Executives at Monster are taking the news of the tragic stock plummet hard. One anonymous executive said that the 14 percent stock drop was “a truly tragic” event “adversely affecting everyone who owns stock in the company.” While he expressed dismay at the “unfortunate incidents” of the individuals whose deaths from caffeine toxicity, “may or may not have had something to do with their consumption of our beverage” (which contains 240mg of caffeine per 24 oz. can) he added, “Our hearts go out to the true victims of this situation — Monster stock holders, and, of course, their families. You are not alone. My family, for example, will be forced to cancel our semi-annual trip to the Virgin Islands, since my bonus is tied to stock performance,” the Monster executive said tearfully. “And I can just forget about that new set of golf clubs. We may even have to sell one of our boats. There’s really no other word for this. It’s a tragedy.”

When asked how the company would deal with such a loss, he responded, “Probably just let go of a bunch of secretaries and maintenance workers and such. We know how to cut corners.”

The post Monster Energy Drink Stock Tragically Plummets Following Death Reports appeared first on The Faster Times.

Forget about the “binders of women” — deliciously ridiculous piece of syntax though it is. The real meat of that statement was in his assertion about hiring a woman and making sure she could leave by 5:00 PM to “make dinner for her family.”

This is what Mitt Romney, again and again, illustrates as his core ideation of women–as a homemaker first and foremost. For him, everything else in her life is secondary, a putative “hobby,” generously granted to her by society and/or a male partner.

Think about what he said later in the debate about how what women want most is “flexible schedules,” presumably so that their work doesn’t get in the way of their “real job.” Or how Ann Romney confided to Good Housekeeping how when she was diagnosed with MS and very ill, Mitt generously said, “it’s okay if you don’t cook every night. I’ll eat toast and cold cereal.”

His imagination does not encompass the idea of a man as a helpmeet, as someone equally responsible for the care of the home and the rearing of children. (Unmarried couples or same-sex couples don’t exist; and as we know, single moms just raise mass murderers, so…), let alone the idea of a woman who works because she must. Because she is the breadwinner for her family, or for her own personal fulfillment, or because–and get this–because she is so terrific at her job that she is indispensable to the wider world. Because we all benefit from her her talent and drive. Mitt Romney believes that women belong to their husbands and children. Not to the wider world. And certainly not to themselves.

The post What Romney Really Thinks About Women appeared first on The Faster Times.

Some people — not me, God knows, but some people — might say that Mitt Romney is a bit of an out-of-touch elitist. This is all based on mild comments that he makes such as saying that 47% of Americans are pathetic welfare bums who deserve to die. But hey, Mitt’s just saying what we’re all really thinking, right? …Right?

Or at least, he’s saying what incredibly privileged emotionally stunted WASP-y billionaires are really thinking. …Which brings us to the Tumblr Lucille and Mitt, which pairs the wit and wisdom of Willard Mitt Romney with images of Lucille Bluth, the frosty matriarch from Arrested Development.

Somehow, reading Mitt’s words but hearing them in Lucile’s disdainful, vodka-and-tonic-soaked sneer really drives home the problem that Mr. Romney might be facing. The problem being that Mitt and Lucille both sort of seem to hate the “common man.”  …And the greater problem being that Lucille at least is funny, whereas Mitt is really not.

So here are some selected images from Lucille and Mitt — and again, you can check out the entire Tumblr right… here. And remember, these are all actual Mitt Romney quotes. Please to enjoy:

The post Here’s Your Mitt Romney/Arrested Development Mash-up appeared first on The Faster Times.

Here, courtesy of me trolling through the “Weird Books” selection at Abe Books, are my selections for the twenty weirdest books of all time. I’m going to present them with minimal commentary and just show their covers, because nothing I could say could make them better. But here, if you like, are some short descriptions of the books, given by their publishers. See if you can match the descriptions with the books. It should be pretty easy:

“A non-fiction look at how scabs form, and how one is to take care of them.”

“Heavy-duty disappearing techniques for those with a need to know.”

“A three-year-old is a real puzzle to parents.”

