Ubergrams: Cluck Clam Jam (901 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.58 on 38 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Jack McCallum (View user info) at 2008-02-28 18:43:28 EST
I stood on the Southern California beach for hours, watching the crowd grow, watching everyone who came and went.
I'd gotten a permit to rent this part of the beach for a private party. I'd also paid a local band of aging surf bums to play old tunes by the Surfaris, the Beach Boys, the Ventures, and others that contributed to a certain sound from long ago. Right now the Fry Cooks were working their way through Deadman's Curve.
There was a black and white banner near the boardwalk. The white was now blood red in the light of the early evening setting sun, and a strengthening sea breeze was cooling the air and ruffling the cloth banner proclaiming Cluck Clam Jam.
The smells of baked clams and roasted chicken filled the salt air and made my stomach rumble. I hadn't eaten anything all day. I wanted to stay sharp. Bums and students and tourists were all helping themselves to the free food and enjoying the free music. I wasn't preventing anyone from coming down off the boardwalk and onto this part of the beach. People were coming from nearby apartment buildings and houses a block away.
The man I was after lived in one of those apartments. I hoped he'd show. I hoped he'd have the balls to wear the shirt.
I'd done four other guys he used to hang around with. Two were wearing the shirts. I did them in public places and left them on display. I made a statement. That statement made each of the dwindling group of survivors skittish and paranoid, but I was making a point.
The guilty pay.
If the courts wouldn't find them accountable, I would.
I sipped bottled water and listened to Warmth of the Sun.
She'd only been fourteen. Fourteen, man. When I think of all the living I've done since fourteen... I'm not famous. I'm not rich. But I've seen a fair part of the world and made some good friends. I've enjoyed fucking and food and acting like a fool. It may not be a life for the record books, but I've been happy through most of it.
The little girl who lived next door to me up in San Francisco didn't get to do any of that. The case against the Judah Street Five was thrown out on a legal technicality. The Five split up. I found one in Colorado. One in Idaho. One was down in Puerto Vallarta. One was in Reno, and now the last one was here... somewhere. I didn't have an address on him, just a neighborhood.
I knew the guy still liked to party. I knew he worked odd jobs. And I knew he liked free shit.
I was telling myself that I had the patience to wait all night and hoping he'd show when I saw him. If it hadn't been for the shirt I'd have missed him because had he put on a lot of weight and grown a beard. But the shirt... man, the shirt.
It was a simple white cotton tee. Five had been made up at one of those beachfront t-shirt places where they'll print anything you want in a selection of font styles. That was years ago. The shirt I was looking at was worn thin, the lettering faded, but I could still read it.
Big Dick Dogma
That was their little joke. I wasn't humorless. I could appreciate what they tried to do, playing with anagrams and all, but there were some things you could laugh off and some you couldn't.
The guy grabbed a paper plate and loaded up on clams. He got a cold beer from an ice-filled tub and sat near a roaring fire. He went through those clams like a seagull on tourist scraps, and then got some roasted chicken.
I'd learned a lot from the last four guys, questioning them before I killed them. They had found the girl walking along Ocean Beach. She'd shared a few beers with friends earlier in the evening and was still a bit tipsy. She wasn't doing any serious partying; she was just farting around and testing the waters like kids at that age do sometimes. The attorney defending the Judah Street Five made a big deal about that. Five guys gang bang a fourteen year old girl and then kill her, and somehow she is partly to blame.
The press ate it up. Yes, she was assaulted, but it could not be proven that the Five raped her or killed her because the chain of evidence had been broken. Rock-solid DNA evidence was thrown out. The state had no case. The cops working the case took it hard. It hit the girl's family harder still.
The Five started wearing their t-shirts a year later.
I found out that it was an inside joke. When they were raping the girl, they got a big laugh out of the fact that she gagged whenever they orally assaulted her. One of the guys described it at 'mobbing' her; trying to stuff as many cocks as possible into her mouth at one time. She kept on gagging and crying, "Don't, don't!"
One of then had started mimicking her in a falsetto, "Don't, don't! I'd gag! I'd gag on mob dick!"
I'd gag on mob dick.
One acquittal and a year later and they were wearing t-shirts with the anagram big dick dogma.
