Edwin Decker

The Definition of Definition

2009-04-30T17:47:29Z

Since Miss California's recent mumble-tastic response to Perez Hilton's question about gay nuptials, there has been a lot of chatter in the media (again) about the definition of marriage. A recurring argument by the traditional-marriage crowd, or, as I like to call them, the Anti-Gay Relationship Orthodoxy (AGRO), is that marriage has always been defined as a union between one man and one woman. And guess what? They're right! In every dictionary I checked, marriage is primarily defined as a union between one man and one woman. What they don't say is that most words have multiple definitions, such as the words in my trusty American Heritage 3rd Edition, which additionally defines marriage as, simply, "a close union." This is not the only problem with the AGRO argument. ]]> "Marriage is a union between a man and a woman and that's it, nobody else can get married, we really mean it now so don't even think about trying to change it or we will send bloodhounds out to track you down and eat your face"--we could still change it. Samuel Johnson, the genius lexicographer, once wrote, "No dictionary of a living tongue can ever be perfect, since, while it is hastening toward publication, some words are budding and some are fading away." Note Johnson's gorgeously apropos phrase "a living tongue," which is to say that language is alive, ever-growing, ever-changing. Johnson, incidentally, is the quintessential example of how dictionaries are subject to their authors' human failings. His magnum opus, A Dictionary of the English Language, had a myriad of problems: It contained several spelling inconsistencies. The etymologies were widely criticized. Johnson was given to fits of editorializing. "And his proofreading was strikingly careless, [as when] he defined garret as a 'room on the highest floor of the house' and cockloft as 'the room over the garret,'" Bryson wrote. So please, please spare us this red-herring question of what the definition of marriage is. It doesn't matter. What matters is what it should be and what it should be is this: "A union between any two (or more) people who love each other (or not) and want to be bound together for life (or at least a few months) because, you know, it's their business, so butt out or we will release the hounds to bite off your face!" Anything less is an abomination.

Ultimate Music Challenge Returns

2009-04-21T07:57:27Z

Well, it's that time again. Time for the Ultimate Music Challenge at Viejas' Dream Catcher Lounge. We just completed Week 1 and it was a blast. Click here to read my Judges' Blog about it.

Strip Joint Tips

2009-04-17T06:00:59Z

I went to the Hustler strip club last week. What a blast! I forgot how much I enjoy them. Not having a great time in a stripper club is like not having a great time on a Ferris wheel: As long as you don't do anything stupid and keep your hands inside the car, you will be rewarded with a spectacular view. For me, the joy of strip bars is broken into two parts: 1. Watching scantily clad sexy mamas dance and undulate and generally be all hot and shit. 2. Watching how men behave in a room full of scantily clad, undulating sexy mamas. Aside from gay-pride parades and sloshball games, strip clubs are unrivaled when it comes to watching men make jackasses of themselves. The creepy crawlers; the gropers; the old-man golly-jolly seekers; the loser lonelies; the wannabe pimp gangstas; the misogynistas; the inside-the-bar-sunglass-wearing, big-Dan-on-campus, 20-something yuppie twits--all seem to have no idea how to act in a strip club. Maintaining an exceptional strip-club presence begins with your approach to a strip club: What you think it is. What you think it's for. ]]> 1. Hitting on the Strippers: Oh, yawn. Could you be more obvious? The chances of pulling an on-duty stripper are about the same as your chances of getting hit by lightning while being eaten by a shark, in the same place, twice. The exception is, of course, The Alphaclops male. The Alphaclops is a massive, walking, one-eyed penis-like creature that can lay the females of an entire metropolis at once and induce clitoral orgasm in a woman with only the whisk of wind he creates as he walks by. If you are not an Alphaclops male--and I guarantee you are not--don't even try it. 2. Rudeness: I despise the strip-club misogynistas. They call the girls bitches and sluts behind their backs and talk down to them as if, by virtue of their chosen vocation, they are inferior, when really, deep inside, it is the misogynista who is inferior and can only feel superior to women in a venue where they're being objectified en masse. 3. Eye-Contact Abuse: There's a theory that strippers will like you better if you make a lot of eye contact. But eye contact is good in stripper bars the way eye contact is good in the outside world: In periodic, medium-sized doses only. Don't be one of these bozos who dreamily gaze into a stripper's eyes like they're trying to pry open the window to her soul, crawl inside and creep to where her soul is sleeping so he can climb into bed with it. 4. Dumb Questions: This is difficult for me because I have a hard time keeping my inner journalist at bay. It's one of the reasons I don't like stripper small talk--because I always end up asking them all sorts of mood-killing questions like, "What does your father think of your career choice?" and "Which is your favorite brand of stripper-pole grease?" 5. Stripper Gifts: Never bring a stripper a present. It's too losery, too stalkery. And you should shoot yourself in the ear if you ever compose a poem for a stripper. O' Mercedes How you writhe On the dance floor of my heart. I love you. Now what is your address? That I may deposit a dead bird on your porch. Ed Decker 04.15.09

