A Life Unnoticed

I used to run into him all the time at the local Wal-Mart. I would be there loading up my cart with useless (but necessary) items such as; scarves, socks, pajamas, body wash, shampoo, laxatives, and tampons, while he was there with his cart full of smoking cessation aides such as; sunflower seeds, a jumbo pack of gum, “the patch”, and some of that nasty Nicorette gum. I always found it weird that he went to these great lengths to seemingly “stop smoking”, yet each and every time, at the checkout, he would still ask for a pack of cigs… Marlborough Lights. It was kind of half-assed, and it must have been expensive!

One day while behind him in line at the cash, I decided to talk to him;

“What’s the deal with the cigs. Aren’t you trying to quit?”

“This is my last pack…”

“What about last week? Was that the last pack too?”

“Who do you work for, the FBI Reform Smokers Division?”

“Very funny… I’ve seen you make this very same purchase a few times now, so I felt compelled to ask that’s all. Ever think that maybe this shit isn’t working?”

“Well maybe that was then, this is now.”

“What makes this time any different?”

“Well for starters, I’ve never had a cheeky stranger like you in line behind me telling me that my strategy isn’t working. Maybe (despite your annoyingness) you’re actually helping me.”

He had a smirk on his face, but I could tell that deep down he was just as disappointed in his multiple attempts to quit smoking, as I was with his explanation.

“You go interrogate the world! And leave my respiratory health to me!” He tipped his hat at me and left the store while my merchandise moved down the conveyer belt. The cashier kind of snickered under her breath; I could tell that in her head she was thinking “ha ha ha, he BURNED you sister”.

The following week I went in for my weekly visit, but didn’t see him. I wondered if he had successfully quit. Either that or maybe my interference had caused him to scout out another Wal-Mart or maybe he just chose another less-predictable shopping day. In any case, I wondered. I even asked one of the cashiers if they had seen the “stop smoking guy”. Nobody knew who I was talking about, but finally a cashier vaguely remembered him, it was the same one who saw our exchange that day. She said he hadn’t been in.

Months went by until finally one day I saw him sitting on a park bench near the waterfront where I walk my Doberman Ozzy. I don’t know why, but I got a huge smile on my face as Ozzy and I approached him eagerly.

He remembered me right away and groaned “Oh no, not you again…”

“So what’s the verdict?” I shouted

He looked me square in the face with no sarcasm, no humour, no joy, and no sadness and stated “Cancer”.

I sat down beside him and looked down at the ground while a single leaf blew past. Neither one of us spoke or looked at each other for a few awkward moments.

“Look… I’m… I’m really sorry for razzing you about the smoking thing. I didn’t mean to offend you in any way. I can be sort of obnoxious sometimes; it’s one of my many fatal flaws as a human being. I am so sorry about your health. Is there anything I can do?”

He reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a half-smoked pack of cigarettes, lit one up and said “yeah… don’t harass me about this one.” He cracked a half smile and sighed as we both stared out at the water.

After that day, we became good friends and I learned that his name was Randy. Despite the twenty-year age gap, we had a lot in common. We both shared the same dry sarcastic sense of humour, a love of single malt scotch, and liked to laugh at the expense of others. Every Saturday we met in the park while I walked Ozzy and he smoked 5 or 6 cigarettes. We would talk about the changes going on in our town, our jobs, the news, and occasionally our families. Sometimes we would go for a drink at the local watering hole after our walks, but Randy was a mean bitter drunk, so I tried to discourage the drinking as much as possible. Plus, I couldn’t understand him when he was slurring his words out.

One day while in the park he said something really nice to me. He stopped walking and said “You know, I’ve been a lonely man my entire life. I’ve never had many friends. My family is all either dead or estranged. I don’t talk to nobody at work, but you… You forced yourself into my life, and I feel like a lucky man. A lucky man who’s dying… but a lucky man!” He laughed, before taking a haul of his cig, looked at me with the hint of a tear in his eye and said “Thanks”. He parsed his lips and looked away.

He wasn’t much for emotion, so I knew the best thing to do was shrug it off, but deep inside I was beaming, and I fought back every urge to bawl my eyes out and throw myself into his arms. It was the nicest thing he had ever said to me, and it made me so happy to know that my presence in his life made a difference. That he cared.

