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Love Teaching Living Devil Science

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Go along with it:

I hold your hand and you thrilled with conviction you are, so long before I knew that any true urge was basically false or pretend, and I didn’t know then you were pretending, I thought you were magical and amazing and holding your hand was as if I was learning and getting to know something, getting let in on something which really is what we all want and I know now that is what your power is and after all these years I still think you have this power and at any time can come and take my hand again.

The point of living:

There are those of us chosen, born, made to teach (gross, as if there is any way we can actually talk or in any other way effect all these people oh dear god, really! They don’t listen, they all do their own thing and they love ‘their own thing’ and we have to get into their ‘thing’ thing and from the inside turn them over and over and tell them the truth and oh god my god it’s so hard and long and getting worse over time, I mean, these days sure I am still loved but the window is closing and pretty soon I’m going to have to scream “fuck you, kill people, fuck school” in order to have any kind of coherent respect influence) so you have to get your ass equipped like angels to get these morons smarter, right, that’s the goal. So we can’t fake it, we can’t wear the clothes and ‘blend in’ because these kids sniff that shit pile from a mile away…they know more about psychographic marketing then anyone…they could analyse how shit house the latest campaign is top to bottom. They like what they like. Full fucking stop.

Didn’t you know:

The time comes for your body to be put into the ground or burnt and displaced hence forth in verdant fields of green or else in concrete holes, wherever in which you wish to be desecrated/consecrated. That other time when you, so troubled, so selfish, so self-fucking-centred you…you decide you have to do it for yourself, you have to do it from nothing. It is open and clear, there is no reason to do anything, you have to have a reason, you have to make it up, you have to make it up and believe it and then you have to do it and go on doing it as if you actually really believe it and then say “this is who I am” and that voice inside then says “this is bullshit!”, “this is all an act!”, “I am not this thing!”, “I am not this person”…but you have created this person, you are the only one, you are alone and you have created this person and when you look around all you see is yourself reflected in the eyes and minds of others and how they treat you and you hate them as much as you hate yourself for having/letting them see you like this and the bottom of the pit stuff is where you think you can’t get out, escape, change yourself that you hate and so after fifteen fucking years you are, you really are that external thing, that created acting false thing. By god how hard and disgusting is it to keep living like this: alone, alone on the inside with all these smiling faces who ‘know’ you or at least have learned how to know you in the way you have wanted to be known, because what, because it was easier for you to navigate life being this invented digestible version? This handle-able product, this known entity…this…thing that you are, this shell, this approachable malleable, understood, talkative all-round proper clear cohesive unit thing that you are now?

What devils want:

They give you something, its what you want, it’s a certain kind of, I don’t know, power? No too much (because hey look at you, you are still wearing clothes); but it’s the people. The people: Smiling when they meet you, wanting to be around you, wanting you tell that story or do this thing. And of course you aren’t stupid enough to not realise you are being either a clown or an entertainer, but what it gets you is far more than an entertainer or clown would get. You get; people, money, security, trust, sex, desire, tears and so many other human things. It just comes and sits on your lap and you think ‘why is this happening?’ and then you remember. And then it’s ‘oh, fuck…did I make a deal…did I say the word ‘yes’? Did I say it by not saying it? What then now what do I owe, if anything? If I was so flippant to not care then what happens now?’. Stuff like that. You become scared. And then it’s The Oath to Love.

The scientist speaks:

The room was too small, the walls were so close, making it hard to breath in or out. In was fine, he could fill his lungs and hold it, feeling large, and then after holding his breathe for thirty seconds breathe it out and feel empty, feel as though there is a space available. Then again, looking around the walls, there and there and the roof just there again. He isn’t a tall man, isn’t an obese man, he is a small man sitting in a room feeling trapped and finding it very hard or at least finding the only thing he can do is breathe. Deeply in and slowly out. Closing his eyes and doing this over and over. Seeing the stars and the bright fireworks behind those closed eyes and feeling the chest expand and contract. Feeling the human body taking in air and letting out air. Sitting and breathing trapped in the room he lives in. A glass of water with ice next to him. The ice making popping sounds as it changes. He breathes in again because in this world you live in you breathe and live and drink water like life like breathing. He lets it our feeling the lungs like bags empty out, the body emptying and closing. He drinks cold iced water. The ice slinks and makes a life affirming sound as it pushes its way towards his lips and then slinks back down n the glass. His breathe is shorter and the cold water cools his throat and gut and the lungs now take in more air and they fill up. His legs are short, his arms are short, he breathe deeply and holds the breathe again, arches his back to push the lungs to capacity, spits out a little air as he forces the engorged lungs to their limit and spits out the sir bit by bit through his nose and then mouth. Hunching over the expel all of the air the man is not a large man, he is on a holiday. The room is small and has the essence of ;life. The things you must need. An empty fridge he wanted to put food in but of course he has been sitting in this room watching television and breathing. His legs are skinny and his arms are short and his neck hurts a lot and this time he strains his neck back over the bed waiting for it to crack, thrashes his head left and right and opens and closes his jaw full of effort. Tomorrow he has to talk about stem cell research and how we need to create these blastocysts in order to cure cancer and spinal cord injury. He will say things that will be argued against on the newspaper. The bar fridge has three beers, a mini bottle of wine, a bottle of water and a juice. He drinks a beer and writes it down on the card that you write down what you had from the mini bar on. He opens the nuts on the table and writes it down. He stands up straight and tries to touch the ceiling and breathes in hard and hold his breathe reaching up with his toes to try and touch the roof and collapse on the bed exhaling and sore. The beer is cold, he takes out his phone, looks at it, drinks more beer. The presenter takes out his notes and lies them on the bed, looking at the room, a movie, he is a man in a room preparing for a presentation. He is a man in a room who is trying to breathe. He is a man in a room who will drink the mini bar. He is a man in a room who now walks back and forth in only ten steps saying

“Today we discover a truth, a truth we all know but have been unable to voice, I want to voice this now. And I will tell you there is something deep inside of me that comes from, it comes from perhaps my upbringing. And I can tell you that it makes me feel sick, in some ways, to create, to play with these forms, these little forms of a life. I have experimented on rats, lab rats, I have seen  them squirm in fear or thrash in pain. I have attached electrodes to the exposed brains of primates, I have dissected dead or dying bodies of every living animal including human. I have seen them twitch, I have seen them react. But today I am talking to you about the ideal subject. The immoral yet moral subject. The unformed human, the small creature we want to get our hands on”

He sips the rest of the beer and throws this draft into the hotel room’s provided small waste paper basket. He lies face down on the bed and pulls his arms up over his body and interlaces the fingers and stretches. There is a space enough to live in, it is paid for by the university. He pulls his socks off and throws them over near his bags. He has to pack it all up in the morning. Tomorrow he will leave and take all his bags and check out and take his bags to a small room annexed to an auditorium and tell all those people what he thinks. What he has been paid to say. He is paid to say what he thinks. He draws in a another long breathe and tries to hold it as long as he can. In his mind the medical reasons, the spiritual reasons, the kind on personal in-the-body sense stuff of self healing. The feeling that making unborn-not-really-babies-yet things to dissect, the feeling that making embryos to extract dna from, the feeling inside that tells him he is wrong, he is evil, he is disgusting. His chest is full of air, quitting smoking three years ago is working, the air coming in pure and full.

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MENTAL HYPERTENSION: IN WHICH YOU ARE YOU AS MUCH AS YOU WANT TO BE YOU OR CAN BE YOU OR ARE ACTUALLY REALLY YOU

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No one likes You. They like the You you present to them. Hell, even You don’t like you[1].