My Sacred Muse

2009-04-03T05:59:23Z

The following column was published on April Fools day. In other words, it is a farce. Starting in two weeks, this column will have a new name and identity. Allow me to explain. Some of you may have noticed that "Sordid Tales" was missing from the March 18 issue of CityBeat. That was because I had a bit of an accident. Well, maybe it wasn't an accident. Maybe it was an on-purpose, which is to say, I freaking overdosed! On what, I don't know, since I had ingested so many liquids, powders and pills that night, there's no way of telling what it was that stopped my heart in the same manner that a brick wall stops a speeding egg. One minute I was recoiling from having unintentionally observed the top of Dan Frost's inflamed ass crack as he lined up a pool shot, and the next I awoke with a rubber tube down my throat and a small gathering of whitecoats flailing above me trying to save my life. The procedure is called a gastric lavage (commonly known as the stomach pump), and it feels as though your gullet is being gang-raped by horde of carnivorous alien zombies. It was there, in the hospital, a few hours after that violent intubation--lying broken and twisted among the rocks and glass at the bottom of my bottomed-out existence--where I encountered Jesus Christ. Imagine my surprise. All my life I had dismissed religion. All my life I pooh-poohed anyone's attempt to show me The Light and The Way. All my life I've been told by the deeply spiritual that one day Jesus would appear to me, and all my life I snickered at them. Not snickering anymore. ]]> Of course, Jesus did not come to me in the flesh. I'm not crazy, you know. It was more like a warmth enveloping me, a general feeling of aplomb that was instantly identifiable as The Lord wrapping his enormous, goose-down arms around me. Then He spoke. Not out loud, of course. I'm not crazy. Rather, He spoke as a voice in my head. He told me there was a hole inside of me, a hole excavated by Satan. He told me it was not my fault, but that it was now time to accept Him into my life. So I did, and, instantly, the giant hole inside of me--the hole that Satan dug, the hole that I never knew existed--was filled with the groovy golden cement mix that is the Gospel of Christ, our Savior. After returning home from the hospital, I started implementing the appropriate spiritual changes in my life. You know, ditching the drugs and booze, getting rid of my Black Sabbath and AC/DC box sets, freeing the sex slaves from my dungeon--that sort of stuff. The next thing that needed changing was the title of this column. Obviously, with my newfound spirituality, "Sordid Tales" will no longer be acceptable, so I've changed it to "My Sacred Muse." Next, I had to scrub Edwindecker.com of all the blasphemous prose I had scribed over the years. All the religion-bashing and debauchery-promoting that was the signature of my writing simply had to go. And by-Jiminy was there a lot! I felt like a killer trying to scour every speck of blood from a homicidal home invasion. Whether in giant pools or tiny drops, the blood and guts of my blasphemy was everywhere! On the floors, walls, ceiling, couch and lampshades of my website. It took no less than four score and 14 Red Bulls to clean it all, and it was quite a depressing task. Not so much because of how much sacrilege was there, but how little usable content was left behind. The whole process left me asking some serious questions: How did I not know that Satan was using me to publish his carnal worldview? How did I not know that Christ was always there, by my side, waiting to be noticed? How could I have been so blind? Anyway, there's your back story. In two weeks I begin writing my new beginning: "My Sacred Muse." Instead of being a column about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, "My Sacred Muse" will preach abstinence, restraint and the glory of singer-songwriter music. Instead of writing about drunken, barroom encounters, I will write about all my kooky escapades at midnight mass. I will write about the joys of procreation, the wonder of faith healing and the mortal danger of excessive penis-washing--which I used to do several times a day, even though the penis is, as Jesus informed me in the hospital room that woeful night, "A self-cleaning organ." I was also thinking, as part of a monthly routine, I would use "My Sacred Muse" to identify the more notorious sinners of San Diego, as a call to my fellow Christian crusaders to do whatever it takes to convert their souls--black and slimy as the underside of a rotten Portobello--to The Gospel of Christ: sinners like Steve Poltz, whose songs about fornication and tomfoolery disguised as nursery rhymes irrevocably damage the psyche of unsuspecting children; sinners like Tim Pyles, who thinks "being saved" means successfully sneaking out of some godawful broad's apartment the morning after a particularly beastly one-night stand; sinners like Anders Wright, who writes all the CityBeat movie reviews with a secret gay code embedded to further his homosexual agenda. (If you highlight every 15th word, it reads, "I lick balls and like it," over and over again.) Oh, gay Anders, don't you know you must repent? I know, I know, in my pre-Christian days, I supported homosexual rights. But all that has changed. As Jesus told Paul when they were lamenting about Judas' unnerving habit of patting the other apostles on the butt, "If I wanted homosexuality to be in the mainstream," said Christ, "I wouldn't have made all the queer bars so dark inside." April 1, 2009

TEAM TRIVIA PLUS

2009-03-31T22:30:49Z

ATTENTION MUSIC FANS

2009-03-05T21:17:16Z

Frivolous or Fabulous(Of Brave Hearts and Irritable Bowels)

2009-03-04T20:44:23Z

You’ve probably heard about the four firefighters who recently won a sexual-harassment lawsuit against the city in the amount of approximately $30K.

According to their complaints, the firemen, John Ghiotto, Jason Hewitt, Alex Kane and Chad Allison, were ordered by their superiors to participate in the 2007 Gay Pride parade, during which they were subjected to all sorts of, you know, gay stuff: cat-calls, blow-kisses, Excessive Butt Cheek Exposure, indecent exposure, Hairy Chested Auto-Erotic Nipple Stimulation, man-prancing and simulated sex acts—all the flamboyancy some of us actually look forward to seeing at a gay-pride event. Not the firemen, though—they claimed the event caused headaches, anxiety, nightmares, peer taunting and irritable bowels.

Upon learning of this lawsuit, my gut reaction was, Are you serious? Nightmares? Anxiety? Irritable bowels? It is incomprehensible to me that these manly-man-hero types, who rush into collapsing, burning buildings, could get all vag-damaged about a gay picnic. However, after reading the complaints, I must admit, they did have several legitimate beefs, causing me to rethink my opinion. Let’s examine:

]]> 1. Sexual Harassment?: On one hand, whatever, dudes. This is not a person going into his or her job every day suffering unwanted advances from superiors and being routinely touched or groped by some intra-office oaf or oafette. This was a one-time thingamajig—off premises, with no physical contact—where the worst that happened was their machismo got threatened.