I watched the last of the Five as he dumped his plate and chicken bones on the beach, within a few feet of a trash barrel. He stood up and grabbed another beer, and wandered past the fire and closer to the water, letting out a series of long, soft belches.
He was far enough from the rest of the crowd that I could make my move. I stepped close. Held against my side, out of sight, was a hand gaff. The twelve inch handle was oak, with a little steel ring at the end. The three inch hook was stainless steel. He looked at me and nodded and I raised the hook.
I brought the hand gaff up at an angle, fast, using both hands. I'd practiced this at home, on a rack of ribs. I had the move down cold.
He looked down, probably only saw a flash of steel, and then he grunted as the hook punctured skin and muscle. I gave the hook a half turn and pulled it towards me. The hook erupted from his chest just under his right nipple. The inside arc of the hook was now snug around one of his ribs.
He saw his own blood and really started feeling the pain. He screamed; a good old fashioned horror movie shriek. Before anyone on the beach looked over, I screamed the same way, and then laughed, letting out a loud yeee-haw-hawww!. I took off my ball cap and threw it in the air. A few people looked our way, some of them raising cups and bottles of beer in salute. All they saw was a couple of guys getting shitfaced and having fun.
I started wading into the water. The water was cold. It was only March, after all.
He came with me. He didn't really have a choice. He tried to take another deep breath, to shout, but when he inhaled too deep the pain made him wail softly.
"Please," he said, "Please don't. It hurts."
I didn't say anything. I was too busy pulling both of us out deeper as the water rose up.
"Why are you doing this?" His hands fluttered around the hook, but there wasn't much he could do. If he pulled against it, he caused himself pain.
The water was calm, but even gentle waves could knock you over if you went out far enough. When the water was as high as my diaphragm I stopped.
"Valerie Melendez," I said. I probed the sea bed underfoot until the toe of one sneaker found what I was seeking.
He stared at me. He looked blank for a moment, then his eyes widened. His shirt was streaked with dark blood that obscured the words printed on it.
Before he could pull back or try to cry out again I took a deep breath. I dropped to my knees and pulled down on the gaff. There was a stainless steel clip under the water. The clip was attached to a line of cinderblocks that were chained together. I'd put the cinderblocks out here long before the shindig on the beach had started.
Through a haze of rising bubbles and swirling sand I saw the clip. I slipped the ring on the end of the hand gaff into the clip. I heard and felt a click as the gaff was locked down.
I looked at him and saw a slivery blur as he thrashed and screamed out his last breath.
I stood up and breathed easy, watching the water churn beside me.
"Gag on that," I said.
I waded back to the beach.
When I got to my car I stripped off my sopping clothes. I was wearing swim trunks underneath. As the sun dipped below the horizon and the sea turned red, I dried off with a towel, got behind the wheel, and drive away.
The band would keep playing until midnight. The food might last that long, but the beer would not. The man on the hook probably wouldn't be found until low tide late tomorrow morning. By then I'd be long gone.
User Reviews
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2008-03-03 15:16:14 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Sorry Jacqueline, but I intercepted your most recent e-mail to Bart complaining about receiving -2s and copied it into the review exactly as you typed it.
I didn't weep or anything but the presentation is correct.
But tell me more about Bart's Automatic Alter Banning System and how it proves you didn't cheat with horse87 and your other alters in ubermadness.
I love your science fiction.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-03 14:45:24 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2008-03-03 13:08:25 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-03 12:11:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
If horse87 was an alter, Bart would have shut me down. End of story.
====================
Bart doesn't troll the fucking site looking for 'evidence' of 'alters' like you do, you stupid spazz.
"Bart would shut me down, end of story."
DUN DUN DUNN
Your reviews are as melodramatic and overwrought as your fiction.
What's the matter, pussy? Upset Bart didn't resond to your latest round of e-mails complaining I pick on you?
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH Hotwillie gave me a -2 again, daddy! Make him stoooooooooooooooop!"
Hilarious.
--
I've never complained to Bart about other users like you, ya pissy little bitch. Read what I wrote below, you uneducated faggot. I was referring to ubermadness in which I was accused of cheating by pus bags like you.
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2008-03-03 13:08:25 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-03 12:11:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
If horse87 was an alter, Bart would have shut me down. End of story.