“Have you ever wondered what action you must take to keep clear of that fast-approaching ship? This book will tell you how to do so quickly and in simple terms.”

“History.”

“Now from the incomparable team who stood fairy tales on their heads with The Stinky Cheese Man, come fables as you’ve never heard them before.”

“Children are challenged to guess the animal by looking at it from a rear view before turning the page to see the entire animal.”

“Become the unique and beautifully designed person God has created to reflect Jesus Christ to the world.”

And now — presented with zero commentary from me — are the covers of the 20 weirdest books of all time, including the now-already-semi-famous How to Avoid Huge Ships, which I love, and about which I have no words:

The post The 20 Weirdest Books of All Time appeared first on The Faster Times.

Exciting news, everyone:  Sarah Palin has decided to weigh in and opine on the presidential race. I know. Yes, Sarah Heath Palin, America’s Favorite Sweetheart Who Seems Like She Was Relevant a Million Years Ago, Not Four Years Ago, has decided to take off time from her busy career of doing… nothing… in order to weigh in on the presidential race.  I know.

Sarah gave a statement to The Weekly Standard, in which she suggested that Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan should, quote/unquote, “Go rogue.” Because “Go rogue” is something that Sarah Palin just sort of automatically says at random intervals.  So, here’s some more info about that:

“With so much at stake in this election, both Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan should ‘go rogue’ and not hold back from telling the American people the true state of our economy and national security,” Palin said in the statement. “They need to continue to find ways to break through the filter of the liberal media to communicate their message of reform.”

Palin suggested that America needs to wake up to the troubles it faces, and that Romney and Ryan can help bring that about. “America desperately needs to have a ‘come to Jesus’ moment in discussing our big dysfunctional, disconnected, and debt-ridden federal government,” Palin said.

Palin also lambasted President Obama over the national debt. “At the founding of our country, a great American patriot wrote, ‘If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace,’” said Palin. “Obama’s motto seems to be, ‘Let the good times roll in my day. The kids can deal with the catastrophic bankruptcy in theirs.’

…Interesting… stuff.  Though it’s never truly been clear exactly what “going rogue” means in any context.  Some political observers would argue that in Sarah’s case, it meant going wildly off-message and ruining John McCain’s slim chance to win the presidency.  However, other observers might argue that in fact, “going rogue” means… nothing at all, and is in fact a blank signifier, mere airy meaningless persiflage spewed out in a failed effort to obscure the fact that Sarah Palin never actually says anything of substance at all. …But that’s probably crazy-talk.

Anyway, go rogue, go rogue, go rogue, Obama’s fault, blah blah. It’s also cute that Sarah Palin managed to say that Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney should “come to Jesus,” because Sarah Palin really really likes talking about Jesus and Jesus-related things in her theocratic way.  However, it should be pointed out that Sarah Palin followed that up by quoting Thomas Paine — he’s the “great American patriot” that she references.  Unfortunately, Thomas Paine was a noted opponent of organized religion, who spent most of his later career attacking religion and its outsized influence on government, which is a wild contrast to what Sarah Palin does.

But then, internal consistency, or looking things up, or research, or knowing what she’s talking about has never been Sarah Palin’s strong suit.  And hey, that’s probably what “going rogue” really means.  It just means saying whatever the hell.

And now, for no reason, here’s a picture of Sarah Palin from her days as a television sports-anchor.  Possibly she’s going rogue in the photo, it’s not clear.  After this photo, this essay is just going to randomly end, because I feel like going rogue too.  Here’s the photo.  Please to enjoy:

The post Sarah Palin Tells Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan to ‘Go Rogue’ appeared first on The Faster Times.

According to Deadline Hollywood, Fox TV — of all things — will be creating a “sophisticated, contemporary” version of Hamlet — of all things. That’d be Hamlet, the play by William Shakespeare, universally considered to be one of the greatest things ever written in the English language, but which maybe was lacking in contemporaneity and sophisticated, um, ness — but now, Fox is on the scene to add those things to Hamlet, and thank god.

