Opinion pieces

I recently went trout fishing near the outflow site of the wastewater treatment plant at Lake Mead. The problem was, the only thing I caught that day were turds. Have you ever tried pulling a fish hook out of a turd without gloves? Like politics, it’s absolutely disgusting. There were Republican turds. Democratic turds, Socialist turds. MAGA turds, Libertarian turds. Independent turds. With all these turds in the water, no wonder I didn’t catch a single fish. The reaso

I’ve been everywhere man, even Chinatown. And I can’t find any place that sells bird’s nest soup. A Delicious Bowl Of Bird's Nest Soup The last time I had a good bowl of bird’s nest soup was during the Ming Dynasty. That was the time the emperor had me over for dinner. He had his servants go out in search of cave-dwelling swiftlet birds. I had no idea that birds spit. I thought only hookers did that. The swiftlets use their spit to build their nests. N

It’s been hotter this summer in Las Vegas than it is on Crematoria, where I was born. Crematoria is that planet Vin Diesel ends up in the movie, “The Chronicles Of Riddick.” Believe me it’s a real place. In the movie, Riddick wears these funny-looking swimming goggles even though there is hardly any high-quality H2O anywhere. Kind of like the Mohave Desert, come to think of it. The only thing even remotely resembling water on Crematoria are the sweaty bodies of the people

The most overhyped candy of the year has to be Dubai chocolate. When Paul Ponytail, manager at the Circle K convenience store I go to, told Mr. Al don’t waste your money on a Dubai chocolate bar… get a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup instead, it was sound advice. But the whole Dubai chocolate phenomenon continued to haunt me. A drug dealer, who was trying to get me hooked on the stuff, gave me a little taste. He figured once I got hooked, I’d be buying the

A Very Interesting Flight I live in the woods in The Great Northwest. I love it there. But come summer the mosquitoes can be a bit much, especially when they swarm. I go through a lot of DEET maximum strength insect repellent. The insect repellant irritates my skin like heck. So bad sometimes that big patches of hair fall off my back. But it sure beats West Nile virus, Lyme disease or some other dreaded condition that makes you bleed fr

I live in Las Vegas, the desert capital of capitalism. As such, I believe Las Vegas cannot survive without a socialist mayor. You know like they have in New York City and Seattle. Socialist mayors. They’re the latest rage. Spread the wealth like cream cheese on a bagel. I’m all for it. Think Zohran Mamdani. He wants you, the little guy, to take a big bite out of the Big Apple. Then there’s Seattle’s Katie Wilson, who describes herself as a Democratic Socialist. Wo

Flaquita Torres is supposed to be in Mr. Peeber’s 7th grade science class. Instead, she’s in the wrong place, lamenting how her boyfriend, Ray Ray Johnson has been suspended for the rest of the year for fighting. I’m just an old man who works as a hall monitor at an at-risk middle school. The words coming out of Flaquita’s mouth are in English, but I have no idea what they mean. “I miss my Shayla,” Flaquita says. “I thought Ray Ray was your boyfriend. I’m confused. Do you

Waterfalls are beautiful. My favorite is Multnomah Falls in Oregon’s Columbia River Gorge. I think most folks love waterfalls. They are a wonder of nature. And so are the waterfalls at the desert middle school where I work doing campus security. How did they get that kind of aquatic feature on campus? It’s not like they had the budget to build one. Right now, I’m standing in the middle of what they call the quad. We have an open-air campus. The student

That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup. At the school where I work as a hall monitor, everywhere I turn I see teenagers wearing T-shirts with that phrase. I am drowning in a sea of middle school reprobates wearing shirts that say that. Why Lord why? And at the end of the school year, the Lord sayeth unto me, “Get with it Mr. Al. That’s A Awful Lot of Cough Syrup is a brand you dummy. “ “It is Lord?” I asketh as if I was in church. “It’s a highly

What follows is a work of fiction. All names, characters, incidents and dialogue are creations of the author’s imagination At the school where I work as a bouncer for sixth, seventh and eighth graders there’s this guy named Joel Fossil. He’s the misbehavior specialist at Todos Los Santos Middle School. He works in the misappropriately named Student Success Office. Yeah, that’s actually the guy’s name, Joel Fossil. With a name like that he’s definitely

We bring you this special edition of Mr. Al’s Wacky World of Weirdness from the Met Gala in New York City. The gala is held every year at the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. People wear all kinds of crazy costumes to this event. That’s why I’m all dressed up. As a great lover of art and fashion, I am so happy to cover the Met Gala. And you thought I was just a beer and hot dog guy. I do it all folks. Afterall, I’ve got that 1970s p

If you were a middle school or high school student these days, you might have one of these rings. It’s a double-finger-fake-gold-plated-hundred-dollar-Hip Hop-ring. I think they look swell. Only old people use the word swell, not young people. The term swell as in we had a swell time is as outdated as I am. Some people refer to this kind of ring as a nugget ring. They are using the term interchangeably to refer to a number of rings including rings that look like they ac

Hello everybody. Good evening and welcome to The White House. We are here in this special 4,500-seat arena built on the lawn of The White House to bring you the fight of the century between Pope Leo and President Donald Trump. I’m your host Mauro Ranallo. I’m joined here with our experts, fight analyst Max Kellerman and former boxing champion Andre Ward. Netflix is streaming this event live around the world. Andre we go to you first. What are your thoughts about this fight

It’s the first day of the U.S. military action in Iran. Mr. Al goes to the Three Kegs Saloon to drown his sorrows. He meets a woman named Epic Fury. Ms. Fury asks Mr. Al if he’d like to accompany her on a vacation to sunny Tehran. Mr. Al politely declines as he stares at her cleavage. “But I hear the Strait of Hormuz is nice this time of year,” he tells her. “I always wanted to swim with the oil tankers.” Unbeknownst to Mr. Al at the time of his seduction by Epic Fury, a hi

Oh Kristi, I’d like to be Ken to your ICE Barbie. My lust for you is as big as an endless blue sky. From the moment I saw you in that TV commercial for Department of Homeland Security, I lost all control. You know the commercial Kristi. The one where you ride a horse with Mount Rushmore in the background. Your long brown hair flowing under your cowboy hat. The ultimate American fantasy. “You cross the border illegally, we’ll find you. Break our laws we’ll punish you.” Sex

Vinnie Pizzeria My name is Vinnie Pizzeria. No this ain’t a joke. That’s really my name. I got a pizza joint in the Belmont section of The Bronx. It’s where Dion and The Belmonts came from. Now I know you youngsters don’t know Dion and The Belmonts from prosciutto, but I do. At my joint we still serve pizza by the slice on wax paper. When you eat it, the orange oil created from the sauce and cheese runs off the wax paper. And if