Previous Comments

[1] On Apr-06-2005, wrote:

during drinks with acquaintances the other night, somebody was cracking wise about "seasons in the sun" by terry jacks. the day after, i of course downloaded the song. flash forward to several days later when i'm listening to my satellite radio, specifically the 60s station, on the way to the office, and i hear a song by a band called the poppy family. i dug its groove, so i downloaded their song. as i'm scrolling through my music folder, i click on a file that says terry jacks thinking it's "seasons in the sun". imagine my shock when "which way you going billy" kicks in. turns out the poppy family's song had terry jacks's name on the file because terry and his wife were the founding members of the fucking band. i had no idea. it' weird the way life throws you curve balls just when you think you have everything figured out.

[2] On Apr-06-2005, beest wrote:

I think that's enough of the open forum.

[3] On Apr-07-2005, Kenneth wrote:

I just re-read "Less than Zero" for the first time in at least a decade, and it had never really occured to me the extent to which I had grown up in a parallel universe to Ellis (he must be about seven or eight years older than me), attending a prep school in the west valley very similiar to the one he attended and no more than five or ten miles away (he went to Buckley, didn't he?) and attending a college that was Bennington's closest counterpart (hint: he refers to people who went to my school as assholes in "Rules of Attraction"). Its kind of perverse, but re-reading this incredibly bleak, nihilistic novel made me feel sentimental for those years of total and unabahsed recklessness and hedonism. We had no idea how free we were, and how so much of that beauty and desolation would slip away as we got older. And how we would long to have it back.

[4] On Apr-07-2005, mitch wrote:

I hate High School...

[5] On Apr-07-2005, Kyle wrote:

So how was Sarah Lawrence, Kenneth?

[6] On Apr-07-2005, wrote:

Consider adding Play it as it Lays to the reading list.

You don't have to remove Twelve, though you'd be wise to consider it, add Didion because of her influence in both form and tone on BEE.

[7] On Apr-08-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"So how was Sarah Lawrence, Kenneth?"

Just fine. Long live the cocaine adled, gun toting daughters of rock stars, and lesbian orgies.

[8] On Apr-09-2005, wrote:

i went to look at bennington the other day, and it wasn't exactly how i pictured it. it made sense because it was in the middle of nowhere and the kids were stuck together on that campus.. but, it was just a lot less glamorous then it seems in t.r.o.a. (which isn't very glamourous to begin with). of course, the book took place in the 80s and was only loosely based on that school. idk, just a thought.

[9] On Apr-10-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"i went to look at bennington the other day, and it wasn't exactly how i pictured it."

I think you'll probably find that the world Ellis depicts in his novels is fast vanishing in much the same way that the world of F Scott Fitzgerald novels disappeared with the onset of the great depression (this analogy isn't random - more about that in a moment). What Ellis is describing in Less than Zero, TROA, etc is a collective, generational experience, which is to say the experience of generation x (those born roughly between 1961 and 1981). We xers tend to be a cynical, hardboiled, risk taking lot, who grew up in a time of absent parenting, moral relativism, a declining social safety net, and rather extravagant self-indulgence. This is something that crosses racial, ethnic and socio-economic lines, which is to say that even though I grew up in the world of Ellis's books I identify more with Trainspotting, Boys in the Hood, and Eight Mile - all xer works - than I do with works from similar socio-economic and racial backgrounds but from different generations. I love the Graduate, but I'll never "get it" the way my father and his generation gets it.

I don't want to assume anything, but your post suggests you are looking at colleges, which suggests to me that you were probably born in the 1980s, and a member of the so-called millenial generation (born between about 1982 and 2002). If that's the case you should know (if you don't already) that your generation is really wonderful, and that you will have a very different experience of the world than we xers did (an experience I would add much like the greatest generation, which fought in WW II). By the time millenials started being born, the boomers had by and large gotten their shit together, and were now taking care of their kids (the newborn ones anyhow - those "baby on board" window stickers arrived with the first millenials). The majority of millenials have grown up much more sheltered and well-parented than we xers, and as a result virtually every measure of social pathology, from youth crime to drug use to suicide to teen pregnancy has fallen dramatically since the last xers entered adulthood. Xer lives - as colorful and fucked up as they often are - make for enormously good art, but make no mistake about: we are a miserable, messed up bunch.