This is not going to be a depressing diatribe trying to state “no one understands me” or “if only they knew” or anything Sylvia Plath-ish at all. Really what it is is that these days there is a need to create an ‘other’ to deal with the day in day out of life, to handle the horrific falsities, transgressions and incongruence of modern life that would otherwise forbid you (the actual real You) from making any kind if nine to five money at all. These shadow monstrosities are perpetrated by humans (who are also pretending, acting, behaving) along with your own ‘other’ self and then, much more problematically, your ‘other’ self is to then go on and re-perpetrate atrocities onto other (hopefully also pretending) non-human ‘other’ types. The major problem with relying on us all to be on the same page with this terrible falsity is that not everyone is on the same page, some of us are actually really real (Them) humans and they are taking these blows quite personally and doing these horrible acts quite honestly. They are not pretending, this is their real actual self. They really think and feel the things they say out of their mouth and behind their eyes when you see them crushed a little or sad or depressed or worried about their position or the light in their eyes when they are rewarded for a mediocre achievement. All real. Sometimes the ‘you’ that they present is actually their real Them. The problem is that their reality is derived from the expectations of society, from role and behaviour. Yet, and here’s where it gets weird, that even though there are these precepts, and one could say clearly observable, recognisable and understood observable clichés, the majority actually strive to mimic and what’s more become these expected invented paid for humans, and even try hard to achieve the fulfilment of this goal by ticking every box that would make the, admittedly, poor assumption truer and truer as time goes on. Yet they continue in their endeavour to achieve the fulfilment of a ridiculed socio economic version of greatness that in their mind was assigned to them (and that they deserve). Class structure not withstanding, this self-perpetuating phenomena means that if you are within it you cannot see it, and, if you are criticised for being ‘within’ it, your innate sense of protection of it makes you forcibly sink deeper within as if the mere, actual honest helpful observation of the fact could make it worse (an affront/attack). I could say for example “do you really think you should give your four year old coca cola?” and they would say “fuck off cunt” which would actually in some twisted way in their minds confirm that giving coca cola to their kid is good because they would never want their kid to turn into a ‘cunt’ like I am for pointing that out. Here’s the conundrum, do they really think that or are they innately jealous of my schooling and advantages in life and, in being violently aggressive, show that they want their son/daughter to get out of the “shit” life they have?

Conundrum 1: do they think they have a shit life even thought they say all the time “out life is shit”?
Conundrum 2: do they want their child to have better schooling than they did i.e. do they admit that their schooling was bad?
Conundrum 3: do they admit that they do not have the means to raise a child ‘ideally’
Conundrum 4: do children who haven’t been to kindergarten understand ‘cunt’ ‘shit’ ‘fuck’ ‘asshole’?

What we have now is people striving to achieve the fulfilment of the false Them, mainly in order to gain financial rewards or any mix of power, responsibility or control (money basically, let’s face it). Trying to make it work, assembling a demi-god to aspire to, an epitome of what they know (at the start of this process) to be a false version of themselves or that this created person should want to be (outside of their own instinctive and initial values and beliefs, or worse, it then of course becomes their values and beliefs, replaces the original ingénue). Then, of course, judging themselves against this created-for-the-sake-of-getting-SOMETHING ‘straw man’ persona; am I behaving in accordance to the purposed entity I have created, and, how much of my real self, my reflection, my emotional response, is hindering my progression…that is, how much of my humanity (remember before the You you) is willing to die, be left behind or never existed in the first place. Now you may think this whole concept of You is laughable. When, for instance I ask; what about you? The only answer possible can be from the created You.

How do we now go with dualism? Namely: paid persona vs real persona. Mostly it’s fine, no one has a purpose, they post on facebook and twitter and everywhere because they are really the person they say they are, they really are one dimensional normal good proper society based controlled part-of-the-system types. Pejoratively there is a different kind of existent. Sure we are on the networks, sure we have jobs. Sure we are participating (because otherwise oh my god the world would be horrified or scared or curious to the degree that we may be reported for incongruent behaviour or more simply be de-integrated from the system! Luckily there is still a cultivation of admiration for outsiders as interesting or independent…) but the ways in which we do so are careful, sickeningly careful, even straight out false. In noticing the manufacture of a human and their instantaneous willingness to give away all semblance of ‘self’ to a process and procedure with real basic checks and follow ups and stalking and cross-checking, some have become naturally, um, suspicious? Jesus, yes! Suspicious. In the age of hyped schizophrenia and pervasive social media, we have forced well-thought, balance and aware humans to persist with a dual humanism. To create a hated twin. To live as that hated twin for certain times and in certain spaces.

Complete transparency is ok for those who are willing to be entirely, utterly and wholly (tautology aside) one dimensional. The breadth required for a working ‘person’ (remember, not really You) has grown to include all social engagements, all relationships, all family ties, all social movements full stop. Laying it all out, ‘becoming’ we will call it. It is known by many names within the world of laundered professionalism: achieving, progressing, promotion, growing etc[2]. The become the thing you are instructed to be, or, to become the thing that most benefits you financially, is to become a thing you have created, is to become the ideal that you have been paid to be externally. The ideal Person for the Job. Imagine spending hours honing your outwardly available persona in order to maximise the positive flow on effect that colleagues reading this so called ‘truth’ of your actual life just to get paid more or at least get more lee way in your nine to five day. The worse part is when you stop pretending or manipulating your supposed online persona, you start actually really being that. Another type of suicide, paid for this time, but worse than losing a real friend.

[1] It’s in the grammar.
[2] I need now to make it clear this is not some anti-establishment “the illuminati are in control” “banks are evil” or generally Marxist dogmatic fear-based reaction to a clear and obvious philosophical problem.
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Lego Manifesto

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When I was a boy my bedroom wall was an evolving visual statement of who was at the moment. At maybe twelve or thirteen, when I was most interested in Lego, I had meticulously used all the available wall space to display every facet of the space Lego realm I could. That meant posters, cutting out images from the box the Lego came in (to the point of orientating various logo cut outs from the box to fill empty spaces), shelving and grandly displaying finished pieces, at varying times in stasis acts of war or invasion or even (in my egalitarian moments) functional cooperation[1]. My desire for achieving perfection in my representation of the wall paled in comparison to my actual ownership of Lego, or in fact my actual communication with fellow children of my love of Lego. It was a private thing that I had and a desire to show myself (and my family) the shame I felt in not creating a perfect homage to Lego. This guilt (I guess) spurred me on because even though I and my parents could not afford to buy the complete set of anything, I felt in this absence of ownership a resulting obligation in that I should create something that transcended the mere ownership of the objects, that the desire and single-mined earnestness to complete the collection, complete Lego™’s own desired “full” set, was meaningless compared to my desire to use my other Lego collections to as closely as possible emulate the dream-like scapes that they envisioned on their larger scale marketing inserts (when you buy a large piece they give you an extra brochure that outlays the entire scope of the world they desire for the complete interaction of their Lego army (for that ‘series’), a plan you do not get when you buy the smaller, ancillary pieces that most people get as presents from Aunts and Uncles who don’t really care about you that much, they are usually about $20[2]).

 

Invariably (and in a way attempting to destroying any reverence I had for Lego) every other child I knew had a mother fucking huge BAG of the stuff (which I found out was Lego approved, a common way of storing massive collections). They cared little for the dissemination of pieces and distinction between genres I had come to self-teach[3] was the proper way to control ones Lego collection (using various boxes and cataloguing systems, carful to archive the manuals and partition the pieces into their correct “brand” grouping. I was not insane after all). The large bag exalted a way of treated Lego as a pile of garbage, as a toy, as a thing you ‘got out, messed with and then collapsed into a incoherent mess’ with no deep value other than perhaps an aggrandised ownership. I felt no guilt in stealing amazing pieces from these heathens. They did not appreciate what they had, I appreciated it far more, they would not notice any losses for they were fools with gold (or swines with pearls, whatever analogy you want). So I left their houses with my pockets full with reward. My only disgust came when these ill-gotten pieces from incomplete collections did not fit in with my carefully matriculated collections. They stood out like sore thumbs, they were singular and abhorrent[4].

