here he comes--Mr. America!

Upset about a perceived sexually discriminatory school-wide ban on shorts that does not include skirts, a male high school student has begun wearing skirts to school to protest this gross injustice. (See this article for an irresistibly juvenile interpretation of “gross” as “not attractive”.) After wearing a kilt and skirts to school Michael Coviello was told that he could no longer dress like a girly-man and was sent home by school administrators. Yet, ever watchful for impediments to liberty and justice for all, the ACLU stepped into the fray and negotiated a deal with the school officials: the ban on shorts can remain but the student must be allowed to wear skirts to school.

Is it just me or is the ACLU slipping? Have they gotten so bogged down in the weeds of personal fashion freedom that they’ve lost sight of the bigger picture—you know, sexual discrimination thinly veiled in a spotty and nonsensical dress code? Do they now embody the parody of the big city lawyers swooping down to rescue small-town America from its small-mindedness only to discover that their glamorous existence has only blinded them to the real values they are supposedly defending? If so, maybe the ACLU should hire this Coviello guy. He seems to have a firm grasp of the real issues here. I mean, he’s wearing skirts to high school. Look at this guy! Does he look like he would be wearing a skirt for any other reason? I hope he doesn’t lose his nerve. In fact, I hope he unifies all of the male students and stages skirt-ins at school games and events. If enough guys show up to school activities looking like him the school system may have to renounce their shorts-ban just to salvage some sense of dignity. Do not underestimate the power of a principal’s humiliation at the hands of his peers at county district meetings.

Finally, a word to Michael Coviello: Michael, you are my hero. Not because you’ve taken action against a perceived injustice or taken a stand against an authoritative giant. But simply because you have more balls that I do. High school is a rough social environment and you have the courage to flout the standards of beauty. Though we don’t share quite the same physique, I too have been compared to a football player when wearing a skirt. But unlike you, I never had the courage to wear one to school. Or with tennis shoes. Even for a good cause.

Rock on, grrrlfriend. Rock on.

calling all sperm entrepreneurs

I am intrigued by sperm donation. According to this article, the selection process to become a donor can be a very rigorous and dauntingly self-reflective journey. This particular clinic asks donors to not only complete extensive paperwork on their education level, family medical history and personal sexual practices, but to also submit the sperm donor-equivalent of a college entrance essay and an audio diary as well. Sperm customers (shoppers? recepticles?) may select a sample based on any number of criteria including ethnicity, profession, professed talents and education. In fact, this clinic differentiates between doctoral and non-doctoral donors (although “doctoral” can mean either “possesses PhD” or “pursuing PhD”), a quality which no doubt comes with an extra charge. Thus, reproductive-hopefuls may browse through different categories to select their once-removed impregnator. (Impregnatee donations are available just around the corner at the egg bank—how convenient! And I’m sure the clinic can probably provide a surrogate-yellow pages upon request.) The average donor receives only a couple hundred dollars for his product, though the clinic is richly compensated for its services. How weird—conception is such a simple process and yet in the context of sperm donation it suddenly becomes extremely complicated and expensive. Women (and their partners) pay through the nose to have some carefully-selected random guy impregnate them by a third party. I mean, when you buy a car you can’t help but feel ripped-off by the dealer, right? You know that they get the car for cheaper and the factory produces them at even lower cost, yet you’re stuck with a ridiculous price and a ten-year car mortgage. And sperm banks sell children, and they don’t even make anything technically! How awful! How unjust! Why haven’t some good-looking, well-educated guys thought to fill this niche in the market? I mean, they could set up a booth right outside the sperm bank and make a killing! They could do everything from arranging clandestine meetings between customers and rogue donors to selling their own brand of services. With little to no overhead they could keep prices low as well. Here’s an example of what their sperm menu could include:

Platinum Package: $3000
- Full health-screening and psychological testing
- Extended family medical history
- Signed headshot of donor
- Personal essay about donor’s:
a) religious experience
b) cheerful childhood
c) zest for life
- Personal poem about:
a) love
b) sunsets
c) customer’s beautiful eyes

Gold Package: $1500
- Full health-screening
- Immediate family medical history
- One 5x6 portrait of donor (plus 4 wallet-sized!)
- Brief donor biography

Silver Package: $500
- Blood test
- Personal medical history
- Polaroid of donor

Desperado Package: $200
- One shot of tequila
- A quickie in the donor’s van

For Extra Charge:
- Glamour Shot of donor
- Mini-fridge/van cooler contents
- Orgasm
- Small talk

