Emo Kids Can't Mosh. This and other things learned.

That is just one of the things I learned at the Fall Out Boy concert I attended Wednesday night. I know, I know. You're all thinking, "Fall Out Boy? WTF, Johnny?" Well, I admit it. I like that band. I don't wear black eyeliner or paint my nails black, but "Sugar, We're Goin' Down" is probably one of my current favorite pop tunes. In fact, that whole CD is damn good. I realize the fact that I like their music is probably the kiss of death for this band, but I am not crazy about their newest release, so there's still hope for them. 

So the story goes like this. Last night, since I knew the concert was happening a scant few miles from my house, I decided I'd check for tickets right before show time. About one out of every 20 times, depending on the show, some last minute radio promo tickets or what not show up back in the pool, and you can get pretty good seats. So for fun I checked it out. I thought at the very least it might be fun to grab the wife and go sit on the lawn. Well, when I searched for tickets and saw PIT, I knew they were right in front of the stage. Then I saw seats 14 &15, which generally puts you dead-center, so I clicked the "purchase" button. What I thought that meant was I would get prompted for my credit card number and all that crap, and I could decide based on the total price and a conversation with my wife as to whether I should make said purchase. Apparently, when ticketmaster already has your credit card on file and you're logged in, clicking the "purchase" button means "Thank you for your purchase. Please come again."

There may have been a little more blame to be placed on me not paying attention to wtf I was doing while on the phone at the same time, but there it was. I was the proud owner of two pit seats. Except there were no actual seats. I called the box office to confirm where my seats were. I said, "Hey, I just ordered tickets and I'm trying to find out what GAOPIT means, and where seats 13 and 14 are in relation. The lady on the other end of the phone said, "Yes, the pit is general admission. The seat numbers are for reference only." I said, "So...what? There are no seats, or you just grab whatever seat you can?" "There are no seats. It's standing room only. As I said, the seat numbers are for reference only." I still had no idea wtf she meant by that, so I asked her. "What are they referencing? How many imaginary seats you've sold?" She didn't like that too much, and immediately started trying to wrap up our conversation. So that was pretty much the end of that. I hung up and then gently broke it to my wife that we'd be standing in the pit, and that if she got carried away on some body-surfing wave of 18 year olds, I'd meet her back at the car after the show and we'd compare bruises. Strangely enough, she was OK with that. So was I, because I've never been in a mosh pit before, and I figured it was about damn time. 

My second mistake after buying the tickets was not paying attention to the lineup. There were FOUR warm-up bands on this tour. Four. Which, in case you are all keeping track, is exactly three too many. The list (in order of least suckage to ultimate suckage) was: The Academy Is, +44, Cobra Starship, and some rapper dude named Paul Maul or Paul Wall or some shit like that selling his grills from the stage. He said "what it do" a lot. I don't know. I don't speak rapper. The only one of the four I had actually heard of was The Academy Is, and they were pretty good. However, we got there at 6pm and we could have easily showed up 3 hours later and still had plenty of time to find our seats and watch FOB. Yeah. I call them FOB now. I was in the pit, mofo. Don't mess with me. My third mistake was not listening to my wife when she wanted to smuggle in more than 2 little bottles of vodka, because it was a looooong, dry night. When a bottle of water cost 4 bucks, I didn't even want to price out a beer. 

We sat around on the lawn for a while seeing the sights, then went down to the pit to get situated before FOB came on. I looked around and it was pretty empty. Other than a couple dozen teenage girls up against the rail, and maybe three or four skinhead dudes, a couple of stoners who were dead ringers for Wayne and Garth, and one squat, jar-headed fat guy with B.O. who I took to calling StinkBlock, it was just us, a few bouncers and what looked like some A&R guy for the band. There was also a lone freaky looking goth boy wearing guyliner (thanks sarah), fingerless gloves with black nail polish, fishing lures dangling from his ears, and a name tag that said "Hello, My Name is DANCING KING." Name tag aside, he looked like he was a shitload closer to the other end of the royalty spectrum from what I could see. So needless to say, there didn't look like there was going to be much moshing going on. I think that as emo kids, they are more depressed than angry and they just don't have the energy needed to do anything other than jump up and down in one spot for a few seconds when their excitement overwhelms them. I am pretty sure that when emo kids actually do bump into each other and get upset, they just cut themselves instead of each other. 

Relieved that we weren't going to have to defend our lives, we just leaned against the back railing with the A&R guy and watched. We did have a single mosher -- one of the skinheads -- but a single mosher does not a mosh pit make. This guy was absolutely batshit crazy, and he was moshing with...well, himself mostly. He would ram into his girlfriend every once in a while for good measure, but for the most part, he was just slapping at his own head. He knew every word to every song, and he never stopped moving/dancing/screaming and/or dry humping his girlfriend. I think the emo kid in front of us was a little scared of him. Or turned on by him. It was hard to tell through the waves of angst radiating off his body. Other things I learned at the FOB show: (1) If you flash the band with your camera, your camera will get taken away. (2) If you flash the band with your boobies, you will get taken away. 

The show itself was pretty impressive. It was a little tough to hear when you're that close, and the acoustics at SPAC suck, so sound quality wasn't great. As a spectacle, however, it was really well done. They giant video screens were going non-stop, and the pyrotechnics were amazing. The drummer was on a riser at the very back of the stage that had to be 30 feet in the air, and there were flamethrowers to either side of him, pointing toward the ceiling. When these things went off, I could feel the blast of heat on my face from 50 feet away. He was maybe 4 feet away from them, and I am 99.9% sure he has no eyebrows or arm hair right now. We left during the last song and I'm not sure if there was an encore or not. On the way out I gave our tickets to a couple of girls who were going nuts at the railing that separates the lawn seats from the inside seats, and pointed down to the stage. They took off running, so I hope they got to see something before the show was over. I think I'm getting too old for this shit. Will that stop me from going? Probably not. My plan is to just hang out in the back, drink smuggled vodka and pretend we have kids there. Who's with me?

Overheard at Starbucks.

Overheard #1:

Mom: "Little girls who are lucky enough to have fancy dollhouses shouldn't jam their fingers into their noses."

Overheard #2:

Girl: "Oh, that guy behind the counter is really nice. I should have taken off my glasses so he'd recognize me."

Guy: "So...you're like Clark Kent now?"

Two things I can live without ever seeing or even comtemplating again after this post.

Friday morning, I got in to the office around 6:10 am or so. As you can imagine, the building is not exactly teeming with life at that hour. There are a few other early birds like me, but for the most part it's pretty barren.

I like my coffee. I generally drink a full cup on the way to work. What this means from a practical standpoint is that (a) I don't fall asleep and drive into a bridge abutment, and (b) by the time I get to work I have to pee.

I went to my desk, and got involved in rebooting smtp servers or some such, and by the time I was done, my bladder was close to its limit. This was the unfortunate reason that I burst through the men's room door so quickly at approximately 6:45, only to surprise the crap out of some person I never saw before. What was this person doing the exact second I came crashing in?

He was diligently checking out his bare ass in the mirror, of course. What else would someone be doing in a bathroom at 6:45 in the morning?

Why, I do not know. Perhaps he missed a spot shaving. Perhaps he went hiking Thursday and was doing a post-hike tick inspection. As I said, I don't know, and don't want to know.

