Die Motherf*cker!

How will we all die, you ask? Well, that’s a good question, and one that deserves to have our advertisement-divided attention for two hours. Thank god for the ABC network.

“The Last Days on Earth” aired last night. A dramatic laundry list of the most catastrophic ways that humanity can meet its final demise. Interspersed between the CGI “Armageddons” were testimonials of what people would do if they learned that the life as we know it was going to end in the near future. Stuff like “If a big asteroid were coming to devastate the planet I’d:”

Spend time with my family.
Take that vacation that I’ve always wanted.
Cry.
Go on a shopping spree.

You know, important stuff like that. I suppose that I should go easy on these people in the testimonials. After all, they’ve been asked an incredibly dumb question. What the hell difference does it make? Unless you’ve got the money and know-how to build a planet-killing-asteroid-proof bunker…or a new planet, any answer you give is just an exercise in creative writing.

But I would like to see some of these people be honest. Granted, I didn’t watch the entire show, so I might have missed something, but I didn’t see anyone say “If a big asteroid were coming to devastate the planet I’d run around like a fool, throw some garbage cans through a few store windows and loot and pillage like there’s no tomorrow…which, ostensibly, there wouldn’t be.”

Pretty much everyone was taking the high road. I don’t blame them; they were on TV after all. But come on, we all know what it would really be like if we all discovered that the world was coming to an end. It would be chaos. It would be hell on earth. Madness. Confusion. No one would be taking vacations because the planes and trains and boats wouldn’t be running. Hell, you’d be lucky if you could get gas for your car. Gas station employees barely work now as it is. The last thing that anybody wants is to spend their few remaining days on earth working the cash register at the Flying-J.

Personally, I’d probably just shoot myself. I couldn’t deal with the violent madness. And if nothing else, I’d kill myself just so I didn’t have to listen to those idiots with the “Welcome Back Jesus” banners and their incessant “I told you so-s.”

But the reality is that I probably won’t have to kill myself. The odds of a giant asteroid hitting the planet are fairly remote. I just don’t worry about such things anyway because, I mean, what’s the point?

Here are some of the other ways in which ABC wants you to know that you can die along with everyone else you’ve ever met.

Death of a Star (Gamma Ray Burst and Black Hole):

A star could implode near us and we could be pounded with gamma rays or it could suck our universe into a black hole. The black hole thing sounds cool, but we’d all be crushed into a singularity. And I don’t really like my neighbors all that much to spend the rest of eternity being one with them.

Death by Machine:

No, they don’t mean being pulled into the automated pig masher at the local slaughterhouse. They’re talking about AI: Artificial Intelligence. I wasn’t a huge fan of that movie, but I don’t think it would cause massive death. I kid. No, scientists are afraid of robots. Smart robots to be exact. One thing that you must remember is that scientists are geeks. They worry about these kinds of things. Hey scientists, if you don’t want computers to take over the world then here’s some advice: Stop trying to invent computers with the capability to take over the freaking world!

Again, this problem is pretty remote and a little bit stupid. But it’s a cool and scary way to die so it was on the show.

Super Volcano:

A really, really, really big volcano. A volcano that will erupt without you even knowing it until you’re about to die. That’s something to worry about, huh? Think of all the positive things that can come from worrying about a super volcano eruption that you have no hope of preventing. Just embrace the super volcano. Embrace your firey death! Why not? What other choice do you have?

Asteroid Strike:

I already mentioned this one. If you saw “Armageddon” with Bruce Willis, you know what will probably happen. Also, if you saw Armageddon…I’m sorry.

Nuclear War: (read politics)

Scientists are still really concerned about nuclear war. I’m not all that worried myself. See, when I was a kid, I was terrified of nukes. I thought that just one of them could destroy the planet. They can’t. Sure, they all could. But there’s little chance of all the world’s nukes going off at once. Nuclear bombs will more than likely just fuck everything up for a while. And I think I can live with that. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t stop building them. We should. We should dismantle all the world’s nuclear bombs. I’m just saying that they’re not all that scary to me anymore. Hey, they're no Super Volcano.


Germs/Disease Plagues and Bioterrorism: (read politics)

My computer doesn’t know how to spell bioterrorism. It’s a relatively new threat. Sure, we had mustard gas in WWI and that was nasty. But new militarized strains of disease are worse. These are scary. And we can try to get rid of all the bioweapons. But, realistically, if an asshole has his heart set on releasing this crap, there’s nothing we can really do about it. Why not write to your congressmen and tell them to have the Pentagon destroy all of the stockpiles? Washington DC controls way more bioweapons than Saddam could have ever hoped to.

Global Warming: (read politics)

The scariest of them all. Why? Because this one is the only one completely controlled by money. Money is motivating global warming. Money and convenience. Why has President Bush cut the environmental protection laws? Is it because the atmosphere is doing just fine the way it is? Sitting up there, above our heads, looking cute and being all disproportionately “carbon dioxidey?”

It might have to do with competing in a global marketplace. It’s the battle of who could care less out there. It costs money to be environmentally responsible. And, my god, that might hurt the economy (thank god that Bush cut those repressive laws! Our economy is thriving!)! The misconception is that if factories are made to be more responsible, they’ll lose money, the price of the goods they manufacture will rise, American consumers will turn up their noses, everyone will start buying tee-shirts from China and the commies will take over the world!

That’s true a little bit. It will cost more…at first (and it’s a forgone conclusion about the commies, face it). But shit, what other choice do we have? Bushie and his cronies will tell you that we can’t compete with China. “China’s not being environmentally responsible! Why should we?!” Look, Bushie, if China jumped off a bridge, would you? No, really, if I could convince China to jump off a bridge, would you? Please?

That’s why global warming is so scary. It’s real. Life will change as we know it. I’m telling you this now. But you already know it. Other people have been telling everyone for years. Since at least the mid 80s, we’ve known about global warming. We were told that if we didn’t do something about it soon, life as we know it would change forever.

I know change is hard. It’s too convenient not to die!

Maybe it’s time to go on that shopping spree?

…Or loot.


Fun Fact: I dislike our President. I think he’s an ass. I saw that interview with him by Brian Williams. Honestly, can anyone out there explain to me why we elected this clown?

Really. I want someone who voted for Bush to defend him. I have to know. Why?! Why would you vote for him? Because he could deal with the terroists? What the hell made you think that? Because he had such an illustrious military career? Please help me! Is it because he’s a “Christian?” Is it worth selling out the rest of humanity just so that gays can’t marry or women can’t have abortions? Please? Please!

Sorry, I’m getting emotional. But, I’m telling you, I’ve just about had it. I’ve reached my “smug indifference” limit.

I hate George W. Bush. That’s a fact.

Tar Nation

They’re doing the roof on the new condos next door. Fumes are filling my apartment. I would close the windows but it’s supposed to be hot today. 90°.

