all to ruin. Why do I say that?

Because by having taught my mother to text (so she doesn’t call us as often to ask if I put the chicken back in the fridge, lest it develop deathly bacteria), we have enabled her to write to us ever more frequently, ever more pointedly, knowing full well that when we hear that “bling” indicating a text has come in, we will rush to the mobile device, only to shake our heads in bewilderment when the words “Just wanted to see how you’re shoeing” appear, and we roll our eyes as our blood pressure spikes.

Happy Holidays.

Steadily unbalanced and virtually yours,

Jean-Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Druker

Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

It’s The Hair

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Stanko & Tibor - Choke on the Hair of the Dog

Dateline: Somewhere in North America, late October, autumnal arboreal shedding continues unabated, and I'm blubbery...

Foibles and Shame and Hair

I have said many horrible things in my life, where I was informed in no uncertain terms, I should feel shame for my words and thoughts. It was inevitably followed by a threatening, wagging forefinger (or sometimes a middle finger, usually in traffic or at the dentists office for making improper jokes to the hygienist) and  then by the keen, verbal, jagged, moral dagger meant to spotlight and enhance the moral shaming: “How can you live with yourself?”

A valid question, indeed. Could I live with myself? Could I live with the shame, the embarrassment, the gaseous and noxious fumes? Would I be able to live with myself knowing what a monster I am and look myself in the mirror every day without recoiling in disgust?  

Well, I think I could live with myself, but there would have to be a few conditions: 

  1. I would have to have at least a queen sized bed, preferably a king sized bed, if I had to live with myself. I snore like a choking, drowning bear, and move around and twitch like a tortured frog having a minor epilepsy attack (or so I am told by my significant other). So if I had to live with myself, there would need to be space between me and myself during sleeping time.
  2. I would have to be allowed to cheat on myself if I am getting frisky and my other self was busy playing something on the iPad or watching sports, or more likely, something animated with cartoon violence. Which would probably be often as I am in the habit of gravitating toward anything that I can poke and touch, has flashing lights and movement. Kind of like a stripper. But I digress.
  3. If and when I would get into an argument with myself, let’s say over who left the toilet seat down, or whose filthy, racing-striped underwear was littered on the floor for 3 days running, and I won said argument, I should be allowed to gloat for a full 24 hour period, and write the word loser in toothpaste on the bathroom mirror.
  4. There would have to be someone to clean the house at least weekly. I shed like a cross between an Akita and an Alaskan Malamute (sadly from the top of my head more so than elsewhere) and I like to cook and eat breads with thick crusts and many seeds. The ensuing mess is normally pretty bad, so imagine if I had to live with myself, it would be not just doubly filthy. Nay, I say triply filthy due to the synergistic effects that occur when hair and food bits mix. (I read that somewhere in the scientific journal known as the Weekly Ass when I was waiting at the proctologists office.)

So where does that leave us? Certainly no better off than 4 paragraphs ago. But it does make me wonder about human foibles, in particular body hair.

Fear & Loathing

Why do we North Americans fear body hair so much? Why is it that as soon as it falls from our bodies after hair brushing, towel drying or oral sex, that these hairs are suddenly like a piece of animal dung covered in plutonium? We are repulsed by body hair as if it had become a slimy, sick crawling creature, ready to pollute our environment. What have these detached, aimless, free-range hairs done that merits such a visceral response that there is a minor upchuck in our throats when we have to fish them out of the sink or shower drain? Or they lay in a quiet, filthy pile of dust in the corner of the bedroom? 

(Actually, we are sent into acid reflux convulsions when we see how these hairs have decided to run wild and grow out our noses, shoulders, and if you’re a really unlucky male, above the crack of your butt. But I digress again.)

What did poor Rapunzel, who by the way was named after a type of lettuce, do when she had to sweep up her shedding hairs? How did her prince charming deal with her shedding? She was lionized for her strong, long hair, but in today’s society she would have been a leper if she carried around that lengthy mane. Or at least called a filthy hippie. 

Did these natural fibers not once keep us warm, or shimmer in the light after being washed with shampoo and tamed with conditioner, all in an attempt to not look so greasy to our significant others, or more likely, to catch the eye of that office mate you’ve been staring at surreptitiously from behind your cubicle or at office functions meant to force camaraderie and team spirit?

Backward Unto the Fur

Yet even as we are sickened by an excess our body hair, or worse, loose, unattached body hair of indeterminate origin, we still need it. Sometimes.

We have an entire segment of the fashion industry dedicated to the removal and subsequent re-application of animal hair (and skin) to create what are known as fur accoutrements. Hats, coats, vests, mitts, boots, tea cozies, and underwear. Call it fur if you’re like, but it’s hair to me. And we pay big money to have it draped all over us. Or have paint thrown on it by anti-fur activists. Gross. I hate paint.

