“Y’gotta jam the apple in his mouth before y’roast him!”

“Stuff that!”

“Zackkly, y’gotta stuff it right in and then y’can roast the fucker on a spit real goo-”

“Nah, man, stuff that as in fuck that. We put an apple in that pig’s mouth and then tryta roast him on a spit, whattaya thinks gonna happen?”

“I don’t thinks nothing’s gonna happen, I knows what’s gonna happen! All that’s gonna happen is we’re gonna have us some good-goddamn-delicious barbecue, and its smoky-goodness is gonna have a hint of apple!”

“You fuckin’ moron! Lookit his fuckin’ mouth — it’s too fuckin’ small! Stick an apple in there and then spin him around and around? It’s gonna fuckin’ fall out! We kill this pig, we roast him up real good, and then we jam the apple in his mouth as a garnish!”

Clint, despite every instinct-bone in his body aching, had to admit that his brother had a point. Which really sucked, because Clint had been building up this moment in his mind for months, visualizing how it’d go down. And no matter what changed in his mind — the guilty parties present, the setting, the time of day — one thing always remained the same.

The Senator would be roasted on a spit, naked save for his tie and socks and the flag lapel stabbed into his tit, and he’d unable to scream because of the apple jammed into his mouth.

But if Clint’d learned anything since joining a gang of jenkem-huffing bipartisan cannibals, it was that sometimes you just had to temper your expectations.

“Awh, aight Brucie, you makes a good point! But I still thinks we should wait until the apple’s in his mouth before we post to Facebook!”

“Of course, Clint. Of course.”

—-

This is the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE!

I’ve just foisted some drivel-fiction nonsense upon you. Thanks for putting up with me. Oh, who am I? I’m Rendar Frankenstein — hack writer, amateur sociologist, and pop culture enthusiast.

So, here’s the deal: I’m going to show you some of the stuff I’ll be consuming in the hopes of staving off workweek-ennui. Then, you hit up the comments and show off what you’ll be consuming! And then we all share!

Really, it’s sort of like a pop culture/entertainment-suggestion potluck.

But totally, totally cooler!

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Y’can set out to crack the moonrocks a hundred times – hell, a hundred thousand times – and it’ll never stop bein’ awe-induncin’. Here I am, Earthborn Nobody, crackin’ rocks on the moon. The fuckin’ moon! And y’look down at that chubby blue dot and get weak in the knees when y’think of all the beauty goin’ on down there.

First kisses and guitar lessons and autumn breezes coolin’ the backs of necks that’ve been sweatin’ all damn summer.

And y’just get enough strength back in y’knees to keep standin’ – hell, I’ll be honest, in normal gravity I’d probably have to have me a good five minute sit-and-cry – and y’get back to work, aimin’ y’pneumatic pickaxe at big clumps of lunar basalt and turnin’ `em into small clumps of lunar basalt. And then Charlie or Connie or Debbie or Dan’ll come on by to gather up whatever it is y’managed to crack, and then they’ll go on and rover `em over to the sortin’ station.

And that’s when y’take another minute or ten to yourself, to catch y’breath and think `bout how y’ain’t winded `cause of the work but `cause of the sight of that blue wonder in front of you, and y’know that it’s real and honest down there. And hell, y’know that y’took this goddamn job `cause you’re jus’ tryin’ to get by and y’know y’probably goin’ to die just as broke and untethered – maybe even more broke and more untethered – than when y’started the gig, but goddamn it y’gettin’ to see somethin’ most never even think to imagine.

To see humanity itself from the outside, to bear witness, it’s a fuckin’ gift. To look down and see the whole thing unfoldin’ before y’eyes, it’s overwhelmin’. Beautifully overwhelmin’. Typhoons and military coups and hands takin’ food out of hungry mouths? Sure, y’can’t deny it. But there’s also love letters and reunions and movie theaters and acts of forgiveness and comfortin’ sunsets watched from hospice windows durin’ final moments.

And honestly? I got no clue how it’ll all shake out in the end for us, no goddamn clue if the ledger’ll be red or black.

So I jus’ crack as many moonrocks as I can, bask in the fact that I even get to take part in this thing, and do my good goddamn best to just roll with it.

—-

This is the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE!

What you just read was nonsense from my brain. In order to create that sort of nonsense, I need to make sure that my brain is filled with other nonsense. So! I’m going to describe some of the nonsense I’ll be checking out this week, and then you hit up the comments and share what nonsense you’ll be consuming.

Nonsense! Nonsense! Nonsense!

3! 2! 1! Let’s go!

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Come one, come all, to Monday Morning Commute. Yeah. Yeah! Fucking Yeah!, I’m late. Again. But, like, hey man. I don’t know, I got nothing. General tardiness. Spent yesterday trying to cobble together peer mentors for my Fall semester classes, while admittedly spending most of it playing Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, and watching Monday Night Raw. I’m Trash It’s okay. I’m Trash! It’s okay. I’m Trash!. It’s okay.

Come with me, friends. We can be Trash together.

Even though I’m tardy, even though I’m on vacation before the Fall Semester Gauntlet begins, I got a good amount of shit I’m up to this week. I got a good amount of shit I’m enjoying this week. I got a good amount of fucking shit I’m looking forward to this week.

I shall elaborate on all three of those categories after the beep, the robot vomits into the digi-textual microphone to check for efficacy, and the buzzer sounds.

Then I hope you shall elaborate on your own happenings in the comments section.

This is Monday Morning Commute.

*beep*

*bzzt, vomit, vomit, one-two-one-two, bzzt*

*buzzer sounds*

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Sometimes, man. Sometimes, I just straight-up spend too much time thinking of a post title for a Monday Morning Commute, and then I spend too much time hunting the perfect image. “Perfect”, I know. I’m trash. Anyways, how are you fucking folks doing? You stellar Garbage Lords.

Me?

This guy?

Well, I’m currently pinched for time. Tomorrow I leave for the Great White North, meeting the rest of the family up there for a final service for my Nana. She sloughed the mortal coil last year, I think maybe I discussed it?, and now it’s time.

To throw Nana into the marsh behind the family home. Where her shamanistic tendencies can be unloosed, sent to interact with her fellow Reality Melters in the Gilded Plains of the OMNIVERSE.

Me?

This guy?

Well, I’m currently wasting time!

So here, without further adieu, is what I’m currently enjoying, currently looking forward to, currently sweating. Let me know what you’re up to this week!

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I only needed one more packet.

My palm couldn’t stop my nosebleed any longer. The old lady behind the counter looked at the rivulets dripping into the crook of my elbow. She shook her head. I kept pleading.

“Please, lady, y’gotta help me out! I only need one more packet!”

“Sorry, Bucko, but the policy’s to stop servin’ after seven packets!”

“C’mon, you already gave me nine!”

“That’s right, I already broke policy for your ass!” She looked at the ceiling in that way mastered only by crusty diner waitresses with stories to tell. “Now, I’ll keep slingin’ coffees your way all night, and we won’t have to have any more frustrated words with — or cross looks at — one another.”

“But, but –”

“No butts, no asses, and the only titty will be a tough-titty for you!” She slid an entire carafe of coffee in front of me. “You wanna light your brain on fire? Try doin’ it with that! But I ain’t givin’ another goddamn packet of Nestle Cocaine.”

I only needed one more packet.

—-

This is the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE!

Posted above is some of my patented drivel fiction. I hope you enjoyed it, but don’t blame you if you didn’t. Posted below is a list of some of stuff I’ll be checking out this week. Y’know, things to [excite/expand/extinguish] my brain. After you check out my entertainment itinerary, hit up the comments section and share your own.

TALLY-HO!!!!

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How are you folks, doing? Me? This human? This flesh-sack, organic-computer, consumption-bot? I’m doing fine.

It’s that weird period of the summer where I’m done teaching, but I still have to go into work.

Just enough of a busy schedule to spend an hour, hour-and-fifteen, or hour-and-a-half in my car, each way, for four days a week.

Just enough of a busy schedule to fight traffic to tutor a couple folks to sit idly waiting to see if anyone else is will need tutoring.

Invariably: they won’t.

Invariably: I’ll sit, eyes-crossed, soul-exhaling-a-continuous-malaise, browsing Tumblr, Facebook, whateverwhatever.

Invariably: then I leave, fighting traffic back to my domicile.

How are you folks, doing? Me? This human? This animated-rot, permanent-horndog, masturbation-factory? I’m doing fine.

This is Monday Morning Commute.

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It was a brand new day on a planet as old as time itself.

Edie stumbled off the starcruiser’s ramp, footing as unsure as the color of the soil. Barely a glimpse at the atmospheric readings on her forearm-gauge and Edie was tearing off her helmet. She hadn’t travelled across the stars to gaze upon another planet through a hermetic seal.

Standing at the top of a ravine,Edie looked down at the landscape and gasped. Fields of silver wheat swayed in an electric breeze. Twin rivers of indigo fog raged into each other. A lone tree’s leaves burst into flames, shriveled, bloomed, and then ignited again.

“Fuckin’ brilliant.”

Edie wasn’t sure that she had the skills to repair the starcruiser herself. And she wasn’t sure how much of her supply compartment’d survived the crash. And she wasn’t sure if her distress signal’d ever be picked up.

No skills. No supplies. No signals.

And yet, having actually survived the voyage itself, Edie couldn’t worry. She couldn’t not smile. After all, there’re worse fates than dying in the midst of alien beauty.

—-

Welcome to the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE!

This is the regularly-scheduled feature for discussing what we’ll be checking out in the following week. After presenting some drivel-fiction (see above), I give you the prospective entertainment-highlights of the upcoming days. Then, you hit up the comments section and share what you’ll be consuming.

Yes, it’s basically digital show-and-tell.

Let’s rock!

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Man, it’s been a weird summer so far. Today marked the sixth, and final week of the summer class that I teach for incoming freshmen students. There’s just been something off since the get-go, and as its conclusion nears, a sense of confusion that it’s really ending, and a sense of relief that it’s really ending are both making themselves known. But it’s the end, the conclusion, the finale this week.

And for all my whimpering, simpering, and bitching, I only have to wear dress pants three more times until September.

And for all my whimpering, simpering, and bitching, I only have to work four days a week until September.

So here we are. Frazzled, and fried, but fairly grateful, all things considered.

This is Monday Morning Commute. The wank-off section, where we wank, and oh do we stroke, and rub, and perhaps even lick ourselves to the arts&farts we’re looking forward to on a given week. I’ll go first.

Then you go. Get excited. Don’t worry. Wet naps and warm towels will be dispensed per your request.

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I don’t know, what the fuck do you want from me? Just kind of in a funk, lately. Not pervasive, rather it sort of floats in and out of my day. Tired. Burnt out. Expressed the idea to my wife yesterday and her response was immediate, logical, and undeniable: I haven’t had a proper vacation in who the fuck knows how long, and I work myself to death. Always busy. Always tired. Always distracted.

Case in point, I write the above paragraph at 2pm during my lunch break. But, here I am, now! It’s 7pm. I have surfed time, space, commuter traffic, a half-assed workout, and a dog walk to rejoin this act of writing. I’m just, you know. Tired.

But! Hey! It’s Monday Morning Commute! By way of Tuesday. Despite being slathered in a melange of malaise, I’m actually looking forward to some shit this week, I’m actually consuming some pop culture I’m enjoying this week.

Join me in the comments with your own pop culture proclivities, thoughts on existence, gifs of furries farting on cakes. I don’t give a shit.

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Hello, friends! Denizens of the Space-Ship Omega! This is Monday Morning Commute, by way of Tuesday Evening. Why the tardiness? Why the general silence on the blog?

I’m glad you (didn’t) ask! I just blitz’d a weekend in Maui for a best friend’s wedding, and well. Coming back to reality after two days in paradise requires efforting on several levels. Readjusting to timezones, readjusting to the perils and praxis of regular life, yadda, yadda.

But I can’t complain.

I’ve discovered the answer to a question I’ve been asking myself since last year, when I knew I would be going to Maui. Is thirty hours of travel in the span of four days, and thousands of dollars for said travel, and missing teaching two incredibly intensive summer classes, worth forty-eight hours in paradise, for a best friend’s wedding?

Unequivocally, yes. 

But this, right here! It’s the weekly column where we share what we’re up to, on a given week! I’ll share my own findings, as I rattle around in the befuddled muck of my consciousness, trying to figure out not just what I’m up to, but what day it is, what time it is, this and that, this and that.

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