====================
Bart doesn't troll the fucking site looking for 'evidence' of 'alters' like you do, you stupid spazz.
"Bart would shut me down, end of story."
DUN DUN DUNN
Your reviews are as melodramatic and overwrought as your fiction.
What's the matter, pussy? Upset Bart didn't resond to your latest round of e-mails complaining I pick on you?
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH Hotwillie gave me a -2 again, daddy! Make him stoooooooooooooooop!"
Hilarious.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-03 12:11:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2008-03-02 21:29:52 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
HAHAHAHAHA
Look at McCallum playing detective and 'exposing' alters even though he uses his own alters to cheat at ubermadness.
--
It's the no balls alters like you who have not got the GUTS to check with Bart. If horse87 was an alter, Bart would have shut me down. End of story. But like some fucking lunatic conspiracy theorist spineless snivelling shits like you keep on repeating the same garbage.
Come on, gutless. Let's hear your tough guy response. Come on, chickenshit. Let's hear it.
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2008-03-02 21:29:52 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
HAHAHAHAHA
Look at McCallum playing detective and 'exposing' alters even though he uses his own alters to cheat at ubermadness.
Submitted by HandZon (user info) at 2008-03-02 11:17:46 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-03-02 00:28:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by HandZon (user info) at 2008-03-01 22:57:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
-------------------------------
Are you actually going to defend McCallum's writing, or are you just trying to match me as the crankiest prick on this post?
I see your alcohol and I raise you a plate a pot cookies.
-------------
Perhaps I'm shooting for cranky, but I still find no reason to shit on a post that reads well. I'll see you that plate of cookies and raise you the headache I'm suffering today -
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-03-02 00:28:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by HandZon (user info) at 2008-03-01 22:57:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Ok, I'm drunk and thought this would have played out more by now, but I have a few things to say:
First off. Honestly, shut your fuckin' pie-hole. Whilst I'm sure you'll come back with some droning fucking rhetoric about how great you are or, better yet, how I have no ability to write a cohesive sentence, I don't know this dude from any other on this site but I still think you're way off base.
Secondly, shut your fuckin' pie-hole. Your creative little bit about a DB with a guitar was awesome. You know what? It wasnt and I'm not sorry I think that way. Save that 'brilliant and originative' bullshit for your college professor(but please do make sure your throw it in the trash after the hollow praise you may or may not get for it.) We both know your attempt to disparage the way others write is nothing more than a weak manifestation of insecurities that have plagued you since birth...grow the fuck up, you're not Hemingway. Please, please ask me who I read: The satisfaction I'll get from laughing it off will more than make up for the furious little tapping sounds I imagine you made while typing your prolific replies during your personal theme song, aptly written by Ani DiFranco.
Last but not least, would you like to get coffee sometime? I like nothing more than feeding ye' old stove pipe to a needy beast.
Gobble Gooble!!!
-------------------------------
I like how you used quotation marks around "brilliant and originative" because it's like I actually used those words to describe my own post, instead of saying that I thought it wasn't very good! I refuse to believe you're drunk. Maybe because I myself am pretty trashed on pot cookies and box wine right now.
Fuck college, and fuck professors. Necessary evils. I've taught some college courses in a few different places and I have a couple close friends that still teach. If you get hired as a college professor it only proves that you have the degrees and you needed a job. Being a college professor doesn't give you any real authority unless you're a scientist. Academic science has a lot of value but academic art hasn't been worth much in my lifetime. I sure as shit didn't contribute anything to Academia when I was part of it.
Are you actually going to defend McCallum's writing, or are you just trying to match me as the crankiest prick on this post?
I see your alcohol and I raise you a plate a pot cookies.
Submitted by HandZon (user info) at 2008-03-01 22:57:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-03-01 20:23:49 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
I think you have a decent way with words but as an all-around writer I think you have tremendous room for improvement. You can sit and accept the cocksucking that you get from terrible writers or you can take what I say and use it constructively.
---------
Ok, I'm drunk and thought this would have played out more by now, but I have a few things to say:
First off. Honestly, shut your fuckin' pie-hole. Whilst I'm sure you'll come back with some droning fucking rhetoric about how great you are or, better yet, how I have no ability to write a cohesive sentence, I don't know this dude from any other on this site but I still think you're way off base.
