Porocrom’s Crappaper

Tired of doing the same boring stuff every day? Is your life a mundane routine? Are you ugly? If you answered “yes” to any of the above, you are in the right place. We at Porocrom strive to give you the best and only the best, and we’ve done it again. After years of painstaking research, we give you…

Practical jokes: How to laugh at other people’s expense.

Pet ransom: Find a “missing pet” sign (they’re posted ALL OVER THE DAMN PLACE) that includes an address. Make note of the address, the name, and the general characteristics of the pet. Go back home and write a letter using letters cut out of old Playboy issues that say “We have Bruno (or whatever the pet’s name is). We will be sending you one piece of him every week until you pay us $300,000. -Love, the dognappers”. Fashion a bloody paw (or take one from a dead dog and paint it) and include it in the letter. They won’t know where to reply, and you’ll be laughing your ass off. Repeat until you’re bored, but make sure to use a different pet part every time.

Terrorist alert: Get a shoebox and spraypaint it black. Paint the word “BOMB“ on it with big clean letters. Go to a subway or airport, sit somewhere and hug the shoebox tightly while rocking forwards and backwards in your seat and mumbling incoherently to yourself. Looking at the floor helps, and so does inserting random phrases like “must kill everyone“ and “when will the voices stop?“. See how long you can go without getting arrested and/or shot. (Warning: Americans, try this one at your own risk. You’ll probably get shot in the head before walking in.)

Car ride: While you’re riding in your friend’s car and he’s driving (preferably at night) and he’s driving at a perfectly normal speed, in his lane on an empty, straight road with no car in sight, suddenly go “Hey, cut it out“. He’ll go “What?“. Say “Seriously dude, that’s not funny, cut it out“. Look increasingly worried, and after a few moments go “OH MY GOD, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! DO YOU WANT TO GET US KILLED?!“ and suddenly pull the handbrake. It won’t do anything at all to stop the car, but it will scare the shit out of your friend (and also mildly damage his handbrake). Laugh while he pulls over and punches you.

Mono: While you’re at an expensive buffet with all the rich people and getting food, start coughing at a reasonably small distance from the buffet without covering your mouth. Sound really REALLY sick. Then turn around to the people who are staring at you and say “I’m sorry, but my mono has really weakened my immune system“. Voila, all the free food you can eat.

Feel the love: This one’s for the ladies. If you’re out on a first date in a crowded restaurant (bars/club don’t work so well) with someone and he proves to be a real jerk, suddenly stand up and say loudly to him “Oh my god, how could you do this to my sister, she’s only 9 years old, you pervert!“. Sound genuinely distressed and walk out crying if you can. Watch through the glass while he tries to avoid molestation charges.

Stay tuned for more, folks.

I had a conversation with a female friend of mine, and she related to me the unfortunate story of her interaction with a guy she met.

APPARENTLY, she met this guy and they were talking about a shared interest (I believe it was break-dancing) and they hit it off quite well. At the end of the interaction, she was SHOCKED to learn from friends that the guy found her quite intriguing and wanted to date her.

So I said… well DUH.

Ladies (and I am not just flapping my gums, there ARE women who read this site. I drank tonic water from a hat with a couple of them on St. Patrick’s Day and promised I would write about it), you should stand unamazed if you discover that a guy has a thing for you.

I hearken here to a classic movie about men and women and the way they interact. No, it is not a porno, I have a BIT more class than that. The movie to which I refer is “When Harry Met Sally” with Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan. In that movie, one of my favourite conversations went something like this:

Harry: Men and women can’t just be friends
Sally: What do you mean?
Harry: I mean that if you’re friends with someone, and you’re not interested in him, then he’s interested in you.
Sally: But you and I are friends and you’re not interested in me
Harry: (Awkward silence)
Met: Are you guys gonna need me today?