 

Back in my bedroom, sitting over my modest yet superior Lego collection, I stared at it, processing the confusing mix of anger, disgust and admiration I felt toward those with grossly overpopulated übercollections. I stared at the pieces before me and felt love for every piece (except for maybe the two-ers[5] which, let’s face it, are pretty perfunctory and not very stable). I began to build, using colour matched pieces which a Lego perfectionist would know is the key to creating master works, a working industrial complex replete with security and staff quarters, an open plan building mimicking a cross between Die Hard (the movie) infrastructure and neo-terrorist capabilities (for the infiltrating party…this is ‘space’ Lego after all, they need advanced clever tools). It quickly became clear that my ability to creating fully fledged finished Lego-company quality pieces out mastered the kids with massively ambiguous grey-goo collections. They had no attention to detail. They had no idea of how to get the most out of every piece. They had no idea even of colour matching! They built like imbeciles seeking to create the tower of Babel. Red, yellow, blue (colours foreign to me for I had sets of pristine mainly white space Lego) were used indiscriminately…they made pieces that needed explanation, they made pieces that were abhorrent to nature and architecture. “Where do you see buildings like that?” I’d say. And they would answer feebly and without heart: “In the future”. Like that was a blanket rule that allowed them to create ludicrous monstrous-cities (sorry), as if human evolution would do away with aesthetics. Bah! I knew what they were doing. Quantity over quality. Having my refined collection meant I had to be smarter, more aware. My impoverished collection forced me to become much cleverer, less like a blundering buffoon who used Lego as a way to fill in time, avoid boredom, to luckily connect pieces like an ape.

 

Imagine them, opening their big bag and hearing the pieces settling, but not hearing it in a loving sense, in a noise sense, white noise, or worse even suffering it as an annoyance. The sit and draw their hnds through the pieces, inspiration-less, trying to find a base to begin with. Finding a landscape plate that inspires them! I’ll build a house! And hey build an ugly house. That will do, they think. Even with this sea of potential they crate a stock standard replication of their surroundings, enough for the inhabitants of this brief existence. In their exuberant living conditions they managed to fashion a cold dead ugly reflection of themselves. No awareness of a desire to create beauty, to produce a version outside of the current world, to give value, to offer a better version of life. These are the privileged children who go into government, make the rules they think we al can live by. Devoid of choice, value, appreciation and worst of all awareness that these things mater at all. My understanding of the preciousness of a single piece sets me apart from these conglomerate spoilt for choice moguls who, with it all, instead chose to develop ill-formed, visually disgusting normalities. And we wonder why things turn out like they do.

 

Mainly, Lego built in disdain is built for destruction. The pieces are built without any longevity, almost deliberately brittle and hollow, only visually useful, but mainly, once boredom has been replaced by a need to build with Lego (which is the reason/purpose/point of Lego) the next level (only ten or maybe twenty minutes later) was to smash their creation back to noting, back to a pile. There’s more fun in the destruction for these unimaginative irreverent gluttonous humans. Joy in destruction. Satisfaction in wreaking their crappy inventions. And here’s the clincher, the fat that they knew it was crappy, that it was always destined for the junk pile, that their eagerness to create was underpinned by the eventual desire to destroy. This is the real reason why they didn’t care about their huge collections, or the attention to detail in creating something everlasting. They wanted a quick dirty build followed by a triumphant suicide. The joy in killing what they made outweighed their joy in creating.

 

 

THE END

[1] That’s the great thing about Lego, it actually promotes a level of excitement in mundane cooperative actions, like setting up a moon base, like sharing resources, like fixing a vehicle et al. The greatest socialist tool is not killing all of the upper-class, its aggrandising common perfunctory interactions. Socialist propaganda? Space exploration as a tool for global supremacy? Want to be a town planner?

[2] Further, and the horror again, you realise that the I-don’t-give-a-fuck-about-you present you received from a somewhat distant and let’s face it probably poor adult you used to think were interesting and ‘big’ were those cheap as hell Chinese made rip-offs (fake crappy transformers) that I, now, would never consider giving to a friend’s child, or even as a gift to a acquaintances child let alone a true blood family member! These things happen over the years and you correct your history with them. The fact that you can add detail to historical events is bizarre, and it usually leads you to even further disgust for the moments you in your (youthful) gut knew were distasteful in the first place. You just couldn’t articulate them back then, beyond things like ‘this toy is CRAP!’.

[3] Thus creating a higher ideal I would hold all Lego owners unto.

[4] Not because they were stolen, no! Because they were orphans. Symbolic of the destiny I had rescued them from and juts didn’t fit in with the rest of the collected kits (mainly because I could visualise the finished kit just by seeing a single piece, hence the conceot of belonging).

[5] If you don’t know what this is either you are not versed enough in Lego or (being nice now) for some more or less common terminology start here http://www.themorningnews.org/archives/opinions/a_common_nomenclature_for_lego_families.php

 

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Some notes on humanity

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To understand the state of mind of a person these days you have to take into account a great deal more than any person in the existence of humanity has ever had to process. Here are the major ones:

  • Freedom (ego, acceptance, understanding, altruism, benevolence, political correctness)
  • Mass media (social networks, television, magazines, celebrity (and the dilution of celebrity i.e. everyone is a celebrity…Warhol: everyone will have 15 minutes of fame vs in fifteen minutes, everyone will be famous))
  • Authenticity (truth, honesty, gut feel, righteousness, perversion, accepting ourselves as animals)

 

To write a sentence now you have to be continuously and openly aware of all three precepts and propose a solution, an acknowledgement and a placebo to these themes. To say ‘this is this’ is no longer possible. To say ‘this is like this’ takes reams of explanation. To say ‘this can be this’ lacks awareness. To say ‘this’ is the only possible reality for art and life and culture. We have killed the importance of imagination and fantasy because it is not enough. We have killed reflection because we already know. We have killed curiosity because it is replaced by research. We have killed opinion because there are too many of them. What do we say to the world of self-corrupted sentiment? What do we scream now that hasn’t been screamed already? Why do we reflect upon ourselves in the moment of screaming to ask ‘why am I screaming’ or ‘what does it look like that I am screaming?’ or ‘do they believe me because I am screaming?’ or ‘do I want them to believe me because I am screaming ergo I am screaming so that they will believe me’ or ‘am I screaming because that is what you’re supposed to do in this situation’ or ‘I am screaming for real…really for real and there is nothing else I can do and feel inside but scream out loud and feel like there is nothing else I can possibly do’.

 

Here’s an attempt to address the three precepts:

Freedom: everyone is allowed to do whatever they want, of course, but there should sill be an impetus to improve. There is still such a thing as progression.

Mass media: at no other time in the history of humanity have we had such equal access to information. Instead of burying ourselves in shit, we can become gods.

Authenticity: we have come to learn that nothing is true, it is all an act, a representation of what is real. Worse, that people have come to understand reality as based on mimicries of life and are sustained by this and believe in their actual hearts that that is real life. Freedom (as above) has caused this false evolution.

 

More soon.