I don't worry too much about millenials taking xer art, whether its Ellis novels or gangsta rap, too seriously, but just know that however glamorous xer land may seem (and Ellis's novels are I would not unrealistic in this regard) there's a great deal of very real human suffering there. Growing up I saw more than my share of kids with more money, brains, and good looks than anyone deserves destroy themselves, and it just wasn't a pretty sight. I know what its like to hold an incredibly handsome, rich son of a major figure in the tech world in your arms as he cries, telling you he can't stop using heroin on his own, and how ashamed and scared he is that he has to be the one to tell his father he's a junkie. I know what its like to end up in an ER with an IV stuck in your arm, oxygen tubes stuck in your nose, and electrodes stuck to your chest, with one doctor lecturing you about the perils of cocaine and meth (as if by this point the thought hasn't occurred to you), and another one telling you that the results of your EKG are not entirely normal - especially for a boy your age. I was so scared, and young. I remember pulling the covers and blankets up over my head and wanting to disappear.

If anyone is interested in generational demographics, they should read William Strauss and Neil Howe's books (especially Generations and the Fourth Turning). According to their theory (which is quite compelling) there are repeating cycles of generational types in Anglo-American history, and generation x is very similar to the lost generation (which included Fitzgerald, Hemingway, O'Keefe, TS Eliot, etc), and the millenials are very similar to the greatest generation. My email is kenof98112@yahoo.com if anyone is interested.

PS Sorry for the long post. Sometimes I blather.

[10] On Apr-10-2005, wrote:

Please... tell us more Kenneth, we have so much to learn.

[11] On Apr-10-2005, mitch wrote:

It's that time of day where I have been up all day to such the point that I am not sure if it is really late or really early in the night.
I have spilled white wine on this girl's parent's living room floor with white carpet and I am trying everything in my power not to think about how in about an hour I am going to have to refain from lying and tell her about how drunk and wired and stoned I was last night to spill a whole bottle of red wine. I'm so scared I'm not thinking about it.
The whole house is dark and not lit and everyone is sleeping on the couch, chairs, even one girl might be sleeping on a nail bed. They do not look dead. They look boring. Looking at the new daylight coloring in their faces I get that same feeling at grandmother's funeral. Looking at these possible fuckable people is like looking at grandmother's dead body in her coffin. Not sure what I am looking at.
Was never sure why I needed to see my grandmother in that coffin. Do not think I will ever understand why I needed to see her dead to be proved she was and is dead.
There are only two things I am looking forward for today. Breakfast. And coke. Breakfast will be pancakes and scramble egss layered in chocolate sauce. Coke will be a wall of numbness that I will walk straight into.
Listening to a shit band called The Photo Album. And it is either this or the OST from he motion picture Alfie. Scroll down on iTunes. Change this for The OC Mix One.
Search for pills. In all the rooms the space is playing hide and seek with me. Pretend space is not here. The space knows I knows it knows I know it is here. Close door. Find four painkillers. Swallow. Go back to wine stain damp smell living room.
And it justs to me that last thing I need right now is to hear about how I belong to the millenial generation.
Waiting for boredom.

[12] On Apr-10-2005, LJA wrote:

That was a brilliant essay Kenneth, as a Millenial (born in the mid 80s) the temptation to glamorise BEE's world is all too easy and you're quite right that it makes great art but much as one can enjoy Bosch's work one wouldn't want to inhabit one of his paintings. The quality of BEE's art often prevents the reader (especially of my generation) from appreciating exactly how bleak the world he portrays really was.
Very inciteful.
LJA

[13] On Apr-10-2005, Logan wrote:

Mitch... that was some seriously contrived bullshit.

[14] On Apr-11-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"That was a brilliant essay Kenneth, as a Millenial (born in the mid 80s) the temptation to glamorise BEE's world is all too easy and you're quite right that it makes great art but much as one can enjoy Bosch's work one wouldn't want to inhabit one of his paintings."