On the other hand, fair is fair. If this was, say, the Oversexed Heterosexual Misogynist Construction Workers Pride Parade, and the city sent an engine full of firebabes into the fray, you can bet your daughter’s dowry they would have sued the city for a crap-ton more than $30,000, and won!

2. Courage vs. Cowardice: On one hand, it takes a special kind of chickenshit to get his bowels in a twist over a little man-prancing. On the other, it was courageous for them to stand up and fight for what they believe is right, knowing full well they would be labeled homophobes at a time when “homophobe” is as ugly an epithet as “racist” or “pedophile” or “Cheney.”

3. Frivolous Lawsuit: I don’t know which is worse, that these four hydrant monkeys might be faking the whole thing or that seeing gay people makes their colons go spastic. On the other hand, they were forced to participate:
“If you refuse the direct order than [sic] you will be suspended,” the Battalion Chief reportedly told Hewitt.

So, yeah, the brass knowingly placed these men, each one of them as straight as a boner on a stick figure, in the middle of a sea of queer. Have you ever seen a flamboyant gay man lose his shit over a fireman calendar? It ain’t pretty. Now multiply that reaction by tens of thousands and throw in a real, live flesh-and-muscle firefighter and, well, the SDFD, and City Hall, and every single San Diego citizen are really effin’ lucky those guys didn’t snap and turn the hoses on the crowd in an effort to extinguish the flamers—because that lawsuit would’ve taken everything but the petty cash.

4. Peer Hazing: In his complaint, Hewitt alleges, “derogatory communications by coworkers [for] being in the Gay Pride Parade,” to which most people’s reaction would probably be, “Aw, your little friends were making fun of you? Boo-hoo.”

But, it is a brutal homophobic culture in the locker rooms of manly man occupations like firefighter, soldier or professional athlete. The potential for serious hazing is truly there—the kind of Lord of the Flies-type hazing that doesn’t know the line between cruelty and humor, the kind of hazing that can really break a person in half.

5. Gay Paraders’ Culpability: Along the route, the laddermen were subjected to verbal taunts such as “Show me your hose,” “Give me mouth to mouth” and even more abusive comments like “Fuck you, firemen” when they didn’t play along. They also witnessed gestures such as “showing their penis, grabbing their crotch, rubbing nipples… and flipping us off,” wrote Capt. John Ghiotto in his affidavit. “I personally had a man approach me on the driver’s side… and state, ‘You look hungry, why don’t you have a Twinkie….’ I felt like he was insinuating something sexual.”

Do ya think?! Wow, Captain, how did you ever break that code?

OK, on the one hand, hey, it was all in the name of a good time, right? Nobody got hurt, homosexuals are harmless, Twinkies are yummy. On the other, anyone who yelled, “Fuck you,” or gave the finger, or intentionally intimidated or distressed the cinderfellas with overt, graphic, explicit sexual conduct or innuendo are, in my opinion, callous, classless, non-actualized, unsympathetic loser scumbag asshole jagoffs, not necessarily in that order.

6. Homophobia?: “This complaint isn’t about homosexuality or gay pride,” writes Hewitt. “This has to do with people in the workplace being threatened [and] sexually harassed,” and you know what, on one hand, I almost actually believe him.

But then, on the other, if this were the Hot Soccer Moms Who Just Got Divorced and Are Desperate For a Little Sumtin-Sumtin Pride Parade, well, I’m pretty sure everybody’s bowels would’ve come out of that one whistlin’ Dixie.

Write to ed@sdcitybeat.com. For more, visit www.edwindecker.com. Come to O’Connell’s on Saturday, March 14, for Ed Decker’s most awesome music showcase. E-mail Ed for details.

Funny with an Asterisk(An Open Letter to Alt-Weekly Cartoonists)