One Saturday afternoon, Randy didn’t show up at the park. I waited for him for an hour. Then two, then three… Until Ozzy finally begged me to take him home and feed him. I remember sitting out on my porch that night and looking up. It was a clear night, the moon was shining brightly and the stars filled the entire sky. I caught a glimpse of a shooting star, the first time in my life I had ever seen one. A lump formed in the back of my throat, my eyes welled up with tears… And that’s when I knew. That’s when I knew that I would never see him again.

Suddenly Randy’s whole life (or at-least everything I knew about it) made sense to me. Of course he smoked, it was one of the few things in life that actually made him happy. What else did he have?! He was lonely. His cigs were his comfort, his satisfaction, and his vice. They helped him deal with the harsh realities of a life of going unnoticed. A life where nobody cared, and a life that left him comfortable with his own death, because in a sad way… it was a relief to him. A relief to not have to take the agony of life anymore.

And that night, I shed a tear for every person in his life that didn’t.

Bleeding Extremes

It wasn’t the first time that I was asked “what are you supposed to be?” on Halloween while sporting my day-to-day threads. I guess people think that if you don’t resemble anyone from the Sears catalogue, then you surely must be wearing a costume. Try telling that to my mom on Christmas Day when she’s rockin’ her best Christmas sweater. You know, the one with the Christmas kittens on it. She’ll swat you over the head with a stocking filled with batteries, razors, and disgusting amounts of teeth-rotting British chocolate if you try to harp on her Christmas attire!

I never did fit in from a style perspective anyway, so I wasn’t all that bothered when people didn’t quite see how a pair of Chuck Taylors, a spiked leather choker and bracelet, fishnets, and a Red plaid skirt could qualify as a “normal” every day outfit.


When I got home that afternoon, the kids were already out roaming the streets looking like little freaks on parade. There were little serial killers, miniature whores, devil worshippers, witches, and a plethora of K-Mart Koncoctions! Did I say koncoctions? I meant distractions! What were their parents thinking?!

I hurried into my flat to get my bowl of Tootsie Rolls out ready for the lil’ freaks coming to my door. Tootsie Rolls were nostalgic for me and always reminded me of Halloween. So I guess me handing them out was mildly selfish. I was just about to cross the street when I saw him standing on the corner dressed like a big fucking Red bleeding heart. His face was painted and he had an arrow sticking through his head.

I waved at him and kept walking.

“Hey… Wait. Aren’t you going to say hi?” he shouted as he awkwardly ran across the street holding his arrow head in place and using both hands to hold up his giant Red plush costume.

“Yeah… I waved didn’t I?!”

“I was just in the area” he said “What a surprise seeing you.”

I rolled my eyes “Well, it is my neighbourhood…”

“What are you doing right now?” he asked

“Handing out candies for Halloween.”

I knew if I asked him what he was doing in return it would take the conversation to a needy new stage 5 cloaker level. A level that I didn’t wish to go. A level that I wanted to avoid like the plague!

“Want some help handing out candies?” he asked

“No, I’m good.” I said

He stuck out his bottom lip, pouting like a child and stared depressingly down at his Red furry heart shoe covers. I sighed, knowing I would regret it…

“Okay, do you wanna come in for a bit then?” I asked.

His demeanor changed like a dog about to receive a bone, some scraps from under the dinner table, or upon hearing the words “wanna go for a walkie?” His ears perked up, a smile graced his face and he eagerly followed me into my flat.

Once inside he whipped out a bottle of champagne and two glasses (quite odd for an impromptu “chance” meeting on the corner I thought). He poured us each a glass of champagne and made a toast “to us”.

And that is where I stopped him.

“Look… I know that it wasn’t just a coincidence that you were standing on my street dressed like a giant bleeding heart. I know it wasn’t just coincidence that you happened to have two glasses and some champagne in your bag. I saw you at my gym last week too, and in my cafeteria at work at lunch… Your stalking is not going unnoticed, I assure you.”

He bit his bottom lip, turned away and started to cry. It got pretty hectic. Thankfully his blubbering was interrupted by some Trick or Treaters. I threw a handful of Tootsie Rolls into their bags and mouthed the words “HELP ME”! Unfortunately, they just ignored my cry for help and selfishly carried on to to the next house. They really couldn’t give less of a shit about the dire circumstances going on inside my flat.

I went back to my couch where he was now laying face down crying intensely like a child into a pillow! His body was convulsing and his breathing irregular, I was relieved that the pillow was deafening the pitch. I reached over to the table and grabbed my full glass of champagne; I swigged it back in two gigantic gulps, then grabbed the bottle and started swiggin’ that too.