Also, before your imagination runs away with you, it's not like he was standing on the sink or anything. For some unknown reason, our men's room contains a full-length mirror. Presumably, this mirror is not for ass-inspection, but who am I to say? Other people might (and apparently do) have a different opinion on that matter. Anyway, he quickly zipped up and left, and now I have someone else at work to avoid in the hallways.

That was the first thing. The second thing - while not quite as shocking on the surface - has deeper implications. The two handicap-accessible stalls have railings in them. Draped over these railings you will sometimes see reading material that consists of newspapers, magazines, and other assorted printed matter. I never, ever touch this, because I know the dirty habits of my coworkers, and I am 100% sure that no matter what it is, it contains traces of fecal matter on its well-thumbed pages.

Anyway, the thing I noticed hanging over the railing the other day was: A Victoria's Secret catalog. I suppose there is a remote possibility that some guy was looking for a present for his wife, but I'm thinking not.

All I know is, I don't ever want to walk in on anything that involves that.

It's only "All Ages" if you count the parents.

Last night my wife and I went to see a relatively new band called The Click Five. They have a brand new single called "Jenny" that is well-crafted and catchy as hell. Whether it has any chance of seeing airplay remains to be seen. They had some modest success a couple of years ago with a tune called "Just the Girl" written by Adam Schlesinger from Fountains of Wayne, but this upcoming CD features a brand new lead singer.

The show was billed as "all ages" and from going to previous all ages shows, we thought we knew what to expect. Normally, you go in, get your bracelet or stamp, then head to the bar where the grups are hanging out segregated from the kids, and you drink and listen to some good music.

The girl who took our ticket looked to be about 17. She handed us a little photocopied sheet from the FYE store that said we could meet the band and pre-order the CD after the show. We took the flyer and walked into what can only be described as the cafegymitorium.

There were maybe 40 people milling about, and unfortunately for the band, this number never increased. The average age appeared to be somewhere around 14. This average included the parents, and, as it turns out, the band members themselves. As they become more popular I'm sure the crowds will get bigger. I think they will, as long as the lead singer's voice doesn't change when he hits puberty. I'm kidding. But damn, they were young. The guitar player looked like he might have needed a ride from his mom to get to the gig, but he was fantastic.

After a diligent inspection that consisted of one quick glance around the mostly empty rectangle of a room, we realized there was definitely no bar. There was an upright cooler case with soda and water and red bull outside, but that was it. We instantly decided that if we couldn't buy overpriced drinks and get buzzed, we'd buy overpriced red bull and get wired.

After we stood around for 20 minutes not knowing what to do with ourselves, we noticed a couple of guys pushing a giant cart full of stacked chairs. "Oh," my wife said. "They must be putting chairs out after all. Maybe we're just early." The guys with the chairs then proceeded to put a single row of chairs flush with the back wall of the room.

That was it.

As it turns out, this was "Parent's Row," and it seems that most of the parents either knew this from previous concerts, or as result of some parenting gene found deep in the reptilian level of the brain. Even before the last chair was down, everyone over the age of 25 was doing the zombie shuffle to the back of the room like the sound guy just popped the top on an extra-large case of fresh brains.

Since we were already standing awkwardly in the back trying to pretend our red bulls had vodka in them (and next time, they will - oh yes.) we decided we'd have a seat as well. Our only other option to Parent's Row was to go sit on the floor by the stage with the slutty 12 year olds who I am fairly certain all have The Osbornes for parents.

I really couldn't believe what I was seeing at times. I saw a 13 year old doing a dance that would have made a seasoned stripper blush. I saw another girl who was probably 15 sporting a full sleeve tattoo. WTF? Sometimes I'm so glad I don't have any kids, because I don't think I would handle it very well if my daughter came home from the "library" with a neck tat. I wanted to jump up off my seat every once in a while and yell something like "Melanie! Stop that! It's disgusting!" but then I didn't. With my luck someone in parent's row would have a kid named Melanie who just happened to be a little tart and then the next thing you know the cops would be asking me all sorts of questions about where I knew her from and well... I just didn't want to go down that road.

The opener was an amazing singer named Kate Voegele -- from Cleveland of all places -- who has a voice that's a cross between Patty Griffin and Avril Lavigne. She was great, and after her set we went to tell her so. I said, "You have a great voice. You remind me of Patty Griffin" and she said, "Thanks. You remind me of my dad." No, not really. She said that Patty Griffin was her idol, and she couldn't believe I said that. Her dad was there, and thank god he looked older than me. He saw me talking to his talented daughter and said, "Back off, perv." No, again I lie. He just asked me who I mentioned and when I said Patty Griffin, he seemed pleased. It was funny because on stage she had such a presence but off stage she didn't look old enough to get into an R-rated movie. At any rate, her record comes out on May 22nd on myspace records of all places. Even though she looks 14, she apparently just turned 20 and writes all her own songs. Check her out. For all you Cleveland people, her CD release party is at the Cleveland House of Blues on 05/24/2007 at 09:00 PM. Get tickets and see her now, because I predict she's going to go places. Trust me, it'll be worth the ten bucks.

The Click Five were really pretty good, considering this was only their second show on the tour. They had some technical difficulties with some mic stands and what not, but they laughed it off and even made up a song about their roadie "Steve [Who] Saved The Day" when he brought out another stand. They all had that Lords of Dogtown mop top that you see everywhere these days, and that I personally may or may not have sported as a pre-teen in the mid-70s. To put it another way, they looked like a bunch of skate punks in suits and ties. It was funny to see this new band trying to look like OKGo in 2005 who were trying to look like The Knack in 1979 who were trying to look like the Beatles in 1964. It all comes back to Lennon & McCartney eventually it seems.

At one point, the lead singer announced a song and said it was by Nick Lowe. I turned to my wife and said, "Besides you, me and the band, nobody in this room has even heard of Nick Lowe."

Damn these talented kids. They all make sick, but I'm really glad somebody is still making the good pop.

24 is on in ten.

I did something bad to a tendon in the back of my hand, so I can't touch-type very well.

I've been balls to the wall for the last two weeks doing freelance graphic design work at night.

I mentioned that my next post would be about my pets, and I have a lot of ex-pets to write about, however it's gonna be a few days. If anyone else out there has any good dead pet stories, lay'em on me. Maybe it'll pry a few more stories loose from the nooks and crannies of my mind.

What I'm saying here is that I think I see the light at the end of the tunnel. It might very well be a topless Rosie O'Donnell wearing a miner's helmet and a thong, but at this point I'll take what I can get.

I'll leave you with this, and let you fill in the blanks:



Yeah, I just grossed myself out a little bit there.

Actual conversation I had at a previous place of employment.

My Boss: Is this new problem ticket for the same issue as last time? Because it references the original problem.

Me: It's new. It's in our queue?

My Boss: Yeah, I'm not sure why. We're not the ones who own the TLA.

Me: I think because when this happened they figured it was a different issue even though it wasn't.

My Boss: I understand that, but in that case, since they own the TLA, they should own both problem tickets. It shouldn't hit our queue at all. Not if the TLA assigned to the app is the same.

Me: OK, I'll look into it. I think it's only an urgency 3 ticket anyway, so Steve may have just agreed to take it because it does relate to our systems now, whereas the original problem really didn't.

My Boss: OK. Keep an eye on it and let me know when it's closed.

Me: OK. Um, can I ask you a dumb question?

My Boss: Sure.

Me: I know I should probably know this but -- What's a TLA?

My Boss: It's a three letter acronym.

