Seattle Raptor

I write from time-to-time for a new online satirical news source called The Seattle Raptor (think The Onion, only local).  Ya’ll should check it out at www.seattleraptor.com.  I write under the name RedChief, just like my blog.  Here’s an article I finished today…

Chateau Ste. Michelle Announces “High Impact” Wines

Press Release: 
Seattle Raptor 

Attention all wine connoisseurs.  Kick off your Alan-Edmonds and crank up the Tchaikovsky, there’s a new vintage in town!  Chateau Ste. Michelle winery (Woodinville, WA) is buzzed to announce the arrival of their new “High Impact” vintages.  After a decade of success with classic wines such as Chardonnay, Cabernet-Sauvignon and Pinot-Gris, the Chateau has decided to jump on the energy drink bandwagon by creating a totally new beverage experience. 

“Image what would happen if Red Bull and Carlo Rossi had a love child” announced Chateau Spokeswoman Tamera Wong.  “Well, let’s just say that in our wine cellars, old Carlo’s ‘been milking Bull for long-time’.” Wong poorly followed.

The wines, which will reserve the quality and taste of the Chateau’s classic vintages, will have the added kick of about two Rock Star drinks, as well as a shot of tequila.   The winery plans to release its first two High Impact wines in early September.  They will be respectively dubbed, “Shazzle Shabam Shiraz” and “Chateau from Hell, classic vintage No. 69”.

“We feel our customers will be delighted when they find they can enjoy the classic peach-apricot bouquet of our Cab-Sav, along with the added kick of a double shot of caffeinated tequila” said Wong.  “Imagine how much more fun a formal dinner at your bosses’ house will be.  Instead of monotonous chit-chat and tedious toasts, you’ll be swinging from his chandeliers, skinny dipping in the pool and knocking-up his daughter before you know it.”  

            The Chateau is so convinced their new product will a massive hit, that they have already begun sample production on several more High Impact wines, due for release around Christmas.  Though the winery is keeping the names of these vintages under tight lock and key, spokeswoman Wong did leave us with one little hint. “We’ll say this much:  Guys, once you give your date our new Gewürztraminer, she’ll be saying ‘Gev-me-yer-wiener’…every time.”

            The winery is also preparing for an onslaught of personal injury lawsuits. 

Hot tent, cool lake

Worst thing ever:  Waking up (with a hangover) in a hot tent.  It’s horribly bright, flies are busy noisily whacking themselves against the hot, transparent canvas, and the sweat on your body is like a warm layer of Karo Corn Syrup.  Everything is hot, everything is uncomfortable, and you used the last of your drinking water to douse your passed-out friend at 1AM (funny, but definitely not worth it).

Best thing ever:  Walking out of that tent and straight into a cold mountain lake.  You leave the tent, marching in a perfectly straight line over coolers, backpacks and burnt-out fires if needs be (in order to prove to any onlooking woodpeckers that you are a man on a mission).  You do not stop to dip a testing toe at the lake’s edge; no, you walk on into the chilling water as if you were on a flat sidewalk.  You keep marching until you feel your nipples harden: the sign it is time to fall face forward into the lake, as if you had just suffered a massive stroke.  A cool, dark silence envelops you, as your soul and body are instantly cleansed, and the Karo Corn Syrup sinks past you to the Lake’s rock-covered base.

Bad Marketing or Bad Audience?

I read this article from the “strange headlines” of my hometown paper today (http://www.helenair.com/articles/2006/07/21/ap/strange/d8iv1qbg0.txt).  It was about a Florida airline that came up with a game where you basically “dug” for Jimmy Hoffa’s body in a large field.  It was a simple marketing ploy, aimed at getting folks to check out their website, and maybe have a little fun while at it. 

Of course, people had to complain.  Apparently digging for Hoffa’s body just didn’t tickle the funny bones of several dozen Floridians, in fact, it pissed them off enough to make them actually take the time to complain to the airline in writing.  Even worse, an actual Marketing Professor at the U of Detroit Mercy (sounds more like a convent than a University) ragged on the airline’s poor marketing, saying it was “a bad bet” and furthering that the airline hadn’t done its homework.

This kind of stuff just gets to me.  It’s the classic case of a few too many conservative people making a stink about something that should be taken lightly, if taken any way at all.  Yes, I know Jimmy Hoffa was a real person, but if I’d been the most famous missing person for 31 years, I’d sure as hell hope someone was eventually brave enough to have a sense of humor about my mysterious disappearance. 

Why is it that people find it their business to scrutinize and change even the littlest things that offend them?  Did it make the world a better place?  Did it help end global warming, destroy a few nukes, or lower gas prices?  I’ll tell you one thing it did do: it forced an airline trying to have a little fun with it customers to change the name of their clever little marketing ploy from “The Hunt for Hoffa” to, get this…”Happy Sale.”  Wow.  God Bless America.

The 5th level of Hell – the Dentist

I’ve detested the Dentist like a mayonnaise sandwich since before I can remember.  I can actually remember measuring time, not by birthdays, seasons, or even school bells, but rather by trips to the Dentist.  In between trips to the evil scraper of teeth, bleeder of gums, Time always seemed to zip on by.  I’d plead for it to slow down, but it would only scream back as it faded into the past “sorry son, I’ve got to get you to your next tooth-drilling!” 

Then, one cheery spring day (as it always seemed to be), my mother would announce with false enthusiasm “oh look darling, you’ve gotten a reminder from Dr. Painreaper’s office,” holding up the dreaded postcard of a cartoon tooth with a big lying smile on its demonic face.  Before I knew it, Time had me plopped back into the Dentist’s chair; you know the one that actually feels quite comfortable and reclines like a champ, like something you’d have loved to watch cartoons in?  The chair that tries to make you forget the hellstorm over the ridge? Yeah, well that chair never fooled me; I was always sure to wipe a booger underneath it as a nice little ‘fuck you’ to the bastard chair.

And THAT’Swhen Time would finally decide it was going to take a break from rocket speed. Suddenly, while strapped to the chair, the second hand on the Mickey Mouse clock would begin to slow down, until I could take five full breaths between a single second hand stroke.  For some reason, that was usually the point at which I started to faint, and as I faded into what I thought was surely my demise, I could hear Dr. Painreaper shout to Nurse Bloodwrench, “quick Bloodwrench, grab the syringe, no the BIGGG one, we’re looooooosing himmmmm!”

With all this in mind, it’s no wonder I hadn’t been back to the Dentist in years.  I really don’t know why on Earth I though it would be a good idea, other than the fact that I got this shinny little insurance card that declared my trip to Hell would be free!  For some reason, after college, everything that has “free” in front of it, automatically sounds divine.

So being a big boy out in the world on my own, I decided to do the responsible thing, or maybe it was just the free thing, it doesn’t matter, the point is somehow the thought popped into my head ”Why don’t I go have my teeth cleaned? That sounds like a great idea!”  And mere moments later (thanks again to Time) I found myself strapped to a wonderful reclining chair, which by the way, I’d pay good money to watch a game from at a Sports Bar. 

I was sure my memories of old were simply the result of the time I secretly watched “Demon Dentist VII”, or the fact that I took terrible care of my teeth as a youngster; thus lot’s of painful drilling at the Dentists.  But oh how very much I was mistaken.  The second I saw that silver clawed tool making it’s crafty little way towards my unsuspecting teeth, I knew I had made a frightful mistake.

Ah! The grinding! The scraping! The poking and prodding of innocent gums! The icy-cold sprayer, and its dreadful mate, the deafening vacuum tube, which tries to suck out your soul! I swear I spent three weeks in that chair this morning!  And now here I sit with gums a’pounding and the sounds of sinister scraping stuck in my ears.  Well at least I left a booger on that chair…the bastard.

Excuses

Excuses are so much fun to come up with, mostly because if it’s a good excuse, no one knows it’s just an excuse.  So I opened this blog up last Friday and began to write out the story I told in Copywriting class on Thursday (poopball, which unfortunately became my name), but the story kind of took control of itself, as good stories will tend to do.  So now it’s Wednesday, my story is pushing 1500 words, and there’s no way in hell I’ll be satisfied with it enough to post it anytime soon.  I wonder if anyone will buy that excuse?