As I hoped, Teens got to experience a true North Dakota Christmas. There were sub-zero temperatures, snow piled everywhere, and we even had to cancel the Mostly Annual Kickball Game in the Walsh Quad due to the weather.
However, she also got to see the underbelly of the North Dakota bar scene and the downfall to having to start your car and let it run before you drive it. She got to experience, first-hand, the scenario where a cross-eyed drunk ex-hockey player from the rival high school repeatedly gropes you before finally getting chased off.
I got to experience the scenario where I start my car at the end of the night to let it warm up, leave it unlocked outside the bar, and come back 10 minutes later to find the same shithead who was just molesting my wife in Bonzer's fast asleep in the driver's seat.
Gotta love Christmas back home.
Monday, December 30, 2013
Tuesday, December 24, 2013
Buzz, Your Girlfriend! Woof!
So last week I was playing around with Google Earth, and wanted to look at the McCallister's house from Home Alone. (Don't judge me for creeping around Google Street View. We all spend our lunch breaks in different ways.)
What I saw was unsettling.
You can clearly see, in the next-door neighbor's driveway, the old van used by Harry and Marv to case the neighborhood.
THE WET/STICKY BANDITS ARE BACK! MCCALLISTERS, DON'T LEAVE KEVIN HOME ALONE THIS CHRISTMAS! LEARN FROM PAST MISTAKES!
If it's already too late, Kevin, make sure you bust out your Michael Jordan cardboard cutout and throw a fake party tonight. And stop fucking with the Little Nero's Pizza boy, he's just doing his job.
Anyway, Merry Christmas, ya filthy animals.
Friday, December 20, 2013
What's Cooler Than Being Cool?
I used to be a tough North Dakotan, as far as weather was concerned. To be clear, 'weather' is the only North Dakota category I can be considered anywhere close to tough in. Hunting? I'll let you spend hours stalking, slaughtering, and mutilating a helpless animal until you've transformed it from a peaceful living creature into Tuesday night dinner. Give me a call when it's cooked and sitting on a dinner plate, preferably with a baked potato and a side of corn. Fishing? No, I don't really want to bait my own hook....but I bet I can drink 17 beers on the boat before you guys fill up the livewell. Snowmobiling? I tried that a couple times in middle school. Almost crashed into a barbwire fence and ultimately got stuck in a pit, then got yelled at by the Culligan Man for being reckless. So I'm all set there. I like your Arctic Cat jacket though. It's very neon. Cold weather, though? I could handle that. No, I'm not cold, you pussy. Here, take my gloves, I don't even need them right now. Hands were getting sweaty anyway.
But I've been gone for over six years now, and the last couple years, my body finally acclimated to the warmer Kansas weather. Christmases up north are now almost intolerably cold for me. In addition, I completely lost my ability to dress responsibly according to the weather conditions. Last year, during the 12th Mostly Annual Walsh Quad Kickball Game, it was below zero, and I figured I'd be OK in a track jacket, MC Hammer pants, ankle socks, and tennis shoes, "Since we'd be running around and stuff." When I saw people showing up in full body snowsuits, face masks and boots, I knew I was in trouble. Plus, I thought it was a good idea to drink a 40oz. outside in those temperatures, so I ended up leaving half of the skin in my mouth area stuck to the bottle that night. A man can't even enjoy his malt liquor in peace? I honestly can't understand why that region of the country is inhabited with human beings. Basically, at this point in my life, every time I get ready to drive up for Christmas, I hope for the warmest temperatures possible, as my ability to accept shitty weather with a shrug and a grim smile is gone.
But not this year.
Before we started dating, Teens had never even set foot north of Omaha. She's been to North Dakota on a couple of occasions since then, but never during winter. So I want her to see what it's really about. I want it to be cold. I want it to be freeeeeezing. I want to make her go start the car and scrape windows in the morning. I want her to go to the gas station, and scurry back inside the car while the gas is pumping, because you can't stand to be outside for even a couple minutes. I want her to run from a parking lot to a building because she can't stand walking in the cold, while I crack jokes like "You know, it's not really the heat, it's the humidity that'll get ya." I want her to pull a 'Jenna', also known as getting hammered, then coming home and crying in the middle of the night in bed because it's so cold. (Although, to be fair, that incident occurred at Culligan Manor, where the walls were made of paper mache, and we had competitions with friends in other apartment buildings on how deep we could get into winter without turning the heat on.) I want all of it.
So bring on the cold, Weather Gods. Do this for me, and I promise, I won't drink any more 40's in the Walsh Quad, ever again.
(That's a lie, Weather Gods. Just hook me up anyway.)
But I've been gone for over six years now, and the last couple years, my body finally acclimated to the warmer Kansas weather. Christmases up north are now almost intolerably cold for me. In addition, I completely lost my ability to dress responsibly according to the weather conditions. Last year, during the 12th Mostly Annual Walsh Quad Kickball Game, it was below zero, and I figured I'd be OK in a track jacket, MC Hammer pants, ankle socks, and tennis shoes, "Since we'd be running around and stuff." When I saw people showing up in full body snowsuits, face masks and boots, I knew I was in trouble. Plus, I thought it was a good idea to drink a 40oz. outside in those temperatures, so I ended up leaving half of the skin in my mouth area stuck to the bottle that night. A man can't even enjoy his malt liquor in peace? I honestly can't understand why that region of the country is inhabited with human beings. Basically, at this point in my life, every time I get ready to drive up for Christmas, I hope for the warmest temperatures possible, as my ability to accept shitty weather with a shrug and a grim smile is gone.
But not this year.
Before we started dating, Teens had never even set foot north of Omaha. She's been to North Dakota on a couple of occasions since then, but never during winter. So I want her to see what it's really about. I want it to be cold. I want it to be freeeeeezing. I want to make her go start the car and scrape windows in the morning. I want her to go to the gas station, and scurry back inside the car while the gas is pumping, because you can't stand to be outside for even a couple minutes. I want her to run from a parking lot to a building because she can't stand walking in the cold, while I crack jokes like "You know, it's not really the heat, it's the humidity that'll get ya." I want her to pull a 'Jenna', also known as getting hammered, then coming home and crying in the middle of the night in bed because it's so cold. (Although, to be fair, that incident occurred at Culligan Manor, where the walls were made of paper mache, and we had competitions with friends in other apartment buildings on how deep we could get into winter without turning the heat on.) I want all of it.
So bring on the cold, Weather Gods. Do this for me, and I promise, I won't drink any more 40's in the Walsh Quad, ever again.
(That's a lie, Weather Gods. Just hook me up anyway.)
Monday, December 16, 2013
That Awkward Moment....
....When you realize that starting sentences out with "That awkward moment" and then going on to describe an unfunny everyday situation is really annoying and you should probably stop doing it.
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Broke Into The Old Laptop....This Is Where We Used To Live
Besides my currently functioning laptop, I have an old Gateway laptop that was my high school graduation present from my parents. If I had to give an approximate breakdown of its lifetime usage, it would be:
10%- Writing papers & speeches about the '92 Dream Team and/or Tupac faking his own death
10%- Sending 5,000-word emails full of mostly bullshit to keep Easy E, ADawg, and their squad entertained while they were in Iraq
80%- Downloading music
The vast majority of my songs on this laptop were downloaded freshman year of college, back in the days when you'd queue up about 30 songs to download before you went to bed, then wake up in the morning to a brand new cache of hot jams, for free! All you kids out there legitimately purchasing your music on iTunes nowadays, don't get it twisted-- illegally pirating music was fucking awesome.
This old laptop has been dying for a few years now. Even when it's plugged in, I can only get it to turn on every few months or so, and it only stays on for about 15 minutes, during which I make a mad dash to scroll through my old Morpheus/Kazaa/Limewire to steal as many songs as I can before the computer quits. During my latest run-through, I was taken aback at how much shitty music I had on there.
Before we go over some of my favorite finds, a disclaimer: Some of the rubbish can be explained by the fact that everyone always downloaded songs on each other's computers during dorm room parties....kinda like STD's for a laptop. So I'm sure I only downloaded most, not all, of the following examples-- but the fact remains, they're still on my computer. So at the very least, I didn't go and buy the MP3 version of the special shampoo for crabs, for which I need to take some blame. ANYWAY....
- My collection of Nelly songs- Country Grammar, Batter Up, Hot in Herre, #1, etc.
(Don't worry, this is the SFW version, not because I care about curse words in your place of employment, but because I want you to hear one of my favorite radio edits of all time, right in the opening three seconds. HOTDISH!)
Nelly didn't age well for me personally, as I made my transition to hip-hop snob (we'll get to that later.) When it comes to "Party" rap, which sets up an entirely different evening than Gangsta Rap, I'm not sure why I gave Ludacris a pass, but started referring to Nelly as a little bitch (nevermind, I remember why.) Regardless, I hadn't listened to Nelly in years, and some of songs were pretty sweet upon re-listening. Country Grammar is just a straight-up fantastic Party Rap song. And thanks to Nelly, I wore a band-aid on my cheek on more than one occasion for Halloween. So there's that.
- Debbie Does Dallas theme song
We went through a phase freshman year during which we would download songs from some of our favorite pornos. I blame Lane and his roommate, the incomparable Logan Stoner.** To this day I still think this song is baller, even when you're not watching Bambi Woods get railed in a sporting goods store. I was listening to this song the other day while I was shaving, Teens heard it from the other room, and we had this exchange:
Teens: What is this?
Me: The theme song from Debbie Does Dallas...
Teens, deadpan: What.
Me: Pretty cool bass line, isn't it?
~ Teens walks away ~
Me: Hey, you could've said no when I proposed! This is your life now!
**Normally I don't use real first and last names on the blog so you can't get put on blast by Google, but I want Logan to google his own name, read this, and somehow have it lead to him hanging out with us again. What a tremendous random roommate he turned out to be for Lane. I lived with Paul in the dorms, so we knew it would be awesome, not to mention homoerotic. We took the element of chance out of the equation; signing up for a random roommate was a risk we didn't want to take. Sometimes it didn't work out, like when Russell got the kid with three first names that studied all the time and sneered at us every time we tried to get him to put down the books and come party with us, but sometimes.... sometimes you got lucky like Lane and drew a magnificent bastard like Logan Stoner. Holler at me, Logan.
- Prozzak- www.nevergetoveryou
Presented without comment.
- Pink- Get The Party Started
A girl that I had a crush on at various points in college LOVED this song when I was a frosh and she was a sophomore, ipso facto, I loved it too. Paging Dr. Ikes. Dr. Yee Ikes, you have a telephone call up front.
- R. Kelly- 'Ignition'
Somewhere along the way, I turned into a hip-hop snob. It's important for me to stumble across songs like this one, or 'The Thong Song', or anything by Ja Rule, and remember that I wasn't nearly as cool as I later portrayed myself to be when arguing about the state of rap music. On the other hand....
- Lil Bow Wow- Bounce With Me
....If I was always cool, I might not have songs as delightfully brutal as this one.
- John Mayer- Your Body is a Wonderland
One of my least favorite songs of all time. I hate John Mayer with a burning passion. I don't even care that he was on Chappelle's Show once, fuck that guy. However, this song did give our friend group a great running joke for a few months:
"James, grab me a beer while you're up!"
"I'd be happy to, Fundy. I mean, your body IS a wonderland and all."
or
"Ike, we're not ordering Chinese, you know I hate that shit. Let's get pizza."
"Quit being such a pussy all the time and just eat Chinese for once."
"Screw you, I just hate Chinese food, it's the one thing I won't eat!"
"Hey, can I tell you something right now without you getting angry at me?"
"WHAT!"
"Your body....it's a wonderland."
- Brutal Songs, HOT GIRL DIVISION:
Kylie Minogue- Can't Get You Out of My Head
Nelly Furtado- I'm Like a Bird
Shakira- Whenever, Wherever
Goodness gracious, I hadn't thought about Shakira in a while. Do you guys remember when she was gloriously released to the world? My wet dreams do.
- Man, I Loved Ruining Songs For People Sometimes (And Still Do)
Fuel- Hemorrhage (In My Hands)
I think this song sucked, but a lot of people loved it. I have very fond memories of singing this chorus as loud as I possibly could, not knowing the words and not caring, and annoying the crap out of people. If you made a list of activities that I enjoyed the most in calendar year 2002, and I'm kinda spitballing here, it would probably look something like this:
1. Getting drunk
2. Getting laid
3. Playing Madden
4. Ruining that stupid Fuel song while my friends are trying to enjoy it
5. Arts & Crafts
"LEE LA BLEE DA IN MY HANDS! IN MY HANDS AGAINNNNNN! LEEEEE LA BLEEEE DAAAAA IN MY HANDS!" Classic.
- Songs That I Have Ripped On For Over a Decade, Only To Just Now Realize That They've Been On My Computer This Entire Time:
Crazy Town- Butterfly
Nickelback- How You Remind Me
Creed- Higher
If my old laptop never turns on again, at least he gave me one last gift. Sleep well, sweet prince.
10%- Writing papers & speeches about the '92 Dream Team and/or Tupac faking his own death
10%- Sending 5,000-word emails full of mostly bullshit to keep Easy E, ADawg, and their squad entertained while they were in Iraq
80%- Downloading music
The vast majority of my songs on this laptop were downloaded freshman year of college, back in the days when you'd queue up about 30 songs to download before you went to bed, then wake up in the morning to a brand new cache of hot jams, for free! All you kids out there legitimately purchasing your music on iTunes nowadays, don't get it twisted-- illegally pirating music was fucking awesome.
