Recently I was able to sit down and talk to the leader of the world, he has successfully ruled Earth for the past 27 years now and his generosity knows no limits. I am of course referring to our most hallowed leader, General Zod.

(This has been transcribed from a recording of our conversation.)

Me: Good evening General.

Zod: Impudent fool! How dare you address me first. I should have you destroyed for your insolence.

Me: A thousand apologies, General. My manners failed me because I was overwhelmed by your magnificence.

Zod: I will allow you to live, if only to send my message to my subjects on Planet Houston.

Me: I hate to correct you sir, but the planet we live on is called Earth.

Zod: This is my planet, I control it, I possess it, I shall call it what I will.

Me: As you wish General.

Zod: (Noticing my California Angels of Anaheim from the city of Los Angeles and also the county of Orange USA, North America, Earth, 92800 Western Time Zone T-shirt) I see you are practiced in worshipping things that fly, good.

Me: Yes General. Worshipping things that fly has become very popular since you arrived. Which reminds me, you came with two companions, where are they today?

Zod: Non and Ursa are on a date. Ursa has a weakness for the strong silent type apparently. They will be getting their own apartment together soon which will be good because I cannot stand to hear them making love. Few things on this wretched planet cause more discomfort to my ears than hearing Non climax.

Me: Does that mean that our General is lonely?

Zod: Why do you say such things when you know I will kill you for it? To answer your question hardly! I am the ruler of Planet Houston; I am a virile leader who would make a fine companion for any of your females. As a matter of fact I was going to ask someone out this week.

Me: Sounds like love is in the air, may I ask who?

Zod: One of your actresses, she will succumb to my wily charms and by dawn's early light she will "subjugate" herself before me.

Me: But you aren't going to let the cat out of the bag as to who it is?

Zod: If you must have an answer to your prying questions it is Jessica Biel. I want Jessica Biel before Zod.

Me: That reminds me, you are known for your penchant for making people kneel before you. It's been years since we've heard you say it though; will you grace us with a shouting of your most famous command?

Zod: I am not a catchphrase. I am your ruler, as such I will be treated with dignity and respect, all will pay tribute to me, General Zod.

Me: It's been twenty seven years since your generous protection started, is there anything about planet Earth, I mean Houston that you like?

Zod: I must admit I find this game you play called baseball intriguing. You hit a leather covered sphere with a stick. I came upon some children who were playing this game and they asked me to join them. I decided to enrich their pitiful lives with my presence and I decided to hurl the sphere toward the child with the stick.

Me: How did you do?

Zod: I did not appreciate the child standing so close to the rubber pentagon. I took this as an act of defiance so I threw the sphere at the child's helmet to show him that I, General Zod, possessed the very rubber pentagon that he was trying to stand close to. They never found the child's head but a lesson was taught to all the other children, DO NOT CROWD THE PLATE WHILE ZOD IS ON THE MOUND!

Me: It sounds like you have one hell of an arm General. Did you get to hit at all?

Zod: Indeed. After having the other children remove their fallen comrade from my vision I decided to take the stick and strike the sphere. As I understood it to hit the sphere over the wall would result in a "home run" which would score a point for my, General Zod's, team. I had another child throw the sphere at me so that I could swing the stick.

Me: Did you make contact?

Zod: The stick broke when I hit the sphere which caused the sphere to not achieve the desired lift I required. Instead the sphere shot back at the child who threw it at me and hit him square in the chest. The child and the sphere rocketed backwards through the fence and into the next county. The other children tried explaining to me that that would have to be ruled a "double" which does not score any points. I decided to rule that hitting the child through the fence would result in double points, thereby giving me the victory. As a reward I claimed all the children's property as well as their parents. I had all of it destroyed because I did not feel like carrying it back to my residence.

Me: A fitting tribute to your epic victory. Is there anything you dislike about Planet Houston?