2009-02-20T08:02:03Z

After nearly two years of debilitating cutbacks, the community of alternative-weekly cartoonists suffered another setback when Village Voice Media (VVM) suspended publication of all comic strips. This is a devastating blow to cartoonists such as Max Cannon, Tom Tomorrow, Jen Sorensen, Derf, Lloyd Dangle and others. They see this as the beginning of the end of their industry, or so they say on their various blogs and message boards. Derf (creator of "The City") wrote, "We have reached the apocalyptic final struggle for the future of cartoons." Tom Tomorrow ("This Modern World") has been commenting on what he perceives as a general lack of appreciation for alt-weekly cartoonists: "The only way cartoonists could get even less respect would be if we presented our work in the form of handmade knit doilies thrust upon random strangers on the street." And then there's Max Cannon ("Red Meat"), who wrote the central essay of the debate. It's an open letter called "The Alternative Comic Apocalypse Has Begun," which begins with Cannon complaining that he has "slaved for many years" to bring us his comic strips. ]]> waah-kerchief for you to bawl into. And Max, dude, did you actually say that you "slaved" over your work? Are you for real? You're not picking cotton under a blazing Mississippi sun, man. You're not digging ditches in pools of raw sewage. You draw cartoons. If cartoon-drawing is anything like column-writing, you sit at your desk with your wine and your weed--Big Sonic Chill dripping its pollen from your clock radio--and an expensive computer doing all your heavy lifting. Slaved? Max Cannon averages $15 for each cartoon sold. Multiply that by the 70 plus newspapers in which Red Meat appears, and you get more than $1,000 per strip. Wow. I won't reveal how much my column earns, except to say that it can't even buy me a small bindy of coke and an hour with a bottom-dollar street hooker. I have to choose one or the other, so don't tell me about hard times, Mr. Maximillian McWhinyFace! Not that I'm complaining. I am grateful for this column and its modest earnings. Because there are a bizillion artists out there, writing, drawing and sculpting in obscurity, never to be paid a dime for their labor of love, or receive fanfare--going out of their effin minds every day craving something that resembles an audience or a paycheck. "The stark reality," continued Cannon in his "Apocalypse" post, "is that very soon, there won't be any of your current favorite alternative comic strips for you to read at all--not even online. Here's why: none of us make our living from our website.... Our websites are like a free gift to you...." Well, thank you so much, Max-o. Thank you for this gift that allows us, your humble subjects, to frolic in the electronic treasure trove of your genius. Pffft. You keep a website because it makes good business sense. You keep it to maintain a presence on the web. You keep it because, like most artist-writer-sculptor types--you need to be seen. You are the classic example of a narcissist, and the more you hawk the idea that your website is for our benefit, the more it proves what a wildly unchecked egotist you are. Get this. Some cartoonists have even taken to asking for donations, such as Lloyd Dangle ("Troubletown"), who wrote that his website will now have to be viewer-supported. "That's why I've added the Donate button," he explained. Well, how 'bout that? A mother-fluffin' donate button! Dude, Lloyd, don't you see the folly of your ways? You are asking strangers--who are probably broker than you--to support your little hobby so that you won't have to go out and get a real job like ditch-digging or cotton-picking. If I were a ditch-digger or a cotton-picker, and I saw your donate button--oh yeah, I'd donate something all right. In defense of alt-weekly comic-strip writers, most of them understand why the newspapers need to make cuts. They just don't think it should be them who gets cut. "... [C]omics always appear in the top five of what readers turn to first...." argued Max Cannon in "Apocalypse." "Weeklies should be adding... cartoons, which are both popular and inexpensive," complained Derf on his blog. And Jen Sorenson ("Slowpoke") wrote that if comics disappear, "they'll just stop picking up the paper." These cartoonists are all carriers of a disease that I call Adult Onset Self-Importantitus, which causes the sufferer to have delusions about their value to their employer and to society. Heed these words, Max, Jen, Tom and everybody else who stumbles upon this paragraph: You are all expendable. No matter how smart, how capable, how integral you think you are, you are not. And the sooner you understand that, the sooner you lose your Go-ahead-and-try-to-make-it-without-me attitude--the sooner you will stop looking like the tantrum-throwing child-mayor of Bitterville. Perhaps you don't care what I think. But I tell you what, I will never view those cartoons in quite the same way ever again. The next time I read "This Modern World" or "Red Meat" or whatever, no matter how funny it is, it will only be funny with an asterisk. Ed Decker 02.18.09 There were some angry responses from the alt-weekly cartoonist community. Most notably, these: Lloyd Dangle ("Troubletown") Jason Yungbluth ("Deep Fried Comics") And this brief entry on Tom Tomorrow's ("This Modern World") "Douchebag Watch"

