I started running in April 2010.  I had to move home to Doylestown, a quaint suburban community located about an hour outside of Philadelphia, after I was laid off during the death throes of the Great Recession.  Living with your parents at 28 is a great way to knock your self-esteem down a peg and so I figured running would be a great way for me to feel better about my current situation by feeling better about myself.  My predictions were right:  I noticed rapid changes in my confidence level and physical appearance by virtue of good old-fashioned exercise.  I started getting competitive with running after my first 5k (3.1 miles) and I began setting loftier goals in races that were a bit more physically demanding:  5 milers, 10k’s (6.2 miles), and The Broad Street Run – my longest run to date at 10 miles.

My girlfriend, Colby, is also an avid runner and fitness buff, probably more so than I.  In April of 2013 her personal trainer sold her on the idea of participating in Tough Mudder, which, if you’re unfamiliar, is a ten mile cross-country run filled to the brim with obstacles devised by the British Special Forces.  Foregoing impulse control and attention to detail, we registered.  It was only after the entrance fees were paid that we decided to assess the challenges that Tough Mudder had in store for us aside from the ten-mile run through what I assumed would be very unforgiving terrain.  Holy fuck.  I heard tales of how brutal mud run/obstacle course hybrids could be, but I had to see it to believe it.  Tough Mudder throws its contestants into a gauntlet of wall climbs, tunnel crawls, leaps over fire, freezing water, and electrocution, amongst other things.  While I was a little intimidated at the prospect of negotiating and suffering through these obstacles, the entrance fees were paid and there was no turning back.

Over the next few months I ran, and ran, and ran some more.  I really didn’t alter my training that much aside for some more pushups (on a good day) and sad attempts at non-ironic planking in my kitchen (when I felt ambitious).  I figured since I had run ten miles before and had a relatively sound constitution I could do this thing no matter how insurmountable it seemed on paper. Colby had the benefit of a personal trainer and a varied exercise repertoire that would ostensibly put her in a better place to tackle Tough Mudder.  I just had determination and the possibility of embarrassment or failure as my motivation, and hopefully those would suffice.

Once race day finally arrived, Colby and I piled into her roommate’s Subaru and headed north into Pennsylvania’s rural Lehigh Valley.  While Tough Mudder was billed as a Philadelphia event, it actually took place in a town called Upper Macungie on Jaindl farms.  If you’re familiar with the Lehigh Valley in PA you know that it’s a complex network of farms, various and sundry, nestled amongst rolling hills.  After parking the Subaru, we discovered that we were to be brought by school bus to the event grounds.  Following checking in and storing our bags, we found a few friends from Philadelphia and anxiously awaited the beginning of the event.  “Might as well get this over with” became my mantra for what would become of the next four hours.

It seemed like an eternity before our queue was called to the starting line.  I found myself in a good place as we trudged down the dusty hill towards the starting line, hydrated, stretched, and with a warm June sun beating down on my back.  This was going to be hard, but at least it was neither hot nor humid.  Then my ounce of hope dissipated instantly.  As we neared the starting line, I noticed that the hoards of ramped-up adrenaline junkies sprinting to the it had slowed to a crawl.  Our first test lay before us, an eight-foot wooden wall that had to be scaled to even reach the beginning of the race.  After about three embarrassing tries, I finally made it over the wall and found Colby, who had some help getting over by someone stronger than me.  Go figure.

After a rousing speech about camaraderie peppered with warnings of heat exhaustion delivered by a very fit master of ceremonies, the race began.  I won’t detail every single aspect of Tough Mudder but I can say this – it was the hardest thing, physically, I have ever endured to date aside from flying off of my bicycle face-first into a Chevy Blazer; but that’s a story for another time.

“Might as well get this over with” replayed time and time again while completing Tough Mudder’s grueling cross-country course.  I slowed my usual running pace to match Colby since she has asthma and her inhaler got clogged with mud early into the race.  The slow pace offered little to no respite, however. These obstacles were ludicrously taxing and fully deserving of the waiver and hold-harmless forms Tough Mudder has one sign before registering.

For ten miles Colby and I crawled elbow over elbow under barbed wire while some sadistic asshole shot us with a water cannon.  My attempts at trying to ascend a quarter pipe typically reserved for skateboarders resulted in me face planting while simultaneously receiving friction burns over ninety percent of my body from sliding down the hard plastic surface (Colby opted out of this one).  We scaled monkey bars over freezing cold water, me fueled by pure adrenaline and the bitter memory of everyone in elementary school who made fun of me for being chubby.  I overcame my own claustrophobia and shimmied through sewage pipes into ice-cold mud after jumping through a four-foot flame into a pool of muck and mire.  I climbed haystack pyramids and scaled thirty-foot-high walls using only a knotted rope and whatever energy the gratis fun-sized Clif Bars provided at the refreshment stand provided.  I jumped into an industrial-sized dumpster filled to the brim with water cooled to a balmy 34 degrees from 80,000 pounds of ice cubes alongside a couple in their early fifties (Colby opted out of this one too, smart girl).  While the obstacles were brutal in their own right, the run was downright unforgiving; but we persevered. After a fifty-yard dash through a maze of electrified wires we were crowned with Tough Mudder’s signature orange headband and handed a lukewarm Dos Equis to commemorate our triumph.

I always cursed myself for not finishing the things I started, which went hand-in-hand with years of self-loathing for being a lazy, chubby kid with zero innate talent for athletics. While at its core Tough Mudder could be considered the hallmark of adrenaline junkie douchebaggery, I didn’t see it that way.  Colby and I endured a very challenging test of human endurance and willpower.  Essentially, Tough Mudder started as something we wanted to finish for bragging rights, but for me became a testament to my own gumption, willingness to see things through to the end, and come-with-it-ness that I try to embody when I set out to effect any change in my life.  While I don’t know if I’ll ever sign up to compete in another Tough Mudder event, I’m glad I came away from this one knowing that I’m somebody who sees things through to the bitter end, someone my chubbier former persona certainly wasn’t.

The post Scrapes, Cuts, Bruises, and another Life Lesson appeared first on Rookerville.

We here at Rookerville wanted to pay tribute to our many fathers.  Below are a few of our thoughts on our fathers and father’s day.  Happy Father’s; from Rookerville.

Russ Stevens:

If you know me, chances are, you have heard me say that I am my father’s son.  Each year that progresses, I find myself saying things I imagine he would, or behaving in a fashion I imagine he would.  This is not a bad thing, but it’s definitely funny considering the fact that growing up, there’s no worse idea than becoming your parent’s.

The biggest example of how much my dad has influenced the person I am now comes from his driving radio choices.  Growing up on Long Island, if I was in my dad’s Izuzu Trooper, there was a 100% chance we were listening to either “Sports radio 66, THE FAN! WFAN! NEW YORK!” or Steely Dan.  I couldn’t have hated either of these things more as a 10 year old.  Mike and the Mad Dog was the WORST. Who could listen to these guys yell at each other for hours on end? My Dad could.  And he would argue right back at them.  Steely Dan?  Even worse.  Being forced to listen to light rock while we cruise the streets of Uniondale? Not cool dad.  There’s people listening to Snoop (still Doggy) Dogg and Dr. Dre, but we listen to this?

