Rock Mitchell

That'll do it, folks

2009-10-25T18:13:00.009-06:00

Alright, I'll break the silence. I know it's been a couple weeks since my last post, and I assume you all know what's coming: I'm done.

It's been a heck of ride, writing columns here on rockmitchell.blogspot.com. Funny columns, stupid columns, confusing columns, offensive columns... Now it's time for the last type of column: the terminating column. The clincher. The closer.

It lasted longer than I thought it would, to tell you the truth. Looking at my stats I put up a hearty 86 posts, the first one going up on March 12, 2008. Also, 7,200 people visited this site, although 6,000 were probably lost deep in the Internet when they stumbled in. "What the hell kind of a blog is this?"

I thought blogging was pretty dumb, before I started. And I often thought it was dumb while I did it. But you've got to love what the Internets come up with these days, and the blogging platform--where any idiot can publish their words for the world to see--is something novel.

Well, I've written what I've wanted to write on this blog. Now it's time for me to chase other pursuits. Maybe I'll take up Twitter. Maybe I'll start a blog about what Michelle Obama is wearing these days. Maybe I'll see if AARP The Magazine is looking for any under-age columnists.

Whatever I do, this thing will just sit dormant. So consider this blog for sale. I checked out WebsiteOutlook.com, and it said this website is worth a whopping $876. WebsiteOutlook must be run by the same people that price out theme-park food, because it just ain't worth that much.

Tell you what. Offer me $10 and a cold ginger ale, and you've got yourself a deal. Actually, I'd let it go for just a ginger ale--warm or cold.

Thanks everyone!

I took the trash out and almost went with it

2009-10-04T16:23:00.010-06:00

Listen up, men with a girlfriend or wife: never, ever, ever criticize your significant other's outfit. If you have anything less than positive to say about something she's wearing, punch yourself in the head before you open your dumb yap. With any luck, it will alter what comes out for the better.

Yesterday my wife had to leave for a hair appointment. The trash needed taken out (it has always been my job to take out the trash; probably because I relate to it more than she does), so I followed her out the door on her way to the car.

As she walked away, I asked--and this is where I should have punched myself in the head--"Are you going to wear those pants?" I don't know what I was thinking; the pants looked fine, I just hadn't seen them before. Let's just say it wasn't the time or the place for such a critique. She drove off, probably furious for having married such an idiot.

As I stood in the middle of our condo's parking lot, feeling like a jerk, I realized the door was locked and I didn't have the house keys. It was the middle of the afternoon on a Saturday, and I hadn't showered or shaved. An October chill was in the air, and I was just wearing pajama pants, a t-shirt, and flip flops.

To make matters worse, right before I followed my wife out the door I had thrown a burger on the George Foreman grill. It was going to be more than well done.

I decided to go sit in my car and wait it out--I'd let the burger turn into jerky. I sat in the driver's seat for about 15 minutes, wishing I knew how to hot-wire a car so I could at least have the radio for comfort. Luckily I found a tin of mints in the center console, and found solace in them.

Then I started to wonder how long a hair appointment normally lasts. An hour? Two hours? A day? (Note: I've rocked a buzz cut for the past three years, so I have no idea how long it takes to cut hair when scissors are involved.)

Deciding I needed to do something about my situation, I got out of the car and walked back up to the front door. I thought about going in a window, but we live on the third floor. And flip flops aren't great for scaling the side of a building. A mishap would mean an 18-foot fall.

I started knocking on neighbor's doors. A nice couple that lives across from us was home and took me in. They let me watch TV in their living room, in all of my just-got-out-of-bed glory, until my wife got home. Luckily there was enough love in her heart to let me back in the house.

I like to think that I've learned a few lessons from this experience; 1.) A burger is no good after an hour and a half on the Foreman, 2.) Shower and get dressed in the morning, even if you're not going anywhere, 3.) Say nothing but complimentary things to your wife--and be extra kind because without her you're nothing more than the trash you just took out.

Anything can happen at Walmart

2009-09-27T19:05:00.006-06:00

If my printer were a vehicle, it would be a big-ol' SUV. It seems like it slurps up about a cartridge of ink for every 10 pages of print. For that reason, I stopped by Walmart the other day for a new ink cartridge.

After getting the ink, I made the usual rounds: $5 DVD shelf, fish tanks, BMX bike display, etc. At last I ended up in the produce section, where I began picking out some grapes. Just as I found a firm variety, an old lady came up and grabbed me by the elbow.

"I'm not sure about something," she stammered, while leading me to the broccoli stand. I was wearing shorts and flip flops, so she couldn't have mistaken me for a store clerk. Nonetheless, she pointed to a sign that said "$.99 ea," then proceeded to orate a 2-minute lecture on why broccoli should be sold by the pound, not by the unit.

I had to nod repeatedly and slowly walk backwards until the lady forgot she was talking to me.

Certainly crazier things have happened at Wally's Mart, though. When I was a teen, my younger brother and I got in a full-fledged fist fight over who's turn it was to play the Nintendo 64 that was on display. I eventually dropped him with a knee to the soft part of his thigh and regained command of the controller.

I'm also fond of the time I got recruited by a scammer at the $5 DVD stand. I was standing there looking for something that wasn't an old box-office flop when I noticed a guy start to sidle up next to me. I continued to scan the titles, with him breathing over my shoulder, until eventually he spoke up. "Don't I know you from somewhere?"

I looked at him, and said "No, I don't think so." He replied, "Oh, you look familiar. Well anyway, what do you do for work?" Confused and surprised, I told him I operated "heavy equipment" (little did he know I was referring to my 4-cylinder car out in the parking lot).

He said that sounded cool, then chirped up, "What if I could help you make 10 thou a month by working just 20 hours a week?" I told him I wouldn't wander Walmart to Walmart, preying on people at the $5 DVD stands, for any amount of money.

A lot of people don't like to shop at Walmart because of incidents like the ones I've mentioned. And some people say a few of the folks that shop there are too--what's the word--peculiar? (peopleofwalmart.com) As for me, those are the very things that keep me coming back.

The Challenge

2009-09-21T20:34:00.004-06:00

Had a little chat with my wife tonight... I have a new goal that I wanted to discuss, and hopefully get her approval on. As many of you know, she's with child. Assuming a normal pregnancy, she has 24 weeks left. So just under two trimesters to go.

OK, enough pregnancy talk. My goal is to keep up with my wife's pregnancy weight, pound for pound. A credible source tells me that the average woman should gain about a pound a week during the final two trimesters.

So... can I gain 24 pounds by the time the baby arrives?

Wait, before you answer that question you need to understand my body type. I'm 6'1" and I currently sit at a buck fifty-five. Been at that mark a long time, too. I've got the metabolism of a chipmunk and the build of a greyhound (the dog, not the bus).

Also, I will make the attempt without supplements, pills, or protein shakes. Save the creatine for high school jocks. I'm a man of the land, and I'll be consuming meat, potatoes, and country grits.

Surprisingly enough my wife said she doesn't care if I make the attempt, just because she doesn't think I can do it. What do you think? Feel free to cast your vote in the sidebar.

Goodbye old friend; hello repo

2009-09-20T19:47:00.008-06:00

I parted ways with an old friend last week. We met On-line, just over five years ago. In our time together things didn't always go smoothly. But we had to learn to get along, considering we spent time together every day. We traveled together, ran errands together, and got our pockets rifled by the same sleazy mechanics.

I think everyone loves their first car, whether it's a piece of crap or not. If it moves, it can get you to the local burger joint. If it has a passenger seat, well, it's a whole lot better than picking up a date in your mom's minivan.

I think everyone cherishes the memories of their first car.

Once I thought the time with my first car was going to be cut very short. I had just bought the thing, and shortly thereafter moved into my new apartment at college. I normally kept my car parked in the lot behind my apartment complex, and I could see it from my window.

One morning I woke up, and it was gone. I ran outside and searched up and down the neighborhood. I ran back inside and checked my roommates' bedrooms, thinking maybe one of them took it for a late-night joy ride and ended up parking it in a canal, or something. But they were all cuddled up in their beds, sleeping like slugs.

With no other options, I called the police. Just as I was talking to an officer, the receptors of my brain finally connected; I had parked my car on campus the night before. "Sounds like someone had too much to drink last night," the officer stated. I certainly wished I could blame my stupidity on strong drink.

I'm glad my car never got stolen. It had a full future with me, lying in wait. It would take me and my roommates to the Mexican border so we could buy fake Oakley sunglasses. It would rear end some dude's car on University Avenue. It was going to take me on a first date with my future wife... and apparently my car and I did enough to make me look like husband material.

I passed my car onto my younger brother a few days ago. I always wanted to drive it till its dying day, and sometimes it seemed like it was almost there, but now that honor is left to him.

My new ride is a bank repo, at least that's what struck my eye when I looked at the Carfax report. Since my new car came from an owner that told the bank to stick it, it must be plenty rebellious at heart. We should get along just fine...

It takes time to absorb big news

2009-09-06T21:26:00.004-06:00

It was a normal day. I had just gotten home from work and I was walking into the kitchen. There on the table sat one of those little pregnancy timeline discs, showing important dates at each trimester.

Many things go through a man's head when his wife tells him she's pregnant (although I'm sure many more things go through a man's head when it's not his wife). Here's what went through my mind, in order of occurrence:

"_______ (brain lapse; 4-5 seconds)."
"Wow, cool...."
"No, not cool. How can I get out of this? Is this reversible?"
"Actually, having a kid could be really cool."
"I wonder if she's going to let herself go."
"Oh crap, I'm not ready to be a dad!"
"She's going to make me paint the second bedroom like an Easter egg."
"Wow, I'll be a dad!"

A woman can only stand silence for so long after she bears that kind of news. Eventually a man has actually got to say something. All I came up with was, "How do you know it's mine?" Women aren't really looking for a joke at a time like that, I found.

Women just take the news of pregnancy a lot more favorably than men. Which shouldn't surprise anyone. For example, men take the news of a hot-dog eating contest winner more favorably than women: "Cool!" vs. "Eew, gross."