Zod: There is much I dislike but a constant thorn in my side remains the actor Nicholas Cage who named his offspring Kal-el. Kal-el was your Superman's Kryptonian birth name before I destroyed him. What's more interesting though is that if the child is named Kal-el then the child's father is Jor-el, my jailer. Using the transitive property I can only deduce that this Nicholas Cage is Jor-el and I will have me revenge. DO YOU HEAR ME NICHOLAS CAGE? I DEFY YOU! COME TO ME AND SUBJUGATE YOURSELF BEFORE ZOD!

Me: (To myself) Dammit! Almost got him.

Zod: You were saying, slave?

Me: I said I hope you get him.

Zod: It is merely a matter of time before he dies by my hand. My satisfaction will be immense.

Me: General Zod, while you are known for your fantastic strength and awesome powers, you also possess an incredible intellect, would you care to display some of your cerebral talents.

Zod: What did you have in mind?
Me: I was going to do a word association game with you. I will show you pictures and you will tell me what you see before you.

(I hold up a picture of an eel)

Zod: Eel before Zod

(I hold up a picture of gravy that has been sitting for a couple of hours)

Zod: Gravy before Zod

Me: What is that gravy doing?

Zod: It congeals before Zod.

Me: What is your favorite Tv show?

Zod: Deal or No Deal before Zod

Me: And your favorite prison

Zod: The Bastille before Zod

Me: And your favorite band?

Zod: Motley Crue before Zod.

Me: But who is their lead singer?

Zod: Vince NEIL BEFORE ZOD. I WILL PUNISH YOU SLAVE FOR THIS ACT OF DEFIANCE! COME TO ME SON OF BOB SCHAFFER! KNEEL BEFORE ZOD!

The tape cuts out.

I woke up two weeks later in a hospital in Kuala Lumpur with severe eye laser burns on over 60 percent of my body but I got better.

Remember back in school when the teachers would hand you those stacks of papers with words on them which were bound between two covers and every now and then you would have to write a report about them except that you almost never got to pick which stack you wanted to write about so you had to write stupid words on a stupid paper about some stupid broad's glass animals or some bullshit like that and it made you hate those pieces of paper with words on them? Well get this, I just found out like last week that they make Star Wars versions of those things so I bought a couple and I have been reading them at work when I work my doubles.

So I'm working a double shift and I'm trying to mind my own business and I'm reading a Star Wars Book (Tales of the Bounty Hunter for those of you keeping track at home), and a doctor walks by and sees me reading my most excellent Star Wars book and says "Star Wars? Come on, real mature." Then she gives me this look like she is better than me. FUCK OFF! I Can read a fucking Star Wars book if I want. At least I'm fucking reading instead of doing drugs or surfing the internet or watching tv or something like that. My books aren't good enough for her? She can eat me.

What kind of book am I supposed to read? The one with the stupid guy who tries catching the stupid whale? Fuck that book. I read it. It was long and boring and pointless because at the end of the book HE DOESN'T EVEN CATCH THE FISH! He spends the entire book trying to catch the fish. What's the point of writing a book about going after a white fish if you don't get the fish? If I wanna hear stories about not catching fish I'll listen to my Grandpas tell some stories about not catching fish. They're both dead and they probably spin a better yarn than whoever the shit it was that wrote that stupid book. Besides I know a movie about a guy who got part of him bitten off by an animal and then he hunted it. It was called Happy Gilmore and it was excellent and in the end Apollo Creed and alligator became friends. Now that's closure

What about that retarded book where some backwards ass country fuck kid tricks somebody into painting a fence? Whoopty shit. You fooled someone into painting a fence. Here is the prize for best book ever. That is so stupid. My books have people fooling other people into doing shit for them too. It's called the Jedi mind trick except that the jedis don't trick people into doing menial chores because JEDIS HAVE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS TO DO THAN PAINT A FENCE! "But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east and Juliet is the sun." What the hell does that mean? Some fucking kid is prancing around like a ninny trying to get laid and this is the greatest play ever written? I have two words for you Shakespeareophiles out there......Light Sabers. Whenever I read Shakespeare I hear some droll English twat voice in my head rambling on about whatever. BORING! When I read Star Wars I hear this...


