Thanks For Nothin', Guys

There's a new meme, no not the one I wasted my time on last night but a brand new one, floating around. It shall be discussed below. But first of all, I have an admonishment for you all, dear readers.

Thanks a fuckin' lot for not coming to my funeral.

You all knew about it, didn't you? I know most of you did, save for one or two.

See, it all started with the 3d Great CD Mix Exchange, which had a track listing, "Song you'd like played at your funeral." I thought and thought, came up with a short list of three songs, and finally decided the right one. Which was "Blackbird," by the Beatles. I said it would be just fine, though I did stress that I'd prefer it without the sound effects, that annoying bird chirping along in the background.

Well, not a scant week after the CDs went out in the mail, Mike, Man of Mystery, Movies, and Music, Mike the Blogless, in a grand gesture of generosity, volunteered to play the song for me at my funeral. And in the spirit of brotherhood, or maybe it was just a desire to see me gone, Stennie volunteered to sing along.

There was a problem, though. Mike was only free on Wednesday, the 27th. I had six days to, well, to kick off.

Mike suggested I go in the style he'd always hoped I'd go in, drinking myself to death. That's quite the herculean task in six days, even for me, even at the holidays. I was thinking of hanging myself, if I could find a strong enough-grade rope, I even had the chair I was going to stand on, my red plastic clarinet-practicing chair. (The chair doesn't practice the clarinet, btw - I sit in it when I practice.) However, I have plain old ceilings with nary a beam in sight, and so hanging was right out.

Sure, I could always cut myself while washing dishes, but that would be messy for whoever found me, and drowning in the bathtub sure sounded nice, but I've always heard that drowning bloats a person, and I've spent all this time losing weight and all, so that just didn't seem quite fair. I was sure I was a goner on Friday the 22d, and would have been happy to hang around dead while Mike made his travel plans, but thankfully the bridge I was stuck on for over 2 hours didn't decide to take a powder. It lead to a river, and I don't know that I'd have ever been found. Dying of a broken heart sounds oh-so poetic, but I figure if I haven't done that by now I never will, and so I gave up on that rather quickly.

And so it came to me Saturday morning while I was trying to straighten up the Pod a bit, and was cleaning off my kitchen table. Back during her knee surgery, just for kicks and because it was such a thoughtful thing to do, my friend and workmate San gave me a handful of her percocet tablets. Drug overdose! You just can't beat a drug overdose, it promotes one to the realms of lore, makes people gnash their teeth and rend their garments and scream, "Why?" So I waited till Monday night, wrote out a few plans, hiked all the percocets down with a bottle of vodka, chased it with some kitchen floor cleaner and dill pickle juice just to be safe, and went and lay, arms crossed over my chest, in the Mantrap.

And wouldn't you just know it. It didn't seem to work, and I woke up on Tuesday. I didn't tell anyone, though. I figured, hey! What's the best kind of funeral? The one you're alive to witness! And so I decided I'd let those plans go ahead as scheduled, would crouch down behind a pillar holding several tasteful but large flower arrangements (with cards of sympathy such as, "Good riddance!" and "We thought it would never happen!"), and watch my own send off. I'd even toyed with the thought of popping out from behind the flowers just as the final prayer was hallelujahed, if only to see who really looked happy to see me and who seemed just a tad disappointed.

But again, wouldn't you just know it, because it is sooooo like him, Mike decided not to show. And since all of those written-out plans were based around him and his guitar, and that special red velvet roped-off area for all of you bastards, my funeral was scrapped. My folks just had my plain pine box planted out by the landfill, and now that they know I'm not in it and still around, they want their money back for the box and the plot, and frankly, I don't have it to give.

Turns out Mike didn't realize he was going to have to foot his own bill for traveling east, and didn't think it was worth the dough, or the effort of calling airports and hotels.

And so you all ruined my funeral. I don't know what TV shows you were sitting at home watching, but I'll bet you anything they couldn't beat a reading of some of my best blogs (I was hoping to get my friend Seth, he of the powerful voice, to do this), a mourner's sing-along (with cue cards - follow the bouncing carnation!) of "Trouble," from "The Music Man," a medley of Hackensaw Boys songs played on the bagpipes, a buffet featuring crab rangoons and hard liquor, a march-around to German music played by the Sauerkraut Band, a "death acrochallenge" with prizes, a reel of film clips from Alan Arkin movies, and in what surely would have brought a tear to every human assembled, Mr M playing his part alone on our favorite clarinet duet, "Roberto El Diablo," or as I call it, "Robert The Devil Goes To The Swiss Alps On His Summer Vacation."

You could have had it all. But no, you stayed away. And there's a pine box out by the landfill instead. I'm so embarrassed, I could just crawl in it.

OK, though, the silliness over with, here's that meme I mentioned above. It's the Celebrity Dead Pool Meme. Here are the rules:

1. Pick ten celebrities who you think will die from 1/1/07 to 1/1/08
2. You aren’t allowed to murder the celebrity.
2.5 Saddam Hussein doesn’t count.
3. The point system works like this: you get one point for every year UNDER the age of 90 that the celebrity dies at. Anyone over 90 gets negative points.
4. Whoever gets the most points, wins.

Sounds like a winner to me. Here are my 2007 projections:

1. Joan Fontaine (I only found out this week she was still alive)
2. Dick Cheney (Just a hunch)
3. Fidel Castro (More than a hunch, and probably betting on an odds-on favorite)
4. Ingmar Bergman (I don't know, though, those Swedes are pretty hearty)
5. Pete Doherty (that British hoo-hah who's supposed to be a singer but is famous for being arrested for drug possession; but then again, look at Keith Richards. If you dare.)
6. Christopher Lee (I don't know; he just keeps coming to me)
7. Dean Smith (UNC Basketball coach)
8. Farrah Fawcett
9. BB King (Lucille will survive him)
10. 50 Cent

Now, let me issue my disclaimer. These are my psychic predictions, and remember, my brain is broken, people. I'm not "pulling" for them in an effort for enough points to win. I'm just playing like everyone else, OK?

And yes, I'm ashamed, but if not for this I'd be ashamed about something else.

Betland's Olympic Update:
* In case you didn't realize, there's a mini, teeny version of the hucklebug up. It's a small outtake from last episode. Head to the hucklebug to listen!
* It's Friday. You needed an update to tell you that?