Pregnant women are excited about staring their new role as a mother, e.g., buying children's clothes, rocking a baby to sleep, and reading nursery rhymes. Guys, however, are worried about losing their comfortable role as an idiot. As a father, can I still paint-up my bare chest and go to football games? Can I still watch Rocky I through IV all in one day, once a year? Can I still, well... you get the point.

I hardly know a thing about pregnancy, but so far I know that women are either really hot or really cold after they first get pregnant. And that changes on the second--not on the minute or hour like with un-pregnant women. I'm either being ordered to crank on the A/C or to bring out the space heater. Sometimes they want both going at the same time.

I also know they can hurl at any moment. And what makes them nauseous is as elusive as what makes them hot or cold. One day it's the smell of butter. Then it's the interior of a car. Next it's the look of my toenails.

It's all fun though; part of life's journey. Your beautiful wife goes through all that, then in a matter of months you're rewarded with a mini version of yourself. Except the little guy/gal will have some of the wife's genes, so it's bound to be an upgraded version--thank goodness.

How long should we mourn celebrities?

2009-08-30T21:25:00.010-06:00

Look, I'm all for being sad about someone dying. When a loved one passes on, mourning is expected and called for. Same goes for a respected leader or role model.

But what if it's someone you only know through pop culture; someone who's house you were only invited in when you watched that episode of MTV's Cribs? What if it's someone who didn't know you, nor would they have wanted to? What type of mourning is expected of you when they die?

I'm talking about celebrities here. People that have done no more for humanity other than star in a couple films, hang out at oxygen bars, and sit courtside at Los Angeles Laker's games. One day they're found dead in a hotel room with a bottle of pills on the carpet, and suddenly they become nineteen times as famous as than they were the day before.

The TV networks then scramble to find a few photos of the dead celebrity that can be aired to the public. But that's difficult because the only photos they have are the ones that made the tabloids. Generally a DUI mugshot looks tacky when it's used in a eulogy slideshow on CNN.

Then we, the TV-watching or newspaper-reading public, have to suffer through endless questions raised by the media over the next three weeks: Is the celebs doctor at fault? What's going to happen to the celeb's illegitimate child? Which celebrities will attend the celebrity's funeral?

Eventually the controversy and the discussion dies down (no pun intended), and the funeral is finally had. Again, every major news network is roped into airing the funeral procession, then it's replayed several times over the next few days in case you only saw it twice.

It's unfortunate when a playboy bunny that ODs on pain killers gets more press than a life-long philanthropist that dies of a stroke. What's the saying? Live by the sword, die by the sword? Same goes with the flashbulb, I guess.

My worst enemy dwells in my car

2009-08-23T20:56:00.012-06:00

My greatest enemy is not the state's safety & emissions test (but it is a close second, since it has conquered me and my car every year for the past three years). And my greatest fear is not fear itself; as much as Mandela suggests. My greatest enemy and my greatest fear is actually the spider.

Spiders scare the heck out of me, and just writing the word gives me the hebejebes. Give me snakes, scorpions, or socialists, just don't give me spiders.

A couple weeks ago my wife and I had pulled into the church parking lot. After I put the car in park my wife suddenly stiffened against the back of her seat and her face went blank, like she was staring at death's door. I'd try something like that as well, to get out of church, but she had real fear in her eyes. "Oh my gosh!" she yelled, pointing at the dash above my steering wheel.

There, perched above my speedometer, sat a spider the size of a small frog. In one fluid motion I flung open my door and army rolled out onto the pavement. My wife then made a few attempts to get it out of the car with an ice scraper, but that only made it retreat into the air vent.

I've been driving on pins and needles ever since, not sure when the spider would make another appearance. If texting while driving increases your chance of an accident ten times, I bet seeing a spider in your car while driving increases it a thousand. So I've been hoping it wouldn't rear it's ugly face when I'm doing 75 on the freeway

Well, last Wednesday I was running a bit late for work. I bounded down the stairs from my condo and hopped into my car, trying to make up time where I could. As I turned the ignition and backed out of my parking spot, cranking the steering wheel like crazy, I felt a stringy substance cross the back of my hands.

I looked down and saw the last thing I wanted to see: a giant spider, dangling above my knees. My hands had just mauled the web it had worked up overnight. In the heat of the moment I duplicated the move I made in the church parking lot, weeks earlier. Only this time I had to get my car into park before the army roll onto the parking lot was made.

As I knelt on the pavement with my heart threatening to pound out of my chest, I tried to figure out how I was going to get back in my car and on my way to work. I ran into the house and fetched a broom, and after a few minutes of gladiator-like battling I got the wretched thing out from under my steering wheel column.

I've got a re-inspection for the state safety & emissions test scheduled for later this week, after I get some brake thing replaced. I'd really like for the evil spider to crawl out onto the safety & emissions guy, while he's re-inspecting my car. It would be nice to have my first and second worst enemies meet, and see if the second is any good at the army roll.

A happy wife is sweeter than soda

2009-08-16T20:05:00.011-06:00

A couple Sunday's ago my wife and I were taking an evening stroll through our neighborhood. I picked up an empty beer bottle on the side of the road. My wife scolded me to put it down, but I wanted to take it home.

I wasn't exactly doing a good turn by picking up litter, I just wanted to start working on my bottle collection. I then told my wife about a plan I had to start brewing and bottling my own soda. My plan was not well received, and she threatened death if I didn't put the bottle down. I argued my case until she gave in with an "OK, fine."

As my wife and I approach our third-year anniversary, I thought I'd pause for a moment and jot down the few things I've learned about women and marriage in that time. I know three years is child's play to some of you veterans, but sometimes rookies have good things to say...

First off, women don't like men to stay in their "caves." Men are naturally cavemen, not only in manner and eating habits, but also in how they deal with the day-to-day. Their cave is usually a hobby, an escape from the responsibilities of work and family life.

There are a lot of cave options out in the world; golfing, hunting, fist fighting, soda bottling, etc. Women hate all of them, but they can learn to deal with a few--as long as they don't become too time consuming and they don't prevent their man from bringing home the bacon.

Secondly, women are always lying.

Example 1: "I made this casserole, but I don't think it's very good; you don't have to eat it if you don't want to." That's a lie.
Example 2: "You don't have to get me anything for Valentine's Day." Another lie.

Thirdly, not only do women lie, they also expect men to read their mind.

Example 1: If a man asks "Are you mad?", she'll respond with "No, I'm fine." That means she's mad, real mad. Just don't ask, "Why are you mad?" You're supposed to know why she's mad.
Example 2: If a man asks "Honey, me and the guys are planning a road trip to Montana. Can I go?" She may reply with something like "Um, I guess so." In reality, the deal is not yet done and you don't yet have a valid passport. Go off to Montana on an "I guess so," and she'll curse your name the whole time you're gone.

Normally I would have taken an "OK, fine," and clung to that empty beer bottle, keeping alive the dream of bottling my own soda. But at that moment, I realized no bottle of homemade ginger-ale was worth my wife's discontent. I dropped the bottle into the nearest garbage can and walked on.

Now I just need to work on having more of those kinds of moments.

You're never too old for hand-me-downs

2009-08-09T20:07:00.006-06:00

Sometimes I'm glad I didn't have an older brother. If I did, I know I would have never worn a new article of clothing. Nonetheless, my mom still trafficked most of my clothes down from older cousins or neighbors.

I'm sure my parent's thrift had a lot to do with that, but so did the way I treated my clothes. In less than half an hour of recess I could blow a hole in both the knees of my pants and have grasshopper guts on the front of my shirt. Buying me a new pair of Levi's would have been like giving a white suit to a chimney sweeper.

Now that I'm done growing, and so are the people I associate with, I don't see many hand-me-down exchanges. After childhood, if someone gives over a hand-me-down it's usually not because they got taller... it's because they got wider.

The other way to get a hand-me-down, though, is if the previous owner doesn't think it's in fashion anymore. That's where I come in.

A couple weeks ago my wife and I were visiting my wife's family. Her uncle was ready to get rid of a fine corduroy suit with leather elbow patches, and I was ready to acquire a fine corduroy suit--with leather elbow patches.

The thing is, I know it's a darn-good suit. It's been around for at least 25 years but is still holding up like a champ. Those suckers buying a suit down at Men's Wearhouse only know their suit has made it through a couple trips to the dressing room.

I suppose the biggest qualm people have about taking ownership of a hand-me-down or thrift store clothing item is not knowing where it's been. How do you think new clothes feel, not knowing where their wearers have been?

Whatever the case, I've never grown out of ruining my clothes (you should see me after a spaghetti dinner, I can give a white shirt polka-dots). But that's something I'm going to have to change. If I blow a hole in the knee of my "new" corduroy suit pants, I'll have to wait another 25 years before something that good shows up in my wife's uncle's closet again.

Things we shouldn't give up when we grow up

2009-08-02T21:04:00.007-06:00

I sat through a city council meeting a little while ago, I was on assignment for my job. In such a meeting, or most any kind of meeting, it doesn't take long to realize that some people can be very boring.

In fact, while I was enduring the agenda, I started thinking about why it is that as we grow more mature, we also grow more boring. Adults in the workplace are like bread out of the bag; they go stale too quickly.

There are some particulars of childhood that--unfortunately--we grow out of. I think it would be good for human resource departments to look back at some programs enjoyed in elementary school, and consider implementing a few of them:

1. Yearbook signing. Sure, most full-time jobs don't have a summer break. But how great would it be if at the end of the second fiscal quarter co-workers met in the conference room to sign the back of each other's employee manual?

"Stay cool, Dean... work sucks but you don't!" or "You should have used up more sick days!"

2. Nap time. It's a no brainer. Nobody would object to rolling out a mat by their workstation at 2:00 PM and shutting off the lights for 15 or 20 minutes. If smoke breaks are OK, what's wrong with a nap break? But it seems only former presidents can nap on the job.

3. Show and tell. It would really improve employee relations if workers were able to bring something from home and show it to everyone in a formal setting. Granted, depending on employee makeup this may be risky; you don't want Deedee from mail services showing up with a bong. But it might be good for everyone if Chuck from accounting was able to bring in his tap dancing shoes and do a little jig.