This old laptop has been dying for a few years now. Even when it's plugged in, I can only get it to turn on every few months or so, and it only stays on for about 15 minutes, during which I make a mad dash to scroll through my old Morpheus/Kazaa/Limewire to steal as many songs as I can before the computer quits. During my latest run-through, I was taken aback at how much shitty music I had on there.
Before we go over some of my favorite finds, a disclaimer: Some of the rubbish can be explained by the fact that everyone always downloaded songs on each other's computers during dorm room parties....kinda like STD's for a laptop. So I'm sure I only downloaded most, not all, of the following examples-- but the fact remains, they're still on my computer. So at the very least, I didn't go and buy the MP3 version of the special shampoo for crabs, for which I need to take some blame. ANYWAY....
- My collection of Nelly songs- Country Grammar, Batter Up, Hot in Herre, #1, etc.
(Don't worry, this is the SFW version, not because I care about curse words in your place of employment, but because I want you to hear one of my favorite radio edits of all time, right in the opening three seconds. HOTDISH!)
Nelly didn't age well for me personally, as I made my transition to hip-hop snob (we'll get to that later.) When it comes to "Party" rap, which sets up an entirely different evening than Gangsta Rap, I'm not sure why I gave Ludacris a pass, but started referring to Nelly as a little bitch (nevermind, I remember why.) Regardless, I hadn't listened to Nelly in years, and some of songs were pretty sweet upon re-listening. Country Grammar is just a straight-up fantastic Party Rap song. And thanks to Nelly, I wore a band-aid on my cheek on more than one occasion for Halloween. So there's that.
- Debbie Does Dallas theme song
We went through a phase freshman year during which we would download songs from some of our favorite pornos. I blame Lane and his roommate, the incomparable Logan Stoner.** To this day I still think this song is baller, even when you're not watching Bambi Woods get railed in a sporting goods store. I was listening to this song the other day while I was shaving, Teens heard it from the other room, and we had this exchange:
Teens: What is this?
Me: The theme song from Debbie Does Dallas...
Teens, deadpan: What.
Me: Pretty cool bass line, isn't it?
~ Teens walks away ~
Me: Hey, you could've said no when I proposed! This is your life now!
**Normally I don't use real first and last names on the blog so you can't get put on blast by Google, but I want Logan to google his own name, read this, and somehow have it lead to him hanging out with us again. What a tremendous random roommate he turned out to be for Lane. I lived with Paul in the dorms, so we knew it would be awesome, not to mention homoerotic. We took the element of chance out of the equation; signing up for a random roommate was a risk we didn't want to take. Sometimes it didn't work out, like when Russell got the kid with three first names that studied all the time and sneered at us every time we tried to get him to put down the books and come party with us, but sometimes.... sometimes you got lucky like Lane and drew a magnificent bastard like Logan Stoner. Holler at me, Logan.
- Prozzak- www.nevergetoveryou
Presented without comment.
- Pink- Get The Party Started
A girl that I had a crush on at various points in college LOVED this song when I was a frosh and she was a sophomore, ipso facto, I loved it too. Paging Dr. Ikes. Dr. Yee Ikes, you have a telephone call up front.
- R. Kelly- 'Ignition'
Somewhere along the way, I turned into a hip-hop snob. It's important for me to stumble across songs like this one, or 'The Thong Song', or anything by Ja Rule, and remember that I wasn't nearly as cool as I later portrayed myself to be when arguing about the state of rap music. On the other hand....
- Lil Bow Wow- Bounce With Me
....If I was always cool, I might not have songs as delightfully brutal as this one.
- John Mayer- Your Body is a Wonderland
One of my least favorite songs of all time. I hate John Mayer with a burning passion. I don't even care that he was on Chappelle's Show once, fuck that guy. However, this song did give our friend group a great running joke for a few months:
"James, grab me a beer while you're up!"
"I'd be happy to, Fundy. I mean, your body IS a wonderland and all."
or
"Ike, we're not ordering Chinese, you know I hate that shit. Let's get pizza."
"Quit being such a pussy all the time and just eat Chinese for once."
"Screw you, I just hate Chinese food, it's the one thing I won't eat!"
"Hey, can I tell you something right now without you getting angry at me?"
"WHAT!"
"Your body....it's a wonderland."
- Brutal Songs, HOT GIRL DIVISION:
Kylie Minogue- Can't Get You Out of My Head
Nelly Furtado- I'm Like a Bird
Shakira- Whenever, Wherever
Goodness gracious, I hadn't thought about Shakira in a while. Do you guys remember when she was gloriously released to the world? My wet dreams do.
- Man, I Loved Ruining Songs For People Sometimes (And Still Do)
Fuel- Hemorrhage (In My Hands)
I think this song sucked, but a lot of people loved it. I have very fond memories of singing this chorus as loud as I possibly could, not knowing the words and not caring, and annoying the crap out of people. If you made a list of activities that I enjoyed the most in calendar year 2002, and I'm kinda spitballing here, it would probably look something like this:
1. Getting drunk
2. Getting laid
3. Playing Madden
4. Ruining that stupid Fuel song while my friends are trying to enjoy it
5. Arts & Crafts
"LEE LA BLEE DA IN MY HANDS! IN MY HANDS AGAINNNNNN! LEEEEE LA BLEEEE DAAAAA IN MY HANDS!" Classic.
- Songs That I Have Ripped On For Over a Decade, Only To Just Now Realize That They've Been On My Computer This Entire Time:
Crazy Town- Butterfly
Nickelback- How You Remind Me
Creed- Higher
If my old laptop never turns on again, at least he gave me one last gift. Sleep well, sweet prince.
Friday, December 6, 2013
Et tu, Jacoby?
So Jacoby Ellsbury signed with the Yankees.
Don't worry, don't worry. I'm not gonna do....what you all think I'm gonna do....which is just FLIP OUT!
This isn't another Johnny Damon situation. Really, the only similarity is that a center fielder who most of the female fan base wants to bang (and a portion of the male fan base, whether they admit it or not, and I will freely admit it) signed a free agent contract with the Yankees. The reason Damon's signing was so tragic is that he portrayed himself to be Red Sox to his core, and stated on multiple occasions that he'd never sign with the Yankees, then did it anyway. Ellsbury made it clear from the beginning that he was going to the highest bidder, and had a strained relationship with the Boston front office for years now anyway. I've been prepared for Ellsbury to move on since about May of 2012; it was pretty much inevitable. Even more so once it became clear that my boy Jackie Bradley Jr. was waiting in the wings.
So really, the only bummer is that he had to sign with the friggin' Yankees. Why couldn't the Mariners or Rangers or somebody come up with the cash this one time? (Side note: The one good thing about the Yankees signing Ellsbury is that I think they wayyyy overpaid for him; his main asset is speed, and he's now on the wrong side of 30. He'll probably hit a few more homers with New York's short porch in right, but this contract could still look more than a little Carl Crawford-ish in a few years. Not that that matters with the Yankees' "budget.")
When an ex-Red Sox signs with any other team besides New York, it's much easier to tip your cap and remember the good times as they walk out the door. (Good luck with the Marlins, Salty. Probably shouldn't have tried this throw, but hey, whatever. Champs, dude!) But now, despite Ells being a huge part of two World Series Championships-- not to mention providing all of America with a free taco by stealing a base in the 2007 World Series-- every time I see him in pinstripes from now on, there will be at least 40% of me thinking "Man, fuck that guy."
The lesson here, of course, is to stop having man-crushes on Red Sox center fielders. I promise that will never happen again.
Dammit! Too late. Promise me you'll never leave me, JBJ. PROMISE ME.
Don't worry, don't worry. I'm not gonna do....what you all think I'm gonna do....which is just FLIP OUT!
This isn't another Johnny Damon situation. Really, the only similarity is that a center fielder who most of the female fan base wants to bang (and a portion of the male fan base, whether they admit it or not, and I will freely admit it) signed a free agent contract with the Yankees. The reason Damon's signing was so tragic is that he portrayed himself to be Red Sox to his core, and stated on multiple occasions that he'd never sign with the Yankees, then did it anyway. Ellsbury made it clear from the beginning that he was going to the highest bidder, and had a strained relationship with the Boston front office for years now anyway. I've been prepared for Ellsbury to move on since about May of 2012; it was pretty much inevitable. Even more so once it became clear that my boy Jackie Bradley Jr. was waiting in the wings.
So really, the only bummer is that he had to sign with the friggin' Yankees. Why couldn't the Mariners or Rangers or somebody come up with the cash this one time? (Side note: The one good thing about the Yankees signing Ellsbury is that I think they wayyyy overpaid for him; his main asset is speed, and he's now on the wrong side of 30. He'll probably hit a few more homers with New York's short porch in right, but this contract could still look more than a little Carl Crawford-ish in a few years. Not that that matters with the Yankees' "budget.")
When an ex-Red Sox signs with any other team besides New York, it's much easier to tip your cap and remember the good times as they walk out the door. (Good luck with the Marlins, Salty. Probably shouldn't have tried this throw, but hey, whatever. Champs, dude!) But now, despite Ells being a huge part of two World Series Championships-- not to mention providing all of America with a free taco by stealing a base in the 2007 World Series-- every time I see him in pinstripes from now on, there will be at least 40% of me thinking "Man, fuck that guy."
The lesson here, of course, is to stop having man-crushes on Red Sox center fielders. I promise that will never happen again.
Dammit! Too late. Promise me you'll never leave me, JBJ. PROMISE ME.
Monday, December 2, 2013
Made With Bits Of Real Panther, So You Know It's Good
The person delivering this newscast is one of my best friends. No, not Ron Burgundy, the other one.
I don't even know how many times Amber and I watched Anchorman together back in the day-- I do know that the only person I watched it with more than her is Paul (obvs.) When we heard there was going to be a sequel, we discussed the logistics of going to the movie at the exact same time, three states apart, and putting each other on speakerphone and watching the movie "together." If you would have told me back in 2005 that someday I would watch Amber and Will Ferrell deliver the news together, my head would've exploded. (Actually, that's not true. If you would've told me this story back at that exact time in my life, when all I did was speak in Anchorman catchphrases, I would've paused, put on my best Ron Burgundy voice, smirked, and said "I don't believe you." And if you assured me it was true, THEN maybe my head would've exploded.) I'm still struggling to comprehend that this actually happened to one of my friends, to be honest.
I've been struggling to come up with what the comparable scenario would be in my own life. I play a round of golf with Phil Mickelson and it's televised? Bill Self decides to start me at small forward in KU's next game? I do a cameo on The Wire? The kicker is that this is Amber's job, and she was still expected to deliver the news. So maybe the best comparison would be me working on amortization schedules along with Tiffani Thiessen in character as Kelly Kapowski, or maybe presenting budget projections for the spring semester while Dave Chappelle cracks jokes in my ear. I don't know how Amber kept it (relatively) together, so a tip of the hat to her on that one.
Great news story. Compelling and rich.
I don't even know how many times Amber and I watched Anchorman together back in the day-- I do know that the only person I watched it with more than her is Paul (obvs.) When we heard there was going to be a sequel, we discussed the logistics of going to the movie at the exact same time, three states apart, and putting each other on speakerphone and watching the movie "together." If you would have told me back in 2005 that someday I would watch Amber and Will Ferrell deliver the news together, my head would've exploded. (Actually, that's not true. If you would've told me this story back at that exact time in my life, when all I did was speak in Anchorman catchphrases, I would've paused, put on my best Ron Burgundy voice, smirked, and said "I don't believe you." And if you assured me it was true, THEN maybe my head would've exploded.) I'm still struggling to comprehend that this actually happened to one of my friends, to be honest.
I've been struggling to come up with what the comparable scenario would be in my own life. I play a round of golf with Phil Mickelson and it's televised? Bill Self decides to start me at small forward in KU's next game? I do a cameo on The Wire? The kicker is that this is Amber's job, and she was still expected to deliver the news. So maybe the best comparison would be me working on amortization schedules along with Tiffani Thiessen in character as Kelly Kapowski, or maybe presenting budget projections for the spring semester while Dave Chappelle cracks jokes in my ear. I don't know how Amber kept it (relatively) together, so a tip of the hat to her on that one.
Great news story. Compelling and rich.
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Thankful, But Kinda Not Effing Really
Right now, what I am most thankful for is how crappy the AFC is this year. Its ineptitude is currently allowing the Titans to be relevant in the playoff picture, despite a 5-6 record and a generally crappy level of performance. More than relevant, really; if the season were to end today, they'd actually somehow be the 6 seed.
(Since this is the season of thankfulness, what I won't mention is the Titans' failure to either dramatically improve or properly bottom out, and that they're going to finish the season with somewhere between 6-9 wins for the 5th straight season. Wake me up when we can draft Jameis Winston....he could be the next Vince Young!)