Hairy Malfunction

Think of your pubic hair. Evolutionary scientists and unrepentant perverts alike have long speculated as to the function of pubic hair. The main theory is that it is there to alert its owner and the world around said owner that hormones will soon be raging and the body is evolving into something with sexual needs and wants. It’s beginning to become fertile.

These hairs are beacons for their owner and to others looking to get a “quickie” in after the kids go to bed. They are, in a way, pointers. Why do you think the pubic hair on male and female privates is shaped like an upside down triangle? It’s saying “hey! down here is where the action is!”

Yet, as we age and our bodies change usually for the worse with wrinkles, flab and folds, the pubic hair is still there. But seldom is it viewed or touched anymore in the way it was first meant to. And I mean seldom. Like maybe once every crop rotation kind of seldom. Maybe pubic hair has the same bodily function as the appendix or the spleen, in that it still hangs around but has really become a useless attachment. A relic of a former era, like a signpost on a deserted, barren highway leading to a ghost town that gets the exceptionally rare, wayward visitor in search of once past glories. 

More likely, our hair, pubic or otherwise, is there to remind us the human body is not always such a lovely thing to look at once it ripens, especially in daylight, imperfect and faulty.

Carl the Coiffeur  

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Heroic Lies and Other Black & White Untruths

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Stanko & Tibor - Heroic Lies

Dateline: Mid-August, it's a heatwave and simultaneously election season. It's too much for a bear to soul.

Heroic Lies

As the thick, dare I say pasty fog of sleep cleared and I managed to roll out of bed, turn on my iPad and read with some amazement the latest Chump von Trump zinger about who’s really a hero (clearly not that sissy pants John McCain III), I started to understand a bit about universal truths and universal lies. You just can’t have one without the other.

I won’t get into the “death & taxes” universal truth argument because you can avoid paying taxes as long as you’re heavily disassociated from reality due to a pill or heroin addiction, have a crafty and crooked accountant who makes you look poor, or you have a printing press. Kind of like Greece pre-Euro crisis/national emasculation.

And what of death? Is it a universal truth? Or a universal lie? Is it all darkness? The big sleep? Or is it just a phase before we boogie on down to Hades for some eternal, unpleasant sun-bathing with only half a tube of Bain De Soleil SPF 4? To be honest, I am not too keen to find out personally, given my genetically built-in fear of it, and the fact that I am a bigger sissy than John McCain or that delicately prune-like Herr Hair von Trump.

Infallibly Fallible

Having coincidentally thought long and hard (maybe 15 seconds or so) about the lying as a coping mechanism and the infallibly fallible politicians we have to choose from in democracies when election time rolls around, I have decided to use my web-based bully pulpit to give this installment of the comic that now is down to a readership of three — one of whom is heavily medicated to prevent unintended and unscheduled naked jaunts through the park again, and the other two, conjoined twins battling fiercely over gets to wear the sole part of pants they own before head off for a job interview as a WalMart greeter — a message!

It is universally true that politicians will lie any chance they can get. They can’t help it. If they didn’t, you wouldn’t vote for them. No one really wants to hear the truth anyway. So deal with it. We get lied to all the time by people in power. It’s the basis for a functioning political system and the accompanying bribery machine that makes it all work so smoothly.

Let’s be honest about lying for a moment. We non-politicians aren’t a whole lot better. We lie every minute of every day. We lie to our lovers (‘Of course I’ll leave my wife for you’), our spouses (just ask the members of Ashley Madison), our bosses (‘Oh it wasn’t me. Frank in Accounting must have screwed up the TPS reports. I heard he’s off the wagon again’), our children (‘Of course you’re as smart and pretty as your sister’), our religious mentors (‘I have no idea who peed in the holy water, Father Mike’), and especially to cruel dentists when they ask if we floss regularly. Of course, I do.

Donald The Don

Well, maybe not everyone lies. Maybe that walking piece of chum Trump is telling it like it is. Maybe all Mexicans are drug lords and/or criminals, John McCain isn’t really a hero and all of the women on The Apprentice flirted with him – consciously or unconsciously. That’s to be expected. Could it be that Donald, future ruler of the world, has stripped away the veil of lies to tell it like it is?

More likely his hair dye has pickled his brain.

