Porocrom’s Crappaper

They live. I’ve seen them. If you live in a touristy area, you might have seen them too. They’re tourists. You see them outside, pasty-white, with their sandals and shorts and backpacks, all raggedy-looking, as if they have come out of a cave after an eleven-month hibernation period to catch some sun before they crawl back under a rock to sleep for another eleven months.
I recently saw a (I think it was American) site describe them the exact same way, and I was shocked. I always thought they came from “abroad”, but now it seems that people “abroad” ask themselves the same question. Where do they come from? Could it be that they creep out of a hole every year, after living in the Earth’s core for a very long time? They never seem to speak a language anyone can speak, and I think that is camouflage. In Greece, they speak Norwegian. In Norway (who would go to Norway on vacation anyway, those guys are frozen all year) they speak Spanish. In Spain, they speak Vietnamese. Noone can talk to them, noone can tell where they are from or why they came where they are.
I don’t believe that anyone in their right mind would walk dressed like “they”, even if they were thousands of kilometers (approximately thousands of miles) away from home. One must be characterized with a distinct lack of sanity to wear sandals in public. And what is the matter with their colour? I’ve seen ALBINOS more black than that, for crying out loud. I don’t think humans are capable of having that lack of pigment in their skin (excluding Counterstrike players, but they’re not humans anyway. I can almost hear them cry out “DIE FAGET” to me).
The next time I see one of “them” (which will probably be next summer, which is, for those of you unfamiliar with Greece, in 4 months, because we have 8 months of summer here), I will be sure to confuse him by speaking Norwegian (I shall learn a phrase), so that he will be forced to speak English, and after he has fallen victim of my clever ruse, I will interview him for your viewing pleasure.
Back to watching Black Hawk Down (yeah, I STILL haven’t watched all of it, that movie lasts days, or so it seems). I am fairly confident that the Somalis will lose, because they didn’t pay a single shilling for the production of the movie.

So Poro sent me this link.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00061LC8W/qid=109805258 8/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-5270041-6340636?v=glance&s=kitchen

The page advertises a hexagonal steel bird-cage. The ad screams FREE SHIPPING IN THE UNITED STATES! It also smugly boasts that the locks on the cage are unsolvable by even the wiliest of birds. This cage truly comes with all the bells and whistles (pun intended). And what’s more, this modern miracle of avian science is available for the low price of $3500!

This got me to thinking. WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE? You’ve obviously got your priorities a little mixed up if you’re seriously considering dropping 3.5 grand US (which is like a million bajillion Canadian dollars, or 16 euro) on a cage for a bird.

Well fear not, boys and girls. Uncle Crommie is here with…

WHAT YOU SHOULD DO WITH $3500 INSTEAD OF BUYING A BIRD CAGE

Idea #1: Take a semester or two at a community college
Sure it isn’t glamorous, but you could learn the rudiments of something really cool, like small engine repair, arc welding, ballet, a foreign language, object-oriented computer programming, what-have-you. Upgrade your job, help out around the house, or maybe design the doomsday device you’ve always wanted and hold the world ransom for a tidy sum.

Idea #2: Buy a new wardrobe
Tired of all the cool kids at school making fun of you because you’re still sporting your once-fashionable “New Kids On The Block” t-shirt and matching biking shorts? Turn your life around by sporting some new, swanky togs from all the hippest boutiques (or blow your whole stack on a single mitten from Holt Renfrew).

Idea #3: Start an X-rated website
Make your money work for you. Buy a digital camera, a couple of adventurous prostitutes and a bottle of Old English and start your own business. Maybe that object-oriented programming will come in handy… or at least your newfound famliarity with foreign tongues.

Idea #4: Buy a sound system for your car
Become your own “Pimp Out My Ride” and sink that cash into a new set of speakers and a 6-CD changer for the trunk. Then you can cruise in your 1992 Mercury Topaz down by the home for blind nymphomaniacs and try to convince them that you’re pulling up in a brand new Mustang. And if their heightened sense of smell doesn’t tip them off that you’ve had those chicken bones under the back seat since the Macarena was at its height of popularity, at least they won’t be able to ID you to the cops.