Monday, November 25, 2013
Everybody Get Up, It's Time To Slam Now, We Got A Real Jam Goin' Down
Coincidentally, another perfect example of feeling older occurred shortly after I wrote that post last week. Some construction went awry on campus, and our building lost all internet and phone capabilities, as well as access to our accounting files. As a result, work was pretty much impossible to accomplish, and most of us went home early on both Thursday and Friday. And the weird thing is that my first reaction to all of this wasn't exultation, or even mild excitement. It was more "Dammit! I have a ton of stuff to get done right now, plus we have a short week with Thanksgiving next week! What about the budget projections for December? Those grant reports aren't going to prepare themselves! This is a travesty!" Realizing I had such dedication to my job in a time of near-crisis was alarming.
I mean, yeah, I still went home on Thursday, destroyed an entire six-pack-and a pound from Taco John's, and had a David Lynch movie marathon....and on Friday I popped in Space Jam, played a few rounds of Golden Tee, and started drinking 40's four hours before anyone was scheduled to come over that night....but still, I wasn't as happy about it as I would've been five years ago.
I mean, yeah, I still went home on Thursday, destroyed an entire six-pack-and a pound from Taco John's, and had a David Lynch movie marathon....and on Friday I popped in Space Jam, played a few rounds of Golden Tee, and started drinking 40's four hours before anyone was scheduled to come over that night....but still, I wasn't as happy about it as I would've been five years ago.
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
"Looking Old, Billy Ray!" "Feeling Old, Louis!"
As is the case from time to time, little things from everyday life have been making me feel old lately. Three examples from the last couple of days:
- Josh Hutcherson and Haim are the host and musical guest, respectively, of Saturday Night Live this week. I have absolutely no idea who those people are. Actually, I probably shouldn't even assume who the host is and who the musical guest is, since I don't know for sure. Maybe Haim just goes by one name, like Pele, or Leon, or Aristotle. Corey Haim is dead, right? So it can't be him.
- I've recently noticed that college kids are regularly peeing at urinals with their phone in their other hand. Do you seriously have to stay "plugged in" even while you're pissing? Are you snapchatting right now? Are you instagramming your dick in a public restroom? What is so important on Twitter that you're reading it right this second? Put your phone away, or I'm going to stop trying to write my name in cursive on this urinal wall and I'm gonna turn and pee on you like I'm R. Kelly and you're an underage girl. Friggin' kids. TURN DOWN YOUR MUSIC!!! GET OFF MY LAWN!!!
- I turn 31 in less than two weeks. This last year was bad enough, telling people that I was 30, but now I'm officially IN MY THIRTIES. Also, if you buy into that formula that supposedly draws the line of age inappropriateness in a significant other (your age divided by 2, plus 7) then that means that anybody 22.5 years old or younger is now off the table for me. Which is a problem, since Shawn Johnson doesn't turn 22 for another month or so. At least the older Dunphy sister on Modern Family just turned 23. Still a chance.
(I suppose it could be worse; I could be R. Kelly.)
- Josh Hutcherson and Haim are the host and musical guest, respectively, of Saturday Night Live this week. I have absolutely no idea who those people are. Actually, I probably shouldn't even assume who the host is and who the musical guest is, since I don't know for sure. Maybe Haim just goes by one name, like Pele, or Leon, or Aristotle. Corey Haim is dead, right? So it can't be him.
- I've recently noticed that college kids are regularly peeing at urinals with their phone in their other hand. Do you seriously have to stay "plugged in" even while you're pissing? Are you snapchatting right now? Are you instagramming your dick in a public restroom? What is so important on Twitter that you're reading it right this second? Put your phone away, or I'm going to stop trying to write my name in cursive on this urinal wall and I'm gonna turn and pee on you like I'm R. Kelly and you're an underage girl. Friggin' kids. TURN DOWN YOUR MUSIC!!! GET OFF MY LAWN!!!
- I turn 31 in less than two weeks. This last year was bad enough, telling people that I was 30, but now I'm officially IN MY THIRTIES. Also, if you buy into that formula that supposedly draws the line of age inappropriateness in a significant other (your age divided by 2, plus 7) then that means that anybody 22.5 years old or younger is now off the table for me. Which is a problem, since Shawn Johnson doesn't turn 22 for another month or so. At least the older Dunphy sister on Modern Family just turned 23. Still a chance.
(I suppose it could be worse; I could be R. Kelly.)
Saturday, November 16, 2013
Key & Peele Tipping Point
Time for another linkfest, in my never-ending quest to make everyone in the world have the same sense of humor as me.
Something like a year ago, I watched an episode of Key & Peele and it kinda sucked. I wasn't really in the market for a new show anyway, so I only gave it one chance, then washed my hands of it. To paraphrase Tommy Boy with the chicken wings and the Meat Lover's Pizza: If Key & Peele isn't any good, so what? I still got my Chappelle's Show DVDs over there on the DVD rack. But over the last few months, I kept stumbling into individual sketches, and every one cracked me up. First it was this one....
Then during the shitshow Minneapolis trip, Morley played us this one, which is more or less the same joke, but still funny as hell....
Random coincidences brought me to these two....
And then a couple days ago I discovered my first valet sketch, which quickly became my favorite of all of them. The tipping point was hit; I'd officially seen enough funny sketches to give this show another chance. Now the floodgates have been opened, and I'm DVRing new episodes and spending entire lunch breaks crushing youtube clips of these fools. Go watch this show.
And if you don't want to watch the show, do me one favor and watch at least one of the valet sketches. It's like watching a conversation between myself and JDub when we're both excited about something, only Key and Peele are about 10 times funnier, and aren't a couple of white boys trying to act black. I'm gonna fire up a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds to make a full-length movie of those valet characters. Inquire within if you're interested in donating.
There's like 20 more sketches I want to link here, but instead I'll let you guys fall down the rabbit hole yourselves, then maybe we can have inside jokes together, bup bup bup bup.
Something like a year ago, I watched an episode of Key & Peele and it kinda sucked. I wasn't really in the market for a new show anyway, so I only gave it one chance, then washed my hands of it. To paraphrase Tommy Boy with the chicken wings and the Meat Lover's Pizza: If Key & Peele isn't any good, so what? I still got my Chappelle's Show DVDs over there on the DVD rack. But over the last few months, I kept stumbling into individual sketches, and every one cracked me up. First it was this one....
Then during the shitshow Minneapolis trip, Morley played us this one, which is more or less the same joke, but still funny as hell....
Random coincidences brought me to these two....
And then a couple days ago I discovered my first valet sketch, which quickly became my favorite of all of them. The tipping point was hit; I'd officially seen enough funny sketches to give this show another chance. Now the floodgates have been opened, and I'm DVRing new episodes and spending entire lunch breaks crushing youtube clips of these fools. Go watch this show.
And if you don't want to watch the show, do me one favor and watch at least one of the valet sketches. It's like watching a conversation between myself and JDub when we're both excited about something, only Key and Peele are about 10 times funnier, and aren't a couple of white boys trying to act black. I'm gonna fire up a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds to make a full-length movie of those valet characters. Inquire within if you're interested in donating.
There's like 20 more sketches I want to link here, but instead I'll let you guys fall down the rabbit hole yourselves, then maybe we can have inside jokes together, bup bup bup bup.
Monday, November 11, 2013
Movie Couples, After The Movie
When we watch movies, we constantly see people magically find each other and fall in love. Sometimes we see just the first kiss, sometimes we see the first date, sometimes we see the wedding. But what we never see is what happens to these couples once they settle into real life. The divorce rate in the United States is approximately 45%, to say nothing of relationships that don't even make it to marriage. Here's what I think went down after the cameras stopped rolling....
(Also, hat tip to Double D, who suggested a list of movies that I should write about. His innocent question "Hey, what do you think ever happened to Gordon Bombay and Charlie Conway's mom?" got the ball rolling.)
The Mighty Ducks- Gordon Bombay & Casey Conway
I couldn't find a single picture of the two of them together, which is weird, but at least I found the perfect encapsulation of the "These fucking guys, am I right?" face.
Let's take a quick look at Gordon Bombay's track record: He starts out a humble junior hockey star, but quits hockey when his dad passes away. He grows up to be a bigshot lawyer, turns into a total prick who brags about his undefeated record in court (the fuck does that even mean, anyway?) and has a limousine with a license plate that reads "JUSTWIN." He gets a DUI while celebrating how awesome he is, gets community service, and coaches a ragtag bunch of misfits (and my boy Adam Banks, nothing ragtag about him) to a city championship. He promises the team he'll be back to coach them next year, but instead big-times them and chases a pro hockey career, wrecks his knee, gets depressed, and comes back to Minneapolis. Once again, he catches a break and becomes coach of USA Hockey for the Junior Goodwill Games, but sells out to the sponsors, starts slicking his hair and dressing like he's Pat Riley, starts chasing girls, ignores the team, and generally acts like a dick again. He finally redeems himself-- just in time to win the gold medal, of course. (I'm not going to reference the third movie because it's mostly terrible and I don't remember much of it.)
Really, Gordon's life is just a series of highs, during which he completely "loses himself", followed by lows, during which he finds himself humbled enough to turn into a good guy....until he finds himself on the upswing and starts acting like a jerk again. The question needs to be asked: When Gordon Bombay "rediscovers" himself, to what personality are we referring? To me, I'd say that his true self is the asshole, and the exceptions are when he hits rock bottom and becomes a "good" guy, not vice versa.
So back to Gordon and Ms. Conway. After a series of break-ups and make-ups (oh, you thought she forgot about Iceland's assistant coach and Team USA's tutor from the Goodwill Games?) the happy couple moves in together and settles down. Only this time, Ms. Conway, the single mother who has been working in a diner to make ends meet while her boyfriend travels the country, gets her chance to walk all over Gordon when her son Charlie is discovered by Hollywood and goes on to star in Dawson's Creek.
Suddenly finding herself courted by rich Hollywood men, Ms. Conway drops Gordon like she should've years ago. Gordon goes into a tailspin and picks up another DUI. Only this time, instead of receiving a cushy community service gig like coaching pee-wee hockey again, he gets disbarred and picks up a 4-6 month stint at MCF-Shakopee. While locked up, he becomes Cell Block 3's bottom dollar bitch, and the inmates take great pleasure in forcing him to make duck noises while they sodomize him. Yes sir, Mr. Ducksworth! Thank you very much, Mr. Ducksworth! Quack quack quack quack quack, Mr. Ducksworth!
Top Gun- Maverick & Charlie
Let's review some observations about Maverick, his lifestyle, and surrounding factors:
1. He enjoys skins vs. skins beach volleyball games.
2. He frequently participates in "arguments" with other men that occur a) in locker rooms, b) with faces two inches apart from each other, and/or c) while wearing only towels.
3. Charlie is NOT attractive. Not even a little. She also dresses up like a man to seduce Maverick in an elevator.
4. Let's not gloss over the fact that her name is Charlie.
5. There are a ton of ass references throughout the movie..."Watch your tail"..."Cover your rear"...even "I want butts!"
6. Yeah, Mav sings 'You've Lost that Lovin' Feeling' in a bar to get in with Charlie, but are we sure that wasn't just an excuse to have a homoerotic sing-along in a hot, sweaty bar with a bunch of dudes in uniform?
(I'm intentionally not mentioning Maverick's relationship with Goose, since they're only about 60% as gay together as Paul and I are in real life, so that would be the pot calling the kettle a homo.)
All right, so we can all agree that Charlie is just a beard for 'Mav' (gay stripper name?), right? The only question is how long he can keep up the facade. During their relationship and eventual marriage, there have been a few nagging doubts on Charlie's mind. Maverick always seems to have a lot of "awesome" locker room stories that he brings home and shares, when, in actuality, they aren't that funny. There have also been a couple of role play scenarios that Charlie would rather not discuss-- Maverick's ideas, of course. But ultimately, nothing that can't be explained away.
But then, about 18 months into the marriage, there's an incident in a bar where Maverick slips his phone number to a guy when he thinks Ol' Chuck is in the bathroom. When she confronts him on it, he passes it off as just making a new buddy who also happens to enjoy Kenny Loggins songs and dramatic motorcycle rides at sunset.
After another year of this behavior, fearing the worst, Charlie goes home to visit her parents, hoping for some reassurance from her mother. Instead, Mama McGillis agrees and says she has thought Maverick was gay all along. Terrified for her marriage, Charlie takes an early flight home. She busts in the door, ready for a 'Come to Jesus' meeting with Maverick....when she finds him in bed with Iceman. They were doing a great job of covering each other's tail.
Speed- (Also known as 'The Bus That Couldn't Slow Down)- Jack & Annie
(Sorry, I know that link doesn't fit the theme of this post, I just really wanted to shoehorn in one of my all-time favorite Homer Simpson jokes.)
Here's the problem with Keanu and Sandra's relationship, and they even say it themselves in the movie: "Relationships that start under intense circumstances don't last." Maybe it's because YOU DON'T KNOW EACH OTHER. You met earlier this morning, and you've literally spent the entire day driving around on a bus rigged to the gills with explosives, your lives completely dependent upon a speedometer. Listen, Jack, for all you know, Annie never moved out of her parents' house, still wears My Little Pony pajamas, and all six of her cats are named after the dwarves from Snow White. (There used to be seven, but Sneezy got hit by a car last year. Annie still cries about it from time to time.) Bro, you're allergic to cats. And Annie, what do you really know about Jack? Maybe he's only into S&M, constantly trolls Craigslist for casual encounters, and currently has a restraining order on him from his last relationship?
And you know that their friends wouldn't approve. It would start innocently enough, maybe during a guy's night out, and a couple of Jack's friends start busting balls: "Yeah, Annie might be hot, Jack, but at least I don't need to take advantage of a traumatized hostage survivor to get laid...." But that one comment starts gnawing away at Jack, and pretty soon he starts resenting Annie for it. Pretty soon, happy hours turn into all-night drinking binges, as Jack broods over the mess he got himself in.
And what happens when Jack (who, don't forget, still works at a crazy intense job that requires long hours and constantly keeps him away from home) saves the life of some good-looking piece a couple months later? Annie knows that's exactly how their relationship started, and this new girl has a bigger chest (a sensitive subject for Annie, always has been) so she'd immediately get jealous and suspect that Jack was banging his new damsel-in-distress too. And of course her girlfriends support that suspicion and fuel the fire, as most girlfriends are wont to do.
Everything escalates from there, and during one particularly nasty fight ("Why don't you just go to your big-breasted WHORE! I saw how you were looking at her on the news!"...."She's not a whore, I told you, she's just stripping to pay for grad school! But now that you mention it, you know what? I HAVE been lying: your boobs ARE too small!") the relationship does what they miraculously managed to prevent the bus from doing: blow up in their faces.
50 First Dates- Henry & Lucy
Oh, this relationship is rich. Lemme get this straight: The girl wakes up every morning in a heavy state of confusion; she doesn't know what day it is, where she is, or who you are. You have to convince her that it's OK that she's in bed with you. There will definitely be some crying, probably a phone call to her father, and possibly some throwing up. Most of the day is spent recovering, and then mayyyybe she's good to go by late afternoon or early evening. The next morning, it happens all over again.
So what you're telling me is that basically, Adam Sandler is going to have to deal with the morning-after version of the drunkest girl at the bar, every single day, for the rest of his life? Without getting any of the drunken benefits? I give this marriage a month, tops. There isn't a judge in the world that would deny Henry an annulment.
Little Mermaid- Prince Eric & Ariel
We have a woman with a horribly skewed view of what love is supposed to be like; a prince who has spent his entire life chasing his dreams while girls chased after him; and a father-in-law who happens to be the Lord of the Ocean or some shit, who wields an all-powerful trident that can basically cause any sort of destruction he wants. This thing.....is gonna end violently.
As soon as the honeymoon phase wears off, Ariel starts thinking about how she gave up her entire life to be with him. Disillusionment soon follows, and ordinary husband-and-wife conversation turns ugly quick. "Why yes, of course I don't mind taking out the trash, why would I? It's not like I already gave up my home, all my friends and family- not to mention my tail and ability to breathe underwater- in order to be with you or anything. Why not give up my self-respect too? No, no, don't get up, relax and watch the game."
Prince Eric, who, as we mentioned, has spent his entire life having his every whim fancied and his every desire fulfilled, is far too self-involved to have any idea how to be an attentive husband. While he's off sailing the seas, looking for his next adventure, Ariel is back home, developing an impressive drinking problem, dressing increasingly sluttier, and trying to seduce the hired help every chance she gets.
Eric comes home from his latest conquest, only to discover Ariel, drunk, topless, wearing mermaid bottoms, and slurring at the gardeners, "You know you want to look! Don't you think I'm pretty? This is what my legs used to look like! My husband doesn't even know my real legs, but now you do!!" An unsuccessful rehab stint follows, and a detached Eric finally files for divorce. Ariel runs to daddy, and a furious King Triton returns to land and wreaks havoc on the palace grounds. In his fury, he loses control, and his hurricane destroys the palace, inadvertent flying shrapnel killing Prince Eric on the spot.
Guilt-stricken, and with no way to return to her life under the sea, Ariel becomes a street urchin. She currently lives under a bridge and spends most of her day rolling around in the shallow water, and for a few dollars or just a warm meal, she'll dance for you while singing 'Part of Your World.' Don't get too close, though; her mermaid costume smells like piss.
***************
Suggestions for a possible Volume 2 are encouraged.
(Also, hat tip to Double D, who suggested a list of movies that I should write about. His innocent question "Hey, what do you think ever happened to Gordon Bombay and Charlie Conway's mom?" got the ball rolling.)
The Mighty Ducks- Gordon Bombay & Casey Conway
I couldn't find a single picture of the two of them together, which is weird, but at least I found the perfect encapsulation of the "These fucking guys, am I right?" face.
Let's take a quick look at Gordon Bombay's track record: He starts out a humble junior hockey star, but quits hockey when his dad passes away. He grows up to be a bigshot lawyer, turns into a total prick who brags about his undefeated record in court (the fuck does that even mean, anyway?) and has a limousine with a license plate that reads "JUSTWIN." He gets a DUI while celebrating how awesome he is, gets community service, and coaches a ragtag bunch of misfits (and my boy Adam Banks, nothing ragtag about him) to a city championship. He promises the team he'll be back to coach them next year, but instead big-times them and chases a pro hockey career, wrecks his knee, gets depressed, and comes back to Minneapolis. Once again, he catches a break and becomes coach of USA Hockey for the Junior Goodwill Games, but sells out to the sponsors, starts slicking his hair and dressing like he's Pat Riley, starts chasing girls, ignores the team, and generally acts like a dick again. He finally redeems himself-- just in time to win the gold medal, of course. (I'm not going to reference the third movie because it's mostly terrible and I don't remember much of it.)
Really, Gordon's life is just a series of highs, during which he completely "loses himself", followed by lows, during which he finds himself humbled enough to turn into a good guy....until he finds himself on the upswing and starts acting like a jerk again. The question needs to be asked: When Gordon Bombay "rediscovers" himself, to what personality are we referring? To me, I'd say that his true self is the asshole, and the exceptions are when he hits rock bottom and becomes a "good" guy, not vice versa.
So back to Gordon and Ms. Conway. After a series of break-ups and make-ups (oh, you thought she forgot about Iceland's assistant coach and Team USA's tutor from the Goodwill Games?) the happy couple moves in together and settles down. Only this time, Ms. Conway, the single mother who has been working in a diner to make ends meet while her boyfriend travels the country, gets her chance to walk all over Gordon when her son Charlie is discovered by Hollywood and goes on to star in Dawson's Creek.
Suddenly finding herself courted by rich Hollywood men, Ms. Conway drops Gordon like she should've years ago. Gordon goes into a tailspin and picks up another DUI. Only this time, instead of receiving a cushy community service gig like coaching pee-wee hockey again, he gets disbarred and picks up a 4-6 month stint at MCF-Shakopee. While locked up, he becomes Cell Block 3's bottom dollar bitch, and the inmates take great pleasure in forcing him to make duck noises while they sodomize him. Yes sir, Mr. Ducksworth! Thank you very much, Mr. Ducksworth! Quack quack quack quack quack, Mr. Ducksworth!
Top Gun- Maverick & Charlie
Let's review some observations about Maverick, his lifestyle, and surrounding factors:
1. He enjoys skins vs. skins beach volleyball games.
2. He frequently participates in "arguments" with other men that occur a) in locker rooms, b) with faces two inches apart from each other, and/or c) while wearing only towels.
3. Charlie is NOT attractive. Not even a little. She also dresses up like a man to seduce Maverick in an elevator.
4. Let's not gloss over the fact that her name is Charlie.
5. There are a ton of ass references throughout the movie..."Watch your tail"..."Cover your rear"...even "I want butts!"
6. Yeah, Mav sings 'You've Lost that Lovin' Feeling' in a bar to get in with Charlie, but are we sure that wasn't just an excuse to have a homoerotic sing-along in a hot, sweaty bar with a bunch of dudes in uniform?
(I'm intentionally not mentioning Maverick's relationship with Goose, since they're only about 60% as gay together as Paul and I are in real life, so that would be the pot calling the kettle a homo.)
All right, so we can all agree that Charlie is just a beard for 'Mav' (gay stripper name?), right? The only question is how long he can keep up the facade. During their relationship and eventual marriage, there have been a few nagging doubts on Charlie's mind. Maverick always seems to have a lot of "awesome" locker room stories that he brings home and shares, when, in actuality, they aren't that funny. There have also been a couple of role play scenarios that Charlie would rather not discuss-- Maverick's ideas, of course. But ultimately, nothing that can't be explained away.
But then, about 18 months into the marriage, there's an incident in a bar where Maverick slips his phone number to a guy when he thinks Ol' Chuck is in the bathroom. When she confronts him on it, he passes it off as just making a new buddy who also happens to enjoy Kenny Loggins songs and dramatic motorcycle rides at sunset.
After another year of this behavior, fearing the worst, Charlie goes home to visit her parents, hoping for some reassurance from her mother. Instead, Mama McGillis agrees and says she has thought Maverick was gay all along. Terrified for her marriage, Charlie takes an early flight home. She busts in the door, ready for a 'Come to Jesus' meeting with Maverick....when she finds him in bed with Iceman. They were doing a great job of covering each other's tail.
Speed- (Also known as 'The Bus That Couldn't Slow Down)- Jack & Annie
(Sorry, I know that link doesn't fit the theme of this post, I just really wanted to shoehorn in one of my all-time favorite Homer Simpson jokes.)
Here's the problem with Keanu and Sandra's relationship, and they even say it themselves in the movie: "Relationships that start under intense circumstances don't last." Maybe it's because YOU DON'T KNOW EACH OTHER. You met earlier this morning, and you've literally spent the entire day driving around on a bus rigged to the gills with explosives, your lives completely dependent upon a speedometer. Listen, Jack, for all you know, Annie never moved out of her parents' house, still wears My Little Pony pajamas, and all six of her cats are named after the dwarves from Snow White. (There used to be seven, but Sneezy got hit by a car last year. Annie still cries about it from time to time.) Bro, you're allergic to cats. And Annie, what do you really know about Jack? Maybe he's only into S&M, constantly trolls Craigslist for casual encounters, and currently has a restraining order on him from his last relationship?
And you know that their friends wouldn't approve. It would start innocently enough, maybe during a guy's night out, and a couple of Jack's friends start busting balls: "Yeah, Annie might be hot, Jack, but at least I don't need to take advantage of a traumatized hostage survivor to get laid...." But that one comment starts gnawing away at Jack, and pretty soon he starts resenting Annie for it. Pretty soon, happy hours turn into all-night drinking binges, as Jack broods over the mess he got himself in.
And what happens when Jack (who, don't forget, still works at a crazy intense job that requires long hours and constantly keeps him away from home) saves the life of some good-looking piece a couple months later? Annie knows that's exactly how their relationship started, and this new girl has a bigger chest (a sensitive subject for Annie, always has been) so she'd immediately get jealous and suspect that Jack was banging his new damsel-in-distress too. And of course her girlfriends support that suspicion and fuel the fire, as most girlfriends are wont to do.
Everything escalates from there, and during one particularly nasty fight ("Why don't you just go to your big-breasted WHORE! I saw how you were looking at her on the news!"...."She's not a whore, I told you, she's just stripping to pay for grad school! But now that you mention it, you know what? I HAVE been lying: your boobs ARE too small!") the relationship does what they miraculously managed to prevent the bus from doing: blow up in their faces.
50 First Dates- Henry & Lucy
Oh, this relationship is rich. Lemme get this straight: The girl wakes up every morning in a heavy state of confusion; she doesn't know what day it is, where she is, or who you are. You have to convince her that it's OK that she's in bed with you. There will definitely be some crying, probably a phone call to her father, and possibly some throwing up. Most of the day is spent recovering, and then mayyyybe she's good to go by late afternoon or early evening. The next morning, it happens all over again.
So what you're telling me is that basically, Adam Sandler is going to have to deal with the morning-after version of the drunkest girl at the bar, every single day, for the rest of his life? Without getting any of the drunken benefits? I give this marriage a month, tops. There isn't a judge in the world that would deny Henry an annulment.
Little Mermaid- Prince Eric & Ariel
We have a woman with a horribly skewed view of what love is supposed to be like; a prince who has spent his entire life chasing his dreams while girls chased after him; and a father-in-law who happens to be the Lord of the Ocean or some shit, who wields an all-powerful trident that can basically cause any sort of destruction he wants. This thing.....is gonna end violently.
As soon as the honeymoon phase wears off, Ariel starts thinking about how she gave up her entire life to be with him. Disillusionment soon follows, and ordinary husband-and-wife conversation turns ugly quick. "Why yes, of course I don't mind taking out the trash, why would I? It's not like I already gave up my home, all my friends and family- not to mention my tail and ability to breathe underwater- in order to be with you or anything. Why not give up my self-respect too? No, no, don't get up, relax and watch the game."
Prince Eric, who, as we mentioned, has spent his entire life having his every whim fancied and his every desire fulfilled, is far too self-involved to have any idea how to be an attentive husband. While he's off sailing the seas, looking for his next adventure, Ariel is back home, developing an impressive drinking problem, dressing increasingly sluttier, and trying to seduce the hired help every chance she gets.
Eric comes home from his latest conquest, only to discover Ariel, drunk, topless, wearing mermaid bottoms, and slurring at the gardeners, "You know you want to look! Don't you think I'm pretty? This is what my legs used to look like! My husband doesn't even know my real legs, but now you do!!" An unsuccessful rehab stint follows, and a detached Eric finally files for divorce. Ariel runs to daddy, and a furious King Triton returns to land and wreaks havoc on the palace grounds. In his fury, he loses control, and his hurricane destroys the palace, inadvertent flying shrapnel killing Prince Eric on the spot.
Guilt-stricken, and with no way to return to her life under the sea, Ariel becomes a street urchin. She currently lives under a bridge and spends most of her day rolling around in the shallow water, and for a few dollars or just a warm meal, she'll dance for you while singing 'Part of Your World.' Don't get too close, though; her mermaid costume smells like piss.
***************
Suggestions for a possible Volume 2 are encouraged.
Wednesday, November 6, 2013
60% Of The Time, It Works Every Time
Up until now, on a scale of 1-10, I have not been very excited for the the Anchorman sequel. Because the first movie was sooooo hilarious, sooooo awesome, sooooo I know I throw this term around pretty loosely but in this case it's accurate: life-altering....I kinda didn't want them to ever make a sequel. Especially not nine years after the first one. There's nowhere to go but down. (Although it could be worse; they could be taking the other personality-shaping comedy of my life and making a sequel 20 YEARS LATER. Oh wait.)
When we were in college, a lot of my friends liked to get sauced before going to a movie-- or if there wasn't enough time beforehand, they liked to smuggle booze into the theater, relax in their seat, and tie one on, giggling and rolling their empty bottles under the seats the whole time. I was never a fan of this sort of chicanery. Don't get me wrong, I love to watch movies while drinking, but only in the comfort of somebody's home, during a pre-gaming or post-gaming session, and only movies that we've already seen approximately 20 times, so we can crack jokes and rip on it the whole time and not feel bad. I've always said that if you never went home to your college apartment with your roommates after a long night of drinking, thrown in the Old School DVD, and awoken the next morning on the couch, with your beer 98% full, your phone in your hand (flip-screen still open to a never-sent text message), and the DVD menu screen BLARING....then in my opinion, you never truly went to college in the first place.
So, I don't like to be drunk the first time I see a movie. Embarking on a cinematic adventure for the first time is excitement enough without chemical stimulants. Also, I hate not being able to figure out if I truly like a movie, or if it was a result of booze. For example, the first time I watched The Other Guys, Gangel and I were pretty banged up, and we laughed our asses off. I barely remembered it, so I bought the DVD, re-watched it with Paul.....but then we started pre-gaming during the movie, so I still have no idea if my laughter was genuine or not. Totally annoying. (I do remember that this scene is hilarious, though. Anything that lets me and my friends yell "CHRISTINITH!!!" at my wife is OK by me. Who wants some Arnie Palmies? Classic.)
Having said all that, I was planning on getting a lil' drunk before going to see Anchorman 2 in the theater in a couple months. There's really no downside. If the movie is only mildly funny, the booze will make us enjoy it more. If the movie is truly funny, we'll be rolling in our seats, and walking out of the theater high-fiving and hoping the third movie was already in production. If the movie sucks like I expect it to, the booze would soften the blow. Everyone goes home happy. Bing bang boom.
But now that I've seen this latest preview, I'm cautiously optimistic. I laughed quite a bit; maybe this movie won't be so bad. Maybe it will end up being a worthy sequel.
Still probably gonna get housed in the theater though.
When we were in college, a lot of my friends liked to get sauced before going to a movie-- or if there wasn't enough time beforehand, they liked to smuggle booze into the theater, relax in their seat, and tie one on, giggling and rolling their empty bottles under the seats the whole time. I was never a fan of this sort of chicanery. Don't get me wrong, I love to watch movies while drinking, but only in the comfort of somebody's home, during a pre-gaming or post-gaming session, and only movies that we've already seen approximately 20 times, so we can crack jokes and rip on it the whole time and not feel bad. I've always said that if you never went home to your college apartment with your roommates after a long night of drinking, thrown in the Old School DVD, and awoken the next morning on the couch, with your beer 98% full, your phone in your hand (flip-screen still open to a never-sent text message), and the DVD menu screen BLARING....then in my opinion, you never truly went to college in the first place.
So, I don't like to be drunk the first time I see a movie. Embarking on a cinematic adventure for the first time is excitement enough without chemical stimulants. Also, I hate not being able to figure out if I truly like a movie, or if it was a result of booze. For example, the first time I watched The Other Guys, Gangel and I were pretty banged up, and we laughed our asses off. I barely remembered it, so I bought the DVD, re-watched it with Paul.....but then we started pre-gaming during the movie, so I still have no idea if my laughter was genuine or not. Totally annoying. (I do remember that this scene is hilarious, though. Anything that lets me and my friends yell "CHRISTINITH!!!" at my wife is OK by me. Who wants some Arnie Palmies? Classic.)
Having said all that, I was planning on getting a lil' drunk before going to see Anchorman 2 in the theater in a couple months. There's really no downside. If the movie is only mildly funny, the booze will make us enjoy it more. If the movie is truly funny, we'll be rolling in our seats, and walking out of the theater high-fiving and hoping the third movie was already in production. If the movie sucks like I expect it to, the booze would soften the blow. Everyone goes home happy. Bing bang boom.
But now that I've seen this latest preview, I'm cautiously optimistic. I laughed quite a bit; maybe this movie won't be so bad. Maybe it will end up being a worthy sequel.
Still probably gonna get housed in the theater though.
Friday, November 1, 2013
Looking Back, Looking Forward
So the Red Sox hung another banner, capping off an unbelievable year. And KU basketball is underway, with the best recruit in arguably a decade, about to embark on an unbelievable year. It's a lot easier to flip the switch when your favorite baseball team is eliminated from the race in early September. I feel like I've barely had a chance to get properly fired up for this upcoming basketball season. I'll admit, it's a pretty awesome problem to have.
Let's bridge the gap between my two favorite teams in sports:
Things I'll miss the most about the baseball season ending:
5. Complaining about the Red Sox in general. Maybe "complaining" isn't the best choice of words, but all I know is that the Sox have now won three titles in ten years. The collapse of 2011 has now been erased. Basically, even if they never win another World Series for the rest of my life, I've still been spoiled. So whatever happens from here on out, my life as a baseball fan has already been a success.
4. Tim McCarver. TIM MCCARVER MADE THIS LIST! I'm as surprised as you. I've spent years hating him; basically once I was old enough to understand the game, I realized he was mostly an idiot. You could argue that no announcer in any sport is just flat-out wrong more often than he is. And yet....watching the montage at the end of the telecast, realizing I'll never hear him again...I felt a little bummed. I mean, I've never watched a World Series in my life that wasn't announced by that old bastard. And I'm nothing if not nostalgic.
3. The daily grind of scoreboard watching; obsessing over standings ("Well, we play our next nine on the road, and Tampa has an easy stretch, if we can still be up at least 1.5 games by the end of July, I'll take that in a second"); and fretting over statistics, both basic and sabermetric ("Yeah, Salty is hot lately, but his BABIP is sky-high, he's due for some serious regression soon.") It's weird when you obsess over little things all year long, and then the playoffs come around, and then the World Series, and all of a sudden everything else goes out the window and it boils down to "If we just win this game tonight, right here in front of us, we win the whole damn thing." It's bizarre.
I suppose I'll take a couple weeks off, then start obsessing over free agents and whatnot ("We'll offer Ellsbury something like 6 years, $90 million, they'll turn it down, we'll maybe go a little higher, but then Seattle will swoop in and offer him like $120 million, and that will be that.") Speaking of.....
2. The guys who probably won't be back next year. Ellsbury and Stephen Drew are the two main guys I don't expect to see in a Red Sox uniform ever again, which is unfortunate for Teens, since those are her two main crushes. So I suppose I'll grow to miss her inappropriate comments too. Stuff like "Jacoby should've tried to stretch that into a double right there! Maybe if he slides into second base his pants will accidentally fall off."
1. The beards, attitudes, and character of this team. Nothing will ever touch 2004, but I did definitely enjoy this championship more than 2007. Despite not having a "boy" on this team, this was just a really fun, really enjoyable group of dudes to cheer for (I suppose my favorite player is Dustin Pedroia or Jonny Gomes, but I liked Manny, Johnny Damon, and even Kevin Millar in 2004 more than I currently like anyone on this team.) Like I said before the playoffs started, even if they flamed out in the playoffs early, I'd always remember the 2013 season fondly.
(This should really be its own entry, but I'll say that Jonny Gomes' celebrations fall under "attitudes and character." Besides the beer punting, there is also this little beauty, which makes me giggle and drives Teens crazy. So naturally I throw it her way every chance I get, like after she makes a dynamite batch of spaghetti, or scores us a coupon for six free tacos from T.Bell, or goes upstairs and gets my spitter for me when I'm too lazy.)
Things I'm looking forward to the most about college basketball starting:
5. New seats, son. Previously, KU only gave season ticket deals to faculty, not regular old accountants like me. But now the game done changed, staff are included, and Kyle, Lanny and I just jumped up about 20 rows (for the same price that we were already paying.) Give me a few more years, and I'm gonna be Spike Lee up in this piece.
4. Andrew White III, rotation player. I had a soft spot for 'Drew last year, even though he played sparingly. He's a phenomenal three-point shooter, he had some fun moments last year, I got to yell "Drewwwwwwwwwww!" every time he did something good last year (I hope that catches on this year), and he has a terrific mini-flat top-- not quite NBA Live '95 quality, but definitely old-school Starting Lineup figurine quality. He had the makings of somebody who could eventually find his jersey on my Wall of Fame in my basement someday. Then KU got Wiggins, not to mention Brannen Greene and Wayne Selden, and I was pretty worried that 'Drew would be asked to redshirt, or even worse, he would transfer to get more playing time. Instead, he worked harder than anybody else did this offseason (Coach Self's words) and looks like he played his way into the 6th man position. Here's hoping that sticks.
3. The spectacle of Andrew Wiggins. KU's teams are usually made up of guys who go through growing pains, and steadily improve year after year in Self's system. We don't usually have the Carmelos, or the Wades, or the Durants....or even the Harrison Barneses, the Anthony Davises, the Greg Odens, the guys who have huge names coming out of high school already. We get lots of good recruits, but not THE top recruit. But now we've got Wiggins, and everything that goes along with it. To be honest, I don't expect him to be as unbelievable as everyone says. I'd be (pleasantly) surprised if he put up much better stats than Ben McLemore did last year. I'm just enjoying all the excitement and hoopla that comes with having the best high school prospect since LeBron James.
2. The incoming freshman class, besides Wiggins. I was already thrilled with KU's incoming guys before they landed Wiggins. I loved everything I was reading about Wayne Selden and Brannen Greene; Joel Embiid looked like a classic Bill Self big man project in the footsteps of Aldrich, T-Rob, Withey, etc.; and Connor Frankamp was a little white kid from Wichita who can shoot the lights out-- so obviously I was in on him. I figured we'd struggle this year, and then in 2014-15, when Naadir Tharpe was a senior point guard, Perry Ellis was ready to shoulder a big load, and all the freshmen were a year older, we'd be awesome. Then the reports on Selden kept growing and growing, and Embiid absolutely exploded (From an unranked prospect to, if you believe Rick Pitino, the possible 2nd pick in the draft? Are you kidding?) Now they're both both potential one-and-dones, and maybe we'll only be enjoying them for one year. But damn, if they somehow both come back next year, even without Wiggins...I predict we'll be even better.
1. The rivalry with Oklahoma St. heating up. The Big 12 was pretty crappy last year, and figured to be even worse this year. Texas sucks now, K-State and Iowa St. both got worse, and Baylor is supposed to be decent every year.....and every year they come to the Fieldhouse and lose by 30. But then Marcus Smart improbably returned for his sophomore year, and he started chirping a little bit, then their coach made some sarcastic comments about Wiggins, and now it's on. Tickets on Stubhub are already in the $250 range. Now we have another conference game to be super fired up for, and when they come to town this year, it should be the best atmosphere since the last Mizzou game a couple years ago. I love that Okie St. is talking a little trash, it's good for the game, but now they have KU's full attention. To steal a line from Omar from The Wire: "You come at the king, you best not miss."
(And just in case anyone forgot, the last time the Sox won the World Series....KU followed suit and won the title. I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'.)
(ALSO, this is completely unrelated to everything, but this just happened last night, and if I don't use this space to complain about it, then I don't know why I have a blog in the first place: Wanna know how my NFL gambling season is going? I can sum it up in one example. The over/under in last night's Miami/Cincinnati was 42.5. I had the over. Miami won 22-20. In overtime. ON A SAFETY. You guys wanna kick my dog while you're here?)
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Game 4, By The Numbers
- Number of times I startled a random Red Sox fan by throwing up a high-five/punching them on the arm/yelling "Let's go SOX!!" as we walked past each other: 4.
- Number of times somebody startled me by flipping the script and doing the same thing to me: 2.
- Number of people who laughed at BroMo in the men's room, after he saw a guy wearing a Curt Schilling jersey and said, "Ahh, the ol' knuckleball, eh?": 5, including me, but not including the guy wearing the jersey, who didn't think it was a funny mix-up for some reason. Don't worry, BroMo, it's a common mistake. The 'Wakefield' is silent.
- Number of prayers I sent to Baby Jesus, thanking him that I wasn't in attendance for the Game 3 walk-off obstruction shenanigans: Roughly 56. Seriously, security would've had to remove me from the stadium after that one. Forcibly. Make it 57 times now.
