Horrorfest 2010: An American Werewolf in London

AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON is one of those movies any film buff hears about again and again. It's on all kinds of lists. Best horror movies, essential cult films -- even greatest films of all time! I remember in the olden days of the Internet reading about AMERICAN WEREWOLF on film related newsgroups, the same newsgroups that got me to watch the films of Raimi, Romero and Jackson.

But, I've just now gotten around to watching AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LOND and. . . it's great! Turns out everyone knows what they're talking about.

Before WEREWOLF, I'd seen lots of John Landis flicks, the most famous of which is probably ANIMAL HOUSE. So, I was prepared for his slant on college humor. Still, matched up with the horror element here, it becomes pretty irresistable, even if you know what you're in for.

WEREWOLF is the story of two college dudes who are backpacking through Europe. They start out in rainy England, much to their disappointment, dreaming of sunny Italy. This is the equally likable and affable David (David Naughton) and Jack (Griffin Dunne). After stopping in a creepy pub -- the kind where everyone stops what they're doing and stairs at you when you come in -- and ignoring some cryptic warnings about the full moon, David and Jack find themselves attacked by a werewolf in the English countryside. Jack dies; David finds himself in a London hospital, tended to by an alarmingly dismissive doctor (John Woodvine) and a cute nurse (Jenny Agutter) who has her eye on him.

As David convalesces, he suffers strange nightmares in which he stalks the countryside and kills deer with his bare hands (and teeth). Eventually these nightmares give way to day time visitations from the increasingly decayed corpse of his buddy Jack who shows up to let David know that being undead sucks.

Here's an interesting twist on the WEREWOLF mythos: in this flick, anyone killed by a werewolf (an unnatural death) is cursed to walk forever in limbo. That is, until the werewolf bloodline is destroyed. Then, the curse is lifted, and the victims can finally rest in peace. Because the werewolf who killed Jack and injured David was killed in the attack, David is now the last in the werewolf bloodline and Jack pleads with him to kill himself before the real trouble starts when the full moon rises in a few days.

David's understandably worried, but also not entirely convinced. After all, maybe he's just going insane. Or dreaming. Either way, he falls ass backwards into living in the cute nurse's flat and before you know it, the full moon rises.

That's when the kick ass transformation sequence begins. Rick Baker, arguably the greatest makeup artist of the last couple decades, provides the gruesome transformation which, unlike previous werewolf flicks, takes place under bright lights in excruciating detail. There's no cutting away here. Sure, once the werewolf is on the prowl, we get lots of snippets of shots and suggestions of carnage. But as David transforms, we get every painful moment of the process, as his hands and feet contort and twist and a snout protrudes uncomfortably from his face. This is preceded by a funny sequence in which David grows increasingly agitated, pacing the apartment set to the ironically upbeat "Bad Moon Rising" by CCR.

There are a few angles to the humor, here. The first angle is the friendly, joking tone of Jack and David's college age mentality. They're smart enough to crack wise but friendly enough to be gently bemused by everything. It's easy to see why the nurse would be into David -- he has an aloof, amused quality that just seems comfortable. This, contrasted with visits from the the like of the undead and werewolves, creates a consistently funny balance between the mundane and the fantastic.

Secondly, we've got the unflappable, stuffy British natives. With the exception of the denizens of the creepy pub, everyone from police to doctors seem to be fairly unimpressed by the increasingly supernatural events of the plot. The best sequence showcasing this attitude is on David's first night of werewolf attacks in which his victims are so busy being British they almost don't even have time to be proper murder victims. One of them marches to his death with a drink in one hand. Another, alone in a subway tunnel, attempts to speak rationally to David's growls and howls.

The whole thing reaches an exciting and expertly crafted climax in Piccadilly circus, where the crowd's panic causes more carnage than the actual werewolf does. Cars smash into each other, innocent bystanders launch through windows.

