Don Hall 3/31/22 Don Hall 3/31/22

American Jobs—Cleaning Up Bars on a Graveyard Shift

It felt like I was living two lives. Each day surrounded by hopeful, enthusiastic, and highly dramatic college students. Lots of chatter, lots of noise. Each night it was as if I had transported to a movie about the dystopian end of mankind.

Don Hall 3/28/22 Don Hall 3/28/22

I Believe... [Bullies Always Gotta Punch the Little Guy]

I believe... that Chris Rock was the victim of assault and still held his poise. Will Smith was the much bigger kid hitting the class clown for making fun of his wife like any other garden variety bully. And the room gave him a standing ovation for it like the cheerleaders after the high school quarterback punches out the drama kid.

Don Hall 3/24/22 Don Hall 3/24/22

American Jobs | Waiting Tables for the Son of Satan

"So what's the worst customer story you have?" I asked.

Don Hall 3/21/22 Don Hall 3/21/22

I Believe... [Cartman as Greek Prophecy]

...that South Park turned out to be the funny Cassandra prophesying our fate.

Don Hall 3/17/22 Don Hall 3/17/22

I Like to Watch | Nostalgia Porn

As a GenXer, I've started to notice what can only be called Nostalgia Porn as it is the practice of taking cherished memories of movies and recreating them with the same actors playing the same roles with a fresher coat of technological paint.

Don Hall 3/15/22 Don Hall 3/15/22

Excerpt: My Kind of Corporal Punishment

The following is an excerpt from the book "Strippers, Guns, and The Holocaust Museum: OR: How I Survived My Time as a Chicago Public School Music Teacher"

Don Hall 3/14/22 Don Hall 3/14/22

I Believe... [Public Education, My Ass]

I believe... that you either give teachers appropriate compensation or authority in the classroom. One or the other. Take away both and you get completely unqualified babysitters searching on their phones while your kids become a modern version of the boys in Lord of the Flies but with TikTok.

Don Hall 3/13/22 Don Hall 3/13/22

Things Discovered Upon Quitting That Cushy Gig

The easy road is to accept that age is a prison. You become obsolete over time. Just resign yourself to that obsolescence and retire to a corner, whittling stick figures and rocking in that chair. I've never been one to take the easy path and I'm starting now.

Don Hall 3/9/22 Don Hall 3/9/22

You Don't Mess Around with Jim (after COVID and he has a gun now)

And you don't take a completely irrational population, after spending a few years in lockdown in fear of an invisible virus and prone to yelling at each other for either wearing or not wearing a cloth mask in a Sbarro, and give them unfettered access to the largest arsenal of personal weapons in history. It's just dumb. It's dangerous. It's catastrophic.

Don Hall 3/7/22 Don Hall 3/7/22

I Believe... [Rushin' Cancellations]

...that cancelling Russian food, Russian television show, Russian dressing, rushin’ around in traffic is a sign that Americans are a bit too dense to enter any European wars anytime soon.

Don Hall 3/2/22 Don Hall 3/2/22

Seven Things Learned from Taylor Sheridan's '1883'

1883 is the tale of the Dutton ancestors traveling along the Oregon Trail (just like the early video game most of us GenXers played on ancient home computers) on the way to Montana to settle the Yellowstone/Dutton ranch. Featuring Sam Elliot, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, and Isabel May, I gained an appreciation for Sheridan's work (he is the sole writer of every episode) and just finished it last night.

Don Hall 3/1/22 Don Hall 3/1/22

[From the Archives] America is Not the Amityville Horror or Poltergeist House

The house that is the United States, if it were an actual house, has plenty of flakey hemoglobin on the grounds.

Don Hall 2/28/22 Don Hall 2/28/22

I Believe... [Taiwanese Anxiety Disorder]

I believe... that the most nervous government on the globe right now is Taiwan.

Don Hall 2/21/22 Don Hall 2/21/22

I Believe... [Nevada—Dumb But Fun]

...that Nevada has a worse record in education than Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi which supports the conclusion that only the dumbest people gamble on the regular. We do have lots of booze and exposed boobs, so there’s a plus side, right?

Don Hall 2/20/22 Don Hall 2/20/22

I Like to Watch | Inventing Anna (2022)

Why did any of these people believe in her bullshit?

Because she didn't care if you liked her. Unlike everyone else among our affirmation-addicted bunch of apes, the Anna Delvey of Shondaland didn't give two shits what you thought of her or even if you bought her bullshit.

Don Hall 2/15/22 Don Hall 2/15/22

When the World is On Fire, Who Can Laugh About Anything?

What I miss most is the opportunity to just throw down and fucking laugh like an idiot about, well, anything.

Thank god for Jackass. I appreciate the not-so-gentle reminder.

Don Hall 2/14/22 Don Hall 2/14/22

I Believe... [Legitimate Political Discourse, My Ass]

...that justifying disruptive protests, riots, and looting as ‘legitimate political discourse’ cuts both ways and is horseshit regardless of which side claims it.

Don Hall 2/12/22 Don Hall 2/12/22

If Trust Builds a Society, the Absence of Trust Destroys It

I’m an optimist at heart. I also believe without finding a way to trust a few more people today and a few more tomorrow, to openly seek out those we feel we can trust, we’re fucked as a nation.

Don Hall 2/8/22 Don Hall 2/8/22

I Like to Watch | Magnolia (1999)

When I went to see Magnolia I discovered a film that captured this concept more clearly, more beautifully, than I could have ever conceived of myself. I was transcendent.

Don Hall 2/7/22 Don Hall 2/7/22

I Believe... [Not Nihilism. Clarity]

I believe... that, at half a century plus, one starts to see how much of the world’s issues are bullshit. This is not nihilism. It’s clarity.