4. Reading time. For HR manuals or policy guides that are never read, it might be a good idea to implement a time to gather together and take turns reading paragraphs. The lady from PR could help out anyone getting tripped up on big words like "harassment."

5. Last but not least, a shorter day. Start at 8:00 AM, but ring the quittin' bell at 3:00 PM. Just because you get older doesn't mean it's easier to stay put at a desk for another 2 hours.

How to slow down the fast-paced city life

2009-07-26T19:53:00.008-06:00

I can only listen to country music when I'm driving alone--my wife won't let me listen to it when she's in the car. It's not just that she doesn't like country. It's her incessant fear that one day I'll turn out to be a hick, and I guess she thinks country music could increase that chance.

She grew up in a small town and didn't care for the 4-H guys. The dates she hated most were the ones where she was picked up in a camo-colored 4X4 with a gun rack on back. I'm from a small town as well, a farming town, and I used to drive an old truck. To most men where I'm from, a "car guy" is an oxymoron.

My married, male readers will understand that you've got to promise a lot of ridiculous things to get a girl to marry you (e.g., eat less fried chicken, stop wearing a particular shirt, quit cussing). Before we exchanged vows, my wife made me promise to always be a "car guy."

I actually didn't listen to country music growing up, in fact I currently like a lot of rap. And I drive a car. But now that I'm living in a faster-paced city environment, I've come to really enjoy the slower-paced lifestyle found in country music's lyrics.

So my wife putting the kibosh on that genre has been difficult. But, I've come up with other ways--that are harder for her to control--to get life down to a Willie Nelson pace:

Say "I'm going into town to get ____," when speaking of running any errand, even if you already live "in town" and are just walking to 7-Eleven for a churro.
Drive with the window down and your left elbow sticking out the door. Cowboys don't use A/C, and they drive with one hand on the steering wheel.
Use "'ol'" as a prefix whenever possible: "I'm heading down to ol' Buck's place to watch the game," or "I've got to stop by the ol' supermarket after work."
While driving, deploy the four-finger wave whenever you're passing someone heading in the other direction, especially at a 4-way stop. (If you don't know what that wave is, click here)
When talking about any automobile that isn't a Ford, Chevy, or GMC, use the term "foreign job."

I can do all those things and more from a car, so I'm still keeping the promise I made to my wife. You can take a guy out of the small town, but maybe you can't take the small town out of a guy.

I don't mind a little pesticide on my apples

2009-07-19T09:57:00.014-06:00

I grew up in a house bordering several potato, wheat, and sugar beet fields. In the summer months the whine of a crop duster often filled the sky. It was those moments when my brother and I would hop on our bikes and ride along the canal bank to get a better look.

The guy in the crop duster was named Chuck, and he lived across the street from us. He was kind of an old grouch (my brother and I's shenanigans often put us on bad terms with the neighbors), but we always did our best to try to get a wave from him as he swooped back and forth over the crops.

He usually just acknowledged us by spraying a load of insecticide our way, rather than bothering with a wave. While the stuff never smelled great, it did wonders for keeping mosquitoes off us for the next couple days.

A lot of people nowadays would freak at their kids riding their bikes behind crop dusters. Heck, a lot of people nowadays freak at their kids eating a carrot from soil boosted by Miracle-Gro. I have no qualms about non-organic food, though. Then again, I have no qualms about eating food off the floor.

I read the other day that organic food is the fastest growing sector in the American food marketplace (I guess Hostess Cake food has finally been bumped from first place). Apparently Americans are turning a new leaf on their eating habits.

I just don't see myself following the trend. The other day I was at the grocery store picking out some apples. I noticed a chic-looking lady next to me, picking out apples from the organic stand. She glanced over at me, thinking "enjoy eating rat poison." I glanced over at her, thinking "have fun paying double for smaller apples."

As you can probably guess, I went home with rat-poisoned apples and she went home with cow-manured apples. We'll both probably live healthy lives and, hopefully, die of old ages. I guess the fundamental difference is that she'll always see a crop duster as something to try to get away from, while I'll always see a crop duster as something to try to get a wave from.

My "Breaking 5" blog is flourishing

2009-07-14T20:50:00.005-06:00

If you haven't been over to www.breaking5.blogspot.com lately, you're missing out. Posts are popping up almost daily.

I'm chopping down the 4:59-minute mile one swing at a time. Read about my latest progress here.

Who needs energy bars when you've got donuts?

2009-07-12T09:09:00.000-06:00

What's the best way to negate the benefits of a 20-mile bike race? Eat a bunch of donuts while doing it.

Saturday morning I competed in the second annual Tour de Donut, a grueling race against speed and appetite. The details of the race are as follows:

Bike a 6.5-mile lap
Eat donuts
Bike a 6.5-mile lap
Eat donuts
Bike a 6.5-mile lap

Each donut you wolf down takes three minutes off your overall time, so there's an incentive to spend plenty of time eating donuts before hitting the road for the second and third laps.

I felt a little out of place, upon arriving at the race site to register. While most riders donned flashy jerseys, spandex shorts, and click-in shoes, I had on a t-shirt, basketball shorts, and an old pair of Nike's.

As we lined up I noticed most everyone had sleek racing bikes made of toothpick frames. I had a full-suspension mountain bike that I picked up at a yard sale last year. Picture a bunch of gazelles lining up to race an old jeep.

I hadn't ridden my bike for over a month, and that was just to go to the grocery store for some soda. But then again, it's an event with donuts--the "real" bikers are practically asking for idiots like me to crash their race.

I trudged my way through the first lap, then quickly polished off four donuts. They actually went down pretty easy. With sticky hands I was off for lap two.

My second trip to the donut table wasn't as enjoyable. After I shoved the fifth one in my mouth I had no desire to continue. I guess it was at that point that the same spirit which moves Lance Armstrong to go stronger came upon me: I hunkered down and kept eating.

I found a couple tactics handy: one was the donut sandwich, where you smash two or more donuts on top of each other to eat at the same time; the second was water logging, where you keep squirting water in your mouth while you're munching on your donut.

Having pounded my ninth donut, I took to the course and trucked my way through the final lap. There's a special feeling when you cross the finish line of a race, but it's even more special when you do it with icing on your face and a belly full of donuts.

Just for kicks I looked up a calorie calculator when I got home, and I probably burned 1,000 calories during the race. However, the donuts totaled 1,980 calories. Ultimately, it was the donuts that came out on top.

Check out my new blog!

2009-07-01T22:17:00.004-06:00

The blog is called "Breaking the 5-Minute Mile," and the URL is breaking5.blogspot.com. If you enjoy the "Rocky" movies, you'll love this new blog.

Holding off on the A/C

2009-06-27T09:40:00.009-06:00

http://www.bellsouthpwp.net/k/g/kgoss17/fan2.jpg

I like to fully enjoy the change in seasons--inside as well as out. So come summer time, I hold off on the air conditioner as long as possible. I usually don't turn it on until the paint on the wall starts to drip or my wife threatens to check into a hotel.

Same goes with the heater, in the winter. I'm not wanting to crank it on until we start waking up to frost on our pillowcases

It seems that in a woman's perfect world, we should all be like chicken eggs; incubated at a steady temperature.

But relying on conditioned air is a sign of weakness, in my view, because humans can adjust to whatever environment surrounds them. Our body temperature is fixed at 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit--whether the A/C is on or not. At least that's one ball of logic I throw my wife's way.

So rather than try to change the inside temperature of our house, I prefer to take time to adapt.

Sure, dealing with a hot house takes some acclimatization. Clothes and blankets turn superfluous, while popsicles and ice cream become worth their weight in gold.

And dealing with a cold house has its struggles.

When watching a movie, you can't leave any appendages outside of the cuddling blanket without suffering minor frost bite. And when you exit the shower, you've got to shake off like a cat out of water before early stages of hypothermia set in.

A cold house has it's benefits, though. When it's really cold in the house, my wife has an unusual urge to be around the stove. Food naturally results from that, time to time.

I take pride in our low utility bills, too. I'm pretty sure that in February the gas bill for our little condo was less than the gas company's cost in metering, paper handling, and postage. There's nothing like stickin' it to the utility company.

If anything, having a house with an uncomfortable inside temperature makes going to places with a comfortable inside temperature--like church and work--more enjoyable.

My car spent a night in the slammer

2009-06-21T09:00:00.000-06:00

If 7-Eleven didn't sale Slurpees, I'd be wishing Chapter 11 bankruptcy on them. They're just too dang uptight about parking.

The other day I met my boss at a nearby convenience store. We were car pooling, and my car was left behind in the parking lot. Little did I know, 7-Eleven has a deal with the devil on parking; the devil in this case being Discount Towing.

Here's how it works: Discount Towing drives around arbitrarily, keeping tabs on how long cars are parked in the various locations they oversee. When a car has been vacated longer than it should take for someone to go inside for a Coke and a churro, they make their move.

Hence, when I came back to 7-Eleven to get my car two hours later, it was gone. I found Discount Towing's phone number on the side of the building, then called and asked the weasel that answered where my car was.

Here's the gist of what I found out: my car was in an impound yard 13 miles away; I could get my car out that night, but I needed to bring $271, cash.

"So... why exactly are you called Discount Towing?" I asked, before ending the phone conversation. The crook didn't appreciate my sarcasm and hung up. Too bad he hadn't a clue who he was dealing with, i.e., one of the cheapest persons on earth.

My boss drove me to the impound yard, where I planned on negotiating the rate down (on the way there I called some other towing companies to see what they charged, and found I was getting raked over the coals).

Discount Towing was located in the shady part of town, not far from smoke shops, gentleman's clubs, and a KFC restaurant.

If you've never been to an impound yard, know that "prison yard" and "impound yard" have a lot more in common than just "yard." This dump had it all: rottweilers, barbed wire, mean guys that looked like they ate babies. What the attendants lacked in teeth they made up for in tattoos.