Okay so maybe I am paraphrasing a LOT, but there is a lot of truth in that. I can’t count the number of times that I have met someone who seems really cool and we appear to have a lot in common and I would like to get to know better (in a naked sort of way), only to find out they have a boyfriend. Or WORSE, when you finally screw up the courage to ask someone out that you’ve been friends with for a while, and only THEN do they drop the bomb that they are currently letting someone else use them for sex.

Well Skivven, you might say, how can such a thing be avoided?

To this question I reply… WHO THE HELL IS SKIVVEN? Why is EVERYONE calling me Skivven?

But there IS an answer to this.


First of all, I want to make a disclaimer, or a caveat if you will:

Women, if you meet a guy, and you hit it off and you have a lot in common and you have a long meaningful conversation, HE IS LIKELY INTERESTED IN YOU!

Women, if a guy asks you to go out, and you don’t have the kind of relationship where you go out and do stuff, or you don’t hang out regularly, HE IS LIKELY ASKING YOU ON A DATE!

Men, WOMEN DO NOT KNOW THIS!


Okay, so let’s run through a little scenario. Steve and Jennifer meet through a mutual acquaintance. Steve is currently not seeing anybody, whereas Jennifer has been dating her boyfriend for a few months. For illustrative purposes, internal monologue is being supplied.

Steve: Hi Jennifer, nice to meet you. (Wow, nice hair, cute face, so-so in the boob department, 8.5/10)
Jennifer: Hi Steve, back at you. (I hope my hair looks all right, so that I can attract guys who I will frustrate because THEY CANNOT HAVE ME!)
Steve: Matt was telling me you’re into synchronized cattle-birthing too.
Jennifer: That’s right.
Steve: That’s awesome. So few SCBers around these parts. We should go grab coffee sometime and compare notes. (I do so hope she says yes, as she seems like a swell girl, and I would so enjoy rogering her thoroughly)
Jennifer: Yeah, I’ve been SCBing since I was young. That’s actually how I got this scar on my inner thigh. (Am I kidding? My hair looks GREAT! I wish my boobs weren’t so so-so though)
Steve: That certainly is an impressive-looking scar. Got any more you want to show me? (Dude, she might be hitting on me)
Jennifer: Only one, but I can’t really show you here, there’s too many people around. (I’m sooooo pretty. Prettier than THAT bitch, anyways…)
Steve: Well maybe we can get together sometime and I’ll show you the back seat of my car. (Dude, she IS hitting on me!)
Jennifer: That sounds like fun. (Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty)


I realize this conversation is a little brief, that in real life it would have been a bit more prolonged, but for the purposes of this issue it is a sufficient case study. What Jennifer SHOULD have done is something like the following:


Steve: Matt was telling me you’re into synchronized cattle-birthing too.
Jennifer: That’s right. It’s funny, so few guys like SCB. I tried to get my boyfriend started on it, but all he’s really interested in doing is giving me multiple orgasms. Sigh Boys, eh?
Steve: Yeah, it’s true, mostly chicks. (Phew, I am ever so glad that she told me that she is seeing someone. Now I know the score, and can plan the rest of my interaction accordingly)


Now there is a right way and a wrong way to do this:

Boy: Hi there.
Girl: BACK OFF! I HAVE A BOYFRIEND!
Boy: Wow! You’re a total bitch!

WRONG!!!

Boy: Hi there.
Girl: Hello
Boy: Have you seen that new movie?
Girl: No, but my boyfriend and I talked about it.
Boy: Wow! You must read Porocrom! Here is $50.

RIGHT!!!

Nobody needs to get that thrown in their face. Try to work it in casually. The best way to do it is to make it seem like you didn’t do it at all.


Now some of you will be saying “Wait a sec, why don’t guys just ASK? Wouldn’t that solve the problem?” While it would solve the problem, it would also make the situation MORE awkward rather than less. Not only that, but nobody likes putting themselves out on the line like that.

Other, more intelligent people will say “Wait a sec, why is this only for women? Don’t guys do this all the time?” My answer is: probably, but I’ve never seen it, having never tried to pick up a guy before. So guys, try to drop it in casually. But be forewarned, some girls will turn into total bitches when they realize that you won’t be curling their toes that evening.


