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 |   The only blog that will put hair on your chest... |
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** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Turning from the Dark Side ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** < This is where I'll insert a cool new blog description. Someday. > |
| Last night was the annual Little League meeting for selecting coaches of the 11 & 12 year old all-star team. My father and I decided to coach the team as our last hurrah of sorts. The last time we coached that team was 2002, and the team won the district championship. We lost in the sectionals tournament, a western Mass tourney that was won by a Worcester team that eventually made it all the way to the Little League World Series in Williamsport, PA. I remember that entire tournament vividly. I especially remember the routine of getting ready before the first game and every game thereafter. I always fetched my keys, wallet, watch, scoreboard, and pencils in the same order before I left the house. I'd have three scoops of cookies n'cream ice cream right out of the bucket, and I'd give a ritualistic farewell to my mother. Some people call it being superstitious, but years ago I had noticed how my rituals coincided with victories. Some people would say it was exactly that: a coincidence. Maybe, but if man-made coincidence was helping our team, who was I to argue with the baseball gods? I got a little antsy before the first game when we didn't get out of the house exactly on schedule. My father was on the crapper, and he was apparently trying to push China out his ass because he was in there for a half hour with no reading materials. (Not that he would read in the bathroom or anywhere else for that matter anyway.) He came out after a bit, and we hurried to the game. We won the first game 11-1, and our pitcher threw a no-hitter. I ran through my pregame ritual again the second day, and this time I had to wait for my father to expel the southern tip of Africa. Why he decided to start getting regular moments before we had to leave for each game was beyond me, but I dealt with it. We won that game 17-7. On the way home my father told me he had a revelation. He had come to realize that he could predict the outcome of each game based on his bowel movement. A big, fiberous turd meant lots of runs and almost a sure victory. Basically a good BM meant a good game. Conversely, a scattering of little turds meant we'd scratch out some runs but have our work cut out for us. A wet and runny movement meant disaster, a game riddled with walks and errors. I laughed at him, especially after he described the two footlong monsters he pushed out before the first two games. The third game was much of the same, poop-wise and game-wise, and we won 9-3. Before game four, I jokingly asked how his BM went, and he said it would be a tougher game but we would come out on top. We won 9-6. His pooscapades were starting to get a little eerie. Before Game 5 he let me know that bastard turd had hung for dear life but it had eventually came out nicely. I laughed at him, but it wasn't so funny when we won that championship game 7-4 after getting out of a bases loaded jam with no outs and their leadoff hitter coming up. I was starting to wonder if it was really coincidence. We moved on to the next tournament and had to leave early to get all the way to Agawam, Mass. I asked him how it went, and to my horror he said "I couldn't go this afternoon." We lost in extra innings on a catchable fly ball that tragically hit the left field fence with the winning run already on third base. I had gone through my usual ritual before the game, so I couldn't blame it on that. I really started to wonder. In fact I tried to take a dump of my own before the next game. I'm shit pushing right now just thinking about it. On the long drive to North Leominster the next day, my father gave me a forlorn look. "It was tiny." I had never seen him so crestfallen. This was the tough-as-nails man I had always looked up to, and he was approaching tears because of a weak turd showing. I nearly cried. Or shit myself, which seemed to be the more appropriate reaction. The score remained at 1-1 until the very last inning. They advanced a runner to third with one out, and the next guy up hit a grounder to third. Our third basemen checked the runner, holding the game where it was, and fired to first. An errant throw kicked up dirt in front of the bag, but our first basemen scooped it for the second out. He spun around and threw to the plate. The throw was in foul territory, and the catcher dove back to the plate a second too late. We lost that pitcher's duel 2-1 in the last inning. A tiny, tiny turd of a game. Coincidence? I think not. |
| Why is it that people who appear to be in authority positions insist on helping their underlings along when they in fact have no grasp on the situation at all? Why do "important" people pretend to know what they're doing? Why do they insist on us doing things a certain way or get upset when things don't go as they expected, when they never understood the problem in the first place? I remember graduating college and beginning the great job hunt. My parents and extended family couldn't understand why it took so long to find job. Every day it was "How many resumes did you send out today?" Well, let's see, I'm qualified for exactly three jobs in the entire county this week and I already applied to them, so that equates to exactly zero for today. They never stopped to realize how worthless the degree is when nothing is available. Nor could they ever understand the differences between Bachelors vs. Masters and 5 years experience vs. zero experience. The only member of my family with a degree was a nurse, and we always need nurses, so they couldn't understand why it was so hard for me to find a job. Sorry, this is so tough folks, I guess I should have dropped out and got a job at Burger King. At least I'd be employed now huh? Better yet, I should just go to work selling USB flash cards at BestBuy with my Bachelors in computer science. That would have been worth 5 years and countless thousands of dollars, right? My idiotic, redneck, extended family started sending me ads they saw for any and all computer jobs. They were pumping me with the same old question, "When are you going to apply for that job at Salisbury school?" I'm not sure how many times I explained to them that networking and programming were two entirely different things and I had no networking certifications. They finally understood when I put it in typical NASCAR fashion. "It's like the difference between a racecar driver and his mechanic. They use the same equipment, but they do totally different things." The synapse finally fired and the comprehension made it back and forth between the two lonely brain cells. It was followed by much ooh'ing and ahh'ing. Stupid hicks. Thank God I don't speak to any of them anymore. Thankfully, where my extended family drove me nuts, my parents were pretty supportive and mostly just let me be until I found a job. But I discovered that at work, you deal with a whole slew of people that try to tell you what to do without ever having a clue. Telling stories about each of them would be like running down the list of Darwin award winners, so I won't bother. But as I watched my supervisor stare at the wall with a blank expression this morning, I knew I had to write about this. My supervisor somehow took over the IT department just before I arrived on the scene. He was an engineer, who had weedled his way into that position without a degree. Now he was the IT supervisor, and he couldn't tell SQL from an SQM. The programmer I work with says it's because he's a member of the Engineering Penis Club, which is to say he's an engineer and he has a penis, which puts you on the fast track to promotion in this company. Whatever, so long as he stays locked in his office balancing budgets with smoke and mirrors while those of who actually know how to click a mouse take care of business. So long as he just lets us be. He used to be swamped with work, which meant he'd lock himself in that cubicle and we'd get everything done ahead of schedule and exceeding performance measures. That's because we kick ass, and I personally am the master of ass kickery. Damn, I love that word. But now he's caught up on stuff, and he wants to "get involved." It makes me think of when you're about twelve and you've got a great game of kickball going with the neighborhood kids, but along comes your puny little brother who's just as likely to blow a snot rocket on himself as he is to actually make contact with the ball. Your mother forces you to let him play, and you watch in horror as the game degenerates into an unskilled battle of which team sucks less. Pretty soon the real players are leaving or just plain don't care, and it takes thirty-three minutes to get through a single kicker because your idiot brother just tried to kick the ball with his elbow. My supervisor is the snot rocket, ignorant brother with the bruised elbow. He's also the curler-wearing mom who's making sure we let him play. People used to drop stuff on his desk, and he'd pass it along to me immediately. He'd give me the problem and just let me be. Now he tries to look at it himself first, which roughly means he prints out binders full of irrelevant data and wants to pinpoint why the system made this error. Every single time, and that is no exaggeration, his conspiracy theories of gremlins sabotaging our data have in fact been simple cases of users following procedures or entering data incorrectly. Newsflash, people, "a problem with the system" probably isn't actually a problem with the system unless multiple users produce the same errors multiple times. We make our systems so that trained monkeys can use them. But our trained monkeys are too busy flinging dung on and around the water cooler to ever learn how to do it the right way. My supervisor keeps bringing the same sort of data problems to me. Each time we've pinpointed it to a single user who we know is entering things incorrectly. I explain this to him as he stares at me like a deer in headlights. I can almost see his gears coming to a grinding