Negotiations with the crook didn't go well. In fact, I ticked Mr. Discount Towing right off. The thing that's tough about wheelin'-and-dealin' with a guy that has your car locked up is, well, he has your car. I eventually offered $190, but he wouldn't bend.

He was stuck at $271, cash, and I had no leverage. In one last attempt I asked if he wanted to arm wrestle for the car, and again, my sarcasm wasn't appreciated. Not even a little. I told him I'd be back in the morning for round two. I had to--I didn't have $271 on me.

I went home that night, without my car, and studied the state towing codes up and down. I found out what they could charge and what they couldn't. I was ready for round two.

I couldn't help but worry about my car, though. As mad as I made the crook, I figured he was out vandalizing my car that evening--rolling it over and slashing the tires. What worried me most was that I didn't lock my car when I left 7-Eleven (the door locks don't really work).

I started thinking of all the valuables I had in my car, but after listing them off in my mind (a pack of David sunflower seeds, a book on tape from the library, Altoids, a Sacajawea dollar) I returned to worrying about the slashed tires, rather than burglary.

I was back at the impound yard before noon the next day. After looking through the fencing and spotting my car, still in one piece, I marched confidently towards the crook's office. I had spent the morning talking to the folks at the DMV and the state tax commission, and I had a case.

With Eye of the Tiger playing in my head, I confronted the crook with everything I had. I even got him on the phone with a lady from the state. After all was said and done we settled at $163. Not a knockout, but still a win.

As I followed him to my car we passed a smashed circuit board (one of the many pieces of garbage scattered around the place) laying on the ground. I turned and joked "hey, that's my car stereo!" Again the crook was in no mood for small talk, especially since he could've had $190 the night before.

Analog TV, digital TV, there's nothing on either way

2009-06-13T12:02:00.013-06:00

http://www.smh.com.au/ffximage/2007/05/30/300_tv2.jpg

I bet TV watching in the United States hit a record low yesterday, because 2.8 million homes woke up to blank screens. The national switch to all-digital broadcasting kicked in Friday at midnight.

Their TVs didn't have to go blank, though. For the past year or so the FCC has been telling folks that if they're picking up television over the airways, they'll need a converter box--at least if they want to keep watching This Old House beyond June 12.

But to most the people who are currently without any TV reception, a converter box holds the same meaning as a flux capacitor; they don't know where to get one and they wouldn't know how to work it if they did: www.baltimoresun.com/news/bal-md.dtv.

In 4th grade, my elementary school promoted a No TV Week. Dworshak Elementary was always pushing crap like that on us (e.g., Red Ribbon Week, Jump Rope for Health Week, Give the Cafeteria Food a Try Week).

If only the school had the ability to switch our TV feed from analog to digital. Such a switch would have cut me and my family off from television.

I grew up on rabbit ears (I'm talking about a TV anteanna, not my daily fare--people in Idaho know the ears are one part of a rabbit that's not good eatin'). We only had five channels to surf: 14 - PBS, 21-Spanish TV, 59 - NBC, 61 - ABC, and 63 - too fuzzy to tell.

Honestly, those 2 million folks without TV right now aren't missing much. My wife and I found ourselves up late last night, bored but not tired enough to go to bed. We turned on the telly and settled in on the couch.

We spent some time on Travel Channel's Ghost Busters, where this guy went into Jack the Ripper's old prison cell to conjure up ghosts. He sat in the dark for some five or six hours until he heard a radiator clink:

"Oh my gosh, did you hear that?! I've been sitting here for hours, asking the departed soul to speak to me, and then I heard this spooky noise. (The radiator clink is then played over and over.) I think he's upset!"

Then we made our way over to Discovery Channel's Cocaine Nation, where we learned about the one commodity that's keeping the nation's GDP from going completely into the gutter.

Soon bed started to sound a lot better than whatever was on.

As far as I'm concerned, I'd be fine joining those folks without a converter box. Another No TV Week might be kind of nice... as long as it's not during football season.

Evolution lapses on camping trips, Part 2

2009-06-06T08:54:00.008-06:00

The first few miles were all smiles. We were tromping along a dirt path that I could have hiked in my sleep. After a while, we entered Orderville Canyon.

Orderville is a slot canyon, which according to Wikipedia, "is a narrow canyon, formed by the wear of water rushing through rock."

The first part of the canyon floor was all mud because a flash flood had torn through the night before. Despite collecting several inches of mud on the bottom of our feet, we were all still in high spirits.

Here's where I want to get back to the stupidity thing I addressed in Part 1. It's not that we weren't prepared--we certainly had everything we needed for the hike, we just didn't bother to bring what we had.

The first thing I'd like to address is our rations. While some had plenty to eat and drink in their packs, others had very little. Actually, Neanderthal #5 didn't even bring a pack. He carried a re-filled Gatorade bottle in his hand and a PBJ his back pocket. Neanderthal #10 went with two cans of Mountain Dew and a small bottle of water.

Also, as I mentioned earlier, we decided to leave the wetsuits behind. Well, about the time we got to the water section of the hike, where we had to start wading and swimming, a cold front came in.

The wind picked up and rain clouds covered the sun. Nonetheless, our jovial nature managed to carry us through the first few swims. But after an hour or so of plowing through 55-degree water in the bottom of a chilly canyon, it got really old really fast.

With everyone being hungry, dehydrated, and soaked in freezing water, it was every man for himself. If anger is a symptom of hypothermia, we all had it.

Funny movie quotes and jokes were replaced with death threats and grumblings. If someone biffed it in the water, their call for everyone to hold up was ignored. I'm pretty sure I remember someone asking for a handgun.

I remember thinking that if I fell in the water one more time it would definitely be my last fall. I was ready to give myself up as a sacrifice to Orderville.

Just as we were all reaching our limits, we came to the end of the hike. Orderville Canyon terminates at a visitor's point of Zion National Park. Thus, families with little kids and Chinese tourist watched ten men, on the brink of death, climb out of the river one by one.

It didn't help that many of us had our shirts off (some hiker we passed earlier on suggested we'd be warmer without them). Like zombies, we each stumbled onto the riverbed and fell down shivering.

Some of us looked dead and some looked incoherent. Some of us looked like we still had some evolution to go through.

Evolution lapses on camping trips, Part 1

2009-05-31T19:45:00.013-06:00

I'm sure women are the driving force of mankind's progression. We men are just too stupid on our own; we have no internal check and balance to keep us on evolution's path.

The best place to realize this is a camp out. Get a bunch of guys together out in the wild, without female counterparts, and they immediately begin to degenerate.

Last weekend I noticed this phenomena when I went camping with a bunch of friends, all of whom are men. About a month earlier we started emailing each other about doing a big camping trip.

The first stirrings of stupidity came then, in the planning stages. Emails like this started to circulate among the ten of us:

Neanderthal 1: What do you say we plan a man-trip for some weekend?

Neanderthal 2: I'm down for something intense, or something casual. Just something where I can spit, swear, and not shower for a couple days.

Neanderthal 3: Here's what we do: head down to Zion National Park and camp on Friday. We'll eat some tin foil dinners, or whatever we kill with our bare hands. Then we hike Orderville Canyon on Saturday and drive home on Sunday. Boom, planned.

Neanderthal 4: There's a lot of water in Orderville Canyon, so we'll need wetsuits. The water down in the canyon will be freezing in May. Also, there could be flash floods.

Neanderthal 5: This is MANcation. We don't need tents, we don't need changes of underwear, and we don't need to plan.

Neanderthal 6: It's outings like this one where I wish I had some sleeveless Harley Davidson T-shirt.

Neanderthal 7: Hey, what do you wear under a wetsuit?

Neanderthal 8: Nothing.

Neanderthal 9: I don't think my wife wants me to go on this trip. She thinks I'll hurt myself being stupid.

Neanderthal 10: Stupid decisions are likely. Is it bad that my wife is not concerned for my safety? She either trusts me or wants me to get hurt. You pick.

With input like that, our trip to Zion National Park transpired. We arrived at our destination around 10 pm. Then we spent the next three hours, in the dark, looking for a place to camp.

We eventually settled in on a spot and began preparing for the next day's big hike by carbo-loading on Mountain Dew and Chips Ahoy. After a couple hours of sleep, we woke up and tried to cook some eggs and pancakes.

Luckily nobody could find the plasticware, so we got to eat breakfast with our bare hands. After breakfast we packed some PBJs and drove up to the get-out point of Orderville Canyon to begin our 13-mile descent into one of the Park's most treacherous slot canyons.

We had all rented wetsuits the day before, but it was sunny when we started out so we decided to leave them behind.

TO BE CONTINUED (next week)...

The Lone Ranger knows how to pack light

2009-05-23T07:38:00.006-06:00

I recently spent some time chatting with my brother-in-law about a seven-day trip to China he'd just returned from. What impressed me most about his trip was that he took nothing more than a single carry-on bag.

The last time I caught a plane, I had to pay 15 bucks to check in my suitcase--at least if I wanted it to be on the same flight as mine. And then I had to deal with the baggage claim crowd. If I’m going to stare at a conveyor belt for a long time, I want it to be at Krispy Kreme, where doughnuts move along in front of you and not suitcases.

I’ve put some serious thought into packing lighter. Take packing, hauling around what is packed, and unpacking out of the traveling equation, and you’ve got a pretty enjoyable trip on your hands. Indeed, a suitcase is nothing more than a traveler’s ball and chain.

The next time I fly, I want to walk by the baggage check-in and give ‘em the bird.

There are definitely some obstacles to overcome in packing lighter, all of which are reasons why we're turning into pack horses:

For one, I can't wear the same shirt for more than a day (I haven't found a deodorant strong enough). Actually, I guess I can, but I'd need to be around people who have no regard for personal hygiene. And I just don’t travel with my old college roommates that often.

Then there’s the weather. Who knows if it will be too hot for pants or too cold for shorts? They do make pants that can be transformed into shorts by unzipping the bottom half of the legs. Those would be a good option, but my wife has veto power over all my clothes, and I think she'd exercise it in this case.

Probably the best way to pack light is to bring a little washboard and take a few minutes before bedtime to scrub down the clothes I wore that day. I'd just need to bring one pair of clothes to wear while the other dries out on the shower rack.