Flashforward almost twenty years and I am that same guy.  ESPN Radio is the default station on my car. Mike and Mike, The Stephen A Show, The Michael Kay Show.  None of these are any better than what my dad listened to.  They are all middle-aged men yelling about the Giants and Jets.  Yankees and Mets.  It’s all the same.  It sounds awful most of the time, but I wouldn’t know what else to do in the car.  It’s how I’ve been conditioned.  Also, Steely Dan, while still not a preset in my life, is the default music of choice for me if I happen to go to Long Island (which I try not to).

My dad has never given a flying crap about what other people thought.  He was and still is, his own man. He’s impossible to embarrass, and unflinching in his interests.  Today I am the same way.  I think as far as personality traits being passed down go, you could do a lot a worse. Excuse me while I go listen to Aja.

Andrew Rose:

Happy Father’s Day.

Scott Signorino:

Sometimes I wonder how my father and I are related.  His cool, calculating demeanor stands in stark contrast to my Type A exuberance, carelessness, and tendency to proverbially break things.  In addition, I couldn’t care less about spots yet, if a Phillies game is on, you know that’s all my dad is paying attention to for the next ~3 hours.  My dad’s a great guy, everybody likes him.  He’s well traveled, having been all over Europe when he was in the Army, and is a lot of fun to have a conversation with in all things history, spaghetti westerns, cooking, politics, and finance.  Also, our entire neighborhood comes to him when they need something fixed which is admirable because it’s always great to see the old man good with tools.  Unfortunately for me, I’ll never be that old man to anybody.

Back in 2010 my dad had some issues with his heart and it was a scary time for our family.  My dad, who’s going to be 75 this coming November, never asks for help from anybody unless he really needs it and back then he really needed it making me the de facto man of the house.  Suffice it to say, my dad made it through the corrective procedures perfectly fine and still continues to keep a part time job in between mowing the lawn, drinking a beer while watching the Phillies, and keeping calm and collected while both my mom and I fall back on our awfully short tempers.  Happy Father’s Day, Dad.  While we may not have a lot in common, I relish and look forward to all of the conversations we have about things in which you have infinite wisdom and understanding and by the way, I still need your help with the frame around my closet door.

Justine Kolsky:

“You’re your father’s daughter” is something that I’ve heard more than frequently. As far as looks go, I’d rather look like my mother so if that’s what people mean, I’m not into it. If they are speaking about my character, I’ll take it.

My dad raised me as if I was his son. He was my teacher of all things practical. The difference between a flathead and a Phillips screwdriver, how to insulate your windows, how to check your oil, change a tire, paint, move furniture, fish, and any other boyish tasks you can think of.

To teach me how to swim, he threw me up in the water and didn’t catch me (it worked), to teach me how to ride a bike he took off my training wheels, pushed me, and let go until I caught on.  He taught me the value of family, a dollar, and how to never “half-ass” something. He may not be the most sensitive, he may not always say the right thing, but he’s always coming from a good place. Dad, thank you for continuing to teach me through the years and always providing me with a good laugh. Happy Father’s Day, I love you!

The post The Rookery Does Father’s Day appeared first on Rookerville.

“Mhysa”

Poor Theon Greyjoy.  If “Mhysa”, the slow-burning close to Season 3 of HBO’s Game of Thrones left me with any resounding thought at all, it was POOR THEON GREYJOY.

If you’ve been following the show then you know that Theon Turncloak has been suffering a bit of nastiness by a formerly unnamed, incredibly sadistic young man.  One of my favorite scenes in “Mhysa” was Roose Bolton’s “revealing of Ramsay.”  Prior to Season 3 we’ve probably referred to Roose Bolton as the weird bald guy who followed Robb around Westeros as he fought in the name of the North.  In a brilliantly executed scene, Roose explains to Lord Walder Frey exactly what happened at Winterfell when his bastard son stormed the castle.  Ending this explanation, Roose’s iron tones announce in almost defeatist fashion that “Ramsay has his own way of doing things.”

The very next scene is a horrifying exchange of symbolic penis-oriented double entendres between who we now know as Ramsay and a defeated, and now castrated Theon.  Ramsay makes many observations about Theon’s manhood and snacks on a pork sausage nonchalantly before bestowing a new moniker on Lord Greyjoy, “Reek.”  When reading the books I was probably the most interested in Theon’s story arc.  While there have been a few deviations from the printed page to the big screen, all of the key points are hit.  Theon’s paying big time for his incessant self-regard and his insecurities as a ward of the Starks.

“Mhysa” takes us all over the Game of Thrones world, and in keeping with the theme of “Poor Theon Greyjoy” we find ourselves at the Iron Islands.  Balon Greyjoy, ever the sympathetic father, is hand-delivered his son’s manhood.  Asha, Theon’s rather cold sister, vows to take avenge and rescue her brother taking the best of the best that remain on the Iron Islands and the fastest ship around.

In the Riverlands, poor Arya Stark and her brutal caretaker Sandor Clegane travel to parts unknown after the bloody miasma of the Red Wedding.  You begin to soften any attitudes you had towards the Hound given the bit of humanity he showed to Arya as she watched her brother’s dead body paraded around at the Twins with a hilariously awful prop wolf’s head sewn on top.  All of that aside, Arya makes her bones in her apparently newfound career as a murderer by ruthlessly stabbing a Frey bannerman boasting about Robb’s death.  Sandor gives her a hand with the remaining Frey soldiers and you have to applaud their newfound partnership.

King’s Landing hears about the death of Robb Stark and as Joffrey acts like Joffrey, Tywin coolly reminds him that “A man who has to say ‘I am the king’ is no true king” in one of my favorite Charles Dance moments of the series.  Tywin and Tyrion share a borderline heartfelt father-son moment where Tywin reveals that he relented throwing Tyrion in the sea as Tyrion is a Lannister and Tywin always puts family first.  You begin to feel for Tyrion because in the grand scope of things, he’s one of the few almost wholly likeable characters on the show and it was a shame that his relationship with Sansa tragically regressed after it showed a hint of thawing once Sansa heard of her brother’s death at Lannister whims.

Stannis Baratheon receives a raven from Castle Black to which Sam and Gilly return after a chance meeting with Bran at the Nightfort.  While Sam and Gilly were running from what lay beyond the Wall, Bran and his entourage soldiered through the Black Gate with great abandon into the bleak unknown to put a stop to the rising of the dead.  I’m glad Bran’s purpose has finally been revealed, albeit clumsily during an almost forced interaction between he and Sam.  It really just felt like Bran was traveling to nowhere the entire season.   I’m also glad that after sending warning to those declaring themselves king in Westeros, Stannis Baratheon has been given another chance at proving his worth to the realm by answering the call of the Night’s Watch.  Speaking of member’s of the Night’s Watch, Jon Snow teaches us that all you need is a little love and a penchant for being riddled with arrows to smite the wrath of your lady.  Let’s keep our fingers crossed for Jon Snow and his arrow wounds.

As expected, a scene with Danaerys wrapped it all up.  Her army awaits the openings of the doors at Yunkai, and essentially Game of Thrones turns into a music video at a concert as Dany crowdsurfs in a sea of slaves chanting “Mhysa”, the Ghsicari word for “mother”.   In this reviewer’s opinion, the ending was a little lame as I had hoped for more of a supernatural cliffhanger a la the first two seasons, however, “Mhysa” definitely kept me interested for what HBO has in store for us next year.

The post Game of Thrones: Seasons Endings (Part 2) appeared first on Rookerville.