The heat and the smell make me feel as if I’m a roofer. I’m getting the virtual roofer experience. I have a couple of ex-step-relatives who were roofers. Now I know what they were going through. But I have to tell you it doesn’t seem all that bad. They used to complain that it was strenuous work. What a bunch of crybabies. Apart from the smell and the heat there’s nothing to this roofing business. Just sit around smelling tar, sweating and working on a computer. What’s so hard about that?

And I haven’t fallen off a roof once so far this morning.

However, I think the fumes are starting to get to me. So we’ll see about that “falling off a roof” thing. A couple more good, heavy lungs full of steaming petroleum and I’ll probably go up on my roof for the purpose of falling off. Luckily, I’m a smoker so I’m used to having my lungs filled with tar. And the chances of me getting a “good, heavy lung full” of anything are remote.

See, there are upsides to being stupid.

The fumes are getting to me though. Perhaps it’s the missing nicotine?

I’m just going to sit here watching the polar bear in the corner and wait for one of the workers to fall off the roof. Because, let’s face it, the job’s not over until one of the roofers breaks a leg.


Fun Fact: Last night I wasn’t hallucinating when I ran across the insectoid monster that decided to make my ceiling fan home. It was this largish, green, cricket/grasshopper/praying mantis-looking thing. It was creepy. And I almost touched it!

See, it wasn’t enough for this creature to invade my home, he had to plant himself on the one thing that I needed to touch. I understand that it may seem strange that I needed to touch my ceiling fan, but trust me I did. I needed to pull the cord to turn off the light because if I switch the fan off from the wall it’ll turn off the blades and…look, I don’t need to explain myself to you! Just know that I needed to touch my ceiling fan and let’s leave it at that.

Thanks to some Raid and Tanya’s fancy shoe work, the creature is no longer with us. It’s grossing out Jesus now.

But when something like that finds its way into my home I always feel violated. As if I’m being burgled. As if the feelings of torment caused by the insect are deliberate and not just a byproduct of my intense “pussiosity.” I know that other people feel the same way. In fact it was one of the first things Tanya said when I pointed the bug out to her. “How the hell did that get in here?!” As if we somehow left an insect-sized door unlocked somewhere.

I hate bugs. Thanks Tanya for killing it for me. Although, I would like to point out that the only reason Tanya could kill the bug was because I put my life on the line to spray its general vicinity with poison.

Which reminds me, I should really clean off the dinning table and the buffet. Oh, and the tops of those Coke cans before I serve them to anybody.

I’ll do it later. I’m sure that I won’t forget.

I Don’t Even Read it for the Articles

I don’t care for Playboy. There, I said it. I’m a heterosexual man who doesn’t like Playboy Magazine. In fact, Playboy gets on my nerves.

Let me explain why I’m even bringing this up at the moment. Last night Tanya, our friend Kathy and me were discussing Playboy because Kathy’s been watching “The Girls Next Door” on the E! network. Kathy said that the show made her want to buy issues of Playboy so that she could see the fruits of the girls’ labor. I could have chastised her for being a pawn to Playboy’s publicity machine, but I didn’t, I’m more mature than that. Instead, I just spent the next half hour throwing a hissy about the stupid magazine.

I’ve never liked Playboy. I take that back. I think that there was a brief moment when I was around 10 or 11 or so that I was a fan, but that’s only because the pictures of naked chicks in Playboy were the only ones I could get my hands on. As soon as I was introduced to the more expansive world of porn, Playboy got left behind. It was a fairly sad time. I remember my youthful disillusionment with Playboy even now.

See, to a pre-teen boy, Playboy is like the Holy Grail. I mean it’s right up there with drinking beer. If a kid had a Playboy he was king for a month. At least that’s the way it was supposed to be. That’s what I saw in movies. Kids in movies were always looking at Playboys with awe and wonderment. The cool kids always found a way to sneak a Playboy out of their “Old Man’s” collection. But the reality was this; the naked pictures in Playboy weren’t any sexier than anything I could find in my mother’s art books (and I knew where every naked woman was in my mother’s art books. I memorized the pages they were on. I had to, my mom would have noticed if I had dog-eared the paper).

Incidentally, my disillusion with beer was almost as bad. It didn’t live up to the hype either. And I like beer.

So, I stopped being interested in Playboy. I put away childish things. Sure, when a kid would show up with one, I would feign interest just so that no one would beat me up for being gay. It’s hard to explain to a 13-year-old who’s cool enough to steal a Playboy, that the pictures just don’t “do it for you” on a strictly cerebral level. That your sexual fantasies involve the woman to do more than just show up and be naked. I was pretty sure that I couldn’t argue my point eloquently enough to avoid being labeled “fag” for the rest of my Junior High career.

But there’s something interesting about the allure of Playboy. There is an allure, after all. But it’s purely mythological. That’s why men are drawn to it.

And then there are the articles.

Look, I have to be honest. I haven’t read that many Playboy articles in my lifetime. I know that many of our countries great writers have contributed to the magazine over the years. But…I just don’t like to read all that much. Plus, the articles that I’ve read in Playboy tend to be a little on the…heady…side. Overcompensating, I’m sure, for being in Playboy to begin with. I mean do I really need to read another interview with former FEMA Director Michael Brown? And can I take the article seriously if it shares a leaf with some bimbo’s “knockers?” it’s hard enough to take Michael Brown seriously as it is without being distracted by boobs bigger than he is.

In college, I had some friends who would put Playboy out on their coffee table. These guys claimed that they read Playboy for the articles. And I can honestly say that they did read the articles, but I think it was more in case anyone actually confronted them about it than anything else. I don’t think that they got off on the pictures either. I mean, sure, they were perverts, but I believe that their number one motivating factor for putting Playboys on the coffee table was to look cool.

They were sensitive to this criticism. Instead of using the tired old “I read it for the articles” argument, they did one better. They acted as if their decision to place Playboys on the coffee table were in fact a genius social experiment. They would have you believe that they were keeping score of how many men picked up the magazines compared to how many women and in which social circumstances they did so. As if there was a one-way mirror with a man behind it wearing a white lab coat and scribbling on a clipboard (ostensibly not masturbating).

But they really did it to look cool. Let’s just face facts.

However, every single time I would go over to their place and I would see those Playboys on the coffee table, I would pick one up and thumb through it. There were two reasons for this. One is that I wanted to look cool, as if I had evolved beyond mortal taboos. And the other is that Playboy does something to me. It’s in the ink they use, I think. It gives me amnesia. I see a Playboy and I think “hey look! A Playboy! Wow! Naked ladies!” Then I pick it up, thumb through it for a second and put it back down. Disappointed all over again.

The people with the Playboys would always give me grief. They would see me put the magazine down and mistake my look of utter bemusement with one of embarrassment. They would offer a way out. “You know, there’s a fascinating interview with so-and-so in there.”

“Uh…that’s okay” I’d say.

See. I was looking at the magazine because I wanted to see some porn. I never pick up a magazine with a picture of a mostly naked cheerleader on the cover because I am interested in how Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange are holding up these days. That’s never my motivation. I like my porn to be porn.