C’mon guys, reproductively-challenged couples everywhere are counting on YOU to restore balance to the donor sperm force. It is an opportunity to promote justice, help the helpless, and develop your budding entrepreneurial skills. It’s the American thing to do.

the morning after last night

Last night at 1:30am we got into a discussion about long-term relationships and the danger that paired young people like ourselves might become too dependent on each other and merge into one “couple conglomerate,” thus losing their individual identities. On top of the fish that we had for dinner this served up some interesting dreams:

I’m in a big city—either Chicago or New York—and it’s the end of the world. Rain has been pouring down for days and the streets are flooded. I know that the floodwaters will just keep rising and rising until all life on the planet is wiped out (or at least all life in low-lying areas without a proper drainage system). I am holed up in an apartment complex with my family and a gaggle of random parentless children. Our building is almost completely full of water, there is no one to save us, and everyone has just given up hope and is waiting to drown. Well I hate drowning and can’t sit still so I yell at everyone to pack a suitcase with useful materials like sweaters and matches and shampoo and I gather them on top of the building. At this point I have now assumed responsibility for all of these kids and my family—a group of about forty people. But I’m unsure of what to do. As I’m struggling to come up with a plan that doesn’t involve dying in cold dark water I glimpse a group of people walking over a nearby hill not yet covered by water. Among the group of twenty adults is Dr. Justin Brookshaw, a well-known pilot who never travels without his Boeing 747, which I now notice is parked on the next hill over. I become jubilant that we will soon be able to fly the children to higher ground and thus be saved. As they near us I realize that the person leading the group—the person responsible for organizing the rescue mission and saving the children from certain death—is Jed. I am overwhelmed with gratitude and love and general warm, fuzzy feelings. He’s alive! He brought help! He’s saving me and my family and the children! But before I can properly express all of my tumultuous feelings he calmly saunters up to me and says, “Don’t you worry sometimes that we’ve become too dependent on one another and that this dependence might hinder our individuality?”

Then I wake up.

Now I know that the flood scenario stems from a recent read—The Preservationist by David Maine, the story of Noah and his family—and possibly some cross-wired thoughts about Jake Gyllenhaal and his roles in both The Day After Tomorrow and Jarhead, which I am currently reading. And I know that my role as savior of the children is a product of some deep-seated psychological issues that, as of yet, I’ve not been willing to deal with. But what about Jed’s response in my dream? What exactly does that tell me about our relationship status? Our future together? Our conflicting need to express ourselves as individuals while simultaneously maintaining some sort of joint identity? This morning after hearing about my dream he cleared everything up.

“It means that when the world ends, no matter what our relationship is or where we are living I will come and save you. So quit your whining and just get on the goddamn plane!!”

And strangely, that was the perfect thing to say.

the sweet smell of french fries and sunshine

Today a couple of guys are fixing some sort of plumbing/electrical problem on the outside of my office. All morning they’ve been digging a giant hole next to the building and struggling with the leaking sprinkler system. On my way across the courtyard I could hear them joking around with each other, talking about last night’s game and mocking the DJ’s choice of old rock tunes blasting from their radio. Now they're sitting on a low brick wall near their work area, eating burgers and French fries and drinking Cokes. They are covered in dirt but their mood is cheerful. And why shouldn’t they be happy? This January day it is 80 degrees and sunny and beautiful outside. The smell of their food and the warmth of the day reminds me of June days in high school when summer break was just around the corner.

As I sit in my overly air-conditioned office, going blind over the 18-page, size-10 font budget spreadsheet in front of me, I can only envy them their relative freedom and exposure to the sun. Not to mention their French fries.

market forecast – cute and fuzzy with a 98% chance of adorable

Apparently, in Korea there are cafés where customers can hang out, have some coffee and play with cute, establishment-owned dogs. Thus, on a quick lunch break a lonely, overworked employee can experience a few moments of puppy-fun to recharge his/her mental and emotional faculties. What a great idea! What better cure for a case of the doldrums than happy, tongue-lolling dogs that you’re not responsible for feeding, cleaning or walking? I think China may have the answer: Panda Bonanza!

Panda bo-NAN-zaaa!

With the way its panda-production has been going these past few years China is well on its way to cornering the market. It’s only a matter of time before panda factories start popping up everywhere and cubs can be mail-ordered over the internet. I can’t wait. Soon those bulky mechanical water massagers in the mall will be replaced by Panda Pits, where for a nominal fee, one will be able to roll around in fluffy panda cubs for 10-minute increments.

Panda Pit

Pessimists might complain that China’s new therapeutic export will undoubtedly push psychologists around the globe out of a job, but their dissent won’t last long. How can you argue with globalization when it looks like this?

So cute!