Me: Yes, I know that. But what does it stand for?

My Boss: Three Letter Acronym.

Me: You're telling me we have an acronym for an acronym.

My Boss: Yes.

Me: That's completely ridiculous.

My Boss: Yes.

Me: OK. I think that's all I have.

My Boss: OK. Talk to you soon. Bye.

Me: Bye.

Click.

This Just In!

I received this picture today via overnight FedEx. It was mailed yesterday morning from a MailBoxes, Etc. in San Diego, California:



There was nothing else in the envelope except a few grains of beach sand and one long, blonde hair. Maybe the rumors are true. Maybe he did fake his own death to escape his unwanted fame.

I want to believe that. I really do.

Searching For Spring

It's that time again. And by 'that time' I mean the time whereupon I rely on the other denizens of the web to write my blog for me. Without further ado, I present:

Fantastic Google Searches That Somehow Led People To My Site:

mary and joseph miracle - I think this person got disconnected before they could finish typing, because I did a similar search using just that criteria and found almost nothing. By adding the word "Whip" to the end, however, I found exactly what I believe they were looking for.




This stuff tastes so bad it's almost sinful.

butt plug pager - this idea has some possibilities. On the plus side, you'd always know when you got paged. I can't count the number of times I didn't notice a page because my pager was on my desk or in my coat pocket. On the negative side, it would make answering a page while you were in public pretty difficult. "Excuse me for a second." POP! "Yeah, it's my boss. I gotta take this."

old underwear germs - I need more clarification on this one. Are you looking for germs that exclusively inhabit old underwear? Or underwear germs of a specific age? Because these two things are not necessarily one and the same. It's all in the inflection, my friend.

my girlfriend is sleeping with the bass player - Let me guess. You're the drummer, aren't you? All I can say is get used to it.

retractile testicle stuck - Sometimes, when the last battery in my flashlight gets stuck in a similar fashion, I find that rapping the flashlight sharply on the edge of the kitchen counter can sometimes jar it loose. I've also had success dipping the end of the flashlight in boiling water. Another way: If you find someone to hold it very tightly, a firm tap on the end with a hammer can also get it unstuck. You might want to try something similar.

labia shows - You know, it's good to see labias branching out these days. They used to be such a one trick pony. It's really encouraging that they've been getting out there and giving the people what they want. I've even heard about this new Broadway labia show that is apparently the current "must see" when you're in NYC. I think it's sort of a rip-off of Cats, except they're all shaved bare.

humpy rabbit - Little known fact: This was one of the rejected cartoon mascot ideas for Trix cereal. They ultimately went with "Silly Rabbit" because "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for Kids" tested much better to the target demographic than "Humpy Rabbit, Tricks are for Prostitutes."

testicle hammock - This one intrigued me. On the off-chance that this person wasn't really searching for "banana hammock," I could almost see how a testicle hammock might have some appeal. I imagine it would be comfortable, supportive and the woven mesh would provide stellar ventilation. Of course, your junk would look like a bag of suet, so you'd want to keep it out of sight of birds and squirrels.

is it marmaduke that dog always makes me laugh - No, you must be confusing him with some other cartoon dog. That's the only explanation. Well, that's not quite true. There is one other explanation. The other explanation is that you are brain damaged and would laugh at a picket fence.

monkey peeing in coffee cups at restaurant - You need to be more specific. Do you want to know how to make this happen, prevent it from happening, know if it ever happened or just see pictures of it happening? I know, so many choices. I suggest you get a monkey, and then you'll be covered for all of the aforementioned possibilities. Of course, they're probably not going to let you into restaurants with him. After that first time, anyway.

is brown skidmarks in the front of your underwear a sign of your period? - Well, that depends. Are you a guy? If so, then no. If you are guy it just means you have yesterday's underwear on backwards. It also means you need to do a better job back there, Sheryl Crow be damned. If you are a girl, then that's different. While it's certainly within the realm of possibility that your period would manifest itself as a brown skidmark, I think you should first make sure that your creepy little brother hasn't been wearing your underwear and then putting it back in your drawer.

searching for oscar - I too, have been wondering about this. I haven't seen Oscar around lately, and your search got me to thinking. So I stopped at his crib to check up on him. When I got there, the cops were all over the place. I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but...

Oscar is dead.

I knew you wouldn't believe me unless I took a picture, so here you go:



Foul play is suspected. I'm not sure who finally caught up with him, but I asked around a little bit. Fat Jimmy over at the pawn shop told me he heard somebody yelling, then he heard what sounded like a garbage can getting kicked over. Some more yelling, then a single gunshot. Crazy Tina swore up and down that she saw a big-ass yellow bird fleeing the scene, but she was high on crack and pretty drunk at the time. So far police have come up empty.

Oscar, this 40's for you, Homes. Rest in peace, you smelly-ass SOB.

Until next time, whereupon I jump the shark and talk about my pets, Johnny out.

I can't believe it's been five weeks.

Yeah, I'm on pager duty again and it officially sucks it. Needless to say, I won't have a lot of time to write about the stuff percolating in my brain until this weekend sometime.

In other news, my credit card number got stolen and someone used it to buy a bunch of country CDs from a French music website. Capital One was on that like flies on shit, and called me the next day. Apparently my buying habits don't normally include purchases of country music from France, so all sorts of red flags went up. I could probably cause some real trouble if I ordered some rap music from Israel or something.

They blasted through their brownie points pretty quickly though when I called them back on the fraud line and got hung up on by some dude name "Steve Smith" who was clearly in Bangalore somewhere. After I punched in all sorts of information to the automated system, he came on the line. His job was to rattle off some charge amounts and stores and I was supposed to verify or deny using my card at those establishments. Apparently, he got pissed when I couldn't understand him and had to ask him to repeat himself a few times.

I was very nice about it too -- it's not like I was a dick or anything. Hell, he obviously spoke English way better than I spoke his native language, so I'm not sure why he got so angry so fast. Maybe he was upset about the 10,000 rupees he pissed away on that "How to speak with a American accent" 4 DVD set.

I even apologized for my lack of ability to understand whateverthefuck language he was half speaking. I said, "I'm sorry -- but I'm having trouble understanding you. Could you please repeat that company name again?" He replied with something very angry sounding and completely unintelligible, and then hung up on me.

I am pretty sure it was Hindi for "I'm going to use your card to purchase $1600 dollars worth of Ravi Shankar CDs, you American asshole" but I could be wrong.

After that, I started thinking, "Did I just get phished by an elaborate automated voice-recognition system?" I had punched in my account number, the last 4 digits of my social security number and my card code, and if the number was fake, I had just given up all that information willingly.

So I called the number on the back of my card to verify that the fraud number was real.

The nice lady confirmed for me that it was indeed just a pissed off Indian dude who worked the phones for Capital One.

So I guess that's better, but I still want to call him back and tell him he's an asshole.

Hot Fudge Sunday

This past weekend, me and the wife got a hankering for something bad. We both tend to eat pretty healthy, and as you all can attest, healthy=boring. With that in mind, we decided on complete decadence -- grilled ham and cheese on fresh Italian bread, with hot fudge sundaes for dessert. Since we had nothing to create these banana spits of our imagination, we stopped at a convenience store near the house.

Normally when I go into this place, I end up in line behind a half dozen truckers buying coffee and some lady who wants two hundred dollars worth of Lotto tickets. This time for some unknown reason, the place wasn't that busy.