There are plenty of other obstacles (e.g., contact solution, swimsuits, neck pillows), but it can be done. I just think of the traveling cowboy: nothing more on the back of his saddle than a bedroll, a can of beans, and a rifle.

Those big, bad airlines probably thought people would simply accept the luggage fee. Not this lone ranger; he'll be checking his gun in for a washboard and firing back.

When do I get my honorary Ph.D.?

2009-05-17T20:52:00.014-06:00

This past week Barack Obama received a Ph.D. from Notre Dame. Dolly Parton got one from the University of Tennessee. Here's the kicker: neither one of them did a dang bit of the university's coursework.

On top of that, they didn't even have to buy a textbook or take a test. President Obama never had to paint a football helmet gold. Dolly Parton never had to sing "Rocky Top Tennessee" after getting hazed into a sorority. It was just given to them.

Here's a list of a few other famous folks that picked up a degree like it was a doughnut at a complimentary breakfast:

Tim Allen - Western Michigan University
Bob Barker - Drury University
George Foreman - Houston Graduate School of Theology
Billy Joel - Syracuse University
J.K. Rowling - Aberdeen University, Scotland
Arnold Schwarzenegger - University of Wisconsin Superior
Mike Tyson - Central Ohio State University

As masochistic as it may sound, I've thought about going on to graduate school a time or two. But then I think of, well..., going back to school, and any desire to do so is immediately extinguished. Walking back into homework just doesn't sound appealing. "Like a dog returning to its vomit," to quote Proverbs.

After seeing the above list of honorary degree recipients, I think their path to higher education is the way to go. Now I know what you're saying:

"You could never successfully host a game show for 35 years."

"You'll never pen a song that matches the likes of Uptown Girl or Piano Man."

"There's no way on this green earth you could write a book about Quidditch."

Maybe that's the case, but I think I could be a handy man (regardless of what my wife says). I also think I could invent something like a hamburger grill. Shoot, I could even be a boxer and take a bite out of some dude's ear.

Wikipedia says that a school giving someone an honorary degree "often derives benefits by association with the person in question." That may be a hard sale. I know that even my wife wouldn't give me an honorary degree, based off that criteria.

For now, I guess my marriage certificate is as close as I'll get to anything honorary.

The idiot and the parking lot

2009-05-09T06:44:00.011-06:00

I took an IQ test last week. The format was a little different than the conventional test, but it still assessed my intelligence. Essentially, I'm as dumb as a dead carp.

I don't lock my car anymore. I figure that between the high-pitched whine that resonates when I accelerate and the rattling that kicks in once I apply the brakes, anyone that chooses to swipe my car will abandon it a quarter mile down the road.

So when I couldn't find my car in the airport parking-lot, I knew darn well nobody jacked the thing. Rather, I knew I had lost it.

I've certainly lost my car before at places like Walmart, Home Depot, and the parking lot outside my apartment complex. But an airport parking-lot is a different story. It's like all three of those combined.

The IQ test began as the park-n-ride shuttle approached the lot: find an object the size of a baby whale that I had parked 5 days earlier.

I had no clue which stop to get off at, so I just went with the first one. No problem, I thought. I'd just stroll up and down a few rows of cars and find my car in five minutes.

Twenty minutes later, I found myself disoriented, alone, and on the bridge of heat stroke on an asphalt sea of cars, none of which appeared to be mine. I'd hauled my luggage up and down countless rows of cars and had passed the mocking (at least he appeared to be) shuttle driver more than once.

In that asphalt sea, I was looking for my white whale. And there were a lot of look-a-likes. I'd see a white Honda and head for it, only to realize it didn't have a dent in the bumper from where my wife hit the pole of our carport.

Thirty minutes later, I switched my search from a random, scattered search to a more methodical strategy. I realized the only way to find my car was to start at the top, row 20, and zigzag back and forth down to row 1.

Fifty minutes later, my mouth parched, my face sunburned, and the wheels of my luggage ground down to stubs, I arrived on row 3. There sat my blasted car.

I may have felt like an idiot, but it sure felt good climbing into my car knowing I wasn't going to perish on the arid parking lot. As I accelerated out of that dreadful place, the whine and rattle of my car never sounded so good.

ROUNDTABLE

2009-05-03T13:27:00.000-06:00

The author is out of town. Please enjoy this re-post (originally published on 3/22/08).

I've now been to roundtable... I'm not even old enough to rent a car, and yet I've been to roundtable. To say the least, it was a slap-in-the-face welcome to the boring world of adulthood.

For those of you who've grown up with parents involved in scouting, you may remember hearing them grumble under their breath about going to some horrendous meeting on a Thursday night. The second Thursday of the month, that is... always has been, always will be. Unless you end up in hell, then it'll be the second and fourth.

When I arrived at the meeting I saw a bigger crowd than I'd expected, all decked out in certified uniforms and neckerchiefs, mumbling to each other about the latest Klondike activity. There were basically three types of people in attendance:

1. The nice lady that serves faithfully as the troop's den mother. Always has a lot of fragile decorations in her house that you're not allowed to touch, but she's good for home-baked goodies.
2. The overly-cheerful guy that serves as the troop's scoutmaster. Dons a beard 90% of the time. Can rattle off at least 9 dutch-oven recipes upon request.3. The newly-called scout leaders that are wondering what wrong they've done to the world to deserve such punishment.
After a few opening announcements, a bona fide scouter stood up and called a person from the congregation to join him on stage. Apparently the chosen individual had completed "Wood Badge," a week-long training course for scout leaders. With his wife in hand, the prizewinner took an honorable walk to the front; he looked proud as a peacock when a new neckerchief was placed upon his shoulders. The awarder then announced, "we can't let him go without singing the Antelope Song!" In a flash the others in the congregation, who'd apparently completed Wood Badge also, stormed the stage and belted out the type of song that makes you want to slam your head against the nearest solid surface. They finished, there was an awkward moment of silence, and the meeting resumed.

I learned from roundtable that there is a pride cycle in the world of scouting. As an 11 or 12 year-old, it's neat to get badges and beads; when you're 17 or 18, it's not so great anymore. But when you become a middle-aged man, racking up badges suddenly becomes cool again.

I'd rather not tweet

2009-04-25T10:06:00.020-06:00

It's hard to keep up with the latest, coolest thing. For instance, we still don't have a bagless vacuum or a toaster that fits bagels.

I also didn't have a Twitter account, until just last week. I don't really know why I registered for one. I guess I just thought that someday I may use it, so it would be a good idea to nail down the user name I wanted before it got taken.

For those of you who don't know, Twitter is like a blog, but each post must be under 140 characters. Each post must also contain one or more internet initialisms such as LOL, ROFL, or JK. If you're unsure how to use one in a sentence, just ask a 12-year old girl--or one of the Jonas Brothers--to send you a text.

Each post on Twitter is actually called a "tweet," which is a big reason I was so hesitant to open an account. As a man, I try to limit the number of times I use the word "tweet." It falls right in with "yay," "scrumptious," and "oodles."

The idea of each tweet (*shuddering*) is to give a quick update about what you are doing/thinking/wondering at the moment.

Even though I have an account, I haven't touched it since I set the dang thing up. And I don't intend to. Why? Well, here's an example of how a given day, say... a lazy Saturday, of me on Twitter would read:

8:10 a.m. - Didn't sleep in today. Instead I got up early so I could wander around the house.

9:33 a.m. - Aerating the soil in my houseplant pots. BTW, when will I have a yard and some real earth to till?

12:29 p.m. - Had a good church-ball game: 2 points, 3 fouls, and I made some guy swear. Dude shouldn't have tried to make a lay-up on me.

12:54 p.m. - Great shower. Skipped the soap and just went with water - LOL!

2:02 p.m. - Lunch at the local taco stand... went with the 1-pound Machaca burrito smothered in salsa verde. Now my stomach hurts like hell, but IDC.

3:31 p.m. - I'd like to get on Antiques Roadshow with some random piece of crap. I should start visiting more yard sales.

4:22 p.m. - Just ate a green Otter Pop. Should have gone with red.

4:28 p.m. - Just ate a red Otter Pop. Much better, IMO.

5:49 p.m. - Went to the dollar store, now I'm SFETE. Bag of cinnamon bears, tube of super glue, bottle of Mexican soda, and a mini radio all for just 4 bucks!

I think you get the idea. Not much there. I think I'll keep my energy focused on this blog, where my mindless drivel doesn't have to be capped at 140 characters.

Was it Britney Spears who sang "Smokin' In the Boys Room?"

2009-04-16T22:12:00.025-06:00

It all happened unexpectedly: A long time ago my wife mentioned that she kind of liked Britney Spears' music; I recently found out she was coming to town; I got a good deal on tickets; Yada yada... Suddenly I'm a 25-year old guy walking into a Britney Spears concert.

There are a lot of places I never thought I'd end up in my lifetime--North Dakota, a NASCAR race, Denny's--and now a Britney Spears concert can be crossed off that list.

I wouldn't say I was excited about the whole thing, but I was somewhat curious. It's not every day you get to see a former Mickey Mouse Club all-star in person. However, once I got into the venue my curiosity quickly dissolved, and I wanted to get the heck out.

For one, my wife wasn't letting me make any sarcastic remarks. For instance, she got mad at me when I asked the usher if Jamie Lynn was going to be performing with Britney. The usher didn't think it was funny, either.

Secondly, crazy-pshyco-fanatic girls wearing shirts saying "Oops I did it again" and "Hit me baby one more time" were in full force. Hundreds and thousands of 'em. There weren't many guys there, and I told my wife I needed to leave because everyone would think I was some kind of pervert.

However, my concern quickly dissolved when the show started and the Pussycat Dolls, who opened for the concert, were on stage. That's when I saw some dude with binoculars, and he kind of took the cake on the whole creepy/pervert thing:

The show wasn't too bad; lotta theatrics, lights, dancers, and screaming fans. At halftime (technically it was intermission, but we were in an NBA Arena so I'll call it halftime) I headed for the men's restroom, to well, use the bathroom. I also wanted to hear some man-to-man urinal talk and find out how other guys in the place were handling the concert.