“Look Gerry. I can’t help you okay. I’m sorry that you had a horrible childhood. I’m sorry that your parents live thousands of miles away and don’t call you on your birthday, and I’m sorry that your friends are all a bunch of coke-snorting queens who don’t give a shit about you. But really… What the fuck am I supposed to do? I can’t do anything. I just feel bad for you, and that’s all I can offer! Is that what you want? Have you taken your meds today?”

He looked up from the couch, he had big tear-streaked lines in his face and his face was now red and flesh striped. He looked a mess.
“OHHHHH FOR FUCK’S SAKE!” I shouted, “Look at my sofa… You got Red face paint all over it. That is a $5000 couch!”

This caused him to burst out into a crying frenzy once again. I think he said something along the lines of “how can you say that to me when I did this all for you”… or something like that.

(Doorbell)

Again, more Trick or Treaters! THANK YOU LORD!!!

“Trick or Treat”

“Hi kids… How about a trick. I got time. Lemme see what you got!”

“Can we just have some candy?”

“Can I have a trick?”

The kids just stood there and looked at me like little oblivious creatures of the night. Their eyebrows raised as if to say “we’re not impressed” and their hands on their hips waiting for me to come to my senses. I think I even heard some crickets chirping.

“Fine, fuck here” I dumped handfuls of candy into each one of their bags. A mother shot me a dirty look so I shouted “like you’ve never said fuck in front of your kid before” as I was shutting the door.

Back to hell…

“Ummm look Gerry. I’m really sorry that your life sucks and that you’re so unhappy.”

“HOW CAN YOU BE SO COLD?”

“I just don’t know what you want from me… I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be like this, it’s just I can’t help you. I’m not a fucking savior, I can barely handle my own life, let alone yours!! And frankly, my patience is wearing thin.”

He wiped his snot and tears off on the sleeve of his shirt and picked his big bleeding heart up off of my (once beige) couch.

“Well it’s obvious I’m not wanted” he snarled “I’ll just go then.”

“Okay.”

He picked up his backpack from the floor and scurried towards my front door, but not before tripping over his gigantic Red heart shoe covers and falling face first to the floor, driving the arrow through his left eye causing it to bleed everywhere.

This would happen! I couldn’t let him leave like this. I picked him up off of the floor and escorted him to my couch. I grabbed him some ice, his glass of champagne and a roll of toilet paper for the bleeding.

“You can stay here tonight” I told him

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“I’m sure. I wouldn’t have it any other way. “

He smiled at me forgivingly and we hugged for a minute before I hopped to my feet.

“Okay, so the candies are by the door. Help yourself to whatever you want in the fridge, and I’ll be back in a few hours.”

Before he had a chance to object, or cry, or retort, I was out the door… Leggin’ it down to the local bar to get myself a cold drink!

I never did vote Liberal again either…

CrackerJack

She was at least an hour late every single day. If she woke up early, she just spent longer getting ready or casually sipped her coffee. Sometimes she would hit the carwash in the mornings and sing at the top of her lungs while the hot mops and scrubbers slapped her windows. One time she even stopped her car on the side of the highway to take pictures of the sun peaking through the clouds. She hated clocks and relied on her (rather unreliable) internal alarm clock to wake her up in the mornings. She even made sure there were no clocks facing her at work, and she set the clock on her computer to the wrong time zone. She hated thinking about time, and found it to be an intrusive annoyance in the pursuit of living life.

Some people said that her total lack of urgency and time management skills were a problem, others said it was admirable. She didn’t have much of an opinion on the matter and simply said “take me as I am, or not at all.” She was always getting fired and warned about being late for work. People always seemed to like her, they just didn’t like the fact that she didn’t care about being on time. It really drove her managers crazy, some more than others. The ones who fired her always felt “really bad” about doing so… one or two even cried, stating that they wouldn’t have had to if she could just learn to be on time… which she never did!

During her brief stint as an office manager in an accounting firm, she was called in to her manager’s office for an “informal chat”.

She sat down with the same unaffected and genuine smile she wore day after day.

Her manager forced a smile from gritted teeth and looked down and then back up “Is everything okay?”

“Everything is fine,” she said

“Okay, it’s just that there have been some complaints about your punctuality, so I just thought I would bring it to your attention.”