The new Hamlet TV show will be called America’s Son, because, sure, why the hell not — and will be a “part juicy soap, part political thriller,” according to the writer, a Mr. Paul Redford, who previously wrote for The West Wing, which makes him more than amply qualified to fuck around with the greatest drama in history and borrow from it and reuse it for his own stupid purposes. …Apparently Mr. Redford never heard the following quote: ‘Neither a borrower nor a lender be: For loan oft loses both itself and friend’ — which is a quote from some old play or other, god, who even knows which one. Or this quote — ‘O horrible, O horrible, most horrible!’ — which pretty much sums up all reasonable opinions about this project from Fox.’

ANY-way, so the show is set in Washington, D.C., and here’s the description of the show’s plot:

When a beloved presidential hopeful dies in a tragic car wreck, a renegade JFK Jr. type returns home to D.C. to discover his father’s death was no accident — and he makes it his mission to untangle a complicated web of family secrets, expose the truth and ultimately avenge the murder.

‘The sight is dismal,’ to quote some play or other yet again. …I mean, really, the show description barely has anything to do with Hamlet, except for the idea of revenge, and the idea of family secrets, which are really just basic archetypal ideas that you could use without pretending that your show is a remake of Hamlet. But then, of course, if you didn’t pretend that your show was a remake of Hamlet, then you’d get less press attention — such as the press attention contained within this article, for instance.

Truly, this Hamlet show is a little more than kin, and a little less than kind. How stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to us all the uses of this world. But we must hold our tongues, for the rest is silence. …And so anyway, now, for no reason, here’s the best film version of Hamlet ever created — Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Hamlet, which is a real thing that actually happened, sort of. Hopefully the TV show will be 1/1000th as good as it. Although, then again, there’s nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so, to quote someone or other, once again. Here’s the video of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Hamlet. Please to enjoy–

The post ‘Hamlet’ Is a Fox TV Show Now, Because Sure, Why the Hell Not? appeared first on The Faster Times.

It honestly never occurred to me before that all video game characters always head to the right. I am speaking, of course, of 2-D characters, from the 8-bit age — the age of real video-gaming, or, at least, the age when I actually played video games, which was 1985 or so. The 8-bit era was the era when we had these things called “arcades,” which were supposedly dens of iniquity, according to parents, though being a nerd, I never got in trouble in an arcade. Though you could probably buy drugs there, or something.

My memories of arcades involve blowing through my entire weekly allowance in a twenty-five minute period, followed by aimless hours of standing around. I’d get dropped off with a friend or two, and then inevitably be drawn to a game that I was terrible at, such as “Q*Bert,” “Tempest,” or “Double Dragon.” I could never stick to the games I was good at: a terrible mistake.

You got your quarters from the surly older dude who changed dollars into quarters. You maybe bought a piece of greasy pizza from the pizza parlor next door. And then you played. And you lost. The goal was to go to the right. To keep walking or running to the right, until your avatar rescued the princess or saved the President from drug lords or beat up the final space mutant or gangster or robot.

In the days before consoles, the goal of a game was to defeat you. Many games wouldn’t even let you “continue.” The goal was to block your quest to go to the right, over and over again. (It should be noted that there were a few exceptions to going to the right. In some space-based games, or army-based games, you wanted to go up. And in some very early games, such as “Breakout,” or “Centipede,” you went… nowhere at all.

I was trolling through YouTube the other day, when I found this shockingly good tribute to older games of the arcade, Atari, and Nintendo variety. It celebrates the struggle to head to the right. Yeah, it’s just pixelated characters, but this video might surprise you, with the unexpected pathos of it all. It might even make you a little weepy. Please to enjoy:

…What’s the meaning, what’s the moral here? “Go to the right.” The moral seems to be that persistence is crucial. Don’t procrastinate. Seek your bliss. Don’t be turned away from reaching your ultimate goal. That seems to be the moral here. And also: never go to the left — because that’s just stupid.

The post Video Game Characters Go To the Right appeared first on The Faster Times.

For those of you who have (inexplicably) never seen it, the film recounts the wacky misadventure of Freddy Shoop (Harmon), an uninspired teacher with a crop of equally uninspired summer school students. Shoop’s been given an ultimatum: get these slouches to pass English… or lose his job. Along the way, Shoop also has to foil an Evil Vice-Principal (a requirement for 80s movies) and win the heart of the teacher next door, the prim, by-the-book Robin Bishop (played by Kirstie Alley).