halt. Sometimes I throw technical phrases in the mix just so I can inwardly snicker when his eyes bulge. Then I pause for a second, creating an awkward silence, which I then break by asking him if he understands what I just explained. For a moment he'll gasp, breathe deeply, and his eyes and even head will dart around looking at everything and nothing at the same time. (One of these days I'm going to give my answer in code and see if his head corkscrews a la the Exorcist.) Finally he'll give his reply, and in typical management employee fashion he'll never quite answer but instead start spouting off things like "But why would the system do it like that..." I knew it, he had no fucking clue what I just said. Next week I think I should tell him a microscopic demon has slipped in through our firewall and is dismantling the entire database and replacing it with photos of a three-legged dog pooping, which coincidentally is the single most hilarious image known to man. Then I'll sell the story of his spontaneous combustion to World Weekly News. Since he won't just let me be, I've worked out a routine. He comes into my cubicle with a ream of paper, of which I only need one sheet, and plops down in the spare seat in my cube. At that point I quickly close the Writing.com IM console, so I don't get bothered by any IMs whilst he embarks on his nonsensical meanderings of a system he doesn't understand in the least. He likely wouldn't know what the IMs are, and I think I could convince him that Jodi saying she wants to lick me or Mia calling me a jackass is really just the computer assimilating all the artificial intelligence I programmed in the last six minutes. Then he starts laying out the paper and describing the problem. I zone him out after the first twenty-three seconds. Always twenty-three. By then I already know what I need to fix, and I already know what he's going to say he thinks is wrong. He's also going to want me to investigate and document this feature of the system and ask the vendor for a fix or workaround. I'm going to nod and say "yup yup" and never bother to tell him that either that part of the system is actually just used for sending prank calls to our customers or that I've already fixed the problem while he was just intently staring at the tack on my cubicle wall like he could see Jesus in it or something. He'll start wringing his hands and scratching his head, all the while sighing and shaking his head, because he genuinely thinks we have a system issue. I promise to fix the current problem and contact the vendor to find the bug. He promises to get more information from the user, whom I've already emailed with every question I'll ever need answered while he was being hyptonized by the worthless printout of the print queue. Then he leaves and expects to reconvene later to address the issue. By the time he returns I've concocted a suitable tale of how our vendors found and fixed the bug that wasn't a bug. He'd save himself thirty points on his blood pressure and ten years on his life if he'd just let me be. When will people just let me do my job and leave me be? When will smart people stop wasting productivity on teaching the stupid people? Just let us do our thing, and everything will be okay. I promise. |
| A few months back our human resources department held a little training session. Roughly 40 employees sat down at 5 tables. Each table was littered with over-sized and over-turned puzzle pieces. The anal and motivated problem-solver in me took over. I began flipping the pieces and assembling the puzzle. And for this I was reprimanded. I had to dissemble what I had assembled and turn them back over. The meeting started when all the slackers finally arrived 10 minutes late. Apparently they still had stuff to chat about at the water cooler. We were then instructed to assemble the puzzle on our table. I knocked off the puzzle almost single-handedly well before any other table was half done. And we were of course missing pieces. The next trick was going table to table to find your missing pieces. I snatched those quickly, without ever asking, because the other problem-solvers were too busy scarfing the donuts and coffee to answer anyway. I had the puzzle solved in no time flat, and all for jack squat. So what's the lesson of this story? The smart, hard-working people always carry the load, and the slackers coast along on our coattails. Sounds an awful lot like socialism to me. And that's what team building effectively is: socialism. Socialism, communism, it's all the same, and it all translates to working people doing everything while the lazy bastards get a free ride. I thought I escaped this nonsense of working with ninnies within the confines of my own blog. My blog is exactly what the possessive pronoun says: mine. I crank out as much or as little content as I want, I write about what I want, and no one will share the glory of my blogging exploits. But no longer, because the journal contest has a new bonus game. You get paired up with a random journaler and have to generate two collaborative entries. I looked over the pairings and realized how absolutely unfair it was to some people. When did I fall into a vortex and end up back in grade school? When did Ms. Shannon assign Robbie the nose picker to be my partner for the science project? When did I wind up doing all the work while Robbie ate his damned boogers? Screw you, Robbie, and the short bus you rode in on! Ooh, ooh, here's a thought: I'll tell Ms. Shannon how I did all the work and then redid it when Robbie misspelled his name on the final draft. That way I'll get an A, and he'll fail. Now that would be fair, but that's not how it works. Instead we'll just get the same grade. That way the teachers union can carry on with this wicked plot to instill liberal, communist bullshit in the minds of our children. Luckily I got a serious partner who's bearing her fair share of the load. I didn't get a slacker or a complete assclown like some people did. I was a lucky one, but the liberal nonsense of "team building" is always unlucky for some. With slackers, you do all their work and earn the grade/points/money for both of you. It's a lot like welfare, another abomination horribly managed by touchy-feely liberals who come from trust funds and don't give a thought to ever having to work to support the crackwhore on the corner who's feeding twelve kids by twelve fathers. That's what exercises like this really teach: how to support our fellow man because he's a worthless bum. It could be worse than being paired with a slacker though. Suppose instead you're paired with someone who does work but only succeeds in hindering you? A few people got paired with people they genuinely dislike. Thank goodness that didn't happen with me, or shannon's contest would have quickly degenerated into a flame war. (Actually that would have been really fun, especially since I would have eaten my opponent alive.) But what if you're one of those poor bastards that has to write something collaboratively with your personal definition of pond scum? Or what about having to write with someone who's guaranteed to bring your score down just for being a total dipshit and/or bore? Some people may as well have gotten paired up with potatoes, because that's about the level of excitement and intellect their partners have to work with. What if you like writing controversial stuff and your partner is a religious zealot that has to ask God for permission to talk about dirty sweatsocks? Well, the liberals who devised these idiotic exercises will claim this exercise will then bring diverse people together. Yeah, and when they fail to produce anything substantive together, you'll dock 'em both. Because even though you live in a land of make-believe with gumdrops and lollipop lanes, the world doesn't work like that. People who butt heads on principle will always butt heads. This grade school team building exercises never really accomplish anything except to get the good pairings extra points and give free points to the stupid people lucky enough to draw a good partner. I immediately had a second gripe when I saw this little bonus game. It stifles creativity. My blog is where I spout off about absolutely anything. I write what I want, when I want, and no one can tell me to shut up or argue with me to write about something else. If you don't like what you read, then just don't read it. But when you write with someone, you have to agree on the topic at a minimum. If you're stuck in one of those shitty pairings I mentioned above, there's no way in hell you'll get to write what you really like writing. You'll both wind up writing something about which neither of you have much to say. You'll spin a bullshit entry, like I just did with this one, because you suddenly can't write about how you shit your pants today, or how much God touches your life, or how you've never had any friends, or how you want to bone this chick and that chick, or how mean PC is, or whatever else all you journalers write about. You're stuck in a tunnel, and every time you try to escape through one of those portholes, some communist pushes you back in. And yes, it's always a communist. Bastards. Some people succeed and some people fail. When you match these people up you get mediocrity. How about putting all the successful people with more successful people, have them create something amazing, and tell the others to go grab us some McDonald's? I didn't bring lunch today, and I'm fucking starving. |
| http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000CMKPDI/ref=dp_return_1/104-5274072-3376764?... You need to check this link. It's the best thing since sliced bread. The reviews are the most important part. |
| Every "game" has a winner and a loser(s). If no one wins, it's not a game, it's just an exercise. "Exercises" are for pussies and socialists. That's all. |