Problem is that the pictures in Playboy aren’t porn. They’re “classy.” By classy, they mean that you don’t see genitalia. I have a much broader definition of the word, but that’s what it means to Playboy. It’s not as if the scenes set up in the magazine are all that tasteful. I don’t look at them as the epitome of class and taste. It’s just another picture of a woman who’s not allowed to show me her ho-ha. I can see that every day! Every time I walk down the street I’m barraged by women who aren’t allowed to show me their ho-has. Not in public anyway.

So if Playboy isn’t sexually stimulating, let’s address their other “selling point.”

Art.

Playboy likes to parade itself around as if it’s walking the high ground. As if the pictures, since they don’t show actual labias, are somehow “artistic.” If that’s the criteria for artistic then we live in an art-filled world, my friend. Myself, not being cursed with a labia, am a freaking walking work of art 24 hours a day!

But seriously, there’s nothing artistic about Playboy pictures most of the time. They’re stock. Cookie-cutter. Like Glamour Shots for areolas.

So if Playboy is neither stimulating sexually or artistically, what is it? It’s immature. And if you need “painstakingly trimmed bush” as your incentive to read about the failed policies of President Bush then perhaps you need to rethink your intellectual life.

And that’s why I hate Playboy. Listen Playboy, stop objectifying women in your “porn!” Have them do something!


Fun Fact: I don’t read porn magazines. I mean why buy porn magazines anyway?

I pay good money for DSL.

Am I Blue? Oh God No!

So, they were on the news again this morning. Of course, I’m talking about twin sister racist pop supergroup “Prussian Blue.” Debutants of dislike. Sweeties of stupidity. Princesses of…uh…Prussianousness.

These aren’t your typical brainwashed white supremest kids. No! Sure, they prefer the term “racialist” to the more sinister “racist.” Sure, they spout the same asinine tripe that their parents have been spitting out all their lives. But unlike most racist twins, these girls play their own instruments!

Awesome.

Well, since the girls are fighting to save the white man’s racial identity, and since I’m a white man, I figured that I should check these girls out and see how well they’re waving the banner for my skin color.

I mean, I’ve got people looking after every other part of me. My masculinity’s covered in spades. We men have people like Tom Lycus, Howard Stern, Adam Carolla and various other questionably talented people to raise the flag for men everywhere.

My brain has been well cared for. Barbara Bush was kind enough to keep it off drugs and Bill Clinton worked his ass off to make sure my brain could go to college at reasonable interest rates (a mute point now…thanks for nothing George Bush, you dickhead).

So, with my brain and testicles in good hands, I popped over to Lynx and Lamb’s (those are the girls’ names in Prussian Blue) web site to see how the custodians of my skin color are doing.

I’ve got to say, I’m disappointed. Never mind that they’re both ignorant, uneducated hate-mongers, but – they suck!

Yeah. They suck. They claim to be representing the entire “white race” and they can’t stop to make sure that they’re writing songs that don’t stink on ice? They do claim to be musicians after all.

I have a little advice for everyone who’s ever tried to make the argument that their race is genetically superior:

If you’re going to put yourself up as the example, try not to be a complete waste of space. Please?

I understand how difficult it can be to find a good example of a racist. It’s a paradox. By qualifying, you’re disqualified.

But, Prussian Blue, at least write your hate songs with a good “hook.” Every great song needs a hook. You can’t just subsist on hate for your entire career. It’s a one trick pony.

The Prussian Blue web site (which I won’t link to here, but if you really want to find it, it’s easy) claims that their latest and second album has the potential to cross over in to mainstream alternative rock. Not likely. The samples that I’ve heard from it are pretty hard to listen to.

In fact, I must admit that I prefer “vintage” Prussian Blue. Their old stuff is better. No, it’s not good. But it’s better. It’s got more blatant “hate” which, let’s face it, is what you look for in a Prussian Blue song. Plus it has a homemade, down homey, little girls with guitars and violins, innocent, let’s lynch us some black folk and go to a picnic quality to it that could be endearing if your ears would stop bleeding long enough for you to regain equilibrium.

In all the years that I’ve been alive there have been hundreds upon hundreds of people who have stepped forward to carry the banner for my skin color. And none of them has done a good job. It just strengthens my belief that my skin color doesn’t really need a banner. It’s doing just fine without one. It sits there, covering my body, being all “white” and all. My skin doesn’t even seem to care that it’s white. It changes color in the summer. And that seems disrespectful if you ask me. So, screw my skin color! If it can’t be bothered to take “pride” in itself then why the hell should I?! What has my skin color done historically speaking anyway? It never won a war. It never painted the ceiling of a church. It never went to the moon. It just hung around while those things happened.

I hate my skin color! I hate all skin colors!

Lazy-ass, good-for-nothing color!

Prussian Blue can have my skin color. Just as long as they promise to never make another album ever again for the rest of their sad, hate-filled lives.


Fun Fact: Prussian Blue also has a blog on Blogspot! Cool. I clicked a link to another racist heavy metal band called Battlecry. It’s actually a little bit better. The production quality is better, that is.

But I tell you – after listening to this music all morning – if you’re going to listen to this stuff too, take an antacid or something because, honestly, it’ll turn your stomach.

Unless you’re a RACIST!

Jerk.

I’m a Big Boy Now

And it has nothing to do with Pampers Pull-Ups diapers. My character doesn’t derive from disposable undergarments. I wear them strictly for the comfort.

When Tanya and I went to Nags Head a while back, we returned from the trip with a 2002 4-door Saturn L200. My father, in a fit of generosity, gave the car to me. It’s been sitting around like an out-of-towner ever since. That is, until yesterday. I went down to the AAA, transferred the title and registered the car. I even had the thing smog checked.

Now, that doesn’t sound like that big a deal. But I don’t register cars every day. And when I do, I rarely have to go it alone. So, when the world didn’t end because I filled out the paperwork incorrectly, I felt a great sense of empowerment.

See, when I actually accomplish an adult task – all by myself – it makes me feel a little more like a competent member of society. Like I can survive on my own. Sure, I’m 33 years old now and I’ve been living “on my own” (read: no parents) for a while now. But I still feel as if, any minute, I could encounter a task that is so incredibly “adult” and complicated that I would slip into a responsibility-induced coma at its very mention. Even though I’m not a complete dullard, I lack a certain amount of confidence when it comes to taking care of grown-up business.

The nice thing is that I don’t think I’m alone here. Registering things, signing loans, making health-related appointments, dealing with insurance (or the lack of it), re-financing stuff…all that crap is scary. But my lack of confidence isn’t helped by certain people who waltz around this little planet as if they’ve figured all of it out. As if calling a credit card company isn’t nerve-wracking. As if calling the pizza place isn’t terrifying. As if strangers in general aren’t something to be completely avoided at all costs.