“Okay.” she said. Her smile a little smaller now.

“You see, it’s not me… I don’t mind that you’re not here at 8 every morning, because I know you get your work done, you don’t always take lunch, and you stay late… but it’s just the perception. And… Yah, it’s a senior management thing. This is really uncomfortable, I’m sorry.”

She just stared at her manager waiting to hear what the point of this “informal chat” was.

“So, I’m going to have to write you up.” he said

“Okay”

“Well is there anything you’d like to say? How do you feel about this?”

“You do what you have to do, you’re the boss.”

And she sat there, while her manager printed off a 3 page Corrective Action Document from his bubble jet printer, and filled it out in front of her.

She stared at the big empty Beige wall behind her manager and wondered why there was no art on it. She observed some of the items on his desk; a half drank cup of coffee, a pile of scattered paper, a bunch of yellow sticky notes, a stapler, a highlighter, and some paperclips. No personality or anything even resembling that he had a life outside of work. “How very sad” she thought to herself.

After waiting for her boss to fill out the paperwork, and then reading, acknowledging and signing it, She left his office feeling like a school kid coming out of the principal’s office after a lecture. Like that time she bagged the quarterback of the football team in highschool.

On her way home she stopped in at the Roadhouse Tavern for a few shots of whiskey to get her mind off of things. A bum walked in waving a lottery ticket in the air and mumbling something about the jackpot. Nobody took any notice of him. The closer he came, the more she could smell him. He smelled like urine, booze, and body odour. He was missing some front teeth and his clothes looked like they had just been shit all over and then feasted on by a pack of hungry moths.

Most people moved when he came close (offended by his stench). Others simply told him to go away. He walked up to her smiling as she was slumped over the bar drawing on a cocktail napkin.

“Hi sweetheart. You don’t look very happy.”

She forced a smile, looked at him and said nothing.

“Would you like to buy some happiness?” he asked.

“You can’t buy happiness,” she said, as she tried not to breathe in through her nose.

“Most people can’t sweetheart… But you… you can.”

He handed her the crumpled dirty lottery ticket; “last nights draw. 2 million dollars. All I want is some whiskey and a warm place to sleep.” he said. “I’m not a legal citizen, I can’t claim this. I don’t even know why I bought it.”

She sat up and glared at him, not knowing whether he was just completely wasted or just trying to pull a scam. She peered down the other end of the bar, where there was a stack of newspapers.

He nodded at her urgingly, “go ahead… go ahead and check it.”

She slowly got up and walked towards the newspapers with the dirty crumpled lottery ticket in her hand. The bartender in seeing this, was now watching intently. She sat down and opened the paper to the lottery results page while the bum stood there with his toothless grin waiting for her reaction.

“HOLY SHIT!” she shouted

“Ah ha ha… I told you.” he laughed appreciatively.

The next day, her and the bum took a trip to the Lottery Corporation to claim the prize. They both stood in line sipping CoffeeTime coffee while they waited for their turn.

“Next” shouted the customer service clerk

“Hi, ummmmm I won 2 million dollars” she declared with the grin of a child on Christmas Day.

Finally after some photos, a ton of paperwork and a lot of questions, her and the bum left the office much richer than when they had arrived.

“So do you want me to set up an account for you, and transfer you the money?” she asked

“Sweetheart, I told you… I only want some whiskey and a warm place to sleep.”

“You meant that?”

“What’s a bum like me gonna do with all that money? I’ll just piss it away,” he said. “You keep it. You’re young! Me, I’ll be dead soon.”

So she did… She kept the money, but not before buying him a lakefront loft, some furniture, and a year’s supply of Jack Daniels.

Having not communicated to her work in over 3 weeks… She decided it was time to go in and pay them a visit. She leaned against the doorway of her manager’s office sipping her Starbucks coffee loudly until he finally looked up from his desk and shouted “WHERE THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN?”

“Meh, I don’t feel like getting into it. I just wanted to let you know that you won’t be seeing me again.”

“Well we haven’t seen you in 3 weeks… We assumed you quit.”

“I did. But I just wanted to come and see your face one more time so that I will never forget WHY I quit… That… and to tell you that I won the lottery.”

She looked around the office one last time before leaving, shaking her head and smiling at the thought of never having to return.

The rest of her days were spent painting and sculpting in a little waterfront bungalow (not too far from Charlie, her new homeless friend who was no longer homeless). You could never mistake her house either, because on the front lawn was a giant fist, made entirely of broken clocks.