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I add, you add, we all scream for iAd

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See see see the problem is you want to do too much too soon. As if one sentence can make it, can make someone stand up and change their whole life. Their whole way of being who they have become after, what, forty years! If that sentence exists and you can just read it then its too powerful and scary. Its not even contained in any bible type thing (although sometimes proponents of written religious works think it is). So now the new advertising is a message that is spoken to you by you and can change you:

 

“Michael. Michael. Mi—chael…we know. We have been listening. Keep walking, it’s ok, we’re with you. Down this same old street. There’s something you need just down the way. Down the, no Michael not there. That’s not for you. That’s an adult theatre. You can walk past it this time. See? And we’re right here with you. What you want its to see this bedding. It’s soft, thick. Everything you need to be comfortable. Can you imagine being that comfortable, on a rainy day? Michael? Have a look here”

 

Slater & Slater were the first to invent “I” advertising. Not like radio, not like TV, hell, not even like Back To The Future II holographic stuff. This was the real future, the kind of real future you at first feel sick about and think is incredibly wrong but after only a few months accept and move on from. Basically what it is is everyone with an ‘i’ device or pretty much any other “smart” thing is automatically hooked up via either a wifi, 3G or Bluetooth connection to neighbouring users and so can be pinpointed by location and targeted thusly. Google were reluctant to get on board but in a meeting they persuaded them that it would yield more ad impressions and clicks on said keyword ads, warranting a new touch-what-you-want-wherever-you-are kind of point and click and so, they aren’t idiots…

 

Ok, here’s how it works:
You, with your iThing, walk around, plugged in like you normally are. Bing! a message comes in; a voice message. Through the speakers or right into your headphones. What? You didn’t sign up for this (and sure you can opt out but it’s hard because we’ve built it in to your plan. If you want to get rid of it you need to move to a different plan, a ‘free’ plan that will likely cost more (freedom is not cheap). So, a few discrete messages that you actually want based on who all of your accounts say you are OR anonymity at a price? You can choose of course but by default (check your contract) it’s ON. The outrage is subsided by relevance. Its almost like a friend cajoling you towards a destination. We don’t even like our friends, most of the time, making us go places and do things, so we can tolerate this. After all, it’s your own openly available, personally contributed to social identity talking to you. And who created that? You did, and you kind of respect yourself for being so careful about your online identity. Etcetera.

 

Read: it’s only your responsibility to ensure these invasions are not invasions so you must maintain a high level of connectivity and online presence to exclude you from unwarranted messages, i.e. the better you are at existing within this landscape the better we are at not bothering you i.e. delivering you what you actually want (and you agree that it is what you want).

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The Genius and Our Cynicism of Homeless Marketing OR Sorry, I’ve got no change

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I’ll start with a few examples;

(a) The Sign: this is when they[1] write maybe twenty words on a pathetic[2] piece of brown cardboard pleading their case in a way-too-aware-that-brief-words-have-meaning kind of way that alludes to an understanding of advertising principles.

(b) The Prayer: this one is brilliant[3], they kneel on the hard pavement and put their hands out in a pose reminiscent of a ‘true’ beggar from history.[4]

(c) The Engager: talks to you, words, voice, clever quips to either endear you or at least urge you in some way to give some coins.[5]

(d) The Asker: straight up confronts you, in your face, some are more committed than others. For example some are brief as in they try and give you the ‘sound bite’ pitch that will or will not catch you and others are hanger-on who actually walk along with you and break down your initial ‘no’ into a more and more ‘well, yeah sure’ so you give money. Pestilence par excellence.

(e) (oh no) The Truthful: they don’t even really beg. Basically they have stopped using any of the tactics and are just there. They don’t even have a receptacle or method in which to receive donations.

So here we go in talking about these strategies and how successful they are and if even success of these methods is desired by the perpetrators/performers and if in fact these analytics are observed, discussed and improved upon or simply are an aggregate function of our society[6]:

(a) The Sign

One example I encountered that I found particularly bad:

PLEASE HELP, WHAT YOU CAN. NEED MONEY FOR FOOD AND SHELTER. I DON’T WANT TO BE HERE.

Well of course they all start with please help, that is something that needs to be there. And in being there so commonly we as consumers (huh?) now pretty much ignore. Help is expected, understood. If I was to give advice I would leave that opening out of the intro. Imagine actually squatting next to them[7] and giving advice on this level: “I think this would work better if you…”. I mean that is worth way more than the fifty or so cents you’d throw into the hat or onto the rag or piece of paper or whatever they have in front of them, yet it’s incredibly insulting. Another noteworthy aspect is the choice of cardboard. It has to appear as though it is found or in some way scavenged. Not too perfect, yet not too beat up so that the message is illegible. And as far a illegibility goes that is another nuance of the sign writer, the text cannot be too well written so as to give the impression that the author is capable, that is able to perform the handwriting task so well that they are actually suitable for employment, and again not too illegible as to render the text ineffective. So it being created somewhat knowingly somewhere in between (I doubt we see a third of fourth draft version), a cynic gets the impression that it is deliberately slightly poorly written, in the same way an adult tying to mimic a child’s handwriting does the obligatory reversing of the letter e to effect some type of emotional or sense-memory response. A homeless sign writer uses grossly disproportionate font sizing, obligatory random capitalisation and a quick three or four word syntax. All these techniques when imagined how they are put into practice seems impossible for it is an organic process, whereby there are incremental improvements in the message over time. Do they take a break in their daily routine to wander the streets noting each others signs and resulting monetary success, and then use the good ideas they discover to alter their message for their next sign (research)? Is there a forum at which they discuss way in which to improve their messages (meeting)? What connectivity if any is there and, perhaps even more cynically now is there an ‘agency’ (I imagine organised crime) that is profiteering from these beggars, offering coaching, managing their physical placement, appearance, techniques and resultant monetary success (business)? Surely the percentage taking would be miniscule and not worthy of such effort. And lastly on the choice of receptacle for coins, it seems the smaller the better. Of course we all know they remove their takings every so often so that it seems like they have been given a small amount which is supposed to compel you to contribute, I mean they think that if they are sitting in front of twenty dollars worth of coins we are going to be less likely to contribute? This is how they see us. As stupid, as uncaring, as if we are able to dp the quick maths of adding up a bunch of silver coins and think: they don’t need my dollar.

(b) The Prayer

This one really hurts, so you could say, it’s effective. Perhaps it’s just because of the physicality of it, or the Judeo-Christian biblical implications that pose possesses. I’ve seen this used in the greatest and probably truest of senses in Rome where gypsy women actually lay kneeling and face down with their cupped hands out over their heads. There is real suffering in their body, you can see it. Their knees hurt, it is hard to stay upright, they tremble and sway, they look up to a god in the sky, all hallmarks of the classical artworks of the great masters. Seeing such wanton, pure hope and pain is confronting, and an affront to our own sensibilities, mainly because we see this whilst shopping for new clothes or looking for bottled water because we are slightly thirsty (and cranky now because why can’t I find a god damned bottle of water in this piece of shit city and when I do it’ll be three bucks, fuck!). As you know, they have possessions, bedding, excess clothes, other basic necessities so in order to perform this tactic these items must be safely secured. So we can guess that they have either a secure place or a community that is watching over their kit. In this sense then the desire to get money rapidly is important, therefore the extremity in which they ask for money is heightened, as they must appear bereft of any kind of support structure and in being so are vulnerable and/or constantly worried about theft and the real possibility of ‘losing it all’ to an insanely finetuned heightened degree . In summary this deception is designed to bring in income quickly, for as we all know high risk ventures are more lucrative.

(c) The Engager

The first thing you love about this approach is how charming, unthreatening and basically ‘like us’ they are who employ it. Well spoken, clean, jovial and seemingly upwardly mobile, they represent the version of homelessness that we, in our darker moments, can envisage ourselves embracing. The line I heard that made me give many gold coins was “ah here comes a potential source of income!”. Clever. I walked past him every day for a further two weeks until he came up with “spare some change for a man who shares the DNA of a leech”. Wow. So many post-modern hip meta references in that one line. That equals money (which I happily gave). The urge to give money transcends pity, it becomes fellowship, genuine friendship help, you no longer care that it may or may not be used for alcohol, you want to buy him a drink. As far as marketing is concerned, this is the way to go. That being said, it takes a lot of resources to achieve this, possibly even resources which rival a lowly paid factory worker, like a bed indoors, access to a kitchen, laundry and bathroom facilities. So in that sense, giving money to this type of ‘homeless’ person is probably not the best use of charity. There’s the twist, that we have the capacity to judge levels of worthiness based on degrees of comfort. They are one and all worse off than you clearly because your lunch and bottle of wine that night will cost approximately what they make, yet because they have a pleasant disposition you (a) want to give them money (b) don’t feel compelled to give them money.

