Urban Toledo Gang

Steve Fomper reports on white paranoia.

The rise of Barack Obama to the most powerful postion in the world has been a story full of integrity and high politics, and most breathed a sigh of relief as Bush flew away and Obama marched in on historic Jan. 20th. But only a few days into the presidency, a sense of subtle doubt has seemed to creep up on some of the white voters. On special task Interviewing people from all over the homeland on their thoughts about Obama, i began to see a pattern emerge underneath the prevailant optimism. In areas such as North Carolina and Alabama, I noticed small flocks of middle aged relatively uneducated white males who voted for the president but on seeing him in the whitehouse began to feel a sense of fear. In Carolina I ran into the animated Billy Cutler. A 54 year old house builder for most of his life and married with 4 kids in a strong southern christian family,Billy was a strong embodiment of midwest americana. I asked him his thoughts on the president. ” Everyone was all happy bout this president so i figured, hey, maybe this guys not so bad, america is behind him and i consider myself a patriot, so i voted for the man. But once i saw him stroll into the whitehouse i began to have my doubts, i mean shit, the black panthers still have a lot of say and all what with rap and everything and you just never know his full connections.  And he just looked so confident and sure and tall and has such a booming voice, and well, i’m rather short, insecure, and my voice is unusually high and soft because i worked installing insulation for 20 years and the dust crystals cut my vocal chords to smithereens, and i just felt momentary hatred seeing this man so much better than i. And you know Steve, the blacks are taking over, time to pack your bags.” I notice he literally does have many bags packed in the back of his modest living room. I ask him where he’s going. “Canada Steve, the last promised land for us whites except maybe Russia. See the blacks dont like the cold, like if you’ve ever seen a bee paralyzed by the early morning frost its kinda like that for em. And they’ve conquered most of our sports by this point, even got golf, and i’ve never enjoyed nascar cause its too loud, but in the north you got hockey, one of the whites last stands. And my two daughters Vanessa and Charity are always watching that mtv and most of what i see is black men racing lamborghinis and talking gibberish but my daughters love these guys.  Lets face it, they’re stronger, louder, faster, and they make more popular music. Us whites are on our way out of the evolutionary plan buddy, but god damn i’m gonna move to canda and try to forget it. I mean, maybe we’re still a bit smarter than them and we can just leave blacks the earth and the whites can explore space.” Steve Fomper reporting.

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I was just checking out Portland the other day and thought I would go into this comedy club and whoa I did.  I don’t remember what it was called but it had some doors and shit in the entry and there were these people sitting around drinking PBR and sucking on each other’s thumbs.  They stopped right after I got in there, I guess it was part of the act that was on stage.

His name was Billy Grubs (or Grubbs, he never spelled it, just ended every joke with “My name is Billy Grubs”), and he was a hoot.  I tried to find some stuff on YourTube with him, but could only find stuff about meal worms and shit.  Anyway, there was one joke he did I really liked so I thought I would share it with you all.  It loses a little in the telling, you had to be there.  Still, it isn’t bad.  I’m just going to bracket the whole thing in quotes, and not tell you when there was laughter, because there was a lot.

“You guys know these self-help gurus?  What a load of shit, am I right?  My name is Billy Grubs.  I went to the bookstore the other day because I really need to get my life in order.  My wife wants to leave me, but I tied her up in the basement so she can’t do that, right?  Haha, no seriously my name is BIlly Grubs.  Anyway, I picked up like two dozen books.  They all have the same sounding titles, like Get your life together, one step at a time, and What your life can be like, once you get it together, one step at a time, and My name is Billy Grubs.  Kidding about that last one folks.

“Anyway, I started flipping through them all, trying to get my life together.  They all have the same advice, and I think it’s pretty true.  They say you have to break down every task into as small a thing as possible.  I said, ‘That’s what she said, my name is Billy Grubs.’  Am I right?  Seriously, Grubs, Billy Grubs.  Hahaha.  Anyway, for example, you don’t just ‘Clean the house,’ you break it down to ‘Vacume the house’ and then you vacume by ‘get the vacume out of the closet,’ ‘plug the vacume in’ etc.  This helps you manage everything, right.

“So I thought, why not do this for my act?  You know?  Why don’t you guys help me get my life together, or at least watch me do it, right?  Come, on it will be fun!  You guys just follow me out the door.”

We followed him out the door of the club, and were standing around the street now.

“So, we need to hail some cabs!”

We did.

“We need to go to Kitchen Kaboodle!”

We did.

“We need to buy some of these knives, I’m buying guys.”

There must have been about fifty or so people in the Kitchen Kaboodle, and we all bought knives.  The store was clean out of knives.  Actually, that’s what he said, “My name is Billy Grubs and Kitchen Kaboodle is out of fucking knives, motherfuckers.”

“So we have knives, now what, right?  Well this is my life, and I’m breaking everything down for you.

“We’re going to go to the grocery store now, and by some goddamn vegetables.  Doesn’t matter what kind, otherwise I’d break it down even more.”

We went to Whole Foods and even tho I won’t shop there, I went in anyway.  I let everyone else pick out all manner of cuccumbers, melons, tomatos, oranges.  (No one seemed to realize that most of these are fruits.  Billy Grubs didn’t care.)