>I thought I could do Frankenstein. It's a book about somebody who cuts up dead bodies and stitches them back together for fun. I could get behind that kind of book. Except that some pseudo intellectual asshole will see me reading it say something like "It's a power metaphor about man playing God." FUCK OFF! If they saw me reading Jurassic Park they wouldn't say shit about it. They would probably scoff at me from a distance while they sip cappucino and have a pencil thin mustache. They can get bent. I thought man was playing God when he brought back dinosaurs and last time I checked a Tyrannosaurus Rex is big enough to eat Frankenstein so who wins now you elitist fuck?

I guess the moral of the story is don't read anything ever or else some doctor is going to make fun of you and then you get pissed off and write a blog about it.

Love, Schaffer

• Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1983) Atari 2600, Intellivision ..:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
• Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1985) Arcade
• Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1992) (Platform) NES

·         Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1993) SNES

• Star Wars: Rebel Assault (1993) Windows, Mac, Sega CD, 3DO

• Star Wars: Rogue Squadron (1998) Windows, Nintendo 64
• Star Wars Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader (2001) GameCube
• Star Wars Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike (2003) GameCube

• [Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds (2001) Windows, Mac
• Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds: Clone Campaigns (2002) Windows, Mac

• Star Wars: Battlefront (2004) PlayStation 2, Windows, Xbox,Mac
• Star Wars: Battlefront II (2005) PlayStation 2, Windows, Xbox, PlayStation Portable
• Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron (2007) PlayStation Portable wii

• Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy (2006) Windows, PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, Xbox, Xbox 360, GameCube, Nintendo DS, Game Boy Advance
• Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga (2007) PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo DS, Wii

• Star Wars: Empire at War (2006) Windows, Mac OS X
• Star Wars: Empire at War: Forces of Corruption (expansion) (2006) Windows

• Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire (1996) (TPS) Nintendo 64, Windows - set between episodes V & VI  
• Star Wars: Rebellion (1998) (RTS) Windows - set during the time of episodes IV through VI
•  
• Star Wars Trilogy Arcade (1998)
• [Star Wars Arcade (1994) Sega 32X

The Preceding is a list of all the video games in the Star Wars universe that contain the battle of Hoth as a playable level. THAT'S 19 TIMES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Does that not seem a little ridiculous to anyone else? No wonder George Lucas is like a kajillionaire. We as Star Wars fans have bought games that contain a battle of Hoth level 19 times. This isn't like a Final Fantasy or Legend of Zelda situation where you know that in the course of the game you will be going through a fire temple and you will have to use fire to melt stuff and progress through the level because they constantly update the puzzles and force you, with each new game, to rethink what you know about fire temples and how to get through them. In those games you must unlearn what you have learned to experience what is a pretty standard video game cliché in increasingly fresh and new ways.

The battle of Hoth however is always the same thing, hop in your snow speeder and trip the walkers. There aren't any innovative ways to do that because you always have to use your tow cable to trip the walkers. "That armor's too strong for blasters!" is always your clue to do this. Yet we as a gaming community have allowed this to go on for 19 games and sometimes more than one level per game. The Empire Strikes Back for the Atari 2600 is one long neverending battle of Hoth.

            Not to mention when you look at the very best games that the Star Wars franchise has to offer namely "X-Wing", "TIE Fighter", "Knights of the Old Republic", and "Lego Star Wars", the battle of Hoth is nowhere to be seen. The battle of Hoth is to Star Wars video games as Dan Marino was to the Miami Dolphins.