Secondly, shut your fuckin' pie-hole. Your creative little bit about a DB with a guitar was awesome. You know what? It wasnt and I'm not sorry I think that way. Save that 'brilliant and originative' bullshit for your college professor(but please do make sure your throw it in the trash after the hollow praise you may or may not get for it.) We both know your attempt to disparage the way others write is nothing more than a weak manifestation of insecurities that have plagued you since birth...grow the fuck up, you're not Hemingway. Please, please ask me who I read: The satisfaction I'll get from laughing it off will more than make up for the furious little tapping sounds I imagine you made while typing your prolific replies during your personal theme song, aptly written by Ani DiFranco.
Last but not least, would you like to get coffee sometime? I like nothing more than feeding ye' old stove pipe to a needy beast.
Gobble Gooble!!!
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-03-01 20:23:49 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
So you dig up some comments from some chick from a year and a half ago and you think I'm the same person? You're fucking insane. Gina's criticisms are very different from mine, anyway. But you can believe whatever you want, I don't give a shit.
I think you have a decent way with words but as an all-around writer I think you have tremendous room for improvement. You can sit and accept the cocksucking that you get from terrible writers or you can take what I say and use it constructively. You can think I'm an asshole who is just trying to piss you off, but that doesn't mean you can't take my criticism and use it as motivation to better your writing. If you think you've reached your apex and you have no interest in trying to take your work to another level then that's up to you.
I read "The Very Best Thing Of All". It reads like a made-for-TV movie, which I guess is a compliment or an insult depending on how you look at it. It shows a little bit of commercial promise but it's just as brain-numbing as any of your other stories.
As for my only post, I am very open to your criticism of it. I would love to hear what you have to say about it. I do not think it is a great piece and I would be more than happy to hear some ways to improve it. The only thing I really like about it is that I think it expresses a couple of my ideas in very few words.
Submitted by HandZon (user info) at 2008-03-01 18:02:49 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Good shit. Nasty review down below, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.
Also, I thought it had a beginning, a bit of 'meat' if you will, and an end. Worked for me.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-01 16:36:19 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Sounds like the same chick to me. If she LIKED my stuff I'd have my own Annie Wilkes.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-01 16:36:00 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
EXHIBIT B
-
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-02-28 23:07:44 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Do people actually think this is enjoyable reading? This is the kind of paper that your high school English teacher is looking for. You would be awarded full points for meeting the technical and stylistic requirements, and then you would throw your paper in the trash when you got it back because it has served its only purpose.
You have your followers because people don't want to give a -2 to technically sound writing. And it seems like a lot of people on here view you as someone who is talented. But when you actually state your views or truly expresses yourself through your writing it becomes obvious that you're a hack with absolutely nothing interesting to say. People read Stephen King and see that it sells a million copies, and then they come to Ubersite and read this same sort of dreck and assume it's worthy of praise.
I would love to know which authors you've read, and more importantly, which authors you haven't. It seems like you read Stephen King and Mitch Albom and never got around to reading Burroughs or Mailer or Vonnegut.
Say something, McCallum. Not one of your boring witticisms. Not another polished turd of a story. Say something interesting. You have all of the tools but you have no fucking clue how to use them.
-
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-02-29 20:10:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
""Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-02-29 06:33:55 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
This is a website for posting whatever you want to post. I like to write. I would like to sell, true, everyone would like to be able to make a living doing what they LIKE doing, but I like to write primarily for ME, because it is fun, it's a pressure value, and it's an outlet for all the stories filling my mind every minute of every day.""
That's fine. That's not what sickens me. What really sucks about your writing is that it is so confined. You are fairly talented when it comes to putting coherent stories on a page, but you are either too lazy or too barren to present interesting ideas. If you wrote these things with the attitude of "Well, I just go through the motions of putting these stories together because it's therapeutic blah blah blah" then it wouldn't be as off-putting. But as far as your personality on this website is concerned you are anything but humble. I don't see you deflecting the undue praise that's heaped upon you by the drones on this site. You eat it up and embrace your role as King of the Boring Writers.
