Bathroom Monologue: Re: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPIkYbVEH0E

Do you ever get the feeling that directors of TV commercials are actually short film directors that have fooled companies into financing, producing and distributing their short films? How is a riot connected to vodka? Stargazing to an SUV? These commercials tell a story or do something amusing in visual theatre for fifteen or thirty seconds, then throw a product logo up at the end. It's less a commercial, and more a miniature movie sponsored by Hershey's or Scion. I wonder how many of these product companies have caught on and are just looking for short film directors to sponsor.

( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPIkYbVEH0E )

Bathroom Monologue: Small Town Telekinetic

On weekdays he is a mechanic, and a darned impressive one considering he doesn't need a hydraulic lift. There isn't a lug nut he can't unscrew. Still, he's always falling behind schedule, so he unwinds by bowling every Friday and Saturday night. His game is never very good, but anybody in the alley who looks miserable has an exceptional game. These mystery champions are the people who complain to their friends or family that they didn't want to come anyway, or who get hissy after a few gutterballs. For these people, our weekday mechanic wiggles his telekinetic fingers, keeping their balls on track. He's learned how to play this game; no perfect scores, more spares than strikes, and there's nothing to make a wispy girl's night like a seven-ten split in the last frame. To him this amusing job is like putting training wheels on bikes, or throwing underhand at softball. It may be playing God, but he thinks it's more of a school play than Broadway.

Cult of ROH at insidepulse.com

Pulse Wrestling of insidepulse.com has brought me on to write Cult of ROH, a weekly column about the Ring of Honor pro wrestling promotion. It's no secret that watching pro wrestling is a hobby of mine, and ROH is one of my favorite parts in that hobby. My column will focus mostly on current events, reacting to the most recent stories in ROH, with some historical perspective (and probably a weekly request that people not go insane just because their favorite guy lost).

Thanks to Aaron Glazer and Matthew Michaels for bringing me on. Technically my first piece is up on the website already, as part of the parade of people supporting Ring of Honor as the best pro wrestling company of 2007. My first regular column should go live on Tuesday, with a new one every week thereafter. I should also have some DVD reviews up in the near future.

This will not interfere with the Bathroom Monologues. This is exactly the kind of situation that creates them; remember these babies began when I got up from work and immediately improvised a change of subject from whatever I had been working on. And according to Microsoft Word, I have about thirty more pages of Bathroom Monologues archived to post - and most of them have never been published online before.

Bathroom Monologue: Title: Leap Year

Pitch: February 29th. Every four years the ghost of Black History Month rises from the grave to kill 29 rich white kids. Paris Hilton will be advertised as the star, but will die in the opening credits. Possibly killed when her hair is caught in a cotton gin.

Running gag: pale Latino tries to convince the killer that he isn't white.

Bathroom Monologue: A Sentence is Never a Story

-No one ever thought that werewolves would make good skiers, but what other explanation was there for the missing pies?
-The medics laughed as they ran over the girl they were supposed to save.
-Thirteen people were trampled when the millionaire threw his diamonds into the fountain.
-Jimmy climbed through the window every time he came to see his brother at the hospital.
-What if God accidentally shed His grace on a pinecone instead of us?
-DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN
-The protestors broke his arm for tearing down their "VIOLENCE IS NEVER THE ANSWER" banner.
-In the end, it turned out the zombies just really, really missed us.
-Two jumpers climbed the same ledge on the same day, and were so embarrassed that they almost talked each other down, though when the cops approached them, the two asked for sandwiches instead of a ladder.