Lovingly exhausted,

Ombudsman Druker of the 3rd Precinct

Crime, Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Your Guide to True Crimes, True Idiots

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Stanko & Tibor - Crimes & Idiots Galore

True Crimes

Driving home this evening in my creaky, achy minivan, trying not to notice the criminally exorbitant price of gasoline in my fair city, I heard on the radio that the national bureau of statistics had calculated that the rate of violent crimes in the country had dropped to its lowest point since 1991. Well, I thought, that is a pretty good sign of a society that is not totally going into the porcelain crap collector.

Yet that was followed by a more sobering fact that non-violent crimes had indeed increased in number and frequency, and showed a mild yet consistent trend upward. What made the report truly interesting and surreal was something I hadn’t really considered as a crime statistic before.

A Little Extra Death

Let’s differentiate between non-violent crimes, such as fraud, property damage, identity theft, excessive fruit fondling, and the violent ones, like breaking-and-entering (which sounds vaguely sexual), robbery, Pope-pestering, rabbi-rousing, wearing a pink polo shirt with checkered slacks, manslaughter, murder and pet-kicking.

But we now we have a new category of crimes being counted: terrorism. Just think, blowing up people and places is considered a crime that’s counted among the stats now. When I was growing up writing your name in pee in the snow was considered a violent act. Especially if you misspelled your name or only used lower case letters. Now it’s the ideologically-driven, indiscriminate murder of civilians that police have to count. Like they don’t have enough paperwork to do and African-Americans to physically abuse, now they have to deal with terrorists when they file a report.

Etymology and Cheap Segues

Interestingly, the etymology of the word idiot is Greek: idiōtēs (“person lacking professional skill”, “a private citizen”, “individual” – if that last descriptor is true, then we’re all idiots. Seems about right).

More critical to this fractured, late-night rambling, I thank the literary gods for that etymological deus-ex-machina because I had no clue how I could segue in the next paragraph from crime to the Greek tragedy occurring in Europe, and the subject of this inane comic some of you read when questioning whether you want to continue living or not. (Coincidentally, in a recent Reuters poll it was revealed that the expressed desire to commit suicide and/or vomit after reading my blog/comic has stayed steady between 99-100% among my loyal readers.)

Actually, come to think of it, now that my sugar levels are spiking, if we are speaking of true crimes and true idiots, Greece’s inhabitants and especially its politicians, and most of Europe fall under those descriptors.

Corruption Matched Only By Idiocy

Marvelling at the complicated corruption and financial extortion and ineptitude that is Europe and a bankrupt Greece, one has to wonder who is the bigger idiot, Greece or Germany, the bankroller of the EU.

If we had to define Greek attitudes toward paying taxes, acceptance of bribery monies, nepotism and backroom deals, we could generalize and say they wilfully and knowingly committed fiscal self-fornication for many a decade. When they entered the Euro Zone, they now had a rich Onkel to bail them out.

So when the proverbial περιττώματα hit the fan, some German banking sucker would fork over some cash at exorbitant and usurious rates figuring Greece was good for the dough. Little did those fat, corrupt German bankers know that the Greek skill and penchant for pissing away the money of others was comparable to that of drunkard on heavy diuretics at an ouzo factory. (Btw – I love hurtful national stereotypes. They make writing this crap much easier.)

Simple, Idiotic Answers to Complex Questions

Now that we have all watched this criminal Greek tragedy while Iran was negotiating a sweet deal to continue funding terrorism and simultaneously build a nuclear bomb pretty much unfettered, a simple yet moronic solution presents itself in this episode of the comic once referred to by Pope Francis as “the devil’s dung.”

Bomb everything, pave it over and put up a Wal-Mart. Violent, arbitrary, Neanderthilic and a wholly unnecessary overreaction? Sure. But so are Fox News and shopping at Wal-Mart on a Saturday.

No, I say we follow the simple, direct, armed approach. It has specific, measurable and attainable goals, as was taught to me in management classes. Which I mostly faked my way through as I was playing with my phone.

Everlastingly exhausted and mentally dull,

Alexis Nikos Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

The Pause That Refreshes

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Stanko & Tibor - Pause From Reality

A PAUSE REFRESHES. SOMETIMES.

Contrary to what most of you think, I have not published anything in months because I was in “pause mode” – which sadly doesn’t mean vacation. I was working darn hard at my job. A job that has me traveling far more than I imagined. So the enforced pause from the world of cartooning, blogging, and as some call it “spewing out crap onto the Internet” has slowed my output of witty observations, crooked drawings and sometimes hurtful commentary.

Did the pause refresh me, recharge my will to cartoon and blog? Did this enforced creative hiatus do wonders for the material I have lined up for future episodes of this crudely crafted comic? Not really. I’m still sleepy and I have gained weight from eating hotel food and indulging in vats, heaps, bushels of chocolate when I was anywhere within spitting distance of a vending machine or airport lounge. But that isn’t such a bad thing because what I saw while traveling the globe, and stopping to eat chocolate bars, made me realize many things about humanity, inhumanity and chocolate.