I wandered over and picked up what I needed. Ice cream, of course, then hot fudge, crushed peanuts, bananas, pineapple and whipped cream. I carefully carried my stash up to the register and deposited it on the counter. The guy working the register was one of those cheerful cashiers who never shuts up, and obviously still lives in the basement at his mom's house.

The first thing he says is, "You know what would go perfect with this? A couple of our fresh-off-the-grill, all-beef hot dogs. They're 2 for $1.49. I shook my head and said, "No thanks. Just this." Hot dogs and ice cream really didn't sound like a great combination to me.

He rang my items up, chatting all the while. As he's bagging the sundae ingredients, he laughs heartily and says, "With all this stuff, I'll bet I know what you're having after dinner tonight!"

"Yeah," I replied. "Sex."

Apparently, he was easily embarrassed, because he turned a deep, tomato-red, and handed me my change without a word.

As I took the coins, I couldn't resist a parting shot. I leaned forward conspiratorally and added, "We use a LOT of food."

I think he cursed me though, because even with all those goodies, it didn't happen.

Now all I can think about is going back in there and buying a giant box of slim jims, some rope and a quart of motor oil just to see the look on his face.

Nothing to report.

I took a mental health day yesterday. It was a beautiful day, and I woke up a little later than normal, and decided to do something completely unrelated to my current work situation. So that entails being outside, and doing something other than staring at a computer screen like I am right now.

Because it was a perfect day, I decided I'd hike one of my favorite local mountains. It's not too difficult -- it's about 3 miles long and takes you to a little over 2,000 ft. It's got some nice views of Lake George once you get to the summit.

I took my camera with me, and while I didn't get too much that was very interesting, here's a few shots for you.

Sitting at a traffic light along the way, this bumper sticker made me laugh:

I agree wholeheartedly.

This is an old shack I saw:

From the top:

This snake and I played a game where he would stick out his damn tongue the second I took my eye from the viewfinder. As long as I was looking through the camera, he was tongue-less.



I was a little far away from this guy, but he was pretty neat.

That's all I have right now. I'll be back with something funny later this week.

If anything funny happens. If not, I'll just make something up like I normally do.

Man, I hate Lowe's.

I was wandering around in Lowe's today, and I stumbled on these modern marvels:

They were on sale for about a grand each, and I was beside myself with excitement. I immediately called the salesperson over, because I happen to be in the market and that's not a bad price. He started to tell me about all the cool features, but got annoyed when I kept interrupting his sales pitch. Not to brag, but I happen to know a little something about these bad boys, and all I wanted him to do was cut to the chase and show me the initiation sequence.

I was short on time, and I just wanted to see something go from Pod A to Pod B. Is that too much to ask?

Apparently so, because he insisted on rattling off a litany of features I didn't give a shit about. I told him I didn't really care if my transporter has 4 different "delicates" cycles. Granted, the whole laundry thing is a nice feature, and I wouldn't complain about not having to move wet clothes from the washer to the dryer, but really...when it comes down to it, that's just gravy. All that really concerned me was whether or not it could send drinks from the kitchen to the patio without effing them up. If it could do that, I told him, I'd buy the set on the spot.

After he told me he couldn't demo it because they weren't plugged in and there was no plumbing, I got a little skeptical. As a test, I asked him if he thought it would transport live animals. I even offered to go to the pound and get a kitten so we could try it, but he just got pissed at me and walked away shaking his head. He clearly had no idea what he was talking about.

I hate shopping at Lowe's. Nobody who works there knows dick about anything. In my book, they shouldn't even sell those things if they don't know how to operate them. You'd think that for eight to ten bucks an hour they would be able to find someone who could demo a simple transporter for god's sake.

Morons.

Good advice.

In an amazing coincidence, the local firehouse sign exactly mimics the troubleshooting instructions that ship with cheap chinese vibrators.

I've finally opened Pandora's sweet, sweet box.

A while back, John turned me on to something called the music genome project over at Pandora.com. You give it a band you like as a "seed band," and it'll go out and play a song by that band, and then it'll find a bunch of stuff from other bands that are similar in sound and play those songs. You have the ability to give each a thumbs-up or thumbs-down, and over time this will tweak your station more to your liking.

Unfortunately, I didn't have an internet connection capable of doing anything with that information at the time. Now that I have DSL, I've recently rediscovered the Pandora website, and I'm seriously thinking of buying this thing.

I got a tip on a fantastic group from Sarah over at OK Seriously, and used Jack's Mannequin as the seed band to create my radio station. So far I've discovered the following outstanding bands that are new to me:

Fielding, The GoStation, Josh Fix, The Stereo, Robbers On High Street, Ronan Keating, The Supernaturals, Wakefield, Evan And Jaron, The Skies Of America Move, The Whitlams, The Get Up Kids, Jonas Brothers, Voxtrot, The Apples, The Tickets and Golden Smog.

This thing is fantastic. Go try it for yourself. And if you like great pop music, go listen to Jack's Mannequin.

I am pretty sure Snow Patrol has things in common with Milli Vanilli.

I just got back from a trip to NYC. I went down for a concert -- Snow Patrol, OK Go and Silversun Pickups. We missed Silversun Pickups waiting in line for drinks. That sucked. They had Ketel One, so that did not suck. OK Go were great. They looked like they were having a blast, and I love seeing that.

Snow Patrol looked and sounded good too -- a little *too* good, truth be told. For instance, the background vocals sounded like a full chorus at all times. I could make out at least two distinct women's voices, and there was nary a woman on stage or off. At one point the bass player was playing something completely different than what we were hearing. It looked like he wasn't even plugged in. It didn't seem to matter to the teenagers in attendance, however. Damn, I felt old. But fuck it, we had fun anyway. A side note: The open cellphone camera is the new lighter. It looks pretty weird to see all these kids holding up their little screens.

Before the show, we went to dinner to sort of celebrate my friend's engagement. He made the reservations since he knows NYC. He's marrying a lovely woman from Australia, who happens to be a vegetarian. He has since become one himself. Needless to say, since he is now too physically weak to lift a fork and steak knife, he picked a vegetarian restaurant for our group dinner. That way we all got to eat with two very light bamboo sticks.

First, though, let's clear something up. I am not a vegetarian. I like to eat animals. In fact, I'll go a step further, and say we're supposed to eat them. That's why they taste so damn good. Granted, they're probably not too pleased with this arrangement, but the way I look at it is like this -- the animals had a good run. For thousands of years predators of all types hunted and killed humans for food and sport. Then our opposable thumbs allowed us to make the .308 and it was all over. So I feel no qualms about eating meat. Especially chickens. Those little bastards were ruthless right up until the early 1600's.

It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be -- however, I think a lot my willingness to eat stuff-I-know-not-what had to do with how much wine I consumed before dinner. Everything I ate tasted like an egg roll dipped in soy sauce. Or slime.

That being said, you know you're in trouble when "Protein" is an actual menu item. Also, the reviews of this place boasted "The best approximation of meat anywhere!" I wanted to order that, if only to actually utter the sentence, "Yes. I'll have the approximation of meat, please." but it wasn't on the menu. They weren't lying, though. This stuff tasted exactly like meat, if meat was actually flavorless and rubbery in texture. Unfortunately, my mother's famous pork chops aside, it's not. This was nothing at all like meat. Of any kind. This was coagulated soy milk through and through. I will say this, however. I am willing to bet that you could take a dog turd and deep fry it in their batter and then soak it in sweet and sour sauce and you wouldn't be able to stop at one.