Slippery Slopes(If sexy funky donkey love is wrong, I don't want to be right)

2009-02-07T08:11:38Z

When Rick Warren read his prayer at President Obama's inauguration, the hairs on the necks of several million gay people stood erect. After all, it was Warren who, many said, equated homosexuality with polygamy and pedophilia. Conservatives agree with Warren--such as Mike Huckabee, who forecast that allowing gay marriage would lead to matrimony between "man and animal," and James Dobson, who openly worried that gay nuptials could lead to "marriage between a father and a daughter." The list goes on--the Hannitys, the Robertsons, the Santorums--all of them citing some or all of the Big Four conjugal taboos: polygamy, pedophilia, bestiality and incest, or, for lack of a better word, polypedobestincestialism. First of all, let's set the record straight: For all their 12th-century, homophobic viewpoints, Warren and friends are not equating homosexuality with polypedobestinsexuality. They are simply employing a slippery-slope argument. For instance, if you were to say that marijuana could lead to heroin, you are not saying that marijuana is as a bad as heroin, only that it could lead to it. Warren and friends are absolutely correct: If we allow gays to hitch, what's to keep the bigamincestamists of the land from arguing for their marital rights as well. If you open the door for one group, why shouldn't it stay open for the rest? In this way, I find myself in reluctant agreement with medieval homophobes. Where we disagree is that, instead of locking gay marriage out, I believe we should let every other marriage in--pedophilic wedlock excepted, of course, because children cannot consent to sex with adults, but as for the rest--whatever tickles your testicles, is what I say. Let's examine individually: Bigamy / polygamy: This is a no-brainer. Yes, duh, of course, we should incarcerate that fundamentalist, compound cultist scumbag who collects 14-year old slave-brides and forces them to spend the remainder of their childhoods lying beneath his saggy, hairy, middle-aged abdomen as he statutorily rapes the souls right out of them night after night. In my perfect world, that guy would spend the rest of his life in Leavenworth as the seventh wife and cellmate of Krusher, the 400-pound, serial-killing, cross-dressing Wizard of the Aryan Nation. As for the rest of the consenting-adult, polygamist population, whatever bubbles your hot tub, folks. Bestiality: If some guy wants to put a ring on his cocker spaniel's paw, what's the problem? For all we know, the guy has been screwed over by human women all his life. Maybe dogs are the only people with whom he can relate. Maybe that cocker spaniel is exactly who he wants to visit him in the hospital should he ever get beat down by a roving gang of zoo-bashers. I know many have argued that animals do not have the capacity to consent to inter-species intimacy. I have to laugh at that. Coming from a society that has the flesh of a trillion slaughtered farm animals wedged in the crannies of its collective teeth, your outrage over the occasional shotgun dog marriage underwhelms me. Besides, these creatures can consent to manimal sex. Has your cat ever rubbed its ass in your face while purring suggestively? Ever been leg-humped by a dog before? Me? I've been leg-humped more times than any person I know. I may not be all that attractive to humans, but in the LGBT community (Labradors, Greyhounds, Beagles and Terriers) I'm considered to be one hot bitch. Incest: Not every incestuous relationship is of a pedophilic nature. Sometimes they are actual consenting adults who, for some reason, have fallen in love. Whatever. It's not my business. I know most people think this is a bizarre position to hold. Sorry, but I just do not care--I don't care, I don't care, I don't care--I do not fucking care how perverse is anyone's sex life. I do not care how many people try to convince me that they are too revolting or aberrant to receive the same rights as the rest. That's what they said about homosexuality 20 years ago. I'm glad I didn't listen to them, either. These people, these "degenerates," they didn't choose to be who they are. I hate to regurgitate a cliché, but, there but for the grace of God, right? So, why do we always try to govern whom other people are allowed to love? Is it fear? Do we believe there will be a sudden international wave of brother-sister couplings? Are we concerned that everyone will go running out to acquire multiple spouses? Has everyone forgotten how hard it is to have even one spouse!? All the aforementioned perversities are subscribed to by a tiny minority of the population. The rest of us are too repulsed to even think of going there. That's the reason for the international recoil. That is also the reason why they represent no danger to us. There is no possibility of propagating a man-dog race. The gene pool will be just fine. Conventional marriage is not threatened by any of these unions. The only thing that will change in America--if we had the heart and the balls to sanction bestincestolygamy--is that a few thousand people may legally pursue their own peculiar brand of joy, and we will move one step closer to being the sort of people who actually mean it when we say that everyone, not just the so-called "normals," may have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of sexy funky donkey love, er, I mean happiness.