(d) The Asker

Insofar as I hate hate hate this it works the best, mainly for that very reason. To equate it to marketing or life terms it’s the most annoying ad on TV or the most annoying person you know. And isn’t it funny and bizarre and counterintuitive that these ads and people you know actually succeed (in anything). Why? Because there are always (a) people so stupid they believe the hype (b) people so dull they find it exciting (c) people who are unable to deal with such an affront that they yield. (oh and of course (d) the people unafraid enough to scream FUCK OFF). That a 75% chance of success, or, actually higher seeing as those in group (d) represent maybe 2-3% of the population, so we’re talking a huge 97% success rate. No wonder flashing, yelling and manipulate advertising and fucking loud annoying-ass people are still around, and, not only that, inexplicably getting results. Bottom line stuff. Money. The Asker attaches themselves to you and doesn’t let go, they have a story, more a diatribe, an unchanging repetitive messages, full of supposedly catchy sympathetic scenarios, pithy situational diagrams and brief easy solutions that YOU can provide repeated ad infinitum until you do something about it (which as I illustrated in 97% of cases if give some coins). There are two major things going on here, (1) being that they basically do not respect you, in that they know you can be beaten, you are not clever or forceful enough to do anything other than eventually succumb to their will and (2) they know you do not like them, do not want to spend any time engaging with them or seen to be engaging with them so your natural flight-or-fight instinct will kick in and, well, its easier to pay them off then start a fight. This approach is most commonly used in major public thoroughfares that are not monitored or controlled by security, shop fronts, or places that have a concerted desire to keep such succubi at bay. Essentially city parks, major connecting pedestrian roadways and outside large shipping complexes (note: outside the golden place of air-conditioned luxury that represents a haven for those with a disposable income or loose credit morals).

The counter to this definition is seen when desperation forces this type of charity seeker to approach customers seated at the outdoor tables of restaurants and cafes. This is a very ineffectual way to solicit funds for you are basically shooed away like a stray cat by the proprietors who shrug their shoulders at their customers in an effort towards an apology that makes me feel sick at seeing the person I am about to give fifty dollars to for a couple of coffees and two toasted foccacias treat another human being so indifferently. No tip for you.

(e) The Truthful

There is no ulterior motive here, mainly because they are not trying to gain anything. The truly homeless, the truly decrepit, the truly lost in the world are not trying to get your money in any way. They rely purely on the world and any one’s common human decency to assist them in not dying for another day. This is why we give money to charities so that they may help these people by providing soup and blankets and such. If I was to insinuate that this kind of lifestyle is in any way calculating then you have my permission to find out where I live of work and throw rotten fruit and vegetables at me. My only comment on this reality is: how amazing it is in this day and age and in this society that I live in these people can exist and live and breathe.

LASTLY: the phenomenon of being ridiculed for giving too little!

[1]Okay I do realise the use of the word ‘they’ is terribly incorrect and (what I would say terrible atypical of ) sociological analysis is critically wrong. Can I also offer that this is just common usage and, by way of a footnote apology go on to use the term they but have you know that I m not so callous and crass and classist to think that it is an okay term. If you want to discuss the ways in which this is wrong or debate the ways in which I could possibly go about correcting this misdemeanour in society’s mind then please email me. I won’t bore the rest of you with this suffice to say we will probably agree so, hold your horses.

[2] I’ll explain later why I use this word

[3] I know, I mean it in a sense of…well, please read on

[4] Oh god now I am sure to be labelled a horrible person now. Look, bare with me, this is the beginning and you can be assured that by the end either you will like me, agree with me or at the very least understand what I am writing is not an arrogant diatribe of a wealthy capitalist trying to understand the ‘trouble’ we are having with the ‘dirty underlings’. Okay?

[5] My favourite

[6] Brief example: how would one at first realise that a sign is the best method to facilitate monies and also how would one know how to optimise a sign to maximise incoming coin AND THEN ALSO how would one know that one’s sign was at first effective and then became less so because of the emergence of another’s more successful sign leading to a decline in your signs ‘heart string’ approval rating thereby leading you to adjust your sign to measure up to the new appropriate ‘heart string index’.

[7] Again…I know. Did you read the other footnotes? What do you want me to use in play of ‘them’?

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Billy Evans Pies

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Homeless writer – I paid 20c for this piece which means he has officially made more money from publishing fiction than I have.

His technique is to stand with a vaudeville-esque hat on the ground (the brim slightly tilted in an homage to Chaplin), pointing at the hat to illuminate it. It works. It is amazing the simple marketing tactics of homeless people (more on that soon).

The syntax of this piece is amazing:
Billy Evans Pies

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Media and what it makes

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The worst thing is we expect people to be able to deal with insanely complex situations without any kind of education or intelligence. Instead we get to see people react like TV show characters that have been written by paid people trying to sensationalise, in a paid way, a version of human reactions to hardcore real life scenarios which, seemingly accurate and serving in place of any reality have come to supplant anything real and are now quid pro quo the way most humans do in fact react to and reason of life’s challenges. Worse that these living humans are not aware of this, aware that the way in which they are behaving is actually orchestrated and may or not be real, that fiction has become their actual subconscious reaction. Worse that because this is what they think and have learnt that there is no way of talking them out of it, convincing them otherwise, no way of getting in as it were because they are already convinced that what is real is based on commercial television and movies. Real simply because it is backed up by popular culture as in ‘look, it’s right there…what are you crazy? What is wrong with you for not getting this?’ etcetera. I am talking about the existence now of non-persons. Humans who are mainly constructed by pop culture, by the values, ideals, concepts, morality and behavioral cues taken from the produced media which has become so clever at pretending it is a mirror of reality that what has happened is that people believe it is a mirror and then adjust their self to fit the reflection.

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SLATER AND SLATER

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Frederick had a good idea. Jelly wrestling, three girls, then, five or six big pig dogs come in and just jump in there and start, ripping at their flesh but the girls, they’re like laughing and trying to play with them even as the dogs are sinking their teeth into their legs, bellies and breasts, and their hair is mixed with jelly and blood and the dogs are like pure muscle and going crazy like devils and the girls are sort of screaming laughing and almost like fucking the dogs and squirming, you know. How to film that though? Johnno thought of lots of spliced close ups and then Fred was all like real dogs but tame and real girls and like fake blood but is that enough? and then James, you know, the boss, just kept asking how does this sell beer and we’re like it’s a joke, you know, like how guys like jelly wrestling and dogs and it’s like, overkill, you know…all those other ads with girls and cars and beer but he didn’t get it he just wanted jelly wrestling and like loud rock music or something and we were saying that’s not interesting and back and forth and so we had to go and come up with some more concepts but instead we were so pissed off we just went on an early lunch down at Henry’s. What a shit hole really but the damn place is right next to the office and it’s like four bucks a beer so we just bought beer and Tom bought some wedges and that was that.

“Fucking hell I thought James would go for that, man!”

“We didn’t pitch it right, I mean, we didn’t have the images right”

“Yeah, we need some photo outfit to get some glam shots of that shit”

“Yeah yeah like, some stills of some hot models covered in like jelly and blood and stuff”

“Got to be blondes…GOT to be blondes”

“I’m getting another round”

And we had rounds, four rounds or something because what faggot wouldn’t buy a round? Normally Tom but we made him get a round, trying to get out of it buying some wedges, fuck that, get some beers AND some wedges Tom you asshole. Nancy at the front desk, sexy bitch, was all smiles and giggling because she could tell we were all half pissed and Johnno was like ‘what you doing tonight’ like he always does and she says something like ‘nothing with you’ the playful little thing and we get in the lift and Fred lights a cigarette and we’re telling him to put it the fuck out and he does one floor from the office and the doors open and we pour out all smoke and loose suits but you know that’s what we do and who the fuck is going to say anything…come up with better work and then we’ll talk. There’s a new girl in the office and she’s all open eyes and saying nothing so, you know, screw her she doesn’t know who we are and it’s back in our office and Fred rips down the cards with the dogs and shit on them and says ‘next!’ and we get out our pads and phones and I say ‘what next? That’s the fucking idea. Lets pitch it to the client!’ and Johnno says we can’t because of James and as much as we all think fuck him it’s not how it’s done, asshole got his hands so tight around the clients scrotums they’d never go with anything he wasn’t sitting there smiling about with his big shit-eating endorsement. Whatever, got to make this sex and death thing more appealing…how the fuck can you advertise some beer with the slogan ‘Get it down your throat’ I mean, that’s aggressive right I mean what else do they want? Their last piece of thirty second garbage was some Swedish skiers malarkey and it’s all about blow jobs and snow and swallowing frozen sperm or piss or something and like THAT’S okay?  Tom closes the blinds and Fred lights another cigarette, Johnno gets the small bottles of scotch out of his drawer and sets them on the table, I take one and pour it onto a glass ‘ice?’ but no one filled up the bar fridge

“Fucking hell! How hard is it to fill it up the fucking sink is right there, or wait no, there’s a jug of water in the fucking fridge right there, jesus’

“Shut up Sash it was probably you”

“Yeah right, like I’m a cunt huh?”

“Just drink it neat you baby, or splash some of your ‘fridge water’ in it”

“That’s not a bad idea, Johnno, pass me the jug”

And so I tip some of the water in and we can get on with it…a new idea to sell this piss tasting beer.

“Beer bongs?”

“Nah…too teen”

“Too obvious”

“Well, they did go with cock sucking Swedish chicks…”

“All right fine…what about a DUDE wrestling with the chicks?”

“And what is he getting down his throat”

“Like, like a freeze frame at the last second of some chick with half her hand down his throat, and his eyes are all bulging and he’s all red and about to throw up, you know, like, gagging, and it’s like freeze frame in the moment and then: Greigsons…Get it down your throat…BANG”

“Right and then we do like, five of them with shit getting stuffed down throats right, like, choking on a pie or like, sword swallowers or…”

“Porn chick”

“Fuck imagine…that would be cool…yeah…okay…not bad”

“Ha! That’s hilarious!”

“Ok ok, Tom, draw something up…lets see how it’ll looks for a pitch”

“Fucking geniuses again…what was that like, five minutes”

“No way Fred, we were talking about that all lunch remember”

“Oh yeah…expense account!”

“Fucking A”

The afternoon wears on but we’re done here really so we wait until Tom has finished mocking up the stills and they look pretty good and the little bottles are gone so I email Nancy to fill it up for tomorrow and we have a few more cigarettes and grab out jackets and leave. James is n the hall and he stops Johnno and they go into his office but the rest of us get in the lift. Me and Fred get out at the lobby but Tom takes it down to the basement. Typical Tom.

*                              *                              *

The morning sun makes the office look all yellow and like we’re still in the 1960s. Doesn’t help that the office was actually built in the 1960s and the tiny windows that were so cool back then just make this air conditioned hell hole even seedier, pinholes of light blasting in on otherwise dark cubicles. The account managers bashing away in their cells trying to place pissy little ads in magazines or newspapers or, fuck! The end of the industry…online advertising. Like anyone buys shit from a ugly banner ad. These kids have no idea, all fresh-faced, fancy designer clothes, nice university degrees that say ‘digital communications’ or ‘social media’ bullshit. You want money? Get your shit onto TV period. Thirty seconds to get some sitting-at-home-on-their-useless-fat-ass idiot to bother to get out their credit card the next time they’re in some shitville store and buy some useless crap they think they need just because we told them to. That’s it. You want to know what stuff we’ve sold? Okay, toothpaste, okay? Oraldent. Used to be some ugly all-white too-minty paste that no one would ever consider buying…tucked down there at the bottom of the shelf with the crappy ‘we contain no fluoride’ shit for weirdos and hippies…and especially not when the ‘family trusted’ brands like Colgate and Macleans have such a duopoly. What we did? Oral dent. Dent. Oral. Do the maths. We had every fucking male teen from the age of fourteen to THIRTY buying that paste. Why? Because why the fuck would you want to raise a family when your could get a blow job every morning, or even the idea of a blow job every morning. Even if it’s a joke. Even if you don’t even think you’ll ever get a blow job in the morning, it doesn’t matter. Now they’re the number two selling toothpaste in this country because we know what makes dumb fucks tick. Tick. Ha, that’s a joke. We need to get some more god damn titis in here. Fucking bosses keep hiring these faux-beard ‘Gen X’ in touch with the skaters douchebags…we’ve got more semen piling up in here than a fucking sperm bank. Sorry, crap line but you get my meaning. Everyone’s twittering like the world’s gonna end…fucking hundred years time the world’s hard drives are gonna be full of useless puke about people’s ‘day-to-day’. Day to day? Since when did anyone care about day to day? We have entertainment, books, movies, art, music and god knows how many things specifically designed for us to forget about the annoying morose day-to-day! God, these kids…they could use a drink, and just as soon as I stop flirting with the girls in the café that’s exactly what I’m going to do: The blondes getting their herbal teas and wheat free muffins are all cute and stuff but they must look at me like I’m some hard skinned monster but, you know, it’s cool to play with the whole they-have-to-worship-me-because-I’m-senior-partner stuff and they just say whatever nice thing pops in their empty suck-cock-to-get-ahead brains, about my tie or my shoes or (god) my cologne, which, by the way, is just good scotch and maybe a few squirts of Ralph Lauren whatever is new. Didn’t even mention the watch…wouldn’t even know it’s an Omega.

“Long black darling and don’t you dare out any sugar in it”

“Of course not mister Bernstein”

“You been here long?”

“You ask that every day”

“Do I? And what do you say?”

“I’ve been here three weeks Mr…”

“Sash, okay…did I ever tell you to call me that before? Seeing as you’ve been here three weeks I must’ve told you to call me Sash before”

“Yes…you did…but…”

“But what?”

“The other partners they….I call them…like mister and…”

“Okay okay, so…you’re thinking ‘this up-his-ass prick’ is, what, just like all the other up-their-ass pricks so even though he is saying ‘don’t call me mister’ he actually means please keep treating me like a fucking up-his-ass prick is that right?”

“Oh, (laugh) oh no…it’s (laugh/giggle thing) no…”

“Okay, okay so…from now on…okay…from now on you’re going to call me…what?”

“Um…Sash”

“Perfect…Sash, okay…and we’re not going to do this again, right?”

“No Sash”

“Excellent…and it’s a long black you’re making?”

“Yes Sash”

“Great”

So I have to deal with this fucking idiot just to get a coffee, right? So instead I can pay two dollars fifty downstairs or deal with this? Okay okay…’thanks’ I say and take my coffee out of there and remember that I can just buzz Katy to get me a coffee and why the hell not, it’s her job and I wouldn’t have to talk to that three-week idiot again but then of course those insipid yet easy ‘account manager’ girls are there, but, you know like not worth it. In the office Tom and Johnno are already doing something and I don’t really want tog get involved right now and Fred’s on the phone talking some bank stuff so I tip some scotch into my coffee and wait for us to start the meeting.

*                              *                              *

Tom’s got another bruise on his cheek he’s covered in foundation, like we can’t tell, the idiot, get carried away doesn’t he and forgets who’s in charge or actually likes it (!). So, SHOES   ARE   FOR   FEET, that’s what we’re dealing with today and Johnno’s on to all these ideas like ‘crushing’ and ‘soul destroying’ and other weird stuff but it sounds good. We’re going to kill the whole ‘shoes give you freedom’ clichéd crap pouring from other agencies (for Nike) or the ‘shoes make the man’ boredom (from Boss) or the ‘women love shoes’ idiom (from Sex and the City type stuff). Fred’s got a pair of the things on the table and they look okay, kind of like half-sneaker half-dress shoe type of things like you can wear them with a suit or at least good dress pants like these rappers do, rappers ha! more like fucking millionaires trying to ‘keep it real’ by wearing these things with suits, okay, so you’ve got the picture. They’re, what, like three hundred retail. Okay so we’ve got like six boxes of them and they’re all pretty much the same: leather, laces, clan lines, fine sticking, not too much stupid swirls and crap, kind of low key and shined up, like a good leather jacket but a shoe.

“Okay so it’s like don’t take shit”

“Shit. What shit?”

“Like the whole shoes in a club, shoes in a fuck-off restaurant stuff”

“Okay”

“Okay so, like, fuck the convention, wear these”

“Yeah okay…what’s the hook?”

“Who makes these anyway?”

“Ah it’s some Paris Hilton type brand…they cal themselves Billionaire’s club…it’s Pharell. From The Neptunes”

“Yeah yeah, they’re the guys that have basically remade Justin Timberlake and Brittney and co.”

“And who are we selling to?”

“Fucking hell Tom do your research. It’s basically for fucking trend-heads who have no money but are BURSTING to piss away their McDonald earned cash for these ultra cool shoes, right? So they can dance like mother fuckers and get laid while looking all ‘I don’t give a fuck’ shabby. Got it?”

“Yeah yeah I know…Christ I was up until like three or some shit…give me a sec guys”

“Yeah right and that smack to the face isn’t helping”

“Shut the fuck up Fred…this…this is something else”

“Been spending too much time in the basement huh? You’re gonna get AIDS at this rate”

“Yeah those girls have AIDs, like they don’t check that shit”

“Ha yeah, you’re right. Anyway fuck, we’ve got like three hors to nail this all right? They’re here this afternoon”

“Are we taking them for drinks? What girls are we getting? Not Stacey again because she is a fucking annoying lightweight. Almost cost us the Christal account”

“Um not Stacey…she’s fired Sash”

“Makes sense”

“Of course we’re taking them for drinks!”

“Yeah I mean we just need a basic outline, some shit they’re going to think is like ‘whoa’”

“Okay so…back o the basics…what do these rich kids want, huh? Sales…but…why the idiot no-money-hip-hop-douchebags? Can we, I don’t know, get the cashed up white folk buying these?”

“Yeah right like ‘be as cool as an African American’! So what, we need some big asses or what?”

“Yeah, we need hip-hop beats, oiled up asses and just at the end the shoes. Fuck it, that’s easy”

“Christ, too easy. Keep thinking”

“No wait, how we gonna pitch with Tom all banged up wearing his sister’s make up?”

“Fuck off Johnno”

“No seriously Tom…what the fuck were you thinking?”

“I got carried away you know….you know what it’s like”

“Um yeah I do, but I don’t get them to hit me in the fucking face! Ah fuck it whatever, it’s done. You can just make the mock ups and go home to get your shit sorted”

“Okay okay…lets just get something up on the cards”

“I’ve got it! Dominatrix. Tom, rub that makeup off your face. Johnno, all that weird stuff you were saying about ‘crushing’. Here it is; hot chicks, leathered up, I mean make up, hair, all that. Wailing on guy’s with these shoes on…like fucking loving it, right, like, sexy cool, like, fuck you I can do what the fuck I want. But before that it’s all suits and style and all that Jay-Z classy stuff, but like in the end their like getting whipped and fucking these hot dominatrix bitches, right?”

“Sash you are a fucking genius”

“Yeah yeah and Tom is all like, ‘I get it, I love it’”

“Fuck off”

“No seriously, you can be presenting this shit with your whole bruised face thing wearing the shoes, I mean, you’re not an ugly fuck, hell, you’re probably the best looking guy here. We need to get you a better suit…call Katy”

We celebrate, Tom makes the cards, Johnno on the phone again and me and Fred finishing some scotch telling each other we need to make sure they buy better stuff next time. Johnny Walker black label, what the hell is that crap? It’s only eleven and we have to wait two hours for lunch.

*                              *                              *

We get back from lunch and Rick is in James’ office, throwing his arms around like he does, got James smiling his wide smile, getting his cock sucked always makes him look like that. Fucking little ass crawling shitbag…last ad he did was for a magazine, some up-herself stick figure blonde chick dressed like a god awful princess gracefully receiving a diamond ring from some homosexual male model, yeah right, fucking beautiful. Did we keep the account? Yes we did. How did we keep that account? Because James the moron promised them a BIG TV AD…and who’s doing the ad? Not fucking us I can tell you that. Now Rick is all shit scared and trying to get in with us. Yeah keep buying us drinks, yeah send us your pathetic emails. Get ready to burn in hell you little piece of shit. Good luck affording your new apartment and suits. Fucking hotheads, you know, they land one job and start spending all their cash like it’s gonna last forever. Doesn’t matter how long you been doing this, you fuck up, you lose the client’s money, and you can kiss your life goodbye. I mean it. You mess up with half a mil of someone else‘s money, just try and get a job in this country again.

“Ricks in with James gain”

“That little shitbag”

“Tell me about it”

“Got his fucking tongue right up his ass huh?”

“You know it”

“Got a taste for ass that little ugly cunt”

“Ah fuck him, he’s out of here in one month, tops”

“Not the way he gets that cock down his throat he won’t be”

“Forget that shitbag, lets go over the pitch”

“Fuck the pitch lets go downstairs”

“Henry’s?”

“No dumbass, downstairs”

“Why not? We got a couple-a-hours”

“I’m in”

“All right lets go…grab some bottles Tom”

And we’re leave that mess behind, got it all down anyway: Shoes + Bondage = Sex Sells. How hard is that? Those rap douches are going to go ape shit for it. We’ll tell them about oiled up shaved muscled black guy chests, gold chains, sexy big assed chicks, whips and leather and crap and BANG their shoes in the frame, all fresh and edgy. They’ll be hard as rocks when we’re done…bus ads, billboards, magazines, TV, music videos, soft-core porn micro sites, everything. Sign up for some barely covered tits spanking some other barely covered tits. Cut to Shoes. Done. We get in the lift and press the big red ‘B’.

There’s only one spotlight on, hard to see if there’s anyone here today. The chains and cuffs are open and I can maybe make out a bucket. Tom turns the lights on and there’s two girls over in the corner sort of half sitting on each other, some light sheer nighties on and pink fluffy slippers. It’s not cold in here, it’s maybe like 30 degrees, they look scared.

“What the fuck did you do last night Tom?”

“Nothing…I mean, this one chick, this one chick, she…she fucking…like hit me so, like…you know…”

“Oh not again…you’re a sick bastard you know! Now we gotta go over there and be all nice and shit. Fuck you’re a moron. Luckily you can do mock ups like no one’s business. Urgh, get the keys”

Tom gets the keys off the wall, one of the girls get up, yelling something and we tell her to shut up we’re coming in and she’s struggling against the ankle chain like some dog and it’s pathetic really and she’s saying we’re all pigs and Fred’s laughing and Johnno is already talking his clothes off. Tom opens the cage and we go in, the other girl is just sitting there all quiet and the other one is standing there, nice tits, firm and pointy. She must be like, twenty, maybe twenty one, jesus the assholes upstairs know how to keep us going that’s for sure. Johnno walks over to her and pulls her hair back, she tries to kick him but he’s not weak and just moves her back and turns her around, pushing her against the wall and playing with her ass, she’s trying to push back but he’s got his other hand on her wrist and he’s twisting her arm hard against her back and pushing her face into the cement. He’s got her nightie up and is pushing his fingers into her holes hard and dry and she’s crying out and he asks for a gag. There’s a rag on the floor which I give to him and he wraps it around her mouth and ties it so she can only sort of whimper and it’s better that way, still, her hands are all over the place so he takes her over to the rack and eventually get’s her hands cuffed in. The other one is watching us and it’s like she’s curious or waiting or something so I go over and sit next to her.