            I move that George Lucas owes us a brand new kick-ass Star Wars game free of charge as an acknowledgement that he is trying to make ammends for gypping us out of the equivalent of 2 or possibly 3 other games. Why doesn't he do one based on the "Heir to the Empire" trilogy. That's a legit source of material and I know of a lot of Star Wars fans would be pumped to see that seeing as there is virtually zero chance of it getting made as movies. Why don't you let us play a game as Darth Vader that's not "Masters of Teras Karsi" which is the "Rocky V" of Star Wars games. You'll make a mediocre game about Boba Fett's dad but not one featuring the Fett himself? Or Ig-88? Have these ideas not made it to the Lucasarts offices? Don't let George Lucas trick you into buying another game without all new material!

Love, Schaffer

I'm back baby! Nearly a year after my last and most glorious The _____  of suicide blog, I have returned with a vegeance. Now you are probably thinking that is stemming from my car dying, and indirectly you would be right, but feast your eyes upon this ridiculous tale of want and woe.

Having spent my Saturday morning perusing used car sections, Craig's list, and making phone calls in an effort to find a new car, I saw that it was 1:45 and I needed to get ready for work because I worked at 3. I got dressed and my Mom was gracious enough to let me use her minivan to get to work. I went to get on I-75 at West road. It was closed due to construction. I knew that the Telegraph and Sibley road on ramps were under construction, so I decided to head to the next closest on ramp at Eureka road. It took 20 minutes to get from Dix and Pennsylvania to the Eureka road on ramp only to find that on ramp closed as well. I held my breath and realized that the next available on ramp was at Northline, deep in the heart of Southgate.

Northline, by the freeway, was backed up in both directions for a ridiculous distance. Realizing that it would be some time before I could turn left due to a no turn on red sign, I pulled into the gas station by the 24 hour Mcdonalds to turn around so that I could go back to Allen to go up to Goddard, back to Dix and then onto the freeway. Big mistake.

A cop saw me turn around and pulled me over instead of all the other people who turned around for making an illegal turn, whatever that means. He approached the car and as I looked up to greet him I stared into the face of the same God damned cop who arrested me for my DUI. In my head I screamed "Newman!". He asked me for my license, registration, and insurance. I only had the license because I had my Mom's car and apprently she keeps her registration and insurance in her purse. He went back to the patrol car and wrote me tickets for an illegal turn, and having no proof of insurance and registration. Before he left, he congratulated me on successfully completing my probation. Fucking cockmaster.

I finally get on the freeway at Dix and rush to work. When I get off the lodge at the Warren/Forest exit I find that I can't get through because my archnemesis of street fairs is going on, The Dally in the Alley. (For those of you who don't know, I hate the Dally in the Alley. A couple years ago when I lived down there, I got off work and couldn't park anywhere near where I lived because of all the people who were down there for the Dally. I refused to go the next year and Karl and Clark were not happy with me. I don't think they understand how much I hate being inconvenienced by a bunch of hippies who make me walk like 12 blocks from where I parked to my apartment so that they can dance in the street and by bongs from a street vendor, ditch that bullshit!) Long story short it took me 15 minutes to get from the exit to work, this is four blocks.

I get to work 25 minutes late and the nursing supervisor had been called and writes me up for being late. This is my first write up in 18 months. Fuck everything!

Love, Schaffer

P.s. Seriously.

Bessie was born in Flint, Michigan on august 30, 1992. She came into this world at 2 tons 6 ounces. Bessie's mother had smoked during assembly so Bessie was born slightly underweight. Bessie's mother could not afford to keep her and all of the other Buick Lesabres she had given birth to so she gave her up for adoption at the Zubor Buick orphanarium. Due to her small stature Bessie was teased mercilessly, but it was in the teasing that Bessie would develop her trademark bulldog skin and her resiliency. It was a sunny day in October 1992 when Joyce Derian went to the Zubor orphanarium to adopt herself a car, in spite of her being the runt of the litter or perhaps because of it, Joyce, a known runt herself, adopted Bessie.