""Sometimes times I post things are think are pretty damn good- for uber. Sometimes I post utter shit. I'm only human. I have good days and bad ones. As this is just a website where people post whatever they want and there is a fair amount of mindless crap to which I have contributed over the years, there is no way in hell I will put the same effort into an uber post that I would put into something being submitted for publication. If you think I'm gonna give the good shit away for free, think again. I'm not an artist. I'm a story-teller. Artists can starve. Story-tellers gotta eat."""
I don't see much of a difference between your stories that you consider good and the ones you probably consider not as good. The only thing that you can say is good or bad about your stories is how effectively they execute the same trite ideas.
If you save the "good shit" for publication, that's stupid as hell. You retain the rights to everything you post on Ubersite. You aren't losing out on money by posting anything here. If you're writing a novel then you have no reason not to post some excerpts on here. How lucrative your book becomes will not be affected by having a chapter or two on Ubersite. Even if you post a "good" short story on here in full, you are not actually jeopardizing that piece's future as a commodity. If a magazine wants to publish your short story they will still have to pay you to do so.
You are exactly right in saying that you are not an artist. But why not be one? You've obviously been honing your craft for years. Why not use this ability to create something artistic? Would it be less satisfying than churning out all this flavorless mush that you've been making? I would think it would be more satisfying. Maybe instead of writing stories every day, take some time off to reflect on the world around you. Have an open mind and let yourself think deeply. Think about things you never think about. Think about things from completely new perspectives. Spend a lot of time on that. Then come back and write and express yourself.
"""This post was conceived, written, and proof-read (to the best of my limited ability in THAT department) in just over 2 hours. It is not high art, but I think it provides a few minutes of amusement and isn't half bad for a lunchtime quickie, considering that the title is an anagram of my user name and those anagrams are very limited."""
There's nothing wrong with some good low art, and there's nothing inherently horrible about most of your individual pieces. It's just that it boggles the mind that someone like yourself wouldn't want to take their work a step further. There are a million people out there writing mainstream fiction, none of it particularly unique. Why not put in some extra time and really express something that's thought-provoking? Because you're content to have people on this random website suck your cock when you write all of your usual stuff.
In your nonfiction posts on Ubersite you have proven yourself incapable of discussing anything but the most yawn-inducing garbage. You have stupid dogmas that you follow. Your sense of humor is boring as hell. Your writing, technically sound as it is, is nothing more than a fancy vehicle for the triteness that is your personality.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-03-01 16:35:35 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
EXHIBIT A
Submitted by gina (user info) at 2006-11-02 12:22:07 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Your stories are all very frustrating to me, rather, the ones that I've read are. It always feels like you start writing them before they are fully formed, like they are all ideas for a story that you will actually write later. In this sense, they aren't really "stories" at all. They are much more like the non action, "slice of life" fiction of the eighties.
Take "whirlpool" (I think that was what it was called.) No suspense, no building action, just an idea that is related in completely plodding, narative style. Now forgive my fading recollection, but isn't it just, "guy climbs a fence, wants to molest girl, gets eaten by sand"? I mean, that's a cool idea, but your execution is completely without drama or build.
And the one about the potion that involved menstual blood. Again, cool idea, completely unformed and told in the most banal way. Your dialogue is generally good, your discriptives okay, but there is no drama in the pacing ever (in my experience anyway) and never a cool "gotchya" moment at the end. The surprise endings are told so straightforwardly, that I wonder if you trust your audience very much.
You are incredibly prolific, which I guess accounts for most of my gripes, but I can't help feeling like the results would be really remarkable if you sat on an idea for a while, instead of committing it onto the paper the moment it goes through your head.
Your stories, this last one in particular, always come across to me like, "wouldn't it be cool if there was a devil chick held in a museum of oddities that comes back to life..." Great idea, but that's not really a story, is it? It's sort of a beginning to a story, it's maybe a conceit that could be developed into something, but you skip past the development part. The guy who listens to a song, and then steps out onto the road and kills himself (again, please forgive my bad recollection, I read that ages ago) was a cool exercise in narrative style in that you juxtaposed the song with the narrative, but it felt like a completely unformed idea. Ultimately, what happened? A guy killed himself, totally slice of life. No irony, no drama (aside from the manufactured drama of the prose) and no discovery or revelation. It read like an obituary, "guy kills self while listening to depressing song."