As the riot police converged on David and the nurse rushed to his rescue, the climax of the original KING KONG came to mind. Here's why: I cared about David. I didn't want to see him die. It's the way you feel about KONG at the end of the original film -- sure, he's tearing apart the city, but he's ultimately an innocent character who has been pushed into extraordinary circumstances. The thing that makes this movie work is that David is so likable, you really care about his situation. As ludicrous as it is, and as murderous as he becomes, you root for him. Indeed, a strength of the whole movie is that basically every character is totally likable. There's just this feeling of goodwill in the film, despite the gore. That's what's missing in a lot of horror movies today, especially these ones that are obsessed with torture. They forget about humans, they forget about good people. They think because it's a horror film, everyone has to be depraved and nasty. It's simply not true.

I like how David knows enough about classic horror films to compare his situation to the classic WOLF-MAN, even going so far as to describe the plot to his girlfriend in terms of the stars involved. "Bela Lugosi bites Lon Chaney, then Claude Rains kills Lon Chaney," he says.

Later, David has the best line of the movie, as he screams, "Be rational? I'm a fucking werewolf for Chrissakes!"

Like I said, as the climax came down, I didn't want to see David die and I wondered how the movie would possibly come to a satisfying conclusion. Then, it ended abruptly. At first I wondered if I had been cheated. But then, as yet another version of "Blue Moon" blared on the soundtrack and the credits rolled, I realized this was the movie's last laugh and I had to smile.

Horrorfest 2010: Don't Look Now

I get to kill two birds with one stone watching DON'T LOOK NOW -- that's one more film down for horrorfest, and one more I can mark off the list of Ebert's "Great Movies" -- a list I'm working my way through, albeit slowly.

I'd never heard of DON'T LOOK NOW until compiling a list for Horrorfest 2010 -- this 1973 film stars Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie as a couple who has recently lost their daughter in a tragic drowning accident. The sudden death puts some distance between them as they try to recover as Sutherland's character is summoned to Venice to help restore an old cathedral.

Things get weird when two elderly women contact Christie's character after staring at from across an empty restaurant. One of them is blind and reveals herself to be a psychic (Hilary Mason). The other is her caretaker (Clelia Matania). Although they seem to mean well when they tell Christie they've seen an apparition of her dead daughter and that she's "happy," there's something definitely creepy about them.

Sutherland doesn't like it one bit as Christie gets more and more drawn into a relationship with the supposedly psychic sisters. He begins to fear that they're taking advantage of her and also begins to wonder if she might be snapping under the pressure of her loss. The sisters, meanwhile, begin to sense that Sutherland has a "second sight" of his own -- after all, as Christie relates the story of her daughter's death, it's clear that Sutherland attempted to race to her rescue before he could have possibly known that anything was wrong.

Things get even more crazy when Christie is called away to visit her son at a boarding school in England where he's been injured in an accident. In her absence, Sutherland wanders the winding streets of Venice and begins to see ghostly images of his daughter creeping down back alleys. He even sees an image of his wife, who has supposedly left town, in the company of the two mysterious sisters. Add to that the fact that there's apparently a serial killer loose in the streets, and Sutherland decides to take things to the cops.

Anyway, enough plot. Although this is a mystery of sorts with a surprise ending, it's mostly about mood and atmosphere. The other two stars of the film, other than the actors, are the film editors and the city of Venice itself.

From the opening sequence, the film is edited together in a disturbing juxtaposition of unsettling images. The trick is, most of the images on their own might seem mundane enough, but one suddenly butts up against another on odd beats that the audience doesn't expect and the whole thing starts to make you really uneasy as it unfolds. You never know what you're going to see next, or why you're going to see it, and that's basically the opposite of usual film editing, in which one shot seems to predict the next in a seamless flow. There's nothing seamless or flowing here, just a bunch of hard edges.

Similarly, the usually romantically portrayed city of Venice is presented here as a maze of dark alleys, stairways to nowhere and claustrophobic winding streets, most leading to watery dead ends (or graves). Characters are constantly losing locations they've been to before and walking in endless circles, almost as if they're caught in one of those MC Escher optical illusions. People constantly seem to be peering out of windows, and then suddenly shutting the windows as soon as they're seen. On the verge of winter, most of Venice is shutting down and all the tourists have gone home. Even Sutherland's own hotel is eager to get rid of him.

Because of the psychic theme, a lot of the film is put together slightly out of order, so you never know exactly what has already happened or is going to happen. Are these images recalling each other or predicting each other? It's unclear. It all seems to be happening at the same time. There's a love scene early in the film, famous for how graphic it was at the time, that cuts back and forth between the present and the future and plays with time so much it made me wonder if maybe Alan Parker had it in mind when he put together the stream of consciousness PINK FLOYD - THE WALL.