When I walked into the men's room it smelled heavily of marijuana smoke. THAT is how they were handling it.

I elected to skip out on sharing in on the high, and I went back out for the second half. More theatrics, more lights, more ear-drum deafening shrieks whenever Britney began to sing (and by sing, I mean lip-sync) a new song.

She sang a song while sitting in the handle of a giant umbrella, hung by the rafters. She sang a song while getting sawed in half by a magician, then came out of the box whole again. Etc, etc. And then it was all over.

Going to a Britney Spears concert is kind of like playing in the mud: it's entertaining enough while you're in it, but after you're done you feel like you need a shower. So as my wife and I walked back to our car after the concert, I was glad it was raining.

What happened to riding bikes?

2009-04-12T12:01:00.000-06:00

When I was a kid, my bike was freedom.

For one, a bike provided unlimited options for fun. A popular game in my neighborhood was one wherein some kid was chosen to be on a bike, and everyone else was on foot. The chosen cyclist would then try to ride away from the pedestrians (a.k.a. foot soldiers), who were wielding broomsticks.

The goal of the foot soldiers was to lob a broom handle into the spokes of the rider's front wheel. The goal of the rider was to try to avoid eating the handlebars. When a foot soldier successfully wrecked the cyclist, he was awarded a turn on the bike (I know, the motivation seems idiotic, but it worked). The following embedded video will give you a general idea of the process:

We always talked my younger brother into letting us use his bike for that game; all we had to do was compliment his bike by saying it did the best front flips. He never seemed to mind that his bike was in constant need of an alignment.

Secondly, my bike could have been a tax write-off, had my paper route brought in enough money to merit filing income taxes. My bike was a moneymaker, and delivering newspapers on it was certainly more efficient than doing so on foot.

For instance, the time I threw a newspaper through the glass of someone's storm door I was able to make a quick get-a-way. Unfortunately, a newspaper thrown through glass is an object that can easily be traced back to the paperboy. That dang storm door equaled six weeks of wages.

Lastly, my bike was great for simply getting around. It was nice to not have to beg my parents for a ride into town; I could go buy crap from the the pet shop, the gas station, or the pawn shop on my own volition.

With all the freedom bikes gave us as kids, it's unfortunate that we abandon them so readily once we've got a car.

I bought a bike last fall from some stoned dude at a yard sale. He was also selling a lot of other stolen goods, but the bike was all I was interested in. It's actually a pretty nice bike; it has shocks and everything.

My goal this summer is to ride my bike more often, not just to reduce my carbon footprint (that line is for you, Al Gore), but to see if I can garner the feeling of freedom I once had as a young and reckless cyclist.

Two pets is one too many

2009-04-05T09:55:00.016-06:00

"Surround yourself with people smarter than you," is a saying tossed around in the business world. However, at home people seem to prefer to surround themselves with those of lesser intelligence.

At least that's my philosophy on why people have pets. We naturally like to be the ruler of someone or something, and getting a pet is one of the quickest ways to gain a subordinate.

Such was the case with a lady in Lehi, Utah. Last Friday police removed 60 cats from her two-bedroom apartment, then condemned the dwelling. A few years prior, the police had removed 35. I guess she was more of a sovereign queen of kitties, rather than just a ruler of pets.

The thing is, I'm sure it all started with one feline and then snowballed out of control. I went through the same thing last year, but with houseplants. Although they're not pets, they are still something to rule over.

First I got a neat-looking yucca plant, and placed it in the living room. Then I thought a pepper plant by the window would be nice. Then I figured housing an aloe vera plant would be reasonable, for sunburns and what not.

And on it went with herb gardens and palms, until I realized I needed to take a deep breath and step back. Now on our front porch lay half-a-dozen stacked pots, like gravestones to those that I did away with. I guess I'm lucky I was able to nip the craving at the bud (no pun intended); the cat lady wasn't so fortunate.

My wife and I also have a little fiddler crab, that we rule over jointly. It's as far as we've gone in a pet venture. We got it about 10 months ago, and never thought it would live until now. But since it's survived the trials we've put it through (like the time we went on vacation for a week in December and left the heat off), we've grown attached.

I'll even say we've thought of getting a second fiddler crab, so it could have a friend. Thankfully we've been able to resist, because next thing you know we've got 60 and our next door neighbor is calling the police.

Cell phones were originally used to call people

2009-03-29T09:45:00.020-06:00

http://imjosh.com/images/

I recently got a new cell phone for work. The thing does everything from GPS navigation to emailing. Heck, I could even update my MySpace page from it, if I had one. It's a lot different from my first wireless phone.

I decided to finally get a cell phone during my Sophomore year of college. I was sitting in class, watching some guy pick up on some girl--so I started taking mental notes. Before they parted ways, he smoothly pulled out his cell phone and asked her for her number.

That's when I decided to get one, so I could have something to put chick's numbers into. I went down to Cricket Wireless and signed up for the cheapest plan they had. No texting, no voicemail, and my service area was only in-state. All for an even 20 bucks a month, which matched the amount I budgeted each month for dating.

To my disappointment, I quickly found out that women wouldn't flock to me just because I had a mobile phone. When the opportunity finally came, and a girl was standing in front of me rattling off her number, I couldn't figure out how to type in her name with the stupid numeric keypad. And so Dgtmmg became the first female--that wasn't a relative--to grace my phone.

I also learned that I wouldn't suddenly muster the courage to call a girl just because I had her name (some form of it) and number programed into my cell phone.

Since then I've been through a number of phones. My personal favorite was the one that would randomly call 911. I'm not sure how it would happen, but the phone would be in my pocket, think there was an emergency, and dial away.

It happened once on a date. I got a call from the police, saying I had dialed 911 and they wanted to know if everything was all right. I told them it was, and explained my phone's bad habit. Then they told me they looked up my number and that there was a warrant out for my arrest.

A couple month's prior I had received a traffic ticket. I paid it right away, but somehow my payment didn't get recorded. It was a lot of fun handling that call in front of my date.

My new phone sure is slick, but it probably does too much. Looking back, I kind of wish I could go back to my first cell phone and the simple world that went along with it: dial and hang up.

The Kool-Aid tastes funny in Arkansas

2009-03-22T09:22:00.011-06:00

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e61/vasandack/kool_aid_man_main.jpg

In a particular Simpson's episode, Homer is on tour with the The Smashing Pumpkins. In a scene backstage, he is quizzed by a couple members of the famous rock band:

Billy Corgan: Hey, Homer, looks like our next stop is your hometown, Springfield.
D'Arcy: Is it true that we have to bring our own water?
Homer: We got a little rule back home: if it's brown, drink it down; if it's black, send it back.

In Arkansas, bright blue is the new brown...

Earlier this month, a day-care operator near Little Rock served windshield wiper fluid to 10 children. According to reports, the operator thought the brightly colored liquid was Kool-Aid. It was even chilled in the fridge before serving.

The good news; all 10 kids were quickly released from the hospital and are doing fine. The bad news; Arkansas just reaffirmed its usual stereotype.

I imagine a lot of people are outraged at the incident (like, say... the parents of these 10 kids), but I can understand the screw up. As a youth, I went through many unpleasant experiences while trying to figure out which liquids were palatable, and which were not.

For instance, my mom would always save the juice from cans of vegetables and use it for soup stock. When I came across the pale-colored liquid while sneaking through the fridge, I'd often mistake it for pineapple juice. It shouldn't be a surprise when I tell you the sweetness of green-bean juice certainly doesn't measure up to that of the pineapple.

On that same note, I also vividly remember a time when I found a mason jar full of brown liquid in the fridge. Mmmm... root beer! After taking a hearty swig, I was quickly reminded that my mom was big on homemade maple syrup.

I guess kids just have a knack for expecting things to be better than what they really are. That is, if it's wet, drink it down. How else do you account for Kool-Aid's success?

If this blog were a plant, it'd be a perennial

2009-03-15T08:43:00.015-06:00

Experts say 50% of businesses fail within the first year. I should know, my "Abercrombie & Your mom" T-shirt business never made it to the mark... those eBay buyers are cutthroat.

I imagine the same stat pertains to blogs. Take my friend Jeris, who started a blog about a year ago. The introductory post was titled "Just one more thing to neglect." At least he was being frank--three post and three months later, his blog gave up the ghost.

A blogger's life is tough. Regularly coming up with new content and hoping we don't have any typos is the bane of our existence. We're avid expressionists flooding the Inernet with amateur writing and Ads by Google that nobody clicks on. With no reward but the comments left by our readers, we regularly have to look deep within ourselves to find a reason to keep posting.

That being said, please join me in celebrating this blogs one year anniversary. It's hard to believe, but rockmitchell.blogspot.com began on March 12, 2008. Since that date I've offended several family members and friends, had articles published in two newspapers, and made a little over 3 bucks with the Google Ads in my sidebar.

You're probably aware of the Sitemeter thing at the bottom of this blog. It not only keeps track of the number of visitors, but it also keeps tabs on where visitors come from, as well as what search words they may have used to end up here.

My most popular article, overall, is Rubber cement boogers vs. cell phones in school. It's most often stumbled upon by people from Ivy League schools Googling something like "effect of cell phones on education." Those poor saps sure hit a dead end when they arrive.

My most popular international article is Mistaken for something great. For some reason, people from South America and Eastern Europe love to search for "fubu boots." All they get, though, is an article about how much I suck at basketball.

My most popular article with the country folk is Big hunting trucks don't scare me. It's usually dudes from the bible belt or the deep south that are using search words like "I wanna see big trucks," or "cool elk hunting stickers."

The same experts that say 50% of businesses fail within the first year also say 90% of them fail within the first five years. Don't get your hopes up, oh faithful readers.

Why even get out of bed?

2009-03-07T09:58:00.015-07:00

http://gothamist.com

Well, I had quite a week. On Monday I got kidnapped, but my captor stopped at a convenience store for a drink and I was able to slip away to the back of the store and lose him. I hid out there for a long time, and survived by sneaking bites of ice cream from the freezer.