“You like this?” I ask and she doesn’t say anything, “Huh? You like watching her getting raped? Lets watch then”.

Tom comes over to me but I gesture for him to go away, he goes and sits on a bench and lights a cigarette, he had enough last night the pervert so he’ll wait his turn. Fred’s got a big dildo and he’s rubbing in between the girls legs, she trying to kick back but Johnno hits her in the ribs and she calms down. Fred spits onto the thing and shives it into her pussy but it’s not working so he takes it out, spits on his fingers and starts working her open that way. Johnno rips her nightie off and starts sucking on her nipples while Fred works the dildo into her pussy. She kind of struggles but the two guys are pretty much just doing whatever now and Fred’s got his face buried in her ass. The girl next to me is motionless, I open her legs and she doesn’t do anything, I start playing with her pussy and still nothing, it’s like, what the fuck is wrong with her or more likely, something really is wrong with her. Not very erection inspiring, or maybe that’s her game? I pull a blanket out and lay her down face first and start to take my pants off. The other guys are really going for it now I mean, Johnno’s slapping the hell out of her ass and Fred’s driving the thing in and out in and out and she’s got her head forward and trying to scream but it just sounds like a really soft cat meow or a howling dog or something and Johnno pushes Fred away and throws the dildo into a corner and starts really fucking her, I mean like really like he can’t possibly even enjoy it himself and he’s pulling her hair and spitting on her face and all kinds of shit and Fred joins Tom on the bench, pulls out a mini-scotch and smokes a cigarette. I’ve got two fingers in this girls ass and it’s tight and warm and smells like shit but it’s a sweet kind of thing, it does dawn on me ‘when did these girls last take a shower’ but it was probably this morning so they should be pretty clean and my fingers come out okay so not too bad and I keep working at her asshole with fingers and spit until it feels ready and my cock is hard. Johnno is done and he’s turned her around and her arms are crossed and her face is red and covered in loose hair and his spit and now he’s got his whole hands up there just ramming at her and her tits are jumping up and down so fast you can barely make them out and he gestures for someone to come over and Tom gets up and goes over and Johnno tells him to undo her cuffs and she falls onto the floor and then they’re just fucking whatever now, face, pussy, ass, and I can’t watch anymore because it’s so abstract, these two guys just moving about shoving their cocks here and there while this girl is like, like, a rubber doll of something. And I’m like up to my waist in this girls ass and she’s just making this ‘uh uh uh’ sound which is really tuning me on and hell even I start doing it, thrusting and saying ‘urgh’ like louder than her so it’s all so intense and she’s like a quiet lamb just taking it and I’m having actual nice thoughts about this one which is rare and I don’t like that any more so I put my hands around her throat to you know like stop the sound, just squeezing her neck and pulling her head up and she’s got her mouth and eyes shut tight now which feels good and I cum in her ass after about one more minute of this and I’m done. Johnno is done too and just like he always does it getting his suit back on, over by the sink with the mirror smoothing out his hair with water and watching himself smoke a cigarette. Almost a too cool but too crazy a thing that ritual. Tom the psycho is hitting her in the back of the head and calling her ‘slut’ ‘cunt’ ‘whore’ and all kinds of stuff, really taking it out on her. Poor guy, must be how we treat him, right? Comes down here, goes fucking ape shit. Terrible.

“How’re things Fred?”

“Yeah fine…not really into it today”

“Throw me a bottle huh?

He throws me a vodka and I throw it back, then he throws me a scotch.

“Fuck what the hell, they’re still giving us this shit. I got to talk to Katy.” I open the bottle and finish it one go, “hurry the fuck up Tom, jesus. We got a pitch in like half an hour!”

Tom’s banging away, got that look in his eye like he’ll never stop so we just leave him there and I throw a roll of toilet paper over to the girl I came inside.

“See you upstairs Tom…don’t be late…two thirty okay” and he kind of says okay but it’s like o-o-o-k-k-k type thing with breathing and now we’re done it’s just plain gross to see Tom like that.

*                              *                              *

The men’s room on our floor has these warm-wet-forest-fresh towels that I use to get her shit out form under my nails and the aroma is so refreshing it’s like ‘where am I?’ but the feeling is broken by the sound of some sicko pissing in a urinal like right into the water. It’s like ‘didn’t your parents or someone ever teach you not to do that?’. I mean seriously, what kind of unadjusted socially retarded peasant does that? Oh look, there’s some water I guess I’ll pee straight into it, like in the river back on the farm. Manners, right, like maybe someone else is in this cacophonous tiled room that’s a veritable echo chamber to expose all your basic bodily functions. If you need to be told this then you should be fired on the spot. We don’t want inconsiderate illogical dunces working for Slater and Slater. The cubicle door opens and it’s no surprise that Rick strolls out, a dullard’s grin on his face as he publically zips up his fly.

“Sasha, how’s things. Heard you got the Greigson’s account. Man you guys are the business”

“Sash”

“Huh?”

“Don’t call me Sasha ok? It’s Sash. In fact, don’t even fucking call me Sash. You’re gonna call me Mr Bernstein or your ass is going out the fucking window, okay?”

“Jesus take it easy. I’m on your team, okay? We gotta get this place up and running twenty first century style you know what I mean?”

He runs his hands under the tap, no soap, reaches for a hot towel,

“Hey. What the fuck are you doing slimeball?”

“What” he says, picking one up and rubbing it on his face and neck.

“You ever hear of hygiene?”

“Huh?”

I turn on the tap, press some foam soap into my hands and rub them together, looking at Rick like he’s an infant.

“See? Watch me now. This is the important stuff your alcoholic fuckhead of a father should have taught you”

“What did you say?”

“I said your fresh-out-of-jail unshaven loser of a father should have at least showed you how to wash your hands. What the fuck do they teach you where you’re from? How to steal car stereos that no ne wants anymore and sell them for a tenner?”

“Hey man…you’re out of line”

“Out of line, huh? I tell you what’s out of line…you fucking coming up to me and anyone from my team and even thinking for a second you are one of us. For a second. What kind of fucking degenerate university taught you that you know ANYTHING about what we do. You push out the most gut-sickening clichéd shit I’ve ever seen, get one account per year that takes a fucking truckload of cum drinking for you to keep. Maybe make what, a ten percent commission, and then try and fucking stand here next to me, rinse your fucking loser ass piss stained fingers under cold water and just think ‘hey, I’m going to talk to Sash…even though I am a turd and he is a FUCKING PARTNER!’ Any of this making sense to you?”

“Calm down man, I’m just…”

“Shhh. I’m done. Okay?”

My heads buzzing, scotch and fucking and that got damn oily skinned bad suit asswipe just comes together and

“Hi Sash”

“Hi Stacey…how’s the mag going?”

“Good good, but hey, I wanted to ask you…”

“Not right now okay…I’m pitching in like five minutes so I’ve got to go get my face on”

“UH, okay Sash, but, I, I’m gonna come find you later”

“Sur Stacy, you come by and see me. We’re gonna go for a drink though okay”

And she says something but I’m not really listening and it’s amazing I even got those three lines out at all. They’re all in the office and Tom is making some more sketches, like the back up sketches because as soon as one of the idiot executives freaks out we just put those up and they calm down and we can push through what we want without them doing too much thinking. Legal. Consumer. Reaction. Blah blah heard it before, way ahead of you. Fred’s playing with his phone again, he’s getting screwed over some share deal so we understand but he’ll have to keep the crowd going in about ten minutes and Johnno is sitting back, smiles at me when I come in. I sit down and run my fingers through my hair, it’s weird right now, I’m more shaky than I usually am.

“You okay Sash?”

“Yeah. Are we ready? Let’s go”

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