Straight Faced

Disturbing… Brutal… Hard To Watch… These were the words used by the straight faced, oh-so-compassionate and humanitarian news anchor to describe a recently released video footage compilation of street brawls and ghetto fights (now on sale for only $19.99). You see the problem with this video is not that it is violent, and not that it is a bad influence, that it teaches children how to land a kick-ass uppercut or break someone’s nose in one bone-crushing blow… or even that you get to see some fucking serious blood, and hey who doesn’t like blood, am I right?

No, the problem here people, is that this video footage is REAL!!! There are no Hollywood effects, expensive directors, overpaid makeup artists, obscene marketing budgets, or theatrical releases… This is real shit. This shit is happening in our schoolyards, in our local bars, in our neighborhoods… and kids are filming it, selling it, and making some cash doing it! And the news… Well, they’re not happy about it! And they’re hittin’ the streets and the airwaves to express their concern!

And why… why is this such a glorious uproar? Why is the powershaven anchorman looking through the set at me as if this is some fucking epidemic of savage anarchy? As if the world is now suddenly going to hell in a hand-basket?

Guess what anchorman? We’re already fucking there. And you know what? It wasn’t the release of this video that did it… But go ahead and promote it on the news, talk it up! Yah, that’s right… you’re making the world a better place. Keep reciting that to yourself while you’re getting the makeup caked on your face and practicing your best “disturbed” face in the mirror…. Because this… THIS is what we need to do… yes; we need to talk about it. Your way! Highlight it… fuck… let’s show some footage too, just to really drive the point home! You might wanna consider looping a few of the more brutal scenes. Make sure they’re in the upcoming “highlights” section before the commercial break too. Tell us how brutal and wrong this footage is… Where we can buy it, how much it costs, while in the same breath saying how “disturbing” it is. Do that face that you do, furrow those brows… make the puppy dog eyes… The “what is this world coming to face”…. and do this all with a STRAIGHT FACE as you practice your responsible journalism… As you do your due diligence of informing the people of the political and social issues that plague our great nation, the cancers that erode our communities…That’s right anchorman, bring us all together in fear and harmony… As your station single handedly tackles all of the world’s problems…

And makes them worse… at 6 o-clock and 11 o-clock, every fucking day!

This is Lingo Slinger signing out! Have a good night and a pleasant tomorrow!

Culture Patch

My dad thinks that my Cabbage Patch Kid doll made me date Black men.

My family is hardcore tea drinking, crumpet eating, queen adoring, alcohol loving, British… We immigrated here in 1980 and moved to a safe (but lame) suburban neighbourhood where it was predominantly White folks who listened to Wham and drank Molson Canadian. Back when the average price for a new car was $12,585 dollars, there was no such thing as bottled water, email, the Internet, or DVDs. When you could play hide & go outside for hours after dark and not worry about getting kidnapped, raped, or shot. When you could say Merry Christmas to people in December and no one would get offended…

And when (God love them) my parents were still completely afraid of anyone who wasn’t White.

It was a cold November day in the 80s, a couple of days before my 7th or 8th birthday. The only thing in the world that I wanted was one of those fucking Cabbage Patch Kid Dolls. Ohhh they were all the rage, and I wanted one as badly as I wanted it to snow on Christmas… As badly as I wanted to eat candy bars for dinner… and as badly as I wanted to sleep in a tent in the backyard every day!

There was no getting around it. I had to have one… Only one slight problem though. A little thing called Supply & Demand… The demand for these things far surpassed the available supply. We were in the throes of a full-on full-contact Cabbage Patch Kid combat craze! Stories about people getting trampled in the local toy stores were rampant. People lining up for hours to get one, even sleeping outside at night waiting for the doors to open the following morning. Nothing short of a marketing miracle!

We drove around that day to 5 or 6 different toy stores and not one of them had a fucking Cabbage Patch Kid Doll. Depression was not even the word for my state of mind. It was a downright tragedy! My face would have told you that I was an unloved orphan with a terminal illness… But to my dad my face was saying “daddy, get me that fucking doll.”

Finally we show up to a Toys R Us on the other end of town. My dad is pissed at this point and has already frantically smoked about 4 cigs in the car (windows rolled up despite the coughing and objections from my sister and I). He tells us (my mom, sister and I) to wait in the car while he runs in to see if they have any of these curiously popular dolls.