Tuesday got really interesting. I was castaway in the ocean on some air mattress with a few strangers. Eventually we floated down to Mexico, where I "woke up" up on some bus. The driver kicked me off and I had to walk home in the snow. I certainly didn't expect snow in Mexico.

The rest of the week: Wednesday - befriended a stray dog; Thursday - ran a marathon; Friday - rolled a stolen RV, then tipped it back up; Saturday - bought a bunch of ice cream, but couldn't keep it from melting.

That all happened while I was in the subconscious. Unfortunately, my waking hours weren't so interesting. Work, filing my taxes, and getting an oil change were highlights of the cognizant moments of my week.

As you can tell, I decided to keep a dream journal. I'm not sure why, maybe I just wanted to find out how messed up my psyche is. And yeah, it's messed up.

I went to a dream interpretation website and checked a few things out. Since two of my dreams involved ice cream, I decided to see what it meant: To see or eat ice cream in your dream denotes satisfaction with your life. Ok, good so far... To see ice cream melt in your dream symbolizes failure to realize your hopes and desires. Dang it!

How about that castaway dream? To dream that you are lost at sea suggest that you are drifting around in life without any direction. Luckily I wasn't at sea forever; as you will recall, I ended up on some bus. To dream that you are riding a bus implies that you are lacking originality and are taking no control over where your life is taking.

After a week of recording dreams, I wondered "why get up at all?" Dreams seemed like a lot more fun than real life, until I found out that all my dreams mean I'm a failure with no direction in life.

Turns out, I'm glad I did my taxes when I was awake: To dream you are paying taxes represents the price you are paying for the way you live. The dream may be stemming from some sort of self-guilt and the debt that you owe to society.

We're all becoming germ freaks

2009-03-01T09:13:00.021-07:00

A while ago my wife came home from the store with a big jug of hand soap to refill the soap dispensers in our house. I picked it up and said, "you know this isn't antibacterial, right?" That's when panic set in.

She wanted to throw it away and immediately go buy another jug with antibacterial powers, but I refused. I knew soap in the olden days was made from potash and lard (in fact I made some for a science project in 5th-grade). So I figured that what was in the jug was just as good as the stuff people had been using for hundreds of years prior.

Indeed we were going to wash with it until it was gone, come what microbes may. Funny thing is, over the months that we refilled our soap dispensers with the non-antibacterial soap, we survived just fine.

Not that I was surprised, though. Any boy that's gone to a summer camp has spent a week without coming into contact with anything remotely related to soap--including toothpaste. To men not under the supervision of women, "washing up" is a water-free process consisting of wiping their hands on the front of their pant legs.

I've always had a bad habit of chewing on my pens. I also have a bad habit of never buying my own pens; I just use ones I find laying around or ones I forget to give back after signing my credit card receipt. Studies show pens are one of the most germ-laden things in an office, and I treat them like a piece of licorice.

These days, folks are just too obsessed with sanitation. We're scared of hand shakes, public transportation, and stair rails. I know people that go through their house once a week and Clorox every door handle and every hard surface in their home. This is all done while their kids are in the backyard eating dirt.

And then there's the instant hand sanitizer craze, the biggest "this is better for you" scam since the introduction of bottled water. The stuff kills 99.9% of the germs on your hands, but then the 0.1% left behind go ape because you knocked off all their friends.

I miss the pink powdery soap we used in elementary school; it was better than instant hand sanitizer. Boraxo was the brand name, I believe. It cleaned not so much by creating germ-killing suds, but by abrasion of the outer layer of skin.

I don't think we should stop washing our hands, I just think our germ-free world could loosen up a bit. We ought to get back outside and taste the dirt. We need to learn a lesson from man's best friend and drink water from the toilet. Or at very least, the tap.

Shopping at Costco takes some getting used to

2009-02-22T09:30:00.021-07:00

http://images.businessweek.com

My parents gave my wife and I Costco Club memberships for Christmas last year. No doubt, it's been great. Yesterday we got a 3-pack of frozen pizzas, an 80-pack of fruit snacks, and a tub of salsa big enough to wade in--all at a reasonable price.

However, there are some things about Costco that I've found rather interesting...

On our first trip we turned in our gift card for a membership card. The process of applying for a membership card at Costco is similar to getting a drivers license at the DMV. You even have to get your photo taken for the card's picture ID. I tried to look cross-eyed for mine.

I'm also pretty sure they run a background check to make sure you're a white, SUV-driving suburbanite. At least that seems to be who fills the store.

My favorite part about going to Costco is trying to get past the membership card checkers at the entrance without showing them my card. I put on the facade of an angry man ready to snap at the next person that crosses my path, and they haven't stopped me thus far. My wife thinks my little game is stupid, though.

Before we had our Costco card I heard a lot about the free samples. However, I've been rather disappointed. When the samples are being prepared, nobody is in line. Instead they're all hovering close by, acting like they're interested in some nearby product. The only difference between them and the people in line at a soup kitchen, I guess, is the soup kitchen doesn't require a membership.

Once the samples are ready, though, you have to box-out soccer moms and shoulder-check CPAs just to get a chance at a 1-oz cup of granola. I guess knowing your cart full of groceries is going to run you 300 bucks makes you want to milk everything you can out of the free samples.

As a member of this wholesale club, I'm also entitled to bulk goods--right off the pallet. Of course Costco outfits you with a 100-gallon shopping cart that is willing to swallow up whatever you want throw in it; be it a 4-pound bag of Sunsweet prunes or a 96-pack of toilet paper... or both.

At checkout Costco is a mix between your neighborhood lemonade stand a 5-star hotel, in that they only take cash or Amex. They also don't bag your groceries, probably because they don't want to be held responsible for smashing your bread (I used to be a bagger at a grocery store, and I've seen nice old women start foaming at the mouth upon finding their bread smashed).

After checkout comes my second favorite part about Costco: trying to sneak past the Sharpie-toting receipt checkers guarding the exit. Then comes my least favorite: hauling unbagged groceries up the stairs to our 3rd-floor condo.

My Utopia

2009-02-15T09:21:00.011-07:00

I spend plenty of time in my car--mostly because of my commute. About a year ago I decided to start listening to books on CD, and it has generally made driving much more enjoyable.

So a few days ago I was at the library looking for another book on CD. The library was closing in a couple minutes, and I couldn't find anything interesting. On my last glance I saw Sir Thomas More's Utopia and decided to give it a whirl.

Bad mistake.

I'm sure it's a great literary work and all, but it's as boring as C-Span. The book, written in 1516, is essentially More's ramblings (in very old English, mind you) as he describes the political arrangements of the imaginary island of Utopia to some other boring guy.

If you consider getting stuck in traffic to be lame, getting stuck in traffic AND having listening to Utopia is like salt in the wound.

Anyway, More goes off on the way this Utopia, or perfect society, should punish criminals, conduct sheep farming, monitor excessive fashion, etc... His dissertation got me thinking of how my Utopia would pan out.

What would not exist in my Utopia:

www.theonion.com

1. People that wear bluetooth headsets all the time
2. The Clinton's
3. John Mayer

What would exist in my Utopia:

www.show.me.uk

1. Domesticated penguins
2. A college football playoff
3. Carbonated water running through all culinary water pipes (for some reason I've always wanted to take a shower in club soda)

You may not sign up for everything in my Utopia, but I promise it will be more interesting than Sir Thomas More's.

Should we start looking for new heroes?

2009-02-08T09:38:00.011-07:00

I played baseball for 6 consecutive years--mostly little league. I was flat out horrible at the sport, though. Memories of hitting RBIs or fielding grounders are lacking. In fact, my most poignant memories are bloopers:

Having the third-base coach yell at me for missing a chance to score a run because I was staring at my cleats instead of watching the hitter
Lying on the ground after missing an easy pop fly, then deciding to just remain on the ground for a while and act like I'd injured my shoulder

Indeed, I preferred chewing the rawhide off my glove in some abandoned corner of right field to manning some infield position. I think my coach invented the "rover" position just for me:

Coach: "Listen, I want you to go hold down that patch of weeds under the bleachers and watch for stray balls. If you get bored there, feel free to wander over to the ditch behind the field and catch garter snakes."

Me: "Sure coach, but will you send someone to the ditch to tell me when it's our turn to bat?"

Suffices to say that the Capri Suns at the end of each game is the only thing that kept me playing the sport. Unfortunately, that's not the only juice being served after baseball games these days, nor the only "juice" that keeps guys in the sport:

A new report says Alex Rodriguez tested positive for 'roids in 2003--the year he won the AL home run title and MVP award. So add A-Rod to the growing list of baseball stars that have been on the juice.

It makes me wonder how real their feats are. Would McGwire and Bonds have hit as many home runs if they weren't on the drug? Granted, no amount of steroids would have made me a successful ball player--a foundation of basic talent is certainly necessary--but I have to wonder how good these tainted athletes really are.

And then we've got the recent Michael Phelps drama. The only thing we're used to seeing him smoke is the competition, and I don't recall Mary Jane being the name of one of those guys on the French swim team.

In America we love our heroes. We want them to climb out of the gutter and into success, but we want them to be squeaky clean in doing so. Are our standards too tight? It was F. Scott Fitzgerald who wrote "Show me a hero and I will write you a tragedy."

Knowing darn well that our sports heroes will make a mistake, maybe we shouldn't judge them so much by what they do wrong, but by how they respond to what they do wrong.

I try to eat well, but is it worth it?

2009-02-01T08:42:00.000-07:00

Photo: http://scrapetv.com/News/Images/

A couple nights ago I decided to make myself a double cheeseburger. But when I opened the freezer, I realized we had both hamburger patties and Gardenburger patties.

I was faced with a health-vs-taste and fiber-vs-protein decision. What did I choose? Let's just say I sat the fence; my double cheeseburger had one hamburger patty and one Gardenburger patty.

It was probably the first time the American Beef Council and PETA had met between two buns.