Watching it again a quarter-century later, I have to say the film is quite remarkable—and not just because it allows one to chart how far its leads have come: Mark Harmon, after all, has evolved from playing goofy, Hawaiian-shirt-wearing playboys like Shoop to raking in $500,000 per episode as the super-serious Special Agent Gibbs on the top-rated NCIS; and Kirstie Alley is… well, she’s slated to reprise her role as “Self-Parodying Hasbeen” on the upcoming Dancing with the Stars: All-Stars.

No, what really makes this movie stand out is how sweet it is. Not only does film have a lot more heart than it ought to, given its premise, it’s also nowhere near as raunchy as other flicks that came out in the Porky’s-fueled 80s. (Clearly, though, the film’s marketing folks don’t want you to know that: the DVD cover shows Mark Harmon, margarita in hand, poking out from behind a sign that says “Bikini Xing.”)

Granted, the film doesn’t get everything right. As someone who has taught in the summer school trenches for twelve years, I have a few quibbles with the movie’s depiction of the venerable post-vernal (or pre-autumnal) educational institution. For example…

* Mr. Shoop is basically blackmailed into teaching summer school by aforementioned Evil Vice-Principal, after the real teacher wins the lottery and bails. In real life, teachers choose to teach summer school; believe it or not, we even get paid to do it.

* Shoop is a physical education teacher but he’s forced to teach English—a switcheroo that tends not to happen in the real world, due to this pesky thing called Teacher Certification.

* Finally, Mr. Shoop’s job is dependent on whether or not his students pass a test at the end of the summer. Now, come on: judging a teacher on how well the students do on an exam? That would never, ever happen in real life. (Uh… hmmmmm…)

Moreover, as a teacher myself, I’m a little uneasy about how close Shoop gets with the kids. A major plot point has Shoop agreeing to give the students incentives to get them to study for the final exam. Good idea… except one of the “incentives” involves allowing the kids to throw a party at his house. Not cool, Shoop.

Even less cool: he lets a fetching female student named Pam move in with him. Nothing happens between them, of course, but still… that’s some fire with which single male teachers should not be playing. (Bonus points if you recognized a young Courtney Thorne-Smith playing the part of Pam.)

All those quibbles notwithstanding, the film does an admirable job portraying its teens in a genuinely positive light. No, the students are not the most studious lot. And no one will ever accuse them of being role models: one moonlights as a male stripper, while two others almost get arrested for underage drinking. (Luckily, Mr. Shoop intervenes… and then gets arrested himself!)

Still, the teenagers in Summer School do have some redeeming qualities. When Evil Vice-Principal tries to replace Shoop, they drive out the new teacher by re-enacting scenes from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. And when they realize Shoop’s job depends on their grades, they try their darnedest to step it up. In short, they care about poor Mr. Shoop.

And Shoop cares about them, too—which is another thing that makes Summer School stand out among other 80s teen-flicks: it shows adults actually having some redeeming qualities of their own. And given the shellacking adults took in 80s cinema, this is a revolutionary concept indeed.

Take, for instance, the grown-ups in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off: Mr. Rooney is a vengeful, monomaniacal doofus; Cameron’s dad loves cars more than his son; even Mr. and Mrs. Bueller, despite their obvious love for Ferris, are completely clueless and ineffective.

There’s more: The minister in Footlose who outlaws dancing. The parents in Sixteen Candles who forgot Molly Ringwald’s birthday. The dad in Say Anything who’s been siphoning money off his elderly clients for years. And, really, isn’t Impending Adulthood the main antagonist of St. Elmo’s Fire?

Ultimately, all these depictions just reinforce what Ally Sheedy says in The Breakfast Club: “When you grow up, your heart dies.”

Well, Freddy Shoop’s heart is alive and kicking, thanks. Yeah, he shouldn’t have taken the kids on that field trip to the peting zoo. And he really shouldn’t have let the kids party at his house. But he does lecture them about how drinking kills brain cells. And he goes out of his way to help the students—serving as the driving teacher for one student and the Lamaze coach for another.