Thank you. One of the great hallmark millenial traits is politeness, and you are clearly no exception. Your parents raised you by and large very, very well, and my experience (as well as the statistics) suggests that most of them probably wouldn't allow their millies to descend into Ellis-esque debauchery. It may seem hard to believe, but the same boomers who gave the millenials such sheltered and structured upbringings were extremely laissez faire with us xers. In fact, in many cases they (along with the older generations - the interwar "silents" and the greatest generation) didn't simply look the other way at our bad habits, but actually enabled them in one sense or another. It occurred to me recently that at my high school graduation party in Malibu the (mostly boomer) adults - teachers, administration (including the headmasters), and parents - were all getting shit faced with us. It didn't seem particularly odd at the time that the assistant headmaster was pouring me champagne, and that no one seemed to care that we weren't just drinking (by the end of that night I was also high on weed, opium - which I had brought - and two hits of acid), but the changing cultural climate in the country has really driven home the point that that time - like the 1910s and 1920s - was unusual.

[15] On Apr-11-2005, Jason wrote:

I would have thought the open topic would have been slightly more interesting than the majority of people writing things that people couldn't give a damn about. But, hey, whatever.

Has anyone got any literacy recommendations that take on a similar societal commentary as Ellis'? As a teen, alot of references in Ellis' novels are lost on me, but I still find them completly riviting. So, hey, anything you could throw at me would be awesome.

[16] On Apr-11-2005, christopher wrote:

Somebody mentioned Twelve. I have seriously considered burning my copy. I rue the day I ever bought this, as in out my hand into my pocket to retrieve actual MONEY to exchange for this absolute rubbish. Nick McDonnell's godfather owns the publishing company, his parents are heavily connected in the literary world, he got his buddies (like Didion and Thompson) to write blurbs in which they claimed he's the "real thing" or similar nonsense. Think about it: McDonnell has written a book about the horrible results of priveledge amongst the young...and yet he uses his parent's connections to get the book published. Can I get an I-R-O-N-Y!

[17] On Apr-11-2005, wrote:

The only mention of TWELVE was by me, I think, and that was to reccomend its immediate removal from the "sugessted reading list" for the reasons Christopher stated.

He's a decent, competent writer, I suppose, though we have no idea how heavily edited the thing was. If you must read it, get a copy from the library. Take the $14 you would have spent and pick up a copy of Play It As it Lays. Or Project X by Jim Shepard.

[18] On Apr-11-2005, christopher wrote:

The thing is, it's hardly anything knew: a lonely teen kills his peer group in the "unexpected" climax. This topic has been done to death recently in both film and book. I am presuming it was heavily-edited: the book wasn't that good, or that impressively-written, and I would bet it was even worse when he handed the original manuscript in. His daddy would have wanted this published by hook or by crook, and I am sure the editors spent many sleepless nights trying to carve it into something acceptable. It's a horrible insult to all those struggling writers: that even the literary world is so corrupt and more about connections and nepotism than actual talent.

[19] On Apr-12-2005, wrote:

kenneth - i liked the insight and that makes sense of it. and yes, i was born in 1987. i have no idea where my generation is going.

and as for twelve - that is nothing compared to 'normal girl.' talk about connections? erica jong and jonathan fast as your parents... i normally wouldn't hold that against a writer, but the book was awful!

why is bret making this a movie?

[20] On Apr-13-2005, pragmatist wrote:

a question:

has anyone taken note of excerpts/chapters from "less than zero" and "american psycho" which are, if not similar, then exactly the same scenario and dialogue but in different contexts? one good example, the character clay and his mother exchange the same dry small talk at a cafe, which patrick bateman exchanges with his mother at 'sandstone'...
there are other subtle instances of similarity, especially between these two books, and i wanted to know if anyone has any thoughts or insight on these. besides socio-economic background, what do bateman and clay have in common?

[21] On Apr-13-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"i have no idea where my generation is going."

More than likely to war my friend, but that's for another blog...

[22] On Apr-13-2005, suicide wrote:

TWelve as a film?...starring Jsutin Timberlake?

[23] On Apr-15-2005, suck my cock wrote:

suck my cock you pathetic faggots

[24] On Apr-15-2005, beest wrote:

Suck My Cock, I don't want to assume anything but the tone of your post suggests you are a member of the so-called Millenial generation (born between about 1982 and 2002). I realize it can be difficult for you to avoid traps that we gen xers have inadvertently laid in your path, such as the glamorization of homosexuality. This particular notion has led to such modern phenomenons as metrosexuals, Starbucks and the popularity of Carson Daly. Your post seems to express both anger towards and acceptance of your homosexual plight. The fact that you lash out "suck my cock" for no reason shows your anger but asking "faggots" to complete this act shows your acceptance (and longing)... thus making you a complete homo. I know this can be very confusing but the next time you get to feeling this way don't write a mindless post, just do what I do: Put on a diagonally striped button down, grab a Grande Mocachino, and stroke it to TRL until the cows come home...