The Rains of Castamere:

If you’ve been a religious watcher of HBO’s “Game of Thrones”, then you’ve come to expect monumental things each time we hit episode number 9.  In the ninth episode of season 1, “Baelor”, poor Ned Stark lost his head as a result of a Joffrey Baratheon bait-and-switch further escalating the Northern rebellion against the Iron Throne.   Moreover, in season 2, episode 9, “Blackwater”, gave us Stannis Baratheon’s siege of King’s Landing in the only detailed battle scene on the show to date.  Characteristically, Episode 9 in “Game of Thrones” has become the de facto climactic episode throughout the series; that climax, by proxy, always ushers in sweeping change to the Westeros we’ve come to know and love (or hate).   Season 3, Episode 9 of “Game of Thrones”, aptly titled “The Rains of Castamere” has been described as traumatic, gruesome, and downright heartbreaking and for just cause.  At the conclusion of “The Rains…” the War of Five Kings is lessened by one and the nature of his subtraction from the sum is gut-wrenching, to say the least.  In typical GOT fashion, the show does a good job of giving the major players a fair share of screen time, so while the events that take place at The Twins may be the most important, other scenes featuring some of our favorites were delivered masterfully in this episode.

In the East, Danaerys and her motley crew of Westerosi exiles, freed slaves, and Dothraki tribespeople are still contemplating the siege of Yunkai.  Newfound accomplice Daario Noharis leads Jorah Mormont and Grey Worm on an almost suicidal, guerilla warfare styled infiltration through Yunkai’s back gates, dispatching the Yunkish guards almost effortlessly.  This scene was a real treat to watch as the directors and choreographers did a wonderful job displaying the different fighting styles used by Jorah, Daario, and Grey Worm during the fight scenes.  To be fair, this was one of the most action-packed moments to date over the course of the series and I wish it had gone on a little longer.   With bated breath, Dany and Barristan Selmy await the return of hastily assembled task force. Jorah and Grey Worm return, bloodied yet successful, and finally albeit dramatically, Daario comes home last and you can’t help but wonder what’s in store between he and Danaerys given the emphasized “stolen glance” they give one another-  could Dany be smitten with this cut-throat?  Time will tell.   She certainly was more interested in Daario’s well-being than old news Mormont, or so it seemed.

While Danaerys is becoming quite the conqueror in the Free Cities, back in Westeros things start off teetering on the hopeful side.  For once it almost seems like the Stark family will be partially reunited as Sandor Clegane takes Arya to The Twins for the wedding of her uncle, Edmure, to Rosalin Frey.  The interplay between Clegane and Arya has been enjoyable to watch.  Arya’s contempt for the Hound coupled with his brash and callous, yet patriarchal caretaking of the Stark girl almost makes us wonder if the Hound is really all the piss and vinegar he presents himself to be.   As they arrive at The Twins during the throes of the Red Wedding, the hopes of any reunion are cut short and the most Arya gets is meeting eyes with poor Grey Wind, Robb’s direwolf-turned-crossbow-target by Frey soldiers.  The Hound, maybe for Arya’s benefit, knocks her unconscious to save her from the horrors of the betrayal dealt by House Frey.  Part of me was happy that Arya was “reunited” with Sandor as I would love to see their dynamic continue through the finale and into later seasons of the show.

For all the Kit Harrington fans, we have one of the better Jon Snow scenes to date.   His band of wildlings led by the likeable Tormund Giantsbane happen upon an elderly horse breeder at a lone homestead en route to Castle Black.  Here we have the second possibility for a Stark reunion, of sorts.  Hiding in the homestead’s windmill is Bran and his companions taking a needed respite from their sojourn north of The Wall.  While again, Bran and Jon never reunite face to face, Bran is able to warg into his direwolf, Summer, and see his long lost half brother and not a moment to soon.  Jon’s Night’s Watch instincts betray his façade as a wildling as he refuses to kill the elderly horse breeder.  Wildling swords are drawn on Jon, Jon finally kills that pesky asshole Orell who, with his dying breath, wargs into an eagle dealing a scratch or two upon Snow’s pretty visage which, in my opinion was second in the badass category only to Bran warging into Summer to give a brotherly hand to the outnumbered Kit Harrington.  This scene was a great break from the seemingly endless, and pointless adventures of Jon and Bran in the aesthetically uninteresting northerly locales of Westeros.

While this scene may have had us finally seeing the Starks catch a break for a change, the penultimate moment of Episode 9, The Red Wedding, reminds us all that the Starks are the underdogs of Westerosi kingmaking, perhaps “underwolves” would be a more fitting title.  At The Twins, Robb apologizes to a surly Walder Frey who makes no bones about his reasoning behind Robb’s choosing the exotic Lady Talisa over his rather homely selection of daughters.  While Frey accepts Robb’s apology, the tone is a grim as it gets and for good reason.

Cersei explained the meaning of “The Rains of Castamere” to Margaery Tyrell a few episodes ago.  More of a warning than a song, “The Rains…” tells the story of House Reyne who defiantly rivaled the Lannisters on all fronts: wealth, power, showmanship, you name it.  The Lannisters responded by completely eradicating House Reyne and the song was written as a warning to those who would even consider crossing Casterly Rock.

The wedding between Edmure Tully and Rosalin Frey has us all on edge, and in terms of vibes, it’s fairly ominous however Lord Walder Frey adds a little levity as the bride is revealed.  Rosalin Frey turns out to be quite the beauty and Lord Frey shoots Robb a “see what you could’ve had if you would’ve waited” glance which, had me chuckling as did the Blackfish’s uneasy expressions as he tried to disregard the wanting eyes of the remaining Frey girls.

What happens next is essentially the dismantling of the northern rebellion one crossbow bolt at a time.  As the wedding feast comes to an end and the door to the main hall is barred shut, Catelyn lifts Roose Bolton’s sleeve to notice he’s armored.   Almost simultaneously as we realize what’s about the happen, Catelyn lets out a scream, slaps Roose Bolton and the band begins to play “The Rains of Castamere”.   Frey soldiers, aware that Lady Talisa is pregnant with Robb’s child brutally disembowel her as Robb is riddled with crossbow bolts.  As Walder Frey chuckles throughout the entire proceeding, Catelyn makes a last ditch plea for her son’s life, grabbing Walder Frey’s wife and threatening to slit her throat if any harm comes to Robb.  Frey, very coldly, announces that he will “find another wife” as Roose Bolton ends the short reign of the King in the North with a coup de grace to his heart uttering, very coolly, “the Lannisters send their regards.”  Catelyn’s throat is slit shortly after making sure she takes a Frey with her and the credits roll to no music.

Quite simply, this was one of the most jarring episodes of Game of Thrones to date.  The Starks, always the honorable and merciful family, were given no quarter by those they thought were friends and while I personally thought Robb arrogant and careless with his oaths and promises, it was a real blow to see the one family that I considered wholly “good” (or at least, as good as could be by Westerosi standards) further dragged through the muck .for which they had no acumen.  Quite possibly the most riveting moment in Game of Thrones history to date, it will be interesting to see where season finale “Mhysa” takes us through Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire.

The post Game of Thrones: Seasons Endings (Part I) appeared first on Rookerville.