And he somehow inspires them: they all do OK on their final exam. No, only a few of the kids technically pass; in fact, the kid who gets the highest grade excused himself to go the bathroom on the first day and never came back. Still, they show enough improvement that Reasonable Principal, overriding Evil Vice-Principal, allows Shoop to keep his job.

In the end, despite all its low-brow humor and general goofiness, the film teaches some pretty good lessons:

(1) Working hard pays off.

(2) Good things happen when adults and teens share a common goal.

(3) Shoop says at the end, “There’s more going on here than test scores and grades”– a truth that someone should communicate to the folks in Washington. After all, a grade on an exam rarely reflects all the valuable things going on in a classroom.

(4) And, finally, as the student who spent the entire six weeks in the bathroom reminds us… some kids improve by not coming to class. (Sadly, I’m probably not joking there…)

Bottom line: if you haven’t seen Summer School at any point in the past twenty-five years, check it out. Even if you have seen it, check it out again. Either way, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Like Mark Harmon himself, the movie has aged pretty well.

The post ‘Summer School’ Revisited appeared first on The Faster Times.

“The eyes are the window to the soul,” Aristotle once wrote. That’s something to think about, although also something to think about is Homer Simpson’s mangled description of Muppets: “They’re not quite a mop, and they’re not quite a puppet, but man… so to answer your question, I don’t know.”

For a long time now, we have only encountered Muppets with googly-eyes, or Muppets with ping-pong ball eyes, or whatever their eyes are made of. But the Tumblr Muppets with People Eyes aims to rectify this situation — though after viewing the photographs, you might understandably feel that it was not a situation that needed to be rectified.

Yes, it turns out that Muppets with people eyes are terrifying — utterly terrifying. Muppets with people eyes gives us the window to a very, very scary soul indeed. Below are the photographs.  I would merely warn you that once you see them, you will not be able to unsee them. Prepare youself–

_____

Kermit:

-

Cookie Monster:

-

Gonzo the Great:

_

Elmo:

-

Scooter:

And Miss Piggy:

_____

…You see? I warned you. You cannot say I didn’t warn you. Anyway, go to the Tumblr — muppetswithpeopleeyes.tumblr.com — for more hot terrifying Muppet action. …As for me, I’m going to go look at something cleansing, to rid the memory of these images from my eyes. Maybe I’ll try watching an old episode of the Muppet Show to cheer me up. Or maybe that’s a terrible idea. …Go away, images of Muppets with human eyes!

The post Muppets With Human Eyes appeared first on The Faster Times.

Can you hear me, Google? I’m in the princess’ castle. For the life of me, I can’t find the big key, and I must’ve looked in every room at least twenty-five thousand times. This is the last time I’ll come to you with something as trivial as a video game. From now on, I’m going to play fair, use my brain, let my intuition kick in, get a hair cut, pick up dog food… Hang on. Where was I?

Okay, Google, I made it to the giant Walmart. I found pet food and now there’s a sale on fire extinguishers, and it seems like something people have for whatever reason. Is there a difference between the red ones and the silver ones? And how can I get these salespeople to leave me alone? They keep asking if I have any questions. It’s so annoying.

Seriously, Google! This boss is driving me crazy! If he throws me into the lava one more time, I’m going to break the game. Show me one human being who can put up with this many trials!

Thanks, Google. MattMan1980’s how-to-beat-Mario video showed me what I was doing wrong. You just press B until you win. My dog likes MattMan, too. When she hears his voice, she curls up on my chest. Hey, what’s the best kind of dog? Is it an English bulldog? Yes it is.

Google, this just popped into my head for no reason, but how much does it cost to stuff an animal and is it wrong? How long do dogs live, anyway? Okay, what’s the longest a dog can live?

Hey, Google, please don’t freak out, but do you think you could tell me what this lump in my throat is? I keep trying to swallow it, but it just gets bigger. It feels tumor-y. Don’t show me any results that mention the word “tumor.”