[25] On Apr-16-2005, mike wrote:

hey! i'm a 1982-2002, we don't all act like assholes.

but who am i kidding, "suck my cock you pathetic faggots," is a very millenial generation comment. oh well.

[26] On Apr-16-2005, wrote:

"suck my cock you pathetic faggots"

I didn't realize people this dumb could actually get on the internet. Count me as impressed.

[27] On Apr-16-2005, James wrote:

the time has come. if anyone knows any links or anywhere i can get a pirated leaked copy of lunar park i'd love to hear about it.

I know, i know. But I don't care. I'm going to buy several copies anyway. I WANT a leaked copy. It'll also be great fun to read..illicit material.

I've looked everywhere..

[28] On Apr-16-2005, Tom wrote:

In response to Pragmatist:

I have just finished reading Less Than Zero a few hours ago. Did you notice the scene in which Clay is preparing to leave Blair after making love is EXACTLY the same as that in which Patrick Bateman leaves that woman's bedroom in American Psycho? Even up to the stuffed black cat.
In American Psycho, the woman, whose name I can't remember at the moment and I don't feel like getting up and searching through the book for the scene, asks Patrick if she will "see [him] before Easter"..."If I don't, have a good one." Is the same as Blair's asking Clay if she will see him before Christmas. I'm sure there are some more in there.

[29] On Apr-16-2005, Tom wrote:

I'm curious as to the scene involving the snuff film in Less Than Zero. I see a definite influence of the works of the Marquis De Sade upon Ellis. Anyone who has read 120 Days of Sodom, an undertaking that requires both a thick skin and a wide attention span, knows that Sade portrays the wealthiest in society as having to indulge in the most violent and beastial acts in order to satisfy their sexual appetites. Does anybody else feel a Sade influence upon Ellis, because I have not heard of any.
While this scene alone may be not be convincing evidence of a Sade influence, a latter scene in which the boys are taking advantage of a bound twelve year old girl sounds like it may have come straight out of (the tamer part) of 120 Days of Sodom, especially Rip's justification of the act by claiming that people have a right to take what they want, which is basically the entire message of Sade's novel.

[30] On Apr-17-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"Anyone who has read 120 Days of Sodom, an undertaking that requires both a thick skin and a wide attention span, knows that Sade portrays the wealthiest in society as having to indulge in the most violent and beastial acts in order to satisfy their sexual appetites."

That's a great point, although I'm not sure that the rich have sexual appetites any different than the middle class, just fewer inhibitions and less expectation of judgment or consequences. As one of my English teachers in high school (who was also an Anglican priest, and gay, and alcoholic) used to say (quoting Johnson I think): "the rich are above contempt, and the poor beneath it."

[31] On Apr-17-2005, Kyle wrote:

To Tom:

>>Did you notice the scene in which Clay is preparing to leave Blair after making love is EXACTLY the same as that in which Patrick Bateman leaves that woman's bedroom in American Psycho?

I just always assumed something similar happened in Bret's own life and he found it inspirational for whatever reason.

[32] On Apr-18-2005, pragmatist wrote:

thank you for elaborating on connections.
i read in an interview that ellis has never read any Sade, so the influence is not direct.

[33] On Apr-18-2005, Tom wrote:

Thanks for clearing that up for me. However I do find it interesting that the upper class is accussed in literature more than once of having no or little regard for the lives of the weaker. Sade shows this excently, but a similar theme is found in Dickens as well. Now, I don't really think it would seem plausible to compare American Psycho to a Christmas Carol...so I won't do it. But we see the same theme of the inhumanity of the powerful towards the weak in A Tale of Two Cities when we are told the story of what happened to the family of Madame DeFarge (I think most of you know what I'm talking about).
But I do see a striking parallel between the backgrounds and works of both Sade and Ellis (and if he doesnt like being compared to Sade, too bad). I think I read that Ellis grew up in a similar environment in which his characters live. Sade was a Marquis and also focussed much of his work upon the aristocracy, or the encounters of the ordinary people with the aristocracy(such as in Misfortune of Virtue which is a really fantastic novel and not nearly as graphic as his latter works). I could go on and on, but I won't. If anyone else here has read Sade and can either correct me or offer more examples it'd be appreciated.
-Tom

[34] On Apr-18-2005, Ben Johnson wrote:

I must admit that I am very interested in learning about the millennials( my generation). I actually was not sure what the term meant until last week. If anyone has any good info on how I can learn about them and their role in the Fourth Turning that would be great!