A bunch of us wanted to share some quick thoughts pertaining to Mother’s Day.  Below is a collection from a few writers:

Andrew Rose:

My mom’s family is 100% Italian-Catholic from the Bronx, and my upbringing reflected this strongly. Dinner was pasta multiple times a week. Misbehavior led to a wooden spoon. Parent-child communication meant gesticulating wildly with your hands while yelling rapid-fire sentences at one another, and regardless of what you were about to do, you were definitely going to break your neck. That caffeinated brown liquid you drink in the morning? KWAW-fee. The place where your socks go? DRAW-ah. Silence was meant for church, and otherwise, ALL SYSTEMS GO. The first few times my then-girlfriend-now-wife heard me on the phone with my mother, she thought we were constantly fighting. No, I assured her, this is just how we talk. Sorry, tAWK. As the oldest son and grandson in the family, my mom’s devotion to me also likely set totally unrealistic expectations for my future relationships with women. Alas, no one will ever put me on a pedestal quite like she does, but the skinny, blonde, very-not-Italian girl I married fits the bill well enough.

A few years ago, my mom’s mother passed away, and the family did not react well, to put it lightly. My grandmother was probably the strongest person I’ve ever known, and how she managed to keep her family afloat with a deceased husband prior to any of her four children being old enough to drive is beyond me. She was the bond that held them all together. I joke with my mom sometimes about how alike the two of them are becoming, mostly because they are both slightly insane. But besides the tangential monologues and constant fretting, their strength and dedication the familial unit in all situations, at all costs, solidifies their similarity. And really, that’s all you can ask.

Happy Mother’s Day to the woman who holds it all together.

Scott Signorino:

Mother’s Day has always been a bittersweet holiday at the Signorino castle.  My mom, like everyone else’s mom, is the greatest mom on earth.  She’s a hardworking, straight-forward woman who does her best to understand her right-brained only child which is a pretty tall order to fill considering my mom is a Happy Days-era Jersey girl from a family of six.  My mom’s a waitress and sometimes a bartender and so Mother’s Day takes on a different meaning for her than just flowers and a brunch paid for by dad and Scott.  My mom works at a fine dining restaurant a few miles outside of Doylestown where I grew up and her knack at interpersonal communication has caused her to befriend politicians, lawyers, judges, the guy who now fixes all of our family cars, people who have given me job interviews, and an automotive baron who owns about 75% of all of the businesses in Doylestown.  This same knack has caused her to be a stellar waitress and sometimes-bartender and she essentially makes it rain when it comes to tips on Mother’s Day, the busiest restaurant day of the year.  So while I’ll be dragging myself out of bed this Sunday morning and schlepping it to Doylestown from Center City on the long and tortuous R5 line, my mom will have been at work for about four hours of a ten hour day.  She’ll get home in her uniform around 6:30, we’ll have family dinner, she’ll try to give me part of the money she made that day, I’ll give her some flowers I bought at Acme and a funny card with some smart ass remark I wrote in it and then I’ll head home and my mom will go to bed.  I don’t think I can give my mom the credit she deserves on Mother’s Day because she won’t give it to herself.  She’s held two jobs until I was 28, one always being at a restaurant, and when she retired from corporate accounting, she’s continued and she’s now 64 years old. My mom doesn’t get a break on Mother’s Day because she wants to do right by us like she always does.  Mom – I know you read Rookerville and I want you to know that I love you and you’re the most important woman in my life and I wouldn’t have the same work ethic or ambition or ability to talk to people I didn’t know that well if it weren’t for what you’ve passed on to me.  Happy Mother’s Day, I hope you make it rain one more time.

Russ Stevens:

My first memories begin around 3-4 when I was in pre-K, a year early.  At the end of the school year, I said “Mommy I need a break” (because my life was SO hard) and my mother obliged.  For the next full year, I got to spend every single day with my mom.  My routine was so specific, that I still remember it.  Dunkin Donuts, where I’d get a donut and sneak some of my mom’s coffee.  I never liked it, but I always hoped one day I would.  I got to go the park every day, and then come home to watch Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers and be read to before naptime.  Eventually, I got so tired of having to wait for my reading time that I started to pretend to read by myself.   My mom seeing this, and knowing her older son hated reading, spent as much time as possible helping me learn to read.  By the next year, I was the age I should be in kindergarten, and I was the only kid in the class who was already reading chapter books.

I guess my point is this:  I became an English and Philosophy major down the road and to this day and it feels as though reading is and will always be my first love.  This is what makes moms awesome.  They are there with you from day one, helping you learn and grow and figure out the person you are going to be.  I cannot say for sure if I would be the person I am today without her care.  Even as you get older and sometimes dread the phone call you might have to make because she may have an opinion about what are/are not doing, remember that she really only ever wanted you to be the best person you could be. Relax. And say I love you.

Jennifer O’Connell:

When I look back on pieces I’ve written, I find all sorts of topics.  African leg infections.  Motorcycle marriage proposals.  Aboriginal bachelor pads.  Whitney Houston flashmobs.  Shiny spandex adventure pants.  Falling in love and out of planes, narrow escapes and near misses, eating tarantulas, fleeing venomous snakes, wrangling llamas.  Adventures, misadventures, personal illuminations…they’re all there, save one topic: my mother.

I don’t know why it is so hard to put her on paper.  Fed up with trying to do it myself, I’ve resorted to someone else’s words.  It’s the week before Mothers’ Day and I’m standing in a supermarket leafing through stacks of greeting cards, trying to find one that resonates with what I want to say.  What do you say to a woman who is everywhere at once?  I can pick out small things I love about her: the way she throws her head back and laughs a little too loudly, corny puns, apple coffee cake, weathered hands, her favorite hue of indigo.  She is modest, except for when it comes to command of the English language or her aim with a frisbee.  At the family reunion last summer we were all telling stories, singing songs, showing off talents.  “What can you do?” we asked my mother.  “I do a damn good impersonation of bacon,” she said.

I heard a saying once: “there are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle, or the mirror that reflects it.”  I can’t put my mother into words, because she is in everything I do.  She is in every adventure and misadventure; she is in all that I am.  I sigh my defeat to Hallmark and turn and walk away.  I know that soon we will sit on the deck in the fading dusk, watching the mountains, saying more through our silence than we could with all of the words in the world.

Matt Cargile:

The ability to amaze someone by just being normal is a luxury not everyone has.  And even those who do have it don’t really get it with everyone they interact with.  I’m one of the lucky few, but it’s really only with my mother.  See for her I’m a miracle child; so strange how someone can have such a different point of view for your personal development. In my looks back at growing up I have some realizations.  1) even if I was right about grades really not being a sign of intelligence, I could’ve put a little extra effort in and gotten A’s.  2) Picking a college on a whim isn’t the best move.  Especially if you don’t even know the college and only went to check it out when it visited your High School cause it got you out of AP Physics. 3) Just cause you can film a party you threw at your house while your parents were away, doesn’t mean you should.  But if you asked my mom she’d exclaim that 1) it’s amazing I even graduated high school (not like I was a bad kid, but literally miracle baby amazing), 2) Best college choice ever, and she tells everyone else’s kid they should go there too, 3) she’s keeping the tape for when I run for president (which I’m never doing).  See my mom dealt with me nearly dying a couple times after being born.  This is a very interesting time for such dramatic occurrences cause it’s literally like it never happened to me.  So while I grew up, driving like an idiot, doing stupid stunts on my bike, and just floating through school my mom was busy being amazed I didn’t have brain damage.  Amazed I could even talk like a normal person.  In the end I didn’t need to do much to impress my mom, but in her eyes I’ve exceeded all expectations and then some.  For what’s it worth I just did my best to listen to my parents and that seemed to get me pretty far. And now my mother is always praising the skies for gifting me to her, which is a nice sentiment but if I could tell her one thing is that maybe she should thank herself a bit more for who I am.  I know I do.

