more zombies than you can shake a stick at

Howdy folks. It's me, The Haiku Master, freshly returned from my nightly patrol of Charm City -- where the streets are thick with zombies, as they are every year during Halloween Weekend!!!

A Pack Of Bloodthirsty Zombies Rushes The Haiku Master (Foreground, Right)

To make matters worse, these aren't your father's zombies. Historically, thwarting the walking dead was simply a matter of keeping up a brisk pace while swatting at their heads with the weapon of one's choice; in my case, my trusty 1-iron. But these days, those suckers are fast!

Frankly, I blame it on 28 Days Later. Not to mention that high-gloss Dawn of the Dead remake! Whoever directed those movies should be run out of town on a rail. I mean, what kind of traitorous humans make zombie empowerment flicks?!

No matter though -- the Sultan of Syllables is still more than a match for a bunch of stupid zombies, regardless of how quickly they move! In fact, I took down more than 50 earlier tonight while rescuing the nice people seen in this photo:

The Haiku Master (Left) Takes A Break From Fighting Zombies To Comfort A Group Of Human Survivors

Of course, not all zombies are bad. Take my close, personal friend, Zombie Gary Hart. The onetime presidential hopeful may have a head full of worms these days, but he's still a dreamer with a powerful message. If he could just learn to stay away from the "Monkey Business" -- wink wink, nudge nudge -- he might just make it to the Oval Office one day.

From Left: Zombie Gary Hart And The Haiku Master

Okay for now, kids. Fighting zombies is tiring work, so it's time for your hero to hit the hay. Catch you on the flip side!

Best,

it's okay to come out now

Good news, friends! It's me, The Haiku Master -- finally ready to emerge from Castle Haiku's bomb shelter following Hurricane Katrina's bloody reign of terror!

I would've been up sooner, but with Katrina just leaving the country yesterday -- and totally destroying New Orleans, Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Chicago, Kansas City, Nashville and Kalamazoo in the process -- the Pharaoh of 5-7-5 wasn't about to take any chances. Hopefully you took my sage advice and sought shelters of your own before she hit.

Fortunately, I talked Haiku International's Minister of Information into serving as a topside lookout while this horrid, Old Testament-style storm wreaked a swath of destruction from one end of the country to another. Without him, the Haiku-Bot and I never would've known just how bad things had gotten outside: gas shooting up to $57.00 a gallon, Iraqi freedom fighters conquering New Orleans, people eating each other, the dead rising, etc.

Katrina had her cruel way with my luxurious top-secret base of operations, to boot: drinking all the liquor; eating all the snack cakes; drawing crude, unflattering cartoons about yours truly on the walls; and racking up some hefty pay-per-view porn charges on my satellite link-up! Shelton, on the other hand, came through without a scratch -- though his nerves were so shot he'd resorted to drinking vermouth, as seen here:

H.I.'s Minister Of Information Desperately Tries To Soothe His Jangled Nerves With A Stiff Glass Of Vermouth

So I guess that's that. Good luck on rebuilding society, folks. I'd join you, but I have just about everything I need here in Castle Haiku. Plus, there's no way I'm fighting any crime in Baltimore -- or anywhere else -- until they get all those goddamned zombies off the streets. Maybe I'll feel different after watching the 10 O'Clock News for the first time in a week, but as of right now it all seems a little pointless.

Best,

draft walken

Mahalo, friends! It's me, The Haiku Master, with some bad news -- legendary thespian Christopher Walken isn't running for President after all, despite the recent appearance of a Walken 2008 website!

Yesterday, Walken decried the site -- www.walken2008.com -- as a hoax, and promised to utterly destroy the giggling twits who created it... as well as their family, friends and acquaintances! Not in so many words, but with a man like Walken, you have to read between the lines.

Regardless, I feel Mr. Walken is exactly the kind of leadership this country needs in such troubled times. To be honest, I don't know much about his political views, but I do know I like his movies. And that's good enough for me. Which is why I'm stealing a page from 2004's turbulent campaign, and announcing the immediate formation of the Draft Christopher Walken Foundation!

This Country Has A Fever, And The Only Prescription Is President Christopher Walken

More details to follow as they become available, but in the meantime, feel free to start sending me your presumably tax-deductible donations to Walken's war chest!