Maybe that’s the problem. You know, if my buddy Phil worked down at the AAA, I wouldn’t have a problem taking care of that stuff. Not at all. I’d just call Phil and as him how to take care of it. But my buddy Phil doesn’t work at the AAA. I don’t even have a buddy named Phil. So I’m on my own and forced to subjugate myself to complete strangers. And what have I been told since I was an Anthropomorphic Boy? “Don’t talk to strangers!” “If you need help, find a policeman!”

Well, now I’m forced to talk to strangers, with my “Stranger Danger” alarm ringing loudly in my subconscious, and the last person I want to talk to is a cop.

Plus, I can never get a police officer to make my dental appointments for me. They suck.

So what am I saying? All I really need to know I didn’t learn in kindergarten. In fact some of that crap really screwed me up. And if you’ve ever said to someone “I was filling out my tax forms the other day and thought to myself, am I going to have to fill out a Schedule-M3? Ha ha ha ha!” and you’re not the CFO of anything, then you need to stop. You’re only doing it to make the rest of us feel like adolescent pussies.

And it’s working.

But, yeah me! I registered my car! Now it doesn’t have West Virginia plates on it anymore. However, I was hoping that someone would mistake me for an out-of-towner. That way, when they flipped me off in traffic and yelled something like “hey, you hillbilly douchebag, why don’t you go back to West Virginia, your sister’s getting lonely!” I could yell something back that only a local Los Angelino would know like “Santa Monica is overpriced!”

And that would rock their little world.


Fun Fact: I didn’t just take care of my car yesterday. I also painted a painting for the apartment. We had the need for a large 30” X 40” painting, so I created one.

And this is it. Enjoy!

Did Everything Come Out Okay?

I’m back from PA hell. That’s “Production Assistant” hell, not Pennsylvania hell. Pennsylvania’s actually quite nice. I haven’t been there for years. But if the Amish like it, you know it’s good.

So, in lieu of anything else to post about, I thought that I would share a little bit more of the cross country trip that Tanya and I returned from about a month ago.

When you drive across the country, you get very familiar with certain aspects of freeway life. You learn which gas station chains have the best bathrooms. You learn that places that sell fireworks need gigantic billboards because, well, how else are you supposed to find fireworks? (As a rule, the billboard size is directly proportionate to the size of the fireworks stand; the ratio is 5:1, 5 feet of billboard for every 1 actual square foot of fireworks stand)

Truck stops and rest areas become very important on a cross country trip. There are a few similarities between the two. Both generally have a lot of trucks parked at them. Both have bathrooms. And both are crawling with prostitutes. But rest areas are much nicer to look at. I enjoy Yosemite Sam and bare breasted women, don’t get me wrong, but there is something a bit more serene about a rest area.

Nowadays rest areas aren’t the same rat infested, biohazards that they used to be when I was a kid. Some of them are downright pleasant. When I was young, rest areas were not much more than a port-a-potty housed in a wooden shed with a lovely view of the freeway and a smell that could make a river worm turn up its nose (river worms are used to treat sewage by the way. Vermicomposters will find that last joke funny at least).

Tanya and I stopped at a few rest areas on our trek. Not as many as you might think since we usually just popped into McDonalds when we needed to heed the call of nature. Rest areas don’t sell Double Quarter Pounders. But, like I said, we stopped at a few.

Most of them were your typical new concrete and block type places. Sturdy and clean…ish. Texas actually had some very nice rest areas. With tile mosaics adorning the walls inside. Places you could feel slightly classy pooping in.

But I saw something new in New Mexico. Here’s the rest area. Pretty normal.


It’s located near some kind of historical site, so there’s the obligatory plaque to make the spot seem more important than it actually is. This plaque does a nice job of that.


But there was one thing that set this particular rest area apart. This was on the outside of the rest area bathrooms.



Good for them! Hey, New Mexico cares about your rest area experience. And they make you feel regal by allowing you to refer to yourself in the survey as "we." Very classy.

Then I saw this and I knew that New Mexico really cares about your rest area experience.





Fun Fact: When I was a kid and we were at a rest area, I would stand out by the freeway and get semi trucks to honk as they sped by. Rest areas became much nosier places when I was in town.

The “kid me” would really bug the living hell out of the “adult me.”

Boring

That’s what it’s going to be around this blog for the next few days. I’ve gotten another job with HGTV so I’ll be working this week. I’ll try to get a post or two up, but I can’t promise anything.

In the meantime, I’ll just put up some pictures of the trip that Tanya and I just got back from a couple weeks ago. I would post about something topical but really, what’s the point? There’s really nothing worth blogging about right now anyway. Sure, there are the wars in the Middle East, but they’re depressing. And there’s Mel Gibson, but that’s too easy. I mean when the best possible defense you can offer up is “hey, you have to remember, when that cop pulled me over I was really drunk!” Then you know you’re trapped in a PR nightmare.

So, you get to look at pictures. Lucky, lucky you.

Here’s my nephew Dylan. He’s my brother’s son and is built like a masonry poophut. If he doesn’t want you to open a door, damnit, you’re not opening a door.


This is my gentler, albeit slightly more possessive, other nephew Asher with his sister Lily (my sister’s kids). We buried Lily in the sand and then tried to convince Asher to give her a kiss.


100,000 hours later, he did. Kids are fun. They’re tiny miracles. Until you’ve experienced the glory of children, you’ll never know the pure nirvana that can be obtained from standing in the hot sun on hotter sand with a camera, just waiting for the kid to get over the fact that sometimes sand is “sinky.” It’s like the finger of God has parted the clouds…to flick your ear really hard.


Here’s a picture of a lighthouse. It’s the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse to be specific. It used to be closer to the ocean but not too long ago, because of beach erosion, they put the entire thing on a huge trailer and hauled it a few hundred yards to its current location. Wow, aren’t you interested in that fact!


Here’s a picture of the outside of the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, Arkansas. It’s like an anti-President Bush haven. It was a vacation within a vacation.


Tanya took the opportunity to be president for a little while. She sat in Clinton’s cabinet meeting chair. I’m sure it wasn’t really his chair, but rather a replica of his chair. But it was remarkably lifelike. I mean, you could almost swear that it was an actual chair!


Actually, this picture got me to thinking about what it would be like if Tanya were president. I think the world would be a much better place. We wouldn’t be embroiled in a hopeless war in the Middle East and all of America’s bedroom floors would be completely free of stinky guy clothes.

And here’s a picture of Tanya playing with some petrified wood. Insert your own “big wood” joke here. I’m too classy.


I should include some “exciting” pictures. So here they are. Exciting!

It’s a hamster attack! Me with Tanya’s niece’s hamster “Junior.” It’s a good thing that hamsters can’t understand English. It’s never a good thing to be a hamster named Junior. The only thing worse is to be a hamster with a more dubious suffix like “the 3rd” or “the 4th.”


And here’s the Lone Ranger’s costume. It was at the Clinton Presidential Library. Why shouldn’t the Lone Ranger’s costume be at the Clinton Library?!





Fun Fact: I’m grateful, humbled and only slightly annoyed at all the comments, emails and cards I got for my birthday. Thank you. You’re the best.