Jake Serlan:

The angriest I was ever at my Mother occurred six time zones away from her. I was abroad for college, living off an unsubsidized loan paying for six credits I didn’t more than I needed to graduate. But, the girlfriend said she wanted to go to London and wouldn’t go with me. So, there I was.

I was reminded of all these facts by Mom’s delayed shrill through my English style Nokia that still played the Nokia ring tone. ‘Wasted money’ this, she said and ‘squandered time’ that. “My life is mine” I said or something equally teenagery despite being in my early twenties. At some point, I started yelling. I think I did anyway, cause she asked “why are you yelling” in that Motherly way that knows why your yelling and her mission was accomplished.

By the time I hung up on her my face was beet red and I was sweating. I had found my way to the bathroom some how and my girlfriend looked in on me with concern.

“Please come out of the bathroom,” she said.

“Why?!?!”

“Because you’re about to punch the mirror.”

When I looked into the mirror, I was greet by a man who looked just like me, only with his fist cocked back, loaded for a knock out blow.

“Oh.” I said.

I’m not prone outbreaks of anger, much less violence. It took me a long time to realize how I got to that point.

My mom never got mad. She was disappointed.

And she was the one person I never wanted to disappoint.

I would discover as I got older that I couldn’t disappoint her. Not really. Even if she didn’t agree with me or I her, she encouraged my convictions. I would never have gotten the nerve up to raise my fist to the mirror if she hadn’t instilled my sense of indignation, and I wouldn’t have been able to resist throwing the punch without her ability to judge a situation in a second.

My passion comes from my Mom. And I love her for it.

Justine Kolsky:

How do you purchase a gift of appreciation for the person who literally brought you into this world? You can’t. Well technically you can but, the flowers you’ve sent, the Spa day you’ve purchased, or the nice lunch you’ve planned doesn’t compare to the LIFE that she has given you. In most cases, your mom sacrificed her killer body for 9 months to give you a nice little space to grow in.  How selfless is that? Most people are thinking “well it’s not selfless she wanted children” and to you I say, are you serious? Yes, some people plan pregnancy but for MOST, it just happens. So before you start to think you’re the best gift your parents have ever received, think again. A mother is the best gift we all have received in one-way or another (biological or not).

Cyn (aka Mom) is not your average mother and that’s what I appreciate about her so much. She has no issue with confidence and plays the part of detective, doctor, dancer, banker, and weather(wo)man without hesitation. To be clear, professionally, she is none of these things but does a damn good job pretending she is. To be honest, I don’t know how Cyn has made it this long without murdering me. I am the reason why I don’t want to have children. I was the worst child up until about a year ago and Cyn put up with all of it without batting an eye. That’s how Moms are. They are there for you unconditionally, regardless of the situation.

Mom-

Thank you for calming me down when I was having temper tantrums, staying by my side all night when I burnt my hands on the radiator at that restaurant, letting me cut my hair however I wanted to (even though I looked like a boy), allowing me to take the car on my first day getting my license, not getting that mad when I crashed it, picking me up at 2am from a sleepovers because I missed you too much, carting me around until I was 16, laughing it off when I call you a bitch or moon you after dinner as a “thank you”, introducing me to chocolate, introducing me to old movies, always making me aware of the dangers of wherever I’m living at the time, calling everyday just to say “hi”, being brutally honest, and putting up with all of my bullshit. Sorry I couldn’t be home today to celebrate with you but hopefully this will suffice for now. Cheers to you Ma! Keep dancing, humming, cracking cases, and running the hospital – enjoy today, I love you.

The post Mother’s Day: A Rookerville Collection appeared first on Rookerville.

We spilled into her apartment and I knocked a stack of mail and her roommate’s keys to the floor as I crashed into her end table.  She narrowed her eyes at me with a look that said “settle down or you’re going home” and I got my shit together.  Knowing my luck, her roommate would sleepily drift into our parlay and monopolize the conversation turning me into the de facto third-wheel on my own date.  In hushed tones, Allison showed me to the living room, excused herself, and I plopped myself down on her couch trying to patiently wait out her return so we could do the damn thing already.

As I played with the fringes on the blanket that hung over her couch and my senses adjusted to this new, strange place, I began to wonder what the hell was taking so long for her to come back.  I looked down the hallway and saw the light from underneath the door to her room so I figured she was getting changed, charging her phone, or doing whatever it is girls do when they disappear into their bedrooms.  I thought I heard what sounded like baby talk and childish giggling but I dismissed it as me being drunk and resigned myself to continue waiting for her to come back.

I yawned. A minute passed. Another minute.  Two minutes.  FIVE MINUTES?! I kept checking the clock on my phone and it turned out I had been sitting there for ten fucking minutes.  What the hell, man?  We were supposed to be naked and rolling around in her room by now. My excitement and feelings of success were slowly spiraling into despair, agitation, and maybe unsurprisingly, exhaustion.  I checked the clock on my phone: 1:34 am.

This sucks.  “Fuck this,” I thought.  “Five more minutes and I’m getting the fucking fuck out of here.” Either she was telepathic and acted on cue, or I was really good with timing my frustrations because her door swung open and she sauntered out, still wearing the same shit she had on when I took her to the bar.  Something was different, however. She was cradling something in her arms.  What was it?  Drugs?  A bottle of fine wine?  Dirty movies?  She made her way into the living room slowly, the apartment was poorly lit so I couldn’t make out exactly what she was holding, but my dejection was turning back into excitement so I didn’t give a shit, it could’ve been a live hand grenade. Whatever.

“This is LOLA!  She’s my baby girl,” Allison announced quietly with sing-songy, almost patronizing, absolutely cutesy fervor.  A kitten.  She was holding a tiny tiger-striped kitten.  No hand grenades, pornography, or mind altering-substances.  In my drunken attempts to recollect, I drudged up a liquid memory of her saying something about how she just got a cat.  I thought nothing of it though.  Cats do their own thing, but this, this was a kitten and infant animals have a way of making everyone in the room pay attention to nothing else except them, this time was no different.  Might as well introduce myself so we can move on to the reason I came here in the first place.

“Hi Lola!  I’m Scott!” I whispered, feigning my excitement while introducing myself to this feline.  The kitten meowed and buried her head into Allison’s cardigan.  I yawned again and forced a charming smile. I tried to scratch the kitten’s head but it shied away from me.

“Oh, she doesn’t like you!” Allison said, her hushed tones carrying the nascent scent of accusation and judgment.  I couldn’t tell if her tone was serious or if she was being a flirt, I went with the latter but still, my senses were dulled by hops and barley and the ever-increasing sleepiness wasn’t putting any edge on my wit.

I cracked a toothy grin.  “Maybe she can tell the bad ones from the good ones, ha ha,” I retorted, in a feeble attempt to be coy.  I probably thought I was being real smooth, but in truth, I probably sounded like this was my first time doing this sort of back and forth.