Schmoozing and Boozing Why I love the Southern California Writers' Conference)

2009-02-02T07:08:24Z

[Full Disclosure Part 1: Decker is currently on staff with the Southern California Writers' Conference. Take that into account when he blubbers on and on about how great it is. See end of article for special discount offer.]
About 25 million years ago, when monkeys ruled the earth, I wrote a novel. That book - which I furiously banged out on a Brother word processor, day and night, until the carpal tunnel spread to my neck, spine and colon - was a giant kettle of crap. And I don't mean the kind of crap that most first time novelists produce due to inexperience, rather, the kind of crap that exists within the writer's DNA, the kind of crap that no amount of experience or workshopping can ever flush - this crap was the kind of crap about which the Mother of All Craps could be proud. "That's my boy!" the Mother of All Craps was often heard saying about this novel. Not having a predilection toward delusions of grandeur, I permanently shelved the tome and sought a career in journalism. This way, I could still be an author without having to write, or revisit, or even think about - ugh - books. ]]> MSG speaks!
Fast forward to November 2005, scouring the internet trying to find fodder for a looming deadline, I encountered the website for the then upcoming, 2006 installment of the Southern California Writers' Conference and was immediately intrigued. I've always wanted to attend one of these writer thingies but, to my horror, noticed the conference focused on writing - acck - books! Oh books, wilt thou ever stop taunting me!? While I was still committed to never thinking about that horrible piece of crap that I wrote back when monkeys were flinging their own dungheaps and calling it technology, I was nonetheless drawn to the idea of a writer's conference, drawn to the promise of schmoozing with other scribes, chatting about sentences and words and semicolons and also, boozing, which is something apparently many writers enjoy - schmoozing and boozing - that was my main attraction to the conference. As Michael Steven Gregory (also known as MSG) said, "Most writers work in such agonizing isolation that the chance to work, hangout, drink and stay up all night with other writers and publishing professionals is invaluable." Michael Steven Gregory, incidentally, is the Executive Director of The Southern California Writers' Conference (SCWC). Together, with his partner Wes Albers, they produce, design, market, book, finance and MC the SCWC, which has three chapters: one in Los Angeles/Irvine; one in San Diego, coming this President's Day weekend, February 13-16, at the Crowne Plaza Resort; and the Palm Springs installment, currently on hiatus. According to MSG the conference has been a huge success. Nearly four million dollars in first-time-author book and screen deals were facilitated by the SCWC over the past 23 years. During one 14-month period, five books were published as a direct result of first-time authors being recognized, embraced, and enabled by SCWC staff. "What most often distinguishes our conference from similar events," said Gregory, "is the generosity of authors, agents, and editors on staff willing to extend their relationships with conferees well beyond the end of any given conference weekend in order to get their manuscript where it needs to be to sell."
Wes Albers
Admittedly, the SCWC does not staff the mega-popular Stephen Kings and Dean Koontzs like some of the other Gigantor conferences do. Instead, it gets the working stiffs, the guys and gals who are not so far removed from the bloodlet of debut book publishing that they are no longer able to relate to conferees, and vice versa. Authors such as Andrea Portes, whose immensely popular debut novel, Hick, was recently optioned by movie producer Steven Seibert; Andrew Peterson, a competitive Master ranked marksman and author of First to Kill, also returns; writer's writer Maralys Wills (A Circus Without Elephants) brings back her popular and hyper-informative workshops; and writer's writer's writer, Judy Reeves - whose books, essays, and work groups have motivated aspiring authors for years - will again impart her limitless wisdom upon the conference. "There are so many diverse, exceptional authors on [this year's] schedule it's difficult to highlight only a few," says MSG. "For instance, Novelist and screenwriter Don Winslow (The Death and Life of Bobby Z; The Dawn Patrol) will be joining us for the first time to discuss his uniquely Southern California-set thrillers. . . and I'm looking forward to Laurel Corona (The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice), whose [speaking] topic is, "My Years of Writing Copiousssssly [sic]: How I Published 19 Books in the Last Decade, and Remained Relatively Normal (I Think)." These authors, while not as famous as your Kings and Koontzs, are success stories nonetheless. There is much to learn from them. And they are quite approachable. You can ask a question such as, "So exactly how did you get your book published?" and not receive a pat answer like, "Through hard work my son," before the author scuffles off to a cone of silence in the corner somewhere with their equally unapproachable entourage. The SCWC staff will engage. And that, right there, is the foundation upon which the rest of the conference is built. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~``
Here is what a person can expect when attending The Southern California Writers' Conference: You register Friday afternoon and dive into the workshops or Read and Critiques. Then comes the schmooze and booze mixer, followed by book signings, an evening speaker and the rogue Read and Critiques, which tend to go into all hours of the night. On Saturday, there is more of the same - more speakers, more workshops and Read and Critiques -- and the beginning of the One-on-One Advance Submissions Critique, which operates as such: Before the conference begins, you send 20 pages of your manuscript to somebody from a long list of agents, publishers and other industry professionals on the SCWC staff. The person you choose, let's say an agent, will read the manuscript before the conference. Later, at the conference, you will meet with him or her for a one-on-one sit down, during which the agent will explain the myriad of ways in which your book is a kettle of crap or, in the rare instance, will say he or she needs to sign you immediately, or, most likely, something in between. And so it continues through Monday morning, with more speakers, workshops, Read and Critiques, the much anticipated Agents and Editor's Panel, a banquet, a writing contest, an awards ceremony and tearful goodbyes followed by the long, lonely ride home. As for me, I listened to the speakers and attended the workshops (that did not focus on novel-writing). For the Advance Submissions Critique, I mailed some of my columns to syndicated Canadian humorist, Gordon Kirkland, who told me I was, "not ready for prime time," probably because of the column, "There is a Fungus on my Penis," about which Kirkland asked, "Is this some sort of sick joke?" "I wish," was my response. Matt Pallamary (left) giving advice during Advance Submission session
I pretty much sampled everything at the SCWC, but the best part, as expected, was the late night schmoozing and boozing. In fact, it was on just such an occasion, gagging back shots of tequila with Andrea Portes and her agent, long time SCWC staffer, Sally van Haitsma, when something simultaneously magical and horrible happened. We were pondering Andrea's recent success with Hick and Sally began praising Andrea's initial query letter. Apparently, this was the perfect query letter. It was unanimously lauded by all the attending agents and publishers as a shining example of what a query letter should look like. It was then when Sally turned to me and asked, "So what about you, Ed, do you have a novel to pitch?" Horrible reaction then: Tequila, and bile, and old, terrible feelings about a long forgotten manuscript began swirling at the top of my stomach, threatening to disgorge. "Um, well, I did write something 25 million years ago, when simians ruled the planet." "Let me hear a pitch," she said, in such a manner that made me think that everybody in the world has a pitch just sitting around waiting to be pitched. "Um, I don't really have one prepared," I responded. "Surely you have something?" "No, really, it's not ready." "C'mon!" she persisted. "Let's hear it!" "I c... c... can't." And that was it - the moment about which every aspiring author dreams - an agent asking, nay, begging, to hear his query for the great American kettle of crap. Yet I had nothing. After several months of full-blown depression, several months of lying in bed in the fetal position till 2 p.m., drinking Pepto from the bottle and throwing shoes at The View's Sherri Sheppard's stupid face, I started an entirely new novel. And I've been working this novel ever since. And when this novel is near completion, I will write a pitch. It will be a great pitch, a pitch for the ages, a pitch that no agent can refuse. The book may turn out to be another kettle of crap, but my pitch will make Andrea Portes' pitch seem like it's sitting on top of a T-ball post waiting to be whacked by Derek Jeter. More late nights
... And godawful early mornings
Discount Offer: Mention my name (that's Ed Decker) for 50 dollars off full conference fee. Contact me for more details. [Full Disclosure Part 2: Shortly after the author's attendance at the 2006 San Diego installment of the Southern California Writers' Conference, he plied the directors with enough quality booze and schmooze to weasel his way on to the staff. Make no mistake though, the author does not hold the conference in high regard because he is on staff, rather, he is on staff because he holds the conference in high regard.]

Fox Watch

2009-01-27T06:51:31Z

I saw this image on Fox News tonight of a couple of Arabs burning the U.S. flag while holding it upside down. Of course, the talking heads were getting all freaked out about such an image, but the first thing I thought was, Hmm. Doesn't that cancel itself out? Sure, when Americans fly the flag upside-down it's supposed to be a distress call, but when protesters fly it upside-down they are saying, "Down with America!" Same goes for burning the flag, which means you hate what that flag currently stands for. But what does it mean when you burn a flag that is upside down. Seems to me you are saying, "I hate what the upside down flag stands for." And since the upside down flag stands for "Down with America," when you are burning it, aren't you really saying, "Up with America!"? I'm just saying.

Beware the Ides of January

2009-01-23T06:46:38Z

Editor's Note: Due to the recent post-season defeat of his favorite football team, the author has been unable to speak or write not only the name of that team, but the letter with which that team name begins. Consequently, he will not be using that letter in this, or future, columns. We are sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.

