It's always good to watch your friends grow up

Commodities used to actually be virtual commodities. Nobody actually owned the pigs, or cared where they were located. Commodities, which in actuality are the most tangible of financial instruments ("Hey we're trading something that actually exists!"), were actually virtually named instruments representing those commodities. In other words, 'coffee' wasn't actual coffee that you could turn into a delicious beverage, but was a bet about what coffee would cost at some specified future date. Commodities trading was futures trading and shorting with hilarious names. Does that make sense dear readers? I'm happy to explain more if you'd like! Please request in the comments and I'll make an entire post about complex financial instruments. Or, knowing how this blog works I'll make a series of posts about complex financial instruments.


It seems though that our old friend, Goldman Sachs has turned this model on its head. With the price of land, and machine-gun clad 'security' at an all time low, it seems its more profitable to buy commodities outright rather than trade them. Why bother with the ins and outs of future pricing and speculation when you can just buy one quarter of the world's aluminum and store it in a series of warehouses outside Detroit? Why bother with the middle man? Why bother with the markets? Why bother with the financial instruments you invented? Just debeers style that shit!

just for you dear readers

There will be no default. Please do not worry. You should focus your attention on other matters. We will continue our expose of the inner workings of your leaders.

Do not short the economy if you are playing the stock market, long it or medium it or whatever the inverse of short... The rich will get richer.

You are silly for playing into this nonsense and giving these morons any of your time. Enjoy your summer. (or for our southern hemisphere readers, your winter)

late night washington dc

John Boner is speaker of the house. Everyone thinks he's a consummate douchebag but seriously he's just a misunderstood white guy. Like the rest of them. Anyway - he's usually joined in his office by his assistant, but this time its just him. and his cell phone. John Boner has been promised too much and too little has been delivered. Someone told us recently about a bell hooks book to this effect, but the mere thought of that just reminded us of susan faludi too much and we became angry... we digress...

Barack Obama is the president of the United States. He's taller than John Boner.

JB (into the phone): Hi
BO: John, that you?
JB: Yeah its me.
BO: Great to hear from you John! How can I help?
JB: I guess, you know after all we've been through I just felt kind of bad about last night...
John Boner coughs
BO: Last night? Oh the press conference.
JB: Yeah, I mean I felt like, you know, like I'd maybe come on too strong and like you know, you wouldn't, I don't know...
BO: John, I'm here for you, i"m listening. Just hang on...
Long pause
BO: Where were we John? Sorry I got distracted!
JB: It's just that this whole thing is eating me up inside. I just - I don't know how to go through with or how to not go through with it. I'm just - I'm torn up about everything - I just want things to be ok, like they were.
BO: What is it that's troubling you John? I mean hang on...
John Boner walks around the office, dismayed that maybe Barak Obama doesn't take their relationship as seriously as he thought... He pours another drink
BO: Hi John Sorry - they were calling from Greece - so hard to keep everything in check. But listen, we should talk sometime! Do you want to call my secretary and set up a time? I'll give her some dates in a few weeks when maybe you and I can chat, you know - mano y mano.
BO: Ok John! Great to hear from you! Have a great night!
John Boner sits at his desk. The world spins. It might be the ventilation. We aren't sure.

rain rain go away thats what all my haters say

*

we can't write anything today.
we don't have it in us.

we have a 15000 page manifesto to read

Dear Readers

A little poem to brighten your monday:

Don't stop Believing
Hold on to the feeling
Streetlights people

Yes! We think we will add a 'boner' section to our google news page!

John Boner (JB) in his office, he's depressed. He can't believe the mess he's in. He doesn't know where he belongs or who his allies are. He's sitting in his executive chair, behind his desk. He's released the nob on the right hand side so he can really lean back and stare at the ceiling. He's doing this now. Across from his desk sits his Assistant (JBA). His assistant is wearing a pair of stylish black pants that just might be too short, or maybe we don't get it. Anyway he's in his late 20s . He's handsome. He's very thin.

JBA: Is reading something on his iphone.
JBA: Ugh
JB: What tell me. What happened? I need to know... No wait. Don't tell me.

JB lights a cigarette.

JB: Now tell me.
JBA: They want you to call a press conference about that bill.
JB: God.
JBA: They want you to say that its a compromise?
JB: What? How?
JBA: They want you to say that 'they' get the increase, while 'the american people' get a constitutional amendment to prevent taxes from ever being raised again.

Both men stare into the distance, across from each other but as though they are alone in the room. JB forgets he has a cigarette lit, and lights another one.

Dear People of the WORLD

Next time I predict something, why not just listen?