“Hmmmm, maybe.”  There was no playfulness in her tone. Actually, it was “deadpan” personified.  A swing and a miss from Signorino!  Ugh.  I plopped down on the far end of the couch and expected Allison to sit down next to me. Instead, she took up residence in the recliner on the far side of the room with her eyes fixated squarely on the kitten.  Jesus Christ.  Am I really sitting by myself on this couch in this girl’s living room while this girl fusses over this kitten after we made out, aggressively, like a half-hour ago?  Does this cat have any idea how much fucking money I spent on this date?  The kitten mewed and Allison went from quirky girl from the record store to full blown insane:

“Yes Lola, Scott’s no good.  Scott’s creepy, isn’t he? Scott’s blazer looks stupid, doesn’t it? Scott’s overdressed” and on and on and on it went.  The kitten mewed again, I yawned, and the feelings of hopelessness crept back in mixed with full blown frustration.  I tried to keep up some idle conversation but Lola was the apple of Allison’s eye.  My efforts were futile and my eyes started to get heavy with sleep and it was all I could do to fight passing out.  I wanted to sleep, ideally with Allison, but I resigned myself to that not happening.  Allison rocked the cat back and forth, coddling it with more baby talk, and I was pissed.  I didn’t understand why this chick invited me up to her apartment after copiously making out with me at the bar, on the way home from the bar and in her hallway if all she was going to do with dick around with this minx.  Look, at the time I wasn’t one of those people that just “…wasn’t a cat person,” or whatever.  I was an avid animal person, and to this day, I still don’t eat the fucking things.  However, this night slowly turned from me quenching a drought, to me getting cockblocked by a goddamn kitten.  It’s not like I was a stranger to being cockblocked, sure, I’ve had the more attractive and exponentially more charming friend ruin one or two chances with the ladies in my day; I’ve been put on hold so the girl I was courting could tend to her crying and vomiting roommate and sent home as a result of such because it just “…wasn’t a good time for me to stay over.” But, JESUS CHRIST DUDE, I’ve never been bested by a kitten before.  Why am I still sitting here, yawning incessantly listening to this girl tell me about Lola’s first time at the vet?  This was not the night I had envisioned; about forty five minutes earlier I was certain I had it in the bag and that there was no way I was going home without at least getting my dic-…

…I awoke several hours later sitting upright, fully clothed and very much alone. The blanket that was once draped over the couch now wrapped around my person.  I stood up and that’s when the hangover took hold: the inside of my skull screaming as a result of the alcohol borne dehydration I had inflicted upon myself just a few hours earlier, my stomach churning from doing somersaults, barrel rolls, and corkscrew spirals as my liver worked overtime to purge the toxins from my body, the inside of my mouth drier than the Gobi desert bedecked with the taste of personal failure.  Allison was gone, retired to her bedroom most likely, and apart from the whir of the heater, her apartment was darker and more silent than a tomb.  Bleary-eyed, I checked the clock on my phone:  5:27 am.  I heard the sounds of rain and early-morning Philadelphia commuter traffic seep through the window.  I stumbled to her sink, grabbed a glass from the dish rack, swished some water around in my mouth, splashed some on my face, took a gander down the hallway – no signs of life.  All the better. I got the fuck out of there as quietly and as quickly as I could so I wouldn’t wake either Allison or her roommate, sparing myself any morning-after awkwardness.  Similarly, I quickly suppressed any urge to take Lola from Allison and let her loose in a heavily wooded section of Fairmount Park as retribution.

After a physically painful and mentally tortuous drive across town, I got back to my apartment and called myself out of work.  I climbed into bed reflecting on the lessons I learned from the previous night:

1) Clearly I’m far less interesting than a new kitten

2) Staying up all night partying isn’t a skill that hones itself with age I really lost any ability to do so with the real world responsibilities that take hold after college

and

3) Maybe I had this night and Allison’s intentions pegged all wrong.  Sure we got drunk, sure we made out.  Sure, to me this seemed like a sealed deal.  However, I rationalized that really any disappointment I felt was on me and me alone. Just because you take a girl out and spend some money and then she subsequently invites you over afterward doesn’t automatically mean she’s going to sleep with you.

My feelings of “Shame on you Lola for diverting my date’s attention from me to you.  Shame on you Allison for your crazy cat lady bait and switch.” were quickly replaced with “Shame on you, Scott Signorino.  Shame on you for taking for granted a solid date with someone who gave up their Thursday night to spend it with you.  Shame on you for your feigned interest and your exaggerated stories about yourself just so you could have some sort of sexual validation to remind yourself that you were worth a salt.”

Shame on me indeed.

The post Life Lessons with Lola and Me appeared first on Rookerville.

Is North Korea to be feared, or revered. Are they misunderstood.  Two Rookers dissect and discern the rumors from reality.  Spoiler alert, I don’t think they’re misunderstood.

Scott:

Does your mouth water at the possibility of eating mud for lunch and grass for dinner?  Do you yearn to practice for a parade for about nine months a year, so diligently  that once said parade is executed will be the most smoothly-run thing in the entire country?  Does the notion of not knowing anything about the rest of the world except for the fact that you hate and are afraid of most of it because your government says so turn you on?  How about a nice trip for the rest of your life to a place known only as Camp 14 where you’ll be separated from your family all because you threw out a newspaper clipping with your president’s face on it?

Well buddy, if that sounds like the best time you haven’t had yet, have I got just the place for you…North Korea!  Nestled in the Asia’s southeastern corner on a little over a thousand square miles of landmass, North Korea is one of the most fascinating places on the planet, and not because it’s awesome, in fact, anyone who’s not a citizen yet has paid North Korea a visit will tell you that it’s frightening, horrifying, oppressive, and just plain weird.  However, a lot of people don’t really know much about North Korea other than the fact that they love Dennis Rodman and George Bush named them last in his Axis of Evil trio.  So, let’s learn a little more about North Korea, why they’ve been in the news lately, why we may or may not care about what they have to say, and why they just don’t like the United States, South Korea, or anyone who isn’t China or Russia.  North Korea doesn’t even like China or Russia that much, in fact, I’d wager a guess that secretly North Korea doesn’t even like North Korea, but we’ll get to that.

North Korea is a battle born nation to say the least. Without getting prehistoric, we’ll look at recent world history. From about 1910 – 1945, the Korean peninsula was one big Japanese colony.  The Koreans, like other folks we know, decided that being ruled by a foreign empire wasn’t anything they wanted a part of, so, this guy, Kim Il-Sung, got a bunch of peasants together, taught them a little bit about Marxist-Leninism which he learned from the then-Soviets, and, according to who you ask, “single-handedly threw the Japanese” out of the Korean peninsula.  After the Japanese went home and they slowly began to lose their front of World War 2, Stalin decided that the Russians would invade Japan through Korea, however, he required a man-in-charge sympathetic to his cause. and who would be a better fit for the job? Why the same guy who was Soviet educated but Korean born, and responsible for ousting imperialist Japanese in the first place.  Enter Kim Il Sung.  However, at that point, it was a little late for Stalin’s raid on the land of the rising sun because by that point the United States bombed Japan into the Stone Age and World War 2 was essentially over.  A few years lapse, Kim Il Sung gets bored, turns his gaze south, and decides “Hey, it’s the fifties!  Happy Days! Let’s make everyone a Communist!”  So with Stalin’s blessing, Kim and his North Korean army supplied by both the Russians and the Chinese invade US occupied South Korea.  The Korean War ensues, and, again depending on who you ask, Kim almost overruns the entire South Korean peninsula until the UN steps in.