| I'm a good sport, so I decided to really think about this exquisite corpse thing and see if I could figure it out. I thought about it all during my drive home and all while I was coaching baseball this afternoon. I think I understand how the game works now. I took some heat for expressing my opinion, which is apparently something I shouldn't be doing in my own blog. You should never be rude or hateful towards someone in your blog, so I'm not entirely sure why people are during that towards me. I think there's a word for not practicing what you preach, but it escapes me at the moment. I think it starts with an H. At least four people agreed with me. We all detest poetry and so not surprisingly it was all Greek to us. Because this is a journaling contest, and since journals are for writing out our innermost thoughts, we all wrote exactly what we were thinking. I'm the problematic one though, so my entry was especially hateful I guess. That's okay, I have no qualms about being the poster child for honesty. Or realism. It's funny that my most scathing criticism came in the form of commenting that life isn't all logic. Very true, though I never claimed it was. There's a difference between reality and nonsense though. I can function perfectly fine using mostly just logic in the real world. The Exquisite Corpse is an exercise in surrealism, and last I checked surrealism is definitely NOT realism. Forgive me for being grounded in reality. Woe is me for not seeing the point of melting clocks. But, like I said, I figured this game out. Incidentally why do we call it a game if there are no winners? Is this one of those games invented by new-age parents in which every child, regardless of incompetence, wins? Like when little Mikey pins the tail in Robbie's neck instead of the donkey and gets a prize for "trying his best?" One of those games that encourages everyone to be mediocre and promotes socialism? No matter... I read examples in other peoples blogs and journals, and I have a handle on this now. The whole point is to grab random phrases, slap them together in particular order, ignore all semblance of sentence structure, grammar, and coherency, pretend to be an A student in creative writing class, and call all the incongruous phrases "symbolism." I have to say it's pretty brilliant. It surely must be the only literary game that handicaps a twit well enough to compose something that rivals the great minds of our day. I'm not a very creative person myself, at least not when it comes to composing seemingly incoherent phrases. I was always one of those anal toddlers who turned to the next page and started over if I colored outside the lines. So rather than create a mental short curcuit, I've devised a plan for composing my own exquisite corpse. I'm going to cut out all the headlines in the newspaper and lay them out on the floor. Then I'll snatch them up in whichever order Zeus drools on them. I'll reattach them in that order, and throw a comma and line break after every 10th syllable or so. It'll be genius. I may even put an anthology together from a bunch of exquisite corpses. Though just for variety, I'll have my cat Ty and my 1+ year old nephew-to-be pick some headlines too. Once Luke learns to read though, I'll need to find a replacement, because understanding the written word will screw the whole thing up. Thanks for enlightening me. Being a poet is going to be so much fun! |
Huh?  My head nearly exploded when I read this prompt. I have absolutely no idea what I just read, and I'm fairly certain I need to be experiencing an opium-induced hallucination to completely understand it. It's something right out of the verses of "Kubla Kahn."This is exactly the stream of consciousness, new-age, artsy nonsense I was afraid of. What did I just read? I honestly have no idea. I have never seen so much right-brained surrealism thrown on a single page in my life. It's like Picasso just gave me my next journal prompt. My brain doesn't work like that. The left side of my brain, the analytical, logic-based, linear thought side, controls 99% of my body. The 1% my right side controls is just enough to blow the boogers out of my left nostril. I'm not going to attempt to play along and create an "exquisite corpse" or whatever it is. For one thing I don't understand the rules, for another I simply don't do poetry, and finally, anything that involves the French is clearly for hippies and communists. Anyone who has read my blog knows my opinion of those particular type of... creatures. I wasn't around in the 60's to smoke all the weed necessary to write an exquisite corpse, and I've never touched LSD or Ecstacy in my life. I don't take marijuana for medicinal purposes, and my favorite movie of all time isn't "A Clockwork Orange." I don't wear tie-dye shirts or berets, and I've never been to a poetry reading. I'm not an "artist." I know this is right up your alley if you're one of these "my journal is art" types. Have fun with it. I'm sure if I was a beatnik, a stoner, a sex-crazed poet, or a pained artist I'd be loving it. It sounds like a neat idea, and I'm sure it warrants a great deal of creativity. It's just not my thing. If you ask me to make my own Picasso, I'll go rearrange some guy's face. (In fact I have the guy all picked out; he's an alcoholic who sees the world in two genders: men and the people men fuck. Any guesses who? Now that would be a most exquisite corpse.) You artsy types will call me ignorant, or *gasp* a philistine. Yeah, yeah, whatever, I probably am. My brain doesn't work like that. But frankly I'd rather be getting paid big bucks to write code than sit around smoking the peace pipe and living the grandiose life of the starving artist. I really wish I could play this game, whatever it is. I wish I had a poetic ear or a non-dormant cell on the right side of my brain. But I don't. I think in binary, not in nonsense. |
| Okay okay, I know you're all sick of the scat stories, but the coolest thing just happened and I must share it. I can count the number of times it's happened in my lifetime, and each time brings a new sense of awe. It burns like hell for a minute, but it's so worth it. I felt a fart coming on, so considering I was sitting in my cubicle, I did my best to suppress it. But then I felt a tickle in my nose, and I knew a momentous thing was about to happen. I sneezed, a violent sneeze that throws your head back and gives you instant pain in your neck and shoulders. The force was too much to bear, and I sneezed out my other end at exactly the same time. I'm sure it would have been a loud, ripping fart, so I was thankful for the muffling effect of the atchoo. When you fart and sneeze at the same time, your body feels like it's exploding in both directions. At first there's a mini implosion as both suck inward, and then your inwards shoot out in both directions, in a sensation that very nearly matches an orgasm for sheer pleasure. It's like being violently tickled from the inside out. Okay, so maybe it's not actually very pleasurable, but I cherish the feeling even so. The moment of explosive is followed by a brief moment of seering pain. The sheer force of your fart burns your ass and you wonder for a moment if you soiled yourself. The battling forces of ass rippery and nasal convulsions send stabbing pains through your neck, down your shoulders, and into your arms. It's all gone in an instant thankfully, and all you have left is skidmarked undies, a palm of greenish white goo, and a schoolboy giddiness. |
| Well, I chose to wait until Sunday to reply to this journal prompt. That way the title is not only mind-numbingly dull but also completely out of place. Did you know that tomorrow is Monday, June 5? Astonishing, isn't it? I nearly shat myself with excitment. "This entry is going to be short or long..." It will probably be interesting or boring too. It might be funny or dull. Oh wonder of wonders, it might be even good or bad. On the other hand, it could be medium length, mildly interesting, worth one or two snickers, and more or less mediocre. Nah, it's just going to suck. I think my IQ dropped thirty points just by replying to this. I get bronchitis almost every year. And lo and behold, the inclimate weather of New England means temperatures varying from -20 to 110 degrees. It must have something to do with that. I'm almost 100% certain that I'm the only person in the world that ever gets sick though. Woe is me. Oh no, I just had to clear my throat. I should go into scroll now and let the whole W.com world know that today is another potentially bad day. I can already see my luck unravelling. I wouldn't be surprised if I break one of my dirty plates today. Maybe I should go kick a Munchkin just to feel better. And now, because I absolutely adore throwing as much non-coordinating crap into a journal entry as possible, I'm going to talk about the SLAM. I don't write poetry. I'm way too manly to aspire to be the next Walt Whitman. I only know that the SLAM is some poetry contest. I'm not even sure why the whole word is capitalized. In fact, I'm only writing about it because this prompt had nothing that I could spend more than a paragraph on with a clear conscience. I keep rereading the prompt, looking for some nugget of inspiration, something not entirely inane. I'm actually mildly disappointed that the prompt wasn't as whiny as I expected. That would have given me plenty of journal fodder. But I can't find anything that would inspire me to write a decent, albeit problematic entry. I'm either losing my touch, or Shadow has just outsmarted me. Someone please load the gun for me, I only need one bullet. I'm hereby dedicating this entry to Jodi, shannon, Mia, Haizey, Pia, Alyssa, and plenty more. They all know what I'm talking about. |