“I’m buying these cunt vegetables!” (Billy Grubs was getting more and more vulgar as we went along in the night, I think he had been drinking.) “Get in line, and save the receipts, you pricks.”

So we all saved our receipts.

“Hail another cab!  And we’re going up to Killingsworth, at around 42nd.”

So we got in our cabs and headed up there.  We got out and Billy Grubs was yelling at a couple drunks.  I couldn’t really understand any of it, except “My name is Billy Grubs,” and then he gave them some knives and vegetables he had.

“All right everyone, take a shit.  This is your last chance.”

Billy Grubs just pooped right there next to the sidewalk, and a few people went into the bushes.  Most of us just skipped this step and hoped it didn’t hurt his chances of turning his life around.

“This way.”

We followed him up to a house, and he knocked on the door.  “You guys can lose the vegetables, just keep the receipts.  We may need those as evidence.” This guy answered the door, “Billy?” he said.  “What are you doing here?”

“Get your knives ready, guys!  We all bought these knives for cutting our dinner vegetables, right?”

Billy lunged on the guy, and started stabbing him a bunch.

“Come on, stab, you cocksuckers!  My name is Billy Grubs!”

It was a bloody mess.  Whoops.  What have I done?

An indepth inteview with the hottest trend-setters in So-Cal by New American Trend’s Senior Editor, Doug Katzen

A perky group of young twenty-somethings congregate around the entrance of the popular sun tan parlor, Richard’s Rays in downtown Los Angeles. The six of them chatter away loudly, making plans for their next big gathering. A few text messages are sent with plans to meet with even more of these golden-skinned California girls. The girls begin to say their goodbyes through faux hugs and air kisses on either side of each other’s cheeks all while balancing an iced mocha and an over sized tote bag from Gavani or Duetche. They begin to exit the parlor and return to their respective cars when suddenly one blond and loud-voiced girl shouts, “Ass seal!” in a manner that sounds as matter-of-fact as, “See you tomorrow!”. Two girls emerge from the group bare-assed and fly impossibly through the air at each other and connect mid-flight to each other’s asses. The two girls giggle and remain stuck together in this manner until the salutation is over.

This isn’t some form of strange nude public fetish but just the newest form of saying goodbye between young women. While appearing strange to those new to the concept, when looked at beneath the surface, its nothing less than a sign of respect and deep friendship. “When our anuses touch, there really isn’t any other way that you can connect closer to another person. Period.” Says Maddie Saillian of West Hollywood. “If there is a better way to say goodbye to one of your closest friends, it either doesn’t exist or we just haven’t invented it yet.” says another California native with a wry smile.

I had a chance to sit down with the girls who started the Ass-Seal trend and really see where it all began. Sarah, presumably their leader by how the other girls look at her in admiration and the giant size of her bulbous head, starts the interview without the need of a question.

Sarah: “So what this whole Ass-Seal thing is now is a, like, pretty much a big fad that everyone is doing now. But I’ll tell you this; we’ve been ass-sealin’ for a lot longer than these other girls have been.” Sarah looks around the group for confirmation, all of them shake their head in agreement.

Me: “I guess that answers my first question then. So what exactly made you want to start such a strange goodbye?”

Sarah: “Well, it wasn’t just overnight. We had been starting goodbye trends for a while, but nothing really stuck, you know? Then suddenly, like, overnight, I had one of those ‘piphanies and I thought, you know, “why not go ass to ass in a way that says, “see ya, sister!”?” After that it was more popular than Kanye West at a smoothie shop in, I don’t know, Vermont or some weird place. It seriously happened overnight.”

Me: “So where is the limit? What decides who gets the ass-seal and who doesn’t?”

Sarah: “It really comes down to who you know and how much you know them, but there have been times when I’ve done it to complete strangers before. Everyone wants an ass-seal, so you know that it’s not a big deal if you do it.” Sarah suddenly gets up and removes her skirt. “Ass-seal” she screams and she leaps end first to one of the girls in the group who seemed to not be paying attention. As if there was some sort of telepathic link between the two, the girl receiving an ass-seal leaps at Sarah. The resulting sound was like a large butcher’s hand spanking the bare skin of an overweight pig with a subsequent sucking sound that sounds eerily like a cartoon suction sound effect. The two stand there, smiling at their most recent connection. Sarah continues the interview. “It’s like you are saying, hey, you wanna hang out later or you’re like my bestest friend in the world right now. The French have their kissing. We have our ass-seal.”

Me: “So where do you see this trend going?”

Sarah: “Well I recently saw some commercial on TV with Jennifer Aniston and Brett Favre that was talking about little, like, fucked up kids in Africa and in all of the pictures that they had of the kids, none of them were smiling. My hope..no, OUR hope, is that we can go down there and ass-seal each and every one of those children. I think that would make their hunger, diseases and sadness go away like that!” Sarah snaps her fingers together.

Me: “That certainly sounds ambitious, but just the little amount of time I’ve spent with you girls has made me realize that an ass-seal is much more than just a trend; it’s a way of life and it can change the world.”

The girls smile bashfully, a few engage in spontaneous ass-seals.

Me: “One more thing, ladies. Do you think I could get an ass-seal?”

Sarah and group: “Of course! ASS-SEAL~!”