That’s a fact.

33

Yeah, it’s my birthday today. I’m feeling a bit old. But you know what they say; 33 is the new 23!

They do say that right?

Right?!

For the benefit of future historians who find this blog looking for a picture of me at 33, I’ve decided to include a photograph of myself.


See how young I look? And I didn’t doctor that photo one bit either. My skin! It’s so supple. And I look like I’ve even lost a few pounds.

Maybe getting older isn’t so bad. So far my organs still work and there’s not one hint of dementia.

Happy 25th birthday to me!


Fun Fact: There are about 4 birthdays that I can’t remember at all. I’ve tried, but it’s no use. It would be cool if I could blame alcohol. Then I would seem like a real partier. I’m going to assume that alcohol isn’t to blame for my birthday amnesia. Unless my parents were giving alcohol to their toddler!

Mom? Dad? You wouldn’t do that, right? Right?


Also, you may remember that I thought it was 33rd birthday last year. Determined never to make that mistake again, I’ve researched my birthday this year. Turns out that I am indeed turning 33.

Damn.

Sweep This!

My hand is planted firmly on my crotch.

They’ve done it to me again! Or, I’ve done it to myself?

I blame my car.

My father has generously given me a new car. But I still have my old car which means that, when you add Tanya’s car to the equation, we just have one car too many. We’ve got lovely two car tandem parking (which if you’re not from a city where there’s an overcrowding problem means that we have to park one of our cars behind the other). Since my old car doesn’t actually run anymore, it gets a permanent place in the driveway which leaves another car to fend for itself, forced to circle the streets like an angry hobo just looking for an open doorway in which to spend the night.

Well, my car overslept this morning. It stayed in its cozy little cubby, tucked into the same spot it’s spent the entire previous week.

That’s when it was molested by some jerk in a white hybrid car with “Los Angeles Parking Enforcement” written on the side. It’s street sweeping day.

LA loves street sweeping day (that’s why it’s always street sweeping day somewhere in this town). If someone were to come up with some animated map of parking tickets issued in Los Angeles, you’d be able to watch the city coffers fill up block by block as the street sweepers winded their way through the city.

The city wants you to believe that street sweeping exists for the sole purpose of sweeping the street. Residents of Los Angeles know better. Street sweeping is an excuse to hand out parking tickets at $45 a pop. On my block alone, this morning my car was one of four others who had either purposefully or inadvertently ignored the posted no parking sign. That’s $180 dollars just on my block. I took a walk this morning and noticed an average of about three cars a block that were parked on the wrong side of the street at the wrong time.

So why $45? I’ll tell you my theory. It’s the same strategy they use in marketing. You don’t charge $20 for an item. You charge $19.95. Why? Because it’s not $20. It makes it seem more reasonable. $45? Well, it’s not $50, that’s why. $50 is a lot of money. It’s half of $100. But $45 is worth taking a risk on.

I wasn’t trying to take a risk. I had every intention of moving the car this morning (uh, I mean, my car had every intention of moving itself).

Instead, now I’m out 45 bucks. For absolutely no reason.

I hate this town.


Fun Fact: As I was researching for this blog post (yes, I do some research…very little research but…) I found this article on the subject from the Los Angeles Times.

Also, you’ll notice that the picture at the top of the post says “No Parking” on Wednesday. I realize that it’s Thursday today. See, our apartment building sits on a corner. The street in front of the house has no parking on Thursday. The street on the side of the apartment has no parking on Wednesday. That’s where I took that picture.

Incidentally, on both streets there’s only legal parking on one side of the street. This means that every week on Wednesday and Thursday, we get to have the “Great Car Shuffle!”

It sounds more exciting that it really is.

I Have Left Elvis’s Building

Every pilgrimage needs its Graceland, its Mecca. For Millions of Muslims, their Gracelend is, um, Mecca. For Tanya and me, our Graceland was…well…Graceland.

Memphis, Tennessee.

You got it. More vacation photos! See, Tanya and I realized that our trip from Nags Head, North Carolina to Los Angeles would take us right through Memphis. So how could we possibly turn down an easy trip to Elvis’s house? Well, we couldn’t. We didn’t. We went. And I took pictures.

But before we got to Graceland we passed through Scottsboro, Alabama. If that place sounds familiar to you, then you probably harbor a secret desire to buy other people’s lost airline luggage. You see, Scottsboro is home to the Unclaimed Baggage Center. The place where millions of pieces of unclaimed lost luggage get sold at low, low prices to greedy patrons willing to profit from other people’s misfortune.

I am one of those people! I want to buy people’s lost stuff. I was really just hoping that a lot of musicians had run into recent bad luck at the hands of the airlines. So you can imagine my excitement when I learned that the place I had just heard about on the national news was only a few blocks away!

We got off the freeway and weaved our way through town. There’s really no easy way to get to this place. You have to be alert and follow the directions that you read off the freeway billboard. But I was on a mission. And we found it! My dream was about to come true.

Only, I forgot one key thing. We were in Alabama…and it was Sunday. Nothing is open on Sundays in the Bible belt. Hell, you’re lucky to find a freaking church with its doors unlocked.

So I did what any other red blooded American would do in this situation.

I pouted.


And Tanya made fun of me.


What the South fails to realize is that people who are willing to buy other people’s lost stuff don’t have much need for church. Damnit! Heathens want to buy crap on Sunday!

I hate the Bible belt.

But we finally made it to Graceland.


We took the tour. We saw Elvis’s dining room! Wow. He like ate here and stuff…sometimes.


We saw the infamous “TV room.” This room looks like something out of James Lilek’s “Interior Desecrations.” You can’t really see it in the picture but underneath that creepy porcelain monkey with the pitch black, lifeless eyes there’s a sign that reads “Please Do Not Touch.” I’m pretty sure that’s because that black eyed monkey “will eat you!


Also, there are also only two TVs pictured here. Of course you know there are three. You can pretend like you don’t know anything about Elvis, but secretly you have the knowledge that Elvis had three TVs in his TV room. You’ve known all along, haven’t you? Clandestinely, we’re all hicks.

Here’s the back of Graceland. Nobody ever really wonders what the back of Graceland looks like. Not until you bring it up anyway. Well, this is what it looks like. Awesome.


The tour through Graceland is an audio tour. You have to listen to headphones the entire time. Everyone in the joint looked like obstinate teenagers. If every tourist didn’t look as if they were genuinely interested in everything, I would have felt as if I’d stumbled into my worst vacation nightmare.


And lastly...

Elvis is dead.




Fun Fact: It was Kevin’s birthday the other day! Go to his website and click around. Let him know that you care that he’s one year closer to death.

He’s almost 30!

How did Kevin celebrate his birthday this year? Well, he got 6 stitches under his chin thanks to a sea kayak.

And he stepped on a bee.

Fun!



P.S. This post was supposed to be up yesterday but...Blogger is a piece of stupid, stupid crap!