- Number of fellow Red Sox fans I had in my section: ZERO. Nobody within 15 rows. I knew I'd be completely out-numbered; this was St. Louis, a true baseball town. This wouldn't be like going to Tampa or some shit. But still, I figured there would be a lot more Sox fans in attendance, especially in the upper deck, where a lot of us second-hand ticket purchasers were residing.
I was mistaken. I looked around in dismay as the first pitch approached; I didn't even have anybody I could air-five with. During the first inning, two Sox fans showed up, directly across the aisle from me, and I quickly established fist bumpsies and told them I was coming to them for every celebration. However, they disappeared in the second inning, never to be seen again, and so I had to celebrate Han-style (Solo) the rest the game.
- Number of Cardinals fans in our section who were pretty cool to me: All of them. We struck up a friendship right away with the people in our immediate area, and rather than an antagonistic relationship, they used me as a resource for knowledge that would help them better understand the game. They took to calling me 'Boston Guy', so throughout the game, there was a lot of "Hey Boston Guy, who is that in the on-deck circle right now? Are they pinch-hitting for Buchholz?" or "Hey Boston Guy, why is John Lackey warming up in the bullpen right now?" or even "Hey Boston Guy, is it pronounced Big Pappy or Big Poppy?"
- Number of times I felt like a dick, due to said relationship with Cardinals fans: 1; after the three-run homer by Gomes. The Cardinals pitched around Ortiz, putting men on first and second, and leading to some general grumbling among the fans. "Don't worry," I assured them, visions of another Gomes strikeout clouding my vision, "Gomes has absolutely sucked this postseason, he's hitting like .120. You made the right decision here." Then, of course, Gomes went yammies, and I felt a little sheepish, especially after I heard one of the guys behind us mutter juuuuust loud enough for me to hear, "Nice fucking call, Boston Guy."
- Number of beers I drank: A couple too many.
- Number of beers I drank at the all-you-can-eat, all-you-can-drink banquet afterwards: 1. Our Craigslist guy surprised us by giving us a couple of passes to this post-game social club in Busch Stadium, but by that point, I was pretty hammered, pretty drained from the intensity of the game, and I sensed that there weren't a lot of people happy to see me in that room. Maybe if it would've been pre-game, I'd be more welcome, but after their boys just got done losing to my boys....there was a lot of mean-mugging going on. Usually my policy is "If it's free, it's me, and I'll take three", but BroMo and I only had one plate of food and one beer each, and got the hell out of there. There was a pretty sweet ice sculpture though.
- Number of times I had a perfect view of a pickoff play at first base with two outs in the ninth inning, and got to yell "YUP! SMELL YA!!!!" before the umpire could even make his call: 1. Just once was all it took.
Saturday, October 26, 2013
YOLO Once
Back in 2004, Dunph had a connection with Major League Baseball, and scored a couple of tickets to the (potential) Game 5 of the World Series between the Red Sox and Cardinals. On short notice, we jumped in the car for the 13-hour drive from Grand Forks to St. Louis.
Game 4 was being played that evening, and the Sox were up 3-0 in the series, so we knew there was a chance that our free tickets to Game 5 would be worth nothing more than the story you're hearing now. I was roughly 70% cheering against the Red Sox that night. Yeah, I wanted to go to a game in person, and yeah, I'd LOVE to see them clinch the World Series in person....but there was 30% of me that wanted them to just wrap it up and win it now. I mean, we just watched the Sox come back from 3-0 down against the Yankees less than a week ago. Let's not tempt fate here.
The drive was mostly uneventful. There were lots of moments where I couldn't suppress my gut reaction before realizing that what just happened actually hurt our chances for seeing a game. Johnny Damon leads off the game with a homer: "YEAHHHHH!!! Wait, FUCK!" Repeat, repeat, repeat. Also, Dunph ran over a cat on the interstate (you could actually feel the skull crunch against the bumper) and after about 30 seconds of horrified silence, he looked over at me and said "Welp, some little kid's best friend isn't coming home tonight!", I named the cat Crunch, and we laughed for about 45 miles.
We made it as far as Sioux City, Iowa, before we decided to pull in and find somewhere to watch the remainder of the game. Boston was up three runs in the 7th, and was solidly in control. I needed to at least watch the clinch on TV, I couldn't deal with having just the radio for such a moment. What is this, 1938? Is this one of FDR's Fireside Chats? No way. We're pulling over and watching somewhere.
We chose the Argosy Riverboat Casino, right off the interstate. We watched the end of the game, I had some of the best-tasting and most rewarding beers of my life, and then we looked at each other and said "What next?"
What's next ended up being:
- Getting an extended tutorial from the dealers on how to play craps (the casino was mostly empty that night, and they were just happy for something to do);
- Cautiously putting a few bucks on the table and dipping our toes in the water;
- Winning everything in sight and going up a few hundred each in a matter of 20 minutes-- celebrating, boozing, shit-talking, and high-fiving like we owned the place;
- Watching a dude who looked exactly like JR Ewing from Dallas stroll up to the table and casually buy in for $50K in chips;
- Slowly having our excitement eroded away, since it's tough to celebrate a $40 win when Yosemite Sam next to you just lost 8 grand;
- Eventually losing all the money we were up for the night, plus all the money we brought with us for the trip, plus all the money from our respective ATM withdrawals.
All in all, an awesome night, and also the reason that every time I drive through Sioux City on my way back to North Dakota and pass the Argosy, I re-enact the anguished arm extension of Lloyd Christmas reaching for Mary Swanson.
For the last few days, I've been going back and forth on whether or not I want to make an impromptu road trip and try and catch Game 4 in person. On one hand, it's not a 13-hour drive to St. Louis anymore. BroMo (BROther of a different MOther) lives there, so I have a place to stay. On the other hand, ticket prices are outrageous. Also, I haven't exactly been a model employee the last month or so, what with trips to Minnesota, Montana, and a golf outing for a wedding-- not to mention multiple trips to the dentist (FYI dudes, periotherapy sucks.)
After some hemming and hawing, the memory of this story from 2004 is what finally swayed me. Even though I don't have free tickets this time, and even though the absolute shittiest tickets in the ballpark still cost enough to pay for a night at the craps table at the Argosy in Sioux City....I mean, what was I gonna do, NOT go?
In the end, it kept coming back to one sentence ringing over and over in my head. A sentence that 90% of the time, I'm on the other side of, using it to get people to do things when they're straddling the fence:
Old Jum would do it.
Oh, and in the event of a Red Sox loss, if anyone knows of any good bridges to sleep on in the greater St. Louis area, please let me know. I know there's obviously a bunch of highways crossing the Mississippi River, but I'd prefer to keep it smaller. Pedestrian bridges are more my steez. I know, I know, beggars can't be choosers, but please keep it in mind when making your recommendations. Thank you.
Game 4 was being played that evening, and the Sox were up 3-0 in the series, so we knew there was a chance that our free tickets to Game 5 would be worth nothing more than the story you're hearing now. I was roughly 70% cheering against the Red Sox that night. Yeah, I wanted to go to a game in person, and yeah, I'd LOVE to see them clinch the World Series in person....but there was 30% of me that wanted them to just wrap it up and win it now. I mean, we just watched the Sox come back from 3-0 down against the Yankees less than a week ago. Let's not tempt fate here.
The drive was mostly uneventful. There were lots of moments where I couldn't suppress my gut reaction before realizing that what just happened actually hurt our chances for seeing a game. Johnny Damon leads off the game with a homer: "YEAHHHHH!!! Wait, FUCK!" Repeat, repeat, repeat. Also, Dunph ran over a cat on the interstate (you could actually feel the skull crunch against the bumper) and after about 30 seconds of horrified silence, he looked over at me and said "Welp, some little kid's best friend isn't coming home tonight!", I named the cat Crunch, and we laughed for about 45 miles.
We made it as far as Sioux City, Iowa, before we decided to pull in and find somewhere to watch the remainder of the game. Boston was up three runs in the 7th, and was solidly in control. I needed to at least watch the clinch on TV, I couldn't deal with having just the radio for such a moment. What is this, 1938? Is this one of FDR's Fireside Chats? No way. We're pulling over and watching somewhere.
We chose the Argosy Riverboat Casino, right off the interstate. We watched the end of the game, I had some of the best-tasting and most rewarding beers of my life, and then we looked at each other and said "What next?"
What's next ended up being:
- Getting an extended tutorial from the dealers on how to play craps (the casino was mostly empty that night, and they were just happy for something to do);
- Cautiously putting a few bucks on the table and dipping our toes in the water;
- Winning everything in sight and going up a few hundred each in a matter of 20 minutes-- celebrating, boozing, shit-talking, and high-fiving like we owned the place;
- Watching a dude who looked exactly like JR Ewing from Dallas stroll up to the table and casually buy in for $50K in chips;
- Slowly having our excitement eroded away, since it's tough to celebrate a $40 win when Yosemite Sam next to you just lost 8 grand;
- Eventually losing all the money we were up for the night, plus all the money we brought with us for the trip, plus all the money from our respective ATM withdrawals.
All in all, an awesome night, and also the reason that every time I drive through Sioux City on my way back to North Dakota and pass the Argosy, I re-enact the anguished arm extension of Lloyd Christmas reaching for Mary Swanson.
For the last few days, I've been going back and forth on whether or not I want to make an impromptu road trip and try and catch Game 4 in person. On one hand, it's not a 13-hour drive to St. Louis anymore. BroMo (BROther of a different MOther) lives there, so I have a place to stay. On the other hand, ticket prices are outrageous. Also, I haven't exactly been a model employee the last month or so, what with trips to Minnesota, Montana, and a golf outing for a wedding-- not to mention multiple trips to the dentist (FYI dudes, periotherapy sucks.)
After some hemming and hawing, the memory of this story from 2004 is what finally swayed me. Even though I don't have free tickets this time, and even though the absolute shittiest tickets in the ballpark still cost enough to pay for a night at the craps table at the Argosy in Sioux City....I mean, what was I gonna do, NOT go?
In the end, it kept coming back to one sentence ringing over and over in my head. A sentence that 90% of the time, I'm on the other side of, using it to get people to do things when they're straddling the fence:
Old Jum would do it.
Oh, and in the event of a Red Sox loss, if anyone knows of any good bridges to sleep on in the greater St. Louis area, please let me know. I know there's obviously a bunch of highways crossing the Mississippi River, but I'd prefer to keep it smaller. Pedestrian bridges are more my steez. I know, I know, beggars can't be choosers, but please keep it in mind when making your recommendations. Thank you.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
October Bliss
I've made my thoughts on October weddings known before. The chance for conflicts with hugely important playoff baseball games trumps the usually glorious weather, at least for me.
When JonJon and Amanda got married in October 2011, the Red Sox had just finished the biggest collapse in Major League history, so no worries there. When ADawg married Bobbi in 2008, the Sox didn't play during the wedding reception, although I did have to listen to a game on the radio during our nightmarish, hungover drive back home. In October 2007, nobody got married, but I did miss Manny's walk-off in Game 2 of the ALDS. That was my own fault, since I answered a phone call from Katie Z when I probably should've flushed it and called her back after the inning (but I haven't let her hear the end of it for over six years now, and will probably never stop blaming her.)
We have to go all the way back to October of 2004 to find the last time I was at a wedding reception during a Red Sox playoff game. And strangely, it ended up being an awesome memory, rather than an excuse to make passive-aggressive comments to the happy couple for the rest of their lives.
It was during the ALDS vs. the Angels and Brekka's wedding in Minneapolis. There was an open bar, and I would alternate between dancing, giving Jennifer and/or Buckley some excuse why I had to disappear for a bit, then grabbing three beers from the bar, running up to our hotel room, chugging the beers and watching an inning, then running back down and dancing some more. I made it up to the room in time to see David Ortiz hit the series-ending walkoff, and Wojo came into the room in time to see me shotgunning a beer...by myself. All-around great night.
This time around, with the Red Sox playing in Game 6 of the ALCS with a trip to the World Series on the line, there were no TVs available, and no hotel room to retreat to. I did, however, have phone technology that I didn't have in 2004. I was constantly checking for updates, and any time I got too wrapped up in the dance and neglected to check my phone for awhile, well-timed texties from Myshawn, Alfonso, and others served as reminders. After Victorino hit the grand slam and the Sox closed out the win, I calmly walked out of the reception area into the bridal party dressing room (an adjacent room that was more like a warehouse with furniture, a bathroom, and a kitchen in it), closed the door behind me, and let loose with a triumphant one-man celebration, complete with dancing and beer-spraying. At least I thought it was a one-man celebration. Turns out there was a second participant: a previously unnoticed employee of the building. And he wasn't so much "celebrating" as he was "telling me to go ahead and get started cleaning up the beer all over the floor." Whoops. Sorry for partying.
Other shenanigans from what was otherwise a very classy evening:
- In an unfortunate turn of events, hair-smelling came up in conversation earlier in the day. That basically guaranteed that we'd be smelling hair during the reception, and sure enough, that's exactly what came to pass. I had a pretty successful night by the numbers, going 7 for 8 (I got busted by my walking-down-the-aisle partner Dani) but I'd be lying if I said I was content with it. My white whale for the evening was the wedding planner Ashley (see below.) After spending the day planning and scheming my execution and getaway like I was in Ocean's 11 or something, Ashley unexpectedly bounced early, and I was left with nothing but my imagination on what her hair must smell like. Cue up Ron Burgundy:
- Ashley the Wedding Planner was kinda hot. Her hotness started a running joke amongst the Groomsmen all weekend, where every time she would ask us to do something, we would hit on her under our breath and/or after she walked away. So there was a lot of this:
"Hey, I need you guys to go over to that table and get your boutonnieres pinned on before people start getting here."
"Yeah, no problem!.....(quietly)....I love you."
Or:
"Jum, can you do me a favor? Grab this ladder and string these lights up in the front window?"
"Of course, I'd do everything to you!"
"What?"
"I'd do anything for you."
- We've talked about Rock & Roll Part 2 before. I've made the case that not many people love that song more than I do. But when Munch decided he wanted it played during the wedding, I tried to stop him. Warned him it wouldn't go over well. Cautioned him that it could be a dance floor murderer. Begged him not to do it. But he requested it anyway....and it went over like gangbusters. A total crowd pleaser, with almost everyone joining in for a Kansas City Chiefs chant on top of it.
I am man enough to admit when I am completely and totally wrong. (Maybe because it doesn't happen very often, ah-thank you.)
- I am not what you would call a jealous guy. In fact, I'm so far on the other end of the jealous spectrum that it probably could get me in trouble someday....
Teens was asked to dance by one of the guests, a tall, handsome guy named Adam. She didn't really want to, and I wasn't around, but if I was, I would've absolutely encouraged it. She finally agreed to dance ONE song, but then Adam tried to grab her ass while two-stepping, so she bolted off the floor and left him hanging, mid-song. Later on, after I had re-joined our crew and been briefed on the situation, Adam wandered into our conversation, and asked what Teens' story was, and why she was now avoiding him. Teens had continually tried to flash him her wedding ring, but like most clueless guys, he hadn't picked up on it. Technically JDub started the douchebaggery when he introduced himself as Jim, but I followed suit by sliding my wedding ring off and introducing myself as Adam Banks-- this is where we found out that the guy's name was Adam as well.
Now here's where you might think that I, the drunk husband, full of Morgan Diets and testosterone, would throw a punch at Adam for trying to molest my wife; or at the very least, tell him to get the hell out of our circle. Instead, my first reaction was to say "You seem like a good dude, Adam, I don't know what her deal is right now. You just gotta keep trying!" From there, we proceeded to give him possible topics of conversation, and common interests that might help him win her heart.
This continued on for the rest of the dance, to everyone's enjoyment (except Teens.) Finally, at the end of the night, we came clean with Adam on everything, and he was devastated by our betrayal. Before we parted ways, however, he left us with one last laugh: After I put my wedding ring back on and told him that his potential conquest was actually my wife, he processed the information, shook his head, then slowly looked back up at me, his eyes filled with hurt even as he made this realization: "You know something? I'm beginning to think that your name isn't really Adam, either!"
Just classic Adam right there.
- While we were downtown taking the bridal party photos before the reception, Mazzy was lamenting the fact that he didn't have a date for the evening. Just then, a provacatively dressed, gorgeous woman walked by. I told Mazzy to ask her "Hey, are you a flash card? Because you have +1 written alllll over you!"
He declined to ask her. I continue to think that line has promise, though.
- Two factors led to maybe my most questionable decision of the night (which, if you've been reading so far, is saying something.)
1) Our buddy Wags was the videographer, and he commented early on in the day that it was a boring job after the fact, going through hours and hours of footage trying to make cuts for the final wedding video. We told him we'd try to help with that, and from time to time, while he was just panning the camera over the reception area, we'd walk up and say things like "Wags, wanna hear a story? OK, so I'm balls deep in this homeless chick...." Just anything that might crack him up while he was re-watching and making edits later on.
2) I've always wanted to sing 'I Want You Back' by the Jackson 5 during a karaoke night, but I've never had the balls. I feel like I could knock it out of the park, but I don't have any frame of reference, as I'm only really belting it out by myself in the car, in the shower, outside ex-girlfriends' houses while masturbating, etc. Ipso facto, I've never sung it in front of a crowd before.
So, when that song came on during the dance, and I noticed Wags recording the dance floor, I split the difference, and 1) plus 2) equaled me walking up to about six inches away from the camera and laying down my best 12-year-old Michael Jackson impression. YIKES.
Last night Wags sent me this picture with the caption "Definitely going to make the cut...." So whoever watches that wedding video is about to find out if I can sing that song as well as I think I can. I will provide video evidence later on if it becomes available.
- Have you guys heard of the 'Nudify' app? Hours of fun. Schne turned me on to it, I told my Kansas friends, one thing led to another, and now we find ourselves here, with pictures of Double D like this:
Congratulations Steph and Jared. All in all, it was lovely, classy affair (except for our group of friends, who were neither lovely nor classy) that was enjoyed by everybody (well, except for maybe Adam.)
Also, a tip of the hat to one of the best collection of Groomsman I've been a part of: Double D, Womack, Munch and Mazzy. We had so much fun and were having such bridal party withdrawals that a bunch of us had to have dinner together last night, soley to rehash all the shenanigans from the last three days.
***************
OK, now I know I say this a lot, especially after a rough weekend, but this time I totally mean it...I'M NEVER DRINKING AGAIN.
Wait, what's that? The Sox are in the World Series? Well don't just stand there dude, go grab me a beer!
When JonJon and Amanda got married in October 2011, the Red Sox had just finished the biggest collapse in Major League history, so no worries there. When ADawg married Bobbi in 2008, the Sox didn't play during the wedding reception, although I did have to listen to a game on the radio during our nightmarish, hungover drive back home. In October 2007, nobody got married, but I did miss Manny's walk-off in Game 2 of the ALDS. That was my own fault, since I answered a phone call from Katie Z when I probably should've flushed it and called her back after the inning (but I haven't let her hear the end of it for over six years now, and will probably never stop blaming her.)
We have to go all the way back to October of 2004 to find the last time I was at a wedding reception during a Red Sox playoff game. And strangely, it ended up being an awesome memory, rather than an excuse to make passive-aggressive comments to the happy couple for the rest of their lives.
It was during the ALDS vs. the Angels and Brekka's wedding in Minneapolis. There was an open bar, and I would alternate between dancing, giving Jennifer and/or Buckley some excuse why I had to disappear for a bit, then grabbing three beers from the bar, running up to our hotel room, chugging the beers and watching an inning, then running back down and dancing some more. I made it up to the room in time to see David Ortiz hit the series-ending walkoff, and Wojo came into the room in time to see me shotgunning a beer...by myself. All-around great night.
This time around, with the Red Sox playing in Game 6 of the ALCS with a trip to the World Series on the line, there were no TVs available, and no hotel room to retreat to. I did, however, have phone technology that I didn't have in 2004. I was constantly checking for updates, and any time I got too wrapped up in the dance and neglected to check my phone for awhile, well-timed texties from Myshawn, Alfonso, and others served as reminders. After Victorino hit the grand slam and the Sox closed out the win, I calmly walked out of the reception area into the bridal party dressing room (an adjacent room that was more like a warehouse with furniture, a bathroom, and a kitchen in it), closed the door behind me, and let loose with a triumphant one-man celebration, complete with dancing and beer-spraying. At least I thought it was a one-man celebration. Turns out there was a second participant: a previously unnoticed employee of the building. And he wasn't so much "celebrating" as he was "telling me to go ahead and get started cleaning up the beer all over the floor." Whoops. Sorry for partying.
Other shenanigans from what was otherwise a very classy evening:
- In an unfortunate turn of events, hair-smelling came up in conversation earlier in the day. That basically guaranteed that we'd be smelling hair during the reception, and sure enough, that's exactly what came to pass. I had a pretty successful night by the numbers, going 7 for 8 (I got busted by my walking-down-the-aisle partner Dani) but I'd be lying if I said I was content with it. My white whale for the evening was the wedding planner Ashley (see below.) After spending the day planning and scheming my execution and getaway like I was in Ocean's 11 or something, Ashley unexpectedly bounced early, and I was left with nothing but my imagination on what her hair must smell like. Cue up Ron Burgundy:
- Ashley the Wedding Planner was kinda hot. Her hotness started a running joke amongst the Groomsmen all weekend, where every time she would ask us to do something, we would hit on her under our breath and/or after she walked away. So there was a lot of this:
"Hey, I need you guys to go over to that table and get your boutonnieres pinned on before people start getting here."
"Yeah, no problem!.....(quietly)....I love you."
Or:
"Jum, can you do me a favor? Grab this ladder and string these lights up in the front window?"
"Of course, I'd do everything to you!"
"What?"
"I'd do anything for you."
- We've talked about Rock & Roll Part 2 before. I've made the case that not many people love that song more than I do. But when Munch decided he wanted it played during the wedding, I tried to stop him. Warned him it wouldn't go over well. Cautioned him that it could be a dance floor murderer. Begged him not to do it. But he requested it anyway....and it went over like gangbusters. A total crowd pleaser, with almost everyone joining in for a Kansas City Chiefs chant on top of it.
I am man enough to admit when I am completely and totally wrong. (Maybe because it doesn't happen very often, ah-thank you.)
- I am not what you would call a jealous guy. In fact, I'm so far on the other end of the jealous spectrum that it probably could get me in trouble someday....
Teens was asked to dance by one of the guests, a tall, handsome guy named Adam. She didn't really want to, and I wasn't around, but if I was, I would've absolutely encouraged it. She finally agreed to dance ONE song, but then Adam tried to grab her ass while two-stepping, so she bolted off the floor and left him hanging, mid-song. Later on, after I had re-joined our crew and been briefed on the situation, Adam wandered into our conversation, and asked what Teens' story was, and why she was now avoiding him. Teens had continually tried to flash him her wedding ring, but like most clueless guys, he hadn't picked up on it. Technically JDub started the douchebaggery when he introduced himself as Jim, but I followed suit by sliding my wedding ring off and introducing myself as Adam Banks-- this is where we found out that the guy's name was Adam as well.
Now here's where you might think that I, the drunk husband, full of Morgan Diets and testosterone, would throw a punch at Adam for trying to molest my wife; or at the very least, tell him to get the hell out of our circle. Instead, my first reaction was to say "You seem like a good dude, Adam, I don't know what her deal is right now. You just gotta keep trying!" From there, we proceeded to give him possible topics of conversation, and common interests that might help him win her heart.
This continued on for the rest of the dance, to everyone's enjoyment (except Teens.) Finally, at the end of the night, we came clean with Adam on everything, and he was devastated by our betrayal. Before we parted ways, however, he left us with one last laugh: After I put my wedding ring back on and told him that his potential conquest was actually my wife, he processed the information, shook his head, then slowly looked back up at me, his eyes filled with hurt even as he made this realization: "You know something? I'm beginning to think that your name isn't really Adam, either!"
Just classic Adam right there.
- While we were downtown taking the bridal party photos before the reception, Mazzy was lamenting the fact that he didn't have a date for the evening. Just then, a provacatively dressed, gorgeous woman walked by. I told Mazzy to ask her "Hey, are you a flash card? Because you have +1 written alllll over you!"
He declined to ask her. I continue to think that line has promise, though.
- Two factors led to maybe my most questionable decision of the night (which, if you've been reading so far, is saying something.)
1) Our buddy Wags was the videographer, and he commented early on in the day that it was a boring job after the fact, going through hours and hours of footage trying to make cuts for the final wedding video. We told him we'd try to help with that, and from time to time, while he was just panning the camera over the reception area, we'd walk up and say things like "Wags, wanna hear a story? OK, so I'm balls deep in this homeless chick...." Just anything that might crack him up while he was re-watching and making edits later on.
2) I've always wanted to sing 'I Want You Back' by the Jackson 5 during a karaoke night, but I've never had the balls. I feel like I could knock it out of the park, but I don't have any frame of reference, as I'm only really belting it out by myself in the car, in the shower, outside ex-girlfriends' houses while masturbating, etc. Ipso facto, I've never sung it in front of a crowd before.
So, when that song came on during the dance, and I noticed Wags recording the dance floor, I split the difference, and 1) plus 2) equaled me walking up to about six inches away from the camera and laying down my best 12-year-old Michael Jackson impression. YIKES.
Last night Wags sent me this picture with the caption "Definitely going to make the cut...." So whoever watches that wedding video is about to find out if I can sing that song as well as I think I can. I will provide video evidence later on if it becomes available.
- Have you guys heard of the 'Nudify' app? Hours of fun. Schne turned me on to it, I told my Kansas friends, one thing led to another, and now we find ourselves here, with pictures of Double D like this:
Congratulations Steph and Jared. All in all, it was lovely, classy affair (except for our group of friends, who were neither lovely nor classy) that was enjoyed by everybody (well, except for maybe Adam.)
Also, a tip of the hat to one of the best collection of Groomsman I've been a part of: Double D, Womack, Munch and Mazzy. We had so much fun and were having such bridal party withdrawals that a bunch of us had to have dinner together last night, soley to rehash all the shenanigans from the last three days.
***************
OK, now I know I say this a lot, especially after a rough weekend, but this time I totally mean it...I'M NEVER DRINKING AGAIN.
Wait, what's that? The Sox are in the World Series? Well don't just stand there dude, go grab me a beer!
Friday, October 18, 2013
Hashtag Get Beard
So if we're naming beards now, alongside such beauties as "The Sick Flow" or "The Ironsides" or "The Freshwater", I'd like to call mine "The Honest Effort", if it's OK with you guys.
Or, alternatively, "The Playoff Beard I Wish I Could Keep, Except I Have To Look Presentable For Groomsman Duties Tomorrow, And This Is Pretty Much Why People Shouldn't Get Married In October-- But Seriously Steph And Jared, Long Life, Best Wishes, All The Happiness In The World."
As a form of protest, I will be spending much of the reception running in between dancing couples, punting beers like Jonny Gomes. I'd like to say that's a joke, but now, just by talking about it, that seed is officially planted in my subconscious, and alcohol's a hell of a drug. All bets are off.
(Editor's update: LOTS OF COMPLIMENTS ON THE BEARD! THE BEARD PLAYS! OCTOBER WEDDINGS FOR EVERYONE!!!)
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Montegna
Random notes from our trip to Bozeman, Montana, set up by Manada and I to surprise Paul on his 31st birthday. (Or 32nd, if you believe the mistaken birthday card from his own mother. Good ol' Suddenly Susan, she never disappoints.)
- I was hoping to drop a couple pounds or so before a wedding next weekend, since I got my measurements a few months ago and I need to fit into this suit, but instead I gorged myself like it was....well, actually it was kind of a standard weekend for me. However, it was noteworthy because every meal I ate during the weekend was outstanding. Report card:
Quesadilla at Mesa Verde in Denver airport: A, borderline A+
Buffalo wings at Chico Hot Springs Poolside Grill: A
Lobster sliders at Copper Whiskey: A+++
Pizza & wings at Tarantino's: A for pizza, A+ for wings
Paul's homemade tuna casserole: A++
I can always leave my pants unbuttoned at the wedding anyway; I'm pretty sure that's why they invented belts.
- Paul and I had a stalking session on Facebook that would've made any online predator proud. What started as an innocent "Whatever happened to _____?" quickly spiraled into creeping HARD on every random schoolmate we could think of from first grade and up. It started while Teens and Manada were taking a nap, but it continued well into the evening, long after they had woken up, and what had started as shameful morphed into shameless. Soon we were all enjoying the conversation that included sentences like "What was the name of that girl in middle school who had ringworm?" and "I would've bet a lot of money that chick Randi from Kuz's 5th grade class would've turned out hot....got that one wrong."
- If I dare say so, the Red Sox Hate Pendulum might be swinging back to the positive juuuuust a little bit. Back when they won it all in 2004, there were a TON of people that were happy for me. They were the lovable underdogs, and they took down the universally-hated Yankees on their way to winning their first championship in 86 years. For various reasons (a large payroll, media overkill, bandwagon fans, a second championship, Ben Affleck, and just good old-fashioned hatred of a team stemming from continued success) the Red Sox became about as hated nationally as the Yankees. The last few years, anytime I was wearing any Red Sox gear in public, I could guarantee at least one dirty look from a stranger.
After the crazy Red Sox rally in Game 2 Sunday night, I was wearing my Red Sox hat during our flights back to Kansas the next day. Although I did receive a mean-mugging or two (Yeah, brosef in the flat-brim Cardinals hat, I see you too, guy) what stood out was that I had four different congratulatory conversations with strangers, all initiated by the other person. It felt like 2004 all over again. Maybe a couple down-and-out years have lessened the Red Sox hate a little bit.
(Side note: One new experience I had this weekend was celebrating a crazy comeback and walk-off playoff win with a toddler sleeping upstairs. During Big Papi's homer, I involuntarily lept out of my seat and jumped around a bit, but I was able to keep the volume at an acceptable level....whereas if I was at home, I would've sprinted around the house, yelling and spraying beer....and if I was back in college at Culligan Manor, I would've punched all my roommates in the balls, inadvertently torched a few cars in the Chucky B's parking lot while trying to set off fireworks from the roof, and broke up with whoever I was dating via text so I could "concentrate more on the rest of the ALCS." Progress. Making progress.)
- While Paul and I were digging through old photo albums and searching for yearbooks (I told you, this was a Hall-of-Fame creeping sesh) we came across this gem, from one of Paul's birthday parties, one of my favorite pictures of all time.
Me, RJ, ADawg (obscuring Aubol), Fundy, Paul, Marto, and Scott (who is dangerously close to getting defriended on Facebook-- no, I don't want to play Lucky Slots, SCOTT.)
How 'bout my giant glasses? How 'bout my shirt with the huge Lynx/Panther/Cougar/Mystery animal? How 'bout our Bambino Baseball All-Star hats? Every single person who owned that hat wore it down to absolute shreds, since there was no better way at the time to impress girls (besides baller-ass rollerblading skills) than to show you were a little league all-star. If anyone still has their hat buried in their old bedroom at their parent's house or something, I'll give them $100 for it, right now.
- I finally got to meet Leah, and she is adorable, not to mention hilarious. One could make the argument that she already has better comedic timing and fresher material than her father. In fact, I think Manada already makes that argument.
- I was hoping to drop a couple pounds or so before a wedding next weekend, since I got my measurements a few months ago and I need to fit into this suit, but instead I gorged myself like it was....well, actually it was kind of a standard weekend for me. However, it was noteworthy because every meal I ate during the weekend was outstanding. Report card:
Quesadilla at Mesa Verde in Denver airport: A, borderline A+
Buffalo wings at Chico Hot Springs Poolside Grill: A
Lobster sliders at Copper Whiskey: A+++
Pizza & wings at Tarantino's: A for pizza, A+ for wings
Paul's homemade tuna casserole: A++
I can always leave my pants unbuttoned at the wedding anyway; I'm pretty sure that's why they invented belts.
- Paul and I had a stalking session on Facebook that would've made any online predator proud. What started as an innocent "Whatever happened to _____?" quickly spiraled into creeping HARD on every random schoolmate we could think of from first grade and up. It started while Teens and Manada were taking a nap, but it continued well into the evening, long after they had woken up, and what had started as shameful morphed into shameless. Soon we were all enjoying the conversation that included sentences like "What was the name of that girl in middle school who had ringworm?" and "I would've bet a lot of money that chick Randi from Kuz's 5th grade class would've turned out hot....got that one wrong."
- If I dare say so, the Red Sox Hate Pendulum might be swinging back to the positive juuuuust a little bit. Back when they won it all in 2004, there were a TON of people that were happy for me. They were the lovable underdogs, and they took down the universally-hated Yankees on their way to winning their first championship in 86 years. For various reasons (a large payroll, media overkill, bandwagon fans, a second championship, Ben Affleck, and just good old-fashioned hatred of a team stemming from continued success) the Red Sox became about as hated nationally as the Yankees. The last few years, anytime I was wearing any Red Sox gear in public, I could guarantee at least one dirty look from a stranger.
After the crazy Red Sox rally in Game 2 Sunday night, I was wearing my Red Sox hat during our flights back to Kansas the next day. Although I did receive a mean-mugging or two (Yeah, brosef in the flat-brim Cardinals hat, I see you too, guy) what stood out was that I had four different congratulatory conversations with strangers, all initiated by the other person. It felt like 2004 all over again. Maybe a couple down-and-out years have lessened the Red Sox hate a little bit.
(Side note: One new experience I had this weekend was celebrating a crazy comeback and walk-off playoff win with a toddler sleeping upstairs. During Big Papi's homer, I involuntarily lept out of my seat and jumped around a bit, but I was able to keep the volume at an acceptable level....whereas if I was at home, I would've sprinted around the house, yelling and spraying beer....and if I was back in college at Culligan Manor, I would've punched all my roommates in the balls, inadvertently torched a few cars in the Chucky B's parking lot while trying to set off fireworks from the roof, and broke up with whoever I was dating via text so I could "concentrate more on the rest of the ALCS." Progress. Making progress.)
- While Paul and I were digging through old photo albums and searching for yearbooks (I told you, this was a Hall-of-Fame creeping sesh) we came across this gem, from one of Paul's birthday parties, one of my favorite pictures of all time.
How 'bout my giant glasses? How 'bout my shirt with the huge Lynx/Panther/Cougar/Mystery animal? How 'bout our Bambino Baseball All-Star hats? Every single person who owned that hat wore it down to absolute shreds, since there was no better way at the time to impress girls (besides baller-ass rollerblading skills) than to show you were a little league all-star. If anyone still has their hat buried in their old bedroom at their parent's house or something, I'll give them $100 for it, right now.
- I finally got to meet Leah, and she is adorable, not to mention hilarious. One could make the argument that she already has better comedic timing and fresher material than her father. In fact, I think Manada already makes that argument.
Friday, October 11, 2013
Social Media At Its Finest
Disclaimer for this post: I've haven't been using first + last names in the blog since 2007; we'll call it the Katie Z Rule. Even though I'm pretty sure we'd be OK for this post, since the information is public domain which is already being disseminated over the interwebs, we won't take any chances since we're talking about jobs here, and I won't even be referencing my friend by their blog name. Friends of mine should be able to guess who I'm talking about. Random readers will survive without knowing who we're talking about. End legal disclaimer.
***************
A couple months ago, a writer from New York that I follow on Twitter tweeted something that gave me a chuckle. It was a retweet from a town's police department that simply described what occurred in the police report-- the matter-of-fact tone is probably what made it funny. It simply said "Two men were seen putting four glass mugs in the middle of Tracy Avenue at 1 a.m. Officers removed the mugs from the road."
I chuckled, thought it could be mildly entertaining to follow a police department on Twitter, glanced at the original tweet, and realized OMG I HAVE A FRIEND WHO IS A POLICE OFFICER IN THIS TOWN ARE YOU KIDDING ME WHAT ARE THE ODDS.
So naturally, it was on. I get probably 5-7 tweets a day from their police report, and it's awesome knowing that there's a good chance my buddy is working on at least some of these "cases." And of course, I've started blowing him up with texts such as these:
"Hey, I really hope you catch the guys who threw rocks at Hyalite Elementary School."
"So an officer had to give a woman advice on how to handle her son, who she thinks is doing dangerous drugs-- Pleeeeeeeease tell me you were the one giving the advice!"
"An officer checked on a man who was sitting in a vehicle drinking beer and throwing up out of the door....so were you the officer, or the man in the car? Was it like a Back to the Future situation, like two of you running around at the same time, and you had to arrest yourself?"
Here are some of the other gems from the Twitter feed that I have not texted him about (because, quite honestly, while I want to give him shit, I don't want to text him every two hours when something funny comes up):
- A person reported finding what appeared to be a crack pipe on the floor. It turned out to be a light bulb.
- An officer checked on a woman who fell off her bike. She was fine.
- A woman reported that some juvenile neighbors dug up her dead tortoise that she had buried in her yard, took pictures of it and posted them on the internet. (Editor's note: this one is probably my favorite. That's some shit right there.)
- A man reported that he found his front door open the last two days. Officers said it was possible the wind was opening the door.
- A young man on a bike was chasing geese.
- A person who reported that a mountain lion was outside their cabin at 6:45am called back to say it was actually a black bear.
This Twitter feed is just the gift that keeps on giving. Now, I am aware that I'm picking and choosing the funny ones here, but still...these are pretty awesome. Forget Baltimore, they should've filmed The Wire in this city. All in the game, yo.
***************
A couple months ago, a writer from New York that I follow on Twitter tweeted something that gave me a chuckle. It was a retweet from a town's police department that simply described what occurred in the police report-- the matter-of-fact tone is probably what made it funny. It simply said "Two men were seen putting four glass mugs in the middle of Tracy Avenue at 1 a.m. Officers removed the mugs from the road."
I chuckled, thought it could be mildly entertaining to follow a police department on Twitter, glanced at the original tweet, and realized OMG I HAVE A FRIEND WHO IS A POLICE OFFICER IN THIS TOWN ARE YOU KIDDING ME WHAT ARE THE ODDS.
So naturally, it was on. I get probably 5-7 tweets a day from their police report, and it's awesome knowing that there's a good chance my buddy is working on at least some of these "cases." And of course, I've started blowing him up with texts such as these:
"Hey, I really hope you catch the guys who threw rocks at Hyalite Elementary School."
"So an officer had to give a woman advice on how to handle her son, who she thinks is doing dangerous drugs-- Pleeeeeeeease tell me you were the one giving the advice!"
"An officer checked on a man who was sitting in a vehicle drinking beer and throwing up out of the door....so were you the officer, or the man in the car? Was it like a Back to the Future situation, like two of you running around at the same time, and you had to arrest yourself?"
Here are some of the other gems from the Twitter feed that I have not texted him about (because, quite honestly, while I want to give him shit, I don't want to text him every two hours when something funny comes up):
- A person reported finding what appeared to be a crack pipe on the floor. It turned out to be a light bulb.
- An officer checked on a woman who fell off her bike. She was fine.
- A woman reported that some juvenile neighbors dug up her dead tortoise that she had buried in her yard, took pictures of it and posted them on the internet. (Editor's note: this one is probably my favorite. That's some shit right there.)
- A man reported that he found his front door open the last two days. Officers said it was possible the wind was opening the door.
- A young man on a bike was chasing geese.
- A person who reported that a mountain lion was outside their cabin at 6:45am called back to say it was actually a black bear.
This Twitter feed is just the gift that keeps on giving. Now, I am aware that I'm picking and choosing the funny ones here, but still...these are pretty awesome. Forget Baltimore, they should've filmed The Wire in this city. All in the game, yo.
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