[35] On Apr-18-2005, Tom wrote:

In response to Ben Johnson:

"Millenials" is kind of an outdated term. I'm pretty sure that we have now been labeled "Generation Y." All I can really tell you is that the last Generation Y-"er" was born on December 31, 2002. If you want to learn more about our generation I suggest you research "Gen Y." I hope I've been a help.
-Tom

[36] On Apr-18-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"However I do find it interesting that the upper class is accussed in literature more than once of having no or little regard for the lives of the weaker."

That's not necessarily untrue. The wealthy people I've known in my life tend to be particularly magnanimous, smart, clever, and charming (although I have known more than a few little brats as well) in person, and although I don't know a great many politicians I would expect that they are similarly smart, clever, and charming in person. But I guess the thing is that you don't get to be rich (unless of course you inherit a vast fortune or win the lottery) by being nice, anymore than you get elected to office being nice. And its certainly true that both money and political power give people a sense of invincibility and omnipotence.

On the other hand though I've seen wealthy people do incredibly selfless and in some cases heroic things. Do you remember that scene in Less than Zero where Clay and his sisters witness the car on fire in Palm Springs, and his sisters want to stop and watch for their own sadistic pleasure, but he's a bit haunted by the image? A friend of mine in high school whose parents were filthy rich, and who got a brand new 535i for his 16th birthday, risked his life to save a woman whose car was stalled out in the #2 lane on the 405 freeway in the valley. Thats kind of a random example, but it was the one that came to mind.

With respect to sexuality and the rich, I think part of what Ellis is describing in his novels is generational (xer sexuality tends I think toward the polymorphously perverse in general) and probably part of it is specific to that particular class and regional context. As I think I said above, I went to a west valley prep school growing up (we used to play Buckley - the school Ellis went to - in sports) and there was definitely a culture of bisexual chic there, as well as at Sarah Lawrence. It just wasn't all that common for kids to get wasted and wake up in bed at 5:30 in the morning with some boy from your school (or girl if you happened to be one) lying next to you. That's just what people did. I have no idea if its still that way.

[37] On Apr-18-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"If anyone has any good info on how I can learn about them and their role in the Fourth Turning that would be great!"

Read William Strauss and Neil Howe's books Generations, the Fourth Turning, and Millenials Rising. They have a web presence too at fourthturning.com.

[38] On Apr-18-2005, Kenneth wrote:

Also, with respect to the whole question of Ellis-land and sexuality, it can't be emphasized enough that people are just as full of shit about things as people are generally - if not more so. At the risk of mentioning too much here, one of my female friends (who went to high school and college with me) said she "didn't want to end up with some dyke roomate" at Sarah Lawrence (as if she herself wasn't sleeping with boys *and* girls at the time). Then there was my own girlfriend at the time who didn't want to go see the Indigo Girls with me because they were "fat lesbians" (she was also sleeping with girls at the time). I remember not going to see some Tom Cruise movie because one of the boys with us didn't want to see "a fag movie." Not six weeks later he slept with one of my close male friends.

This whole sexual gestalt in some sense resembles what happens at British public schools, where rich boys and girls have no one to get with in adolescence but members of the same sex. The same is true traditionally of Arab and Latin cultures, where the prohibition against sex outside marriage generally made it easier to get with people of the same sex than people of the opposite sex (in Taliban Afghanistan [which is of course not Arab but makes my point for me nicely] the incidence of male homosexuality was in some areas - especially conservative Pashtun areas - above 50%). The difference between what I saw, and Ellis describes, is that there's really no prohibition against sex generally in this culture (the way there might have been 50 years ago when Kinsey first studied this stuff), and there certainly was no shortage of people of the opposite sex in Ellis-land. I don't necessarily think it was all empty hedonism (as it tends to be in his books) - although there was certainly more than a tinge of that - but more a mix of pretension, hedonism, and genuine sentiment, and affection. The world is complicated.