Idea #5: Purchase a third-world country
Anyone who has ever played the Risk board-game knows how easy it is to become a military dictator. Get your whole underfed population to start building those cannons that are worth like 10 guys each. Once you have 7 or 8 cannons (this might take a few turns), you can start your manifest destiny of global conquest. Just hope that you are consistent with those dice-rolls.

Idea #6: Hire a hitman
Well, most hired killers worth their salt will turn up their noses at a measly $3500. Maybe you should just outfit your neighbourhood wino with a 40 and a hand-gun, then turn him loose at a preview screening of an Olsen Twins movie. Innocent bystanders? They should have known better than to be within 10 blocks of that vortex of acting talent.

Idea #7: Become addicted to a designer drug
I hear great things about Cocaine mixed with chilli pepper. They call it the Unlucky Housewife. Just one snort and your nose is bleeding worse than the foolish woman who married a guy named Jim-Bob then tried to wean him off football and pork rinds. Maybe she should have had dinner ready like he asked…

Idea #8: Rent a crappy apartment for a year
If your landlord isn’t wary about a tenant who pays in cash up front, you will be the proud owner of a scumhole shack. Start a grow operation, lure some children, start a mail-fraud scam. The world is your oyster now that you have a new mailing address and a clever alias (I recommend “Ares Stevenson” for the fellas and “Phyllis J. Armistice” for the ladies).

Idea #9: Invest in technology stocks
What? You were going to throw it away on a bird-cage anyway…

Idea #10: Empty out a fast-food restaurant
Go in to your neighbourhood Harvey’s and ask for 1500 value-burgers with extra pickles. If they are capable of making this order, then pay for the burgers, then go out on the street and throw them at oncoming traffic. Leave any unthrown ones to fester in a hidden place near the entrance to the store. The stench of rotting meat will serve as a constant reminder to the management of the error of contributing to the cult of excess.

Idea #11: Buy some Porocrom t-shirts
Or better yet, just give me the money and I will draw funny pictures and sayings on t-shirts you already own.


With these ideas firmly in hand, I’m sure you’ll have no trouble properly investing your money in a more lucrative endeavour than a cage for birds.

But some of you are probably wondering: “Skivven, if I blow my $3500 on these ideas, where will I keep my birds?”

For the last time: My name is not Skivven

But I will help you anyways. I have designed a cage with all the same features of the deluxe version, but at a fraction of the cost.




With its durable yet light space-age cardboard frame, this cage utilizes the same technology used by package-delivery companies worldwide!

Remember the story of the three little pigs? The smart one’s house used bricks, and now yours can too! This brick is guaranteed bird-proof. No matter HOW badly Polly wants to go gallavanting about town, she’ll be safe and secure in her cage.

These ergonomically-designed holes allow both air and light through simultaneously to maximize viewing efficiency. Certified 100% organic, low-carb and free of trans fats, these holes are also guaranteed fire-proof, rust-proof, and will not shrink in the wash (WOW!).

FREE SHIPPING IN THE USA, CANADA, OR PRETTY MUCH ANYWHERE WHERE I CAN GET MY HANDS ON A BOX, A SHARP STICK AND A PIECE OF MASONRY.