Another spiritual presence in the film, aside from the psychic sisters, is the Bishop overseeing the reconstruction of the cathedral Sutherland's character is working on. As played by Massimo Serato, the Bishop is worried for the well being of Sutherland but seems somewhat detached from the more immediately emotional spiritual world by the trappings of dogma and tradition.

"I wish I didn't have to believe in prophecy," he tells Sutherland. "I do, but I wish I didn't have to."

By the end of the movie, as Sutherland feverishly attempts to make logical sense out of a story that can't be rationalized, I think he thinks the opposite. He wishes he did believe in prophecy. He doesn't, but he wishes he did.

Horrorfest 2010: The Horror of Dracula

I've been looking forward to seeing THE HORROR OF DRACULA for a long time. I don't know why I never watched it earlier. Growing up, I was obsessed with the classic era of Universal monster movies (DRACULA, FRANKENSTEIN, all those guys) and would read any book I could find on the subject. The books always mentioned the second wave of horror films in the late 50s and 60s from Hammer Studios in England. Everything in print made those Hammer films seem way more scary and adult than the Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff monsters I was used to -- the publicity stills almost always had bright red blood splattered everywhere and even the name of the studio itself -- HAMMER -- seemed so harsh and unrelenting. And, at the time, the films all seemed so modern -- turns out, they're just relatively modern compared to the films of the early 30s, but looking back from 2010 they're still pretty old fashioned.

Anyway, HORROR OF DRACULA was the first of these. It's basically a remake of the usual DRACULA story, but there's a lot of twists that deviate from the source material and films that came before it. Some of them are welcome surprises while others are just weird.

Just looking at the cast list is exciting. It has been plundered over the years by the last few decades' best and most popular filmmakers -- Christopher Lee stars as Dracula and later appeared in Peter Jackson's LORD OF THE RINGS movies. Peter Cushing is Dr. Van Helsing the vampire hunter, and he was Darth Vader's boss in STAR WARS. Michael Gough is Arthur Holmwood, and he spent about a decade playing BATMAN's butler for Tim Burton.

The film opens like most DRACULA stories do, with Jonathan Harker (John Van Eyssen) coming to visit Count Dracula (Christopher Lee) in his castle. But, it isn't long before Harker reveals as he writes in his diary that he actually knows all about Dracula's vampire status an, unlike his literary counterpart, this Harker has arrived specifically to kill Dracula. Unfortunately, he's no match, and before you know it, Dracula's on his way to terrorize Harker's fiance, Lucy (Carol Marsh).

Here's where I start to wonder if I remember the book correctly. Harker marrying Lucy? I thought he was marrying Mina? But, when they cut to Lucy's home, she's living with her brother, Arthur (Michael Gough) and his wife Mina (Melissa Stribling). But in the book, wasn't Lucy engaged to marry Arthur? Now I'm all confused.

Oh well. That's beside the point. The point is, Dr. Van Helsing (Peter Cushing) follows Harker to Dracula's castle, figures out what's going on, and returns to rescue Lucy with his vampire hunting expertise.

Here's the thing: Cushing and Lee are both badasses in this movie. But, they're both under stated and fairly tame. The whole movie reeks of decadence and operatic over dramatization, but Cushing and Lee resist chewing the scenery, most of the time. And, the screenplay doesn't really give them any super powers to work with, either. Lee's Dracula is probably one of the most human Draculas I've seen on screen -- he doesn't transform into animals, for instance, and although he appears to be a fairly refined gentleman, he doesn't waste too much time with the sweet talk and is far from poetic. He's mostly just a pissed off, dry, humorless creep you don't want to mess with who happens to look really good standing at the top of a big ass stair case wrapped in a cape. Which is kind of Cushing plays Van Helsing, too -- he's not the kind of guy who will start shit with you, but a glare from him will start you walking on egg shells.

The film is in beautiful color that really shows off the red blood, and Terence Fisher's direction is a model of efficiency. The movie clips along at a great pace, and there isn't a shot that doesn't need to be there.