You were right, Google. It was just tension. Why did Bowser have to go and kidnap the Princess, anyway? Why can’t I just stay with her in the Mushroom Castle? And what the heck was I about to look up? Maybe I should get out more. But every time I try, I have so many questions. What do people actually do outdoors anyway?

Camping is so much fun, Google! I’m doing a trial run indoors, just to be safe. Just me, my dog and a two-four of Bud Heavys. What more do you need? Maybe nothing. Hey… can you show me how to make a stove out of a beer can?

Google, this is crazy. My ceiling is on fire! I made two reservoirs by accident and no snuffer. I tried to put it in the sink, but that made it way worse. How do I use a fire extinguisher? Depress the third pull-up cord on the right? What the hell does that mean?

Wow, Google It’s a good thing I did a trial run, because I could have been seriously hurt. I just need to upload the video to Youtube, and then I’m ready to try outdoor camping. I mean, what’s the worst that can happen? Please limit my search to the first twenty results.

Great, I got signal! I feel like I’m really living out here! I just fell in the fire, and it felt really realistic. It’s like anything could happen right now, like a bear could just come out of the woods and kill me. But that never happens, does it? What are the best bear-fighting techniques for an amateur? Yes, I meant bear-fighting. Why, what did I type?

Shoot me some classic TV shows, Google. I’ll explain later. See, I’ve got my dog with me, and she’s stuffed into a duffle bag, and I’m walking around the campsite in a big circle, waving a hammer around and making loud noises – like you said – when I got into some good TV theme songs. I think it was working because I went through ten of them with no bear maulings. But all of a sudden, my mind’s a total blank. Hold on, something’s coming.

I survived, Google, no thanks to you. As it turns out, it was never a bear, just a really aggressive tree branch tapping against my car, sort of where the window used to be—before I threw the hammer at it. Will insurance fix that? Will insurance fix that for free?

Google, are fireworks illegal? I’m asking for a friend. Stop telling me about fireworks factories exploding in China. You know you can be a real downer, Google. Sometimes I think you want me to miserable on the Fourth of July.

Dear Google, it’s the Fourth of July. My dog got hit by a car last night. I found him by the side of the road and I told him it would be alright, but it wasn’t. I don’t know…I just don’t know. How does a person get over something like this? Does Mattman1980 have a dog-hit-by-car video? His stuff is always really good.

It’s me again, Google. I decided to take the week off to replay the video game from start to finish. It brings back such good memories of all the time I spent with my dog. I’ve forgotten most of the answers you told me, so it should be “all me” this time. I’m going to find the key if it takes me a week. It’s kinda fun just to wander around, anyway. Hey, remember that thing about, y’know, honoring your dog? Can you show me that one again? You were right about the best kind of dog. L

I beat the game, Google. When the credits rolled, I saw myself with the princess and we were both young and happy and I felt like I could just die – I finally had what I had been searching for this whole time. And then it ended. I started sobbing into the couch cushions. Sometimes I think life should be more than this, Google, because, even if I play the game again, play fair, save the princess a hundred times, shoot myself out of a cannon, rotate the control stick, collect all the stars and coins and mushrooms, jump on all the platforms and right-colored boxes in just the right spot, how will I know that she won’t leave me alone again?

Dear Mario,

We have watched you throughout all your endless searching, and we bring you guidance. A silver fire extinguisher looks good in a kitchen with a lot of stainless steel. You should never use white gas indoors. As to your deeper psychological needs, have you checked the rates at GameFly? We know how much you like video games.

-Google.

Ace Stevens lives in Massachusetts with four dogs and a lot of camping equipment. He is an American Legion Award winner, and he is the creator of Youtube’s “aluminum can stove.”

Elizabeth Stevens has beaten every Myst, Zelda, and King’s Quest video game by cheating. Her unauthorized Muppet histories have been published in The Awl, Rollingstone.com, and the Electric Literature Outlet. Her fiction has appeared in Explosion-Proof Magazine and theTrout Family Almanac, soon to be published on the Espresso Machine. She teaches writing at Boston University and the Gotham Writers’ Workshop.

The post Are You There Google? It’s Me, Mario. appeared first on The Faster Times.