Best,

well screw you too, south korea

Fair warning, 'ku believers -- I, The Haiku Master, am in the foulest of foul moods tonight! Why, you ask? Because South Korea has banned members of its Korea Baseball Organization from playing with cabbage on their heads (link goes to Reuters)!

Feeling Cool, Looking Cool: Doosan Bears Pitcher Park Myung-hwan Takes A Page From The Haiku Master's Playbook

Never before have I cared so much about an act of racial discrimination! Sure, the pitcher in this report was only wearing cabbage. But Mr., uh... Mr. Korean Leader Who Isn't Kim Jong-il would do well to remember that some of us can't take our cabbage off!

On a related note, however, putting iced cabbage on your head is indeed a fine method of beating the summer heat. Twenty minutes of chilling my noggin on a frozen block of H2O, and I'm cool as a cucumber all day long! Or cool as cabbage, as the case may be.

Okay for now; time for the Sultan of Syllables to whip off some angry letters to South Korea's president and the KBO's commissioner, whatever their names are. Racist bastards!

Best,

drunk in the heart of texas, pt. II

***
CHAPTER II

After landing at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, I was greeted by Texas Kelly's lackey; a wild-eyed brute who smelled of aerosol cheese and clove cigarettes, and bore a distorted resemblance to our nation's leader. He introduced himself as Dubya.

Dubya

"Like the president," he grunted, hoisting my bags on his shoulders. "Now come. Master Kelly waits."

He led me to a slick Mercedes convertible in the airport garage, and we were soon underway. Dubya drove like a maniac, weaving in and out of traffic at a fantastic rate of speed until we arrived at our destination -- the Stuart Beach Inn in Austin's Hyde Park area.

"Good, looks like the boys are already here," I said, noticing the official Masters of Mariachi tour bus parked outside our place of lodging.

The Official Masters Of Mariachi Tour Bus

"Yes," said Dubya, retrieving my luggage from the trunk, "they come last night. Very drunk. Very loud. Master Kelly have to detain them."

"Detain them? What do you mean, detain them?"

"You see. We go there now."

I was led up an exterior flight of stairs to room 222, where Dubya knocked out a stacatto take on "shave and a haircut."

"C'mon in!" Kelly shouted from inside.

We entered... and walked smack dab into an international incident in the making! There, in the middle of the room, was my band -- hog-tied in a circular formation, with thick slabs of duct tape wrapped 'round their mouths!

"Sainted mother of Nixon!" I gasped. "What in the hell is going on here?!"

"Aww, shucks," replied Kelly. He was sprawled out on the room's only bed, cradling a giant bag of Lay's potato chips. "Them little buddies of yours were all hopped up on mescal when they got here, caused a real ruckus. Had to mace 'em down and tie 'em up after one of 'em started waving a nasty switchblade around."

Texas Kelly

"Oh, all right then. As long as it's not some kind of weird Abu Ghraib sex game thing."

"Never in hell," he assured me.

Catastrophe averted, I untied Paulo and the boys before changing into a fresh ascot and smoking jacket. Then, it was on to a long night of intense band practice -- after all, those mariachi fanatics at the Austin Wal-Mart weren't going to rock themselves, now were they?

---CLICK HERE FOR 'DRUNK IN THE HEART OF TEXAS' PT. III---

three cheers for the pirate captain

Avast, me hearties! 'Tis I, The Haiku Master, with a whale of a report for you -- pirates are within a handsbreadth of winning their first elected post since their glory days, and it's all thanks to North Carolina State University's The Pirate Captain!

The Pirate Captain Looks To Be A Lock For NCSU's Student Body President

In last week's election for NCSU's Student Body President, T.P.C. keelhauled 44% of the vote in a race against three landlubbers, and looks to be a lock against his sole remaining competitor, the oddly named Will Quick, in next week's runoff. Which means that fine academy will soon be America's premier haven for blackguards, scalliwags, cutthroats, bad eggs, and rogues everywhere!

As a result, the Sultan of Syllables gladly endorses The Pirate Captain for this and any other public office he may seek in the future, up to and including President of the United States of America. Or even Pope! So sayeth I... The Haiku Master!

Best,


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p.s. Don't forget about International Talk Like A Pirate Day, which is held every year on September 19!

f for freedom

Most triumphant news, freedom lovers -- Chess Grandmaster Bobby Fischer has left his Japanese detention center and is on a plane to Iceland as I, The Haiku Master, type these words!!!

Ring The Bell -- Grandmaster Bobby Fischer Just Schooled The Tyrannical Bush Administration At International Chess!