There was something on the menu called "Autumn Rolls" and so we ordered them. We were curious as to whether they'd be full of brightly colored leaves. They weren't. I'm not sure what was in there, but big surprise -- it was deep fried. I'm not sure why, but I was continually caught off-guard by the appetizer plate. Mostly because I didn't know what was going to be hot or cold when I put it into my mouth. When you're expecting a nice warm egg roll sort of thing, and instead you get a mouthful of cold wheat gluten, it's tough to follow through.

Also, don't eat too much of this soy crap. From what I've read, it isn't the perfect food most vegetarians would have you believe it is.

Regardless, we had a great night in NYC. Drunk chicks, rock n' roll, vodka, you name it. I managed to get out of there without a tattoo on my ass, so there's that. Wait...goddammit.

McSweeney's Rejected Submissions #1

I've decided I'm going to try to write something for McSweeney's. If you haven't read the stuff there, go do it now. Some of it is hilarious, and some of it will leave you scratching your head and thinking, "Huh?" It's that sort of writing, and I love it. I've never submitted anything there before, and I'm sure I'll collect a virtual pile of rejection e-mails in the process, but I figured I would post my rejects here on the blog, you know, since it's mine and all that. Here's my first rejected attempt:

Via E-mail, The Real Spiderman Addresses His Issues With The Movie Franchise of the Same Name

Sam, I realize your third Spiderman movie is due out soon, and you're probably wondering why I didn't come forward with my concerns earlier. Well, to be honest, I thought I could just ignore it, but my therapist has convinced me otherwise. He said that the only way I'm going to get past this is if I learn to deal constructively with my anger. That being said, I'd like to get a few things off my chest. First of all, Kirsten Dunst??

Seriously?

Listen, I've been married to Mary Jane for a long time now, and Kirsten Dunst is no Mary Jane, I can tell you that. In case you haven't noticed, Mary Jane is a hot model. Just for the record, Kirsten Dunst is not a hot anything. Secondly, Tobey Maguire looks like a nice kid. You might want to have him hit the gym a little more. Just a suggestion. Also, I know you'll find out about this on Monday, so I wanted you to hear it from me first. It's not something I'm particularly proud of. Last night, I had a few too many and I tracked down the casting director and well ... I webbed his ass shut. I'm not normally that violent by nature, but please understand. You have no idea how tired I am of hearing MJ bitch about it. If I have to hear "I do NOT look like that flat-faced cow" one more time, I'm going to climb the fucking walls. More so. Casting problems aside, do you want to know the one thing that really bugs the shit out of me? This whole organic webbing concept of yours. Somehow, you arbitrarily decided that the movie version of me can just shoot organic webbing directly from his wrists. That is so disgusting to me that I can't even think about it -- not to mention the fact that it completely marginalizes my college degrees in chemistry and engineering. Do you think I just ordered the plans for my web shooters from the back of Popular Mechanics? Well, I didn't. I spent six long, painful years in college learning what I needed to know in order to build my web shooters from scratch -- and this Maguire kid gets to just "magically" squirt webbing? Fuck that, Raimi. I thought we were friends. The least you could do is invite me to the set for a consultation, but have you?

No, you have not.

And that, Sam, is truly what I am most upset about. You know I don't make much money taking pictures of myself for that dickhead Jameson. You know where I live -- you've been to my apartment for Christ's sake. I could have used a little help here, but no, instead you hire that asshole Johnny Storm as your so-called "consultant." He lives in a penthouse at the top of his family-owned building and he doesn't even know me. And so far, I haven't seen dollar one of those royalties you promised me. You know what? I'm done with this. I'm done with you. This whole deal sucks. I hope you get hit by a car, you greedy son of a bitch. Sincerely, Peter Parker Friendly Neighborhood Spiderman ps - nice CGI job on the alien symbiote costume.

I am willing this week to be over. It's not working.

Tonight, I'm supposed to have my piano lesson, but this week I'm on something called "Pager Duty" which basically means I am a slave who is required to stay near my laptop and a high-speed internet connection at all times. It also means that I don't get a lot of sleep at night because my pager is nice enough to alert me every time one of our gazillion servers gets a little gassy and needs to be burped. I haven't had time to practice my sad chops at all this week, so I'm skipping it. I'd probably just end up rebooting servers from the piano bench all night anyway.

The lessons are going slowly, but I don't have brick hands any more. Now I just have these completely uncontrollable and apparently boneless protuberances between my middle finger and my pinky that don't seem to be connected to anything resembling my brain. In fact, even though on the outside they look like fingers, they are not. They are imposters, and I think they may actually be chinese spies. They just sit there and take detailed notes as they watch all my other fingers do stuff. They are shitty spies though because you'd think they'd want to blend in more so their cover doesn't get blown, but who knows. I don't speak chinese finger.

Oh, and if I haven't mentioned enough about pager duty sucking, here's another thing -- when it's your turn, it goes from Monday morning to Monday morning. Included in that stretch of time, for those of you who may not be awake yet, is the entire weekend. Also you might be surprised to learn that it's generally frowned upon to be intoxicated during potential crisis calls. You put those two things together and it means that right around 11pm on Saturday night, you almost hope your pager goes off so you don't feel even more cheated.

In other news, the pot-hole infested dirt road that leads to my piano teacher's house caused me to bottom out my car, and now something is effed up underneath. Whatever it is, it's making horrible sounds, and I know it can't be good. I haven't looked yet, but I am pretty sure I have been dragging this around under my car all week:



OK, I gotta go, my pager is going off and I think that means the tamagotchi needs to be fed or some shit.

Two things I do not anticipate ever needing.

I was at the drugstore yesterday trying to find a deodorant that doesn't smell like something my dad would use. The problem is that I am out of the stuff I normally use (Polo Sport), and you can't buy it at any drugstore around here. Because I'm a sucker, it's ridiculously expensive and I have to go to a store like Macy's to get it. I have been using some sort of shitty smelling Mennen Speed Stick called "Ocean Surf" which smells less like the ocean and more like some kind of automobile air freshener. It was supposed to be a stand-in until I could get more of my normal stuff, but I couldn't stand to smell it one more day. So anyway, that's how I ended up cruising the aisles at CVS. I bought something made by Adidas, and it smells OK-not-great. Servicable. Only slightly whorish.

After I bought it, I was thinking about the whole idea of Adidas making pit sticks. That's pretty diverse, since I only remember Adidas from their sneakers and warm up suits.

So now that you are intimately familiar with the olfactory nuances of my armpits, I will get to the meat of this post. While I was perusing the aisle of the stuff of man-whores and picking up some more shampoo, I saw a couple of hair care products for men that I (with luck) will never use. The first is not so much a hair care product as it is a lack of hair care product. Check this out:

Yikes. Head Wipes. They are kind of like those little moist towelettes you use after you eat chicken wings, except they are more expensive and a little bigger. They claim to gently clean and freshen your head. The gentle part is good, because really, who wants to brutally clean and freshen their head? Not me, I can tell you that.

I have to confess that I didn't realize that bald heads can sometimes have that not-so-fresh feeling. Also, I just sort of figured that a shiny head was normal, and maybe even desirable in the bald circles, since that's normally what I see. Perhaps someone should step up and simply claim it to be so. Then you wouldn't need to chicken-wipe your head three times a day -- you could just Turtlewax that bad boy once in the morning and be done with it. And can someone please get Foreigner out of my brain? Thank you.