Today is Jan. 14. The New Year has been in effect for a mere two weeks and already it's been an enormous disappointment. Actually, if you want to know what I really think about The Year 2009, here it is: I think The Year 2009 can suck my zit-milk. Barely three weeks old, The New Year has already sodomized my friends, my family and myself several times now. Indeed, the very first act perpetrated by this witch we call the New Year was to shatter the foot of my pal Billy, a doorman at the bar where I work, who scuffled with a contentious drunken customer. Apparently, the man refused to leave, a brawl ensued, they fell on the floor in an awkward manner and Billy's cod damn foot was shattered in three cod damn places. Um, Billy's the head of security. He needs that foot! She sure didn't waste any time did she? Just a few short moments after the last of the noisemakers petered out and this witch, this crone, this shrew they call The New Year made a conscious decision to incapacitate our old chum Billy for the next two or three months.]]> has been a truckload. And only two weeks into the new year. Two weeks! "Beware the Ides of January," said the sorcerer. "Lick the Ides of my anus," replied the embittered columnist. This year is only two weeks old and the fact that she is already an expert sodomizer of our collective buttocks is quite scary. From here, she will only hone her sodomy skills; month after month, she will become better and better, until autumn, when she finally becomes a Zen Sodomaster - and shoves her hurricanes and twisters deep into the sphincter of America. Now, I know what's in your head. You probably think I have tested the patience of The Year 2009, that my use of such words as "shrew" and "witch" to describe her will only cause her to smite me much in the manner that most narcissistic, immature deities are wont to smite their rebellious subjects. Well, I'm not worried. Because yesterday, I purchased some of that New Year's insurance they have available online. Actually, I had no idea New Year's insurance even existed until I encountered a popup ad on my computer that said I was "vulnerable" and included instructions on how I could purchase this special insurance. So I clicked on the link, selected the year I wanted to insure (2009), entered my credit card and bank information and--voila!--peace of mind! Now I'm protected from any twisters, literal or metaphorical, that 2009 may deliver. I only wish I had purchased the insurance before The Ides of January. Oh well, I'm covered now. So, as far as I'm concerned, The Year 2009 can eat my eczema flakes. Have at me you beast, you fiend. Let's see what you're made of! Editor's note: Shortly after submitting this column, Edwin Decker's bank account was emptied and his credit cards maxed out. On the way to the police station to file a report, he was struck by a car and thrown into a ditch, where a live wire electrocuted him and then a piano fell on his teeth. Write to ed@sdcitybeat.com and editor@sdcitybeat.com. For columns without any I's, P's, J's or M's, visit www.edw ndecker.co . RIP Ricardo Gonzalo Pedro Montalbán y Merino.

Fox Watch (Bill "Oaf" Reilly)

2009-01-17T05:47:38Z

Since I'm the only non-right wing conservative republican I know who actually watches Fox News channel, I figured I'd be your eyes and ears for the stupid shit they say there. I actually watch Fox for most of the day, and much of the night so the amount of stupid shit I am exposed to really is amazing. So much so that I figured I'd only chime in when the shit they say is REALLY stupid, as with the stupid shit I heard yesterday, not surprisingly, from the mouth of Bill "Oaf" Reilly. Oaf Reilly was talking about President Bush's Farewell Address and gushing over how great it was, and how Bush had the country's best interest in mind, and how he kept us safe etc. "It'll be interesting to see," he opined, "how the Left wing loony Bush haters will spin this tomorrow because decent people - and all the polls show this - like President Bush." Let's look at that sentence again and marvel at it's utter stupidity and gall. (I have rearranged the quote for clarity). All the polls show that decent people like President Bush. Wow! All the polls? Really? So, since Prez Bush's approval rating is at 27 percent, is "Oaf" Reilly saying that only 27 percent of the country is decent? Furthermore, who are these poll takers that are deciding who are the "decent" poll responders, and which are the, um, indecent ones? Perhaps these polls to which he is referring have a question on the bottom that says, "Are you a decent person? Please check yes or no" And who are these people that check "no"? To me, this quote goes to the very heart of what's wrong with Bill "Oaf" Reilly, what's wrong with Fox News as an institution, and what was wrong with this administration - a complete disregard for facts, common sense and a view of the world through the thickest of ideological lenses.

The Jader(How to celebrate a holiday that you are not able to celebrate)