Mark this day in your calendars, friends, for it is one your descendants will long sing songs about as they sit 'round the trashcan fires necessitated by the future devastation of the ever-deepening peak oil crisis!

Speaking of which, I wish I could tell you about the time I went to the future in a failed attempt to evade paying taxes, but certain legal entanglements prevent me from doing so.

Best,


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P.S. -- Not to worry, a complete Texas wrap-up is still on the way. Give a Haiku Master a couple of days to unwind, for Christ's sake!

P.P.S. -- For additional Haiku International coverage of the Grandmaster's legal problems, click here and here.

grandmaster update: iceland's knight to king bobby's bacon

Mahalo, loyal readers. It's me, The Haiku Master, surfacing from my current adventures in Texas with an exciting chess update: Iceland has agreed to grant full citizenship to Chess Grandmaster Bobby Fischer, thereby enabling him to avoid U.S. "justice" (link goes to the Philadelphia Enquirer).

Thanks To Iceland, The Deadly Gamesman May Be Free By The End Of Next Week

I wish I had more time to expound on this victorious news, but Masters of Mariachi is due at Hyde Park's Fresh-Plus in 20 minutes, so I've got to go.

Best,


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P.S. Please ignore the post Paulo made prior to this one. I'd delete it if I could, but my area of wizardry lies in the twin realms of haiku and crimefighting, not computering. Suffice it to say Paulo is lying scum, and will be dealt with shortly after MoM takes top prize at SXSW.

god save bobby fischer

Raise the roof, gentle readers, for the deal went down earlier today: those bastards in Japan proved just how long America's money leash is by agreeing to deport Chess Grandmaster Bobby Fischer to the U.S. for prosecution (link goes to BBC News)!

And I, The Haiku Master, do hereby call "bullshit" on that spineless decision.

Hero To Hunted: Bobby Fischer, Then And Now

First and foremost, the Grandmaster's only crime (outside of his vicious, self-loathing anti-Semitism, which I can't endorse, and overall craziness, which I'll gladly endorse) is playing a game of chess. That's right -- Uncle Sam wants to put a Chess Grandmaster in prison for playing chess. The historic '92 Fischer-Spassky Match, no less. What made the match criminal in the eyes of The Man is the fact that it was played in Yugoslavia to the tune of $3 million... thereby technically breaking a then-U.S. trade embargo against a country that doesn't even exist anymore.

For this, Fischer faces a $250,000 fine and/or 10 years in prison. At the age of 62, mind you.

Seems pretty silly, no? Some gratitude for a man who was his own 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team when he whipped the living shit out of Boris Spassky during their first first meeting in '72, bringing the World Championship Title in Chess back to the U.S. after decades of Soviet control. Chess still meant something back then, and Fischer was rightly hailed as a national hero. Thirty years later, against the same opponent, in the same general part of the world, and he's labeled a blackguard of the worst sort.

Fischer (Right) Was Hailed As A National Hero For Beating The Weirdly Bouffanted Spassky (Left) In 1972

What makes the plot even thicker is that George H.W. Bush was President at the time of Fischer's alleged transgression. For the next eight years, the Justice Department gave exactly two turds as to the location of the Grandmaster. Fast forward to 2001 -- the year George "Dubya" Bush stepped into office -- and "Searching for Bobby Fischer" suddenly becomes a top priority.

Because, you know, with corporate crime all but wiped out in America, might as well shift resources towards putting a 62-year-old man in prison. For playing chess.

Could it be the '92 match embarrassed the elder Bush? Did he take it as a personal slight? Did Dubya's administration go after Fischer to avenge his daddy's honor, the way he did with Saddam Hussein, Tommy Chong, and Johnny Carson?

Hmm? Hmmmmm? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

Is Some Kind Of Twisted G.W.B. Daddy-Revenge Fantasy Driving The Federal Government's Zeal To Put Fischer In Jail?

Honestly, I wouldn't know, as I'm more of a crimefighter and haiku writer than political expert. But I do know bullshit when I smell it. Write your congressmen, 'ku believers; this situation must not stand!

Best,


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UPDATE: Here's a couple of swell sites where you can learn more about the rise and fall of Grandmaster Fischer: his Wikipedia listing, and BobbyFischer.net -- a privately maintained forum devoted to all things Fischer, up to and including detailed diagrams of his matches.