I wouldn't be frustrated if you weren't such a capable storyteller. You are, I just think that your ideas are MERELY ideas, and not really stories.
I would love to read an example of yours that defies this humble opinion of mine. If you like, please direct me to one.
g
-
Submitted by gina (user info) at 2007-08-15 21:03:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
"eyes as cold and hard as concrete after a rain." This is really just a terrible discriptive; it's trite and uninteresting; a twelve year old could have written it.
"Two cops who showed up for work every evening in uniform, wearing guns, ready to ride a night desk until their disability claims were accepted or rejected." is a sentence fragment, no big deal, just to let you know.
I'll never really understand your obsession with how people are dressed, but it really slows down your pacing, which isn't lightning fast anyway.
"Morales heard the buzz of electric current, and heard the wings of a moth flicking against the glowing neon tubes of the Roosevelt Hotel sign. " See, that's pretty cool. I like the little, strange details that people notice in the middle of fucked up circumstances, and this one is captured nicely.
I'm not really into this kinda stuff, probably won't read the next parts. Your endings are uniformly terrible anyhow. But I thought I'd put in my two cents.
Oh, and I think you're a dick.
-
Submitted by gina (user info) at 2008-02-02 21:44:36 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Didn't like your story much, never do really. I think you might want to get past your whole father complex. It's really a boomer generational bit of angst to be honest with you.
The world of fiction has long ago moved on to a whole host of more topical deconstructivism, things like suburban existentialism, self imposed sexual alienation, the metaphysics of deconstructed communication forms (like email and chat) just to name a few. The whole "I wanna be like my dad/ I hate my dad" thing that you come back to time and time again is just so tired and screams mercilessly of how out of touch you are. It's why the boomers' fiction reads so quaint to those of us growing up on Junot Diaz and Chuck Palahniuk. Gen X and everything afterwards doesn't have this same obsession with our parents that the boomers did, cowboy.
It's also why your stories, even when futuristic or fantasy, fairly ooze a sort of nostalgia that I find sickening in the same way that the hair on my neck stands up if I have to listen to Prairie Home Companion or Mister Rogers; both of which are still more entertaining than your, and I'm being overly charitable when I say it, prose. It's this nostalgia for a time (and/or relationship) that never fucking existed that undermines the validity or, to sound academic, the verisimilitude of every story of yours that I've ever read. They all sound so damn quaint and waggish, so fucking prosaic. It's also probably why you're a fucking republican. But that's a whole different conversation.
Submitted by JustAnotherStudent (user info) at 2008-03-01 15:20:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Creepy... at least you killed the fucker off in an amazingly painful way.
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-02-29 20:10:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
""Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-02-29 06:33:55 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
This is a website for posting whatever you want to post. I like to write. I would like to sell, true, everyone would like to be able to make a living doing what they LIKE doing, but I like to write primarily for ME, because it is fun, it's a pressure value, and it's an outlet for all the stories filling my mind every minute of every day.""
That's fine. That's not what sickens me. What really sucks about your writing is that it is so confined. You are fairly talented when it comes to putting coherent stories on a page, but you are either too lazy or too barren to present interesting ideas. If you wrote these things with the attitude of "Well, I just go through the motions of putting these stories together because it's therapeutic blah blah blah" then it wouldn't be as off-putting. But as far as your personality on this website is concerned you are anything but humble. I don't see you deflecting the undue praise that's heaped upon you by the drones on this site. You eat it up and embrace your role as King of the Boring Writers.
""Sometimes times I post things are think are pretty damn good- for uber. Sometimes I post utter shit. I'm only human. I have good days and bad ones. As this is just a website where people post whatever they want and there is a fair amount of mindless crap to which I have contributed over the years, there is no way in hell I will put the same effort into an uber post that I would put into something being submitted for publication. If you think I'm gonna give the good shit away for free, think again. I'm not an artist. I'm a story-teller. Artists can starve. Story-tellers gotta eat."""
I don't see much of a difference between your stories that you consider good and the ones you probably consider not as good. The only thing that you can say is good or bad about your stories is how effectively they execute the same trite ideas.