Of course, Lugosi will probably always be the greatest Dracula there ever was, but Lee makes the part his own, which is a big part of what makes this movie so great.

Horrorfest 2010: A Nightmare on Elm Street

A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET is one of those movies I feel like I've seen even though I don't think I ever really sat through the whole thing until earlier tonight. Then again, now that I've sat through it, I'm starting to think maybe I have seen it after all. Oh well, whatever.

Continuing with the dream theme from VAMPYR, NIGHTMARE is the by-now famous story of the kids on Elm Street who are haunted by the ghost (I guess?) of child murderer Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) in their dreams. He can kill them in their dreams. He can follow them out of their dreams and kill them in the real world. Like a dream, he can manifest himself in a bunch of different shapes and sizes and defy the laws of physics.

I imagine if I'd seen this movie as a kid it'd probably be a lot more effective now. These days, it's not really that scary, and although the film isn't intended to be taken totally seriously, there are still a few unintentional laughs to be had. For instance, I know the whole "running but not getting anywhere" thing is a common component of many nightmares, but when you literally see it played out by an actress on screen, it looks kinda silly.

That said, the death scenes are incredibly creative and, unlike most slasher movies, because of the blatantly supernatural element of the film, they're allowed to be as off the wall and over the top as possible. NIGHTMARE succeeds where FRIDAY THE 13th, for one example, fails, because it makes sense that Freddy is basically invincible, whereas you're never quite sure what the deal is with Jason. Also, the imaginative ways Freddy manifests himself and dispatches his victims are a little less morbid than your average slasher film because it's all about nightmare imagery and not so much about thinking of demented ways to literally kill people.

I also like how the kids being haunted by Freddy are the unwitting objects of revenge that should be visited upon their parents -- only, their parents never told them their gruesome secret, so the kids are totally in the dark.

Also, the structure of the first half of the film is pretty cool, pulling a little bit of a narrative twist Hitchcock would have been proud of involving the film's heroine.

Oh yeah, and the film features Johnny Depp's film debut. So there's that.

Horrorfest 2010: Vampyr

I had so much fun watching and writing about 31 horror movies in 31 days last October that I've decided to do it again. Last time I originally planned to just watch my favorites that I happened to have on hand, but that evolved into me watching a bunch of movies I had never seen before. There wasn't much rhyme or reason to it, though -- I mostly watched whatever happened to be available on Netflix via the watch instantly option, or whatever happened to be playing in town.

Anyway, this time I decided to look up a "100 best" list to work off of. I'd seen about half the movies on the list I settled on, so I'll be watching 31 of the other half of the list in no particular order. First up:

VAMPYR

I've heard of this flick before but never watched it until now. It's an old German/French co-production from 1932, directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer. I've seen at least one of his films before, THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC, which was kind of a horror story in and of itself, depicting the trial, torture and execution of Joan of Arc.

Going into the movie I assumed it was a silent film, but it turns out it's actually a very early sound film. So, it still relies heavily on a lot of silent techniques, like extensive use of title cards. But, atmospheric plays throughout and there is some sparse dialogue and a few sound effects here and there.

The movie is light on plot and heavy on atmosphere -- almost more of a stream of consciousness nightmare than an actual story with a beginning, middle and end. At the beginning we're told through narration that the main character, Allan Gray (Julian West), is a student of the occult and has been so entrenched learning about witch craft and devil worshippers that he sometimes can't even trust his own eyes anymore and can't always tell the difference between dream and reality. So, appropriately, much of the movie walks that fine line, too.

Gray is wandering through Europe, stops at a weird creepy inn, and becomes involved in a mystery that slowly unravels to reveal a local Vampyr sucking the blood of some locals while using other locals as slaves to help her in her crimes. The first half of the film is a lot of Gray wandering around abandoned buildings, witnessing strange sights -- a guy who appears to be a grim reaper taking a ferry across the river, shadows that seem to have minds of their own, bustling about. That kind of stuff. The second half deals more with the reality of the situation as Gray realizes he's dealing with a Vampyr and sets a plan in motion to destroy the monster and her accomplices.