The other hair treatment I saw was this:

Now, as I've said. I am not bald -- I have hair. Some might say a lot of it. Too much, even. So I am a prime candidate for this product. I am this company's target market. That being said, there is no fucking way I am putting this stuff in my hair.

The Henna part, OK -- there's some wiggle room there. The 'n' placenta part is where I draw the line. I don't care if this shit is like stem cell rejuvenation for my scalp and smells like fresh strawberries and cream, I am not rubbing placenta on my body. Anywhere.

Why do they have to call it what it is? Doesn't this company have a marketing department? If they do, I'm betting it's still in the embryonic stages.* They may as well have called it Henna 'n' Afterbirth for god's sake.

This product has to win the worst marketing of the year award for, hell...for ever. All I'm saying here is that they need to change this name if they are serious about wanting to sell it to normal and fine people who do not paint their fingernails black and worship satan. They could maybe stick with the afterbirth naming convention, but call it HENNA/AB. Make it sound scientific instead of disgusting. I mean, even the guys over at Purina know you don't call your brand of dog food "bull penis and chicken guts" if you want to move units. You call it something like "Beef 'n' Chix.*"



*I think I rented that video once in college.
*I know, and I'm sorry.

I want my eggplant, goddammit.

Last night was my company's big annual dinner/dance, and I decided to go -- mostly because my friend Gutu kept badgering me until I said I would. I figured at the very least, it would be some good food, good company and some decent music. I was wrong.

It was a cash bar, and even though I knew that going in, I didn't think a glass of wine and a G&T would cost $12.50. We had planned ahead though, and my wife had a purse full of mini-vodka bottles. That doesn't make me an alcoholic by the way - it just makes me cheap. We stood by the window with our drinks and had sort of a poor man's red carpet view of the people coming in. As we were commenting on various coworkers as they strolled to the front doors, we spotted the Big Boss and his wife. They had flown in from the old home office just for this occasion. To give you an idea of where we sit on the totem pole in relation to him, this is my and Gutu's boss's boss's boss's boss. There may even be one more in there somewhere. I can never tell without an org chart.

For the purposes of this story, we will call him Big Boss, or BB for short. After I spent about fifty bucks at the bar, and passed on all but one of the hors doovers, it was time to go into the dining room and figure out who to sit with. Gutu had a plan, and I backed it -- we would go in first, find a nice table in the back, and then wave over the people we deemed cool enough to join us.

With that plan in hand, we set forth and snagged a nice table. It was far enough away from the DJ's speakers so you could still talk, yet close enough to the dance floor to watch your co-workers do the robot to a country song. As we sat there waiting for the rest of our group to come in, Gutu turns to me and says, "Can you imagine if BB walked in and sat with us?" Ha ha ha we all agreed. Good laugh. I am pretty sure I could rob this guy at gunpoint and he wouldn't recognize me as one of his employees.

Not 30 seconds later, BB and his wife walk up to our table. BB says, "Hi Gutu, are these seats taken?" And Gutu responds in the only way she possibly can. She says, "Yes. Go sit somewhere else." No, unfortunately, I'm kidding. Obviously, she says, "No, BB. Please, sit down."

So they did.

And nobody else did.

As every one of our friends filed into the room, they took one look at who was sitting at our table and literally ran to a different table. So the 6 of us sat at a table for 12. I don't know how he knew Gutu's name, but he did, so this is all her fault, damn her. Damn her to hell. He's a nice guy and all that, but there's a little pressure to be on your best behavior if you know what I mean. In other words, doing shots from my wife's purse probably wouldn't have been in my best interests.

My wife and I also got screwed by the waiter. There were three choices for food: Beef, Fish and Vegetarian. We asked what the vegetarian dish was, and the waiter told us it was roasted eggplant, red peppers, mozzarella and ricotta over pasta and that sounded pretty damned good. "That sounds pretty damned good," we said, and placed our order.

A little while later, after about 30 minutes of polite chit-chat with our boss's boss's boss's (boss's?) boss, our food showed up.

We got pasta. We got Broccoli. And nothing else. No Eggplant. No delicious cheeses of any sort. No roasted red peppers. No goodness at all, damned or otherwise. When the waiter came back, I said, "Dude. What happened? You screwed us." and he said, "Oh yeah. They changed it to 'pasta vegetable medley.' Sorry about that."

You know what? The definition of a "medley" is this: An often jumbled assortment; a mixture. I am here to tell you that two ingredients do not make a medley, or an assortment, or even a mixture.

Since we ate almost nothing, we stopped at the grocery store on the way home and picked up a frozen pizza. As I was preheating the oven, I saw this on the front of the box:

I may not know a good way to smuggle a tiny booze bottle out of a woman's purse when I'm sitting at the same table as a guy who could ruin my life with one phone call, but I know a shitty serving suggestion when I see one.

I haven't pissed in 24 hours.

I am an avid "24" fan. If any of you reading this are also fans, then you know that we are all forced to forgive inconsistencies in the timing of pretty much everything related to the actual 24 hour day. Like how it takes people less than ten minutes to practically cross the entire state of Califonia by car. That's fine. You have to take some shortcuts to keep the story moving. The one thing I can't help but notice, however, is how nobody ever eats or goes to the bathroom. For an entire 24 hours. I don't know if it's just because I drink a lot of coffee or I have a bladder the size of a peanut, but I have to take a piss about every 2 hours. So just once, for the sake of realism, I'd like see Jack pick up his cell phone, call CTU and say, "This is Jack Bauer. Put Bill Buchanan on the phone. What? Well, number one or two? One? OK, I'll wait."

I know some of you will point out that Morris was in the can during the last episode, but I am convinced he was only drinking whiskey and not dropping a duece, so that doesn't count.

So now I can't seem to stop wondering exactly when it all happens. The suspense of the show has shifted for me. There could be a ticking nuclear bomb ready to explode any second, yet when they cut from scene to scene, all I'm doing is trying to figure out who's going to the bathroom where. I will actually turn to my wife and say, "I am 87% sure Karen Hayes just took a dump right before this. It's the only time she had free in the last three hours." or I will just casually mention, "You realize that Wayne Palmer is pissing like a racehorse as we speak, right?"

These comments are not going over well, probably due to the unwanted mental images they conjure up, yet I can't seem to stop.

Now you won't be able to either. You're welcome.

Soilent Green is people

I got a cereal sample in the mail the other day. I don't usually make it a habit to eat stuff that shows up in my mailbox, but in this case I was intrigued. They are called Mighty Bites, and they are apparently made for kids. Here is a picture of the box I found on their website:



The interesting thing is, nowhere on the box does the manufacturer give any indication as to why the individual pieces of cereal are made to look like tiny people. They just don't mention it at all. I am not sure if you are supposed to feel like a giant man-eating monster when you are eating them or what -- but I found it hilarious. Here's a close up:



It's not bad enough that they look like little people when they are lined up on your countertop. It gets worse when you pour in the milk:



Then it looks like the horrible aftermath of a torpedoed cruise ship and a subsequent shark attack.

Not only did they taste like crap, the bodies got soggy and started to decompose pretty quickly.

Long story short, these things bite.

Mightily.

Site Meter and the kindness of strangers.