[39] On Apr-19-2005, Tom wrote:

In response to Kenneth:

I fully agree that in real life we cannot predict how someone will behave based on their bank account. I do know many well off kids (having gone to both HS with them and now being a student a NYU), and have no doubt that any of them would not want to watch a child burn on a flaming car engine. However, I must differ with you on point. I take what you have written to mean that you would expect to see more of a callous and unsympathetic personality in those who have made the fortune themselves, as opposed to those who have inherited it. While I this is a legitimate point of view without any doubt since it is based upon Darwinism, be it social or political, I feel that both the characters in Ellis' works and those in the works of Sade and Dickens were born into their wealth.
I think that Ellis is trying to paint a portrait of people who grew up and developed emotionally in such an environment as oppossed to someone like, say the creators of Google, receiving their fortunes only after having matured.
But then again we could say that "development" is irrelevant and that environment and power might allow us to act out our deeply held tendencies with differing amounts of freedom.
As far as the whole sexual aspects goes, I personally dont find the sex lives of Ellis characters (excluding the rape of the young girl, the snuff film, and of course Pat Bateman), as anything too out of the ordinary for people that age.

[40] On Apr-19-2005, beest wrote:

Just one thought. I've been reading a few of the posts comparing Sade and Ellis because Sade's wealthier characters have a blatant disregard for the weak. You can say the same of ellis's characters but only because they have a blatant disregard for everyone but themselves, the weak are just lumped in with the rest. Patrick Bateman slaughters a bum just as easily as a co-worker. the bum out of disgust and the co-worker out of envy. You can also say he sees himself in his victims and self-loathing is part of his motive but that's a completely different topic all together. Maybe we'll save that for the AP open thread.

[41] On Apr-20-2005, kieran wrote:

i was just wondering which character out of all of bret's fiction do you think is based on himself?

BTW Nick McDonnell doesn't deserve to be breathing oxygen let alone publishing books.....what a c.u.n.t!

[42] On Apr-20-2005, Kenneth wrote:

"i was just wondering which character out of all of bret's fiction do you think is based on himself?"

Clay.

[43] On Apr-20-2005, beest wrote:

fuck

[44] On Apr-20-2005, Tom wrote:

Hopefully not Patrick Bateman. I have to agree with Kenneth and say Clay.

[45] On Apr-23-2005, Marc wrote:

Has anyone seen the movie "Nowhere" by Greg Araki? I love it, not many others do; but there is a scene which was taken (copied) from Less than Zero and I wondered if anyone else knows what I'm talking about. Also, what's the deal with "watching television with the sound off"? It's in a lot of Ellis' books. And finally, does anybody have a family tree or whatever of all Ellis' characters in his books?

[46] On Apr-25-2005, James wrote:

Hey, that's a great idea about the family tree of Ellis's characters.
Of course Ellis himself must have one.
We should too!
Anyone?

[47] On Apr-27-2005, Sirayderf wrote:

I had been thinking of setting up a map for the characters in Glamorama. Impossible. Do you think you can do it for all the characters of all the books? good luck then..

Just finished reading Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney.

If you can grab this book, then go for it at once!!
It goes along the lines of Ellis's favourite themes, though a bit more on the psychological / emotional register. McInerney has this unique sense of closure that makes every chapter an experience in itself.
I loved it.

[48] On May-05-2005, Marc wrote:

What I was thinking about was just how a lot of people are connected in Ellis' books. Patrick Bateman(AP,TROA) is Sean Bateman's (TROA etc.) older brother. Victor (TROA, Glamorama) has numerous connections to Lauren Hynde (TROA, Glamorama, AP) Jaime Fields (Glamorama, TROA)connections with Victor, etc..... And I always wondered two things: Is Clay from Less that Zero the "guy from LA" in the party scene in Rules of Attraction? and also in ROA when Victor goes on his Europe trip doesn't a bomb go off somewhere? I always wondered if that bomb was the work of Bobby and his terrorists in Glamorama?

[49] On May-10-2005, Sirayderf wrote:

the bomb scene does appear in the RoA movie, but I double checked and it does NOT exist in the book (though I might have missed something, but I don't think so). However, this is a very nice reference from Avery's part. Made me go "Hey! wait! a bomb!! what the...!" in the theatre.

[50] On May-11-2005, Frundsberg wrote:

hello... kenneth, who said that the homosuality incidence in taliban afghanistan is in certain area around 50%??? where did you get this??? sounds like bullshit to me, but I am curious.