Then the rest is history- we have an armistice, or a cease fire, between the two Koreas, the US stays behind to protect it’s friends in the South as well as it’s democratic and capitalist interests abroad, and the Soviet Union crumbles leaving North Korea with only China to turn to for political camaraderie.  Kim Il-Sung, bathing in the glory of defeating yet another foreign enemy, capitalizes on a cult-of-personality style of leadership stylizing himself  “The Great Leader”.  He instills a policy called “Juche Communism” or “military first” and begins to raises an army which nowadays numbers about nine million strong.  The common folk go nuts.  They have to.  Remember the prison camps? If you don’t go wild for Kim, well, you won’t be seeing your family for a really long time and you’re going to be digging corn kernels out of cow dung to sustain the next few decades of your life in good old Camp 14.  Kim Il-Sung organizes parades in his own honor, builds statues all over Pyongyang to immortalize both his legacy and the legacy of the Korean Communist Party, and enjoys an unopposed rule until about 1994. Kim Il-Sung passes away, his son, Kim Jong-Il steps in calling himself The Supreme Leader (Great Leader was already taken), Kim Jong-Il dies, and his grandson, Kim Jong-Un ascends to the throne. This brings to the present.

I mean, let’s face it, South Korea, really won the breakup from the Korean War.  South Korea enjoys a prosperous democratic economy and open trade from the United States, and why not?  We made them see the light of nation building and hubris and so now they can send some action figures and flat screen TVs our way.  Seoul, South Korea’s capitol, is one of the most densely populated cities in the world, while Pyongyang looks like a ghost town or a scene from Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.”  While North Korea is probably bitter at how lousy of a hand they were dealt even though technically they won the Korean War, it’s not all petulance and jealousy.  North Korea, like South Korea, believes that they are both ONE Korea however divided across the line they may be.  This yearning for unification has been a fly in the ointment and point of contention since the Korean War Armistice was drafted.  People flee North Korea for the south in droves.  They cross the demilitarized zone or go through China and cross their fingers hoping they make it in.  If they do, South Korea accepts them, if they don’t, well, North Korea deals with them via firing squad.  They’re really bitter about defectors.

Lately we’ve seen a lot in the news about North Korea.  In fact, every six months or so, the free world remembers that North Korea is a country because they either fire off a bunch of artillery shells at South Korea and kill a dozen or so people, or they start dusting off their nuclear reactors and test fire missiles like its still the Cold War.  On a good day, North Korea threatens a thermonuclear war against the United States, South Korea and all of its enemies (read: the rest of the world) because the US flew a jet fighter too close to the DMZ in the closet.  Historically, that’s about as bad as its gotten.  Since the beginning of April 2013, however, people have started paying a bit more attention to North Korea.  Just a bit though, let’s not get carried away. See, North Korea has Kim Jong-Un,  a new leader who’s still surrounded by the old guard of generals, business people, Juche fanatic politicos, and a really zealous populous who still believes that they’re in the greatest country in the world.  Kim Jong-Un is the Joffrey of the House Baratheon for that part of the world – an ambitious young leader with a lot to prove who was raised in a country where his father was Jesus, Buddha, Mick Jagger, and Justin Beiber combined. He’s also well schooled in North Korea’s history of dealing with foreign policy:  throw them out if they come here, and if they don’t come here, throw some harsh words around so they remember why we earned that bronze medal in the Axis of Evil.  Kim Jong-Un has taken the warspeak a step further; beyond simply threatening the United States with an open nuclear war, he’s gone so far as to close one of the very few borders shared with the South and the requisite industrial plant that went with it; he’s also moved medium range missile launchers to North Korea’s east coast and has the White House AND the Pentagon saying that an attack is “imminent”.   So what does this mean?  Do we finally pay attention, or is North Korea posturing?

For the short period of time that North Korea had our attention, they’ve now been pushed to the back burner in light of the tragedies at the Boston Marathon which the news is saying but not saying smells a lot like Middle Eastern flavored terrorism.  That sort of terrorism still makes the top of the stuff-we-care-about-list even in post-Bush America; Islamic fundamentalists still pose a bigger threat than a conventional army backed by a sovereign nation still clinging on to Communism ever will.  I mean, how many dead soldiers have come back as a result of anything that North Korea has dished out since the 50s?

See politically, at least, we’ve gone about the whole “caring about what happens with North Korea” a totally different way.  The United States still has a fairly concrete foothold on the Korean peninsula to the South, and as of last week one thing has become abundantly clear, this is going to be China’s problem.  After China basically told North Korea to slow it’s roll, we made sure we sent our man John Kerry over there to bore the Chinese Prime Minister to death about an “unified” approach to dealing with North Korea.  If there’s anyone in the Pacific Rim that can get North Korea to shut up, it’s going to be the country that can also get the United States to shut up.  China has expressed an interest in denuclearizing the North Korean peninsula, North Korea balks China, China says “Look, we gave you the stuff you needed, we keep your country barely afloat, we’re the ones that can call the shots around here, and look, United States, if you piss us off, we’re just going to deflate your dollar even more and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

While the American people may get a little of the Cold War hide-under-your-school-desk nostalgia from North Korea’s momentary mouth off and muscle flexing, we’ve basically said “China, you deal with it, because we’ve got our own problems now, see?  And by the way, you’re still going to build all of our stuff for really cheap right?”  So does it really matter if North Korea is posturing now or not?  Will the United States people really begin to lose sleep over a country we forget about every half-year or so?  Are we that unsure of our own military’s capability to disrupt any hostile action North Korea takes especially when the bigger and stronger China will ultimately be left holding the bag?  Will we really flip to page 4 of the “International News” section of our hometown paper next week in the wake of what’s happened in Boston this week?

In this writer’s opinion:

NOPE.

Jake:

North Korea sure has been on the news a lot lately. And by news, I mean that I see a lot more pictures of Kim Jong Un on the internet while I take breaks from searching for pornography. Like most good American’s, I don’t understand what the hell is going on in the world today. It really goes right over my head. However, when I try to find out, I come to find that the media and government too are in the same dilemma. What should be my window into understanding my world seems to just muddle the issues at hand even further. Right now, the North Korean (Crisis? Dust up? Show of force? Display of Cocksmanship?) Situation is a perfect encapsulation of why Americans are so distrustful of their government and media.

Do you remember when we were supposed to be afraid of North Korea?

Just four short years ago they were a card carrying member of the ‘Axis of Evil’, that rogue group of sinister nations hell bent on taking down the United States. The only difference NK and its Axis compatriots, Iraq and Iran, is that Korea actually stated that they want to destroy the US. In fact, in recent history, they are the only sovereign nation to overtly state that they would engage in us nuclear war and bragged that they had the capacity to do so. And what was the mighty US’s response to these threats?

Shrug

As excitable a nation we have been in regards to threats, for some reason the North Koreans never seem to register as a danger. It would seem that they have all the ingrediants for some solid fear mongering: nuclear weapons, the backing of the communists, and an entitled, deluded, insecure fatty pants at the helm. You couldn’t invent a seemingly more dangerous powder keg of potential terrorism if you tried, and the Bush administration tried really hard to do that.

Even back before we defeated racism forever 2008 and again in 2012, we were sold Iraq as a much more imminent threat than our friends on the Pacific rim. Granted, most of us didn’t buy it, but low and behold, we somehow all managed to pay for it in blood and dollars. When we discovered that Iraq really had no way to harm us, it didn’t come as a shock. We had already moved passed the reasoning phase, and forged head on into the mired in an endless conflict phase. And all the while, the original Mad Man in the East, Kimmy J the Ill, blustered and threatened his Margaret Cho looking ass off. The biggest difference between Iraq and NK at the point was a simple one: Iraq didn’t have any weapons of mass destruction and North Korea actually, and verifiably, did.