Cheaper By The Billion

Like the absurdity of repeatedly cleaning the gunk out from between my toes –deemed by international podiatrists as a proper measure of good foot hygiene and a sign of latent pathological fetishes– I saw many absurdities in my most recent travels. Each time I was in a cab stopped at a light (rare in Mumbai – traffic rules are the mere notions of a fevered, frustrated motor vehicle bureaucrat), or driving on somewhere elevated to avoid a local flood due to the passing monsoon, or to swerve violently around a dead animal or injured beggar, I had time to pause and think about what passes for humanity.

One key theme repeated itself as I went east: Life is pretty cheap. That isn’t meant to say human life isn’t important in Asia. Not at all. It’s just as important there as it is here. Seeing how we treat each other, and more importantly, the declining quality of baked goods that use oils and carob to substitute for butter and chocolate, everything and everyone on this planet is a commodity, especially when you’ve got millions and billions of them (or it).

My theory of cheap life is economic in nature. With well over one billion people in India, and China having its 1.5 billion and another half a billion or so scattered in and around the region, when a monsoon, earth quake, volcanic eruption,  maniacal dictator or just a plain old, run-of-the-mill plague comes along, suddenly you’re down a million humans or so. No one bats an eyelash except maybe the media, unless it interferes with the cricket/soccer scores. Someone else will aways come along and fill in the void. When you pause for a moment, especially when you’re trapped in a taxi in a colossal traffic jam, the source of which is most likely someone being stupid enough to cross the road assuming drivers will actually stop, you realize that makes life pretty cheap.

Gay Marriage – The Pause That Refreshes

You know what isn’t cheap? Divorce. Once the Supreme Court of the USA decided to make same-sex marriage legal, that country had to take a pause. Some hugged, some recoiled, some wept, and some rejoiced. A small but I am sure influential group triple rejoiced: Divorce lawyers.

I bet divorce layers across the 50 states of the USA took a moment to reflect, to pause, to opine, to ruminate over the implication that gay marriage, now finally legal, would be the impetus for many costly, prolonged, anger-soaked legal proceedings that will fill the courts and subsequently the coffers of many in the family law community.  Many a golf club membership or over-priced Autobahn-cruising, German luxo-barges –mit Leder– will now be funded due to the legalization of gay marriage in the USA. What horrible sitcom will arise from this that we haven’t thought of yet?

In actuality, the moronic, semi-sentient, troglodytic judges of the Supreme Court got the decision all wrong. They shouldn’t have legalized gay marriage. Sheer and utter foolishness. They should have made marriage, civil, religious or underwater, altogether illegal. Gay or straight. Or hermaphrodite. Your sexual preference shouldn’t determine whether you can marry or not. Marriage should be outlawed. For several shallow yet meaningful reasons (so I can beat a dead horse while I wait for my coffee to steep in the French press).

  1. It would eviscerate the profession of divorce lawyering thus forcing them to get real jobs like a McDonald’s burger-flipper or Walmart greeter. They could be replaced by ice hockey referees who make split second decisions, and are unionized, wear helmets and have blades on their feet so they are less likely to allow fights to linger.
  2. It would virtually eliminate the so called profession of wedding planner. Has anyone ever met a wedding planner they liked? That didn’t overcharge them for something a software program or an iPad app could effectively do for a fraction of the price?
  3. When was the last time you were at a wedding where the wedding cake tasted half as good as it looked? Never, that’s when. Sure, the hors d’oeuvres are tasty, and if it’s an open bar, a wedding can be fun. But wedding cake? The gross overuse of “fondant”, the dearth of real cocoa in the chocolate icing, the millimeter-thin layer of marzipan between the layers of sponge cake. It’s a sham. The wedding cake is the the triple-decker tower of sugary false promise that inevitably is given to the janitor or taxi driver hanging around at the end of the night looking for freebies. Was there ever a greater confectionary deception than the wedding cake?

Conclusions and Naps

So what are you, the reader of this absurdist rant, this fantastical (hey, that rhymes with ‘testicle’) work of art going to take away from this instalment of the irregular periodical visually chronicling the foibles of humans, and its author/creator? Will you pause, for a moment, before hitting the delete key in anger, index finger cocked and ready, and think about what I have said here? Or will you take a vacation hoping that when you come back, I will have come up with something about the financial Greek tragedy that’s the subject for the next comic? Or will you take a nap and wake up refreshed?

Don’t bet on it.

May you never step in elephant droppings,
Mentally Malicious Mogul Druker of Maharashtra