If you save the "good shit" for publication, that's stupid as hell. You retain the rights to everything you post on Ubersite. You aren't losing out on money by posting anything here. If you're writing a novel then you have no reason not to post some excerpts on here. How lucrative your book becomes will not be affected by having a chapter or two on Ubersite. Even if you post a "good" short story on here in full, you are not actually jeopardizing that piece's future as a commodity. If a magazine wants to publish your short story they will still have to pay you to do so.
You are exactly right in saying that you are not an artist. But why not be one? You've obviously been honing your craft for years. Why not use this ability to create something artistic? Would it be less satisfying than churning out all this flavorless mush that you've been making? I would think it would be more satisfying. Maybe instead of writing stories every day, take some time off to reflect on the world around you. Have an open mind and let yourself think deeply. Think about things you never think about. Think about things from completely new perspectives. Spend a lot of time on that. Then come back and write and express yourself.
"""This post was conceived, written, and proof-read (to the best of my limited ability in THAT department) in just over 2 hours. It is not high art, but I think it provides a few minutes of amusement and isn't half bad for a lunchtime quickie, considering that the title is an anagram of my user name and those anagrams are very limited."""
There's nothing wrong with some good low art, and there's nothing inherently horrible about most of your individual pieces. It's just that it boggles the mind that someone like yourself wouldn't want to take their work a step further. There are a million people out there writing mainstream fiction, none of it particularly unique. Why not put in some extra time and really express something that's thought-provoking? Because you're content to have people on this random website suck your cock when you write all of your usual stuff.
In your nonfiction posts on Ubersite you have proven yourself incapable of discussing anything but the most yawn-inducing garbage. You have stupid dogmas that you follow. Your sense of humor is boring as hell. Your writing, technically sound as it is, is nothing more than a fancy vehicle for the triteness that is your personality.
Submitted by Lib (user info) at 2008-02-29 15:02:56 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Man
Submitted by rob_berg (user info) at 2008-02-29 14:08:32 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Now fuck off and try creating something instead of tearing things down. Be a Positive Patty. Positive Patties are fun. The biggest bores in life are Negative Nellies like you.
---
That is SO Rob Berg.
ya homo.
Submitted by SkullBiter (user info) at 2008-02-29 13:01:50 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Now fuck off and try creating something instead of tearing things down. Be a Positive Patty. Positive Patties are fun. The biggest bores in life are Negative Nellies like you.
HAHA!
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2008-02-29 10:02:16 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
My only comment is that "Big Dick Dogma" =/= "I gag on mob dick".
Otherwise, well done, especially for a lunchtime quickie. Don't get worked up over PepsiCokehead below.
Submitted by LittleMonster (user info) at 2008-02-29 09:28:07 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Nothing of any worth to say, but I thought this was very good.
Submitted by recall (user info) at 2008-02-29 08:57:24 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by BlazinBull (user info) at 2008-02-29 08:36:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by lostnphound (user info) at 2008-02-29 08:30:09 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by skrapmetal (user info) at 2008-02-29 08:20:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Waaay better'n my story, but I had been at the whiskey.
Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-02-29 06:54:12 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Yeah...shut the fuck up PepsiCoke
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-02-29 06:33:55 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-02-28 23:07:44 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Do people actually think this is enjoyable reading? This is the kind of paper that your high school English teacher is looking for. You would be awarded full points for meeting the technical and stylistic requirements, and then you would throw your paper in the trash when you got it back because it has served its only purpose.
You have your followers because people don't want to give a -2 to technically sound writing. And it seems like a lot of people on here view you as someone who is talented. But when you actually state your views or truly expresses yourself through your writing it becomes obvious that you're a hack with absolutely nothing interesting to say. People read Stephen King and see that it sells a million copies, and then they come to Ubersite and read this same sort of dreck and assume it's worthy of praise.
I would love to know which authors you've read, and more importantly, which authors you haven't. It seems like you read Stephen King and Mitch Albom and never got around to reading Burroughs or Mailer or Vonnegut.
Say something, McCallum. Not one of your boring witticisms. Not another polished turd of a story. Say something interesting. You have all of the tools but you have no fucking clue how to use them.