| PC is perfectly horrible and loving every damn minute of it. He needs a DNA transplant very quickly. *wipes away a tear* That's so... beautiful. Well, except for the double adverb at the end, which is a pretty typical writing flaw. Well, I could talk about all those flaws Zoo mentions, but since I can't remember having any, I'll have to respond to the first part of his entry. It seems Zoo and I have yet another thing in common. I bet he's flattered. I wonder if I'll be like him in 40 or 50 years, or however long it takes to get that old. I think by then Jodi will be as problematic as me, probably even more so from living with me all those years, so we should be all set. But I digress... Zoo's related to the serial killer Albert DeSalvo (or something like that, I can't be bothered to go look up the exact name). Of course I'll do him one better, but he should be used to that by now. One of my ancestors was a special kind of serial killer. *dramatic pause* Nope, I'll get to that in a minute for the sake of putting my readers on the edge of their seats. Oscar Beckwith panned for gold in the Catskills in the late 1800's. A hermit living in a run-down shack in the wilds of the mountains and panning for gold in upstate New York was only a part of his saga. He had a partner, whose name escapes me at the moment. Apparently there were at least two crazy kooks who looked to make their fortunes gold panning in the Catskills. Oscar's partner turned up missing, and the Beckwith who shares his namesake with a Sesame Street grouch fled to the caves near some local lake. Authorities finally came looking for Oscar's partner and find the remnants of his bones in good ol' Oscar's woodstove. They searched his cabin and found a diary detailing each of the people Oscar had killed and... eaten. That's right, I descend from a New York cannibal! Beat that, Zoo-boy!  According to Oscar, Native American Squaw is the most tender of meets, and his diary certainly indicated he had experience trying a variety of human livestock. The many charred bones confirmed the contents of his diary. Apparently the bones themselves were not incriminating enough for him. What serial killer would be complete without a boastful journal of his exploits? Hey, I never said the Beckwith line was the sharpest of the sharp... this is probably where I should claim to be adopted. Oscar was convicted and hanged in Albany before the turn of the century. He was known as the "Columbia County Cannibal." If you don't believe me, you can read part of the story at http://timesunion.com/ASPStories/Story.asp?storyID=486352&newsdate=6/2/2006&BCCo.... Hmmmm, I just realized I want everyone to believe me when I say I'm related to a cannibal. I feel like I'm back in high school... Friends in high school didn't believe me, so we started researching it on the net and found all that information. We also found a group of local nut cases who claim Oscar was innocent and the legend was used as a scapegoat. They call themselves Friends of Oscar Beckwith, or FOOB. I wonder how they gain more credibility: referring to themselves as FOOB or defending a convicted cannibal? Keep on fighting the good fight, Foobsters! Now I like the taste of human flesh as much as the next guy, but it has to be Jodi's and there's no teeth involved. Oscar's DNA is in my system though, so just be thankful I write about poop rather than post recipes for liver cooked in Chianti. I could be PC or Hannibal Lector. Seriously now, which is worse? Hmmm, now how about the poop your body makes when you eat human liver? Now that's gross. Talk about damaged goods... |
| ... to come up with a better title. Seriously now, great prompt, Spidey, but how do I turn that ho-hum title into something sarcastic? Work with me, people, work with me! Anywho, what makes me happy? Well, nothing feels quite so exquisite as taking a good dump. This is especially true after a hard day of constipation. Being regular is the singular most... Heh, you actually thought I was going down that road again, didn't you? Puh-lease, despite my well-founded love for pooping, it's not remotely the happiest part of my life. Now, at the risk of alienating part of my readership, it's time for one of my sappy entries. (Don't worry, Mia, only the first paragraph or so will make you gag.) Anyone who's read this blog before has probably already guessed what makes me most happy on this earth. Before Jodi came into my life, happiness existed now and again, but a vague emptiness always accompanied it. Together we've both found completion and everlasting love and frienship. She's my best friend, and the only person I can imagine spending my life with. Since meeting her, the original purpose of this blog, as highlighted in the lengthy description above, has become non-existent. I'm a changed man, all for the better, and I could write an entire journal full of entries about the ways she makes me happy. I could detail pages of that little smirk she gives me when she winks, or the way she kisses me goodbye each day, or how she sips her ice tea, or that little pout that melts my heart. But no matter how important all those seemingly simple things are to me, I know those details would bore my readers and make them all wonder if I've gone all gooey and lovey-dovey. Of course the truth is I have, but that wouldn't be very problematic, now would it? But she does other stuff that makes me happy too, stuff that's not so sickening to you sad, lonely folks out there. *cough* Mia *cough* Anyone who's known Jodi a while knows the shy, sweet little Jodi who's full of kindness, compassion, manners, sugar and spice, and everything nice... or some such. But now I'm rubbing off on her. Sweet little Jodi is getting a bit problematic.  The other day she came up to me and sat on my lap. We cuddled for a bit, when suddenly she reared back and smirked. "I just farted on your leg," she said. Never has my heart swelled with such pride and love for her. She farts in bed every night now too. More importantly, she announces it. She still has some room for improvement though. I'm working on showing her the leg lift technique. When you signal an upcoming blast by lifting your leg and ass cheek off the bed, you've reached an all new level of fart mastery. If farting was a martial art, that would be like third degree rippery. She's mastering the crude insult too. Today in scroll she came shockingly close to calling Mia a wench. Not particularly witty, but absolutely perfect. It's about as close as you can get to the most fitting example of name-calling. She leaves people speechless now. My father called the other night and said Zeus's testicles reek of something rotten since he was neutered. She asked him what he was doing that close to a dog's testicles. Genuis, my love, genuis. And to her future father-in-law no less. I was practically beaming when I heard the story. The most amazing thing about this kind of relationship is the way we know what the other is thinking. She and I are one in the same now. Our minds are linked. She can tell when I'm planning a fart just by the way I flex a leg muscle. I can tell when she's horny just by the inflection in her voice. We can nearly finish each other's insults. She knows me so well and knows what embarrasses me, which is something that's actually possible by the way. She's the only person that can embarrass me publicly, and she trembles with glee afterwards. (I take that back, my father blasting "China Grove" from the juke box at the local Papa Gino's whilst playing the air guitar and dancing in the aisles is pretty much the most embarrassing moment of my life. He's done it roughly six times. And you wonder where I get it from.) What makes me happiest of all is that she loves me.  *insert the retching sounds of my readers here*The other day I got up at 5:00 AM to get ready for work as I always do. I stepped into the shower and noticed a new message. We have special crayons used for writing on the shower and tub, and we often leave each other little notes. I won't make any of you spew with the heart-felt, wax words we leave on the porcelain, but that day a lone tear of joy and awe trickled down my cheek as I read the message she had left me: I love you more than you love Chuck Norris. Now that is a commitment... I love you too, Chuck... er... Jodi! |
| Laura was the kind of dirty, haggard old crone that every small town needs. What fun is a village without its idiot? Laura was my village's idiot. She lived in a shanty in a part of town that made a trailer park look like a gated community. An old rascist friend of the family, who had spent his formative years serving in Vietnam, called it "Little Saigon." They never mowed the lawn, but we were thankful for that, because the high grass, ferns, and thistles hid all the rusted mufflers, dismantled lawn mowers, and shit-caked toys. Yes, the toys were shit-caked. I do believe that's the first time I've ever used that word, but I have no other way to describe it. On more than one occasion the neighborhood children, or vermin as we liked to call them, could be spotted taking a crap in the brook that ran behind their houses. They bathed and played in it too. All at the same time. Laura was the matriarch of this little hellhole of a neighborhood. Well, in actuality all her neighbors hated her, and being hated by scum is about as low as one can sink. She and her family lived in a brown shanty. The walls were simple pine boards, knotty pine boards, festooned with year-round Christmas lights. Those lights had the largest bulbs known to man, because God forbid her little corner of Heaven not be lit up like the Fourth of July. A ramshackle barn with a tin roof crumbled down on the hill behind the house. Her husband housed his swayback, rib-thin horses back there. Thank God for disability insurance, because his sore back kept him from finding work. He was a real trooper though, because he apparently dealt with the back pain while riding his bony beasts. Of Laura, her husband, her three kids, and her two brothers, only one half brother made it through high school. I remember him riding the bus when he was a senior. All the fifth graders used to pick on him. Her husband George must have possessed some special skills though because he drove around town in his 10 gallon hat with its oversized "Sherriff George" star. Their son wore the matching "Deputy Thomas" badge, and he wisely took it off while shitting in the brook. Like all good white trash, Laura and George had a penchant for instant scratch-off lottery tickets. They spent most of her paycheck and most of his disability check on lottery tickets. Don't worry though, they saved plenty for cigarettes. They somehow lost everything, probably because the banks love to pick on unfortunate people like them. The poop-brown shanty, which amazingly had a mortgage on it, was taken and auctioned off, and the vehicles were repossessed. The people who bought the house told everyone piss stains ran down the bedroom walls, and a one inch layer of dog shit coated the floor of another room. Personally, I give them credit for finding a way to urinate without running water. Who are they to judge anyway, considering they just spent