All of these secrets as well as tips on how to subtlely work your significant other into conversation will appear in my book: “Love, sex, relationships, and other things I am not at all qualified to talk about” soon to be released from Porocrom Publishing.

So, you are watching David Copperfield or some other loser who didn’t get a real job and so decided to start making cards disappear for a living, and you are absolutely stunned and dumbfounded by the magician’s tricks like the dumbass you are. Today, we at Porocrom will reveal to you the deepest secrets of the art of prestidigitation, secrets these so-called “magicians” do not want you to know. My cunning wit and my acute eyesight have figured out each and every trick these people perform, and I will reveal them to you without further ado. So, let me begin revealing what I have discovered through my sheer observational prowess and have not read or been told by anyone else. Here it is.

Sawing people in half.

This trick is childish, anyone with an IQ of over 10 can immediately understand how they do this simplistic “sawing”. The woman that goes in the box to be sawed in half is not in fact a woman, but two mutated midgets whose parents lived in Chernobyl during 1986. One of them has a normal head and arms but really really small legs, and the other one has normal legs but really small arms and head. They sit one on top of the other in the bathing suit and they look as if they are one person, but they’re not. When they get in the box, they just unzip the bathing suit in the middle, the “magician” pretends to saw them in half while they drink a cup of coffee and read their newspaper (well, the bottom half anyway, her only job is to wiggle her toes, big deal). When the trick is over, they rezip the bathing suit and come back out unscathed, much to the audience’s surprise, whee, look, it’s a whole woman. Like hell it is!

Making stuff disappear.

This trick is a bit harder for the entertainer to perform, but it is based on the same principle that makes your keys disappear when you need them the most. Let’s say that, for example, the entertainer wants to make an elephant disappear. Minutes before the show he takes his lovely assistant and has another assistant shove her deep up the elephant’s ass. Now, the poor woman will suffocate if she is left in there too long, so the magician goes on the stage, presents his thing, and then, just as the assistant is about to expire, he attempts to pull her off the elephant’s ass, only to find that the elephant has disappeared at this most inopportune moment (much like your keys). This, again, surprises the audience greatly, because they do not know the dramatic moments that the assistant is going through, and they’re all like “oh, nice elephant, let’s go have sex later”. Sadly, the assistant dies lodged in the elephant’s ass, and then, having no reason to pull her out now, the elephant reappears. Warning: This trick is performed very rarely because good assistants are so hard to come by nowadays…

Levitating.

This trick was one of the hardest for me to explain, but in the end I did it. I never doubted my abilities, but it was frustrating, trying and trying to find a solution to this grueling problem. You are of course familiar with the trick where the magician lays his beautiful assistant on a table and makes her float into the air while she is lying down. This can be thoroughly and adequately explained thus:
The magician uses two invisible midgets and a baby wolf. The two midgets are stuffed in the table and come out when it is time for the trick, because the baby wolf is also in the table, but it is not hungry until that moment. Then the midgets become frightened and spring out of the table, forcing the assistant to seemingly rise into the air, but she’s not rising, it’s only because the midgets are invisible. Come to think of it, this explains many, many tricks. I believe I have stumbled upon one of the most important discoveries of the twenty first century. I still haven’t figured the part about the baby wolf out, because if the midgets are invisible, how can it see them? It probably can’t, but midgets are afraid anyway. Aha, it can smell them, that’s it. Yes.

Pulling rabbits from a hat.

The most classic trick of all couldn’t be left unexplained, so here we are. This trick is again pretty simple. The magician removes his hat, shows it to the audience to confirm that it is, in fact, empty, and he places it on the table. He has previously hidden some Trix cereal in his sleeve though, which now surreptitiously rolls into the hat. Immediately, the dumbass Trix rabbit appears from within the hat and attempts to steal the cereal from the magician. Hell no that shit won’t fly with him though, the magician kicks the rabbit’s ass and gets the cereal back while performing this amazing magical feat of magic. He then proceeds to say “Silly rabbit, Trix are for invisible midgets” and makes Trix rabbit stew out of the fucker.