--
Rebuttal-
(1)
This is a website for posting whatever you want to post. I like to write. I would like to sell, true, everyone would like to be able to make a living doing what they LIKE doing, but I like to write primarily for ME, because it is fun, it's a pressure value, and it's an outlet for all the stories filling my mind every minute of every day. Sometimes times I post things are think are pretty damn good- for uber. Sometimes I post utter shit. I'm only human. I have good days and bad ones. As this is just a website where people post whatever they want and there is a fair amount of mindless crap to which I have contributed over the years, there is no way in hell I will put the same effort into an uber post that I would put into something being submitted for publication. If you think I'm gonna give the good shit away for free, think again. I'm not an artist. I'm a story-teller. Artists can starve. Story-tellers gotta eat.
(2)
This post was conceived, written, and proof-read (to the best of my limited ability in THAT department) in just over 2 hours. It is not high art, but I think it provides a few minutes of amusement and isn't half bad for a lunchtime quickie, considering that the title is an anagram of my user name and those anagrams are very limited.
I first noticed the original post here...
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-02-28 16:34:58 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Shit, how'd I miss this?
Time for a quickie.
Fun idea.
http://www.ubersite.com/m/115242#2661161
I posted this tale at 2008-02-28 18:43:28 EST
(3)
One of my many fiction posts,
The Very Best Thing of All
(This was a contest entry. Written with an assigned title and time limit. As such, I think it turned out okay, and it's one of the few posts in which I favored feeling over plot.)
http://www.ubersite.com/m/56174
versus
Your only post so far,
Art
http://www.ubersite.com/m/115053
I rest my case.
Now fuck off and try creating something instead of tearing things down. Be a Positive Patty. Positive Patties are fun. The biggest bores in life are Negative Nellies like you.
Submitted by AsshOly (user info) at 2008-02-29 03:53:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-02-15 12:11:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Imagine what would have happened if the kids in that class had carry permits and got shooting lessons from dad every other Saturday.
Guns don't kill people. Crazy as fuck flunking asswipe sociology students kill people.
----------
everybody in de kalb has a gun and has learned to shoot.
NIU is also the college campus murder capital of the world.
Submitted by czwij (user info) at 2008-02-29 02:33:16 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
classic uber
rape
killing
just needs boobies
Submitted by lungfish (user info) at 2008-02-28 23:41:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Thanks for fucking me up, man. At least *I* got free drinks all night, and all you got was to bang that skank, Kelly.
Submitted by PepsiCoke (user info) at 2008-02-28 23:07:44 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Do people actually think this is enjoyable reading? This is the kind of paper that your high school English teacher is looking for. You would be awarded full points for meeting the technical and stylistic requirements, and then you would throw your paper in the trash when you got it back because it has served its only purpose.
You have your followers because people don't want to give a -2 to technically sound writing. And it seems like a lot of people on here view you as someone who is talented. But when you actually state your views or truly expresses yourself through your writing it becomes obvious that you're a hack with absolutely nothing interesting to say. People read Stephen King and see that it sells a million copies, and then they come to Ubersite and read this same sort of dreck and assume it's worthy of praise.
I would love to know which authors you've read, and more importantly, which authors you haven't. It seems like you read Stephen King and Mitch Albom and never got around to reading Burroughs or Mailer or Vonnegut.
Say something, McCallum. Not one of your boring witticisms. Not another polished turd of a story. Say something interesting. You have all of the tools but you have no fucking clue how to use them.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2008-02-28 21:46:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Ballare (user info) at 2008-02-28 19:42:53 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by monkeyswithguns (user info) at 2008-02-28 19:24:28 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Well structured. I still need to work on that. I had written more about it, but I'm not sure where my weak points are, and any advice and constructive criticism would be appreciated.
shanek07.at.gmail.com
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2008-02-28 19:19:53 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Yozz (user info) at 2008-02-28 18:57:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
By the way Jack - I didn't want you to miss this http://www.ubersite.com/m/115251. Its got your name written all over it.
Submitted by SkullBiter (user info) at 2008-02-28 18:56:07 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Damn.
Good job.
Submitted by Yozz (user info) at 2008-02-28 18:50:26 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Fuck me. That was great.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-02-28 18:46:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Yeah, yeah, typos, I know.