Those five minutes that he was in the store, felt like an hour. I sat there staring at the sliding doors with the same intensity of a cat watching a goldfish swimming around a bowl. Finally he emerged from the sliding doors, and my heart sank as I saw the look of disappointment on his face. He got in the car and looked back at me and said:

“Sorry Selina, you’ll just have to wait until Christmas.”

Tears began to roll down my cheeks as I said, “They didn’t have any either daddy?”

My dad paused for a minute and said nothing… He shot my mom a glance.

“Well they did have a couple left, but they were Black dolls” he said.

My eyes widened with excitement, as I heard “they had a couple”… I didn’t even acknowledge or care about the rest of the statement.

“Let’s go get one daddy.” I said as I dried my tears.

My dad looked at my mom with unsure eyes. We parked the car and went in to the store, and that was where I met and fell in love with Fred. I don’t even know what his “actual” name was, because to me, he was “Fred” from the moment I saw him. My beautiful black bald cabbage patch kid. Ohh Fred was stylin’. He had a pair of Maroon cords and a matching corduroy sport jacket, and a pair of funky-ass kicks to go with. I carried him up to the counter with the HUGEST smile on my face… I was so proud!

I carried that doll everywhere! Fred and I were inseparable! He never left my side. I even had my babysitter knit him a few custom sweaters and a matching hat.

Years later when my neighbourhood became more culturally diverse, I had a group of friends resembling a rainbow. It was truly beautiful. I learned the culture of Guyana, Jamaica, Trinidad, India, and China. My friends were just like me. They acted like me, laughed like me, played like me, and dressed like me. We were all the same. I never saw a difference. And when I started dating (at a young age I might add), I still didn’t see a difference.

One day I brought my current fling home to meet the folks. He was a cute boy named Teddy. He was black and lived around the corner from us. His family was very successful, well educated, and he had the warmest nicest smile ever. He even picked me some flowers!

The look on my dad’s face when he met Teddy was one of absolute horror. He was very polite, but I could tell he was thinking “what the fuck is my daughter doing dating a black boy”. That night after Teddy left I heard him say to my mom:

“I knew we shouldn’t have bought her that black Cabbage Patch Kid Doll.”

Ladies and gentlemen, Lingo Slinger.

You could call Lingo Slinger a liberal if you so chose to do so, but you would be making a massive mistake. Lingo exhibits traits similar to many of the other writers for Less Idiots, but perhaps most importantly she possesses an open mind. Lingo may have the most open mind I have ever encountered, and while this may be frightening to some, her abilities in this area fascinate me.

Today’s standards for pigeonholing a person disgust me to the very core; it is almost as if the prevailing opinion is that a liberal would not ever be disturbed when they look at the number of abortions performed daily. The same thing is true with conservatives, where it is assumed that their blood does not boil when they see the rampant destruction of our environment. These stereotypes are so far removed from the truth that they are completely ludicrous, but yet these stereotypes persist, primarily to be utilized as a tool for those who are in positions of power.

Lingo is extremely disturbed when she looks at some of the trends involving young women these days. She is not thrilled at how they dress or present themselves, and sees many young girls selling themselves back into mental slavery. Lingo Slinger can also be viewed as a staunch feminist, which is in no way a contradiction. It is far more of a barometer of just how phony and duplicitous many so-called feminists are these days.

What kind of writer is Lingo Slinger? I have recruited some great writers so far, and no matter whom else I am fortunate enough to add to the mix, Lingo Slinger may very well wind up possessing more mastery of this craft than all of us put together. The scary part is Lingo is so young that she’s really just getting started. The demands that she imposes upon herself to improve her craft are immense.

Lingo can be exquisitely elegant with the pen in one post, and in the next post, graphically vulgar. She has no real limits that I have been able to detect, and in some ways, she reminds me very much of the late Richard Pryor. If you possess a tendency to be repelled by vulgarity, you may wish to overcome it with Lingo, for as in the case with Pryor, she is communicating volumes while she’s offending your senses. With Lingo, all the normal barriers in place between a writer and a reader, are blasted into oblivion.

Many writers are offensive just for the sake of being offensive, but on the occasion where Lingo chooses to go in that direction, she is inspired solely by the need to be completely honest to the piece she has crafted. In today’s world, where lies have become a viable currency, we could use a human mountain of Lingo Slingers.