several thousand dollars on a literal shithole? The proprietor of the local general store, who happened to be the most pompous impersonator of a good samaritan that I ever met, gave Laura a job tending his store and offered to manage their finances. (Rumor has it he almost fired her when lottery tickets started disappearing, but she has too much moral fiber to buy into those claims.) Going into the general store quickly became an exercise in wondering whether or not it was worth running into Hagatha. That's what we called her, because no name suited her better. Yes, it sounds like a witches name, but more importantly it begins with "hag." Laura wore a prominent tan all over her face and arms. By tan I of course mean grime and stains. Her tooth sparkled white however. (Actually no, it was jaundice yellow, but the contrast makes the story more interesting.) She slicked her long, black hair with all natural grease, and let her brown fingernails grow to dizzying heights. I don't suppose fingernails grow to "heights," let alone dizzying ones, but I've always wanted to use that trite phrase. Unfortunately the post office was connected to the general store so running into Hagatha was inevitable. You'd try to duck and slink around the Hostess rack, but she invariably spotted you and tried to strike up a conversation. Hopefully she'd talk quietly or mumble something so you could continue on your merry way and pretend you didn't hear her. Of course she'd persist in that case and it was a lost cause, but at least all onlookers realized she was no friend of yours. Sometimes you'd spot her in the supermarket. You'd be chatting it up with your neighbor or friend in front of the Stoffer's Frenchbread Pizzas, and along comes Hagatha and starts talking to you. At first you can pretend like you don't know her, but then she'll actually say something like "hey coz," because with all the inbreeding she just assumes you're related. At that point you'd trade pissing your pants right in the store for this embarrassment. Simply associating with her in public dropped you roughly three rungs on the evolutionary ladder. Believe it or not, Laura was an EMT. Apparently you don't need to know how to read to administer first-aid. Normally EMTs have to worry about bloody patients, but I'd be more afraid of the patient catching something from her. We often said, only half jokingly, that if she saved your life, you'd die of something far worse. I still think if given the choice between death and mouth-to-mouth with Laura, I'd like my ashes to be spread over the Atlantic. |
| My prompt for shannon's little contest spawned a large variety of responses. More importantly it proved all the points I wanted to make. Unexpectantly, it also generated some respect for a few of the contestants that I didn't know all that well. I learned right away who are real people, down to earth Joe Public, and who the high-and-mighty, self-important "artists" are. It's rather surprising how many people lack such an ordinary skill: the ability to take life and "art" a little less seriously. Some people take everything seriously, even something as ridiculous as blog entries about taking a crap. They can't abide people poking fun at them either. They can't recognize the simple fact that in the grand scheme of things their all-important blog means exactly nil. A few bloggers/journalers decided to use their response to personally attack me. Unfortunately for them they've chosen a very poor target. The truth is I find it hilarious. The fact that they would waste so much time compiling a discourse on the idiocy of poop entries is immensely funny. Likewise, the fact they would call me narcissistic is both ironic and nonsensical. I wrote "I'm a completely different breed; I write about poop." I had no idea that poking fun at my own scatalogical sense of humor was the act of a self-loving, self-important egomaniac. I wasn't aware that admitting my journaling inadequacies are replaced with nonsense and shocking behavior is the sure sign of a narcissist. I didn't realize that quite obviously exaggerating about poop is a delusion of grandeur fit only for self-important assholes. So was I over the top then? Was my entry truly offensive, self-important, and not the least bit entertaining? If it was, I guess I'd have to say "So?" However, I read every reply to it thus far, and I seem to recall that the vast majority of responses played along with my little scatalogical game. In fact, people I directly poked fun at seemed to recognize the obvious exaggeration and continued to poke fun back at me or even continued to poke fun at themselves. They remembered that the idea of the contest was to have fun. More importantly they realized there's no point in taking everything so seriously. Doubly interesting is the fact that one of the entrants who doesn't care for my brand of humor and didn't find my entry pleasing was smart enough to recognize the fact that I'm probably not as over the top as that particular blog entry would made me out to be. Though not her cup of tea, she recognized that ultimately it was all in good fun. If she doesn't like me or my humor, so be it, I respect that. But she also wasn't so immensely full of herself as to resent the atrocity of letting me influence her journal. Somewhat ironic though is her apparent dislike for my rare scat humor, despite her fawnings over a man whose favorite word is "booger." But I digress. Another entrant had a somewhat peculiar reply which included a variety of puns. I really hate puns, and this writer's particular style is not appealing to me. However, I gained new respect for this writer. She played along, poking fun and recognizing the actual harmlessness of my prompt. Hats off to you for knowing how to take a joke, be it a good one or a bad one. You have my respect for not taking everything so literally and seriously. Lots of entrants wrote about poop stories, which actually surprised me. Despite my dare to do exactly that, I expected people to respond to other parts of the entry. This unexpected development makes it all the more hilarious that some people would be offended by the entry. For every entrant who belittled my humor, made claims on my character, or refused to use their own journal to further such a cause there were many more entrants who wrote poop stories. So then, if the vast majority of entrants recognized my entry as the nonsense, poke-fun-at-life entry that it was, what does that tell us about the remainder? Obviously there are several possibilities. Maybe they're religious? Maybe they can't take a joke? Maybe their journal is their art and they don't dare mess it up? Maybe they stand on moral high ground? The last choice was clearly the case with the entrant who refused to use the "f" word, a word which rarely actually leaves my own mouth. I respect her for sticking to her principles. I may not agree with it, but I respect it. That she would leave the contest for it says something of her character. Despite this, she still thought my little anecdote was hilarious. Likewise, one entrant willingly changed the rating on their blog to accommodate my entry. Though clearly a polite person herself, she played along and even joked about it. My hats off to both of you for sticking to your principles but still recognizing the humor in life. So then, one person that doesn't like my humor and two more that didn't like my vulgarity either played along or saw the humor in the absurdity of the whole thing. The entry got a whole bunch more poop stories, some people poking fun at me and themselves, and entries that recognized humor from the least likely sources. Wow, my entry must have been so offensive and self-important. A couple people out of more than a dozen said so, so it must be true. Anyone else see the problem with this theory? Let's look at this logically. If a tiny minority felt that I am a self-important asshole, what does that tell us. They disagree with the majority. The majority has been wrong before though, so why would they feel this way? I could get down and dirty with this logic, and that might border on name calling, but I'm better than that. So I'll drop it. Hell no, I'm not actually better than that. So why then would they feel that way? Maybe they have a higher set of moral values? Let's see, one is a masochistic world-hater who uses vulgarity and inflicts misery like they're made of water, and the other is a literary wannabe that bears a personality trait with a horny dog that wanders the neighborhood and humps anything that moves. Nope, morals are clearly not a good reason to demean me, unless of course hypocrisy plays a large part, which isn't out of the question. Maybe they just don't have a sense of humor or they have a classier sense of humor? From what I can tell they like anger and sex jokes respectively. I have no idea how that translates, and I can't speculate. I'll let my readers draw their own conclusions. Maybe my uncouth, inferior ways are beneath them and their artistic blogs? I can definitely see where this might be valid, because their journals (I need to clarify journals rather than blogs, because journals are for writers and blogs are clearly for losers) are so damn important. Their journals set them apart as unique and talented writers. Their journals will turn them into best-sellers some day. They are so important and are so integral in all of our lives. We are so fortunate to be blessed with their presence. How else would we get our daily fix of bleeding and countless anecdotes and island installments that exude the debasement of women? I take it all back. I'm definitely an asshole. And loving it.  |