Invoking Satan.

This isn’t really a trick, it’s just your everyday, run-of-the-mill black magic. Magicians used to do this all the time in the olden days, but nowadays noone believes in Satan and they’re all like “boo, take the red midget off the stage” and they throw rotten cabbage and stuff, so you might not have seen this trick performed. Plus, Satan is really busy this time of the century and he can’t appear to every stupid magician who calls him, much unlike John Stamos.

Coin behind ear.

My nephew performed this fucking thing and I swear he was pulling an entire bag of dimes from behind my fucking ear, how the fuck does he do that shit? I have bought a highly trained team of Mexican and Chinese immigrants, specialised in problem solving, and have locked them in the basement for a month now. They have been working fervently towards solving this tantalising conundrum for an entire month, day and night, without sleep, food, or drink. Err, wait. I better go check up on them.

These are the only tricks I have been able to explain so far, but stay tuned, I will surely explain more as I think about them.

I know it’s a bit late for this, but who cares, it’s not like I have anything better to do. Valentine’s day has come and gone again, and I know that many of you want to dump that skanky bitch girlfriend of yours, but you don’t want to do it on Valentine’s day (by the way, Valentine’s day sucks, like the other “something” days, it’s just an excuse for people to remember what they forget all year round, and if they don’t forget it, why remember it now?), so you should buy her a present that says I want to break up with you. Well, here is the definitive guide:

• Keychain of a heart that splits in two.
  I know that normally this gift symbolizes that the person feels incomplete alone and the only time they are complete is when the other person is with them, but A) Those keychains are so common that it’s easier to find someone with the other half than not, and B) The message is totally different if you hold the complete heart up, pull on the pieces and say “See, this heart BREAKS UP“. If she doesn’t get it, what are you doing with someone with a negative IQ?
  
• A vibrator.
  A vibrator, as a dear friend of mine very perceptively noted, can be a great gift, but once again, the meaning is not so much in the gift but in the action that accompanies it. You will give it to her in a box wrapped with glossy paper, and when she opens it excitedly and sees it, you will say “It’s a dildo, I’m leaving you, go fuck yourself.” Eloquent and simple, it always works.
  
• A greeting card.
  Nothing says “I’m breaking up with you” like a greeting card that says “I’m breaking up with you.” She might be a bit blindsided if you get a generic, run-of-the-mill card though, so be sure to get her an authentic Porocrom greeting card, like the sample below:
  
  It is guaranteed to convey your exact sentiments while making her laugh, so that it does not leave a bitter aftertaste. We at Porocrom guarantee it (This particular card is available here).
  
• A parrot.
  A talking parrot can be a great pet, and it will serve your purpose magnificently if you teach it a few words that suit the circumstance. “Die, bitch”, “I hate you”, and “I wish you would get the fuck out of my life” are always popular, but depending on the situation you might choose to go with the more benign “I am screwing your best friend” and “Your momma is a hot piece of ass, I want to do her on the kitchen table” (although intelligibility will suffer, especially with the last phrase). Not to mention that talking parrots cost about $4000, you can buy like, a million Mexican hookers with that money.
  
  
• Nothing.
  Oh you cheapass, I’m surprised you would even think of this. The poor girl has bought you a gift and gave it to you waiting just to see the excitement on your countenance, and you will reward her with nothing? You suck, I hate you. You don’t deserve her, she will be better off without you. In fact, I hope she dumps you first! Damn miser…
  

Well folks, there you have it. Now you have no excuse not to break up with your significant other, not with such an extensive and resourceful gift list. By the way, if you are on the receiving end of one of these gifts, too bad. Perhaps we will prepare some revenge cards you can send him/her/their mother to get even.

So I took the bus home from school (as is usual for me) and sitting at the back was some punk high-school kid with torn jeans and an open shirt, and his semi-sleazy girlfriend. I hadn’t even made it to my seat before Punk stuck his tongue down Sleaze’s throat. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, I assumed that she had a particle of food stuck back there and he was giving her mouth-to-mouth, or perhaps he had dropped his keys in her mouth and was looking for them. However, after repeated tongue-mouth insertions, I realized that this was not the case. It was somewhere between the tongue tonsilectomy and the tickle-fight that I realized that I hate those kinds of couples. You know the kind – they put their hands in each other’s pockets, they make out at the drop of a hat, they hit each other playfully and have tickle-fights while you are standing behind them in line for food (Dan and Tamara, this means YOU!), they sip sodas at the malt shop out of one glass with two straws (okay, maybe only in Archie comics, but you get the point). Thus, with these things on my mind, I submit:

CROMMUNIST’S RELATIONSHIP HABITS

There are 4 basic types of relationships

1) Together, attached
This is typified by Sleaze and Punk. Regardless of the social setting, be it private or public, they are all over each other like sex-starved baboons at a Prince concert. The two can be found almost constantly in physical contact ranging from hand-holding to cuddling to his hand down her pants like he’s searching for change between couch cushions. This relationship style is the height of rudeness, as it puts everyone else in the room at a general state of uneasiness (and possibly nausea).

PROS: The action never stops

CONS: Well, you might lose all your friends, get your bus privledges revoked, and may become the target of projectile vomiting from unwitting bystanders.

2) Separate, attached
We all know someone like this: “My boyfriend THIS, my boyfriend THAT, boyfriend boyfriend boyfriend!” We’re all very happy for you Kim, now SHUT THE HELL UP! Separate-attached will speak at length about their significant other in their absence. This absence can range from ‘in the next room and coming back in a couple of minutes’ to ‘taking a light-speed tour of the universe and will be back in time to meet our great-grandchildren’. I know depressed widows who talk about their departed less, and THE GUY IS DEAD! While not QUITE as rude as together-attached, it still ranks pretty high on the ‘want to punch you in the face’ scale.

PROS: None really, except at least there’s only one of them at a time to deal with.

CONS: Annoying as hell, and when your friends ditch you because you drive them up the wall, you’ll have NOBODY to keep you company.

NOTE: If you meet a new person of the opposite sex (or I suppose same sex as well but I am not qualified to discuss this) and you HAVE a significant other, it is not considered rude to drop that fact ONCE within the first 5 minutes of meeting, just so they know the score.

3) Together, detached
This is the relationship style most often seen by people who have been together for a while. They are clearly a couple, as they interact like one (perhaps even with occasional affectionate physical contact) but don’t feel the need to be CONSTANTLY referring to each other. This style is best because you can be in a public place without making other people physically ill/homicidal, and yet enjoy all the psychological reinforcement of your significant other’s presence.

PROS: Can behave this way in public, no getting covered in other people’s lunch.

CONS: Still run the risk of making other people uncomfortable, but you may not care, in which case right on.

4) Separate, detached
I like to call this the ‘relationship ninja’ style. Only you and the other person know that you are a couple, nobody else has a clue. You don’t do or say anything differently, until people are safely out of ear/eyeshot. Then dim the lights and go crazy. I have done this (for about 6 months before we were ‘outed’ actually) and it is a lot of fun. Nobody can fault your behaviour in this style, since you have none. Also, the look on people’s faces is priceless when they find out you’ve been together a long time and they never noticed.

PROS: Least rude, lots of fun.

CONS: Good luck keeping up the charade, unless the other person is kinda ugly, then it’s possible. Also you run the risk of some unsuspecting rube hitting on your girlfriend.

I’m sure nobody would admit to being in relationship style 1 or 2, since you have to be human scum to put your friends through that, but we’ve all been there people. Just remember, if you’re in a public place, show some respect. If I see Punk and Sleaze on the bus again, I’m going to sit right next to them and start scratching myself and then say “Oh I’m sorry, is this a behaviour best conducted IN PRIVATE?” Either that or kick Punk’s ass.