I was watching Black Hawk Down (actually I have been watching it for the last week, 10 minutes per day or so), and it suddenly hit me. You can always tell the good guys from the bad guys in any movie, because the good guys kill five bad guys with one bullet, while the bad guys kill one good guy with a hundred bullets, and the bad guys’ rockets never hit anyone, while the good guys destroy a small country’s population with a single grenade.
The Americans were out in the open, with hundreds of Somalis all around them (and in elevated positions, I might add), and the Somalis never hit anyone, no matter how slow he was moving, while the Americans killed 2-3 Somalis with one burst. Now that’s efficiency!
Despite all this, the Americans always ran out of ammo, mainly because of two reasons. The first is that Somalia, being the rich country that it is (never mind that they fit machine guns on old cars), had an infinite supply of ammo so they could shoot all day without running out. The second reason is that Somalis aren’t born, their parents cultivate them in huge fields in Somalia, and each Somali takes two to five days to go from seed to fully adult. Thusly, there were millions upon millions of them, and no matter how many you kill, more will always be back to shoot at you. Oh, and if you kill one, two others will grow in his place, so it’s really OK to kill them en masse.
Also, what the fuck is wrong with Orlando Bloom? When you’re on a chopper, you fucking idiot, you hang on to shit, especially when you are about to go down a rope. If you stand in the middle of the chopper doing your tap dancing, then it serves you right to fall off it. I haven’t finished the movie yet so I don’t know if he lives or dies, but he’s nothing but trouble, so that won’t be a terrible loss.
I have just think of a way that this movie might have been better, so I will release this plot in the public domain, with the hope that someone makes a movie: There are to US soldiers in a chopper, the pilot and another one. The chopper goes down, the pilot explodes ALL OVER THE PLACE, I mean, there’s blood and legs and arms and heads and shit all over Somalia, and not only two of each. Then the other dude who was in the chopper tries to guard what’s left of the pilot (his chopper) while millions upon millions of black thin dudes fires at him with guns, RPGs and nuclear bombs, but nothing hits him, because he’s a well-known actor and not some extra. While he is shooting and killing people and forming mountains of dead bodies (which is OK, because they don’t live in the US), he calls in to his base to send backup, but they say “Negative, Doe, you are surrounded by Somalis so we can’t send assistance”. Oh my, really? WHY THE HELL WOULD HE NEED ASSISTANCE IF HE WASN’T? Because of this hole, I have to add hugeass explosions all around, so noone will notice it, so here goes:
BOOOOOOM! PSHHHHHHHHHH! BANG BANG! PSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! BOOM!
Ok, so he’s alone and killing everyone. This is the point where the movie ends, but I haven’t seen all of it, so I can only speculate. My guess is he does something really heroic like dying or running out of ammo and sneaking behind the Somalis and killing him with his nail clipper. I think that him dying would be better, because there are 270m Americans while there are only 6m Somalis.
Anyway, I’ll watch the rest and get back to you later. Maybe.

So…

Imagine in your twisted mind that Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, Thom Yorke of Radiohead and Daniel Johns from Silverchair, through some dark twisted orgy, managed to give birth to a nigh-perfect musical creation. Wouldn’t that ROCK? The hard-rocking yet poignant soul of Silverchair, the vocal and musical experimentation of Radiohead and the dark lyricism of Pink Floyd? If only, eh?

Well boys and girls, it has happened. For your approval, I submit Absolution, the latest EP from the UK’s Muse.

Many of you have probably heard the first mega-hit single Time is Running Out. I’ll admit that when I first heard it, I was decidedly unimpressed. It sounded like another garage-refugee Brit-rock band, the latest of many to hit the new rock scene. However, when I heard the second single Hysteria, I realized that there may be more to the band than another top 40 hit.

If we can discount Time for a moment (and I think we can), Absolution is a complete, narrative album. The tracks flow into one another a la Dark Side of the Moon. Matthew Bellamy’s voice is definitely worth a few listens. Finally a rock singer who isn’t afraid to sustain. I thought we had lost them all. Chris Wolstenholme, the band’s bassist contributes some unbelievable bass lines on tracks like Hysteria and Stockholm Syndrome. It’s almost like listening to the best techno you’ve ever imagined.

While the album is a bit tortured, it takes the time to rock pretty hard. The heavier songs are almost always balanced with cool expressive passages, making this album a regular treat for the ears. It’s one of those rare few that you can curl up with and just listen without doing anything else.

The only criticisms that I will make of this album are as follows:

1) Very heavy-handed getting the point across. The album doesn’t have an uplifting song, and it can really use one. Even Dark Side had a happy ending… then again, The Wall didn’t. But it had a sense of humour.

2) Musical depth. While each band member is very skilled, I was left with the feeling that they could have done more with the incredible compositions. Liberal helpings of strings and piano are classy, but we’ve heard it before.

Otherwise, not a patch on this album. Well worth the money I spent on it instead of ripping the tracks off the web. If you’d like to hear first-hand what I’m talking about, listen to some samples.

Stay tuned for my upcoming review of Cake’s latest, Pressure Chief.

Obeying your wishes, we have created all-new Porocrom t-shirt line, including the infamous “Vaginas rock!” t-shirt (you WILL need to register for free and change your settings to PG-13 rated to see the PG-13 shirts). The URL is in the right of the page, as well as here for my gallery and here for Crommunist’s. NOW GO BUY THEM!
A sample: