Christmas List

Jan 30, 2008 - 13:34 PM PST

Sunday, December 23, 2007

I'd like to figure out why it is that bands like the Trans-Siberian Orchestra and artists like Josh Groban make me so angry. I'm currently investigating a possible empirical proof of TSO's suckage, but I've yet to figure out exactly why it is that they irk me so, and why I might completely disregard a person's sense of aesthetics were they to like such music.

I'd like to live in a city with a professional baseball team, and I'd like to have season tickets. Minor league ball is alright, but those guys are worried about more than just winning a pennant. They're trying to work their way towards some serious coin.

I'd like for Nickelback's airplane to crash in the Andes.

I'd like for the only way for Nickelback's drummer to survive to be for him to eat Nickelback's singer.

I'd like Loverboy's "Working for the Weekend" to be playing in the background while Nickelback's drummer eats Nickelback's singer.

I'd like a new Tonka Truck. I haven't seen one of these in years, but I remember how detailed and sturdy they were when I was a kid, and I'm sure they've only gotten better.

I'd like to pay some guys to move all the boxes and furniture out of my apartment.

I'd like to be in a really terrible car wreck if I could be completely impervious to pain and injury.

I'd like to be strong like the Hulk.

I'd like to not be green.

I'd like Al Gore to run for President.

I'd like to find out, for sure, which baseball players used steroids.

I'd like to get me some of those steroids.

I'd like to hit me a home run with some of those steroids!

I'd like a pool table.

I'd like to be able to have a beer and a smoke without it being a sign of the apocalypse.

I'd like to have a radio show on which I do funny voices.

I'd like to free willy.

I'd like to see the Muppets REALLY take Manhattan. Like, fucking TAKE OVER, with Kermit all in a beige uniform, beating his subordinates with a riding crop.

I'd like two dogs, same breed, although the specific breed doesn't matter as long as they're not small yappy beeyotches, and I'd like to name them Eugene and Mortimer, after the two lawyer friends in Dickens' Our Mutual Friend.

I'd like to meet Andy Kaufman to see if he was really that much of an antisocial arse, or if it was an act, assuming of course that he'd be real with me.

I'd like to be friends with Tony Blair.

I'd like for Adolf Hitler to intensively study the last fifty years of popular music and then make me a mixtape.

I'd like to know if David Hasselhoff would be on that mixtape.

I'd like for my hair to continue turning gray until I'm 35, and then for the process to slowly reverse until, by the time I'm 50, I've got a head of lustrous dark brown locks that get me a spokesman deal with Loreal and I become the first over-50 male to do that slow-motion head-shake thing that shows off my lustrous dark brown locks.

I'd like to have lustrous dark brown locks, obviously.

I'd like to slap Dave Matthews around a bit.

I'd like for Carter Beauford, the Dave Matthews Band's drummer, to quit that band and go join Radiohead for a few weeks, just to see what it would sound like.

I'd like to have more patience for classical music. Maybe this just takes practice.

I'd like to tell Mick Jagger to quit that shit. You're not fooling anyone.

Also, I'd like for most older rock stars to quit pretending you're still 21. I quit when I was 19. It's not hard, gentlemen. Act like you've been there before. I'm not talking about guys like Mark Knopfler or Charlie Watts, guys who have always comported themselves with dignity. I'm talking about the Steven fucking Tylers of the world. Take a page from Jon Bon Jovi's book; his music still sucks & blows OUT LOUD but at least he doesn't look like a complete tool. I mean, he looks like an adult, not like he lives inside his Xterra. Also, that shit with the microphone stand? Give it a rest.

I'd like to shoot a bazooka at a Hummer.

I'd like to get a hummer from [ATTRACTIVE STARLET] in the Oval Office while I'm vetoing legislation that prevents gay marriage.

I'd like for Dennis Miller to shut the fuck up. I get it. We're all amused at how you manage to be conservative AND smart. Fine. It's not that hard to fit in a reference to Erasmus of Rotterdam make it sound like you know what you're talking about, Dennis, if your audience is PEOPLE WHO WATCH YOU ON TV. I don't think Alan Greenspan is watching your show. I think maybe Alan Greenspan is WRITING ANOTHER BOOK. I don't care if you're "the king of references," I think you're a tool.

I'd like for Nickelback's drummer to get indigestion from eating Nickelback's singer, and for him to vomit the remains of Nickelback's singer into a airplane sick bag, even though he's 14,000 feet up in the snowy Andes mountains and there's really nothing wrong with him just rowlfing over by that pine tree that impaled Nickelback's bassist.

I'd like for the Trans-Siberian Orchestra's tour plane to crash on top of the wreckage of Nickelback's already-crashed tour plane, killing Nickelback's drummer but somehow electrically resuscitating Nickelback's singer.

I'd like for Nickelback's singer to wake up while his remaining leg is being eaten by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra's lead guitarist.

I'd like the Nickelback singer's first thought to be, "hmm, this guy eating my leg is pretty cute OH MY GOD I'M IN THE FREAKING ANDES MOUNTAINS AND I'M BEING EATEN BY THE TRANS-SIBERIAN ORCHESTRA'S LEAD GUITARIST! HOLY CRAP THIS IS THE WORST MORNING SINCE THE MORNING AFTER I GOT REALLY DRUNK AND MADE OUT WITH JOSH GROBAN AT THE NATIONAL INQUIRER'S OSCAR PARTY!"

I'd like for Aretha Franklin to storm down from above the tree line and just GO TO TOWN on those skinny jackasses, just beat them SENSELESS with her huge flapping arms and her gigantic pendulum bosoms.

I'd like for a bear to come up to Aretha Franklin and offer her a trout he has just caught in the river.

I'd like for Aretha Franklin to take this trout and grill it over a fire pit she made out of the bones of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra's rhythm section and for her to season it with leaves and grasses this docile bear has brought her.

I'd like for Nickelback's singer's last thought to be, "man, that smells good...I guess I'll never get to have Aretha Franklin's bear-delivered leaves and grasses-seasoned Trans-Siberian Orchestra's rhythm section's bones-firepit grilled trout. Too bad. That probably would have made me much less of a complete waste of precious energy," just before he blacks out for the last time.

I'd like for him to know, somehow, that he would have been wrong. That even eating freshly grilled trout that had been cooked 14,000 feet up in the Andes mountains by Aretha Franklin over a firepit made out of the bones of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra's rhythm section and seasoned with leaves and grasses brought to Aretha Franklin by a strangely friendly bear WOULD NOT have made him less of an asshole, and would in fact just have made the meal itself worse by his presence.

That's what I'd like for Christmas.