!QUIK HITZ!

Let's learn stuff!

Let's do it QUIK!

1. ONE. UNO.

Jackie Chan's reign as the most lovable, Asian, "I do all my own stunts", action star is over. The dude supposedly climbed on stage during a concert by Taiwanese singer-songwriter Jonathan Lee, claimed he was drunk, demanded a duet with Lee and tried to conduct the band. He then grabbed the microphone from Lee and lectured the already horrified audience on the many differences between his films, The Tuxedo and The Medallion. After that he held an impromptu contest to determine who his biggest fan was. The winner was brought on stage where they were guilted into stripping off all of their clothes and peeing on Jackie (at his request). Then Jackie, covered in the urine of his #1 fan, danced what he called "A Jig for Mystery" until he purposefully fell down. While on the ground he broke his own thumb on his left hand and vomited three times. The third time he beckoned for the now utterly disgusted Jonathan Lee to come on over and "mop up my droppings".

It was a rough scene.

For the real (and slightly more accurate story) you can go here.

2. TWO. DOS.

A loyal Johnny reader brought this to my attention. Mr. Bateman's sweater is amazing.

3. THREE. TRES.

Cici's Pizza Buffet may very well be "the best pizza value anywere" but it is also a true melting pot of personalities, nationalities and species.

The other day the members of the band I play music with (hsatrtg) and myself decided to conclude a hard day of practice by hitting up our local Cici's. We went in and sat down in the rear of the restaurant. We were immediately targeted by the hillbilly circus act sitting a table away from us. The pathetic monosyllabic utterances began to fly. The five people sitting diagonally from me were a realization of a white trash vision you can only imagine in the darkest and most fucking pathetic recesses of your mind. There was the the one dude who was massive. His face looking very much like what the face of an ogre or troll would look like if such things were real. If he would have been holding a massive stone club the image would have been complete. When he spoke it was an indecipherable grunt. He was flanked by three smaller dudes who did most of the talking. All of them had the look of the perfect white trash American down to a science. One was wearing a size-too-small wife beater. His "awesome" tattoos visible on his arms. The other two in oversized white T-shirts that were yellowed from the wear and tear of the daily life of a rodeo bad ass (or whatever these sad souls were). They had the token disgusting chick with them. I think she was the wife of the wife beater guy (who positioned himself to be the leader). She also had a wife beater on (they come in two packs so what the hell) and her striped bra or bathing suit top was clearly visible underneath in all of its completely unsexy glory. There was also a little girl running around, presumably the spawn of La Famile de Wife Beater.

I sat down first and began to enjoy my average-yet-cheap pizza feast when I heard them throwing words at me. I was wearing a shirt from the D.A.R.E. anti-drug program for children. They were able to read the big red word on my chest and went with their first instinct which was to just yell it out. Perhaps there first grade educations or collective double digit IQ was telling them to sound out their words and this was the reasoning behind yelling out "DARE" over and over in my direction. Another theory that just occurred to me is that maybe they knew my name somehow and were just trying to get my attention. The length of a word like "Derek" may have seemed daunting to them so early in a conversation with someone who wasn't quite on their level of grunts and hand gestures.

Whatever it was they called it out several times before I finally raised my eyes to meet them. I agreed with their exclamations with a simple, "Yes. Dare." From here my bandmate and friend Justin sat down. Justin has curly hair and it resembles an afro...I guess. I think this is what our new friends were thinking because they began to yell out "Afro" and "Hey" at Justin. He turned around quickly to greet them. It was then that they got ambitious and told Justin how funny it was that I was wearing a shirt advertising an anti-drug program while he had an afro (which is, of course, "druggie" hair). They said something about how "e'ery buddy 'n da 50's had one of dem hercuts". This statement caught me off guard simply due to the fact that these things sitting before me knew that we existed in spans of time and these spans, these decades, had names like the 50's and the 60's. Justin wasn't as impressed by the little things. He corrected wife beater man and told him that the "1960's was the decade that brought about the true rise of the afro". Wife beater man responded to this with something that I could only describe as a howl/snort/laugh/hiccup.

From here the other two members of the band arrived at our quaint little table and got the same treatment. We sat there exchanging smiles with our new friends for a while before my friend Joe got up to get more pizza (it is, after all, a buffet). On his way to the pizza line he proclaimed to the rest of us that "there are a lot of people here". There were. It was a completely accurate statement. Ogre dude, for some reason, thought that Joe's statement had in some way been a form of "shit-talking" and became slightly agitated. He addressed the remaining three at our table with a relentless series of the same query.

"Wad he talkin' shit?"

"I thing he wad talkin' some shit."

"He wad talkin' shit."

We told him that he was a fucking idiot and that Joe had simply been saying what we all knew, that there were too many people in this Cici's on this given day. I looked the ogre-man-beast in the eyes and calmy told him that, "we would never talk about you guys". This was admittedly a lie for we had been talking about the filthy specimens before us throughout the meal in our best six-inch voices. Joe came back and dealt with the same questions and accusations of "shit-talking". He, being a man of peace, told them what he really said and the howl/snort/laugh/hiccup's once again resounded.

The motley group of intellectual champions then got up. They had obviously had their fill of pizza and were ready to go do whatever it is people such as them do with the rest of their day. Maybe they went to the library. On their way out they made more exclamations about the D.A.R.E. shirt and hair styles. Their line of insults never evolved but I guess I shouldn't expect so much. They walked outside and ambled past the window we were sitting by. They, in such an utterly predictable fashion, beat on the window and gave us the one finger salute. I raised my glass to them and pleaded for them to return. They had other stuff to do unfortunately. They piled into their mini-van and drove away.

I know this is QUIK HITZ, and there was nothing quik about that blow-by-blow run down of what happened in the Cici's on that fateful afternoon. I, however, feel it is my right as an educated American to describe the encounter with as many flowery and superfluous adjectives as possible. It is my right to verbally disparage these unfortunate bastards after the fact, and rip them new assholes not with my fists, but with my words. They could do the very same thing if they knew how to spell, write, type, or behave.

If I come off as snobby and/or pompous then I view that as mission accomplished. Anything to distance myself from the testicle sweat of America that was this fivesome.

We just wanted to eat some pizza.

4. FOUR. QUATRO.

Because I have to put something really QUIK after that thing. Go here to listen to the new Sufjan and the new Thom Yorke. Go.

That's enough ranty.

-Derek