So since I have nothing else to post about right now, I've decided once again to let Site Meter be my guide. I've culled the best searches for the last couple of weeks, and in the space of ten minutes, wrote the first things that came to mind. If it's sub-par, well...that's the way it goes. Everyone is allowed an off day once in a while. So without further ado, I present:

Fantastic Google Searches That Somehow Led People To My Site

how do I know if I've lost a tampon? - I need more information before I can help you. For instance, I need to know if you think you lost it on the inside, or if you think you lost it on the outside. Obviously, one situation is a lot easier to assist with than the other. If you've lost it on the inside, you could quite possibly require the help of a medical professional or a really close friend. In either case they will probably need rubber gloves, a headlamp and a pair of tongs to find it. If you've lost it on the outside, just listen for the sound of the people in the mall puking when you walk by. Carefully watch where they point, and follow their fingers. You should find it quite easily.

Wide Labia - Luckily, this is no longer a problem for you. I have contacted a vehicle sign manufacturer, and they are now producing these in quantity:



Demand has been heavy, so if they're out of stock don't be surprised. Just backorder it and tell'em Johnny sent you. (I'm making a killing on these things.)

what happens if I leave a hernia? - Most of the time, it will follow you, even if you have a restraining order against it. Hernias tend to be clingy and quite needy - they don't do well on their own. And once you finally do get rid of them, they have a 20% chance of coming back when you least expect it. At least that's what my doctor told me 10 years ago. So far so good.

how to wear a butt plug - There are many, many ways to wear a buttplug. Wait, no there isn't. It's a BUTT PLUG. In other words, A PLUG. For your BUTT. YOU SHOVE IT IN YOUR BUTT to PLUG IT. I'm not sure I'm helping you at all here, but if not, my advice is to kill yourself because you clearly don't know your ass from...well, anything really.

I hate it when you stare at me when i type... it makes me want to shoot you in the eyeballs. -- Holy crap, I must have been sleep-surfing and found my own blog. I have no idea what it is with people who like to read your screen over your shoulder, but they drive me insane, whether or not I'm actually typing at the time.

what makes a good rapper? - Let's see. All available information points to:

1. Street cred. (This can be in the form of bullet wound scars, doing time, wearing a kevlar vest, being arrested for unlawful possession/and or usage of a firearm, being arrested for unlawful possession/and or usage of drugs, being arrested for unlawful possession/and or usage of an underage girl.)

2. An ability to form nonsense words, and mangle actual words into forms never before heard by man.

3. A good sense of rhythm and timing.

4. Bling.

5. The ability to run quickly away from the po po while not tripping over the crotch of your own pants.

6. A violent disposition.

7. A sense of humor so you don't hunt down Johnny Virgil and shoot him in the face.

how to fuck sandra lee - I suggest starting with a good stalking. Once she is aware that she has an actual fan, you should have no problem after that. Of course, doing it on the kitchen counter will probably get old, but....

why does my septic tank stink? - Hey. Genius. Yeah, you. Come closer. You might not know this, but that tank? It's full of 3-5 year old shit. Take that little clue and run with it.

can doctors check for hernia by grabbing your balls and asking you to cough?- If you are in prison, then yes. Yes they can. People in prison can also call themselves anything they want. "Doctor" for instance.

just ordinary tits - Here is a weary soldier in the war on unnatural porn. All he wants, by god, is just ordinary tits. Instead, he finds page after page of artificially enhanced globes that defy gravity. Just ordinary tits. Is that too much to ask? Apparently, it is, since you ended up on my blog.

stuffed Lorax - You know, I've been to Suess's restaurant, and the stuffed Lorax is fan-foreskin-tastic. It melts in your mouth like filet of North-going Zax, and I am not even kidding.

Nut sack man is wanting my beautiful nut sack, I am scarred, I always watch over my back and see that he is there, Taunting me with a big knife, I know that he is not playin. - I have no advice to give except this: Run. Run from the nut sack man as if your nut sack depended on it --because it does, my friend. It does.

Italian men who look like women - I think you have a far, far better chance of finding Italian women who look like men. Just sayin'.

Yeah, so I didn't even bother to reorder them for comedic effect. Take that.

Mailboxes, Etc.

As most of you know, I live a little bit in the sticks. To set the stage, here's a picture of our post office:



There is no mail truck. The mail carrier drives around in a white 1977 chevy station wagon with "U.S. Mail" painted on the side -- in black paint. By hand. With a brush.

Given this level of commitment from the Federal Government, you can imagine that there isn't much in the way of regulations regarding the kind of mail receptacle you need to have at the end of whatever it is you call your driveway.

I took my camera to work one day, and on the way home, I took some pictures. These mailboxes are all within about 2 miles of my house.

First, let's start with my own:



It's old and rusty and loose (like me) and for some reason it looks like it took a straight-down shotgun blast to the head. The empty metal rings contained flowerpots sometime around 2002, but they've been barren ever since they filled with water, froze solid, then fell apart that winter. I am fairly certain that the ceramic shards are still on the ground underneath the ring, and years from now some archaeologist will be able to determine that the people who inhabited these lands were cheap and bought flowerpots at Walmart. All in all, though, it's a pretty bland specimen.

Down the street from me, you'll see the ever-popular milk jug mailbox holder:



There has to be at least 5 of these in a 3 mile radius from my house. This was the hip new thing sometime back in the late 70's I think -- I remember my mother looking all over hell for one of these stupid things. I still have no idea why. The only saving grace here is that it's not actually in the ground. That way, when the snowplow knocks it into next week, you can just stand it up again like the postal weeble that it is, and not have to worry about digging holes and replacing poles. These are also fun to knock over with baseball bats. I am basing this information on the sheer number of times I've seen this thing tipped over on my way to work.

The next one on my list is this one:



Coincidentally, it looks almost exactly like a smaller version of the trailer that it sits in front of, except I think that it has more windows, and the roof is in better shape. If it had wheels underneath, it would be perfect.

This next one raises an interesting question:



Should your mailbox be nicer than your actual house? I think that if I had to look at this every day as I pulled in the driveway, it would just fill me with bitter disappointment at the suckiness of my life. I would keep wishing I could somehow make myself really small and just move into my mailbox.

I find this next one a little bit of a mystery:



I figure that instead of buying a 15 dollar mailbox post, Mr. Mason decided to build a solid brick mailbox tower and then perch his mailbox atop this pedestal of fine workmanship. Somewhere along the line, however, I think Mr. Mason moved out and Mr. Steals-Scraps-From-Construction-Sites moved in. When the mortar finally started to break down, instead of buying a bag of mortar and fixing it up, he instead decided to just nail some pressboard and 1x4's around it in an attempt to keep it from toppling to the ground. So far so good, Mr. SSFCS. Six years and counting. You go.

This guy impressed me:



Whoever lives here obviously decided that he was going to put his mailbox up ONCE and never again. After coming to this conclusion, he ordered a telephone pole, tuned up his Stihl and went to work. After a few quick cuts with the saw, he buried the post 6 feet in the ground. God help the driver of the snowplow if he hits it, because he's going to be very surprised as he finds himself sailing head-first through the windshield of his truck.

I still marvel at this next one every time I drive by:



I am pretty sure this just broke off and fell into his yard one day back when the telegraph was still the best way to converse over long distances, and he just decided to strip the wires off, stick it in the ground and hang his mailbox off of it. I especially like the homemade L brackets and the fact that he went out of his way to hand-decorate it with a floral motif, because that really ties things together. The cherry on this particular sundae? The last name written in olde english script. Nice touch, Samuel Morse.