Like a Little Waxy Angel

Dear Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt of the future (the real one, not the candle-like thing at Mme. Tussaud's),

It’s your 16th birthday! Happy sweet 16, kid.

Hold on a second, I have to go outside really quickly and water my flowerbeds. I’m 16 years older now too. I’m going to be 50 soon, and lately I’ve been getting these irrational urges to water the hell out of my yard.

I suppose that I should explain why I’ve decided to write this letter to you.

I was at the gym one morning, 16 years ago, and I saw a story on CNN about your paraffin doppelganger over at the Wax Museum. Now, it’s been a while since the story of a wax “you” first came out, a couple of days actually, but some genius over at the news network decided that they could stretch the story out a bit (god knows there was noting else going on at the time). They went on and on about how you were the first baby ever to be immortalized in wax at Tussaud's famous museum. I’m not sure exactly what kind of honor that is, but it’s the ultimate comeback whenever someone gives you the old “I don’t know who you think you are, young lady” routine. “I was the first goddamned wax baby!” You can shout at them. Why not throw a laté in their smug faces to add some extra effect.

Now I’m not saying that you would do such a thing. I’m just saying that if I were the first wax baby, I certainly would. Especially if someone called me “young lady.”

I just got to thinking that you might be tired of hearing about your evil wax twin. I mean, it’s 16 years later and CNN is still running segments on it every other day (I’m starting to think that Ted Turner has a bit of a fetish thing going on. Oh, no, not for babies, just for wax.).

So I figured that I would explain to you why your wax baby figure initially garnered so much attention. It’s like this:

For one, your parents used to be really famous. I mean like, really famous. Especially after your dad dumped his first wife to travel the world with your mother (incidentally, his first wife is Jennifer Aniston. That’s right, Senator Jennifer Aniston! The same Senator Aniston who was later deemed to be incompetent after it was discovered that she was elected as a joke.) Your parents used to make big movies and save the children of the world. I know it’s strange to hear about your parents making movies since your mom now lives in a Quonset hut somewhere in the African jungle working tirelessly to eradicate that deadly new strain of whooping cough and your dad…well, cut the guy some slack, he was actually a pretty talented actor, I realize that porn isn’t acting per-se, but he used to make real movies, he just was never the same after your mom left him. Very sad.

Anyway, why was your wax self so popular? Because you were popular. The most popular baby on the planet (tell that to those cheerleaders who keep flipping you crap about your dad!). And why were you so popular? Well, this is where things get tricky.

When you were born, the Iraq war was only a few years old (Thanks god that, after much begging, Al Gore finally decided to run for president again). The war was going terribly. It was worse then than it was when it began. And America needed a distraction. After all, who wants to pay attention to a depressing old war, right? People figured that if they just stared at the celebrity baby long enough the war would take care of itself.

It didn’t.

In fact, things got a lot worse. Israel took the initiative to act on terrorist attacks by Hezbollah. They bombed the crap out of Lebanon. It was scary. It made the Iraq war look as if it was never going to end. Especially since Georgie Bush refused to help the situation. And Condoleezza Rice…? What the hell does she do for the government anyway? I mean, I could go around the world and piss people off, does that require a lot of talent?

That was around about the time that your polyethylene self was being squeezed out Madame Tussaud's waxy womb. And BAM! We had a reason to live again. And the media could remain upbeat! Thank god for that! Real issues can be such a downer.

So I wanted to write this letter to you to tell you that if you ever get tired of hearing about that inconsequential wax figure of yourself on CNN, blame former president Bush.

Go ahead, blame him.

I like to blame him for hundreds of things. And I’ve never been wrong yet.

Hang in there Shiloh. And happy 16th again! Call you dad every once in a while. He could probably use a friend right about now.

TAM


Fun Fact: Seriously, I got an obscene amount of joy when I typed the phrase “former President Bush” earlier. I felt the clouds part. I felt the hand of somebody’s god.

I envisioned George Bush being booed off the lecture circuit for being a complete moron because nobody felt obligated to listen to him anymore.

Ahhhhhh…that’s the stuff.

First in F(l)ight

More vacation photos. Aren’t you the lucky one?

The Outer Banks of North Carolina have many things to offer tourists but probably the most famous is Kitty Hawk. You know, that place where Orville and Wilbur Wright made their infamous first “powered” flight.

I like Kitty Hawk. I’ve been there a few times. The last time was about 13 years ago. Here’s what it looked like then.


That’s Mike in that picture, not me. He went with me last time. In a completely heterosexual way.

Here’s what it looks like now. It’s pretty much the same angle on this picture as the last one. The only difference is that, this time, my big fat head is taking up the whole frame.


And why is my big fat head taking up the whole frame? Because I was my own camera man that’s why. Tanya didn’t want to run the camera that day. She was in “a mood.” Don’t believe me? Well, here’s a picture of her “mood.”

Pouty.


But she wasn’t pouty all day. Here she is pretending that she can fly simply by putting her arms out. Yes, we were at Kitty Hawk and Tanya was pretending to be an airplane. We were “those” kind of tourists.




Here she is playing patty cake with a statue.


Sure, I had to be my own camera man all day but I still had fun taking goofy pictures. Here’s Tanya pretending to hold the Wright Bros. Memorial in the palm of her hand.


I told you, we were “those” kind of tourists.

And here’s a picture that I took of myself doing the same thing. This kind of picture requires a deft, almost innate knowledge of space and angles. I think I pulled the effect off quite nicely.


All in all, it was a very nice trip to Kitty Hawk and not once did I pester a stranger with the phrase, “Excuse me sir/ma’am, but could you take our picture? Just hit that silver button on top. No…the silver one. It’s the silver one. The…one on top. …It’s the goddamned silver button, you freaking po! Jesus, how did you even manage to make it to Kitty Hawk in the first place?! I hope you don’t have children! By the way, those things that people dig in the dirt are called holes in the ground and that thing that you speak out of is your asshole! …oh wait, the button is red…sorry…my mistake…would you mind taking our picture?”

Not once did I say that to anyone. There was no need. I am a masterful cameraman.




Fun Fact: There wasn’t actually a fight that forced me to be the cameraman for the day. It was just something that we thought would be funny. No, actually the only time that we really fought at Kitty Hawk was when Tanya wanted to run the camera.

I’m a controlling jerk. But I wouldn’t have to be if Tanya would just take pictures that way that I want her to!

Let’s end this post with a picture that Tanya took.


You see?! Do you see how that’s all wrong!!!!

Man.


P.S. This post would have been up a lot sooner today if Blogger wasn’t a stupid, stupid piece of stupid crap!!! That’s a fact.

We're Baaaack

Tanya and I got back on Friday from our whirlwind tour of the hottest states in America. North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia (very briefly), Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and finally home to California.

First, as you already probably know, we spent a week in Nags Head, North Carolina on the Outer Banks where we passed the time swimming in the Atlantic Ocean, looking at lighthouses and eating boiled peanuts.