The dream like, or, I guess, nightmarish quality of the film is actually heightened by the antiquated techniques the movie uses. For instance, the primitive sound recording techniques results in sparse sounds that seem kind of half heard -- characters speaking right in front of you seem to have voices that are coming from other rooms. Sound effects that are supposed to be coming from actions right in front of the viewer seem to echo from some other dimension. Old films like this often feel alien enough because times and technology have changed so much, but this one is even more alien than usual.

That said, VAMPYR also seemed startlingly modern in places. All you have to do is compare it to the much more famous Todd Browning verion of DRACULA starring Bela Lugosi to see what I mean. DRACULA is from 1931, VAMPYR was shot around the same time and released in 1932. Even though they're so close in age, there's a huge difference in style. Despite its classic status, DRACULA is somewhat infamous for being overly talky, lacking in atmosphere after the first few minutes, and unimaginatively shot in boring drawing rooms. VAMPYR, on the other hand, is full of energetic tracking shots that follow characters down hallways, into doorways, and around corners. VAMPYR also uses a lot of crazy angles and juxtaposes strange unexplained images in ways that would make Salvador Dali proud. There's even a coffin-eye-view shot of a funeral procession. VAMPYR is as much of an experimental art film as it is a horror one.

You always have to take movies as old as this one with a grain of salt. There's a disconnect between the film and a modern viewer that you're just going to have to accept and get over if you're going to give it a chance. It's only a little over an hour long, but that's a long drawn out hour and I'd be lying if I didn't admit I checked the clock more than once. Still, the movie is definitely creepy and definitely unique, and probably one of the best representations of a dream like state that I can remember seeing on screen.

Four short stories about hot dogs

What's that you say? There's disgusting shit in hot dogs? Like intestines, brains, skin and bone? Stuff scraped off the floor of the slaughter house?

Well guess what? I love them, so fuck off. If intestines, brains, skin and bone and stuff scraped off the floor of the slaughter house tastes like hot dogs, sign me up.

Look, I can't be choosing what to eat based on what grosses me out. I mean, if that was the case, I'd have to give up those things that grow up in mud and dirt and get sprayed with animal shit all the time. I mean, vegetables.

Anyway, eating hot dogs makes me feel closer to nature. Much like my Native American brothers, each time I eat a hot dog, I'm earning my right to be an omnivore by using every part of the animal.

But seriously, I had a couple hot dogs the other day and it reminded me of a couple hot dog stories. So here they come:

THE TIME A BABYSITTER FED ME A COLD HOT DOG, PART I

When I was a little kid, the neighbor kids I played with had a mom who ran an in-home day care. I'd go over there to hang out and play and occasionally get trapped into various day care activities. For instance, if I didn't run out of the house fast enough at nap time, I was forced into a bunk bed to "sleep" even though I was not a client of the day care and could have easily run across the street to the safety of my home where I didn't have to take naps since I was too old for naps.

But, I digress.

The point is, once I was over there at meal time, playing in the driveway and the mom approached me.

"It's almost lunch time," she said. "You want to eat here, or you want to go home?"

Ah, fair warning. This way I could run away before I was forced to eat. But, I decided to ask:

"What's for lunch?"

"Hot dogs," the mom said.

I LOVE HOT DOGS! I thought. So I decided to stay. I should have known better. Much like those asshole genies who promise to grant your wishes and then fuck you with little technicalities, this glorious hot dog lunch was served straight out of the refrigerator cold package. No cooking, no condiments. Just cold hot dogs.

In retrospect I should have just refused, yelled, "You tricked me!" and run across the street. Instead, since I was afraid of this day care mom, I humbled myself and ate the cold, mealy, dehumanizing, humiliating dog.

The worst part? It was delicious.

THE TIME A BABYSITTER FED ME A COLD HOT DOG, PART II

Part of the reason I didn't have to go to a terrible in home day care featuring naps and cold hot dogs was because my dad worked at the college and the college supplied an endless source of 18-22 year old women who were perfectly capable of coming over to my own house and taking care of me. Far from the frightening dictator across the street at the neighbor's house, these chicks were fun, pretty, and loved me. Some of them even had awesome boyfriends who could quote STAR WARS and throw me across the room.

