Is It Just Me?

Is it just me or does anyone else feel entirely ripped off and scammed that James Frey's book A Million Little Pieces is a complete work of fiction being passed off by him as "as truthful as I can remember memoir." Now, let me get this out of the way first and foremost: I did NOT read this book because it was an Oprah book club pick. I happened to see it at Target one day and being as, in the past year, I have become obsessed with books dealing with drug addiction, it seemed right up my alley. Would I have bought it if I knew it was a work of fiction? Hell no. Why, you ask? Because in thinking I was dealing with a brain damaged recovered drug addict and alocholic I managed to overlook an awful lot of the book's shortcomings: for example, the guy cannot write worth a shit. A 4th grader has a better grasp of the English language than this thug does. But I was willing to overlook the atrocious writing because I felt sorry for him and his allegedly troubled life. Yet now we find out he was a college graduate, former frat boy who has no evidence of any dental surgery, let alone massive root canals done without anesthesia or pain killers and I just feel totally defrauded. But as the old adage goes, "There's no such thing as bad publicity" because his book is now Number 1 again on Amazon. WTF people? Had I not already purchased the book, I certainly would not be running out and buying it right now just to see what all the controversy is about. Are Americans really this stupid and easily manipulated? And to prove that I would not buy the book had I known going into it that it was a work of fiction I offer you my Exhibit A: It was only in the middle of the entire brew ha ha/controversy over the book that I learned there was a sequel to the book entitled "My Friend Leonard." Now, had I still believed the book was true, I would have dropped everything to go purchase Part 2 of his amazing saga. But, as we now know, the ENTIRETY of Book 2 is complete and utter fabrication because it is about his time in jail post rehab - a jail term that NEVER happened - which Frey has, at long last, at least admitted this much as being false. So, I am now trying to erase the whole ordeal from my psyche and will NEVER read Part 2 of this saga. Again, I just feel completely defrauded. I know I should return the book to Target where I bought it because I don't want to give that lying bastard one penny of my hard earned cash. But right now the book is presently being passed among all of my friends who just HAVE to read it to see what all the fuss is about. WTF ever people. At least I can sleep easier at night knowing that each one of my friends who reads my copy of his work of fiction is thereby depriving him of another potential sale of his book. There. I guess that makes me feel better but not by much. I still just feel manipulated and swindled. I cried while reading that book for shit sake - something I would not have done had I known it was all made up. And this is the man that Oprah says kept her awake at night for weeks. Well, screw Oprah. She apparently is just as dumb as the rest of America. But I digress.....

Is it just me or is this hot then cold then hot weather totally bizarre for January in St. Louis? Not that I don't appreciate a warm day in January where we can get one but it makes it virtually impossible to acclimate to the cold weather such that when it is 30 it feels like zero degrees to my poor old arthritic bones. Yeah, you heard me - I'm old and arthritic at the ripe old age of 36. Getting old just sucks. I used to be a competitive gymnast for Christ sake. Now I can barely make it out of bed without groaning and moaning and limping and being hunched over and hobbled for the first hour of every day. And it doesn't get much better throughout the day - I think I just get used to it. Ah, how I long for the days when I was doing a triple backflip off the balance beam. What happened? How did I get this way? Where did it all go so wrong? Allz I remember (yeah, you heard me Allz - I'm from Mizzouree remember and that's how we say that word here) is one day I woke up and my whole body was just recoiled in pain. And that folks was the beginning of the end. The day when the slow decent from youthful vitality gave way to cranky aged worthlessness.

Is it just me or does being in debt suck? I realized today that I have 2 years rather than 1 from this April to continue paying off my car. God that sucks. And considering the damn thing already has 62,000 miles on it - it's going to have about 200,000 when it is finally paid off and will probably be worth a grand total of a dollar as a trade-in. Great. Super. Now, in my defense, my mechanic keeps trying to reassure me that it's not really as bad as it seems because about half of my collective miles are highway miles which apparently puts far less wear and tear on your car than actual city miles. Whatever. Doesn't help the reality much that I will have 2 years of car payments during which time I could very well have costly repairs too since my warranty is set to expire at 70,000 miles which will probably be around April as much as I drive. Great. Super. And what exactly does it say about Chevrolet that they REFUSE to warranty their cars any further than 70,000 miles?! I remember when I bought the car I yelled and hollered and threw a tantrum because I wanted an extended warranty that went to a minimum of 100,000 miles like all the foreign cars do but was repeatedly told GM offers no such warranty protection. You know what that means? That means some number cruncher at GM has ALREADY done the math and determined that it is not in their economic best interest to warranty GM cars past 70k miles because the costs to GM outweight the price of the warranty paid by the customer. So since some number cruncher has already done the math for me it seems I'm up shits creek for the next 2 years as I try and pay it off while hoping beyond hope no catastrophic mechanical repairs come along while I'm already paying $425 a month for the damn thing. Gee, that would be just swell, wouldn't it? To hell with American cars. The next car is going to be a Honda with a STANDARD 100k warranty and an extended warranty that goes until 200,000 miles. Because you see folks, Honda stands behind their product whereas GM apparently wants to run and hide from theirs once it gets to 70,000 miles. What does that tell us about who has the superior product? No fucking wonder GM is in bankruptcy. And it's not like I'm taking jobs away from Americans by buying foreign. Most Hondas bought in America are MADE in America whereas my lovely GM product was assembed in Mexico. Nice. So much for "Buy American." I'm done with that load of crap. I'll be patriotic up to a point but when I start to feel my patriotism in my pocketbook that's when I say fogetaboutit. Honda here I come.

And finally, is it just me or is it a mere coincidence that Osama bin Ladin wants to declare a truce with America right when he is losing and we are kicking his stupid terrorist ass and taking out all of his henchmen? But I'm sure we can take his word for it that he would leave the rest of the world alone if we would just leave Afghanistan and Iraq. Yeah, right. I got your truce right here for you, Osama. Come and get it...