I shall begin this first in a long series of blog entries by quoting a certain haggard homeless-looking drifter who was once almost the Vice President of the United States.  Who am I?  What am I doing here?  Well, I’m writer, philosophizer, and ardent Mountain Dew enthusiast who chain smokes like a seedy European James Bond villain.  I’m also fat-ish.  I’ve added the “ish” because, well, removing it might make you think I look like Gilbert Grape‘s mother.  I don’t.  I look like Paul Giamatti in Sideways.  The situation could be a lot worse.

    I’m losing twenty pounds.  Not because I like exercise.  Not because I’m worried about an early onset of heart disease.  No, I’m losing it because I have man boobs.  Because I almost spit out my endocrine system while climbing four flights of stairs the other day.  I’m twenty-one.  Zac Efron is twenty-one.  So are Sidney Crosby and that crazy guy who screams about leaving Britney alone on YouTube.  I bet they can gallivant about with a heart rate less than one hundred and forty beats per minute.
    I’ve decided to wager two hundred and fifty dollars on myself dropping this tonage because I’m a cantankerous and stubborn misanthrope who just so happens to enjoy money and strongly dislikes losing it.  I ran through a supermarket naked to win a sawbuck; L. Ron Hubbard knows what I would do for two hundred and fifty dollars.  Please don’t tempt me.  I’m not on probation but have a smirk that would scream guilty on the witness stand.  Think Jon Lovitz. 
    As you’ve probably guessed from reading the three previous stanzas of borderline anti-establishment nonsense, I have a slew of enemies.  Maybe even a swarm.  People who abuse the exclamation point.  Diet Mountain Dew.  That hole in the ozone layer.  I hate ‘em all.  But there’s one who swaggers about above the rest, frolicking about with her billion dollar bank account and horrid writing style which frequently implements unnecessary that’s.  Yes, J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series, madame of the disjointed narrative arc, underminer of all things decent and true, the bane of my existence, I hate you.
    I’ll be the first to admit Harry Potter is and was a phenomenal idea, but upon each read through I’m forced to sit and wonder what could have been.  In the hands of a capable visionary, those seven books could have rivaled the best of Roald Dahl or C.S. Lewis.  They could have soared with the classics of children’s literature; instead, they idle alongside vapid, formulaic gibberish like Rudy and Menudo’s second album.  Oh what could have been. 
    I hate J.K. Rowling for not having the guts, conviction, or balls to out Dumbledore when it actually mattered.  I hate J.K. Rowling for sparing Harry, Ron, and Hermione.  It would have been too traumatizing for children, everyone screamed.  Well, spoiler alert: Charlotte dies in Charlotte’s Web, Peter Pan forgets about Wendy, that chick from Different Strokes made a porno.  And most of all, I hate J.K. Rowling for being most people’s favorite author.  Read Vonnegut.  Pick up John Kennedy Toole.  Don’t stop with Rowling’s mediocre drivel.
    I’m losing twenty pounds because I hate man boobs, hate losing money, and despise the thought of J.K. Rowling rolling up a hundred dollar bill and snorting my failure.