A QUESTION

Do you think (honestly now) that Nosferatu was a desperado? In other words, was he, in your opinion, a desperado Nosferatu? A Nosperadu? A Desperfuta? A Desktop Futon? Is your desktop so grand that it can accomodate a futon? Are you so grandiose that you think your desktop merits a futon? Where you can nap for lunch or order in some Ferret Mouton? Would you say that Nosferatu, as he lounges on your desktop futon and eats your Ferret Mouton, is not so much a desperado as just a desperate Teuton? D'you toot on disparate flutes on just a swig of perrier and just one crunchy crouton? Please check 1 for Yes, 2 for Maybe.

THE INDICATOR

The other night when the temperature had dipped to some ungodly Arctic low (note: this morning my city was officially the coldest place on Earth. I am not making that up) and I had to walk back home from a friend's house, so I borrowed a pair of gloves that a previous visitor had left. They were a ratty paint-spattered pair of rough leather work gloves with the seam so split along the left index finger (ebil flindas!) that the tip of my finger protuded as if I were constantly pointing things out. I pointed out the inside of my pocket, the ice on the sidewalk, the cup of my ear canal, the life line on my left palm (uh-oh... that there helix means a stroke at 65, buddy).

I imagine that the original owner of these gloves was a left-handed man obsessed with indication. He would indicate cloud formations, logos on buildings, a new style of shoe aglet, the gills on a butterfly's thorax. He indicated the most important points on his end-of-year budget presentation and the perpetual sweat on the upper lip of his colleague in Accounting. It seemed to him and to all his buddies in the smoking lounge that he would be the best and most enduring indicator they had ever seen. But one day he paused to indicate a group of schoolgirls smoking in the Safeway parking lot and his index finger ripped through the tip of glove. Everybody froze. He laughed, shook off his gloves and let them fall to the snow. To his friends the gloves seemed like a carapace that the man had finally outgrown, and they were witness to a rare moulting. "Guess that'll teach me to indicate, huh?" He winked at his pals. They winked back (Tourette's, you see - tragic). Soon the incident faded from everyone's mind, and the awkward pauses in break lounge conversation died away. But that man never indicated anything again.

I realize how fanciful this sounds, so I asked around and found out that it was just as I had imagined; the man's name is Brent Skjaraben, a 35 year old claims adjuster for Abactinal Life Western Inc. He used to live out West but has recently moved to Toronto, where he lives with his new wife Norah, a baby girl on the way (Caitlin? Emily? They can't decide, and sometimes they argue, but never with rancor) and Sheb the 5 year old border collie. To date he has not indicated any of them. Well, I say that Brent Skjaraben is a brave man and a ticking time bomb waiting to explode.

TODAY'S ROBINOPTICON

Today's Robinopticon is actually a very special feature presentation because it's not really about the freaks who work there. It's about an ass on a billboard. I should probably just stop here and leave you to wonder about the mysterious ass and the mysterious billboard, but I just can't let these things drop, and so I have to worry these subjects like a dog worrying an ass. Oh yeah... you were probably wondering about the ass.

A few weeks ago The Wolf (a classic classic rock radio station) released its new advertising campaign, which is just one thing: a girl in white underwear dancing around in a cloth-covered room. That's it. You see her smile, you see her toss her hair, you see her little poky nipples through the tank top, you see her naked back, and at one point you actually see her smack her underwear-clad ass (to that Puddle of Mmudd ssonnnggg). It's a pretty silly and slightly irritating ad - the worst thing is her bland overbright smile, which transforms her from a just-washed groupie doing a sexy dance into a flight attendant whacked out on a cocktail of Rohypnol and Sudafed, stripped down and dancing in the departure lounge. The TV ads have been matched with a billboard campaign that shows pretty much just that ass in white Hanes.

However, since this is the God-fearing Prairies (not to be confused with the uptight West Coast, the stodgy Ontario, the insular Quebec or the conservative Maritimes), someone has finally decided to slap a gigantic CENSORED over each mechanically reproduced ass. The television spots now have a little bug in the bottom right hand corner announcing the 'censored version' of the ad, and Wolf logos waltz over the offensive bits for a clean viewing experience. I'm not sure whether this is a result of outside pressure or a piece of canny marketing, but ever since the iron boot of 'censorship' has kicked the Wolf's face in, the ad spots and billboards have exploded in number.

The billboard campaign, modest at first, is now intent on blanketing the city with this woman's ass. If I sit in Robin's Donuts facing North I can see two of those ass-radio billboards, and if my perspective were a bit more God-like I'd able to see another one nearby facing west. And I've realized something: there is no ass quite as interesting as one covered in a gigantic red block that screams CENSORED, especially when the block completely covers up the model's underwear as well, leaving only thighs and the small of the back leading into that obscured space. And for the curious, I've used the word 'ass' eleven times in this entry, which is a personal best for me.

WHICH REMINDS ME

I followed a link (probably from Fark) to a comprehensive listing of the top 100 porn videos of all time, since, as Mimi Smartypants (link below) has mentioned, reading reviews of porn is far more fun than actually watching the damn things (Hey Bob, do you think he's going to come in her face this time? Do you? 'Cause I've got a feeling about this episode of Rocco's Anal Adventures - this one's gonna be different), and I discovered a startling paradox. I don't particularly like porn videos, I don't rent or buy porn videos, and I don't think I've even seen one in at least four years - but I had seen a shocking number of the top 100 adult films of all time.

Latex, Taboo, Blue Movie, A Clockwork Orgy, Zazel - how is this possible? How could a man who doesn't watch porn have watched so much porn? It may be that I have some serious repressed memory issues, but I think the more likely explanation is that I have been blessed with pornographic luck. Whatever lusty busty blonde-and-brunette video I choose to slip into the VCR will be an example of the pinnacle of the pornographic arts. Which is a sad comment on the industry, since I've yet to see an adult video that doesn't like a cheap set hastily knocked together in some dude's Los Angeles backyard, with improbable-looking women moaning and snarling away, or nekkid women doing this dirty Playboy slo-mo dildo dance set to synthesizer. But then again, I don't watch porn, so I can only comment on the productions I've seen. Which appears to be a surprising number of them. At this rate, if I continue not to watch porn, I'll have seen the entire Top 100 by mid-May.

parode - exode