The Young Korean Drummer

My dear Korean friend Dan,

You could always become a professional drummer. Not in a matter of business cards and studio sessions, but a hard earned $25 to get an ad in the paper. Another 5 dollars and they put it in bold so it stands out from the other equally sized and bold columns. You write "A1 Drummer 4 Band Avail... call 8x927176." You can't write out your full number because you don't have the money for another line of text and you're trying to make it hard for creditors to find you. They will, eventually, but that's a story for another medium, your homicide case file. Eventually, after weeks of waiting and eating boiled shoes, you receive a call. It's from a fellow who insists that you call him "Deveraux," and he proclaims to you in a hardcore voice that indicates how HARD he has to say this:

"We need a drummer who can double-bass so hard he'll awaken the great satan!"

You spit at him in disgust, but a part of the boiled shoe you were eating comes out as well. Seeing a saliva-covered symbol of your monetary frustration at his feet, you reluctantly agree to double-bass the shit out of your drumset for "Deveraux"

You need to get some supplies from your parent's home, and you haven't been there since the huge fight. The one that got you kicked out in the first place, when you asked for an extra five dollars to give your newspaper ad some cheesy american-flag clipart in order to further grab the readers attention. You tell Deveraux to wait outside, he responds that he changed his name to "Goliath Gein." Your parents greet you in open arms, saying how much they missed you and how they're prepared to send you to a family friend who makes shoes. As his apprentice, you'll have a trade to learn and plenty to eat. The smile is wiped off your face and your appetite disappears when Dev... sorry, Goliath Gein bursts in hard and proclaims even harder: "Dan, do not falter and join me in awakening the Great Satan!"

Your parents are immediately appalled by Goliath Gein and you are out on the streets once more. Your father finds out where you were sleeping and breaks two of your fingers and rubs shoe polish on your favorite shirt, which happens to be your only shirt. As everyone knows, shoe polish rubbed on your favorite/only shirt is an old Korean way of saying "I have no son!"

You tour with SuperStalin (he changed his name in the bus ride back from your parents house) across 15 states, and you haven't been able to finish a single show due to your lack of shoes, working phalanges , and/or lack of a band that doesn't utterly utterly suck.

In a post-office located on indian burial grounds somewhere out west, you send a postcard to your parents saying that you aren't bringing the great satan to earth.... or hope not. Then you see a sign that says "WANTED: Pauly Shore for 27 shoe polish related murders. Has several aliases." Is it true? The picture does look stunningly like SuperStalin. Have you spent the last 6 months being ordered around, belittled, and sodomized by Pauly fucking Shore? You try not to come to terms with this, as it is too much for any one man to bear. You decide to call the police to collect the reward, and alas, SuperStalin was really just Pauly Shore. As the police haul him away, he says in a normal voice "Israel, I failed you!"

What meaning this has matters little to you, since you collected the million dollar reward for his capture. You get printed up in the paper as a hero, and your parents accept you as their son again. Your father never gave you the "shoe polish of disownership" after all! It was Pauly Shore the whole time.

You spend three weeks comfortably at home, sipping on imported beer and smoking pipe tobacco. The creditors found your name in the paper, and drag you off into the night never to be seen in less than 31 pieces ever again.

I hope you now know the dangers of professional musicianship.

Sincerely Yours,
Maximum Barkly