Sincerely,

TrendingVampire(TM)

the future looks bleak

John Boner (our hero) (JB) has an ice pack on his forehead. He's lying on his bearskin rug. Shoes on, not unlike someone at the therapist's office, but minus the actual couch.

John Boner's Aid (JBA) is sitting on a chair doing nothing near his boss's feet.

JB: You won't let them pie me will you?
JBA: No.

a puzzler brought to you by wll shrz

fact: cointelpro aims to distract activists from their true pursuits.
fact: drinking distracts us from our true pursuits.
conclusion: we can blame our drinking on cointelpro.

true blood

1. true blood is a totally stupid show and we won't be reviewing it here

2. true blood is a fun show to watch. we recommend you watch it.

3. dialectics break bricks

act three: the antichrist appears to rabbit

John Boner takes ice from a little ice dish, ala madmen. He puts it in a glass in a mid century manner. He's a disheveled Don Draper. The world is collapsing and all responses seem appropriate. The bearskin rug doubles as a bed. Bring it world!

JB: She's coming here, right?
John Boner's Aid (an tall attractive nondescript thirtysomething of indeterminate sexual orientation, but quite determinate gender) takes the glass and squeezes a lime into it and then gives it back to his boss.
JBA: Yes she called earlier. She has something she wants to tell you.
RANDOM FEMALE BUZZER VOICE: Michele Blackburn is here.
JB takes a long hurried drink and hands the glass back to his aid.
JB: Quick take this. Take the whole thing. The ice, everything! Put it all in the closet. Quick. You get in there too. Take notes. Can you record? Record it but make sure I hear it first. Use your phone.
JBA: Got it.
JBA retreats into the closet, wheeling a cart with a bucket of ice and some limes with him. He closes the door from the inside.
JB looks at himself in the mirror. He likes what he sees. He takes a moment, runs his fingers through his hair and then straightens his tie. He struts over to the door.
JB: Michele! So good to see you.
Michele Blackburn (MB): John! Excellent!
Michele Blackburn, an extremely tall woman with excellent bone structure enters the room.
She grabs him, and air kisses near both cheeks, flashing a winning smile.
JB: Please sit down.
He gestures to a late 20th century chair and sits down across the desk in his own "executive" model
JB: How can I help you Michele?
The edge in his voice comes through to us, only because we are deeply connected to Our Protagonist. Nobody else would have heard it.
MB: John, I've been receiving very important communications. From our Lord, and He is telling me that He doesn't have a direct line to you!
JB: Michele that's strange. I've been praying my heart out every day here. You can see where the bearskin rug's worn down!
MB: John, I hope you aren't telling me that I'm lying, or that the Lord is lying to me. Anyway, He tells me that you haven't received the communication about the debt ceiling. John, the important thing is that we can just take the money from Planned Parenthood instead of not paying back the Chinese. Did you know that 7 of my children are Chinese?
JB: Michele, gosh...
MB: Hold on John... Incoming. .. Lord? Yes, I'm here with him.... He's saying he talks to you daily... Ahhh I see, not true... You are thinking we should go public with this? I should tell America that John Boner doesn't pray?
JB: Michele - don't you think that's a little rash?
MB: Jesus? You want me to tell everyone that John Boner is an impostor?
JB: Oh Michele, really?
MB: God? OK - ummm I see... if John goes to meet with that heathen president I tell everyone he's murdering children in satanic rituals. If he explains to the American people that the debt ceiling doesn't matter and everything can get imported from China anyway then I don't say anything?
JB: Michele
MB: OH Well thank you God for your benevolent guidance.
MB: Well John, you heard the orders! Isn't God great! Pray with me one time
Michele reaches her hands across the desk. John grabs them with great gusto
MB: Dear heavenly Jesus give John Boner the strength he needs to fight the nazi socialists by letting the American people know that the debt ceiling is just an arbitrary liberal number. Help him summon your angels and saints by letting him know that if he doesn't abide by your heavenly will we will let the American people know that he is a godless atheist smoker whom Jesus hates. In Jesus' name.
Together: Amen
JB: Thanks so much Michele for coming! I really appreciate you taking your time out of your busy schedule to visit with little old me.
MB: Oh John, just remember! Let the American people know the truth of His holy word!
JB: Thanks so much Michele, can i get you anything?
MB: Do you have any of those k-cups. I just love those things! There's no mess! It's coffee in a little cup? You don't have a machine?
JB: Do you want some tonic water?
MB: Oh John you have to get one of those k-cup machines. You would just love it! I'll have my people send one over.

fantasies of an alternative life

As there are many different kinds of actual bath salts, there are many different kinds of 'bath salts'. They have many different effects.