Notice: Flashshot Takes Three Bathroom Monologues

Flashshot has accepted "Who's Her Baby's Daddy?" "Too Late, Bill," and "Delectable Dolphins" as micro-stories of the day for three days in 2008. While we don't know when each will appear, you can check their website every day for a new short:
http://www.gwthomas.org/flashshotindex.htm

A "while shoveling two feet of ice-snow off my deck at midnight" Monologue

There are people across the street. At least three of them are drunk off their asses, yelling and playing in the parking lot of the 24/7 deli. Their voices must be much more disturbing to any sleepers tonight than my shoveling and heavy breathing. My back is killing me and asthma is coming on, while they busy themselves jumping on each other. Yet as soon as I feel the twinge of dislike for them that I feel for all drunks, it passes of its own accord. You see, those guys making idiots of themselves are having a blast tonight. But sometime today they had to shovel something like this. If not, they'll have to tomorrow. Or they'll have to pay someone to do it, and to get that money they'll work jobs that they probably won't like. Each of them has probably experienced something worse than what I have to do right now. Can they pay their electricity bills? Has one had a bad breakup? Has one of them lost a mother yet? All three will, unless they die young. Right now, this is their release. Even if they are annoying, I can't hate them for that. I can't hate them because I don't want to be hated when it's my turn to release. Thinking on them takes my mind off the work, the next best thing to making it pass faster.

Bathroom Monologue: Come All Ye Faithful, to Tuesday Night Karate

At the turn of the 21st century, a surprising percentage of Americans believed the apocalypse was near. Well, surprising to people who didn't believe the world was ending - to those people who did, I guess it was surprising that the percentage wasn't 100%. But none of the faithful knew exactly what to do about it. If they figured out how the end of the world was coming and interfered, it could go against God's plan. If they increased Church-going and prayer, God would probably figure out that they were patronizing Him. It was quite the conundrum. The Stooksten Cult (as it came to be called by people from out of town) read Revelations very carefully over a booze-free weekend and came up with the only sensible answer. Since the end of times would begin the war between the Seed of Jezebel and the Host of Heaven, the citizens of Stooksten should probably learn how to throw down. The pastor's son had seen a couple of Jean Claude Van Damme movies and insisted karate was the way to go. So the Stooksten Cult congregation took karate lessons every Tuesday (and every other Thursday), to become blackbelts in time for the call of Archangel Gabriel's war horn. Everyone got into it such that even Ms. Brown, the 72-year-old piano teacher, could break a wooden board (if somebody held it for her). Satisfied that unless the demons knew kung fu that they would serve their lord and savior well, the Stooksten Cult returned to business as usual, with the odd Interdenominational Karate Tournament every seventh Saturday, in preparation for Sunday mass. They may be called illogical or blasphemous, but you have to concede that they were really good at coping.

Bathroom Monologue: Best Something in a Something Else

-Best disguise in a prime time drama
-Best creation of a disguise in a prime time comedy
-Least disappointing overhyped revelation in a prime time drama
-Least annoying pet in an overly rerun sitcom
-Best giant monster attack during an inappropriate situation (all)
-Most creative rip-off of Shakespeare in a daytime soap opera
-The Train Going into a Tunnel Award: Best visual euphemism for sex
-Nostradumbass Award: Pundit who is most frequently wrong in his/her predictions on a 24/7 news network
-The SNL Alum Award: Actor on a sitcom or skit show who is somewhat funny here, but will be intolerable when he/she makes the jump to movies

Bathroom Monologue: Guests at the Funeral for the Word "Good"

Great, grand, sensational, spectacular, astonishing, amazing, awesome, neat, solid, super, nice, fine, fabulous, fantastic, extreme and xtreme (everyone knows they're incestuous), positive, proactive, original, smooth, bold, deft, perfect, splendid, shining, glowing, peerless, marvelous, and cool (everyone's hoping she's the next to go). All attended, though none will miss Good. Like people, words hate being lesser synonyms.

Bathroom Monologue: Last Off Ramp with Gas

First we ceased to believe in anything we didn't see, and this was pragmatism. Then we didn't believe what we saw, and this was television. Then we didn't believe what we felt, and this was psychology. Then we didn't believe in anything, and this was nihilism. And there we were with no spirit, entertainment or hope, and someone had the nerve to ask why everyone was so angry. And everyone believed lynching that dumbass was justified, though they might not have said so, and this was society.