If you’ve never had a boiled peanut, you’re missing a unique experience. Is it a good experience? Well, you’ll have to be the judge of that. Eat a boiled peanut today! (This message has been brought to you by the Boiled Peanut Advisory Council of North Carolina)

We spent more time in Nags Head than we had anticipated when we “planned” this trip. We were having a really good time with my family (which I hadn’t seen in a hell of a long time). Even though they could be extremely loud, there aren’t another 18 people that I’d rather share a house with.

Yes, we stayed with 18 of my relatives. And we actually had fun.

Anyway, now we’re back. And I miss the open road already. I mean, our car has air conditioning. Our apartment on the other hand…


Fun Fact: The first picture above is of a lightening storm that hit the Outer Banks on the second to the last day that we were there. I think it was the pre cursor to a tropical storm that passed by there. But I can’t be sure. What do I look like, a weatherman?!

I’ll post more pictures here as I sift through them. In the meantime, here are a couple. One thing that you should know; I was in charge of the camera for most of the trip so most of the pictures of me look like the one here.

This next picture was meant to be a contrast to the first picture at the top of the post. Just in case you thought that it rained the entire time we were at Nags Head. It only rained the last two nights. Our days were almost completely clear.

Anyway, as I was resizing this picture to post it, I noticed something about it that I hadn’t noticed before. Something in the water. Something that I hadn’t intended to photograph.

Nags Head Nessie!

I’ll make a fortune!

Unless it’s just a dumb old dolphin.

Leaving Nags Head

There are some people out there who said, "hey, you should post from the road!"

So, this is it. I'm "posting from the road."

Isn't this fun?! See you soon.

TAM


Fun Fact: This computer has been in this beach rental house the entire time I've been here. It has DSL. It's a nice computer.

I only learned that it was here yesterday.

And I didn't care.


Also, that logo at the top of the post is for the new and improved Outer Banks. They spell things with "X"s instead of "K"s now. They're way cool. If they ever start to spell things with "Z"s instead of "S"s, I don't know if I could stay here ever again. They might just "cool" themselves right out of my "coolness class."

What's up with that?! This place used to be cool, but still lame enough for me to enjoy. Now it gone and "cooled" itself all up and stuff! What am I supposed to do now?! How can I find a place that's still nice, but lame enough that I can hang? This is just another way that the "cool" people are keeping down the "lame class!"

It's the gentrification of coolness.

I hate "coolification."

On the Road Again

It’s almost that time. The time when Tanya and I take a little tour of these United States. We’re heading out on Sunday night to fly to Norfolk, VA, and then it’s on to spend a few of days on the beautiful shores of the Outer Banks in North Carolina.

I really like visiting the Outer Banks. What’s not to like? It’s the place where the Wright Brothers took their first flight (a fact that the license plates of North Carolina will never let you forget). It’s got some of the largest exposed sand dunes in the country. It has Ocracoke island, a place that was frequented by the dread pirate Blackbeard (and since pirates are all the rage these days, this fact is cool and trendy). And not too far away from where we’ll be staying is the Lost Colony of Roanoke (one of its greatest legacies is that Andy Griffith got his start acting in their little Lost Colony theatrical production – which I still have never seen).

I hope that we’ll find some time to get to Roanoke. I’ve been there before. It’s strange, but every time I visit that place I become convinced that I can solve the mystery of the lost colony. I know that hundreds of scholars and researchers have spent countless hours and used their interminable collective expertise trying to figure out what happened to that hapless group of first settlers, but when I go to the place and see the mounds of dirt and hear the stories, I still feel as if my insight into the matter will crack the case.

I’m an idiot.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about with Roanoke, go here to learn more. The short version is this: Some settlers came from England to establish the first western colony in the new world. They chose Roanoke Island. One of the colony’s leaders, John White, sailed for England to snag some more supplies for the colonists in 1587. Well, some crap came up and nobody was able to return with supplies until 1590. By then, all of the colonists had vanished into thin air. No bodies, no nothing. Only a word carved on a nearby tree "Croatoan." Evidentially, either the colonists were killed by Indians and marauders or they got tired of waiting three years for tea and Guinness and toddled off for greener pastures.

Legend has it that, years later, blue-eyed natives turned up. Ooohh. What a mystery. Did the colonists get killed or come down with a ribald case of jungle fever? Maybe we’ll never know.

Unless, of course, I can make it to Roanoke while I’m at the Outer Banks and solve the mystery.

After we kick around in North Carolina for a while we’re heading back to Los Angeles via road trip. We’re going to be touring through the not-so-deep south. First we visit Nashville and Memphis (to see the Egyptian stuff…or Graceland, whichever one it is that we have in the Memphis in this country, I’m so worldly that I often get my Memphises confused).

After Tennessee, the trip gets a whole lot less interesting…on paper.

We’ll be heading through Arkansas, Oklahoma, Northern Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. Or, as I like to refer to it, “America’s Nothing Belt.”

Not a whole hell of a lot to see in those places, but I’m sure that we’ll have a good time trying to find something.

While I’m gone, why don’t you go on your own mini vacation across the US with us? Just take out your largest map of the lower states and scoot your butt across it. Sure, it won’t be quite the same, but, honestly, you’ll probably have about as much to look at as we will as we’re actually driving through Northern Texas.


Fun Fact: I’m kind of looking forward to visiting Oklahoma. All I know about the state right now is that the wind comes sweeping down the plane and the wavin’ wheat sure smells sweet when the wind comes right behind the rain. Also, I’ve surmised that their main products are barley, carrots and pertaters, (pasture fer the) cattle, spinach and termayters. They have June bugs, lazy hawks and they call their sweethearts “honey lamb.”

I also know that Tanya’s going to go crazy while we’re there as I plan to try to hold out the first note of the Broadway classic song for the entire duration of our visit to the 46th state.

Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaklahoma…..

OK!

So Now I’m Back from Outer Space

You should have changed your stupid lock. You should have made me leave my key.

I’ve been on a brief hiatus lately. Tanya and I have been house-sitting. Well, house-sitting and dog sitting. The people whose house we look after bought a new dog recently (the dog we used to look after passed away. So did the old cat. Now that I think about it, maybe Tanya and I aren’t the best people to care for pets?). The new dog is fun, but man, he requires a lot of attention. He completely wore me out with his constant desire to tear-ass around the back yard. He just wants to play all the time. And he doesn’t want to play alone. He wants me to chase after him. Doesn’t he realize that I’m going to be 33 soon? Doesn’t he realize that I’m lazy?! I don’t have the energy to play “keep-away” at every available moment. I suppose I was encouraging him a bit by letting him win all the time. I could have totally gotten that bone away from him. Easy! I just didn’t want the puppy to feel bad about himself.

Maybe by the time we house sit next life will have worn him down to a dull, lifeless pile of dog hair content to watch the world pass him by and wait for death?

Oh, man, that would be sweet.

