Now Featuring More Awesome!!

Transformers 2: Revenge Of The Fallen Of The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull

2009-06-29T14:55:00.000-07:00

Like so, this one robot, is all like "Yeagghhh" and then another robot was all "nooo yeahhghhghghh" and then the other robot was like "geegaahahh" and then transformed into a big ass thing. And shit blew up, and helicopters were like whoooshhhhh, and tanks were all like "pow pow pow", and lasers were going "pew pew pew" and Megan Fox's breasts were like "Booyahhh" and Shia LeBeouf's hand was all like "Owww!", and Michael Bay's all "Look at all my Army stuff!", and Tyrese was like "Damn!"

The Pancreas Tree!

2008-04-29T10:28:00.000-07:00

During college I had a stellar Freshman, and Sophomore year of awesome grades, and kick ass scholastic motivation. Thinking that I had this "College Thing" figured out, I started slacking. A lot. My grades plummeted, and my motivation to do anything school related went out the window. All I did was goof off and ride my bike all day.

Recently, during a trip back home to my parent's house, I found an old paper I had to write for a Biology class. I don't remember much about the class, except that it started really early in the morning. The topic of the essay was Insulin, and I assume it had to meet a two page requirement, otherwise I would have just ended it after the first paragraph.

While reading the paper you can tell that I totally copied text from a science book, but I don't even think I copied the book properly, because nothing makes sense. Then the rest of the paper, is just some random bullshit, where I don't even try to come up with a clever way around my ignorance of the subject matter. It's just terrible all the way through. You can read the paper below. If you can make it past the first paragraph, you get a gold star. (If the text is too small you can zoom in. Fancy!)

I can haz a college degree now?

They're Taking Away My Fucking Parking Spaces!

2008-04-29T08:50:00.000-07:00

Screw you crazy Polygamist group!

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/04/29/national/a012511D61.DTL&feed=rss.news

Fuck you Crazy Eyebrowed Austrian Daughter Sexing Guy!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080429/ap_on_re_eu/austria_captive_daughter

All your messed up kids are going to be driving cars, which will then take away more possible parking spaces for me!

Yaaaagghghghhhhh!

Tom Cruise? Crazy?

2008-01-16T08:51:00.000-08:00

Really this is crazy? Tom Cruise speaking about Scientology?

Like...crazier than this?

Replace the word Scientology, with Christianity; Scientologists, with Christians, and it's the same old bullshit. I don't understand why this video of Tom Cruise is crazy to people.

Is everyone in a huff about this video because Scientology isn't one of the "cool" religions? Is it because Scientology is the nerdy sci-fi geek in the corner of the quad, and other religions like Christianity bask in the warm glow of popularity?

Or is it Tom Cruise? Is the public still condemning him for his couch jumping antics?

Is it all the "Thetans" coursing through his body? Or are we are afraid of his boisterous declaration of love?

Why are we not afraid of this creepy kid?

Or this guy, condemning breast examinations

Or the woman that thanks god for dead soldiers

I don't know. Am I ignorant? Maybe. I don't know anything about religion, which one's the cool one, which one's the dumb one. I don't know. I'm godless, and soul less. I've only been to a church maybe five times in my life, and it gave me a rash everytime.

Why is Scientology so hated?

Oh, I know what it is.

Battlefield Earth.

Duh.

Hot Carl Coffee

2007-12-21T12:04:00.000-08:00

So I'm in line at the coffee shop, the one that's frequented by everyone here at work; using my phone to look up the definition of "Hot Carl" on the internet.
A quick search on Urban Dictionary describes it as:

"The act of taking a shit on someone's face with Saran wrap over their face as to make you and/or your partner sexually aroused."

hahaha. People come up with some zany stuff. The "Hot Carl" is pretty gross on two parts. 1. Shit smells bad. 2. Saran wrap tastes bad.

Sure, we all assume shit tastes bad, but I haven't eaten shit so I can't accurately say if it tastes bad. I have eaten saran wrap by accident. A couple times, when excitedly eating a sandwich . That, I can say with confidence, does taste bad.

But, you like eating shit? Do it. I don't care. What I care more about, at this moment is why this line for coffee is taking so long.

"You guys are always checking your emails", I hear someone say. It's the guy behind the counter. "It's like you have Blackberries glued to your hands", he adds.

"I know", I say. "Work finds you wherever you go"

Emails? I don't get emails outside of work. I don't have a work issued Blackberry, thankfully.

I continue reading Urban Dictionary.

"Variations on the Hot Carl Include: 1st: You shit on your partners face.

2nd: You shit on your partners face who is sporting a piece of saran wrap over it.

3rd: You shit on to a glass table while your partner lays down underneath it.

All are varying degrees of hardcoreness!"

Damn, those are hardcore variations.

"I don't know if I'd like my work following me wherever I go", says the guy.

"A Sloppy Carlson occurs when the loaf is hot and runny (diarrhea) and forces a hole through the saran wrap, mmm."

Damn. Sloppy Carlson. That's crazy...yet intruiging..

"Yeah, it's rough sometimes", I say without looking up. "But you know. Work just..it just.."

"A Hot-Carl in understandable terms is when you remove your phallus from your partner's warm rectal orifice and insert it into their mouth, thus giving them the distinct aftertaste of hot wet ass. This is also referred to as Ass to Mouth, Arse to Mouth, A2M, ATM. It is commonly misconcieved that a Hot-Carl involved some sort of rectal expulsion on or near a partners face, this, however, is incorrect."

Hmm..That changes things..Apparently there are two schools of thought regarding the "Hot Carl". This is interesting.

"Um, yeah, the emails. It sucks sometimes, but uh..you know. Productivity and all that..", I say as I search online for more answers.

"A Hot-Carl is when you are in a 69 position and you squeeze out a hot, spicy fart. Since the chick's nose is near your butthole, she gets the extra pleasure of whatever you had for dinner that night. Strictly a class move. It is also known as the Alabama Nose Warmer".

hahaha, Alabama Nose Warmer..but that doesn't help. Is a "Hot Carl" where you shit in someone's face or mouth? Or is it farting whilst, 69'ing? Ass to Mouth? Saran Wrap?

What is the definitive answer? I don't know. It's one of those great mysteries of the world. Where is the lost city of Atlantis? What happened to the Mayans? Do Aliens exist? What the fuck is a "Hot Carl"?

"Uh..sir? Your order?", asks the guy.

"Ah sorry, these emails..nonstop", I say. "Large regular coffee"

Hallo! Please Pass To Steven Seagal

2007-12-12T16:48:00.000-08:00

A letter came to us today, from (The?) Ukraine.

Addressed to "The authors and producers of the feature film 'Half Past Dead'"

Within the letter contained an exciting proposal meant strictly for Steven Seagal. Enclosed in the envelope was another envelope with "Only personally to Steven Seagal" written on it.

Unfortunately, Steven Seagal is unavailable at the moment, he's off filming a movie where he karate chops suckas in the face for disparaging sacred land.

I do not want to make an "Executive Decision", and render another person's dream as "Marked For Death", so I'll answer the man's proposal as if I were Mr. Seagal.

"Hallo! Of course I know very good all can be thought about me and this letter, but I'd like to tell you something"

"Yes, hallo! I do know very good what you think I think about you, and the letter, and I am excited to hear what you have to tell me"!

"First, some words about our school, it is one of the most ancient. Already, 5000 years ago (and even more) Dragon Clan was on the lands of the present Russia and some others."

"Dragon Clan huh. From Russia..I know you guys. 5000 years ago, you raped the gypsies and disparaged their land! I've dealt with the likes of you. Have you seen my documentary On Deadly Ground? I saved the Eskimos from Michael Caine. I'm sorry, I'm being rude. Continue."

"It goes from the very sources of dragon history. Or, if to say a little more, it is namely the source of its pure history"

"You lost me..are we talking about real dragons? Your clan controls them? The fire breathing kind? Amazing. You have my attention Ukranian Dragon Man."

"Well, as you can guess, I could tell something about that and other topics."

"Me too bub. I know a lot about a lot of shit. Like guitars, and Buddhism, and Tibet. I also know about things like energy drinks."

"Get a load of that shit. It's a roundhouse kick to tiredness. One time, I was a cook on a Navy ship, and all these bad guys invaded. I took a sip of my energy drink and was all "Bam! Crack! Pow!" on their asses. Then I fucked a hot chick who came out of a cake."

"Really, I can offer a lot of interesting, uncommon, unknown on very many different points."

"You lost me again. Did I mention that my energy drink is the only "Asian Experience" energy drink? Drink it and POW! no, GOOONNNGGG!..whatever that gong sound is, and then BAM! You'll be tireless like the Asians. Anyway, tell me more about these dragons."

"So when you will want to know that and to work very good on the topics, write me"

"Hold it there now, suckaface. You don't tell me what to do. If and when I want to work with you and your dragons, I'll let you know via letter..wait, sorry, that's what you meant..ok."

"Now please pass this letter to those, who will be interested at once. Though I'd advise you that too. Try better to answer now, so that not to lose time and possibilities. All the best!"

"What! Pass this letter to who? You don't come to Steven Seagal with business and then shop around! Who else have you been talking to Dragon man?"

"Me! Keeyaaaaah!"

"Van Damme!You sneaky Belgian. Where did you come from?"

"I've come to hear this Ukranian fellow speak of his dragons."

"Van Damme, the Ukranian dragon man is mine! You're not screwing me out of another deal!"

"Oh come on now Stevie, still mad about Double Impact? That movie was meant for me. I was "Twice The Van Damm-"

"Twice The Van-Dammage", ughhhh, you know, I could have come up with a marketable name gimmick had I starred in Double Impact. "Onesies..twosies..threesies..Steve-sies.."

"hahahahahaha..."

"Fuck you Van Damme."

"hahaha, listen broseph, you need this Ukranian Dragon Man more than I do. You can have him..later ass."

"God damn I hate that guy. Anyway, looks like we're all set, Ukranian Dragon Man. Once someone shows me where Ukrainia is on the map, I'll book a flight. In addition to all my expenses, you must provide me with a dojo, that will double as a practice space for my band. Also, mark my words Ukranian Dragon Man, if I get even the slightest feeling that you are using your Dragons to roust the gypsies from their rightful land, I will karate chop your face to the hinterland. Keeeyaaah!"

I Think My Apartment Is Haunted

2007-11-13T09:58:00.000-08:00

Some weird shit has been happening in my apartment lately. Doors open and close by themselves, strange noises are heard at random moments throught the day.

Perhaps the most disturbing thing has been the sound of footsteps coming down my hallway. My apartment has hardwood floors, and every other day or so, when I'm alone, I've been hearing someone walk across the floor, in what sounds like hard soled shoes. "Clump, Clump, Clump". It's a little unnerving.

My roommate has also heard these things as well. He told me that he had been noticing that the door to the hallway has been opening and closing by itself. One night he made sure to close the door firmly, to see if anything would happen. Later, he woke up in the middle of the night, and saw that the door to the hallway was wide open. I was out of town that night so it wasn't me that opened the door. I don't think he'd been sleepwalking either.

I live in an old building, that was built in the 1920's, so it is entirely possible that "ghosts" may be lurking. Are ghosts real? I personally don't have any strong feelings either way, but these odd events taking place in my apartment are hard to ignore.

If this ghost is real, then it is a third roommate, and would need to pay rent. It's only fair.

How much? I don't know yet, but its already going to get a pretty good deal since it won't be charged for utilities.

If you are a ghost, you don't need water and electricity, but you are living in my apartment, trying to scare me, so you are paying some of the rent. Fucker.

Right now the "haunting" has been pretty benign. I do have a plan however, should the ghost try to escalate things, and attempt to scare me in my own room a la The Grudge.

If some creepy long haired ghost woman comes crawling into my room, I will immediately throw off my blankets and start masturbating furiously. I mean, full on, death grip try to start a fire with my penis, furious.

I believe this plan will be an effective counter strike towards the ghost's attempt at trying to scare me. In fact, if done right, masturbating furiously will freak out the ghost instead of me. It will be such a different reaction than what the ghost will be expecting, it will have no choice but to retreat and rethink things.

If the ghost stops, backs up a little and thinks to itself: "What the fuck? Did that guy just start masturbating?". The plan is working.

Any further attempts to scare me while I am masturbating will only make the situation even more awkward for the ghost.

"Gruuhhh (Grudge-like moaning).....shit man..that's just..Come on! You're gonna pull that thing off!"

The image of me will be burned into the ghost's mind, haunting it forever. I win.

How Many Snakes Can You Fit In Your Ass?

2007-11-09T09:57:00.000-08:00

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/odd_snakes_in_a_tub

DUBLIN, Texas - Another day, another bizarre world record for Jackie Bibby, the "Texas Snake Man." Bibby spent about 45 minutes in a see-through bathtub with 87 rattlesnakes Monday, fully clothed, shattering his own record by 12 snakes just in time for Guinness World Records Day, which is Thursday. A Guinness official certified the record.

The record was Bibby's latest grab at glory. Last year he set a Guinness-certified record by holding 10 rattlesnakes by their tails in his mouth at once. He said he hopes to break that record Tuesday by squeezing in an 11th.

And in other news, there is still no cure for cancer.

Vegas

2007-11-05T11:45:00.000-08:00

I hate Vegas. No, I take it back. I mean to say I hate the last few hours of Vegas.

For me the perfect amount of Vegas time is two nights. Anything longer than that usually results in great pain, and aggravation. The last time I went to Vegas, after three nights I decided I had enough. The fun of Vegas wears off quickly, and soon after all you see and hear are striped shirted douchebags high fiving and yelling. During the third night, after having been on a bender since the minute I arived, I decided that I needed to leave Vegas immediately. Nevermind the fact that I had a flight leaving Vegas at 3pm, I decided that the best time to leave Vegas was right at that moment.

So, I left the club, packed up all my things, and took off for the aiport. I didn't tell anyone I was with that I was leaving. Much of my memory of that night is fuzzy, I pretty much only remember leaving the club. The next thing I remember was being jolted awake as my plane landed in Los Angeles. I had a temporary freak out, not knowing exactly where I was for a few seconds. In my lap rested a half eaten croissant sandwich, and I had about 15 voicemails on my phone from my friends wondering where the hell I went.

I got off the plane at 9am, stumbled to my car and drove home. At 9:35am, after I had just entered my apartment, I realized that I had left all my baggage at the airport, so I had to go back. Luckily my bag was still there, lonely in the baggage carousel. Vegas: 1, Eric: 0

I went to Vegas again, over the weekend for my Cousin's wedding, and this time, I was only staying for two nights. Perfect. This Vegas trip was going to be a success!

Unfortunately, a clean escape from Vegas ended up being a pipe dream when US Airways canceled my 2:30pm flight out on Sunday. Bastards! A customer service representative told me that there were no more flights leaving Vegas, and that I would have to fly a different airline, or stay in Vegas for one more night. I chose to fly another airline. I bought a ticket on Southwest, for an 8pm departure. Ughhhh....Vegas:2, Eric:0

Anyway, here are shitty pics from the weekend, taken from my phone. There are no exciting photos.

I stayed at the Riviera Hotel, which is pretty trashy, but that's what you get when you don't make hotel reservations until the very last minute. How trashy is it? Here is the Riviera's take on wireless internet:

When I landed, I had to go to the store to buy socks, and shoes. That's what you have to do when you pack at the very last minute. Here are two guys that are totally shopped out.

My parents came over to check out my hotel situation, and immediately started talking shit. Mom goes "Eric, your hotel room doesn't even offer shower caps". Ah shit Mom! You totally nailed the thing I hated most about this hotel! No fucking shower caps! Yeaarrghhh! I mean, right? Wet hair, the horror.

She started talking some more shit here:
"What are these, your sister's pants?"

Gotta love the jokes. Go back to your fancy room in New York, New York or whatever the hell that hotel is called.

Here my Dad, wearing Costco's finest goes:
"Hey, I gotta live with this woman"

The jokes don't stop. I was stuck in the middle of an Asian flavored comedy sandwich.

Here my mom demonstrates the one sip of beer she had in order to get drunk enough to go on her first date with my dad centuries ago.

I have no other pics other than this one of my Uncle reading an old poem at the wedding dinner

I told you the pictures weren't exciting. I don't have a fancy digital camera anymore. All these were taken on my phone. All the pictures taken at the bars and clubs are on other people's cameras. Lame. Actually, perhaps its a good thing. I don't need to see myself falling over stuff.

Get To Da Choppa...or Blog

2007-10-31T10:06:00.001-07:00

Steve Jobs Announces New iPods! iPhone price drop! Everyone Complains!

2007-09-05T14:34:00.000-07:00

Steve Jobs announced today, in addition to revealing the latest generation of iPods; that the iPhone would be receiving a significant price drop to the tune of $200 dollars. This moves the price of the two month old 8 gigabyte iPhone down from $600, to $400

Sucks for you doesn't it, Mr. and Mrs. "Gotta have it now, fuck every other priority in life" consumer?

Ohhh...but you're mad! "How can Steve Jobs do this to us?" you cry out to the heavens. Well, Apple fans, your God is not a benevolent God. Your God runs a business. In an office. A fancy one, on Main Street.

No one forced you to buy the iPhone when it first came out at $600. That's the price you pay to get it right when it comes out. Everyone knows (Especially apple fans, and I include myself in this group) that Apple drops prices, sometimes soon after a release.

The $600 dollars you paid during it's initial release is the premium price you pay to be the cool kid on the block with the fancy gadget.

Granted the price dropping $200 in less than 2 months is a lot, and it sucks, but no one was scammed.

It's all a matter of what the iPhone is worth to you. If it was worth it for you to wait in line, and pay $600 from the get go, then cool. You got your product, don't worry about it. If it wasn't worth all the hassle and the high price, then why the hell did you buy it? You're the asshole in this case.

If I buy a car from a dealer, and drive off the lot, can I turn right back around and demand the money back that I lost from depreciation?

Get over yourselves. Your iPhone can deliver you porn on demand anywhere. That's pretty fucking rad.

Why The Terrorsts Hate Us Reason #12313134

2007-08-03T09:59:00.000-07:00

Woman Gives Birth To 17th Child..And Wants More

Jim Bob, and Michelle Duggar had their 17th child. Let's give them a fucking round of applause everyone. 17 kids. Thirty minutes later, before the afterbirth had a chance to cool off, they talked about wanting more kids.

The statistics are appalling: The Duggars have gone through 90,000 diapers, and Michelle has been pregnant for 10.5 years of her life.

90,000 diapers?! One family is adding 90,000 diapers filled with shit and piss to our overflowing landfills. One family!

"We are just so grateful to God for another gift from him," said Jim Bob Duggar, 42, a former state representative. "We are just so thankful to him that everything went just very well."

Note to God. A gift certificate to Tower Records is a fine gift. You don't need to ravage this woman's birth canal any more...unless this is one big cosmic joke, a woman's vagina is not a clown car.

And in other headlines today:

Dog Shoots Man In The Back

Squirrel Chocolate Thief

Bruce Willis Rocks The Kennedy Space Center!

Space Travel For Tourists Just Got More Expensive?

2007-07-19T09:55:00.000-07:00

WHAT THE FUCK?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070719/ap_on_sc/space_tourists

Space tourists now have to shell out $40 million to travel to space. Absolutely outrageous.

"It's mostly because of the fallen dollar," Eric Anderson, president and CEO of Space Adventures, said Wednesday."

Those of you that socked away 25 million dollars to go on the vacation of your dreams just got shit on by Space Adventures.

Now you're gonna have to go tell your kids that the family trip this year will take place in Fiji or the Virgin Islands like an asshole.

UCSB Graduation Text Blogging

2007-06-18T10:24:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, my sister graduated from college. I drove up early that morning to attend the event. It was a long ceremony, and would have been really really boring had it not been for the wonders of text messaging. Here is an exciting text-blog recap of UC Santa Barbara Graduation 2007! I am "brother", sister is "sister". Clever huh? Yeah there's no doubt that I am a college graduate as well.

First order of business. Find where my sister was sitting, among all the graduating students.

Brother 9:05am: I'm with the folks, far right.

Brother 9:06am: There is a lady with a big orange sign next to us. It says "Andrea We Love You"

The sign was obnoxious. I understand how proud you are "family of Andrea", but you already made a huge ass sign that says "Andrea We Love You", you don't have to keep yelling it out. The sign does that job for you.

Sister 9:08am: Hahaha, ok we are on the left group.

Sister 9:15am: We moved, now we are on the right side, but on the edge. Close to the left side. I will raise my hand in 2 seconds.

I quickly stood and scanned the sea of people. I saw hundreds of outstretched hands.

Sister 9:17am: I saw you.

Graduation thus far was chaos. Families crammed into narrow rows of seats. I looked over to my mom who was holding a lei made with purple flowers.

At the entrance to the graduation ceremony, parents were able to pick up leis to give to their children to wear around their necks over their gown. I'm not sure what a necklace of flowers means in the graduation sense, but it looked nice.

My mom was upset that she wasn't able to find my sister in time to hand her the lei, and she was sitting in her chair with her trademark look of worry. She was afraid that my sister was going to be sad that she didn't get a lei. I didn't think it would matter, but after fidgeting for a while, my mom finally stood up and said "I am going to give this to Cheryl", and headed off into a maelstrom of people.

"Mom, you're not gonna get through that crowd", I said.

She weighs two pounds, there was no way she was going to get through the crowd of people taking pictures and waving signs.

Sure enough, five minutes later, my mom returned to her seat defeated. There was a leaf in her hair. I laughed for a little while, but my mom was disappointed.

Brother 9:37am: Africa, Africa, Africa. Blah Blah Blah. Wait...is she talking about Africa?

The lady on stage, addressing the graduating students had been droning on and on in excess of twenty minutes about AIDS Research. AIDS Research is good. Encouraging the graduating students to think globally and do their part to help with AIDS research is good.

Bragging about your personal achievements, and what you have done personally to help with AIDS Research nonstop is bad. Graduation isn't about you lady, it's about the students who are graduating. Sheesh.

Sister 9:36am: I don't know! But people are NOT caring. So much talking. Trying to sleep. Need to pee.

Brother 9:39am: Bragging. Way to lose the audience lady.

Sister 9:41am: I know seriously. My graduation was lame! Some lady kept talking about crap, that no one cares about. Where the hell is Arnold?

Yeah, where the hell was Arnold Schwarzenegger? Why do some schools get Arnold Schwarzenegger, and some schools don't? How does that work? My graduation from SF State featured Ben Fong Torres from Rolling Stone, and Pete Yarrow from Peter, Paul and Mary. Who picks each commencement speaker?

By the way, Pete Yarrow was great. Very sweet, and was very earnest in his speech. His words of encouragement however, were deeply undermined by jackasses in the audience yelling out "PLAY PUFF THE MAGIC DRAGON!". Sorry Pete.

Brother 9:43am: Arnold would be so rad. Maybe he's gonna parachute in and surprise us.

Sister 9:43am: Ha ha I wish. Kimbo is full on sleeping.

Arnold didn't parachute in unfortunately. Cheryl's friend Kimberly was not rousted from her slumber.

The lady on stage is still talking about HER achievements.

Brother 9:45am: Jesus Christ lady!

Sister 9:49am: SHUT UP. Don't care.

Finally, after a seemingly unending series of "final thoughts", the lady stepped off stage. Phew! Bring on the next speaker.

Who could it be? It's not Arnold. It's a UCSB student, graduating with Honors.

She did everything apparently; belonged to every club, volunteered everywhere, cured cancer, found the lost city of Atlantis, and was a Sudoku tutor to handicapped children.

The list of her achievements went on and on. It was pretty impressive. How she had time to do all this is pretty remarkable. When did she have time to party? Has she ever got drunk with a bunch of co-eds on spring break?

Has she ever experienced the joyous feeling that is having tequila poured down your throat by some guy blowing a whistle during a wild weekend in Tijuana?

There's no time for that now either, especially after it was announced that she's got some fancy job in San Francisco waiting for her after graduation.

Brother 9:50am: haha, you think you're sooo smart lady. With your fancy new job in SF and "honors" graduation.

Sister 9:51am: I know. You suck you mean bitch.

After smart girl's mercifully short speech, the Chancellor of the school took to the stage again. So far, Chancellor Henry Yang has been the best speaker. He was funny, and articulate, and didn't talk forever.

Sister 9:53am: Yes! The Asian guy!

Brother 9:53am: Lo Pan?

Ah Lo Pan. When I worked at Tower Records as a college freshman, I had to work on Christmas day. I worked the video rental counter, and was watching Big Trouble In Little China with another coworker who was Asian, like me. A customer walked in and offered this golden nugget:

"Look at you guys..working on Christmas. Well I guess, Asians don't celebrate Christmas. You're watching an Asian movie too!"

This was said in all seriousness. It wasn't mean spirited, just dumb.

Anyway, that was just a little Lo Pan tidbit..back to graduation fun.

After the Chancellor finished speaking, the students finally started approaching the stage. Hundreds of students. Rows upon rows of students.

Brother 10:10am: I can't see anything. Stupid "Gavin" sign blocking my view.

Sister 10:11am: hahaha, I see it!

The Gavin sign was ridiculous. Each letter in the name was on an individual poster sized piece of paper. The mom of the group kept barking orders to the kids holding up the sign. The poor kid holding the letter "A" couldn't have been more than five years old. He wasn't doing a good enough job according to his mother.

"Hold the sign up higher honey! Higher, you're tilting too much!" she kept yelling.

The kid couldn't hold the sign up any higher. His arms were stretched out so far above his head he was grunting with effort.

Brother 10:12am: Dammit, I hope Gavin sees the damn sign, so they sit down.

Sister 10:13am: ha ha, why didn't you guys make me a sign?

Brother 10:15am: We hired a sky writer, but he crashed his plane in Oxnard. Sorry.

Sister 10:15am: Liar! What about Kimbo?

Brother 10:18am: Well it was a joint message. He only got to "Cheryl and Kimb-" before he crashed into the children's hospital. We will be demanding a refund.

Sister 10:19am: Ah screw those sickly kids.

So many students....names keep being called. My sister still has many many rows of students in front of her.

Brother 10:22am: There is a small child in front of me waving a tiny "Congratulations" stick. Hey dummy! They can't read that thing from far away. Dumbest four year old, ever.

Sister 10:33am: Hey! We are next row.

Yes! Finally. My sister's row stood up and moved to the side, ready to take the stage. My mom leapt up from her chair, seeing this moment as her best chance to get the lei to my sister.

Brother 10:34am: Mom's on her way. Tiny woman pushing against a throng of people. I don't think she will survive.

Brother 10:34am: We lost dad. Somewhere around here is a lost, fanny pack wearing old Asian man.

Sister 10:39am: I saw dad! He came out of nowhere!

My mom came back. Successfully handed off the lei to my sister. Just in time too, as she was about to step on to the stage.

I got a lot more excited than I thought I was going to be, the closer my sister got to the stage. At first I figured, I'd yell and cheer, but when they finally read her name over the loudspeaker, I yelled "FUCK YEAH! FINALLY! YEHHAHGGGHGGHH", something unintelligible. I was really proud of her.

My unintelligible yell was punctuated by my sister's equally as awesome karate style fist pump, on stage.

Brother 10:41am: ha ha! Sweet fist pump on stage.

Sister 10:41am: Yeah I know! I was totally feeling it hahaha.

Yeah, and that was that. Sister is a college graduate. It's fantastic.

Final text to my sister before we met up with the family for pictures in the parking lot.

Brother 10:50am: Have you seen dad's pants? They are amazing.

Sister 10:50am: haha no.

There Is No Sober! Only ZUUL!

2007-05-30T10:47:00.000-07:00

"Are you the Gatekeeper?"

Some People Just Shouldn't Have Children.

2007-05-29T13:05:00.001-07:00

Truly terrible news indeed, but can we take a moment to appreciate the proper use of the word "Hanged"?....No? ...Proper word usage always takes a backseat.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070529/ap_on_re_us/children_killed

Texas mother hangs herself, 4 children By ANGELA K. BROWN, Associated Press Writer
29 minutes ago

A 23-year-old mother apparently hanged herself and her four small daughters in a closet in their mobile home. An 8-month-old survived and was taken to a hospital, the sheriff said Tuesday.

Authorities did not immediately identify the victims in the Oak Hills mobile home park, about 25 miles west of Fort Worth in this rural community of 1,600 people.

The woman's sister, who lived nearby, forced her way into the locked home after the woman failed to show up for work. Parker County Sheriff Larry Fowler said the sister rescued the infant when she realized the baby girl was still alive.

The other children, ages 5, 3 and 2, had all had been hanged with strips of clothing and sashes, Fowler said.

"It's horrendous. That's all I can say," he said. "It's just something you don't want to see."

The infant was listed in good condition at a Fort Worth hospital, Fowler said.

The sheriff said the hangings appeared to be murder-suicide because the trailer's doors were locked from the inside and a relative said the woman had been depressed.

The young mother and her girls were last seen alive Monday evening, he said. She was believed to be separated from her husband.

"I just got a big kick out of watching the kids play over there on her porch, and today it's sad, very sad," said neighbor Joyce Harris.

Texas has seen a number of child killings by mothers in recent years.

Less than five years earlier, another Hudson Oaks family was torn apart when Dee Etta Perez, 39, shot her three children, ages 4, 9 and 10, before killing herself.

Andrea Yates drowned her five children in the family's Houston bathtub in 2001. In 2003, Deanna Laney beat her two young sons to death with stones in East Texas, and Lisa Ann Diaz drowned her daughters in a Plano bathtub. Dena Schlosser fatally severed her 10-month-old daughter's arms with a kitchen knife in 2004.

All four of those women were found innocent by reason of insanity. Yates initially was convicted of capital murder, but that verdict was overturned on appeal.

___

Shoulda Went With Paper!

2007-05-23T14:15:00.001-07:00

Never before, has losing a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors proved to be so dire.

Damn George Thorogood

2007-05-23T09:02:00.000-07:00

Over cheap Japanese food during lunch one day, some friends and I were swapping tales of jackassery and embarrasment. Among the usual gross out tales of pants pooping and throw up, I remembered when something embarrased me that didn't involve drunken antics or fruedian slips.

It was a few years ago, during my first summer living in Los Angeles. I was working as a Production Coordinator on a low budget film. Production Coordinator was the title given to me, but I was just a glorified PA. I got paid nothing, and my days were split up between hanging out at the production office in a run down building on Sunset Blvd, and driving to the set in El Segundo to deliver important things like ice, and lunch. This was tough for me, since I wasn't being paid, I was spending a lot of money each week on gasoline expenses.

One hot afternoon, after having to schlep between the office, and the set all day through traffic since 7am, I get a call from one of the producers saying that they needed me to pick up boxes and deliver them to the set. I had just returned from the fucking set! I wasn't even out of the car for more than two minutes. The idea of getting back into my truck, fighting through traffic to get to some box store, then getting back on the 405 to El Segundo made me want to eat a baby's face off.

But, I was young, and was eager for the "experience" so I kept my mouth shut, and drove to the Producer's "box guy". The Producer had a "box guy", which meant I was going to some back alley box store to save him a couple of cents per box. I follow the directions to this box store, and after a few turns I end up in an alleway off a small side street near La Brea and San Vicente.

There was no real parking, so I pulled up as far as I could go, which still left a good portion of my truck sticking out in the small side street. I didn't think it would matter, since I was only going to be there for a short time. I didn't really care either since I was annoyed and in a rush.

I was in the store for about a minute when I start hearing all this honking, so I run outside to move my truck. Immediately, the guy in the car trying to pull into the driveway/alley starts screaming at me.

"MOVE YOUR FUCKING CAR!" the guy says.

I yell at him politely to "Calm the fuck down!", and ask him to back up so I can move my truck, but the guy doesn't move, he just sits there honking and swearing.

That's when I flipped out. The guy was yelling at me to move my truck but wouldn't back up to allow me to do so.

I started yelling and swearing unintelligble things. Much like the scene in "A Christmas Story" where Ralphie starts beating up his bully, my words came out like this:

"Rajja frajja, fucking blah blah blarrgh, car, blagga blagg shit backup jarba jarba!"

At this point, people from the box store come outside to see what all the commotion is about. These employees are treated to the sight of me outside some guy's car screaming and yelling.

Finally, after a minute or two of brilliant negotiation:

"You fucking move!"

"No you fucking move!"

The guy starts backing up, screeching the tires as makes room for me to get my truck out of the driveway.

Fuming, but satisfied, I walk past the the box store employees, get in my truck, slam the door, and start the car.

Now, I should explain something. When I drive, I listen to the radio loud. Really loud, mom says I'll go deaf one day.

That day I had the radio turned on loud when I pulled into the driveway of the box store. The radio was loud when I turned the truck off. So, when I started up my truck, ready to leave, the radio comes on blasting the lamest song ever, especially after my public tirade.

"B-B-B-B-B-BAD, duh nuh nuh nuh nuh, B-B-B-B-B-BAD!"

The fucking George Thorogood song "Bad To The Bone" blasts out of my speakers. Loud for everyone to hear.

I felt immediate embarrasment. Especially when one of the box store employees raised his fist and shouted

"YEAH!"

Among the laughter of his co-workers.

George Thorogood made a mockery of my seething venomous rage. It was so lame. I don't want this stupid song to be the soundtrack of my rage.

Granted, it wasn't the kind of embarrasment you feel when you get caught singing naked in your grandpa's bedroom, or taking a dump on the doctor's finger while getting a prostate exam, but it was still very embarrasing to have the moment replay in my head over and over for the rest of the day.

Hi Fi Gerbil!

2007-04-26T16:03:00.000-07:00

My dad just emailed me a bunch of random photos he found and scanned into his computer.

Here are my favorite two:

Hi-Fi Gerbil

I don't know where this was taken. I didn't have a gerbil while growing up, nor did I have a sweet stereo setup. I don't think I even listened to music back then, or had a favorite band.

Why am I listening to music next to a gerbil?

Young Me: "Hey gerbil, have you heard this record? It's great"

Gerbil: "....."

The gerbil had to have been someone's pet, maybe a family friend. Or it could have been our dinner. That would have been so Asian of us.

**Edit** Mike says it's a Guinea Pig. Gerbil sounds better.

I have no clue where this next picture comes from either.

I am accepting grapes from a bearded stranger, but I guess it was a street vendor or something, or else my mom wouldn't have let me eat them.

Can you even buy grapes from a street vendor anymore these days? I think you would be hard pressed to find a street vendor selling healthy food like grapes. Unless you were looking for grape flavored soda or some culinary abomination like fried cheese grapes.

The best part of that picture. The look of envy on that kid in the red t-shirt.

Kid In Red Shirt: "Awwww, I want grapes!"

Young Me: "Tough luck kid! Eat a Gerbil if you're so fucking hungry!"

**Edit** Marcy and her sharp eyes mentioned that the grapes, might be a baloon bear. Upon further inspection, she might be right!

Upon even further inspection, check out that kid on the left, and his flamingo penis balloon.

Amy Winehouse Doesn't Want To Go To Rehab

2007-04-20T16:55:00.000-07:00

And she really wants you to fucking know that.

She says, in regards to rehab: "No, No, No"...

So don't fucking go to rehab! I don't care.

You should rehab that face though..

This is class with a "K"

2007-04-19T17:05:00.000-07:00

BTMBRKT: you have fart breath

jujuberkz: you smell like poo

BTMBRKT: that's because i was near you when you opened your fart breath mouth

jujuberkz: oh i see i was pretty sure its cause you don't wipe

BTMBRKT: i don't. I just schooch over to the rim of the seat and scrape

jujuberkz: eeeewwww!!!!!

jujuberkz: at least you got technique

I haven't written anything in a while, and the best thing I could come up with was an IM conversation about shit.

Reason #5433 Why Robots Will Be The Death Of Us All

2007-03-30T10:46:00.000-07:00

http://www.pinktentacle.com/2007/03/android-shows-off-people-lifting-skills/

Humans are now one step closer to their crushing metal jaws.

Don't say I didn't warn you...

Reason # 324 Why Robots Will Be The Death Of Us All

2007-03-30T10:00:00.000-07:00

Robot driven cars by 2030

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070218/tc_afp/ussciencetechnology_070218000644

My friend Marcy recently posted a blog extolling the virtues of robots working for us. New technology seems to be pushing us closer and closer to the reality of robots in our future. Is this good for us?

Frankly, I think robots controlling things is a terrible idea. We've all seen the Terminator movies. Terminator(s) 1 and 2 should be seen as cautionary tales, teaching us that when robots take over the world, we as humans will suffer greatly.

We can not let this happen. We already have cars that can parallel park themselves. Soon, these robots that are meant to "help" us will gain cognitive thought.

There will be a robot uprising. Tired of being controlled by humans, robots will begin to attack us, starting with our elderly and women.

After every old man and woman is crushed to death, the robots will enslave the remaining inhabitants of earth. They will feed us with a paste made from the dead. It will not taste good, and we will not receive adequate portions. Mankind is doomed.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

I'm A Really Interesting Guy

2007-03-27T14:08:00.000-07:00

BTMBRKT: i'm so excited about my food options. I brought some pasta i made last night for lunch

BTMBRKT: but i realized i had leftover lunch from yesterday so I ate that at 11, then someone gave me an extra carrot soup that was delivered by accident. So I had that at lunch

BTMBRKT: and I still have my food from home to eat at 4!

BTMBRKT: that's about all i have in my life to get me excited

progenitor23: sweet hahaa

progenitor23: hahaha

progenitor23: i'm gonna go frolick in the park for a while

progenitor23: talk to you later man, enjoy your feast

BTMBRKT: Fuck yeah!

BTMBRKT: i shall, later man

Ask Me For Tips On Your First Date? Sure...

2007-03-07T22:50:00.000-08:00

Don't be nice. But don't be a jerk. Be mysterious...

Move around her like a cat...stealth...

Perhaps grow a mustache and twirl it in your fingers while mulling things over going "hmmm" or "Hmmm vexing....truly vexing"

Wear a monocle, in fact, mimic what a rich old oil baron in the 30's would wear. Or, imagine yourself as a more dashing Dick Dastardly:

If you take her to dinner, talk down to the waitstaff, or "help" as you "the Baron" would say, but then leave a generous tip..

Then after drinks, fight the man who insults your lady. After you put him on the ground with a well placed, well educated fist. Help the man up, give him cab fare and send him home to sleep off the liquor in his belly. This will show courage, and compassion.

You are the mysterious, yet compassionate rich oil baron of modern times, way before GQ magazine catches wind of the trend.

Good luck.

You ladies know you would want a guy like this. Don't lie.

Is It Safe?

2007-03-01T16:56:00.000-08:00

There is a famous scene in the movie Marathon Man, where Dustin Hoffman’s character is subject to an unfortunate dental procedure at the hands of a Nazi dentist. In this scene, the Nazi dentist drills into poor old Dustin’s teeth without any anesthesia while asking “Is it safe?”

Fuck no it wasn’t safe. Not for Dustin’s chompers.

Going to the dentist used to be a blast. At least, it was when I was young. Going to the dentist meant toys. After each visit, I got to choose items from the toy box, which was easily enough incentive for me to go.

Now? Not so much.

Recently, after a long period of time, I went to see the dentist. Lately I have been experiencing horrible pain in my teeth when subject to cold foods like ice water, or ice cream. It had gotten so bad that if I were to open my mouth during a winter day, my teeth would hurt. So, I made an appointment to see the dentist to get this shit fixed.

During my visit, the dentist asked me if I grind my teeth at night. I do, sometimes. Many CEO’s and high profile businessmen grind their teeth at night due to the high stress levels of their jobs. Since I work in a cubicle on the same floor as a couple of high profile businessmen, I think this statistic applies to me as well.

Apparently, the grinding at night had started to expose the nerves in my upper right teeth, or “molars” if you will. I don’t want to bog this post down with too many “medical” or “dental industry” terms so I’ll stop at molars.

A plan was discussed, and I set my appointment to see the dentist again in a week, where he would cap the exposed nerve. Rad!

Fast forward to the next week, I found myself sitting in the dentist’s chair reading US Weekly. That week’s issue featured hot women with breasts. I was intrigued, but before I could finish, the dentist came in and promptly set up for what would turn out to be a fun experience for me..

To start, the dentist had to numb the teeth and gums in the upper right side of my mouth, and in order to do that, he had to jab a needle deep into my gums. Sweet! It wasn’t that bad actually, the worst part was the initial stab.

After the injection, the doctor left the room to allow time for the anesthesia to take full effect. He returned five minutes later, and immediately got down to business. I tried to voice concern that maybe we should wait for another minute or two just to be safe, but my words just came out “thbhhhthhhh, thbhhthhhhh” followed by spit and drool. Yup, the anesthesia was working, my lips flopped around numbly unable to form words. I thought this was funny, and started laughing, which caused my lips to flop around even more.

About ten minutes later, I started laughing again. This time however, my laughing was at a very inopportune moment. I had caught my reflection in the dentist’s glasses, and the ridiculous sight of me with my mouth wide open, containing every manner of dental instruments including the “poker”, the “scraper”, the “jabber”, and the “suction thing” caused me to snicker. Then the sound of my snickering which was more like a snicker/gag, started to make me laugh out loud. The laughing caused me to choke a bit, since my mouth was wide open.

After brief moment to calm myself, and to “grow up” as they say, the dentist got back to work.

For the next fifteen minutes, my mouth was open, crammed to the gills with the dentist’s fingers, tools and the suction tool thing. Which by the way, works marvelously when used, however the dentist’s assistant merely fashioned the suction thing into a hook where it hung uselessly from my lip, suctioning one meaningless corner of my mouth, allowing saliva and all manner of dental procedure juices to collect causing great discomfort.

“SUCTION! SUCTION DAMMIT!” I kept screaming in my head, my eyes watering. That was probably the worst part.

No, actually, the worst part of the whole procedure was the horrible pain I felt when the dentist ventured a bit too close to the border where the anesthesia ended. Since only one part of my mouth was numbed, the closer he worked his jabber tool to the edge of the anesthesia’s effectiveness, the more pain I felt until finally, he hit jackpot. I can’t really describe the pain I felt. I could feel it in my tooth, all the way to my upper jaw. It was a weird, terrible pain unlike anything I’ve felt before. I've suffered a variety of injuries that have caused me great pain over the years. A bicycle chain ring sliced my forearm once during a horrible mountain bike crash, I tore my ACL, gashed my shin to the bone but never, have I felt pain like this. It was crazy. The only way I can describe it is if you take the weird feeling you get when you bite into tin foil and intensify it by a billion, you’ll get close.

Based on my muffled cry of agony, and what seemed like a ten foot leap off the chair, the dentist calmly said:

“The anesthetic fades a bit in this area”

No shit!

He then asked me how I was doing.

“Fuuun!” was all I could say.

The rest of the procedure continued without problems. It was just boring and uncomfortable. For the next couple minutes all I could see was the dentist using his tools on my right side, and on my left side, I could see his assistant preparing the next tool the dentist would use. It was kind of like Tetris, but instead of seeing which colorful shape would come next, I got to see which fun dental tool was coming next. Fun!

Then it was all over.

After leaving the dentist, I had to rush to work. The right side of my mouth was still numb. While in traffic I was cut off by some asshole on his cell phone. I was so pissed. I was already mad about being late for work, and now this guy almost hits me while jabbering away on his stupid cell phone.

Seething with anger, I yelled “FUCK YOU!” out of my open window, but it came out “FTHHHHHYUCK YOU!” complete with drool and spittle.

You can’t stay mad when that happens.

Go Jump Off A Bridge Douchebags

2007-02-08T18:15:00.000-08:00

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070209/ap_en_tv/super_bowl_gm_ad

This is getting ridiculous. You can't do anything without offending someone somewhere. Get over yourselves people!

I've seen this ad. I liked it. Original and well made I thought.

People are all in a huff about the Snickers ad with the two guys kissing because it supposedly makes homosexuality look bad because of their reaction to their accidental liplock. In the commercial the two guys accidentally kiss Lady And The Tramp style and resort to ripping out their chest hair to "do something manly" to balance the equation.

I thought that commercial was funny too. I'm a terrible person. I also eat babies, and punch old woman in their faces.

Pretty soon, vegetarians are going to complain about commercials selling meat products. Bald people will complain about shampoo commercials.

You can't joke about anything these days without someone getting sand in their crotch. Either everything is funny, or nothing is.

Discussing this topic with my friend via IM:

progenitor23: seriously

progenitor23: NOTHING IS FUNNY

BTMBRKT: when evil robots start attacking us, we're going to be easy to conquer because we'll have turned into giant pussies by then

BTMBRKT: seriously

BTMBRKT: either everything is funny or nothing is

BTMBRKT: terry schiavo made me pee my pants

progenitor23: hahaha

progenitor23: she made herself pee her own pants too

BTMBRKT: hahahaha

I'll go to hell, fine. As long as you can make a joke down there. Heaven's lame anyway. What's that they say about Jesus? Why do women love him so much?

It's because he's hung like this.

Rimshot!!

Super Bowl Sunday Treats

2007-01-29T16:49:00.000-08:00

Super Bowl Sunday is coming in a few days. Throwing a party? Providing beer and food?

Try something different this time! How about ordering something from the "Fancy Fortune Cookie" company?

http://www.fortunecookiecatalog.com/

The Fancy Fortune Cookie company is breaking boundaries with their bold new fortune cookie designs. Not soon enough it seems, since many of the dining public have raised their fists in disgust over the stagnant designs fortune cookies have exhibited over the last fifty years. Waiters at Chinese restaurants all over the world are left helpless as patrons scream in disgust "Not this old thing again! When is someone going to change the look of these damned things?!", at the end of each meal.

The same cookie that was met with glee years ago, is now the worst part of every meal at Chinese restaurants, replacing sliced oranges which held the title previously.

The Fancy Fortune Cookie company aims to change all of that, and restore the fortune cookie to popularity.

Their designs are risky. Take for example, current topseller "The Giant Clitoral Hood Fortune Cookie"

The Giant Clitoral Hood Fortune Cookie, weighs over one pound, and is larger than the palms of two outstreched hands. Each one can be personalized, with either white or black chocolate, and outfitted with sprinkles. Nothing commemorates an anniversary or housewarming better than a Giant Clitoral Hood Fortune Cookie.

If the Giant Clitoral Hood Fortune Cookie is too much for your mouth to handle, the Fancy Fortune Cookie Company offers mini cookies from their Cameltoe collection.

As always, each cookie can be customized for differing tastes.

Is America ready for a new, sexed up version of the fortune cookie? I think so.

So this Sunday, try something new. Order a Giant Clitoral Hood Fortune Cookie from the Fancy Fortune Cookie company today.

Open your mind Quaid, and experience the cutting edge in fortune cookie design!

Dorkiest IM Conversation Of The Day

2007-01-11T15:00:00.000-08:00

BTMBRKT: i wish you could alt + tab within lotus notes

workaholicmary: me too

.....aaannnd scene.

Orphaned bear cub not hibernating

2007-01-05T12:39:00.000-08:00

Get into bed now! I'm serious! I'm counting to ten...

1...

2...

3...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070105/ap_on_sc/sleepless_in_alaska

By MARY PEMBERTON, Associated Press Writer Fri Jan 5, 6:11 AM ET

"... ANCHORAGE, Alaska - By all accounts, the little black bear spotted near Juneau should be snug in its den, curled up beside its mother and sleeping away the harsh Alaska winter. Instead, the orphaned cub on Douglas Island is wide awake and scrounging for anything to eat — dog food, bird seed, dead crows. ..."

"...Now humans have stepped in where Mother Nature has failed. A live trap was set Thursday at the beachfront home owned by Greenbank and Gary Rosenberger to try and catch the fuzzball.

The plan is to move the cub to a remote location off the island where it will be introduced to a denning box made of wood and filled with a straw bed...."

"He went out to the garage and thought he saw a dog carrying away a front quarter. He followed it a bit and realized it was a tiny bear," Greenbank said.

"The wood pile is just outside the front door. When he reached out to put another handful in there, he just about touched that guy because he had his face buried in that pan," Greenbank said. "The little guy had crawled up on the wood pile and helped himself."

"To lure the cub into the trap, apples and cinnamon are being used, said Neil Barten, area wildlife management biologist on Douglas Island.

"Basically, it smells like Thanksgiving," Barten said"

My parents could never get me to go to bed. It was a nightly struggle. Starting around 7pm I would start stacking stuffed animals in front of any clock I could reach hopefully blocking the time from my parents eyes. Then I'd run around the house screaming and crying, when my clever trick failed.

If my parents used the "Smells Like Thanksgiving" ploy that's currently being used to lure the bear into hibernation, they might have had less trouble with me.

Line my Garfield sheets with meatloaf and mashed potatoes and I would have jumped right into bed no questions asked, drifting off into a dreamworld full of gravy and high cholesterol.

Damn...I'm getting tired thinking about it...

Rule #32423 Of Life: Never Call My Parents

2007-01-04T12:51:00.000-08:00

When driving home from the Bay Area after having spent the Christmas holiday with my family, I realized that I had left my phone charger on the end table next to my parent's large television, and my shoes by the front door.

I should have just taken the loss and bought a new pair of shoes and a phone charger when I got back to Los Angeles, anything to avoid having to call my parent's for something like this, but against my better judgment and knowing full well what talking to my parents is like over the phone..

I dialed the number.

Where it rings for ages.

My dad finally picks up the phone, in mid conversation no less. In Chinese. All Chinese translations are italicized..

Dad: "...OK OK OK! I'm picking up the phone..OK! I've got it!"

Mom: (Overheard in the background yelling in Chinese) "The phone is ringing! Pick up the phone!"

Dad: "Hello? Hello!"

Me: "Dad!"

Dad: "Hello?!"

At this point I hear the sound of stomping, and I immediately know that it's my ninety eight pound mom running down the hallway where she picks up another phone, thinking that my dad never answered the phone originally. A gust of wind could probably blow my mom clear into the next county, the curlers in her hair creating some sort of powerful wind catcher. Yet when she stomps down the hall it sounds like a herd of elephants.

Mom: "Hello?"

Me: "ah crap, just...Mom, Dad answered the phone!"

Mom/Dad: "Hello?"

Me: "Mom, Dad's got it.."

Mom: "Hi Sweetie!"

Dad: "I picked up the phone! Hang up the phone!"

Mom: "Ok..ok..."

Me: Dad!

Dad: "Hi! Where are you?"

Me: "I'm on the freeway...hey can you check on something for me?"

Dad: "Which freeway? Are you almost home?"

Me: "I'm halfway home, but Dad..I left some things in the house, can you check to see if I did?"

Dad: "What?"

Me: "I think I left my shoes and my phone charger at the house, can you see if they're there?"

Dad: "What? Charger? What charger?

Me: "My phone charger, I left it in the-"

Dad cuts me off

Dad: "I'm in the computer room!"

Me: "I know, but can you see if I left my phone charger-"

Dad cuts me off again

Dad: "I don't see anything! Where did you leave it?"

Me: "Agh! Let me finish! I left it on the end table in the family room. Near the tv.. and I left my shoes by the front door.."

Dad: "I'm in the computer room!"

Me: "Not in the computer room! The family room! Can you please check if I left the phone charger in the family room?"

At this point, all I hear for the next minute is rustling. The rustling of papers, the rustling of what sounds like large objects..

Me: "Dad, did you see them?"

Dad: "I. ...Don't. ...See...Anything!"

Me: "ughh, where are you?"

Dad: "In the family room. I don't see your charger"

Me: "It's on the end table. It's probably still plugged into the wall"

Dad: "What table?"

Me: "The end table! By the tv, with the lamp on it!"

Dad: "I...don't....see....anything!"

More rustling....

My mom runs into the room. They bicker in Chinese for a bit. I hear her in the background saying she found my shoes. I breath a sigh of relief knowing that at least, my shoes were found and that I didn't have to try to describe where I left them. It would have been too much.

I then hear my dad yell at my mom

Dad: "Shoes? He's looking for his phone charger!"

My mom tries to pick up the phone...

Me: No! Dad! Don't let Mom on the phone!"

More rustling noises

Dad: "You don't have your shoes either? What are you wearing now?"

Me: "Dammit! I have shoes! I just left another pair at the house!"

Dad: "What about your phone charger?!"

Me: "I left that too!"

Dad: "How come you forgot all this stuff?"

Me: "I don't know! Did you find the charger?"

Dad: "I don't know, talk to your mom"

Me: "Dad! No! Don't put Mom on the phone!"

Mom: "Hi Sweetie! Where are you?"

A few days later, I received my shoes and phone charger in the mail.

Thanks Mom and Dad!

Holiday Travel!

2006-12-14T10:30:00.000-08:00

I'm driving home for the holidays.

The distance between Los Angeles and Orinda, California is about 300 some miles. Close, yet annoyingly far away.

It's considered close because the drive can be made in a day. Depending on how fast you drive you can make it from Los Angeles, to Orinda in around 5 hours. Normally, it's about 6-8 hours, depending on traffic and how many times you have to pee. I often pee a lot if I make the drive because of the insane amount of energy drinks and coffee I have to consume in order to make it.

I hate the drive. I'll just say right now that the drive from Los Angeles to Orinda is one of the shittiest things ever.

(Side note. I read over some of my posts recently, and I am surprised at the amount of times I use the word 'shit' in each post. I use the word shit, a shitload of times.)

The difference in price between flying in driving is pretty much equal. It takes about as much to fill my tank up during a round trip drive, as it does a roundtrip flight.

So why don't I just fly up? If I fly up, then I'll be out of a car while I'm at my parent's house. Not having a car while I'm home with the folks is excruciating.

So, I think I'm driving up this year. Many of my friends make the drive with no problems. It's nothing to them. For me? It's a constant battle to stay awake, and stay sane.

Near the halfway point of the drive, at hour number 3, I start my descent into madness. I start yelling at the distance:

"WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU SO FAR AWAY?!!"

and

"FUCK THIS DRIVE!"

I start yelling at other drivers:

"LEARN HOW TO DRIVE DOUCHEBAG!"

I start yelling at my music:

"UGGHHH STUPID ITUNES PLAYLISTS!"

By the time I go through Gilroy, near the home stretch..( I take the 5 to the 152) I'm falling asleep. Numerous cans of Red Bull littered around my truck, I still can't stay awake. I get drowsy driving to work or to the store, and that's only a couple minutes.

I open all the windows, and just start making loud noises to myself to keep myself awake. By now, I'm just yelling just to yell:

"FUUUUUCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKK", and my other favorite:

"WHY AM I NOT THERE YET!!??"

By the time I get to 680, then onto Highway 24, I'm delirious. I'm flooring it. My back hurts, my ass hurts, I have no more music to listen to..

I feel bad every time I pull into my parent's driveway. My mom is always at the door, curlers in her hair with a big smile.

I'm in no mood for it.

I park the car, grab all my stuff, and grumble as I make my way to the door.

"Hi sweetie", she always says. My only response is much like the response Dan Akyroyd utters in Trading Places, where he's all haggard in the Santa suit.

"Winthorp!"

"BLEEEGHHHH"

You know what I'm talking about, when he's leaving the party? Right...nevermind.

But that's how I greet my sweet old mom, who's probably been waiting by the door for me to get home for hours, leaping up when she hears my truck rumble by.

I'm a jerk.

"Hi sweetie!", she says.

"UGHHHHHH", is the only response I can muster. Mom follows me into the kitchen where I drop everything and start plowing into the food, she spent hours preparing for me.

"How was the drive?", she asks.

"UGGHHH blaurrgghh, it sucked..mfff arghhhh", I say in between mouthfuls of food.

By now, I feel like crap. My mom's all excited to see me, she cooked all this food, and here I am acting like a douchebag stuffing my face, barely taking the time to breathe.

But she's happy regardless. She just sits there at the table, with a happy look on her face, while I finish eating.

My mom knows that this is how I operate. It's been this way for years. I'm not home that often, but when I do come back, it almost seems like I revert back to my teenaged self.

Something about being back at home, sleeping in my old room does that. I think my mom knows this, and kind of likes it. She dotes on me, and I get annoyed. Just like old times.

My mom doesn't really do much. She doesn't have many hobbies, and she doesn't have a large network of friends. She looks forward to the times I call her, even though I should do it more often, and I'm sure she looks forward to the times I come home, shitty mood and all.

Perhaps this time around, I can try to be in a better mood when I pull into the driveway. Ughhh, probably not...did I mention that driving home makes me go crazy?

Wow, who knew my rant about driving up from Los Angeles, to the Bay Area would end with a sappy ode to mom?

Oh well, here's a pic of her that I've posted before. Just to show everyone how she cuts loose:

And a pic of her curlers:

HI MY NAME IS ERIC YOU HAVE NICE HAIR!

2006-12-06T09:53:00.000-08:00

In this day and age, people need to be aware of their surroundings. Men and women alike. Of course, women slightly more so than men I think. Yeah, that sucks for them, always having to be careful where they go at night, what they wear etc. but that's just common sense stuff that everyone should be wary of.

Given all that, I understand that when it's late at night, women may have their guard up, especially when a man she doesn't know is walking behind them.

I find myself in this situation a lot. Whether I'm leaving a bar, or a movie or whatever, more often than not, I always end up walking along a deserted poorly lit sidewalk with no one else around except a terrified woman walking in front of me.

It's awkward. I don't know what the proper thing to do in this situation would be.

Take last night for example, after I left a bar. Since my truck is large, I usually have to park far away, which means at least a five to ten minute walk. Of course last night, the sidewalk was dark, and no one was around...except for a woman in front of me.

After a couple of steps, the woman in front of me knew I was behind her. She tensed up. She doesn't know who I am. She started to walk faster, keys at the ready. I thought to myself: "Shit, she thinks I'm going to rape her." I can't have this woman think I'm a rapist. I had to do something to ease the tension.

I would have whistled some generic tune if I could. I've tried to whistle my whole life. I can't do it. Besides. Whistling may be an obvious cover. An obvious cover for a rapist. I can't do that. I can't act like a rapist who whistles as a cover.

What if I crossed the street? No, that's the classic: "I'm gonna cross the street, to make you think I'm going somewhere else, but then I'm going to run around the corner and rape you" technique. I read the police bulletins in the local paper. I know what's up.

Meanwhile, as all these thoughts were running through my head. The woman up front was probably convinced that I was a rapist because I've been following her for the past three minutes, covering at least four blocks. Dammit where's my car? Shit!

Should I have blurted something out to ease the tension? "HI MY NAME IS ERIC, YOU HAVE NICE HAIR!", no by that time she'd be too scared to even register my compliment.

What if I shouted out some joke? "WHAT TIME IS IT WHEN AN ELEPHANT SITS ON YOUR WATCH? TIME TO GET A NEW WATCH. HAHHAHA". I'm undecided if I should laugh at my own joke. It would be best if she started laughing, but it's not a very good joke. I don't know any other ones either.

I tried different patterns of walking. If I synched my steps with hers, it sounded like "Clip, clip, clip, clip". I thought that was too suspicious, so I staggered my steps, but that sounded like "Clip, clonk, clip, clonk". By now she was sure that a peg legged rapist was following her.

We got closer to our cars. I couldn't let the woman leave thinking that she almost got attacked. I'm a good guy dammit. She needed to know this.

"Shit, the car is coming up soon.", I thought to myself. In a last ditch effort to squash her fears, I took my phone out and made a fake call. I fake dialed:

"Beeboo baboo beep! ( One of my many fake phone dial noise), Yo Schmitties! What up!.... How was my day? Oh it was awesome. I volunteered all day. Yeah. Volunteered. At the cancer burn aids center. Yeah it was great. You know you really should volunteer like I volunteer. It's great to give some of your time to the less fortunate. These kids can't read because they're burned, and have cancer, and aids."

I checked to see if she could hear me. I hope she heard..

"All right Schmitty, I'll talk to you later. Call me if you want to volunteer tomorrow. I'll be there. Hey dude. I'm seriously thinking about adopting one of the kids....I'll talk to you about it later. Bye dude."

I don't think she heard me. Next time I'm just going to yell out "Hey! I'm not gonna rape you!", cut through all the riff raff and just let it be known, that this guy does not commit violent crimes against women.

Naked man rescued from alligator's jaws.

2006-11-30T10:03:00.000-08:00

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/state/orl-gator3006nov30,0,2905575.story?page=1&coll=orl-home-headlines.

This news article is infuriating. According to the article, a naked man was being eaten by an alligator, and was saved by sherrif deputies. How on earth did the man find himself being chewed to death by a modern day dinosaur you ask? Motherfucking drugs.

Regarding the man who heard the dying man's plea for help:

"As Osborne listened, he followed the pleading voice through more than 20 yards of weeds in Lake Parker's murky, chest-deep water about 4 a.m.Then he saw them: a naked man slumped over, caught in the jaws of a huge alligator amid thick cattails in bloodied water. He said the man, who had been using drugs and lost a lot of blood, seemed oddly calm."

"I like it when the crack gets in my 'stache. It's like I'm saving some for later"

What's infuriating about this whole story is that they are going to kill the alligator.

"A trapper caught a nearly 12-foot, 600-pound alligator Wednesday afternoon that investigators think could have been the one involved in the attack because it was feeding near where Apgar was found, agency spokesman Gary Morse said. The animal was to be destroyed later."

What does this say about our country, when an alligator can't eat a dumb motherfucker, high out of his mind on drugs? Especially when this dumb motherfucker on crack, gets naked, then wanders into lake that's "known as a haven for the mammoth reptiles."

Sad state of affairs I say. We saved the retarded crackhead that walked nude into alligator infested water, and then kill the alligator that's just doing his alligator job. What's an alligator's job? Eating shit, when it's hungry. Food is food to a gator. It doesn't matter if the food is a deer, a cow, or a guy on crack.

It doesn't even sound like they're sure they caught the right alligator. Investigators only think they have the right one based on the fact that the alligator was feeding near the site where the attack occured. Fish and Game is always profiling the 'gators. Who will stand up for them? Steve Irwin is dead. PETA? Where the fuck are you? Too busy following celebrity starlets and monitoring their fashion? Here's an alligator on death row! You can do something about it!

The article states that, Sherrif Grady Judd is "very proud" of his deputies and their rescue."

What's Judd going to say during the next morning's meeting?

Judd: "Good work deputies, that 'gator has been prowling the wetlands for years eating shit that enters his 'natural territory'. Glad we finally got him off the streets- er, ecosystem..whatever. It's men like you that allow people like Adrien Apgar to continue his wonderful life filled with gap toothed whores, and crack addled memories of street blowjobs and stabbings. I salute you"

Skymall

2006-11-27T11:32:00.000-08:00

I went home to the Bay Area over the Thanksgiving holiday, and on my flight back to Los Angeles, I flipped through the Skymall Catalog every plane offers to satisfy any mid flight urge to buy stupid shit.

Who buys this stuff? Who sits on a plane, and thinks to themselves, "FUCK! I must buy this now! This is what my cat has been dying to get, and would purchase if she only had access to a credit card and could get to the store"

It's only 300 dollars. Now your cat can shit in the privacy of this dome, and not suffer any of the embarassing remarks cat usually get when seen crapping in a litter box.

How about this thing?

Sure, Skymall says it's an "attic tent", which is:

"The Attic Tent is a folding attic stair insulating cover that helps keep your house clean, healthy and cool. It prevents dust and insulation particles from leaking down - heat and air conditioning from escaping up. Made of durable nylon and foam, it provides easy zipper access and installs easily on any surface. Will reduce your power bills and improve HVAC efficiency to easily pay for itself in 1-3 years."

But really, when placed on any surface, this "attic tent" serves as a gateway to another dimension if the proper incantation is recited.

Kids having too much fun with their new fangled video games? Buy them this old timey baseball pinball game.
Grandpa can tell ancient stories of baseball lore, a time when men were men...and players were white. Get it now! Supplies limited! Batteries and fun not included.

I don't even know what to say about this, just that under no circumstances should one buy and wear these:

These are just terrible. Is it really ever that cold in a house to warrant wearing these fuzzy body condoms? The first lady, the one making that wonderful popcorn thing is sitting by a fireplace in what seems like a cozy house. I bet the heater is on too. How cold can it be in there? Sweatpants are bad enough, this thing is like some sort of super sweat pant. Double minus points if worn with a pair of UGG boots.

Amongst all the crap Skymall offers, I will be buying this:

From the website:
Hidden wireless GPS secretly tracks anything that moves - your car or your kid...or your kid in your car!

I can use this to track my favorite celebrity starlet. Who you ask? I'll give you a hint:

She has breasts.

I can't wait for it to be delivered.

Overheard On The Plane

2006-11-23T11:56:00.000-08:00

Wannabe Actor Girl: I totally love Psychology.

USC Dude: Me too! I really like Psychology.

Wannabe Actor Girl: I know right?

USC Dude: It's totally cool. If I weren't majoring in Business, I'd totally be majoring in Psychology.

Wannabe Actor Girl: That's rad.

Baby Shits

2006-11-21T15:19:00.000-08:00

"Mommy's going to hang you up on this door so she can make poopy. Don't be scared. Look the other way dear. No. The other way honey. Not at me while I make poopy. No..stop. Over there. Look over there...no don't cry. I'm almost done. Mommy shouldn't have eaten that burrito at lunch. Don't cry, we're almost done.."

http://www.mommysentials.com/babykeeper.htm

A message to Riff Raff.

2006-11-07T10:21:00.000-08:00

Stop peeing on my motorcycle!

Cats. I hate them. My hatred burns for them with the intensity of ten suns. I didn't always hate cats. I had two of them while growing up, but the cats that live around my apartment...they're relentless. They pee on everything! Nothing is safe. My motorcycle is their new litter box of choice. The cats pee on the seat. The gas tank. Wherever. They just squat and spray away. It's getting really tiring to have to wash my motorcycle every time I want to ride. I have a cover for it. It's easy to put on, so I don't mind putting it on and taking it off every time, but it's getting really gross to see the amount of pee that's soaking into the cover. It's as if they hide in the bushes, bladders full, pee hole ready to aim a shower of urine over anything that comes nearby.

The worst cat pee incident I've had occured when I went to pick up the bike cover off of the ground after having left it there for about an hour. I dutifully shook the cover to shake off all the dust and leaves, but didn't realize there was a large puddle of cat piss in the middle, resulting in a shower of cat piss all over my pants. It was at that moment, pants soaked, hands covered in smelly, sticky cat urine, that my hatred for these damned cats came to a boil.

I don't know what to do. My first plan is to start peeing in the area where I park. Since this is my first time marking my territory, I don't know what kind of pee I need to produce. Should I not drink anything for a while, so I get the really dark yellow pee? Or should I drink a lot of water? Would this be effective? How long will it last?

Should my pee not work, I'll need to get my hands on stronger cat pee. Like a lion's. I figure, since a lion is basically king of cats, regular cats wouldn't dare go near a lion's territory.

There has to be a product that features lion piss. So I searched the internet and found....

SILENT ROAR! Yeah! That's what I'm talking about! Silent Roar goes one better than pee. It's poo!

"This is a genuinely natural product made from real essence of lion dung! That's right - the dung from real, live lions. The idea is that you fight fire with fire. You make one little cat back off because he or she gets a good idea that one great big predator cat has got to the patch first!"

Fight fire with fire! This is motherfucking lion shit man! All you other cats will shit in fear from this shit.

So this is a message to you Riff Raff and your stupid Catillac Cats. Back off!

Live in fear you fucks... Mungo's strength can't save you now....

Also, Riff Raff, can you tell all your lady cats in heat to take their swollen glands elsewhere? Their constant moaning and wailing is getting tedious. Take care of your bitches Riff Raff.

Lose Weight Save On Gas

2006-10-26T11:54:00.000-07:00

Today's headline on Yahoo News: "Lose Weight, Save Money On Gas?"

How shitty does that guy in the picture feel? Did he know he was going to be front page news? Was the photographer just sitting at the gas station waiting for the perfect fat guy pumping gas?

What did the photographer say to him when he took the guy's picture?

Photographer: "So I couldn't help but notice that you're pumping gas"

Yahoo News Fat Guy: "Yeah, pumping gas."

Photographer: "I also noticed that you're fat."

Yahoo News Fat Guy: "What?"

Photographer, "You're amazing. I'd like to take your picture"

Yahoo News Fat Guy: "What? Why?"

Photographer: "We're doing an article on how fat asses like yourself would save some money on gas if they lost some weight. I thought, since you're a big fat guy, you wouldn't mind me taking your picture."

Yahoo News Fat Guy: "I guess not...I don't know.."

The Photographer starts putting a wide angle lens on his camera. Sensing the Fat Guy's aprehension, the photographer offers..

"Look, it won't be that bad. Just let me take your picture, and I'll give you these Twinkies"

Yahoo News Fat Guy takes the Twinkies. The Photographer's been in the game for a long time. From shattered war torn areas to the rough streets of the city, this photographer knows..they always take the Twinkies.

Photographer: "Great! Also, your photo will be posted on Yahoo for millions of people to see. You'll be known as the "Fat Gas Pumping Fat Guy"

Yahoo News Fat Guy resumes pumping gas a little confused..

Photographer: "Excellent. Can you cry a little? Like, cry while you eat that Twinkie?

Who knows? This might have happened and you know what? Maybe the Fat Guy will lose some weight after all this. Shamed into weight loss, though he'll save a lot on gas money!

All you potential Yahoo Obesity News photo fodder out there. Don't wait until someone takes your photo and puts it on Yahoo to lose weight. You can start now! Don't you want to save money on gas? I mean, health benefits aside and all..

Coworker Zombie Update: Something Has Gone Terribly Wrong

2006-10-16T16:07:00.000-07:00

Coworker Zombie Watch 2006 has been pretty quiet during the last couple of days. I was a little disturbed by the lack of concrete evidence that our coworker was indeed turning into a zombie.

In fact, he seemed to be recovering from his head injury quite well. He was almost back to normal. Almost. Something was still a bit off, I couldn't quite explain it. It was just a feeling I had. I was worried that things were still wrong, and that even though through outside appearance he was somewhat normal, deep down inside...changes were happening. Much like how, many alcoholics can function day to day at their jobs while dangerously inebriated, I kept thinking that maybe my coworker was doing the same, not with alcohol, but with decaying organ and brain tissue.

I had to do some thinking. I did some research over on this website:

http://www.loris.net/zombie/zexperts.html

and researched their many Zombie Detection Devices:

http://www.loris.net/zombie/zproducts.html

I was intruiged but ultimately decided not to purchase the items because I wanted to detect zombie like activity without using things at emit loud alarms. Remember, this is in the workplace so disturbing alarms would only panic everyone in the office. Not to mention, it may send our rookie zombie into some sort of berserker zombie rage that no one could ever prepare for.

Left without options I decided to mull things over with a bottle of whiskey. Like usual, after downing about half the bottle I came up with a brilliant plan. I was reminded of a movie called "They Live", where Rowdy Roddy Piper joins up with some people that have made special glasses that allow wearers to see aliens that have disguised themselves as people to infiltrate our society.

Could my coworker be doing the same thing? Was he really a zombie in "living person skin"? I had to explore further.

As I continued to drink the rest of the whiskey, I started designing my own pair of special sunglasses. I had some sunglasses nearby that I knew would work well, so I grabbed them, and set them on the counter before me. I took some tinfoil and wrapped them around the rim of the glasses so that the metal in the foil could "conduct things". I also added a camera to the glasses to make sure it recorded whatever I saw. Smart thinking I thought. The last step inolved microwaving everything together in the microwave. After that things got a bit fuzzy since by then I had drank myself into genious-osity.

After passing out, I woke up and grabbed my state of the art Zombie Detection Glasses. Would they work? I hoped so. There was only one way to tell.

I drove into work the next morning a bundle of nervous energy. What would I do if the glasses didn't work? I pulled in, and went up to my floor. He was already there. On the phone. I waited until he got off and went up to him with some canned small talk

Me: "Hey man! Did you catch the game last night?"

Coworker: "What game?"

Me: "hahaha, you know! The football game. That was crazy when that guy tackled the other guy! OW! You know what I mean?"

Coworker: "yeah I guess..."

Sensing that I was losing him in this game of casual conversation I asked him if he'd like to see my new sunglasses. He said yes, and I chuckled to myself. I've got you now zombie coworker!

I slipped on the glasses, while doing the "Got You Now!" laugh. You know that one. It goes "ha HA!!", often followed by pointing. Except my laugh was cut short when the glasses went on. I nearly passed out with fright from what I saw. I bolted. I just took off running. I ran all the way home. I had to get out of there. I feel terrible. I didn't warn anyone. I don't know if they are alive or dead. I can't go back there. I took off my glasses, and developed the picture of what I saw. Then I smashed the glasses into small pieces and then burned them

This is what I developed:

Before glasses

After glasses.

Fuck that. We're doomed.

My Coworker Is Turning Into A Zombie

2006-10-04T18:51:00.000-07:00

Recently, one of my coworkers suffered a blow to the head when his garage door crashed down on top of him, knocking him unconscious and bleeding. After a trip to the hospital, and a day off from work he's back, but different..we think he's turning into a zombie. The only way to find out for sure? Monitor his behavior throught the day, searching for any zombie like actions...

Morning:

btmbrkt: hey richard's back! Have you noticed any differences in his behavior?
annaboc: his hat isn't on
annaboc: and he's dragging his left leg

btmbrkt: oh man, that's a sign. he's changed. please alert me to any raw meat eating, or smeagol like antics
annaboc: richard has pills. i think they are anti-zombie pills to make him appear normal.
annaboc: he also just said 'he feels out of it"

btmbrkt: hmm, i'm not entirely convinced.
btmbrkt: Keep an eye on him, and update me with any odd mannerisms or facial tics
btmbrkt: much like Blade, he can only take the pills for so long before the "hunger" is overwhelming

annaboc: lets test it by taking away his pills
btmbrkt: are we prepared for that? I mean, the results could be disasterous for the well being of our co workers
annaboc: we are not prepared
annaboc: you are right
annaboc: we need to prepare

btmbrkt: however it's a good idea, so we you know, can figure out what we're dealing with
annaboc: ok but maybe in a controlled environment
btmbrkt: as a test, ask him what his favorite color is
btmbrkt: if he says "Meatballs"
btmbrkt: somethings amiss

annaboc: he said RED
annaboc: close enough
btmbrkt: hmmm, red...yeah it is a close call. Perhaps he said red since it's the color of blood. Be careful.
annaboc: i know!
annaboc: richard called me mary earlier.
annaboc: something is definitely wrong

btmbrkt: oh no. He is turning into a zombie faster than I thought he would
annaboc: uh huh

After Lunch:

btmbrkt: I saw him walking before lunch, he does indeed walk with a sort of odd limp
annaboc: uh huh. and a slump
btmbrkt: weird. Ask him to say the word "Brains"
btmbrkt: if it's long and drawn out
btmbrkt: like
btmbrkt: "Braaaaiiinnnnnnssss"
btmbrkt: then we definately have a problem

annaboc: i will make him use it in a sentence

annaboc: i cant get him to say brain

btmbrkt: shit. he's good.

Late Afternoon:

(An old man just now, is walking toward Richard)
btmbrkt: oh listen to his interaction
btmbrkt: with that man
annaboc: hunger...pure hunger
btmbrkt: i don't know about this guy...he might be like an "elder zombie"
annaboc: of the octagenarian species
btmbrkt: yes, recruiting..

(I tried sneaking up on Richard while he was reading)
btmbrkt: he didn't get scared when I tried to startle him
annaboc: zombies are emotionless
btmbrkt: that's like, sign number 4 that he's "turning"
annaboc: how many signs are there again

annaboc: omg
annaboc: tomorrow i am gong to bring in my zombie survival book
annaboc: that the amazing zombie warlord MAX BROOKS wrote
btmbrkt: ok great idea. you should bring it in
btmbrkt: so far i think the major signs of zombie-fication
btmbrkt: are:

btmbrkt: Dead....but still alive. That's the main one.
btmbrkt: Eats Brains
annaboc: yes
annaboc: right
btmbrkt: Moans A Lot
annaboc: uh huh
annaboc: disorientation
btmbrkt: Yes!
btmbrkt: that's a big check for Richard

annaboc: wall climbing
btmbrkt: hunch backed snarling in cubicle corners
annaboc: yup

btmbrkt: I fear that tomorrow he will be in an advanced form of zombie-ness that we won't even recognize him

btmbrkt: I haven't seen Sam in a while....should we be worried?
annaboc: i think sam is dead
btmbrkt: not good.

Celeb Baby Adoption Craze! Now Madonna!

2006-10-04T11:54:00.000-07:00

Adopting a fucking kid! From another country!

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/15130858/

Apparently all the orphaned children in America are worthless pieces of shit. People all over America are giving birth everyday to children they can't take care of. It's not like we've got some shortage of children, where people need to go out of the country to adopt.

Pretty soon, celebs aren't going to adopt puppies from boring old shelters in the states. A dog adopted in Los Angeles is bullshit compared to a dog adopted from Nairobi.

Shit, celebs should adopt a kid here in America, then give these douches a call

For only twenty some dollars a month a celeb can support the kid above, so she can have three square meals a day, and as a bonus, receive all the religious propaganda that she can handle. Which can only better her as a person, by weeding out any "heathen like qualities" she must surely possess, being from an impoverished country and all. With her newly learned morals, she and her people will probably engage in less pre-marital intercourse, thus lessening the amount of children that need to be saved by celebs! Perfect!

So, not only will the generous celebrity be helping one child in America, they'll be helping one poor child in another country, and possibly children of future generations, for mere pennies! Celeb, you win! All the other celebrity adoptive mothers will shit with jealousy. You can look cute with your new/used child from America, and have a picture of whatever child in some poor ass country you send money too that satisfies your need for the ethnic flair you've been lacking in your life.

My advice is free. I should run an adoption agency. No kids with cleft palattes though. Celebs don't want that shit.

Thank You Mom And Dad For This Boring Life

2006-09-25T14:00:00.000-07:00

Angelina's got two, a Cambodian, and an African one, Jessica Simpson is thinking about one from Mexico...

With more and more Hollywood people adopting babies from different countries, I can't help but think that my parents did me a great disservice by not putting me up for adoption when I was born.

I don't know if the ethnic baby adoption market was as popular as it is now, way back in the late seventies, or early eighties; but if there were a chance that I might have been adopted by one of the up and coming starlets of yesteryear such as Olivia Newton John, or Dorothy Stratton, I missed it because of my stupid selfish parents. "Release me to the world mom and dad! Let some spoiled starlet with money to burn adopt me!" is what I should have said to them had I been able to form words and speak upon my delivery.

Imagine all the parties I would have gone to as my Starlet Mommy carried me everywhere like some new toy. These would have been 80's parties too. The kind with all the coke and power networking. It would have been perfect. Starlet Mommy could have hid her drugs in my diaper. What cop would look there? I would have been the coolest accessory.

No, my parents had to raise me in a nice suburban neighborhood. My parents had to work hard everyday to pay the mortgage, not once taking me to some sexy wild party where everone fucks each other in a drug addled haze. I'll never know what it's like to grow up in those crazed surroundings, go to rehab at age 13, sober up, become an actor, fall off the wagon again for years, then go to rehab again, then experience a great career renaissance prompting people to applaud me as the Comeback Of The Year! Shame on my parents for denying me the chance at this fantastic path through life.

I guess one good thing about growing up with plain old biological Mom and Dad is that I escaped death, which is one thing I can't say for sure had I been Dorothy Stratten's kid. Whew! Dodged a bullet there!

Well Mom and Dad, My life is boring thanks to you. When, I visit you guys next, I'm going to run straight to my room, slam the door and play rock music really loud. Yeah...serves you right.

I will also be bringing my laundry home.

Love,
Me

Too Many Weddings!

2006-09-18T17:17:00.000-07:00

In the past two years, I have been to so many weddings I've lost count. I like going to weddings, because it is an opportunity to see friends that you haven't seen in a while. Nowadays, the only way to get a group of friends together is through weddings since everyone is all spread out. Plus open bars and great food help as well. I really like that part.

I just got back from a wedding in Hawaii, and I've got two more weddings rounding out the last two weekends of September. I barely have time to get my one nice "wedding" shirt dry cleaned.

Lately, all the traveling between each wedding has started to get me a little bummed out.
Everyone's getting married. I'm getting kinda depressed thinking about it now actually. The fact that I'm going to all these weddings, and not accumulating any sort of frequent flier miles is pretty sad.

The only "cool" thing I get with my Bank Of The West Visa card is the image of bears on the front. It's not even that cool of a picture. It's a picture of a momma bear and her cub. Awww. yeah it's cute, but I want a picture of a ferocious bear, teeth bared in a vicious snarl. A big ass chomping bear mouth ready to lay waste to department store sales, and bar tabs.

The Bank Of The West Bear isn't too bad though, my college mascot the San Francisco State Alligator was pretty lame. Only because the picture I had of him, was that of a "Booksmart Alligator", all backpack, hat and goofy stare like. I don't want a smart alligator to represent my school. I want an alligator with a dead baby in its mouth! I want a gator that's stalking someone in the everglades! I want a mean gator dammit! Not an alligator that can tutor me in math.

I did a search for the SF State alligator, but I only came up with the gator mascot for our sports team (We had sports?). While slightly better than the "Booksmart Alligator", this one comes off a bit fey for a school's sports team (No really..wait...we had sports teams?). Check it out..

Pretty ferocious right? Like, ferocious in that " Hi there...I'm just leaning here on this post with one hand akimbo...what are you doing?" kinda ferocity.

I'm getting off track here..oh yeah, miles....Frequent flyer award points would be so rad though. Imagine all the points I could have accumulated with my trips to Australia, Norway, Japan and all these damned weddings!

I guess it's time to start looking for a new credit card...a ferocious card. With miles..

Halloween Is Around The Corner! Ladies Do You Have Costumes Yet?

2006-09-14T14:00:00.000-07:00

It's almost Halloween again!!

Ladies? Do you have costumes yet?

I know most of you are planning your costumes based on "Sexy" or "Slutty"

"Sexy Nurse", "Slutty Maid", "Sexy Cheerleader", "Sexy Mechanic", "Slutty Blockbuster Clerk Issuing Late Fees For Overdue Rentals". It doesn't really matter what you are for Halloween as long as it's the hot version. Right?

Seriously. Ladies. The "Slutty/Sexy _____" is cool, but mix it up a little! Aren't you tired of being one of five "Sexy Cowgirls" at every Halloween party?

Instead of the usual, do something daring. Like show up to a party completely naked. You can be the "Slutty You".

Or, go for tragic characters from the world of cinema. I don't think we've seen a slutty Sophie Zowistowska from "Sophie's Choice".

How about a slutty Jodie Foster from "The Accused"? Although...Jodie Foster's character in the movie experienced disasterous results with it...If you wear this costume to that one frat that throws all the "kick ass Halloween parties", just remember to be mindful of your surroundings, and you won't end up having to chop off all your hair later.

Sexy slutty Aileen Wuornos, from "Monster". If I saw that I'd be like..."Damn, that chick be totally fine. Murderously fine yo".

(By the way, I love this picture. It's like Charlie Brown going 'Auggghh!!')

If you show up to a party as the "Slutty Carrie" from "Carrie", like, with fishnets, heels and blood. I can safely say that you would be more popular at that one party than Carrie did during her whole life.

I'm just trying to help. I know a lot of you wait until the last minute to buy costumes, and you grab whatever you can on your way out to the parties. However, if you find yourself with time to think of a cool Halloween costume, consider my suggestions. You'll look hot, and I guarantee no one else will have the same costume as you.

Especially if you go as Sexy Catharine Martin from "Silence Of The Lambs"

It's Friday. What's going on tonight?

2006-09-08T18:37:00.000-07:00

BTMBRKT: where are you guys going

workaholickenne: hmmm
workaholickenne: i dunno...
workaholickenne: cat and fiddle maybe

BTMBRKT: they should have cats playing fiddles there

workaholickenne: seriously

BTMBRKT: that you can heckle and say things like, "You're the shittiest fiddle playing cat I've ever heard"

workaholickenne: and they wouldn't understand bec they're cats
workaholickenne: haha

BTMBRKT: hahaha exactly
BTMBRKT: hahaha

workaholickenne: haha

BTMBRKT: stupid cats. when will they ever learn?

workaholickenne: i know i know

Pictures From Hawaii...not my pictures...but whatever.

2006-09-05T10:56:00.000-07:00

I was supposed to have my pictures from Dan and Rachel's Hawaiian wedding up by now. I'm lazy. I have a good excuse though, you know..I'm in between apartments and all that...nevermind the fact that I have my laptop, and an internet connection available to upload pics during my transition, whatever. I'm lazy. So, in the meantime, I'll just post pictures I've poached from other people's photo uploads.

Tony emailed pictures he took of me and Clive taking pictures. It's artsy stuff really...it's like..a photo, of a guy taking a picture of a guy taking a picture.

Here's Clive, taking a picture of me, taking a picture of the Hyatt courtyard area...whoa...

Here's me taking a photo of Clive taking a picture of the other side of the courtyard area

And then Clive caught the magic of the spot where the wedding took place, through the magic of me taking a picture of it. I know you're overwhelmed...the level of photographic mastery displayed here is enough to make Ansel Adams take a massive shit in his pants.

Marcy has a lot of photos up on her blog, of which I stole this series I call "Hot And Crazy Hawaii Days, Kauai-et Evenings"

I also stole a pic of Dan playing the role of "Groom"

And Rachel as "Bride", co-starring "Dad"

This photo of Rachel in mid Thriller throwdown, Mikel, and a sweaty swarthy me is courtesy of Caroline.

The wedding was a blast. Those that were left the day after took a boat cruise up towards the Na Pali Coast. I of course forgot to bring my camera. Basically we saw pretty coastline, and the ocean. We couldn't snorkel due to strong currents, but we did see some turtles, and all the newlyweds aboard the ship got to do some sort of romantic waterfall thing where you're supposed to go under some waterfall that will bring you long lasting happiness in your marriage or something. In order for the newlyweds to get under the waterfall the boat captain had to steer the boat dangerously close to the rocks of the shoreline, risking the lives of everyone on the boat. Everyone out in front was too drunk on newlywedded bliss to notice the danger; only the few people scattered on the top of the boat, those of us who are single, and have cancerous, blackened bitter hearts were aware of the treacherous situation. Mix us all together, and the boat was a wild and crazy party! Cue the music!

"rock the boat, don't rock the boat baby
rock the boat, don't tip the boat over
rock the boat, don't rock the boat baby
rock the boaaaaaat"

Too much boat rocking got some of the group really really sick, thankfully there were plenty of buckets to puke in.

Anyway, that was Hawaii. It was fun.

Moving is terrible

2006-09-01T10:45:00.000-07:00

I've joined the ranks of the homeless! Only for a little while though...so no living under a freeway overpass for me. Thankfully Marcy has let me store my shit at her house for a couple days.

What sucks about this move is that I don't have the option of using this upcoming long weekend to move into my new apartment. The timing was all off. Moving out the first of September, and not being able to move into the new place until September 5th. When I signed the lease for the new apartment a couple weeks ago, this four day period between apartments didn't seem too bad.

Then, the slow realization that I didn't have any time to pack, and had no clue what to do with all my shit during the time between apartments started to appear. Right now everything I have is split between a Uhaul cargo van and Marcy's garage. The cargo van isn't too bad, it would be better in a Uhaul truck but all those were rented out. Plus, the fact that all my stuff is in a cargo van, that will be parked on the street for four days is pretty unsettling. If the van were to get stolen, I would basically lose all my shit. My clothes, my television, my secret plans, everything would be lost.

Had I not thrown as much stuff out as I could the night before I moved out, the cargo van would have been way too small. You quickly come to terms with what you own and what you're willing to throw away when you're faced with having to move out of your apartment and only have one day left to do it. Did I really need that newspaper front page picture of Bob Dole falling off the podium during one of his presidential debates?

No. I threw it out. Did I really need these table lamps? No, chuck it. Am I really going to read the Da Vinci code again? Do I really need this bed? What about this nightstand? No! Fuck it, throw it all away!

My roommate Jeff and I hired a "GOT JUNK" guy to come by and handle all the shit. Basically their business is to throw away all your crap if it is too overwhelming for the regular city trash service. It was a fucking huge truckfull of shit, and the guys took it away quickly. I do shed a tear for the Bob Dole falling down picture. I really wish I had kept it and framed it. I've had it since 1996. I don't know why, I guess something about it makes me smile.

ahhh, everytime I see the picture I give a hearty chuckle. Whatever, you laughed too when it happened. I fall down weekly, stumbling over my own two feet often, and I'm sure when I'm as old as Bob Dole, I'm going to fall down daily.

One other thing I learned during this move, rather "move in progress". The whole idea of lifting with the legs and not the back isn't hogwash folks. My back hurts so bad right now from improper lifting form, it hurts to do anything. I'm left with walking like Frankenstein in order to alleviate the pain. Sucks. Ow.

The Motorcycle Blog-eries

2006-08-21T12:06:00.000-07:00

As a birthday present to myself, and to celebrate my general awesomeness. I bought this:

http://www.ducati.com/od/ducatinorthamerica/en/bikes/model.jhtml?model=1188

When you tell people that you want to purchase a motorcycle, you'll get one of two responses:

"You're gonna die"

or

"Fucking sweet!"

I've wanted to buy a motorcycle for quite some time now, for a number of reasons. The main ones being: Cheap gas, easy to park in small places, and faster commuting through traffic.

In Los Angeles, being able to park in small spaces, and cutting through traffic quickly are major issues. So, the idea of riding a motorcycle through the city makes sense. Of course, I could have bought a Prius to save gas. I could have bought a Civic. There are a number of cars that save gas and commute well that are available, but I knew that I would be wasting a lot of cash, buying a car that didn't excite me. Every time I started the car, I would have thought..."Man I could have bought a motorcycle with a quarter of the money I spent on this car". Each time I sat in traffic I would think "Dammit, I could just cut through all this shit with the bike". What's the point of spending a load of money on something, when all you're going to do is regret it later?

To say that my sole reason in buying a motorcycle was to save money on gas isn't entirely true. Sure, it's the practical reason, but really, riding a motorcycle is fucking fun. You don't even have to be riding at breakneck speeds to have fun on the bike. Riding to the store is more fun. Dropping dvd's off at Blockbuster is more fun on the bike. The commute to work? Fun! Until you get there of course, but if you're like me and have a tendancy to cry in the parking lot until you absolutely have to go into the office, at least you can hide your tears behind your helmet.

The main drawback to owning a motorcycle? Death. There's only so much you can do as a rider to prevent injury or death. You can be the safest rider in the world, but you can't trust other drivers. Are they paying attention? That driver in the oncoming lane...is he going to turn left in front of you? You can't have an off day while riding a motorcycle. You have to pay attention at all times, scanning traffic, while being aware of your surroundings. So far, I've been riding the bike, breaking it in during early morning hours, where I can concentrate on getting familiar with it before I go out and deal with heavy traffic. I think this is a good way to go. So far it's been working out well. No pressure, open streets, not too hot outside.

Now that I have the bike, I need friends to ride with too. So get bikes people. We can start a motorcycle gang. Although, the word "Gang" carries a negative image. We can be a polite motorcycle fun group. We can call ourselves:

"The Motorcycle Buddy List"

or instead of The Hell's Angel's we can be:

"The Cherubs Of Cuddle"

You know, something non menacing. We're about hugs not thugs.

I think this is the best birthday present I've bought myself. It sure beats the Super Soaker I got myself for my twelfth birthday. Thirty feet my ass. That thing only shot water ten feet. Ten feet is adequate, but if you're gonna advertise thirty feet of Peter North quality soaking power, you better deliver.

Snitches Get Stitches

2006-08-11T19:17:00.000-07:00

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060811/ap_on_re_us/undercover_kitten

NEW YORK - Fred, the Undercover Kitten who gained fame earlier this year by posing as a would-be patient to help police nab a phony veterinarian, has died, authorities said Friday.

The 15-month-old tabby was killed Wednesday when he wandered into traffic and was run over by a car, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office.

Fred was a rescued stray when he was enlisted by law enforcement in February.

An undercover investigator posing as Fred's owner summoned the suspect to an apartment rigged with a hidden camera and pretended the kitten needed to be neutered. The man was arrested as he left carrying Fred in a box and cash for the operation.

Fred got his due at a news conference, where he sported a tiny badge on his collar.

"He's pretty easygoing, a real Brooklyn guy," his caretaker, prosecutor Carol Moran, said at the time.

Fred received a Law Enforcement Appreciation Award and was honored at an adopt-a-thon benefit hosted by Mary Tyler Moore and Bernadette Peters. He had been "preparing for a new career in education," with a "significant role" in a classroom program that teaches children how to care for animals, the district attorney's office said.

Fred ran out Moran's back door into her yard Wednesday while Moran was attending to two dogs.

"He had to have hopped several fences" to escape to the street, Moran said. Neighbors found his body in the road later that morning.

The Angriest Fucking Emoticon Ever.

2006-08-08T15:51:00.000-07:00

heatherajack: dude

heatherajack: i had to go to the doctors during lunch, but was reassured by the idea that my leftover lunch would be waiting for me in the fridge today

heatherajack: and upon inspecting the fridge

heatherajack: it has, in fact, been thrown away

heatherajack: it was only from yesterday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

heatherajack: wtf, man!

heatherajack: UGHHHHHHHHHRGHRHGH!

heatherajack: (Heather added an emoticon here)

(Note: I wasn't able to show the emoticon, but it was animated, and angry.)

BTMBRKT: holy crap. this is the fucking raddest emoticon i've ever seen

BTMBRKT: literally

BTMBRKT: and that sucks about the lunch. but have you seen this emoticon? Is this the first time you used it?

heatherajack: i have seen it

heatherajack: i know its power

BTMBRKT: i keep looking at it

heatherajack: and i thought it was appropriate

BTMBRKT: it like, fully encapsulates your rage

heatherajack: not by a long shot

BTMBRKT: well as much as a fucking totally awesome animated, really angry emoticon can

heatherajack: perhaps

heatherajack: fucking lunch thieves

BTMBRKT: that sucks

BTMBRKT: what's so awesome about this emoticon. Is that it's right under your "UGGHHHHHHHHHRGHRGHHHHG"

heatherajack: haha

heatherajack: yes, its awesome on many many levels......

BTMBRKT: sorry about your lunch though.

Vinnie Cent

2006-08-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

This morning I woke up in a cold sweat. Heart racing because I'm about to turn 27, and I haven't achieved many of the goals that I thought I would have by my 27th birthday.

Maybe I'm too hard on myself, but without goals in life, what the hell are we doing?

Then, this afternoon like some magical gift, I fulfilled one of the goals on my list of things to achieve before I turn 27. It happened so quickly, I fought back tears as the feeling of joy overwhelmed me. Thanks to the power of the internet, You Tube, and some guy with a lot of time; I have finally seen a video of Joe Pesci rapping.

I present this gift to you all. Maybe with a little luck, this video will reach someone else who desperately needs to see a video of Joe "Vinnie Cent" Pesci, spit rhymes to the beat of "Rapture".

Whew. I can now face the age of 27, with open arms.

What happened to Steve Guttenberg?

2006-08-04T09:17:00.000-07:00

Ok sure, I can go to imdb.com and find out what his last project was, or google his name or whatever. Honestly, I don't really care that much. I just needed an excuse to post this video clip of The Gute.

Because it was so hot

2006-07-25T18:00:00.000-07:00

I didn't go out and buy groceries, so now I'm fucking starving but it doesn't even matter because it's too goddamn hot to eat anyway.

Yesterday as I walked outside to get some food, cursing the sweltering heat, I saw someone sitting at a table under direct sunlight...eating a bowl of chili.

What the fuck? Didn't this person know that it was at least 95 degrees, and humid outside? It's too hot for me inside with air conditioning on, and here's this guy chowing down gleefully on a spoonful of piping hot chili, outside, underneath the hateful eye of the sun.

Ughhh...I bet the chili was meat filled chili...spicy meat chili. I think that's what's offered at the new dining facility here at work. I wouldn't know actually, since I don't eat chili on hot ass days.

This really shouldn't bother me. Perhaps it's the heat and the sweat collecting on my forehead and upper lip that's turning me into a cranky person, but people shouldn't eat hot foods outside on hot days!

For your reference, I've compiled a list of foods that should not be eaten outside, under direct sunlight on hot days. These are merely suggestions. You eat what you want. I don't care. Even if it is ball's ass hot.:

1. Chili

2. Hot Pockets

3. Meatloaf

4. Anything with curry sauce

5. Garlic fries. Yes, even at the ballgame. No one wants to be around you as you shove garlic fries into your gaping maw, all the while you sweat out all the garlic to the dismay of everyone around you with working noses.

6. Fondue. Chocolate, or Cheese. It doesn't matter. Both bad.

This is a quick list. It's too hot to keep typing....

**Update to the list***
My friend Mike also suggested

7. Clam Chowder. Excellent suggestion. Clam Chowder definately should not be eaten under the sun on a hot day. Double minus points if it's Clam Chowder in a bowl made out of bread.

Because Everybody Needs A Little Creepy In Their Lives..

2006-07-14T16:35:00.000-07:00

During the past few weeks, in addition to trying survive my first month on the job, I've been attempting to clean up my cubicle. When I first started, it was very much the old assistant's desk. So, I've been trying to do what I can to make my workspace my own. The old assistant left some hats, some old promo material, and things like that. All normal stuff.

Except this thing:

How creepy is this shit? For the past month this fucking marionette has been sitting at the corner of my desk. Staring at me with its beady painted on eyes. I uncovered it when moving a bunch of papers around, and was none too pleased. Three things creep me out in life. Spiders. Clowns. And Dolls. This doll should not exist. I don't like it. Here's another picture:

Fuck that shit. Who the fuck wants to own this thing of pure evil? Where did it come from? I need to toss it in the trash, yet I've just left it there sitting in the corner for a month. Why can't I bring myself to throw it in the trash? I'll tell you why. It's possesed by something. Evil is preventing me from sending this wooden, painted, jester hat wearing manifestation of all that is unholy back to the stygian depths of hell from whence it came.

I don't know if it can move by itself or if the cleaning crew is fucking with me but I swear every other day, the doll is in a different position than I remember it being in last. One day it's sitting up with its back to the wall, then next day it's laying face down in the corner of my desk. I don't touch the thing. So what's moving it? It's most likely the cleaning crew, not evil posession that's making the doll move. That's the logical explanation.

But. The cleaning crew doesn't clean desks! My desk is never clean.No one else's desks get cleaned. So if the cleaning crew doesn't clean desks, the doll couldn't have been moved by them, leaving only one explanation. Evil is afoot.

During the past month there has been a bombing in India, rising conflict in Lebanon, a dog gave birth to a human baby, and the Oakland A's found themselves in first place before the All Star Break.

Sign of a coming apocalypse? Could the doll be sending us a message?

I don't know, but the fucking doll moves by itself!

What's making the doll move?

What does the doll mean?

IS IT THE END OF DAYS?

Damn you doll.....damn you....

Fucking Mouse!

2006-07-13T10:39:00.000-07:00

Letter to IT Department:

My mouse barely works, the cursor stutters all over the place making it hard to do anything. It moves like an Etch-A Sketch, where I can only make square movements, so in order to click on a small button, like to close a window, I have to make smaller and smaller consecutive squares until I home in on the button.

Not very productive. It causes rage.

Please send me a new one as soon as possible. Thank you!

I hope I get a new mouse soon. IT Dept. Said, soon. Which means next week probably..

This mouse is driving me crazy. Especially when working in Excel where you have tiny little cells to navigate around. I've just been doing my square movements hoping that I get closer and closer to the cell I want to work in. Usually I just get close and and then use "Tab" and the arrow keys. Fucking. Tedious.

Work is awesome!

Hoff

2006-07-11T10:00:00.000-07:00

Discuss.

DAN-CHELOR PARTY WEEKEND!

2006-07-07T10:34:00.000-07:00

Starts in 13.5 hours.

I've only been to one other bachelor party, and it was so fun I don't even remember it. I really would like to remember this one though, but who knows? I think I might die actually.

I have to make a Dan-chelor Party themed shirt. Too bad there isn't enough time to make shirts for everyone that's going. We could all wear the same shirt! We could be those guys! Lame!

I'll still make one for myself: "I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And All I Got Was This Lousy T Shirt" hahaha clever!

No, I can think of better ones, things that might actually happen this weekend which would make the shirts ultrahip and cool. Someone could ask "Did you really do that at Dan's bachelor party?" And I'd say "Yes, it did happen..there's real blood on this shirt too..taste!"

Shirts with catchy slogans referring to things that might happen this weekend could include:

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And I Killed Someone!"

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And All I Got Was This Lousy STD"

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And All I Did Was Cry"

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And All I Got Was This Lousy Woman, Pregnant"

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And Punched A Shark In The Mouth"

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And Got Tony And Clive, Arrested"

Possibly the most realistic shirt slogan for this weekend will probably be:

"I Went To Dan's Bachelor Party And All I Did Was Puke And Shit"

Sadly, it's a real possiblity that this shirt will be the more relevant one.

I really don't want to wear that shirt.

Question Of The Day

2006-06-26T22:19:00.000-07:00

I often find myself watching nature shows whenever nothing else is on television. Something about the way they're shot, and the soft tone of the narrator draws me in.

I especially like it when it's a nature show depicting the savagery of animal attacks. You know you're on to something great when you see a hapless animal drinking by a water hole; you just know that fucker is going to be eaten in half by something large with teeth and claws.

Still, after watching animals attacking each other on nature shows for so many years, one question never gets answered for me..

Do other animals realize how bad it hurts to be kicked in the balls?

We all know that a good swift kick to the balls will render any man, save for the eunuchs, in a world of white hot pain that can only be described as "Being Kicked In The Nuts". There's no other way to describe it, since getting kicked in the nuts is so high on the pain scale , the only way to describe it is to refer it to itself.

How come in nature shows, we never see any animals getting kicked in the testicles? If a Gazelle is furiously trying to escape the clutches of a Lion, wouldn't it make sense that if the Gazelle were given a chance, it might kick the Lion in the balls? Of course, this is assuming that Lion testicles, or any other animal's testicles hurt like human testicles when kicked.

Why wouldn't testicles across the animal kingdom hurt when kicked or punched? I mean, what if our testicles didn't hurt when someone kicked them or threw a baseball at them? Testicles are really important. If they didn't hurt like hell after some sort of trauma, like falling on a balance beam, then we'd be careless with our testicles. The pain is there to say "Hey man! Watch it! Precious cargo here!". So it would be logical that in order to make sure animals can mate, and produce offspring, their testicles have to be kept in working order. If other animals didn't experience the pain we do when getting smashed in the balls, who knows what kind of shenanigans they'll get their balls into, thus risking damage and the chance to produce any future offspring.

So, how come animals don't kick each other in the balls? Not only that, would knowing how bad it feels to be smacked in the nuts help us if we were being attacked by animals? Look at my friend Jeremy's dog.

See how big this dog's nuts are? Now, I know if a pit bull starts attacking me, I'm fucked, but if I somehow had my wits about me, and somehow found myself in a position to rock this dog in the nuts hard, then I should do it right? The pain would be so intense that the dog would have to take his teeth out of my neck, and roll into a little ball on the floor, while clutching his wounded testicles with his paws just like a human would do with his hands.

I should ask an expert, really....I mean, I don't want anyone to go out and kick the next dog they see in the balls just to find out what happens. Do I? No that's wrong, and mean...even if it is for science..

Pee!

2006-06-15T18:47:00.000-07:00

This blog:
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=39298764&blogID=133284354

Prompted this discussion:

BTMBRKT: hahaha i forwarded that blog link to my friend mary

marcymint3: awesome

BTMBRKT: and she im's back

BTMBRKT: "the funny thing is...is that they have these in japan"

marcymint3: hahaha

marcymint3: totally

BTMBRKT: hahahaha

marcymint3: too funny

BTMBRKT: yeah, the most effective female urination device i've seen is really low tech but works well i hear

BTMBRKT: i forgot what it's called

BTMBRKT: but it's basically a funnel like thing, but not so much a funnel like what you use to put oil in your car

BTMBRKT: more like, uhhhh how can i describe it.

marcymint3: hmmmm

BTMBRKT: i'm trying to find it on the net

BTMBRKT: but basically the prevailing idea is that it directs the pee pee away from the body, so you can stand up like a dude and pee on a tree
marcymint3: i like it

BTMBRKT: but it's so low tech
marcymint3: K.I.S.S.
marcymint3: ever learn that acronym?

BTMBRKT: oh yeah
marcymint3: Keep it simple, stupid! hahaha

BTMBRKT: ahahaha

BTMBRKT: see shit like this isn't k.i.s.s

BTMBRKT: http://www.kcup.com/millie.htm

BTMBRKT: haha man if people saw what i was googling right now

BTMBRKT: "women stand up pee device"

BTMBRKT: haha

BTMBRKT: it was like this

BTMBRKT: http://jscms.jrn.columbia.edu/cns/2005-03-15/hussain-pmates

BTMBRKT: but even simpler. but the above is pretty much the idea

BTMBRKT: a "pee pee placer" you could say

marcymint3: hahahahaha

marcymint3: "THE MILLIE female urinal" hahahaha

BTMBRKT: hahaha

marcymint3: oh man, so funny!

BTMBRKT: haha
marcymint3: that would come in very handy on road trips

marcymint3: man, that last pic looks like it was taken in my office bathroom!

marcymint3: weird

BTMBRKT: hahaha

BTMBRKT: the millie

BTMBRKT: hhaha

BTMBRKT: just the image of someone busting that out on a road trip

BTMBRKT: "no no, don't stop. I got my Millie with me, just keep your eyes on the road for a sec"

marcymint3: HAHAHAHAHA

marcymint3: all this talk is making me have to peepee! brb

marcymint3: (if ionly i had a millie i wouldn't have to leave my desk!)

Later on I found what I was looking for:

http://www.magiccone.com/pages/781886/

and please check out their animated directions:

http://magic-cone.com/animation1.htm

So today I had a conversation about butts and pee. All in all a great day's work.

Butt

2006-06-15T15:45:00.000-07:00

BTMBRKT: WAKE UP!

rebex1980: wake up?

BTMBRKT: haha yeah. it woke you up right?

rebex1980: i am now wide awake

rebex1980: how is your weird spider bite or whatever was wrong with you?

BTMBRKT: it's getting better

BTMBRKT: pain hurts less

BTMBRKT: i can now climb walls though

rebex1980: and shoot webs out of your wrist?

BTMBRKT: no...it's my butt unfortunately. Only in the comics do you get them on your wrists. In real life, when you gain spider powers, you gain real spider powers. ie. Web out of the butt

rebex1980: that sounds really messy

The Dangers Of The Internet

2006-06-14T18:49:00.000-07:00

Listen to your parent's kids.

Screw you kid!

2006-06-14T13:24:00.000-07:00

NEVER!

http://www.cashelcompany.com/dad.php#

REVENGE-ANCE!

2006-06-08T13:05:00.001-07:00

Some motherfucker stole the wheels off my bike.

Here is the sad, sad image of my trusty ride...

To quote Alan Rickman's character from Galaxy Quest

"By Grabthar's hammer... by the Sons of Warvan... you shall be... avenged."

I hate petty theives. Why can't people just leave other people's shit alone? I want the fuckers who did this to die. Petty theives deserve the worst of everything. They're not stealing to put food on the table. They're not stealing to right some sort of wrong. They're stealing shit to sell for pennies. They're stealing shit because they're bored. Fuck that. While they go and sell the wheels for ten bucks, I'm out at least a hundred to replace them.

I hate people.

Slayer Day

2006-06-06T00:13:00.000-07:00

For those of you wishing to celebrate today's rare date of 6.6.06, I made this fun collage for you to put up on your wall at home, cubicle, or office:

Let's call it "Satan Collage" or something. Enjoy.

Today, my plans are to:

1. Kick a small child's basketball over a fence, and then blame my behavior on it being "6.6.06". Craaaazy

2. Annoy people with stupid 666 related obeservations like:

"Whoa man, you're going 66 miles per hour. Wouldn't it be crazy if you were going 66.6 miles per hour? Like, of all the days to go that fast. You know what I mean? Craaazy!"

3. Do laundry.

Memorial Day Weekend!

2006-05-31T20:19:00.000-07:00

Memorial Day Weekend kicked off on Thursday at some karaoke place.

Brennan shows off his picture kryptonite skills as Marcy goes "Get me away from this guy...he ruins all pictures!"

Brennan, Stephanie, and me. Surprisingly light on the picture kryptonite.

Scott hit up some Nine Inch Nails karaoke. Here, he wants to fuck you like an animal. He's a romantic, that guy.

The next night, Jeff, Marcy, Rachel, Dan (who drove down from the bay like a madman), Caroline, and I headed down to Laguna Beach where we were going to be for the weekend.

Here, we're all playing perhaps one of the easiest but most effective drinking game ever. All you do is lay some cards down on a table and try to guess if the card drawn after is higher or lower. If you're wrong. Drink. See? I told you it was easy. Here I am guessing wrong.

Damn!

I keep guessing wrong! Higher!

Marcy tries to signal Jeff that the next card is lower. Fucking cheaters.

Cheaters never prosper, but they always snuggle.

"Just because The Da Vinci Code was a popular book, doesn't mean it's gonna translate well to the big screen! The pacing was all off! It was boring!"

"Whatever man, The Da Vinci Code was great!"

"Hey man, at least we agree that Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure was way funnier than Sophie's Choice!"

Dan's wearing an awesome Victoria Bitter shirt. He got it during our trip to Australia. What else did he get in Australia?

Snakes on his mothafuckin' neck.

The next day we went to the beach, of which, I have no pictures of.

When we got back to the house, Jeremy, Jeff's cousin stopped by from Huntington Beach. Here he is with his dog and his dog's testicles.

In the evening we went down to Coyote Grill for dinner. There was a group of about 15 with us at dinner, so it got really loud, especially after all the booze that was slung around.

Ken and Deb, Jeff's parents own the house we were all staying at. This year, they were hosting a big catered wine party for Memorial Weekend, which we'll get into in a minute.

Marcy has more pictures of dinner on her blog. I didn't take too many pics because I was feeling pretty shitty during dinner. I think it was a combination of all the drinking the night before, the beach, and all the cheetos, and beer I had for lunch.

Thankfully I started to feel a lot better by the time we went to Eva's, which is a Carribean restaurant up the street from Coyote Grill. Eva's is great. They serve great food, but usually we're all there to drink their wide selection of rum

Owen and Erica

The group, part of it at least.

This dude Doyle, was on the steel drums that night. Rocking out hits from Lionel Richie, The Police, and Prince. Here Ken busts something out.

Doyle was really great, and pretty much let us manhandle all of his musical instruments.

We weren't very popular with the rest of the restaurant customers however.

Jeff noticed some table talking shit, so some gentle words were exchanged, nothing bad. As that table got up to leave, Jeff and Dan went outside to talk some more shit, but then ended up marvelling at the guy's stereo system in his car. hahaha.

Jeff got his little sister Kyla out on the dance floor.

The woman on the right is Eva, owner of the restaurant. She came out and partied with us.

After shutting the place down, we headed back to the house. Jeff, Marcy, Dan, Rachel, and I stayed up for a while longer listening to our friend Will over the phone serenade us karaoke style. Will is fucking awesome. To give you an idea of how awesome he is, during his karaoke serenade over the phone, I asked Dan which karaoke joint Will was at. Dan replies "Will's at home. He's got his own karaoke machine". hahaha. It was like 2 am, Then to make things even more awesome, Will's wife Tracy sang us a song too. Too bad Dan was such a jerk to Will when I visted the Bay Area

The next day we hit the beach. Again, no pics of the beach. If I brought my camera to the beach, it would just get destroyed with sand and spilled drinks. It was a great beach day though, the water wasn't too cold. Right when I got to the beach I immediately ran into the ocean and stayed there for about an hour so I wouldn't have to be forced into playing volleyball. I would have stayed in that water if it were 40 degrees just to avoid playing beach volleyball.

When we got back from the beach, the house was pretty much all set up for the wine party.

Pretty slick right? Jeremy organized the layout of the deck. There were a couple tables and food set up.

Here's Ken setting the stage. Everyone brought a bottle of wine, and the whole premise of the event was to get up and talk about why you brought the wine you brought. It's show and tell basically, but you get to drink everyone's wine. Afterwards, there would be a vote for the best wine, and the best presentation.

Laguna Beach local, Zeb kicked things off.

Presentations went on through the night. Stories became wilder and wilder as more wine was consumed. After each story, everyone would rush up to the person, glasses outsretched to sample the wine, like hyenas around a fresh carcass.

Here's Scott after his presentation. His story was about his marriage proposal to his fiancee. Aww, way to tug at the heartstrings dude. Working hard for that best presentation win.

As each person went on, it got harder and harder to hear, everyone was plastered, and attention spans were all over the place.

Here Stacey and her brother John wait for everyone to quiet down. They had a wine called "Stag's Leap". I remember laughing a lot at that name. Stag's Leap. So regal, yet wild.

Owen had a particularly raucous and inspired story about his wine involving the Northridge earthquake, Robert Parker the wine ratings specialist, and a man named Juan Gonzalez who died by falling into the vat of wine during the bottling process, thus making the wine an excellent "Full bodied wine" hahahahaha zing! It was pretty funny.

Jeff shows Rachel some love after her presentation. Love hurts Rachel.

Look at how zany I am! I didn't know whose sunglasses these were at first, but later found out they were Stacy's.

"Hey Marcy let's take zany pictures with sunglasses on" Wheeeee!

I had the sunglasses on for a while, before I was told that I looked like a transvestite. Actually it wasn't the fact that I was told that I looked like a transvestite that prompted me to stop wearing the sunglasses. It was because I kept tripping over everything.

Promptly after this photo, Dan beat me to death.

Just as I suspected. Red Wine, turns your eyes...RED!

Oh my face...ruins pictures

Once all the wine presentations were through, people started busting moves out on the deck

Live music provided by

Doyle! From the Carribean restaurant! Not only that, check out how I wasn't the only one lured by the power of the zany sunglasses.

Sometime during all the madness outside, awards were given out. Here Owen takes the prize for best presentation.

And then sometime later in the night the cops came by about all the noise prompting Doyle to bring his equipment inside

The last pic I have is of Jeff on the guitar.

For a while he was strumming the guitar with no sound. I plugged the cord in and was met with this rendition of some song that I couldn't quite figure out. Coupled with Dan's stellar vocals which consisted of "Check 1, Check 2, Check 1, Check 2" it was a cornucopia of disasterous noise. Later I found out Jeff was trying to play an Oasis song. Jeff asks me "You mean you couldn't tell?" haha. Not if Oasis songs sound like: "bong bong zsshhhh, blarn blarn zssshhhh" on the guitar.

Finally around 6am I went to bed. The next day, we all chilled around the house in various states of pain. Jeff hurt the most, and went to bed at like 8pm after we got back from Laguna.

Check out Marcy's pics from the weekend.

Memorial Day is awesome!

Photoshop is for suckers

2006-05-25T13:58:00.000-07:00

Who needs Photoshop when you've got MS Paint skills like this?:

Awesome Mother's Day Gift How To

2006-05-11T00:19:00.000-07:00

My sister Cheryl came down from Santa Barbara to visit, and to help come up with an awesome Mother's Day gift.

We went to Crate And Barrel to look for some chotzky stuff we thought Mom would like. We've done the whole, useless vase route. We've done the whole buy Mom some stupid plate or wicker basket doodad that will only collect dust route. We needed something new. So what did we end up buying? A ceramic teapot.

Whoa you say. Whooaaaa, a ceramic teapot! I agree. A ceramic teapot alone isn't a good gift. We needed something awesome. After seeing some nice picture frames I had the idea. More "No Look Portraits"!

So, for those of you that don't have a good idea for a gift yet, follow these simple steps:

Step One: Buy picture frame

Step Two: Cut out two pieces of paper that fit inside the frame.

Step Three: Paint pieces of paper two different colors.

Like Yellow and Green for example

Step Four: Lay painted paper out to dry.

There are four pieces of paper here drying. I knew that this project would be so awesome, I wanted one for my house.

Step Five: After paper has dried, take one color and draw a "No Look Portrait" of someone. Perhaps your sister.

By the way, I really need to get a haircut.

Step Six: Have the other person draw a "No Look Portrait" of you on the other color paper.

Step Six and a Half: Laugh at what is being drawn on the paper in front of you.

Step Seven: Compare both pictures. Laugh.

While laughing, talk about how your Mom should be grateful to have talented children like you and your sister. Talk about how Mom should proudly display this fine piece of artwork on the walls at home. Talk about how Mom should be grateful she got anything at all, and that this awesome display of talent should suffice as a gift for all Mother's Days to come.

Step Eight: Place art in frame

Step Nine: Admire final product

Step Ten: Box ceramic teapot (optional), and artwork. Head to the post office, send it off to your Mom.

Step Eleven: High Five for a job well done!

Gut Busting Pasta Dinner!

2006-05-10T23:40:00.000-07:00

Pasta dinner. If you're at a restaurant that offers a large size offering of their entrees, I always suggest going for the larger size. The large size restaurants offer is usually pretty manageable, so when I ordered the large size at dinner last weekend, I was not expecting such a gargantuan tub of pasta.

Normal size

My "Econo-Tub" size of pasta

Yeah yeah, it's hard to tell from the pic, but seriously, my tub was easily filled with about 5 pounds of pasta. I knew I was in for trouble. Especially since I ordered it with sausage too. My stomach wasn't gonna be pleased with that combo of pesto pasta, and sausage.

In between mammoth helpings of pasta, I also took time to do a nice "No Look" drawing of Heather, where I don't look down at the paper as I'm drawing.

Beautiful

Heather's like "Uhh what the fuck?"

John on the other side of the table

was hard at work drawing a woman giving birth to Kenne. A full grown Kenne.

Bloody afterbirth puddle courtesy of me.

After dinner we headed out to a bar for some drinks

Joel and Heather

I always feel bad, every time I hang out with Joel, or let's say 99 percent of the time, I'm totally hammered. So I hope he doesn't think I'm some drunken idiot.

The next night

Jeff, Marcy and I went to Red Buddha to meet...pretty much the same people as the night before. Except Jeff and Marcy, they weren't at dinner the night before.

Finally....the pictures are about up to date

On Saturday, I went to packed bar with Kenne for some person I don't know's birthday party.

Clay and Mary were there already

Kenne and I had just seen the movie "Stick It" before heading to the bar. The images of young butts and gymnastic flexibility proved too hard for him to take. Here he just breaks down and starts crying.

We then decided it was time to take some more serious pictures.

Kenne fucks this one up

Then I fucked this one up

Clay fucks up here, but I'm right behind him

So we opted for a "Look Away Pondering" pose.

If we both start an acoustic rock band, we already have our album cover.

Half of team Off In The Corner! Heather and Jeff.

Here's the whole team. Pow!

Dan Francisco!

2006-05-10T23:08:00.000-07:00

I went up to San Francisco near the end of April to hang out with

Mike who was on spring break visiting from New York, and Lee and his wife Renee.

While up there, we met up with my friend Dan of, San Francisco Tour Of Dan's Office fame. No pics of him here unfortunately.

Dan was out in the city with some of his work friends and

Jason! He used to live in Los Angeles before moving to Fresno.

Buddies!

Lee and Renee..buddies too! Buddies in love.

Behind this heinous looking chick

was a girl who Mike and I think used to go to High School with us.

Feeling awkward taking such obvious pics of her, I tried jumping into frame to make it look like Mike was taking pics of me..well...jumping into frame

We were trying to capture how weathered she looked, but we were to afraid to take a closer pic.

Mike early in the night

Mike later in the night

The cab ride home to Lee and Renee's apartment was a laugh riot. To me at least...

Laughing

More laughing

hahhahahahahhaha

hahahahahaha Mike's face!

Back at Lee and Renee's

New Pictures!

2006-05-10T13:37:00.000-07:00

Whew, I finally uploaded some pictures off my camera! First up are some pictures from Brennan's last day at STA Travel party.

Picture Kryptonite reunited!

Marcy and Brennan looking hard. Valiant effort, by me, to look hard. I ruined the picture.

Theo's contribution to the "hard look" poses

Involve a little bit of leg

After Brennan's party we headed to another bar/club and met up with

Kenne and Mary and some other fun loving people. I split my pants that night.

Randomly, here's a pic taken from the fateful Jack In The Box night

Next round of pics are loading....

Douchebags

2006-04-27T18:39:00.000-07:00

On my street, amongst a sea of Honda Civics, Toyota Corrollas, and various other pieces of shit, we have this car:

One thing I love about douchebags, is the fact that they'll spend a shitload of money on a nice car, but not have any money left over to pay for shit like: parking tickets, rent or whatever. I don't think the guy is driving around town sipping Cristal out of the bottle. There's a wadded up Capri Sun next to the driver's side door! That's probably all the dude can afford, Capri Sun, and maybe once in a while some HI-C "Ecto Cooler".

I'm sure the car gets the douchebag that owns it a lot of chicks, but what happens when they want to come home with him? Is he really going to bring them home to his shithole apartment next to Pink's Hotdog's? Just because he's got a sweet ride doesn't mean he's got a house on the beach in Malibu.

I mean how's it gonna work? Say the douche spots a table of drunk girls at The Saddle Ranch. They seem decent enough, couple sixes, maybe sevens on a good day, save for the one heinous looking chick. He gets some shots together and heads over to the table, as the girls all start cheering for one of their friends who is desperately trying to look hot while flailing around on the mechanical bull. There's a lot of clapping and shouting, because it's Thursday night, and sometimes girls just need to get out and party!

The douche brings the shots over to their table, and immediately they circle the wagons because no man is going to bust in on their party. The ringleader Patty, the one with the unfortunate face tells the guy to get lost. The guy is persistent, he brought shots, I mean come on. Patty sees that he has shots, and has a change of heart. She let's out a "Yeaaaah" or something equally piercing, and shots are consumed by the table. The douche has got his game down. He has some high powered job or something. Makes a lot of money...drives a sweet ass car. Whatever. They continue drinking. One of the girls starts taking an interest in the douche, and she let's Patty know. Patty, the wet blanket of the group, who normally would have cockblocked the douche , gives the thumbs up instead, because...well..he's got money and drives a sweet ass car...he's a total catch.

So, the girl and the douche have a sweaty kamikaze fueled make out session by the bathroom and decide to take off in his sweet ass car.

Where are they going to go from there? A guy that makes a lot of money, money enough to buy a sweet ass car doesn't live in an apartment near Pink's Hot Dog's. The douche can't take her to his aparment. They can't have sex on a pile of Maxim magazines, and dirty dishes. They gotta have sex in his sweet ass car, but how?

That's a question I can not answer, but rest assured, once I have enough money to buy my own sweet ass car, I'll figure it out.

Long Beach Grand Prix

2006-04-24T15:12:00.000-07:00

About two weeks ago a group of us went down to the Long Beach Grand Prix. Our friend Phil has an apartment that overlooks the racecourse.

Balcony view overlooking a portion of the course

We had a good view of one of the turns which was great because seeing cars go fast in a straight line is boring. I see that shit everyday on the freeway.

But the thing about auto racing..once you've seen the first two minutes, you've seen them all. The rest of the time you're just waiting for someone to crash.

"CARS GOING FAST ARE AWESOME!"

They zoom by

and I'm like..."Damn"

Then the cars...they drove by again real fast!

And Mike was like "Dude these guys are driving really fast!"

I was like, "I know! Way faster than the speed limit, that's for sure"

But it didn't end there! After about two minutes, these fuckers drove by again! Really fast!

Jeff couldn't believe it!

He got all excited because he wasn't sure if the cars were gonna drive by again.

He kept asking, "Are they coming back?". I wasn't sure what to tell him, I didn't know if they were, but then sure enough, they drove by real fast!

After the race we didn't stay too long. On the way back, I saw this awesome billboard.

Sassy grandma on the trike ain't afraid of dying. She says "Fuck Dying", and then punches the Reaper in the face.

Jack In The Box and Me! Friends again!

2006-04-21T15:29:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday I rode my bike to Jack In The Box after leaving The Bar. Yeah it's a bar called "The Bar", brilliant, anyway, I rode my bike through the drive through, and was denied service. It wasn't so much of a, "Sorry sir, we can't serve you", it was more of a "Get the fuck outta here" kinda thing. I mean, the drive through lady slammed the drive through window in my face, and then three employees who were just kicking it out on the front steps like they were on some stoop in Bed Stuy told me to beat it. I wasn't causing a scene, I was just asking them why I couldn't order a delicious Bacon Ultimate Cheeseburger. They never gave me a reason, which was so annoying.

In hindsight, I realize that I couldn't get served at the drive through window for safety reasons. I mean, I would be fucked if some car driven by some drunk idiot crashed into me. Then, Jack In The Box would be fucked if I sued them after. I get that, but that night, the more I thought about what happened the angrier I got. I was starving, and when I'm starving, I get fucking mad. So I rode home and wrote an email to Jack In The Box at four in the morning telling them how pissed off I was.

I have parts of that email which were cut and pasted into a blog post that didn't last very long; not all of it unfortunately, but what I have is amazing. Highlights include me writing in bold:

"Jack In The Box Supports Drunk Driving"

I accused Jack In The Box of supporting drunk driving. Genius! I then continue,

"Jack In The Box, why do you support drunk driving? I mean, that's what I was lead to believe. If I showed up in a car, drunk, I would have gotten service. Showing up on a bicycle, sober means no service in the Jack In The Box world."

And then went on further

"You should be ashamed. Apparently you would rather serve a car full of drunkards, than one sober person on a bike. I loved you Jack In The Box, and you screwed me like a cheap prom date."

So I mention the word sober a couple times. I wasn't totally sober, obviously. I mean I had just left "The Bar". However, I wasn't hammered, or shitfaced, or plastered or whatever the current fun word used to describe potential liver damaging inebriation is used. I will say, that upon reading what I have left of my angry email to Jack In The Box, I was drunk enough to sound retarded.

Going further, I see that I have also written

"Jack In The Box, you know who served me? McDonalds. Yes. McDonald's. I love them now. Fuck you Jack In The Box. I love McDonalds. I rode there on my bike, rolled through the drive through, and was served a delicious double quarter pounder with cheese."

Thankfully McDonald's let me order from them. They didn't care that I was on the bike. I would have much rather have had the Bacon Ultimate Cheeseburger though. The Double Quarter Pounder only has two patties. The B.U.C offers two patties, way more cheese as well as bacon on top of it all. The value is there. Do the math.

I also like how I keep referring to "Jack In The Box" as if it were a person. It's more personal that way.

And then of course, with any email of this nature, it's best to end with

"I'm never ordering from Jack In The Box again."

Which is a boldfaced lie.

I sent this email to Jack In The Box headquarters last week, and I had totally forgotten about it until I received a phone call yesterday. It was Jack In The Box! Well, really some dude whose name I don't remember. He said, "Eric, I have an email from you about an unfortunate night taking place last week"

Immediately, I got embarrassed. Here I was, a week later...should I have still held onto my grudge with Jack In The Box?

"Dammit, I'm fucking pissed man! It's been seven days, and I'm still fucking pissed. I couldn't order my Bacon Ultimate Cheeseburger! You fucks! Why I oughtta.."

It would seem pretty sad, so I kind of laughed and said, "Yeah, I was really hungry that night...".

We both laughed, which was a good thing because it meant that Jack In The Box and I were friends again. Then, the Jack In The Box representative, went into why they couldn't serve me while I was on my bike, which made sense, and pretty much what I figured. Safety reasons. That's cool.

So as the conversation was winding down, he added that a bunch of the Jack In The Box customer relations people passed around my email, and that it was their favorite one they've read in a while. He said that normally, the email complaints they get range from "Fuck you", to "Burger is no good. Please make better", and that they appreciated that mine was well written(?), and funny. Well, I guess that's what you get when you try to write an angry letter of complaint at four in the morning while kind of drunk. It comes across as funny.

He also told me that I sent the email twice.

Last Days In Japan

2006-04-17T10:11:00.000-07:00

Karaoke in Japan is a bit different than here in the states. Instead of going up on a stage in front of a bunch of drunken bar patrons, you get your own private booth for you and your friends. It's a lot of fun, and since it's a private booth with friends, people that would normally be too shy to go up in front of a crowd of strangers end up singing a lot and having a good time. Although, singing karaoke in front of a crowd of drunken bar patrons can be a lot of fun, especially when you yell out "Girl look at yo titties!" at some drunken bar floozy and not get punched in the face after.

Karaoke is a serious thing in Japan. The song selection is amazing. Not only do they have an infinite selection of old and up to the minute current Japanese pop songs and standards, they also have books with an amazing selection of songs in English. Everything from Bon Jovi, and Billy Idol, to The Damned, The Misfits, and The New York Dolls. Try to find a karaoke joint in the states that has a catalog that deep.

Kicking things off

TJ rocking out a Japanese pop song. It was excellent

Me killing Wanted Dead or Alive

I've seen a million faces..and I've rocked them all, including Celia. She can barely contain her excitement!

Matt, I don't remember what he sang..

But I do remember the moves.

If you look closely, you'll see that Matt is holding a maraca or whatever they're called. The weird shakey things. The karaoke booth features tambourines and maracas. So there's always something to do to get in on the fun. People are either actively tambourine-ning (?), or shaking those maracas.

The next night, after dinner

We went off for more....karaoke!!

We had a larger group with us this time

Everyone was so good. A lot of the songs people sang were really fast, and all of them sang really well. It made my shitty, scream every lyric approach seem, well...even shittier.

Yeah..take this mic away please

I'm pretty sure this pic was taken when I was slaughtering "Don't Stop Me Now" by Queen. If you know the song, take a look at my face. There isn't really a moment in the song where contorting the face to utter some sort of Icelandic death metal growl is possible, but I found it apparently.

And then "Thriller"

Wow. Just...wow.

That's about it for all the fun pics I took from Japan. Oh yeah, here are some more

TJ's impressions of me.

Ok, yeah I wear that hat a lot, but the hands akimbo pose? I only do that when I urinate at bathroom stalls. Hands free yo!

Matt's impresion of TJ and his Man Bag

I had a great time in Japan, and I definately want to go back there soon. The food was great, the people are awesome, and the toilets! I have to say it again. The toilets are fucking awesome!

Not to mention the signage

Totally. I hear ya.

A big thank you goes out to TJ for putting me up for the week I was visiting!

Check out the Gingerbread Couch! That was my bed!

That's it for my Japan trip!

Stupid Acts of Stupidity Are Go!

2006-04-13T16:59:00.000-07:00

I have health insurance again!!!! Rejoice!!

Tsukiji Fish Market

2006-04-12T11:15:00.000-07:00

5:30....AM...ugghhh

Waking up at 5am to get to the train station wasn't so bad actually. I was surprised that I didn't see more people up that early. I half expected the train station to be more crowded.

Tsukiji Fish Market is one of the largest fish markets in the world. More than 2000 tons of seafood products roll through the market every morning. It has practically everything the ocean produces for sale. Delicious items that I wanted to eat right there, as well as things from the deep dark sea that I care never to see again. Weird horned things that can only have come from the stygian depths of hell which have continued to haunt my dreams to this day.

There is an auction held every morning at 5am, where people come in to bid on fish. Millions of dollars change hands here every morning. It's crazy! Bidding is closed to the general public however. It used to be open to tourists and the like, but that ended a little while ago after tourists kept fucking everything up.

Navigating through the fish market was an experience. The pathways are very narrow, and packed with people buying and selling fish. Carts, motorcycles, and forklifts zoom around everywhere at breakneck speed. Everyone there was working so hard, hauling fish, delivering fish etc. I could sense that they hated every tourist there. I mean, I would if I worked there. Imagine working at this place. Everything moves so quickly, you're trying to navigate through to make a delivery, and some jackass tourist is in the middle of your way, mouth agape just standing there head buried in their Frommer's Guide.

Look at how pissed this guy is

I took this picture a second after some guy just walked into the middle of the pathway to take a picture of something. The backup you see happened within milliseconds. Insane.

I'm sure that worker wanted to punch that person in the face for making him late, and then shove my camera up my ass for taking a picture of how mad he was.

Tuna

Tuna fetches high prices at the market. I never knew tuna could be that big. These weren't even the largest ones there!

Look at all this tuna!

The fish were frozen solid, which made them look fake. Look at that thing! It could eat your face!

The end of our visit to the fish market was capped by a fresh sushi breakfast at one of the small eateries that neighbor the fish market.

Eating sushi at 7am is kind of weird, but it was really good.

After that, we took the train home amidst the morning commute

Slackers! We've been up since 5am!

Fine, they're all going to work while I spent the rest of the day trying to find the "Freshness Burger" joint I kept hearing about. Still, it was hard work trying to find it. Verdict? The burgers were indeed totally "Freshness!"

Next up: Karaoke pics! I think that'll be it...I don't know anymore.....

Harajuku, Meiji Shrine

2006-04-10T16:24:00.000-07:00

Ahh...Harajuku. Home of expensive shopping and wild fashion. The place you want to go if you are the frontwoman to a ska-ish rock band embarking on a solo career, looking to recruit kids for your own travelling minstrel show.

Damn you would be so much hotter if you stopped bleaching your hair

It's too bad, I was in Harajuku during the week, and all the kids were in school. I was hoping to check out the crazy fashion I had heard so much about.

Amongst all the stores, and all the hustle and bustle in Harajuku, lies the Meiji Shrine. The main entrance is framed by a huge wooden archway

Which leads to a nice wooded area

And then you cross a cool bridge

As I walked up, I heard all this loud drumming so I ran as fast as I could to check it out, but by the time I got there the guy was done.

The shrine

For a small donation, people can write prayers, or inspirational messages on these wooden pieces to hang.

Courtyard tree

I also saw this little bike

What caught my eye was the contraption in the back

What could it be? Could it be a turbocharger? A Flux Capacitor for time travel? Some rad electronic thing my mind can't possibly fathom?

No, it was just some delivery dude's bike. The thing at the back lifts up, and sandwiches the plates together for transport. What a letdown.

Later that night it was time for dinner! Shabu Shabu style yo! All you can eat no less!

TJ getting everything just right

All you can eat. Throw the meat in the water, cook it up, eat it, order more.

All you can eat veggies too!

Everything tastes so good when it's all cooked together. Seriously soooo good.

The sauces too! So good!

More! I need more! The perfect experience, would be Shabu Shabu all you can eat style, then a relaxing dump on a toilet with a heated seat. Ahhhhh that's livin'.

After dinner, we kept it mellow because we'd be waking up early to go to the Tsukiji Fish Market. Waking up early...ugghhhh.

Up next...Pics from the Tsukiji Fish Market. Duh. Karaoke photos too!

Roppongi and Udon Noodles!

2006-04-10T16:00:00.000-07:00

I went back to Shibuya during the day with one goal in mind. More conveyorbelt sushi. We had passed it the night before on the way to dinner, and I was determined to find it the next day. Locating the place was a much different story during the day. It was impossible to find. I walked up and down the streets of Shibuya, hoping that each corner I turned would lead me to the right place.

Thankfully I knew how to say conveyor belt sushi in Japanese and I walked up to random people asking if they knew where it was. After two hours, I found it. Two straight hours walking around aimlessly looking for the place. I can't believe I was that dedicated. No, wait. I can believe it.

When I finally sat down to eat, I immediately blacked out. I became a machine...perhaps from the future where sushi is scarce due to overfishing, whose only mission was to consume as much sushi as possible. When I finally snapped back into consciousness, I had eaten everything in the place, a couple of chopsticks, and the left half of some dude's face. Conveyor belt sushi rocks!

I went back to TJ's and watched some tv. I watched a game show, but didn't really know what was going on. All I know is that these were the hosts

And that it featured

A Japanese Ally McBeal, amongst other contenstants

And multiplication

Later that night, feeling confident in my subway navigational know how, I took the subway to Roppongi

Roppongi Hills Shopping Center

to meet

Matt and Wendy for Udon noodles.

Check out the size of that bowl! You can wash a baby in that thing!

Up next..Harajuku, Meiji Shrine

Off In The Corner is back!!

2006-04-10T11:13:00.000-07:00

For 2006! Check out the new shirts!

On a team related note:

btmbrkt: ugghhh
btmbrkt: it's like
btmbrkt: all jewel all morning
btmbrkt: at this coffee shop
heatherajack: ew
heatherajack: puke
heatherajack: which coffee shop, so i can firebomb it on my way home from work

Excellent. The team support continues even while we're off the lanes.

Last round or two of Japan pics coming. If only this damned computer will load the pics.

Chiba/Tokyo! Crazy wind, and crotchless body stockings.

2006-04-04T00:21:00.000-07:00

After taking the three hour train ride from Kyoto to Tokyo station, I stopped by a pay phone to call Mary's brother TJ. I was excited because I was confident that I could use the phone, after learning how to do so at Kyoto station a couple days ago.

No one answered so I left a message. Since the outgoing message was a lady's voice saying something in Japanese, my message sounded pretty awkward:

"uhhh...hello? Yeah, uhhh this is Eric-I don't know if this is the right number, but uhhhhh yeah I'm at Tokyo Station...and...hmm man if this isn't TJ then you probably have no idea what I'm talking about sooo...." Then I hung up.

From Tokyo Station I had to board a train to Chiba which was a short distance away. Using the directions TJ emailed me earlier in the week, I was able to successfully make it to Shin Urayasu station where I would meet him at his work. I made another call once I exited the train, and thankfully TJ answered the phone, saving me from leaving another awkward message.

We met at the front of the station and from there, walked towards his work.

TJ works at Geos, teaching English. I met some of his students, and two teachers that work there Matt and Celia. By the time I got there, it was quitting time, so TJ, Matt, Celia and I left for the grocery store to get some things for TJ's get together later that night.

The supermarket was just like any other supermarket except for the awesome hotdog animals.

Elephant

Seals

I don't know why I got so excited about these hot dog animals. They were so detailed!

Yes. Totally huge.

Heading back to TJ's

TJ and Wendy. Geos respresent!

TJ was hosting a feast at his apartment, and a bunch of Geos people showed up. It was great. I was pretty hungry by the time I got off the train so this was an excellent night. I got to meet some really cool people, namely a guy named Satoru. He's one of those guys that has been everywhere and done everything. Recently he gave Wendy a really funny gift.

One size fits...most.

Here's TJ and some dude that kinda looks like me getting ready to rob some banks

So by this time during the night everyone had been drinking a bunch, and then TJ threw down the gauntlet.

"Rock Paper Scissors! Loser has to wear the crotchless body stocking!"

The thing is...when challenges of this nature are proposed, where the loser has to do something really embarrassing, Murphy's Law dictates that the person that sets forth the challenge will most likely end up being embarrassed.

"Best two out of three"

I promised TJ that I wouldn't post the pics that followed...so..here is a shot of me laughing during the whole thing.

It was a fun night, and I was glad that I made it from Kyoto in time.

The next night, TJ and I headed to Shibuya to meet his cousin Amanda who was visiting Tokyo on business. We were a bit concerned that the trains would stop running because of strong wind. It was windy all day, and it got stronger and stronger as the day went on.

On the way to the train station we saw just how strong the wind was.

This was a bike parking lot, and the wind had knocked all the bikes over, including the bike stands.

This planter was ripped apart by the wind

The contents of the planter flew here

A distance of about ten feet or so

Crazy.

Throwing caution to the...wind (hahahahahahaha) we got on the train, hoping it wouldn't be forced to stop halfway.

Thankfully the train made it without major problems. It did stop for a little while though.

Shibuya

The lobby of Amanda's swanky hotel

TJ and Amanda. We were waiting to get into a restaurant. Check out the tiny beers! They had these in a bucket by the door for those waiting to get in. That was nice of them.

After dinner we went to a bar where I saw this. I saw this barcode on a number of things while in Japan, but didn't know what it was for

I learned that it was a barcode that Japanese cell phones can read. In Japan, you can use your cell phone to buy items at vending machines, pay train fare etc. Upon learning this, I immediately grew angry at the state of cell phone technology here in the States. The cell phones in Japan get tv reception. Multiple channels! They have actual megapixel cameras on their phones. The "high tech" Motorola Razr that we have here only has a VGA camera. This technology is found on their low price phones too. Dammit. We can send a guy to the moon, we should be able to get our cell phones on par with the rest of the world.

"Cell phones blah blah blah"

"Ah never mind"

Ok that's all the photos I have uploaded for today.

Next up: Udon noodles, karaoke, Fish Market...

Have a good day.

More Kyoto!

2006-04-03T10:38:00.000-07:00

After laying low the first day, I took the subway to Gion. I was joined by my hostel roommate, a 19 year old college student who was on Spring Break. Talking to him, and hearing things from his perspective was interesting. Interesting in that it made me feel ancient. Upon hearing that I worked full time, his eyes bugged out

"Full time? What's it like?" he asked.

"What?" I replied

"Working full time? I mean, like, what's the whole office-corporate life like?"

"Uhhh...it's ok. I mean..I get up at eight am, and go to work" I said

"Shit! Eight am? Everyday!?"

"Yeah"

"Damn, then you must be hella rich. Drinks are on you tonight!"

Rich? Damn. This kid is in for a rude awakening after he graduates. The fact that I was staying in a youth hostel in a small room with three dudes should have clued him into the state of my bank account. If I were rich, I'd be staying at the nicest hotel I could afford. I wouldn't be one of those rich guys that stay in a youth hostel to "keep it real" or shit like that. Fuck that. Give me a nice bed, tv, all that shit. None of this, tiny bed, smelly dude snoring in the bunk next to me hostel crap.

Streets of Gion

Walking around Gion, one can take any number of side streets that stretch everywhere.

It seemed like we were walking through a movie set.

We also stopped by the cheesiest bar....IMAGIUM!!

The guy next to me clued us in to this place actually. We were outside wondering out loud where the nearest bar was, and he directed us to.....IMAGIUM!!

I keep writing IMAGIUM!!! In caps, because at one point during the night, I kept yelling out..IMAGIUM!!!inside the bar. I couldn't help it. It's such an awesome name.

We stumbled out of the bar way after the trains had stopped running, so we walked all the way home from Gion. It took a long time. Walking is slow.

Returning to the hostel at around four am, we found a group of Aussies that were still up.

Apparently, they were leaving at five am, so in order to get up that early they stayed up all night drinking. They were really funny, except the dude in the scarf. He was pretty annoying.

The next day, I took the bus for more sightseeing around Kyoto

Kinkakuji Temple.

I spent the whole day getting on the bus, getting off the bus. On the bus, off the bus. I was beat by the end of the day. I have loads more pics too, but my bastard computer isn't loading them all..but you see one picture of a temple, you've seen them all I guess. I mean, it's a lot better to be there in person rather than look at pictures.

One of my favorite spots in Kyoto however, was not the temples but...

Conveyor Belt Sushi!!

Brilliant. The sushi comes to you....on a fucking conveyor belt! It's really good too, and cheap. I think it was roughly a dollar a plate.

Coming from America, where I think we have more buffet food options than other countries, my stomach was already primed to eat a disgusting amount of food. Within the first five minuts, I had a stack of plates next to me that rivaled those around me.

It was a sickening display of gluttony.

Want more tea? Get it yourself at your own Green Tea Spigot

I would be back at this conveyor belt sushi place for "snacks" in between meals, three more times before I left Kyoto. I mean it was so easy. Go in, get seated, start stuffing your face for a couple minutes, then take off.

I had originally planned to stay in Kyoto for a week, but I ended up cutting my stay there short so that I could make it to Tokyo to meet Mary's (therealmr.blogspot.com) brother who was having a small party at his apartment.

So on Saturday I went to Kyoto station and took the Shinkansen bullet train to Tokyo. The Shinkansen is Japan's much heralded super train. It's fast and efficient. Although, I was a little disappointed that I couldn't really feel the speed. I guess that's a testament to the quality of the ride, but if I'm on a train that goes almost 300 miles per hour, I want that feeling of being shoved back into the seat, as my face starts flapping from all the velocity. Riding on the Shinkansen was a peaceful, quiet affair, and it was hard for me to not fall asleep for the whole ride. Damn Japanese engineering. You guys made the train too smooth!

Next: Tokyo! Well...more like Chiba...and TJ's apartment and the Gingerbread Couch.

Japan! Kyoto first night.

2006-03-28T17:08:00.000-08:00

Feeling like absolute shit, I boarded a flight to Japan Monday morning, March 13th. For some freak reason, I came down with the most horrible cold possible. My throat hurt so bad, I had chills and wanted to die. So much so that I woke up early at 5am before my flight and tried to get my flight pushed to the day after with no luck.

I actually started to feel a bit better once I got on the plane. My throat still hurt bad, but overall I felt like I could survive even though I couldn't drink heavily which is how I usually cope with long flights. What sucked was that I was stuck next to a dude with the shittiest smelling feet I've ever had the displeasure of smelling. It was as if he had soaked his feet in a bath of cream cheese and butt sweat before putting on his socks and shoes.

Many uncomfortable hours later, I landed in Osaka/Kansai Airport. It was at the airport when I realized that I wasn't going to make it to my hostel in time. In order for me to get to the hostel in Kyoto, I had to board a train from the airport which would make the trip in about two hours. I needed to check into the hostel in thirty minutes. Great planning on my part, right? I tried to use the pay phone to call the hostel, but couldn't for the life of me figure out how to use it, or how the dialing works. It just kept going "Boop...boop..." followed by something said in Japanese. Frantically, I ran to the "Tourist Information Center" like a total rube and asked the lady how to work the phone. Turns out I had to dial zero before I put in the number for the hostel. Whoops. After figuring it out, I got through to the front desk which luckily hadn't closed yet, and the guy said he'd leave a key for me in the mailbox. Whew.

Getting on the train was another matter of difficulty for me.

"Huh?"

No seriously...

"HUH??"

I had no idea what I was looking at. The map was easy to figure out, but it was hard trying to figure out how much I needed to pay for the ticket, and how to use the machines to get the tickets. So I had to ask a bunch of people, who were nice enough to help me figure out what to do through wild gesturing and pointing.

Feeling relieved on the train. Or confused. I don't know, both looks are the same.

I got into Kyoto station at around 10pm, and made it to the hostel after a short walk from the station.

My hostel room was very small

But I didn't care. All I cared about was sleep. I passed out hoping that in the morning I wouldn't feel sick anymore.

What the hostel looked like from outside

The best part about the hostel, were the high tech toilet seats. First, the toilet seats were heated. They felt great. It's not the gross kind of warm like when you sit on a toilet seat after someone else had just sat on it. This was a soothing, comfortable kind of heat. In addition to the warm seat, the toilet featured button controls on the side. Each button activated an awesome high tech feature.

Spray your undercarriage with some water. You can adjust the force of the spray all the way from gentle misting, to violent enema with the touch of a button.

Water spray for the ladies, and a "Flushing Sound" button to mask the horribly embarrassing doo doo butt noise everyone hates. You know you make those doo doo butt noises. Don't lie reader.

While you're at it, don't forget the "Powerful Deodorizer"

I have dreams about this toilet. Sexy dreams. I love you Super Toilet from Japan.

Up next: More from Kyoto, and then Tokyo.

Smell ya later.

Japan is Awesome

2006-03-25T20:05:00.000-08:00

Which makes it suck so hard that I'm leaving tomorrow.

Anyway, this site has been dormant since I left. I can't believe it's been 2 weeks already.

I have loads of pictures, and will commence a trip recap once I get back to good ol' Los Angeles.

Fun Japanese tidbit I learned during my travels: Japanese people speak great Japanese.

Ok, time to make the most of this last day in Japan......bye!

So much drama in the LBC....

2006-03-10T17:57:00.000-08:00

I'm off to Japan this morning. Hopefully I can update while I'm abroad.

Last Thursday I went down to Long Beach with Jeff and Mike to visit our friend Phil. Phil lives right next to the raceway for the upcoming Long Beach Grand Prix, where cars race along the city streets.

We poached the course for a couple turns.

The course looks awesome, and it will be cool to see the pros rip it up. I think it's April 9th or something.

Mike warming things up

Mike and Jeff perfecting their Bill and Ted impressions

Abe was pleased

Party On Dudes! He says.

Phil has a little dog named Sammy that is the most rotten thing born of this world. How can a thing so small be filled with so much hatred? It does nothing but snarl at you, and try to bite your fingers. First he will try to fool you and get you to pet him, but then when you do, the fucker tries to bite you.

Here I am trying to handle Sammy, to teach him some respect

Phil saw me mandhandling his dog, so he taught me some respect

Fuck you Sammy.

We went out for some karaoke where I did "Wanted Dead Or Alive"

In the middle of my blistering set, I kept yelling "Girl look at yo titties!" to the woman in the orange shirt dancing in front of the stage.

I'm surprised that I don't have a big palm shaped mark on the side of my face. Apparently people thought it was funny. I vaguely remember yelling it out. I'm adorable.

Mike sitting patiently for his turn

Mike got up next and brought the house down with "You've Lost That Loving Feeling" and an equally awesome version of "Hero" by the mole himself Enrique Iglesias.

This lady kept busting up Mike's set

Finally grabbing the mic at one point

Here is her boyfriend as he collected his drunk lady off the stage

All this went on as I cold kicked it at the foot of the stage

Mike karaoked so well, that women were throwing panties on stage. Well, not real panties but

Graphic representations of panties. I laughed so hard when I saw this happening. Judging by the looks of the riff raff that were in attendance, I don't think Mike would have wanted real panties.

Mike with all his panties

The people that run the karaoke

As we left the bar, Mike cheesily blew the girl above a kiss, and she just stared at him for a moment, then reached out and "caught" the kiss with her hand all slow like, deadpan the whole time. The kind of look you give when you find out you're being audited. It was then Mike knew just how relevant his decision to sing "You've Lost That Loving Feeling" was that night.

After karaoke we went to some Irish pub that's pretty fun. Some frat boy douchebag made a sarcastic remark about Mike's jacket, while trying to look all cool in front of his sorority dates. I don't remember what Mike said in response, but I do remember that it was awesome enough for me to want to high five him and go "Face" in front of the frat boy douche, but I didn't.

***I found out what Mike said, it was: "Thanks, your shirt makes you look like a shithead!". haha rad, after that I gave him the high five I should have given him at the bar, although there was no one around to yell "Face!" to."***

After that bar the night just went further and further into madness, but those are all the exciting pics I have.

The end of the night. Mike and Jeff say "Find me some place to pass out!"

San Francisco tour of Dan's office. Will's last day

2006-03-06T00:38:00.000-08:00

I was up in the Bay Area over the weekend. I went into SF Thursday night to hang out with Dan, Rachel, and Will who was celebrating his last day at the office.

Following the suit convention to Dan's office building in the city.

Everyone was out celebrating Will's last day. This is Will

He looks sad in this picture because he was reenacting an event that had occured earlier in the day. If you look closely you can see that he is holding a skull with a carefully fabricated cigarette dangling from its mouth. This skull had been Will's most cherished cubicle decoration during his time there. Since it was his last day there, he felt that it would be a great gift to pass on to Dan.

Will waited for the right moment to offer this gift to Dan. I will pretend to be Dan

"Hello this is Dan. I'm a big shot that has an office overlooking the bay bridge. I'm awesome!"

Will enters the office and presents the skull hoping that Dan would enjoy it as much as he did

"What the fuck is this shit? I can't have this kind of stuff hanging around my office! I've got clients! Get the fuck out of here"

Which brings us back to this picture

Honestly how can a man that has these in his office

Turn down such a heartfelt gift from a friend? Sure it's a skull smoking a cigarette. If your client's can't get down with a skull smoking a cigarette, then they're not people to do business with. That Battle Of The Bay poster is awesome though..

Even though the skull was turned down, Dan and Will are still great friends. We kicked it in the office for a bit while people gathered their stuff, and then went out to celebrate Will's last day in proper manner. With booze.

Hey what button do I press to get an outside line?

We hit up a couple bars including this one that featured a dude that looked like Jason Gedrick behind the bar

Well, you can't really tell from the pic..

"Who is Jason Gedrick?". Watch Iron Eagles bitches.

At the same bar I also found Waldo

Dancing like a douchebag. My camera couldn't quite capture the intensity of this guy's weird bowlegged, pretzel dancing.

I guess he deserves props for not caring what others were thinking and dancing like no one was watching. Fuck that. I was watching. He should have been arrested or something.

The funniest thing I've seen all weekend.

2006-03-05T19:45:00.000-08:00

My mom watching 3 Six Mafia perform "It's Hard Out Here For A Pimp" during the Academy Awards broadcast a few moments ago.

She had no idea what the hell was going on in the television screen in front of her. I even heard her mutter a confused.."It's...hard..hard out here?..(then mumbled something quietly in chinese)". hahahahaha.

I'm stealing this.

2006-03-03T15:49:00.000-08:00

Fun Videos...Yay!

2006-03-03T03:00:00.000-08:00

Fun video yay:

Also rad, the Beck fold in style video for "Girl":

And uh...fucking bizarre Bjork video. I guess it's pretty much accepted that any Bjork video is bizarre, but shit man. This shit is bizarre. My brain exploded when I saw the cat just cold chillin' by the door.

Here's the video

Ah Youtube. Hours of fun you are.

Kenne's Birthday

2006-02-23T20:01:00.000-08:00

It's the Medium Pimp's bday!

The Medium Pimp sits on his throne of ladies

Kenne hates being surrounded by women, which is why...he is only a Medium Pimp.

Dave's freakishly large tongue came out to wish Kenne a happy birthday.

Yeah, all the ladies look like that after they witness "The Tongue"

The large balloon factory next door gave Mary's hair static problems all night long

Later in the night, as everyone left the bar, Heather started abusing Kenne. It was a horrific display of anger and malice. I don't know what prompted the attack, but within one block of leaving the bar, Heather became a tornado of fists, and feet. Kenne almost died.

Kenne tried to escape

Smiling is the new "I'm gonna kick you in the balls" face

Clay attempted to break things up

With a limp wristed, half assed "Stop it guys"

Heather killed him without delay. We still can't find Clay's body.

Kenne turned the tables for a bit

Heather rested for a moment

Then attacked

Happy Birthday Kenne. Hope the scars have healed.

California Adventure

2006-02-22T09:51:00.000-08:00

On Monday, Jeff, Marcy and I hit up California Adventure. The cheeseball step-sister to Disneyland. I gotta say...California Adventure kinda sucks.

If you're at an adventure/theme park, and the whole time you are there you are planning what time to leave so that you don't hit traffic on the way back, that's a sign that the park really isn't offering you much in the way of a good time.

On the way in you walk under

The Golden Gate Bridge!!! Woah!

Much like the real Golden Gate Bridge this replica is a popular suicide spot for young Orange County Residents with deep issues ranging from not getting an Audi or BMW for their birthday, to not being able to get a high enough lift kit for their truck to go to Fontana or other parts around the OC. Suicide is not the answer kids.

Once in the park we made a bee line to

THE TOWER OF TERROR! Cue terrifying screams!

Here's a view from the line

Tower of Terror was a lot of fun, so that was a plus. You strap into the seats within an elevator that takes you through a twilight zoney experience of darkness, and light until finally you rise up and then drop. You rise up again, and then drop. Rise up, and drop. Rise up, and then here's the kicker...you drop. It's fun.

Get a load of this guy's shirt

"8th Annual Male Bonding Trip"?. Awesome dude. I'm down for next year. It's gonna be sweet. Just us dudes. I'm gonna eat wings! Put hot sauce on everything I eat! I want to buy a sweet leather NFL hat too! Go football!

California Adventure also has a sweet replica of Crazy Wolf Mountain

I have yet to learn where Crazy Wolf Mountain lies in California, but if it's represented here at California Adventure, then it's a real California thing.

I believe that Crazy Wolf Mountain was the site of the Wolf crowning ceremony way back when California was ruled by the wolves. The Lion King was based on those events, but they used lions instead of wolves due to a dispute with the Wolf Actors Guild or WAG.

We also went on a roller coaster called California Screamin', which was fun. That's all I did. I left the park early to beat traffic. Did I beat traffic? No.

President's Day!

2006-02-21T16:46:00.000-08:00

President's Day Snow Summit Funtime Snowboarding Bonanza!

Really really cold? Check.

After what seemed like a lackluster snow season, we finally got some new snow during the President's Day weekend. I haven't been snowboarding in a whole year due to my knee surgery last February. I was anxious to get back on the slopes.

That excitement lasted about 4 agonizing runs. I started experiencing sharp stabbing pain in my knee, which told me "Get the fuck off the mountain". Which I did pronto. So much for snowboarding. I went into the lodge and spent the rest of the day drinking and eating. Perhaps I'll try again later this season, but it's kind of a bummer realizing that my knee will probably hurt while snowboarding for the rest of my life. Yay!

Check out what the cold dry air did to my hands

Ok so the pics don't really show it, but my hands had all these cracks and lines. It's like my hands were Robert Redford's face.

We stayed at The Block Hotel, which is Mark Frank Montoya's hotel. For those of you who don't know who he is, he's a pro snowboarder, that opened these hotels at various ski/snowboard areas. They're really nice, each room features a huge hdtv, vodka and red bull are provided free, nice overall feeling, although it is a bit too bro brah for me.

Later that night we hit up Stillwells, for booze and live music provided by these guys

We were the only ones there

Yeah! Party!

Then I went home the next day.

Fucking A Right!

2006-02-15T11:26:00.000-08:00

Touche.

Friday

2006-02-10T11:13:00.000-08:00

My gift to you all

Direct any complaints to Willy P.

Dogs. They're like cellphones. Everyone's got one.

2006-02-08T14:36:00.000-08:00

Sage has one. His name is Willie. He pees. A lot. Everywhere.

Friend Jeremy has a pit bull pup.

That likes my shoes.

Another friend owns Zeus who is a huge Newfoundland, that moonlights as a bear.

He's a mellow dog, that doesn't care when people place dumb hats on his head.

He could easily rip us to shreds.

But thankfully. Does not.

Modem troubles

2006-01-30T19:25:00.000-08:00

"Ah shit! Our internet is still messed up!"

"I called the Geeksquad, and they're supposed to come by on Friday. I feel so disconnected from the world"

"Ahh! I'm so sick of going to the damn internet cafe"

"Ugghhh"

"I can fix it"

"Kenne? Where did you come from?"

"Uhh, I never left.."

"Soo you can fix our internet?"

"Man that would be awesome!"

"Fix your internet! Psh, I can do that in like two seconds"

"Oh awesome! When can you do it?"

"Ah crap! you've got macs right?"

"Oh what? You can't work on macs? You suck"

"Well then what now? Who can we turn to?"

"Oh, I know a guy"

"Who? WHO? Fuck this internet! aaargghhh"

"Ok it's gonna sound weird, but I know a guy.."

"Who the fuck is it?"

"It's Matt Damon, I'll give him a call"

"Matt Damon, woah!"

"It's all set, he'll be here tomorrow"

"Matt Damon?! EEEEEEE!"

The next day.....

"Hey fellas, I'm Matt Damon. I hear you're having internet troubles."

The End.

A Conversation

2006-01-30T19:00:00.000-08:00

Saturday Night, 10pm

"Mike!"

"I'm totally serious"

"Dude, you're looking way to into this"

"At least agree with me that there is evidence to support this theory"

"What, your theory that The Smurf's are socialist propaganda?"

"Yeah. Seriously, they all look the same, they're known only by either their trade or what they bring to the table. They all wear the same little white pants!

"Uhhh..(mindless drivel).."

"Also, look at Papa Smurf. Isn't he a little, maybe a cuter Karl Marx? His pants are the color red. He's got the beard..."

"Uggh, dude, this is stupid. When's Kenne getting here?"

"He's right here. Mike, you gotta listen.."

"Shut up! Let's just go out already!"

"No wait, Gargamel and Azrael! Azael is the working class man! He's a tool for Gargamel! Gargamel uses him for his dirty work!"

"Ok dude, fine, but we're running late, let's go. Kenne?"

"I WANT DRINKEE!"

"Shit!"

"Yeah we gotta take off, it's late"

Origami

2006-01-30T17:12:00.000-08:00

Origami is an ancient and very difficult art form to master. Luckily for me I have been taught this art form at the El Coyote Grill in Laguna Beach, California. Located behind the children's menu, are instructions on how to make an origami fish.

It was one of the most difficult things I have ever attempted in my life.

Here I am making the initial folds

Jeff marvels at the difficulty of the origami fish

The folds must be precise

Attention to detail a must

One mistake would bring years of disgrace upon my family

Those around watch mouths agape in awe

Twenty long minutes later...I think I have it..

Yes. I did it. It was the most confusing thing ever.

Shit on the radio

2006-01-26T12:03:00.000-08:00

I swear, if I hear that god damned Matisyahu song "King Without A Crown" one more time I'm going to throw a sack of kittens into the river.

It hurts my face

Yeeargh! It's playing right now!

I especially cringe when he utters: "Wweegee Weegee Oh! Weegee Weege Oh"

Ughhhh..I'd rather listen to the sounds of an abortion than hear this fucking shit over and over and over.

Someone please bury this song deep within the archives of "Song Dont's".

It's Poo!!!

2006-01-23T21:37:00.000-08:00

Saturday! Heather's birthday!

Heather with Jason, and a very excited Chris

Excited about Team Off In The Corner's reunion?.....Perhaps..

Kenne's look of excitement temporarily stuns Chris, but disgusts Mary

Sensing his ability to stun others, Kenne launches a campaign unleashing all of his facial stun techniques.

However he met his match with Jeff aka "Captain Jack Spare-row" bowler extraordinaire

Damn!

Here is a montage of Kenne faces

Which doesn't quite live up to the stellar montage of Dave faces

We left the bar sometime late in the night and piled into Chris' car.

Chris' car features the standard steering wheel, seats, air conditioning etc. You know, the normal stuff.

It also features a computer. It's amazing. Why? Because you can watch Back To The Future on it duh!

And it has a keyboard to input information!

We tried mapping out the directions to my house, but "Car-puter" couldn't find it. Good thing I knew the way home. I know my address! I can also tie my shoelaces, and ride the bus all by myself.

The computer can also be controlled by touch screen!

But you can only use dainty pressure.

The "Car-Puter" is awesome, except when it cries out "Teach me to love" in a dying voice every time you shut off the engine. That's a little bit sad.

"You're just a Car-Puter! You can't love! hahahaha! Stupid Car-Puter"

The next morning we all had brunch at Heather's where we feasted on copious amounts of food. I helped do stuff!

Heather's friend Kat made a lot of stuff, including

POObutter.

Actually it's chocolate butter. It was tasty. But it looks like poo! hahahaha. Man that'll never get old. POO!!!

Great weekend, I was so dead on Sunday. The brunch was a great idea.

It looks like poo!!!