Anyway, the queen of all of them was this chick named Sandy. Usually she'd come over and take care of me and my sister, but I remember one time in particular we got to go over to her house. She always did fun and creative stuff with us, but we knew entering her own home there'd be even greater stuff planned. She had a whole series of things for us to do, but the coolest thing was she had us go fishing for our lunch.

Here's how it went: we went up stairs. Right away this was awesome. Our house didn't have an up stairs, so just being on the second floor of a building was kind of amazing. Finally, like the Keatons or Seavers, we knew what it was like to run up and down stairs. There was a balcony overlooking the main room, and from there Sandy had us dangle strings over and "fish." We couldn't see what was down there, but it was Sandy with a variety of lunch items, tugging on our strings, tying food to the strings, and letting us haul them up.

I hauled up some of my booty and found -- a cold hot dog. Great. Here we go again. I shrugged my shoulders, steeled myself, and ate it. My sister looked at me in horror.

"What are you doing?!" she screamed.

"I'm eating lunch," I said.

Sandy called up from down stairs to let us know that we were supposed to gather our booty and bring it down so she could cook it in the kitchen when we were done fishing.

Oops (it was delicious).

THE TRAGIC STORY OF HOT DOG GIRL

When I was in junior high, a girl I was pretending to date told me about a slumber party she went to one time. According to her, a game of truth or dare broke out and as a result one of the girls at the party ended up inserting a hot dog into one of the more private body cavities. Despite the fact that this was the result of a dare and the only people around were supposedly her friends, from that point forward she was known only as -- Hot Dog Girl.

Mostly because that's what I called her after I heard the story.

I wonder if that really happened? Probably not.

Anyway, a few years later I met the legend in person and she was really nice. Fuck me, right?

HOW I GOT A PLATTER OF HOT DOGS FOR MY BIRTHDAY

At work, we have one little birthday treat each month for everyone in the department who had a birthday that month. Every month, an e-mail went out asking for the birthday people to make suggestions for what they wanted to snack on. After about a year at the company, I noticed that this usually ended up being either root beer floats (delicious!) or cheese cake (yum!). Once in a while, the birthday person would ask for something healthy, like a plate of vegetables (whatever).

As soon as I found out the person who did the birthday shopping went to Costco, I got it in my head that my dream birthday treat would be a platter of Costco dogs. You know, those really, really, really good hot dogs they sell at Costco for like $1.00 or something? I figured, they're cheap as hell -- just pick up like ten of them, bring them back to work, cut them in thirds or whatever, and set the platter out. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME.

So, one year, I requested them. Snack time came. No Costco dogs.

The next year, I waited and waited for the e-mail t come out asking for suggestions. Sure enough, the day I stayed home sick, the e-mail went out. Luckily, one of my co-workers had my back and requested Costco dogs on my behalf.

Still, no Costco dogs.

Years passed. I gave up hope.

Then, last year, what should I smell upon entering the office but the distinctive aroma of hot dogs a-cookin'! Sure, they weren't Costco dogs, but they were dogs, and they were there on my birthday.

And they were delicious.

1-976 "I'M A BITCH"

One blustery evening, Gorman and I went down to Zach's Shack, a Hawthorne eatery known for their delicious hot dogs. As we enjoyed our dogs, a drama began to play itself out as a man who appeared to be homeless, insane and intoxicated loitered outside the windows making threatening gestures. He eventually burst through the door and started shouting at the bar tender. The situation was rendered epic by the wind outside, which rushed through the doors, blowing newspapers all over the place as if they were tumble weeds and this was the old west.

The bar tender picked up the phone and started to dial, looking at the homeless guy with an expression that said, "Christ, it's you again."

"Go ahead man!" the homeless guy yelled. "Call the cops! I don't care! I'll even give you the number! 1-976-I'M A BITCH!"

He then repeated, "1-976 I'M A BITCH!" several times before storming back out. The bar tender put the phone down.

The homeless dude burst in a second time a little later, but a table full of giant tough guys with lots of tattoos and piercings instantly stood up and blocked his path, instantly backing him down.

The hot dogs were delicious that night.

When life won't give you food stamps, steal condoms

I have a saying:

"When life won't give you food stamps, steal condoms."

And what I mean by that is this:

"If you can't stumble into one thing ass backwards, just take whatever else is handy."

I'll illustrate by telling a parable of sorts.