So why were we so eager to get into Iraq for a hypothetical danger rather than attack a genuine one? The short cynical answer is oil. The longer more complex answer is…. oil with a side of Chinese influence. However, the truth is, it really doesn’t matter why we went in.  We were never given enough information from any official channel to make an informed decision. We all have our pet theories, but apart from the powers that be, no one really knows.

Now, there’s a new threat from the fruit of Ill’s ill loins, Kim Jong Un.  Or is there? The media has been reporting in its great tradition of sensational panic attacks over nothing that Un is making threats. Nuclear threats. Dire threats with potentially catastrophic consequences. And what has been our response been?

Shrug

            The government has given no strong stance one way or the other. So far, the only thing that even resembles a stance on this issue is John Kerry letting us know that North Korea shouldn’t be doing that in his eminently dull John Kerry fashion. But the news keeps on chattering about nukes and threats and targets. And the government keeps on shrugging. So what are we to make of this?

We aren’t.

Like the Iraq war before, we, as a populace have not been given enough information to make an informed decision. And likely, we’re probably never going to. To maintain its credibility, the news can’t make a conclusion about North Korea this early. If they do, and NK does the opposite, whatever good will they have will be blown away. And the government can’t give us a decided level of urgency either. If they come out and say that North Korea is a threat with their nukes, then why the hell didn’t they do something earlier?  Korea has been making these threats for years. But if they say that North Korea isn’t a threat, then they directly contradict every news outlet and look ill informed.

No one ever wants to look like the asshole. And we, as consumers of information, are looking to the only suppliers we in town and are coming up wanting. The powers that be are forcing us to draw our own conclusions on topics that we are not fit to draw conclusions about. How are we to know the genuine threat level of a country half a world away? How are we to know the global ramifications if that country decides to make good on its claims? Who’s to say that all the bluster isn’t a smoke screen for a terrorist attack on the horizon?  Is there any real threat or is it just filler for a news cycle that relies on constant crises?

Sadly, the answer to those questions is always the same:

Shrug

Then, a couple bombs went off in Boston and North Korea didn’t exist anymore.

And, thus, the crisis, or not, resolves itself.

Until it resurfaces next time.

The post North Korea: Misunderstood appeared first on Rookerville.

They bring back memories of years filled with non-ironic Halloween costumes, asking my parents for money and always getting it, cherry pie on the stovetop the way the leaves smell in Doylestown….I swear- opening e-mails that say: “how was you day?”, “did you talk to you boss about getting a bonus for all you help with the big client?” just brings a smile to my face.   I can’t put my finger on what it does to me that makes me so elated, but I’m glad its there. Sometimes these harmless typos can even take the sting out of a good parental e-reprimand.

What my mom has failed to realize is something very important.  I am an insufferable wise-ass.  Therefore, if she tries to reprimand me with an e-mail that looks like it was written by an eighteen year-old girl that dates guys that wear white, fitted hats backwards; my inattentiveness will be matched only by my defiance. Let me illustrate below with an e-mail exchange that took place after I placed an ill-advised prank call to my parent’s house after midnight.

EXHIBIT A:
________________________________________________________________________

FROM:            Shirley Anne Signorino
TO:                  Scott M. Signorino
DATE:             11/6/2009; 11:21 AM
SUBJECT:       NOT FUNNY
scott we need to talk. that wasn’t a funny joke to play on me had a long day at the office then went to work til midnite at the restaurant didn’t want to get a phone call at 1:00 in the am!!!!!!!! dad and I were worried that it was an emergency. what if u really did get ur girlfriendpregnant??????? u are not responsible enough to be a parent you have hard enough time paying ur credit card bills you need to come to the house and sit down with dad and i to discuss all those monies you wasted on all of you parking tickets if your father will ever come out of the basement should never have bought him the blu ray player getting sick of his attitude and yours only so much i can do. we wont be around forever and you will have to take care of youself. your crazy mother.

- Mom

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FROM:         Scott M Signorino
TO:               Shirley Anne Signorino
DATE:         11/6/2009; 11:49 AM
SUBJECT:    RE: NOT FUNNY

Mom,

Look, I know that wasn’t a funny joke at all.  I’ll tell you what- if I really do get my girlfriend pregnant on accident, I won’t call you after you get done work.  We will come by for dinner and make up a funny surprise like “MOM! DAD! I got accepted into Columbia’s Law School!  I leave for New York in two weeks! SYKE!  MY GIRLFRIEND’S PREGNANT! LOL!”

Regarding my irresponsibility, I just want you to know that I have a plan.  We’re keeping the baby.  We’re quitting both of our jobs and moving in with you and Dad.  You know how much my girlfriend likes you!  It will be great!  You love babies too!  We really don’t want to change our lives after the baby is born either, so the second it pops out, we’re going to the bar and you get to watch it!  Don’t worry about making up a spot for us in the house, we can move into the basement.  All of Dad’s things can go into your room and the room you always use to watch “Everybody Loves Raymond.”  I’m not as irresponsible as you may think, Mom.  I’ve got a plan for our brand new family and our child born out of wedlock.

Love,

Scottie.

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Basically what I’ve done here is akin to poking an improperly socialized Rottweiler with a stick.  My mom was trying to elicit some sort of apology out of me and yes, I did feel bad for calling the house at midnight to play a joke about my girlfriend being pregnant and needing money.  However, she also made it extremely difficult to figure out what she was trying to tell me or what she was trying to obtain through her sixteen year old girl speak.  For every “A” there has to be a “B”.  This is the e-mail I dread.  This is my mom, the disciplinarian.  Gone are the e-mails from my mom that bring back memories of fourth grade, Halloween, Christmas presents.

EXHIBIT B:

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FROM:            Shirley Anne Signorino
TO:                  Scott M. Signorino
DATE:             11/6/2009; 12:32 PM
SUBJECT:       RE: RE: NOT FUNNY

I don’t know why you have to be so difficult.  All I asked is that you stop playing jokes so late at night when I’ve had an extremely busy day.  Your father and I do a lot for you and all that we ask is that you try to play ball every once in awhile.  I don’t understand why you can’t grasp that a joke about you and your girlfriend having a baby when you are clearly unable to fully take care of yourself, in ANY capacity is hilarious.  I assure you, its not.  What IS hilarious is the fact that your overdraft fees from TD Bank come to our house.  You really need to get your shit together and stop wasting your time playing jokes on me and your father that are really not funny at all.  One day we won’t be here.

-Mom.

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EXHIBIT C:

FROM:          Scott M Signorino
TO:               Shirley Anne Signorino
DATE:          11/6/2009  1:04 PM

SUBJECT:     RE: RE: RE: NOT FUNNY

Mom,

Point taken.  I’m sorry.  I won’t pull hijinx like those ever again!

Love,

Scottie

P.S. – it’s really cold in the office.

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EXHIBIT D:

FROM:          Shirley Anne Signorino
TO:               Scott M Signorino
DATE:          11/6/2009  2:36 PM

SUBJECT:     RE: RE: RE: RE:  NOT FUNNY

LMAO, see i CAN PLAY JOKES TOO no biggie.  You are cold? Where is you black knit hat we got you for your birthday?  Are you coming to the house we are having pizza  very busy, see you than J love mom.

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