Hey! So um, I have a question. What exactly is with the 763 area code?

OK. Perhaps I'm starting off too quickly, so let me bring you up to speed with the train of thought currently revolving in my head. Instead, I'll lead off with this: have you recently dined in to Pizza Hut rather than taking a delivery? If you're like any other free-thinking responsible American citizen, your answer would be "Of course not." But if you reside in one of the many fine trailer parks across this great nation, or in a certain fourth-tier suburban hellhole currently known as "763" you are planning to go soon, if you haven't already. Most likely it will happen after you see a Whitesnake cover band perform at a dive of a club. It's all part of the influx of trashy people taking part in activities/hobbies/events that were wildly popular with the social elite of the 1980's. Or, as I call them, "activities/hobbies/events that were wildly popular with the social elite of the 1980's." Think about it: I remember when I was a child, I had this Land Before Time movie with a commercial for Pizza Hut, circa 1986. It showed happy kids having a crazy birthday party amid pizza, and all the mini-preps all gussied up with bowties and cardigan sweaters and party dresses with little ruffles in them. When in the hell is the last time you saw that happen? For me, that never happened, although in 1986 my parents did play host for my birthday party at a fastfood establishment that will remain nameless. Then, several months ago, my dad, my brother and I all got the hankering for some pizza. And seeing that a Pizza Hut was in the vicinity, we stopped in, and it was like being instantly transported to an interior set of "The Breakfast Club". Guns n' Roses spewed like so much vomit from the speaker system in the dining room and in the corner were dusty arcade games of Double Dragon and Bart vs the World. (No, I'm NOT exaggerating.) Anyhoo, as it worked out, we ate and quickly left, just in time to see three shitbox trucks pull up and about 10 of the most blatant mullets you ever saw in your life walk in.

A few other examples of the 1980's resurgence in mullet culture, if you will, are the Nissan 300ZX and monster trucks. Outmoded sports cars, though, seem to be reserved for 80's celebrities. Case in point: A feature in Car Stereo Review's Mobile Entertainment magazine has a feature called "Artist Driven" where they catch up with some of the hottest musical acts of the day, ask them what cars and audio gear they sport, how they feel about industry trends, etc. One issue a few months back had snippets from N.E.R.D., Jay-Z, Chad from Nickelback, and a few other notables, all having cars with a model year of 2000 or newer and at least a $75,000 price tag. That is, except for a member of the band Motley Crue, who owned a 1987 300ZX, "rebuilt at 100,000 miles." May God strike me dead if this isn't true. Monster trucks and other events that involve two or more wheels attached to a motor seem to be more widespread in terms of the audience. For example, here are three things that are widely associated with mullets, hicks and trashy people in general: NASCAR and other motorsports, top-40 rock/metal and pro wrestling. Set aside from each other, nothing seems odd about them. But here's what ties them together: THEY ALL GOT POPULAR AGAIN AT THE SAME TIME! Not coincidentally, this is also when it was "fashionable" for one to sport a mullet, or purchase and eventually wear a hat with flames sewn into it, or drive around shirtless in a big truck, quite possibly with straw hanging out of the mouth while the wretched sound of Guns n' Roses pours out of their factory 2 speaker cassette deck. And when he drives by, take a good look at him, because chances are good you will recognize him working in one of our country's many fine positions in the service industry. Speaking of which, at a lot of the bars and clubs in first- and second-tier suburbs they now, usually on Sunday or Monday night, have "service-workers night," or as it's known to the responsible portion of the nation, "the night of the week in which the only available baby sitter currently resides in the nether regions of Hell" because this is when the single-mom waitresses of the world leave their kids at home to go seek out more pregnancies from men they will no doubt never hear from again. We REALLY need to stop with this. And another thing: why, whenever a national tragedy takes place, does there have to be an onslaught of personal identification with said tragedy? Yes, it's necessary to talk about things but it isn't necessary to have a personal story to attach to it. Because that is another thing trashy people like to do: make it all about them. Case in point: 9/11. Leading up to the anniversary date Yahoo! allowed any, ahem, yahoo with a dialup modem to put up a tile commemorating the ghastly events of that day, and by the 12th half of the tiles resembled this: "I was in so and so place when I heard about it and I thought about it and blah blah me me me..." That's great. Has it occurred to anyone that this might be one of the reasons other countries hate us so much? We (meaning the entire USA including me) are so self-absorbed and almost cocky about where we stand that it drives other people to hate us. And coming back to the internet and dialup modems... you can listen to Bush tell you that the "digital divide" coincides with the poverty line. That's bullshit, friend. The real digital divide is dialup vs. broadband. You can tell by the way the two are used. Broadband is used usually by computer geeks playing Age of Empires online, or junior and senior high kids doing homework and instant-messaging their friends. Dialup on the other hand is commonly used for checking on your favorite soap opera, or playing games on the MSN Zone for hours on end, or to check on what "the stars" are doing. This is a common tagline used on webpages that draws trashy people to visit, using the aforementioned method of personal attachment. "What are the stars....." Who the fuck cares? Honestly? Is your life really greatly enhanced by the fact that some actress with the IQ of a rotten banana just happens to endorse the mascara you use, or own the same mobile phone as you? Another thing that just bugs me to no end about trashy people is their constant need for bragging and exaggeration. "Yeah man, I bought this 50" Mitsubishi HDTV. It's gonna be awesome playing Smackdown on this tonight, especially with the thirteen-speaker surround sound I'm running." Oh really. Where are you setting your set up, the Showplace 16? "But I have three subs too!" Okay then. Whatever you have to say to not seem sad.

I have to stop here or I'll go on forever. So, in closing I just want to say that trashy people suck. I hope the theories presented here help support that. And in the immortal words of the Spice Girls, "if ya wanna be my lover, ya gotta get with my friends...'

Labels: GOTW