There once was a young man who was fresh out of college, splitting his time between living with his parents in the town where he grew up and visiting his girlfriend in Portland about an hour's drive away. I'm not going to tell you who this young man was, but I will tell you that he was incredibly handsome and possibly the greatest writer of his generation (not counting Kaitlyn Burch and Ryan J. Gorman).

This young man was poor, and his girlfriend was poor. Not because of things they couldn't control. Mostly out of laziness. The young man was kind of looking for a job. Really, money wouldn't have been a problem if he just stayed with his parents all the time, but, he chose to use what little money he had to pay for the gas it took to get to and from Portland to visit his girlfriend.

At first, the young man and his girlfriend dealt with poverty by simply putting up with it and doing nothing. Eventually this got old. They heard mystical tales from friends about how gloriously easy it was to get food stamps. And, apparently, these days, they were food stamps in name only -- thanks to the miracles of technology, the stamps now came in the form of a less embarrassing debit card, the likes of which could buy things like Papa Murphy's take and bake pizza.

Faced with this knowledge, and having nothing else to do, the young man and his girlfriend decided to go down to the welfare office to apply for food stamps. For some reason the young man can't remember, his girlfriend could not apply -- so the young man was on his own. As soon as they entered the office, the young man regretted their decision. Confronted with a sitting room full of people who actually needed food, he felt like a fraud. But, he pressed on.

One thing the young man and his girlfriend had not taken into consideration was the fact that most of the stories about the ease of obtaining food stamps came from people who were in college. The young man quickly learned that the state looked more favorably upon poverty stricken youths who were otherwise occupying their time with attempts to better themselves. The state apparently did not look as favorably on people who were simply lazy.

Still, the young man met with a social worker. The social worker looked like a guy who would play a social worker in "The Cosby Show" or another similarly socially conscious late 80s / early 90s sitcom. He was simultaneously non-threatening and edgy. You could tell he was safe by the way he was overweight, but you could tell he was hip by the ear piercings and the funky tie. A basket of condoms sat on his desk as if to say, "Look, please take some of us before you knock someone up. Seriously."

The young man thought it might look better if he acted like he wasn't totally destitute -- he figured if he proved he had some source of income, he wouldn't look like a total loser and would therefore be more eligible for a leg up. He figured wrong. Turns out, the best way to get food stamps is to have absolutely nothing going for you. So, when the young man explained his parents some times gave him money for odd jobs and he earned a pittance as a freelance writer, the road to easy food stamps was instantly blocked with a shit load of paperwork.

At one point the young man felt so nervous and guilty that he eventually just decided to be totally honest.

"Are food stamps really for me?" he asked. "I mean, is it okay for me to come in here and try to get some? I need food and I'm poor and everything, but I'm not as bad off as people with kids or without parents who can help them. Is it messed up for me to even ask?"

"No," the social worker said. "That's a common misconception. We're here to help."

Still, it wasn't very convincing.

The social worker explained how the young man would have to not only look for a job, but take worksheets with him when he looked for a job that he would fill out and have people at the actual jobs he was looking for initial and sign. He'd turn this paper work in on a regular basis in exchange for some food stamps. On top of that, before any of this started, the young man was expected to take a seminar that would teach him how to properly look for a job.

On one hand, the young man thought this wasn't a big deal. He was looking for a job anyway, maybe a little bit of discipline wouldn't be a bad thing. This would simply help him be better at looking for a job.

On the other, if the young man was honest with himself, he knew there was no way in hell he was attending any seminar or getting any signatures.

The social worker eventually left his desk to get some more paper work. Alone with his thoughts and increasingly convinced there was no way he'd ever get food stamps, the young man began to fixate on the basket of condoms. He grabbed a handful and stuffed his pockets.

When the social worker returned, the young man asked:

"Are these condoms free for anyone to take?"

"Sure, help yourself," the social worker said.

So, the young man helped himself to a few more handfuls. A week or so later the social worker called and left a message to set up an appointment for a "how to find a job" seminar. So, the young man called and left a message in return to say thanks, but on second thought he wouldn't be attending any "how to find a job" seminars. Then he had safe sex with his girlfriend.

You see, when life won't give you food stamps, steal condoms.