| Chuck Norris and Mr T. walked into a bar. The building immediately exploded because that level of awesome cannot be contained in a single room. Mr T always says "I pity the fool," but I don't ever recall him specifying which particular fool he pities. The context of the comment always made its meaning clear though, and he almost invariably pitied the poor sod who decided to mess with him. Clearly anyone who would mess with Mr T is a fool. Except for Chuck Norris. ML (normally I'd link her port here, but I can't recall her username and can't be bothered to look it up) apparently pities a lot of fools. I on the other hand pity none. Why should we pity fools anyway? I have no sympathy for stupid people. In fact, when they put themselves in situations over their heads, I may even take advantage of them. I make some nice extra cash fleecing all the idiots and fools that play poker. Stupidity is not a condition that deserves my sympathy. There are two kinds of fools, those that are genetically stupid and those that are too damn lazy to get a clue. Handicapped people are in neither group. Being handicapped is a unfortunate fluke, unless of course handicapped parents decided to mate, which incidentally should probably be illegal for the sake of children everywhere. I'm talking about real fools and idiots, people that flirt with that border of being legally retarded but don't actually suffer from a mental handicap. I almost, I say almost, feel bad for the first group. I feel bad because their idiot parents made the cosmic joke of having unprotected moron intercourse. People should seriously have to take an IQ test before having children. The government needs to institute a threshold of intelligence to allow parenting. This would actually solve our overpopulation problem, because it's the stupid people that fuck like rabbits. For that matter it would clean up our social services system, because kids would be raised by literate people instead of crack whores, inbreds, and politicians. And yes, all politicians fit into the category of stupid people. You can look it up. Then you have the people who are completely ignorant and don't mind staying that way. They don't get an ounce of pity from me. I only hate some of them though. Some of them are perfectly good people that just happen to be dumber than a box of rocks. We need uneducated people in our lives. Without them who would pump our gas, clean our toilets, and serve our fries when the high schoolers are at school? Come to think of it, it's probably good that those people procreate, otherwise we'd have a shortage of menial labor. Still no pity though. |
| This is the entry that everyone in shannon's contest is supposed to respond to. I already tricked a few people into thinking my "Celebrate This!" was the one I was submitting. Apparently they didn't read the rules, and I was counting on that. I already got at least two people to do twice as much work today as they had to. My plan worked flawlessly. Now for the real entry. But first, an anecdote... My parents had a little Memorial Day picnic yesterday afternoon. I left our apartment in the throes of diarhea, figuring I could get it back under control. Little did I know that the active ingredient in Nathan's World Famous Hot Dogs is apparently Ex-Lax. The corn on the cob didn't even stiffen up my bowels, so all during dinner and the ensuing game of volleyball I could feel something stirring down below. I dove for an errant volleyball, which is always a mistake, because getting up with a churning stomach is always a hundred times more difficult than falling down. The makeshift volleyball court was enveloped by an intense ripping sound, which ironically was not my fart. I had split my brand new shorts right down through the crotch, and I was suddenly hanging out for the world to see. Thankfully I was wearing underwear. Maybe a draft is a catalyst for wet farts or something, because I began to ooze. Jodi whipped the ball at me then, and I caught it hard against my stomach. That was all it took to squirt a little out. I waddled into the house with clenched legs and did the best I could. Luckily an extra pair of underwear remained at my parents' house, and I was able to change. By now you're wondering why on earth I would tell this little anecdote. Well, if you read my blog regularly, you know this is a pretty standard entry for me, especially lately. But why would I write it and share it? Simply because it's easily the most interesting and funny thing that happened to me yesterday, and that's how blogs should be. Shannon randomly assigned the entrants in her contest to dates for their journal prompt entries. The first two were not picked randomly however. She wanted to go first, fittingly so, but she also wanted me to go second. Maybe telling you this will get her in trouble or something, but I highly doubt that. The only ones who would care never had a chance of winning her contest anyway. So why did she want me to go second? Simple, because I'm the wild card, the loose cannon, the shocking, instigating, inspiring, ire-producing, death-defying... I've run out of adjectives, both real and made-up. I journal about anything that might be considered interesting, no matter how taboo or vile the topic. I write down what so many people are thinking but are too shy or cowardly to put to paper. I'm juvenile, sometimes obnoxious, and brutally honest to a fault. I'm the Howard Stern of blogging. This all equates to one important thing for her contest: reactions. I hypothesized long ago that negative emotions are the most entertaining ones to onlookers. No one wants to read happy stuff about gumdrops and rainbows when they can read a good rant about the assclowns in Scroll. So by creating anger, irritation, disgust, confusion, shock, etc., I'm bound to produce some good responses. Never one to shirk my duties, I saw this as a personal challenge. Here's how I figure it. I have no chance of winning this contest. I'm simply not literary and artsy enough. I write to entertain, not to produce thought-provoking masterpieces. Shannon already mentioned her favorite entry from the first day of competition. I couldn't even get through it. To me it was rambling nonsense about nothing visibly connected to her entry. It was all artsy fartsy, some sort of stream of consciousness bullshit. A literary masterpiece no doubt, but nothing that mainstream America, with our passive entertainment value and microscopic attention spans, would give a damn about. I never even finished reading it. In fact, the only entry I've read thus far that actually entertained me was that thing about a cornhole. (Seriously now, is there a more entertaining word than "cornhole?" I submit that there is not.) Everyone has to respond to this entry, which means everyone has to read it and use the same title. I stuck the word "fucking" in the title exactly for that purpose. I don't actually swear much at all, but I think it's hilarious that some of the high and mighty journalers have to use it in their titles now. I also made this entry excruciatingly long and repugnant. Now I can feel like I'm doing my civic duty by weeding out the boring people who write two sentence blurbs about how depressed they are. Most blogs are boring, so I'm going to either spice them up or make those bloggers run off screaming. It'll make Shannon's life easier, but more importantly I'll find it immensely hilarious. The best way to do that is to just let it all hang out, through the ripped crotch in your shorts if need be. Some of you bore us with the inane details of your day, like how many times you let the dogs out. Some of you are morally vapid sex fiends that journal about having or craving sex with every bimbo that walks into your life. Some of you incessantly whine about all your problems, tiny catastrophes that make you say idiotic things like "I tore that little plastic piece off my shoelace; it's going to be another bad day." Some of you confound us with utter nonsense that isn't nonsense for the sake of nonsense, but is in fact some sort of attempt at literary superiority. You know who you are, you "journaling is art" beatniks. Or how about the GPs mongers who don't really write anything that isn't a shameless plug or self-promoting diatribe? You GP whores signed up just for the chance to win GPs. You might have even created a brand new journal for this contest, thereby missing the entire point of this exercise. Tsk tsk. I'm a completely different breed; I write about poop. Somehow that means I can stir things up right off the bat. I guess Shannon figures I could throw a cog into the machine, thus forcing all the participants to really step outside their comfort zones and also weed out the wannabes with an offensive entry. I feel so... used. But here's to hoping I'm successful. And finally, if you had nothing worthwhile to respond to in that entire ramble, here's something to think about: the only thing worse than Hershey squirts are Hershey squirts on a 80-90 degree day with 90% humidity that makes your undershorts stick to your sweaty ass cheeks and sweat-slick ass crack. I dare you to write about that. |
| How come people say things like "Happy Memorial Day" and "Have a nice Memorial Day?" Is there something inherently happy about a day for remembering veterans who gave their lives to the cause that is US democracy? Is there something more than just tradition that dictates we have family picnics on a day on which we mourn and remember the lives of our lost heroes? Why exactly should it be a happy day? Don't give me any of that religious mumbo jumbo about being happy because we're celebrating their lives, not their deaths. That's something the church feeds us so we don't forget to fill their coffers. Whether you believe they're in a better place or not, it's a sad day. The 21-gun salute followed by "Taps" is still the only thing that gives me goosebumps besides the National Anthem. So then are we grinning and well wishing because our ancestors died protecting are freedoms? No, most people are grinning because it's a day off work or a day for barbeque. How many people these days go to the parades just so their kids get to see a parade? How many of us zone out when some grizzled veteran stands at the podium and drones on and on? Where has the respect for the dead gone? So do we smile because it's a happy day? Do we throw picnics because we celebrate the lives of those lost? Do we send out well wishes because it's a day off of work? Probably not any of those. The truth is we smile because we can, because we have things in our lives to smile about, because our forefathers have fought and died to ensure our life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, because they gave their lives so that we might enjoy ours. And it seems what was meant to be a sarcastic musing on the wonder that is wishing someone a "Happy" Memorial Day has become a patriotic diatribe. My apologies to my readers. I assure you my next entry will return to form. |
| A cheesy title I know, and you'll quickly learn it has next to nothing to do with the content of this entry, but I had no choice in the matter. You see, dear readers, I have embarked upon a contest of sorts, a journaling extravaganza, a game if you will. (Wow, that sentence entailed a superfluous ending, but I suddenly felt the need to mimmick Jim Carey as the Riddler. If you missed that reference, then consider yourself lucky for never having seen that abomination of a Batman movie.) I'd be remiss if I didn't link to the contest here,
shannon submitted the first entry requiring responses "Victory Shall Be Yours"  . Frankly she disappointed me. It's not that the quality was lacking per se, but simply that she wrote a polite, hostess-like entry that won't inspire any of the more entertaining emotions. One minute she's talking about semen in her hair, and the next you'd think she's hosting a tea party. Her capitalized title is clearly an indication that she's sold out. Poor poor, shannon. Don't let those pedantic journal editors get to you. I sincerely hope all the prompts aren't as equally innocuous simply because we're all "playing nice." Fortunately I'm the second entrant, so I know that won't be the case. So then, I'm supposed to respond to this entry? Since it inspires nothing in particular (probably because it lacks fart jokes, rants, or Chuck Norris facts), I'll read through and see what I can come up with. shannon figures most of us share her passion for reading, writing, socializing, and playing. I read once in while, write almost never because it's too much damn work, socialize as little as possible and only with people who don't deserve to be kicked in the spleen, and I never play, I win. Though I honestly know I won't win this contest, for reasons I'll outline in my entry later today. So what's my motivation for joining this contest then? The answer is twofold: 1) this gives me an excellent chance to make people squirm, and 2) she practically begged me to play along. shannon is not very becoming when she's groveling. I don't think shannon ever specifically mentioned me in her entry. I don't see the adjectives juvenile, crude, obnoxious, or problematic. On the other hand she does use exhibitionistic, depressing, dysfunctional, stunted, and a few others. I'm sure I make her roll her eyes, but I wonder if I ever make her furious. Simply because I hate to be left out I just want to take this time to remind everyone that they should vote Republican and that I proudly voted for Bush both times. What, that's it? Nothing more to respond to? Well, this is clearly the most inane, non-coordinating entry I've ever written. I'm quite ashamed of it. A good start to a great contest. I suppose other entrants may ponder and edit their entries, working toward that perfect score. I'm way too lazy for that. I'd rather ramble on about nothing. Speaking of which, I suddenly realize I have no way of ending this entry. I, the master of the the conclusive sentence, am drawing a blank. This is clearly one of those cases where boredom actually results in cognitive failure. So I'll just stick an elipses somewhere and pretend like I planned it end it this way all along.... |
| Last week I wrote about my adventures in the restroom stall at work. Not surprisingly, my tales of daring captivated my readers. More accurately it made them all gag, but secretly they came to the realization that I was simply writing things we all deal with but are too afraid to put to paper. Because I always give my readers what they want, it's time for the next installment in this saga of constipated lore. I tell you this now to warn those of weaker stomachs. Wimps. Jodi and I went to the mall to see "X-Men 3: Last Stand." Incidentally how come a title that includes the phrase "Last Stand" ends in an obvious precursor to yet another sequel? Will the next one be the final stand? Which reminds me, whoever wrote in his or her blog to make sure you stay for the little scene at the end of the credits was right. I'm glad some loser *cough* Mia *cough* had the time, foresight, and lack of a life to stick around through the credits and journal that little tidbit. My hat goes off to you, comic geek. But I seriously digress; this is not meant to be movie review. After the movie, Jodi and I did some shopping. Scratch that, Jodi shopped and I leaned on the jean racks, yawning and shifting my feet so the toes wouldn't fall asleep. During this time that large serving of nachos with several ounces of gooey Cheez-Wiz imitation cheese began to settle. Throw half a small serving of popcorn with enough butter to grease a pan and enough salt to kill an army of slugs on top of that, and you've got a recipe for a fine bowel movement. Drown it in a jug-sized movie theater Coke that nearly cost me my life savings, and it settles that much quicker. By Old Navy my abdomen was cramping, and by Sears I was very nearly turtle-heading. At The Gap, American Eagle Outfitter, and PacSun I passed enough gas to make Bush's list of WMD's. Somehow I held it in while Jodi finally found a pair of jeans that weren't pre-stressed by some Indonesian boy making 30 cents an hour to sandpaper pant legs. I thought about hitting the public restroom, but at this point I figured I could make it back home. Once you shit push for that long, that puppy's rock hard and is pretty stationery so long as you're sitting on your ass. But I forgot we had to pick up some things at Target. I won't use this space to badmouth Target and tell everyone, rather hypocritically no less, how they should never shop there. My rant for everything the French have their hands in will be saved for another time. Instead I want you to know that as we traversed the dollar bins I felt things begin to stir down there. Not at all what I expected considering the concrete turd lodged in my rectum. I think I devalued the dollar bins to 20 cent bins with the amount of seeping methane I left lingering. During this internal battle I miraculously kept Jodi from realizing that anything was wrong. Finally we checked out, and I told her I had to use the Target restroom. She said she'd meet me in the scrapbooking aisle, which, considering her propensity for browsing the scrapbook supplies, meant I had at least 32 hours to complete my scatalogical expulsion. The bathroom was vacant and clean. I ducked into the stall the handicapped can use because I knew it would have the iron bars they use to get on and off the toilet. Well, I assume that's what they're for. In my case though I was looking for something to grab onto as I pushed a ruler-sized log through my hole. I put toilet paper all over the toilet seat. No way in hell I was going to be able to "birth this alien" whilst squatting, so I needed to sit. At work I would have just plopped down, but when Jodi read my last entry she yelped, "You put toilet paper down right?!" Just curious now, have I never done that before because I'm just a guy or because I'm completely insane? I'd love for my male readers to sound off on this one. Too bad you can't shit in a urinal huh? I grimaced and began the arduous process. After much teeth grinding and pulling on the iron bar, I had that bastard dangling by a thread. I pushed some more, and nothing happened. That monster was hanging on by a dingleberry. No amount of pushing was going to help me. This is the one time when the aforementioned wiggle approach actually works. I ground my ass cheeks against the TP-covered seat and the sucker popped loose. Relief at last. I was just about to snatch off some more toilet paper to clean up, when the restroom door opened. I froze, because as everyone knows there's nothing more uncomfortable than wiping your ass while someone in the next stall or urinal is relieving him or herself. I became deathly silent, calming waiting for my visitor to finish his duty and vacate. By the sound of footsteps, I could tell he stopped at the urinal. Thank goodness it would be quick. Then the funniest thing all week happened. I no sooner heard piss hit the porcelain wall and the guy starting moaning. Loud, deep moans of relief. He could just as easily been pleasuring himself as taking a leak. After two long, audible moans, he mixed in an "mmmmmmm" of relief. The unmistakable splatter sound let me know he was probably leaning back, enjoying the moment, and letting it all hang out so to speak. I suppose I should have been nauseated and creeped out by the whole thing, but the vocal exclamations of relief very nearly had me busting a gut as I tried to remain completely still. After a few more moans, I relaxed a bit. What was first hilarious was now getting a bit old. It began to trouble me that I could no longer hear the noise of running water. Deciding I didn't want him thinking he was alone to enjoy his moment any longer, I roughly yanked down a handfull of toilet paper and tore it off. Although spinning and tearing ass tissue doesn't exactly drown out a moaning guy taking a leak (or worse), he must have heard it because the moaning ceased quicker than a rapid-fire fart. I heard the urinal flush and the restroom swing shut as he made his hasty retreat. I started chuckling, and I probably would have pissed my pants if I had been wearing any. I cleaned out my southern exit, stood up, and pulled my pants back on. Then it happened. Another one of those irritating things that happens to everybody but no one wants to talk about. Sitting on the toilet, I popped out a monster and felt ultimately refreshed. I yanked my shorts back on and was just about to put the button in place, and then I felt it. I still had something backed up in there. Some remote turd still clinging to the inner wall of my intestine, possibly hiding around a crevice in the torturous caverns of my bowel. I felt like I wasn't done. I could have sat back down and tried to renew my assault, but I knew it was pointless. I could have pushed until the cow chips came home, and it wouldn't have done me any good. So I said "screw it," washed my hands, and decided I'd finish when I got home. Hopefully that sucker would be ready when I got home. And yes, he was. |
| When leaving work, I have to stop and pull out into traffic. (Now that I've stated the obvious I can continue with my story.) As I'm parked there I can see the quaint little house on the slight hill directly across the street from my company. My view faces the front door, and I never get tired of looking through the window of that front door, because each day a face stares back at me. She's always there, standing in the doorway, looking out over the street. Most times her hand is beside her head waving to the passerbys. A perpetual grin, a coy yet sly one, is plastered across her too smooth skin, and her mass of dark hair may or may not be compressed under a straw hat or something equally eccentric. She wears the same clothes for days on end, generally bright, floral sundresses and mu-mus, an attire that belies her youthful countenance. She'll strike a pose and re-use it day after day, forever staring out with those tiny black eyes. During Halloween, Christmas, and other decorative holidays her little entrance will be festooned with the colors of the season and grandiose hanging decorum that sometimes seems to cling to her, as if her very arms are the beams from which it all hangs. Because I'm a gentleman I didn't notice, but Jodi also pointed out that she has large, pert breasts that stretch the white T-shirt she's been wearing all week. Jodi met me at work yesterday and got to see the young woman for the first time. I told her to watch for her, and considering her tendencies, I knew she could be spotted in that door window around 4PM. She's standing there everyday. And every night. And everything in between. She is of course a mannequin. So of course this leaves me wondering. Who puts a mannequin in their living room, thus blocking the front door and creeping out all passerby that get whiplash doing double takes at the immobile wax figure eerily waving at them? The clothing, as I mentioned, is floral and bright and generally reserved for nursing homes. The flowers are tended just so, with a very country flair to them, and the seasonal ornamentation is typical Brooks pharmacy decorum. I'd wager my life savings, which is roughly contained within a jar, that only an elderly lady could be going through the routine of dressing and posing this lifeless icon. So assuming my assumption is correct, which is always a safe bet, why does she do it? Why would anyone do it? Personally I think it's great. Think of all the great things you could do with a mannequin. You could creep out the kiddies and old folks with it by having it leer out the front window. You could travel around with it and post photos from various locales a la the infamous pink flamingos and Travelocity gnome. You could take it shopping with you to try out clothes instead of having to use the fitting room. How cool would it be to enjoy a crowd gathering around you as they watch you dress and undress a large-breasted mannequin in the local JCPenney's? You could lay it facedown in the street or hang it from a tree, and then run when someone dials 911. You could put it in the passenger seat of your convertible with a Michael Myers mask while you drive down Main Street. You could even use it for a whole plethora of sexual fantasy fulfillment. The possibilities are endless. Just look at all the fun they had on "Weekend at Bernie's." A lifeless sidekick is priceless. But unless this old lady has a geriatric fetish for mannequin porn, I don't think any of these reasons could apply to her. So why would she be doing it? Well, she could be really lonely and thinks the mannequin provides some company. She could be afraid of burglars, and she had to resort to a full-breasted figurine to stand guard because she's allergic to Rottweiler hair. She might think it makes for excellent decoration. She may mistake it for one of her children. Whatever the case, the most likely reason is she's at least mildly senile. But who cares?! She's got a freakin' mannequin in her living room? Rock on, Granny! |
| Is there a more refreshing thing than taking a nice, soothing dump? I submit that there is not. But where expelling the ultimate fecal log can be immensely gratifying, so too can it be painful and uncomfortable and leave your ass on fire. Luckily for my faithful readership, I'm going to tell such a story. Yes, I just said luckily. I was sitting at my desk, diligently working on finishing the billing process, which is mildly important since it's my company's sole source of revenue. Down below I could feel something stirring. My stomach churned and I could almost feel the gas bubbles roiling around and then slipping into my intestines. Was it that Stoffer's Frenchbread Pizza last night? If you've never had Stoffer's Frenchbread Pizza, then clearly you're a communist or a hippie. (I've recently come to realize that people who don't share my taste in entertainment or food are almost invariably communists and/or hippies.) My mistake was not the frenchbread pizza itself, but rather the variety which I chose for dinner. I should have gone with the four cheese that Jodi had. Those little triangular pepperonis are easily the best thing to happen to pizza since, well, frenchbread, but I don't think four cheese would have left my ass quacking like a duck as much as the pepperoni do. One gas bubble navigated the narrow channel of my rectum and threatened the puckered opening at the end. I sat down firmly on the cushioned desk chair, trying to flatten my butt cheeks. Eliminate the angle of expulsion, and you eliminate the rapid expansion of gas as it rushes through the canyon formed by your ass crack. Alas, my recessed asshole was not to be silenced this time. I could feel the gas bubble begin to slide out. I was hoping it just rolled up my crack and popped against the side, silently but deadly filling my cubicle with toxic methane. No such luck. The farting gods must have visited my coworkers in a dream last night, because both cubicles next to mine went deathly silent mere moments before the fateful moment. The other analyst must have abandoned the typing of his online sudoku game to read the paper online instead, because his incessant typing disappeared, leaving my gaseous wind to break the silence all alone. With no accompanying noise, I couldn't even disguise the impending cheese chutting with a cough or grunt. Apparently an awkward cubicle fart is not something to be missed. Despite my best sphincter contracting, my pepperoni-laced escape artist got the best off me. He escaped with a sharp little popping sound. It sounded almost like clicking your tongue against the roof of your mouth. Fortunately the ass compression prevented it from growing into a full-blown ass cheeks flapping in the breeze, a la whoopie cushion-type toot. Silence continued to surround the neighboring cubicles, both before and after my butt literally tooted its own horn. All the while I kept typing furiously, hoping to either disguise the outburst or make them think they must have imagined it. I wrapped up my end of the billing process just in time for more gas bubbles to venture into no-man's land. With legs and butt cheeks clenched tight, I waddled my way to the restroom in my best "everything's just fine, business as usual" impersonation. Fortunately the restroom was vacant, and I retreated to the stall on the end. Little did I know I was about to forcibly expand the size of my southern exit. Holding back the wind and stool pressing is never a good idea. When I finally sat down on the toilet, a wall of literal crap was backed up to God only knows where. I released and waited for the water to splash back on my ass when the turd dropped. Instead I felt only pain. The sucker was either too big or too twisted to slip out. When you're shit pushing, as my father calls it, there's nothing worse then having it stuck there. I often wonder if the pain of expanding your asshole far beyond it's perscribed diameter is anything at all like childbirth. First you try to push, and then when the pain threatens to rip you a new hole, you suck it back in and writhe around on the toilet hoping to jiggle it loose. Of course that never works. For each inch you push it out, you pull it back half an inch when you suck wind to suppress the excruciating ass tearing. It's a grueling process, one that I find works best when you're able to grip a countertop, towel rack, or tub rim whilst screaming bloody murder. I happen to be an expert at extreme shit pushing bcause of my abnormal amount of experience in the matter. I had nothing to grip this time, and with the main office hallway a mere 15 feet away I didn't dare do anything besides grind my teeth. Slowly but surely I popped out a few little turds. I never pop out little turds. Something was seriously backed up, and I was just breaking off pieces. I clenched my ass and leg muscles, and wrapped my arms around the oversized toilet paper dispenser as best I could. I promised myself I wouldn't scream or cry. I started to push, all the while wishing I had a bullet to bite down on. And then it happened, the single worst thing that can happen when you're engaged in some serious shit pushing in a public restroom... someone else came in. I tightened my sphincter, holding the too rigid log in place between ragged breaths, and waited for the urinal flush to sound. He wasn't using the urinal though. He opened the stall next to mine and commenced with his own shit pushing. My heart sank into my stomach. But I'm a trooper, a real trooper. There's two thing Beckwith men don't do: cry or quake under the pain of shit pushing. Miraculously I had not broken a sweat when the other toilet patron finally vacated the restroom. The bastard didn't even wash his hands. Although I was thankful for that. I grunted once or twice and pushed that monster out. I bled a little into the toilet too. That didn't scare me though; I'd been through it plenty of times before. My ass is now on fire as I sit tenderly on my desk chair though. In a couple days it will be back to normal before the cycle begins anew. Hopefully next time it won't happen at work. There, now anyone who thought I was losing my problematic edge just realized how utterly wrong they were. Let fly with the TMI comments, people. |
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Tooo rich...Love the tale....Would make a great comic for a local newspaper!!
