The RANT guy's on his way to New York city...Manhattan to be exact...because I'm a sucker for punishment! To tell you the truth I was just warming up to Orange County California; probably the most sterile place on earth. I wasn't crazy about the place. It was like living on a golf course with stoplights. I was there for six and a half months and I think I succeeded in getting almost everyone there to hate me.

Yes, I am actually sitting on the plane right now as we speak, tat-tatting this out.

I'm not looking forward to Manhattan, it's noisy, smelly, crowded, life threatening, expensive, hectic, dangerous, dirty... and that's just the Jehovah's Witness's. People get all excited and actually brag about even SURVIVING in this place. "If you can make it here you'll make it anywhere..." Yahda, yahda, yahda.

And can somebody please tell me why they choose to serve peanuts as a snack on a plane? I'm sorry to digress but I'm distracted. What happened? GARLIC was too hard to package so they picked the NEXT most smelly thing on the planet to be re-ventilated over and over for the next 5 hours?

And it's pretty obvious that this pack of peanuts is served for stench purposes EXCLUSIVELY. Come on, there's what, 6 peanuts in this package? There's more WRAPPER then food here! This isn't a snack, it's a teeth clog...you chew but never swallow. What kind of a warped portion is this? I just looked at the package...under "Servings per container", it says "0".

So I'm sitting here crammed in the aluminum tube on my way to Hell City with this big fat guy next to me sleeping in my lap and spewing peanut stink. I'm not kidding about this guy being Huge either; before take off the stewardess exclaimed "Forget the seat cushions, we've got your Emergency Floatation Device sitting in row 14 b".

Anyway, in the coming weeks expect that they'll be some educational comparisons made between New York City and Orange County California. As always, purely objective.

One comparison I can think of right off is the cost of banking. California people INSIST on being over-charged for everything. It's part of the anal atmosphere, they wouldn't have it any other way. Just today I was closing my Wells Fargo checking account and the guy made the God Awful mistake of asking me why.

I told him I was annoyed by the "policy of Wells Fargo and Bank of America to financially rape me" with service charges. I elaborated on how each time I pulled against my overdraft line of credit, I was charged not only a high and insulting interest rate but also a SERVICE FEE of 2 to 3 dollars! He was like, "Well yeah dude, but it's better than having a ten dollar fee for a bounced check." And *I* was like, "Well yeah, it's also better than getting my tongue pierced by the stubble on Richard Simmons legs but I think you're missing the point..." I then pulled out a bank card from a Maryland based bank and exclaimed, "THIS bank charges a Normal credit interest rate and no 'Financial Banking Ignorance Fee'. We're not accustomed to being so extremely taken advantage of on the East coast.

So he gives me this, "Well sooooo, you can do your banking in the grocery store!" (In California, for some reason, there are no laws (other than Republican interests) governing anything and the grocery stores sell hard liquor, have full bank branches and black-jack tables in isles 6 & 7). One of the more relaxing things to do in California is eat steamed peeled shrimp with cocktail sauce while comparing IRA's. So I said, "You've got a point and if it made any sense at all, it would even be a good point." Anyway there was no reason to continue to educate this young man any further since by now it was obvious he held no seat on the board of directors.

So...where was I? I'm sorry...I hope my elbow is sweating but I have a feeling this pig next to me's drooling on my arm...which brings us to our story...

From the RANTguy's stint in California comes the freakin' "Ki Master"! Guaranteed to be the next cult Action Hero figure and you saw him here FIRST. This guy should be the icon for the "RANT of the Week!" Now HERE'S a guy with a right to complain.

Talk about intimidating...I mean, sure we all lift barbells with our Goods, but 500 pounds? Even *I* can't do That! I won't even TRY to do over 150 before having several drinks.

This is an actual ad taken from a widely circulated California newspaper. This isn't the National Enquirer or some Rag with photos of Richard Simmons dressed up to look like a man. THIS is REAL.

RANT surveyed readers to get their input for a caption to this photo. Some of these ideas have been expressed below:

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