Last, but not least, we have this fantastic creation:



There are a few things I can deduce from this fine specimen.

The guy obviously loves golf, and is also probably single. There is absolutely No Fucking Way that any wife would let their husband put this at the end of the driveway, even if they live out in the sticks. Not happening. I can also tell you this: Every single time I drive by, I wish to god I had a giant five iron.

I'd still probably hit it into the woods, 5-putt that bitch and end up with a triple bogey, but it would be totally worth it.

The Truth Shall Set Me Free.

Hypothetical question: Say you're sitting at work with your iPod on shuffle, and someone comes up to your desk to ask you a work question. When you pull your earbuds out they say, "So what are you listening to?" and the answer to the question, at that exact moment, happens to be a sappy love song from your childhood called "I'd Really Love to See You Tonight" by England Dan and John Ford Coley -- do you admit this?

I think I muttered something about OK Go's new CD and then quickly changed the subject, because I'm not talkin' bout my linen.*

I feel so ashamed for two reasons. One, for having this song on my iPod. Two, for lying about it. Also, I really do miss your smile.




*yes, that's what I thought it said when I was a kid. I figured maybe she stole his linen and he wanted it back.

Frozen treats

Here's something you don't have happen to you every day. I was driving home minding my own business, when the window to the car in front of me opens. Some sort of giant dog sticks his head out the window. I laugh, because the dog is monstrous. Like a Marmaduke kind of dog, except being a real dog he was much funnier than the one depicted in the comic strip. I don't know how this dog wasn't freezing his giant marmaduke face off.

Everything is fine for a bit, and then I suddenly realize that my windshield is being pelted by something. Big gobs of somethng foamy and wet. This giant dog is foaming at the mouth, slobbering, whatever you want to call it -- and it is whipping backwards from the dog to my windshield. When it hits, it starts to freeze. I make the split-second decision to turn on the wipers -- which, in retrospect, was the absolute worst thing I could have done. The wipers proceeded to smear dog spit from one end of my windshield to another, causing it to freeze instantaneously. Or maybe it just dried out. I wasn't entirely sure, but it was pretty effing disgusting.

To top it off, I was completely out of washer fluid. So I had to drive almost all the way home peering through frozen dog spit. Good times.

A friendly reminder from Johnny Virgil

So this sign went up in the men's room a while ago:



I've been wanting to post about it, but I was a little hesitant about just walking into the bathroom with my camera and snapping random pictures. Luckily for you all, I finally found an opportunity since almost everyone in the Northeast was working from home for the last day or so.

Now, there are several things here worth mentioning, the first of which is the improbability that someone would actually need directions on how to wash their hands.

Secondly, the people who generally DO wash their hands are pretty good at it. It's the people who don't wash their hands who are at issue here. Maybe it's just me, but I figure that if you are in too much of a hurry to wash, you are definitely not going to read this 300 word missive on handwashing technique. I think a giant sign that says "WASH YOUR EFFING HANDS, YOU SLOB!" would probably work better on the non-handwashing folks, who, let's face it, are the ones that concern us all.

Assuming that someone actually does stop to read the sign, I'm thinking that some of this is pretty obvious.

Let's take a look.

Bullet one -- wet hands with clean, warm, running water and apply soap. Let me ask you this: Where would you actually get dirty, cold, non-running water? There is only one obvious answer to this question, and if you're dipping your hands in there it better be because you just kerplunked your pager or cell phone. Even then, you're probably better off just flushing it and cutting your losses.

Bullet two -- rub hands together to make a lather. You know what? Just the other day, I walked in on a guy with soap goo all over his hands, just standing there dripping goo all over the floor. You wouldn't believe how thankful he was when I told him to rub his hands together. He told me that for his entire life he had never gotten any lather and could never figure out why.

Bullet three -- wash all hand surfaces for 20 seconds. (Imagine singing 'Happy Birthday' to a friend twice.) Two things here. First, I wasn't sure if these two statements were connected at all. Should I count to twenty as I wash, and then imagine myself standing in front of a cake, wearing a pointy hat, and singing the happy birthday song? Twice? Or was I supposed to do these two things simulataneously?

Eventually, because I am a smarty pants, I determined that they intended the length of the birthday song to be a suggested timetable for washing "the hand surfaces." So in order to keep you from counting out loud like some sort of OCD freak, they felt compelled to give you a song idea instead. Unfortunately, they have to pick a song that everyone knows, because telling people to sing the first 20 seconds of the new tune by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus probably wouldn't have cut it. So they tell you to sing Happy Birthday to a friend. Preferably one who was born on this day, the day of the hand washing. Since I find that song a little boring to wash to, I wrote my own somewhat more topical version. Feel free to sing along with me:

Happy birthday to you,
I may have touched poo,
I'm counting the seconds,
'til I shake hands with you!
(X2)

Bullets 4 and 5 -- Rinse well under running water and dry using an air dryer or paper towel. I am assuming here that again they are trying to dissuade you from rinsing in the toilet bowl, or deciding against not rinsing and drying at all. This one sort of took me by surprise because I routinely just leave the men's room with my hands all lathered up and foamy. After reading this sign, I can say this: From now on I will rinse them well --not in the toilet-- and dry them. Don't judge me. I just didn't know.

Bullet six is just a complete admission of defeat by management and building maintenance. In effect, they are saying, "If you touch anything in this bacterial breeding ground with your bare hands, you are completely insane and deserve whatever festering pestilence you end up with. And for god's sake, please tell me you flushed with your foot."

Personally, based on the amount of absolutely non-necessary ass-stank I am forced to deal with on a regular basis, I think they need one on the inside of the stall door that has a picture of a butt crack on it and a bulleted series of wiping instructions.

Keep 'em Clean, people. And somebody, do me a favor and bring back the "fist bump" greeting so I don't have to shake hands anymore.

New Rule.

I thought of a new rule on my way home from work today, as I drove for close to 20 miles behind someone who apparently had absolutely nowhere to be.

If the back of your car looks anything like this:

You are NOT ALLOWED to go under the speed limit. Ever.

In fact, if you have any numbers at all stuck to your car -- whether it be a sweet Audi or a piece of shit '72 Pontiac -- and these numbers actually belong on the cars of NASCAR drivers living or dead, you are required to go AT LEAST ten miles per hour OVER the speed limit at all times.

To reiterate my point: Even if by some chance a deadly virus killed everyone in the world but the cops and YOU, and their single, all-consuming purpose for living has become repeatedly pulling your sorry ass over, BY GOD YOU WILL DRIVE FASTER THAN THE POSTED LIMIT.

Do you hear me? Good.

Now go home and pull that sticker off your car because you're an embarrassment to NASCAR, and that's a pretty effing hard thing to accomplish.

Come on baby light my fire.

I was driving home last night and saw this:



The things I learn from the driver's seat of my car never cease to amaze me. Completely acceptable alternate spellings of common wirds, for instance.

And I have to say -- they certainly know how to take all the romance out of it with the strict timetable and all. I can only hope that after the early evening 7pm "regular" drill, there is an extra-special drilling of some sort. Maybe after the kids are asleep.

Also, I never knew you could get an emergency drilling by simply dialing 911.

I guess that's good information for all you women to remember just in case that "extra-special" late-night drilling didn't quite do it for you, and you require a strapping young firefighter to roll out his fire hose and quench a smouldering blaze somewhere.