I also had to go to the dentist yesterday. I hate the dentist. I mean, I really hate the dentist. Which, I suppose, makes me a glutton for punishment since I decided to go to UCLA Dental School to get my work done. Now, UCLA is a great school, so it’s not like getting your hair cut at the local Barber College. But the morons at the barber college don’t poke at your gums with sharp instruments either.

I’m going to go ahead and wager a guess that you’ve been to the dentist before. I’m also going to assume that you’ve had your gums probed with one of those pokey gum probing thingies. Those things that they shove down into your gum line to check for bone loss and periodontal disease. Those things that make having a toothpick shoved under your fingernail feel like a manicure.

I hate it.

Well, thanks to the fact that my resident “dentist” had little experience with the procedure (and thanks to the fact that I’m a big pussy who flinched every time she crammed that thing into my jawbone) I got to experience the process a grand total of three times!

Whenever the instructor came around to check my resident’s work I crossed my fingers that she wouldn’t have to do it again. I think I may have even prayed a little. I suddenly became her greatest cheerleader. I’ve never wanted a student to succeed so much in my life. Now I know how her parents must feel.

Anyway, it turns out that I don’t have an abscess as I previously thought (yeah me!). Just horrible, horrible gums. Usually, the protocol for me at the dentist is to sit in the chair, get my teeth poked at and, given the state of my gums, have the dentist tell me how awful my oral hygiene must be. I wind up leaving the place feeling like I’ve got the brushing technique and mouth of a crack whore (but without the potential income that it could generate, which could come in handy when it comes time to pay the bill).

But yesterday I was finally diagnosed with a genetic condition. Finally! I knew that I was blameless! I knew that my bad gums couldn’t have anything to do with the fact that I smoke, eat questionable meat products and sometime go entire weeks without brushing!

No, I don’t do those last two things. But it is nice to finally have a dentist give me a freaking break for once. It was nice to have a dentist who didn’t berate me. It was nice to have a dentist who didn’t make me feel like I had gums that could have only been crafted by Satan himself. I’m still in shock.

Has anybody checked the temperature in hell lately? I’m fairly certain that there’s been a cold snap.


Fun Fact: I’ve talked a lot of crap about my gums, but really, they’re not as bad as all that. Sure, they’re not in great shape, but at least it’s not something that you can see.

And if anyone out there is as afraid of the dentist as I am, I suggest that you go to the nearest (respectable) dental school to have your treatment. There’s nothing like a younger, ambitious co-ed to make you act like a tough guy. Sure, inside you’ll be screaming, but the thought of looking like a pussy in front of a college chick is enough to help you hold it together. At least to the point that you can walk out of the dentist’s office with your dignity still intact.

And, trust me, if I can leave a dentist office with dignity, anyone can.

Disabled Vet Please Help $$$ God Bless

I wasn't going to post today. But I got an update email from a company about a product that someday I hope to buy. I speak of course of the Vienna Symphonic Library of sampled instruments. It's a bunch of note samples from various symphonic instruments, painstakingly recorded and presented for easy use by most sampling software.

First, I need to get a new computer and set aside 550 gigabytes of space for the library. There are over 800,000 samples in all. Then I need to raise about $11,000 to buy the library itself.

So, I guess what I'm saying is...do you have $11,000 I can have?

If so, please leave a comment. I would be more than happy to pay you back by writing a song for you (p.s. I would like the "Symphonic Cube" thanks).

TAM


Fun Fact: You can listen to what other (very talented) people have done using these samples. Go here. Click on the "open" button. I recommend "Journey Down Rabbit Lane." Lame title, cool tune.

Don't be afraid to listen to the songs. It's classical music. Very nice. And remember that these songs were performed using nothing but instrument samples complied together note-by-note on a computer.

Symphony Orchestras aren't obsolete...yet.

And This is My Youngest Brother who we Just Call Pansy-Ass

Is this the way you introduce your youngest brother? If so, your parents probably had a lot of boys. There is a new study out that seems to show that the more full-blooded older brothers a man has, the more likely he is to be gay.

Oh, and if you introduce your youngest brother like that you’re also a homophobic jerk. He’s your brother. Show a little respect for the guy. He doesn’t introduce you as his older asshole (at least not while you’re around anyway).

Incidentally, the picture above is from “My Three Sons.” Which begs the question, why the hell did they need this study? Wasn’t “Ernie” proof enough?

Okay, you know what? I didn’t really want to post about this today. Well, I did, but I changed my mind a little while ago. Steve was nice enough to give this blog a shout out yesterday. He liked my Old School blog post. He even linked to a letter that he wrote to himself in 1990. It’s great. Go here and read it.

I was inspired to find an old note that I wrote to my girlfriend in high school. I also have one that I wrote to another (later in high school) girl that I liked. I don’t have a lot of notes that I wrote to girls in high school because…well…I gave the notes to them. I suppose I could have said “hey, baby, you know I love you like the moon loves to shine, but, when you’re done reading it, would it be possible for me to get that note back? You know, for posterity?”

I may have come off a bit arrogant if I had done that. Sure, I was arrogant, but no self-respecting teenager wants to look arrogant. So, all of my old masterpieces are now sitting at some girls house, with the exception of a couple that inexplicably never got delivered. Hopefully the girls kept the other notes I wrote. Most of them probably didn’t. I kept there’s! (some of them) Maybe I’ll post them sometime…if I can ever find them.

So, instead of walking down memory lane today, I get to post about the gay child study.

The study suggests that a man's sexual orientation may be influenced by the conditions in his mother's womb when he was a fetus. I’m not sure how. Maybe after having so many boys, the mother’s womb tries to create a more inviting atmosphere for future residents by decorating with lacy curtains and frilly throw pillows thus dooming any future males to a lifetime of Republican oppression (but possibly creating über-women as well)?

Man, I really wish that I could find those old notes.

Anyway, back to the study. The question of “Nature v Nurture” has been raging for years now…

You know, I bet that I put them in the storage closet downstairs. But it’s a real pain in the ass to get into that thing. I have to climb all over my dirty car and dig past all the Christmas decorations…

Tell you what, let’s just agree that gay men are born and not “turned” and leave it at that. After all, we don’t say that people “turn” heterosexual. To say that homosexuality and heterosexuality are somehow different “urges” is simply asinine.

Let us also agree that this study, with its scope and funding, answers another important question.

Yes, it’s true…no one cares about lesbians. In fact, I’m starting to think that they don’t really exist outside of a “raging kegger” setting anyway.

Who cares. I’m distracted. I’m going to try to find those notes.


Fun Fact: I’m the oldest child in my family. If my parents had liked each other more and had a couple more sons, I could have been a “gay maker!”

Man, I miss out on everything.

See, kids. Divorce hurts everyone.

Power Hungry!

Electricity. Sweet, sweet electricity. You don’t know what it means to you until it’s gone. So, Electricity, let us never fight again.

Yup, the power went out in the apartment last night at midnight. It didn’t come back until noon today. But did the lack of a functioning computer stop me from blogging?

Hell no. I’m hardcore.

HARDCORE!

This is what blogging looked like before the internet: