Yet More Things I Want to Do When I Grow Up

Imagine the curse of writing for Mr. Destructo: doomed not only to set perilously high expectations but constantly to exceed them. Such is the case with our annual event, "Things I Want to Do When I Grow Up," a litany of challenges posed to ourselves and handily dispatched by the following year.

Consider an iron resolve that can only hesitate at obstacles devised by its own will. That previous sentence describes Volkesgeistes so formidable that all the terms in it would be terrifying if they were in German. Ours is a spirit that climbs Mt. Everest not "because it is there," but "because we thought of Mt. Everest."

You're welcome.

Again, as with last year, 2012's edition involves a collaborative effort from many of our writers. General Ze'evi handled our graphics, while Mark H. and Cory H. (no relation) pitched in with fresh ideas. MLB postseason fixture JShap joins us for the first time. Mark Brendle was killed in a catastrophic bridesmaid accident.

May your 2012 be prosperous, and may your January have been horrible.

Even More Things I Want to Do When I Grow Up

We here at Et tu, Mr. Destructo? have but one aim every year: to pioneer new strategies and set new benchmarks in being awesome, by employing new rad dynamics. At the beginning of each year, we establish standards for our comportment and limits on the human body's ability to always be totally crushing it, and each year we surpass them.

In 2009, we smoked myrrh with Lil John and righted the centuries of wrongs created by grave-robbing by grave-donating. (The secret: little paper coffins handed out to trick-or-treaters, who then asked for coins. Thanks, kids!) In 2010, we reenacted Fox in Socks with a rescued and diseased animal, took Brittany Murphy's death virginity and created MILF day.

Indeed, if a shortcoming can be found in our ambitions for ourselves and for Mr. Destructo as a journalistic organ, it is that we may be running out of potential goals due to the shortcomings of the physical universe. May that time never come. May we press on today. May you join us or die. Can you do any less?

Even More Things I Want to Do When I Grow Up:
I'm gonna tell everybody you drink Dr. Thunder.

I want to make all steampunk clothing accessories suddenly viable working machinery. I don't care how many people are scalded with burning oil and dropped to the ground by hundreds of pounds of metal.

I want to sneak into an elementary school and hide notes in every lunch bag that read, "Your father and I are getting divorced."

Pimping in Brief: Cormac McCarthy Goes to a Birthday Party

I've never really subscribed to the idea that blog entries should be about single-paragraph thoughts. It goes against my desires as a reader. When I read someone else's blog, I want something I can sit down and sip a beer through, have a cup of coffee with, see that I've got 10 minutes to kill and can fill them by diving into this text. I accept that I won't get that most of the time, but that's my ideal experience.

That's why I try to post longer entries. This isn't to say that I think of something to write and then wrack my brain finding filler to make it wind up the requisite length. I might indulge in a needless but amusing footnote for the hell of it, but it owes nothing to meeting an assigned word length. No, instead, I try not to write something unless I know it's something I can sit down to, for a while, and something others will be able to spend a little time with. If I think of something and know that it'll just be a paragraph and nothing more, I'll pass on it and hope that maybe later, down the road, another subject will come up that lets me fold that single paragraph into it.

My Friend Cory Has Been Trapper-Keepered by a Lack of Imagination

You may remember my friend Cory from the first chatlog I posted. You know, the good one. Cory — who Google's "I'm Feeling Lucky" function tells me is the person pictured at right — has gone back to school to get an MFA in Creative Writing, and he's already made two huge mistakes.

First up, the degree. Do you have any idea how many chumps who want to get an MFA in creative writing enroll in a creative writing MFA program? Like, all of them. Idiots. If you really want to wow the prof. with your creativity, you need some misdirection. You ever notice how all magicians have really hot lady assistants with tremendous racks? Of course you did. What you didn't notice was the magician inserting a tiny plastic barrier into the tank to keep his face separated from the piranhas and the wolf eels. Misdirection.

Chatlog Post #1

Me: What are you going to grad school for? More book learnin'?
Cory: I'm going to be super-pretentious and get an MFA in Creative Writing
Me: Yeah, like that's an original idea.
Cory: I just need an excuse to wear more hats.
Me: If I were a professor and you came to me with that story, I'd fail you because I've heard that before.
Me: Now if you told me you'd come to get a degree in blowing lead glass, I'd be all, "Mmmmmm, tell me more."
Cory: Yes, but I'd do it IRONICALLY. That's all the rage.
Me: Do you think you can troll a creative writing course? I just picture deadpanning the reading of my story for a room of six other really fucking serious creative writers and finishing it with, "And with that, the Space Dracula, like Cincinnatus, laid down his anti-proton laser forever."