For the first time in her life Bessie had a family. She had an owner who loved her and there were three grandchildren for her to play with Chip, Rebekah, and Schaffer. Schaffer especially loved Bessie because she had enough leg room for him even when he had to sit in the seat behind the driver. Bessie had grown up into a Land Yacht as she was called lovingly. For 12 glorious years Bessie lived the life that every young car dreams about. In 2004 Bessie's owner had decided that she was to old to take care of Bessie and needed a newer and younger model, Bessie then fell into possession of Joyce's favorite grandchild, Schaffer.

Schaffer loved Bessie. "She's like a couch on wheels!" He would exclaim as he proudly drove her through the streets of East Lansing. In May of 2004 Bessie would rise to the occasion after a terrible lightning strike destroyed Clark's car and he had no way to get to work until it was fixed. Bessie gladly volunteered her services because Clark was one of Schaffer's few friends who had not thrown up on her. Bessie felt a sense of pride carting Clark around back and forth between Jimmy John deliveries and asked nothing for herself, but only a sub a day for her beloved owner.

Tragedy struck in 2005 when Bessie was on her way back from Canada. Bessie was brutally attacked by a semi truck on the Ambassador Bridge. She bravely threw herself between Schaffer and the semi, saving his life but having her bumper, and mirror half ripped off as well as damaging her front driver side fender. Bessie had begun to show signs of aging before this but this was the first time that she really looked her age. Bessie knew that while she would never be what she once was she still had a purpose and dutifully carried her owner from point A to point B until today, Spetember 7, 2007. Leaking brake fluid and rusting from the inside she passed away peacefully. She is in a better place now.

In loving memory of Bessie 1992-2007

Bessie is survived by her owner and her cousins the Lucerne, Lacrosse, Rendezvous, Rainier, Terazza, and Enclave.

I like to think that Bessie is now driving in car heaven with car Jesus who, as I have previously said, can turn water into oil.

Here is a list of cars that Bessie is driving around with in car heaven.

1 .James Bond's car from Goldfinger

2. One of the General Lee's

3. Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

4. The Popemobile

Here is a list of cars that Bessie is not driving around with because they are in car Hell.

1. That car that Charlie Sheen drove in "The Wraith"

2. Dr. Claw's car

3. Christine

4. Hitler's car

I miss her already

Love, Schaffer

I find it deeply troubling that so many of my generation are feeling the need to settle down, get married, and procreate. I'm not playing a mope card here; I don't want to be married anytime soon, I'm certainly not ready to have children, I kinda wasted the first half of my 20's but isn't that the point? Why are all of these people in a rush to have children and be married, especially when I have vivid memories of some of them throwing up in Christy Arnold's pool? Did I miss something? Did everyone else get a memo? Am I wrong in thinking that none of us should have children? What are we going to tell our kids when they ask about our formative years? If I were to ever have children, I don't think I'd feel comfortable telling them anything that I did between the ages of 11 and maybe 32. Do the math, that's 21 years of my life that I can't talk to my kids about, lest they say "Daddy drank a shot of jaegermeister while it was on fire. I can too." (True story, it burned.) Take most of my friends, for instance. I don't believe they should have any kids because of all the stupid shit we used to do. "Let's do drugs, drink beer, and see what kind of randomness we can have sex with", was a common answer to the question "What are we going to do tonight?" I'm talking like a Tuesday night. It's a miracle none of my friends have died; it's a miracle I haven't died. It's like survival of the most retarded. Why are people voluntarily packing all this responsibility onto their shoulders? It's not like Prince Lotor and Hagar, on King Zarkon's orders, are sending robeasts to earth that need destroying, forcing humanity to build Voltron. They're all like "I'm over 25. Better have a kid about it." I don't get it.

           What about my brother? I can remember a time, not too long ago, when he was content to sit in his own shit. He wasn't potty trained at the time, but that's beside the point. No one who hasn't had control of their crapulence for their entire lives should be able to reproduce. Before you ask, I believe my mother was born fully potty trained, with the ability to talk, balance a checkbook, cook, and the ability to spot individual specks of dust and then clean them up. She never drank a beer or did drugs, and the only man she has ever known is my father, and even then they only did it thrice, and she still felt guilty about it. My mother knows the shame of joy and the joy of shame. She is a saint.

        What kind of world are we raising our kids in? I know every generation says "Kids today have it so easy." But they really do. Fuck these kids and their sense of entitlement to everything. I earned my shit, I wasn't coddled. There are kids out there that have blackberries because they "need" them. I don't even have a flat screen television. I blame it all on playscapes. When I was younger playscapes weren't colorful with plastic slides and rounded corners. Playscapes were dangerous, you could get hurt. The playscapes of my day were black and silver colored steel monstrosities that got so hot in the summer that they would burn you to touch them. You never played on one barefoot. There were no woodchips or weird padding underneath the playscape, only cement, if you were lucky your playscape was built on top of asphalt. There were no rounded corners, if you fell into it you got hurt, you at least drew blood and if you were really cool, you got stitches. It drives me nuts to see children riding their bikes in what I can only describe as full suits of armor. What happened to getting hurt? Children don't get hurt, they don't experience pain and when you are a child, pain = consequences. They aren't even allowed to play dodgeball for fear that it makes a child feel :( Healthy competition isn't encouraged, and mediocrity is the result. It was said best in "The Incredibles". "When everyone is special, no one is." Not to mention that listening to The Black Eyed Peas and Fall Out Boy is not punishable by death. I weep for the future.

Love, Schaffer

P.s. If my loins ever bear fruit I hope it's a retard so they can go through life as a happy idiot.

Plane grounded by swarm of bees
Fri May 25, 9:17 AM ET
LONDON (Reuters) - A passenger plane was forced to
land after flying into a swarm of bees, leaving
hundreds of holidaymakers stranded.
The Palmair Boeing 737 had to return to Bournemouth
Airport, Dorset, shortly after take-off at 8:10 a.m.
on Thursday following an engine surge.
The pilot decided to abort the flight to Faro in
Portugal and returned for safety checks.
The plane's engine was thought to have become clogged
with bees, which may have caused possible damage to a
fan, the company said on Friday.
Huge clouds of bees have been seen around Bournemouth
during the past few days, a spokeswoman added.
About 90 passengers were on board, with a further 106
waiting in the Algarve for the return flight.
A replacement plane finally left at 7:15 p.m. -- about
11 hours later.
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Go ahead, make fun of me for my fear of flying and for
running away screaming like a little girl whenever
there's a bee near me but this article proves that I
am right, except now things are much worse than I
previously thought. I don't know what's emboldened
these "sandabeestas", but now they're flying around in
huge clouds in international airspace preying on
commuter airplanes with little or no regard for
international law. I move that we treat the bee
community as a rogue nation and immediately sanction
some very harsh sanctions toward them. We must show
the Queen Bee, Bea Arthur, that we will not be
intimidated by her flock and that bees should know
their place, as a shitty plot device in X-files
movies.

Love, Schaffer

P.s. Wait a second, the bees made suicide attacks
against an international flight. Where have I seen
this before? Oh my God. These bees are terrorists.
I'll bet they have been trained at specialized bee
terror training camps in Afghanistan. I'll bet Bin Laden personally handpicked the bees for the mission. The FAA really needs to ban flowers on all
flights as well as honey, and we as Americans should
refer to "Honeycomb" cereal as "Freedomcomb" cereal.

P.s.s. Bees make honey, what eats honey? Dear sweet Lord Jesus, bears. So now the terrorists, using their honey connections, can put pressure on the bear community to attack civillians. What are we supposed to do? Ally ourselves with salmon? We are in trouble.

P.s.s.s. Now I know some of you are thinking "Schaffer this is ridiculous. How do you train thousands of bees to attack an airplane?" You don't need to train all the bees, just one, the queen. All the other bees will fall in line.

P.s.s.s.s. I wonder if we could use Jumpin Jim Brunzel and B. Brian Blair as double agents.