It seems that the nytimes got its grubby mitts on some bath salts that resembled khat, molecularly. At Trending Vampire we have long wondered why khat doesn't exist in the west. We enjoy a good drool and we assume you do too. We have long envisioned ourself in the 16th century, hair cropped, drinking coffee out of teeny cups, riding horses... We wish we were chewing khat in Yemen right now.

just some ideas for your sunday evening.

1. Whenever I hear of anarchist infighting I shift the burden, and demand proof that it isn't COINTELPRO.

2. When I have writers block, instead of thinking, 'gee - I guess this means my life is going well!', I think, 'how can I make myself depressed and angsty?'

3. remember, when given two options always choose the larger room.

4. ??

Some AM Musings

Isn't the total exposure of ideas mixed with an obviously totalitarian state really confusing?

A government employee posted on facebook that Casey Anthony and OJ both deserve to die.

Everyone involved in cablegate is so interesting and modern compared to our actual leaders? Even adrian LAMO is a post modern villain with his MTF ex girlfriend; his clearly redacted newly released 'chat logs in their entirety' are hilarious. He says NOTHING throughout the exchange. His words are so obviously missing! BradAss just babbles away while our sexy enlightened villain twiddles his hipster mustache.

The people involved in the entire caper are so much more intriguing than poor Casey Anthony that we wish her death so that we can put the world back into a simpler place where bad is punished through lynchings. The leaks the sex scandals, the snitching the treachery its all really too much to bear!

While our children are the future our baby boomers are not. Our baby boomers have destroyed everything. They are the people in charge right now, and they are dying out, of natural causes! Why spend a bunch of money trying to prevent that?

j-bo

some weeks ago i was talking with some friends about Dear Leader and we decided to rewatch the inaugural address, and revisit why we thought leonard peltier wouldn't still be in jail today!

so we brought it up, but the most fascinating thing about the address was john bAner. Look at him hungover at twitching and high as a kite, right behind the president. we at trending vampire are no experts, but its really clear that he's on drugs amirite? we thought to ourselves. this dude is no villain, he's a drug addict! he needs some 12 steps, but he's actually too smart sensitive and traumatized by life to even believe in that shit. he's world weary - fuck he doesn't believe any of the shit he says, and he's crying because its all such bullshit.

its not wrong to find yourself not in the life you imagined. who doesn't? bAner's life though is so far from where it started, so confusingly depraved and empty that its like you are watching a john updike novel come to life.

anyway so that you don't get the wrong one without j-bo in it:

she'd been staring at her internet for approximately 60 hours. she was supposed to be packing. her things. her precious things were comingled with her unprecious things, causing tremendous anxiety.

i was supposed to have thrown much of this away by now. i had told myself this when i moved in. now i'm moving out. how did this happen to me? what is wrong with me?

she was absurdly pensive for a person listening to the 'hip hop bbq' station on pandora. her back ached from procrastination. no. thats not right! thats not what she does, and not who she is. is who she is the person with all this half assed shit badly packed in boxes? or is she the one with the stuff still left to pack? who are any of us really?

she bought some cigarettes for the process. winston's - her friend anna's brand. she missed her real friends because they weren't with her. nobody was. just this garbage! why does she have any of it?

does she even have friends?

who am i? a combination of who i am not? this isn't me. i'm can't be this nonexistent garbage that won't put itself into these boxes. everything is so dirty! how do i live like this? surrounding by cheap plastic trinkets.

how to float right out of this life that she's seemed to float right into somehow without realizing it. that she's a nomad is made all the more plain by the absolute proof that she is not.

I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE IN BERLIN

its not worth it! none of it is!

Act 2

John Boner (pronounced Boner): What ever you do do not open the curtains!!!
John Boner's Aid: Duh.
John Boner: God - ugh - i'm so fucked
JBA: No you're not [[looks over JB's head and sighs inaudibly]] You are a great man! Do you want me to light a cigarette for you? That always makes you feel better.
JB: No - i really need some of that mangosteen aloe juice. Could you order that for me? Pretty please! But DON'T LET ANYONE KNOW ITS FOR ME!!!
JBA: Sure. Do you want a cookie too?
JB: Yes!!! A cookie would be great.

~~They both sit on the floor on a huge bear skin rug in the middle of the office. John Boner's aid (who has no name) is rubbing John Boner's back ~~

JB: I have to throw Barry under the bus. I have to do it today. Oh god - he's like my only friend. WHY IS thiS HAPPENING TO ME!!!
JBA: There's nothing wrong you are just hung over.
JB: Really?
JBA: Yeah just do what you have to do. Everyone loves you. Everyone respects you.
JB: Are you sure? I mean I think that there might be something actually wrong...
JBA: No - its just the hangover talking. Seriously
JB: This doesn't even make sense. I mean he's going to cut the deficit by 4 Trillion and I'm supposed to say we don't want to do that? How is anyone even going to believe me.
JBA: Shhhhh - we can't worry about that part.
JB: Do you have a cigarette?
JBA: Right here...

~~ Both men pause, light cigarettes and start to smoke ~~
JB: I don't wnat to do this... I don't even get it. Why are we doing this?
JBA: Shhhhh its ok its going to be ok...

~~ JBA starts to pet JB's hair ~~

JB: I like the deal. I mean who cares if bazilionaires are taxed a bit more. Why do we have to care sooooo much?
JBA: It's just the way it is.
JB: It's just crazy! I mean what do they want for this country? What's the end result of these policies? Big fences, populace in slavery? People with tuberculosis coughing all over me?
JBA: Its ok John, er Representative Boner.
JB: Is it? Am I just hung over?... Barry's a nice guy. You know? He smokes reds!!! I just want everything to be nice, you know? Like just have a good country. I totally know global warming exists. This is all so fucked!

~~ Both men stare into nothing in the dark smokey office ~~

JB: Hold me.

Dear Netflix

We have been together so long. I'm so sorry to see you go. I'm the kind of person who streams a few movies a month, who maybe watches 2 dvds a month. I'm also a person with a high speed internet account. I've appreciated getting those little red packets in the mail for well over a decade.

Best of luck with all your endeavors,

TV

A clarification regarding the TrendingVampire Plan to save the Economy

Dear adoring public:

We are proposing that for a nominal fee, say $1000, Job Creators can 'vote' for our elected representatives. Job Creators, in their benevolence, may choose to give welfare queens sucking off the teats of socialism more incentive not to work by choosing to 'vote' multiple times.

Job Creators are just that kind.

- The TrendingVampire Staff

a totally fictional play i've been working on: act 1

-- a door opens to an oddly decorated dark smoke filled executive office. All the pens seem like pharmaceutical swag, but on closer inspection bear names like 'Camel' and 'Winston'. The furniture is all old wood, and there's a rainforest's worth of tropical animals adorning the walls. A blinking neon Marlboro sign hanging in the stained glass window--

john boner's aid: * cough * John, we are really getting down to the wire. *cough *

-- he waves his hand in front of his face to try to get some of the smoke away. he's a very stylishly dressed very handsome tall man - kind of like the vampire lestat when he was human. --

jb's aid: do you want me to open the window?

john boner (speaker of the house its pronounced boner - he's red eyed from his brutal hangover): yes if it will make you feel better. oh god. do you remember last night? everybody hates me, right? oh no. i think i might have told Labrador i didn't believe in this bullshit. i don't know what i believe. i think i'm dying. my skin feels like mold. do you still think i'm pretty?

-- john boner lies down on the flower and covers his face with his arms. --

john boner: nobody loves me

john boner's aid: everybody loves you mr. boner. you are just hungover. you didn't do anything wrong. everyone thinks you are hilarious. you are so funny when you drink! also that Rep Labrador - all he noticed was that you were even more hilarious than usual.

john boner: are you sure?

john boner's aid: of course i'm sure! i'm sure you behaved just perfectly

john boner: will you marry me in New York?

john boner's aid: hehehe your wife still loves you very much. i don't think going gay will help us rectify this situation.

john boner: can you get me some soup? some miso soup? but if anyone asks, say its yours?

john boner's aid: yeah i'll be right back.

john boner: no don't leave me!

john boner: just order it. i feel like i might have grabbed Nan's ass. do you think thats possible?

john boner's aid: no. you definitely didn't grab Rep Heyworth's ass.

john boner: ok. can i have a coke? and like some spaghetti too? just order it all and say its for you. order me some surprises, too. like a treat of some sort. whatever you think will make me feel better.

the trending vampire plan to save the economy

we have this like election coming up and we need to have a fundraiser of some sort, right?

what about instead of having people vote for free we charge them and then use the money to pay down the debt? you could buy as many votes as you want and then we'd have plenty of money, right?

Lestat's stinking organ

someone asked me why vampires were so heteronormative the other day.

Vampires aren't all hetero. That's why we here are so into Michele Bachmann (mibac) - she and her gay husband are all about the non-trad lifestyle.