2009-01-08T07:27:35Z

Dec. 31, 2009, 9:05 p.m.: It's New Year's Eve. I'm staying home tonight, alone. This is because W. is bartending at O'Connells and I've got a deadline--this deadline, for the column you're reading now. It's due in two days, so, obviously, I can't go out tonight. Not the way you're supposed to go out on New Year's Eve, which means heavy drinking at the bar, an after-hours party, a group stumblefest to Lucy's Tavern at 6 a.m., then continued drinking until either the sun goes down again or you pass out in a pool of your own sweat and vomit (swomit?) This is the sort of rumpus that will pretty much ruin your entire next day and half the day after and, realistically, there's just no way for a person to write a column under those conditions, unless, of course, the column is called "My Head is Exploding and I Have to Throw Up Again."]]> 10:31 p.m.: A friend called. He wanted to know if I was going out tonight. I told him no and explained why. "Dude!" he said, "It's New Year's Eve! Just come out, have a couple of drinks and get home before closing." "Yeah, right," I said. "There is no way you or any of those other varmints are gonna let me go home at 1 a.m." "Yeah we will, man, I promise. No pressure at all." "You're pressuring me right now," I snapped. "Hmm, I guess you're right. Bummer." "No worries man," I said. "I'd pressure you, too. That's what we do. That's why I'm staying home. Have fun, though." After hanging up, I felt a momentary rush of solitude. There I was, alone again, on New Year's Eve--no foghorns, no fireworks, no fanfare of any kind--just me at my computer doing (ugh) work. Make no mistake, though. This is not a woe-is-me holiday column. I'm not regretful or depressed. Like most people, I have a defense mechanism for such situations. It's a built-in device for those times when, for whatever reason, you are not able to celebrate a particular holiday in the traditional way you have grown accustomed to celebrating it. It's called The Jader. For instance, when I can't fly home to New York for Christmas, well, then, I just turn on the device and become instantly jaded about Christmas as a whole then--voila!--depression gone. By the way, my Jader (not to be confused with the Jadar, which allows me to identify and commiserate with other nearby jaders) is top-of-the-line. Not that it matters. New Year's Eve is very easy to get jaded about. It is arguably the lamest holiday in the universe. It celebrates something that doesn't even exist: an arbitrary point on the Gregorian calendar, itself an arbitrarily chosen calendar, among hundreds of other arbitrary calendars, themselves arbitrary measurements of time, which itself is but a theory sopping with arbitrariness. And then there are the material problems with New Year's Eve jubilations: the high cover charges, the crowds, the excessive back-patting, the rattles, horns, bells and party poppers going off in your ear all night and, worst of all, the pub-rookies, who always seem to be ahead of you at the bar, waiting for service with their money still in their pockets and a 15-drink round still not assembled in their brains while you stand behind them with a glass that is beyond empty and an increasing compulsion to stab them in the kidney with a kazoo. 11:04 p.m.: That said, there is one thing I will miss about celebrating New Year's Eve tonight. It's that moment, when the midnight hour clangs and everyone hoists their glasses and yells "Hap-pee New Year!" No matter how high I turn up the knob on my Jader (it goes to 11, incidentally), I simply cannot get negative about the moment when the hugs and handshakes start up, and everyone--strangers, chums and lovers alike--all whisper in each other's ears, "Happy New Year," which is shorthand for "I wish you peace and the promise of better futures and the ditching of worser pasts," which, to me, is just the shit. Then, when "Auld Lang Syne" kicks in--a song of friendship eternal--and everyone sings together, that moment is worth all the horsecrap, and it occurs to me, as the digital clock clicks on 11:52 p.m., that I can make that moment happen, right here, right now. That I can use this column--at my desk, alone, a few minutes shy of 2009, Jader be damned--to ring in the New Year. And here it comes, the clock says four minutes to go, three minutes, two, one--wait for it now--Hap-pee New Year! May peace and good will shine upon your heads and shoulders. May 2009 treat you in the manner that a septuagenarian sugar mama treats her boy-toy. And may 2008, that cheap-ass, unfaithful stripper bitch, fall into a loch and have her skin licked off by carnivorous eels, for auld lang syne, my dear, for auld lang syne. Ed Decker 1/1/09

Kids Talk about God

2008-12-12T07:52:14Z

While perusing the Internet, I stumbled upon a video series called Kids Talk About God the Christian fundamentalist version of Art Linkletter's Kids Say the Darndest Things. Basically, a group of young children answered questions about religion in their typically simplistic, discombobulated, adorably childlike manner. For example, when the question "What is Heaven?" was posed to a cute, pig-tailed, blonde girl (about 5 years old), she answered, "Heaven is a big, big place, and it's very nice for you." When the tubby boy with the crew cut (10-ish) was asked, "What do they do in Heaven?" he responded, "It's a place where you go to music every day, and learn songs because God has a big old choir." And when the adorable olive-complected girl (7-ish) with the plastic-rimmed librarian glasses was asked, "What do angels do?" she replied, "Angels come to my room and protect me from monsters." ]]> Boy: "So there I was, alone in the shower, and God touched me." Stepfather: "Er, uh, yes, son, that must've been God. I was nowhere near the bathroom at that time." Anyway, as cute and hilarious as these KTAG interviews are, they are also a tad depressing for the future of a free-thinking America. I listen to their notions about religion knowing full well that most will grow up thinking and talking about God in the same infantile way they do now--as if God is an old white guy in the sky, with a beard, and a crown, on a throne, with a choir, who watches over everybody in the world but still has time to talk to you. To underscore this point, I found comments on the web from adults (with no connection to Kids Talk About God) who happened to be answering the same or similar theological questions: For example, the question "What is Heaven like?" is answered on the North Star Zone website. Heaven is "a brilliant, shining city," writes the author, "with light streaming through its jasper walls and pearly gates, and a full spectrum of color gleaming from its jeweled foundation." (Yeah, sure, and the roads are paved with chocolate and the trees are cotton candy!) On the blog Praying in Victory the host tackles the question "What do angels do?" "Angels are like secret agents working on our behalf," he writes. "They follow you around waiting for you to tell them what to do." (Great, so fetch me a beer Angel). And on a Yahoo! message board, this reply to the question "Do you ever sense the presence of God?" wins the prize for Best Circular Reasoning in a Religious Discussion: "He is always with me. I believe in Him. I believe because I know He exists. He is my life. My proof." Jesus Christ, people! Your reasoning, your logic, your notions about these matters are impossible to distinguish from the children's notions, because they are the children's notions. The children never outgrew the fairy tales. That's why, as cute as those rug-rats are on the KTAG interviews, I feel such sadness for them, for us, for the future of a free-thinking America. With two exceptions: 1. When a bunch of punks were asked, "What color is God?" it was a pasty-faced bald boy--who broke from the pack and said, "I think God is every color because he created everything." Hallelujah, son! That's as close to a rational thought as one can have when one is trying to describe the physical attributes of a deity. Because, if God is every color, then he is no color at all, and probably no gender, no race, no age and has no facial hair, either--which makes a helluva lot more sense than the old-bearded-white-guy-who-lives-in-the-sky theory. 2. But it was the brown-haired, freckled girl who won my heart and gave me hope for future generations of America. When asked, "How do you win the race of life?" She answered, "You pray and read the Bible and be very good." Now, it's not what she said that was so wonderful, but how she said it. She said it with a mischievous smirk and a sarcastic tone. It was as if she knew this was what her parents, the interviewer and all the adults in her life expected her to say, but her rebellious little brain was already planning on cutting class, smoking cigarettes and showing her privates to boys in the woods behind the school. There's hope for us yet, people, there's hope for us yet. Ed Decker 12.10.08