That's kind of how my diet goes. I do a descent job of eating healthy, but I can never go all-in. For instance, I don't think I'd ever be able to cut ginger ale out of my diet. I know, I know, most people my age are chugging Mountain Dews and Red Bulls, but I think ginger ale is the best drink ever made. I need about one a day to keep my spirits up.

(Random triva: today's ginger ale was developed during the Prohibition and although it's not popular in vending machines, it's a best-seller in airlines and assisted living centers.)

At work is where my diet really fails. I bring a square meal for lunch, but throughout the day I consume a ton of empty calories. By the day's end, the trash can in my office is full of empty fruit-snack pouches, Hershey's Miniatures wrappers, and crumpled-up sketches of army tanks. The night custodian probably thinks an 8-year old works in my office.

Overall though, I feel I make pretty good choices. For example, I like to buy the Dryer's ice cream that has half the fat of regular ice cream, because I know I'll eat at least 2 servings worth at every sitting.

However, most people I know get upset with me whenever I say anything about how I should eat better. That's because I have the metabolism of a gerbil, and bulk clings to me like snow to a hot tin roof.

I don't count that as a blessing, though. My steadfast scrawniness is probably the only reason I'm not playing in the NFL right now. Plus, being funny is an up-hill battle for skinny guys, because fat guys are naturally funnier:

That begs the question, should I have gone for the double cheeseburger instead?

Update: My world record attempt

2009-01-29T18:35:00.003-07:00

As you may recall from my last article, I submitted a proposal to set the world record for the most 3-point baskets made with gummy bears in 10 minutes.

A few days after my proposal was sent off, I received an email from ol' Guinness:

Dear Rock, We are glad to inform you that your record application has been transferred to our internal system. As a result of this, we are sending to you the Agreement Regarding Record Attempts together with a document called General Information on Record Breaking, which will give you an overview of the process.

Unfortunately, the attached agreement was 16 pages of legal mumbo jumbo asking me to give up all my rights, along with a bunch of other stuff. Plus, it said I'd have to pay for the guy from Guinness (adjudicator) to come out and watch me set the record.

I guess some records are never meant to be made...

Anyone can set a world record

2009-01-25T09:28:00.011-07:00

Photo: http://www.tv.com

Am I the only one that's become disenchanted with world records?

In middle school I remember checking out a copy of the Guinness Book of World Records from the school library. I thought it was great reading; the most tattooed person, the longest bridge, the fattest person (who certainly could have held the most-tattooed record if he wanted to, because of sheer surface area).

Well nowadays world records seem to be getting a bit overdone. It's not just the longest sword swallowed, it's the heaviest object dangled from a swallowed sword. It's not just the scariest woman, it's the woman that's creeped out the most people in a one-year span (set by Rosie O'Donnell in 2006).

I haven't seen the latest edition of The Guinness Book of World Records, but it must be huge.

To set a world record, all you really need to do is find something nobody else has yet thought of, nor would care to do if they heard of it.

Like 30-year old Kanchana Ketkaew from Thailand, for instance. She set a world record by living with 5,000 poisonous scorpions for 32 days. At the end of her stay she walked out of her enclosure in a wedding dress, covered in scorpions, of course.

She's also on track to set the world record for going the longest time without having any human friends.

To me, a legitimate world record should be something other people chase. Nobody cares about beating the scorpion queen's feat, so we really don't know if she's the best at living with a lot of scorpions.

Besides, I checked it out and people in Thailand eat scorpions. So Kanchana's feat is comparable to me living with 5,000 gummy worms for a month.

Furthermore, my first college apartment probably had a few thousand ants wandering through it, and I didn't bother to call Guinness at any time during my stay.

Anyway, if anyone's interested they can go to guinnessworldrecords.com and get on the fast track to breaking a world record. They're serving them up like hotcakes. All you do is fill out an online form about a record you want to break and they'll get back to you in 4-6 weeks.

In fact, I went ahead and submitted a proposal on-line this morning. My record: make the most 3-point baskets using gummy bears (instead of basketballs) on a regulation-size basketball court. The record will be set in 10 minutes. For "why I want to set/break this record," I stated that I really like gummy bears and that I have a good aim when tossing them.

I'll let you know if they decide to send an adjudicator out to ensure the record is being carried out according to [Guinness's] rules and guidelines but also to offer PR support and instant certification.

Oh, and for "media that I'd like to have present," I just put friends and family. So charge up those hand-held video cameras.

Cussing: should it really be put to an end?

2009-01-18T09:20:00.006-07:00

Every once in a while I come across a story that reminds me of why I bother to read the news.

This morning I found an article about a 14-year old boy that went to school one day and decided he was sick of hearing all his friends cuss. Upon asking them to stop, they replied with complaints that they didn't even know they were doing it, and they didn't know how to stop. That's when McKay Hatch started the No Cussing Club.

I was introduced to the art of swearing in 4th grade. Mitch Bodily would guide me around the the playground during recess and use every word in the book to describe the goings on. "Lets go see who's on the #%*@ slide right now."

We swore for the same reason a kid does anything they're not supposed to do: it's a rush. Using such words brought about a sense of liberation.

I did my best to reserve cussing for recesses with Mitch, but I quickly found opportunities to use it at home. One thing led to another, and I was soon getting the soap treatment on my tongue.

Since those carefree days, I've done a pretty good job of watching my language. Even the summer before college, when I worked with a concrete crew, I did a good job of holding my tongue. And those guys swore so much they made angry sailors sound like devout monks.

McKay Hatch's No Cussing Club (nocussing.com) invites people of all ages to join their team and take the No Cussing Challenge. 30,000 people have joined thus far. After one week of no swearing you're an Apprentice, after one month a Journeyman, and after one year a Master.

I don't think I could make it to Journeyman. Over the last month I've had to fix the faucet, my wife's car door, and the dishwasher. Each one of those tasks required at least one well-placed hell or damn.

Anyone familiar with the movie Back to the Future will remember George McFly's conversation with Marty about stopping Biff from making a move on Lorraine:

Marty: OK, so 9 o'clock you're strolling through the parking lot, you see us struggling in the car, you walk up, you open the door and you say... your line, George! George: Oh, uh, hey you, get your damn hands off her. Do you really think I ought to swear? Marty: Yes, definitely, ...dammit George, swear.

It is said that the South would not have been bested in the Civil War without the aid of cuss-prone mule drivers to the Union army. Mules were much more durable and reliable in war-like conditions, compared to the horses often used by the Rebel Army. From Hard Tack and Coffee, written by John D Billings (1877):

The theory has been advanced that if all the (muledrivers) in the Army of the Potomac could have been put into the trenches and safely advanced to within ear-shot of the enemy, and then set to swearing at their level worst, the Rebels would have either surrendered or fled... General Grant has given them credit for being able to swear a mule team out of the mud when it could not be moved by any other process.

So while I appreciate what McKay is doing with his No Cussing Club, I don't think I'm going to join. Granted, cussing is not something to be thrown around willy-nilly, but the words exist for a reason. Just ask General Grant.

Women seem to love fictional men

2009-01-11T13:29:00.014-07:00

It's hard for a guy to win over a girl; there are plenty of other dudes out in the world with more money, better looks, and greater charisma. So when a guy does sway a girl his way, he has much reason to celebrate.

However, he must not let his guard down. A hard reality he'll soon face is that while he's beat out all the real men, he'll still have to compete with imaginary men for his woman's love. Any guy out there that is unwilling to acknowledge this competition is simply living in ignorance.

Below are a couple of the biggest offenders:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/prideandprejudice/episodes/pp_1_episode.shtml

Darcy (the one played by Collin Firth). This guy's a heavy hitter. The magnitude of damage he's done since 1995, when the movie "Pride and Prejudice" was released, is hard to calculate.

In the 5-hour film, he graces the screen with dashing looks and a melt-your-spine British accent. Though he fronts as a pompous English lord, anyone who gets to know him finds he isn't afraid to lend a helping hand. For example, he's seen teaching his little sister play the piano, and he isn't above helping a lower-class family with financial woes.

His woman-winning artillery includes
- An estate (a.k.a. "a fat crib")
- A carriage
- Careless locks of hair
- Ruffles on the front of his white shirt

The only weakness normal men can expose is that his first name is Fitzwilliam *chuckles all around*.

http://weblogs.cltv.com/entertainment/tv/metromix/2008/11/

Edward (the vampire in "Twilight"). Unlike Darcy, Edward from the book series is more dangerous than the Edward from the movie. From what I hear, the text does more for his suave demeanor than what the camera is able to portray.

Though he looks like a strapping 17-year old, Edward is actually 104. But that doesn't stop him from robbing the cradle and picking up teenage Bella at a local high school.

While normal men would think women would lose interest in Edward, since he sucks blood, they find it hard not to when he resists his urge to drink it for the love of Bella.

His woman-winning artillery includes
- "Impossibly beautiful" looks
- Swift feat (he can beat any Cullen in a foot race)
- The ability to read minds
- The ability to go without breathing

The only weakness normal men can expose is that he gets purple bruises under his eyes if he goes too long without feeding (hopefully it's mistaken for mascara, and any guy that wears make-up is a sissy).

As you can see, fictional characters like the two listed above are hard to compete with. Darcy would never sit around watching football. Edward would never chug a soda and then crush the can on his head. They'd go to the opera. They'd dance at the ball.

I've told my wife a hundred times that I'd be happy to challenge Darcy, Edward, or the like to a fist fight. I'd pay good money for the chance to roll up my sleeves and meet Edward in a back alley.

However, my attempt to impress her with my strength is always quickly countered with a plea for me not to be so mean. I'm reminded that Edward would never fight if he didn't have to. Plus he's not real, so he'd never show up to the fight anyway (what a wuss).

I, and other normal men, have to find a way to fend off these imposers. We have to find a way for women to start asking why these guys aren't more like us, rather than the other way around.

One option is to follow Sun Tzu's council from "The Art of War:" get to know your enemy before you try to beat them. I think the women would appreciate that stratagem best.

No trip is complete without pictures

2009-01-03T07:57:00.013-07:00

Photo: http://www.kinfolks.info/arner/reunion/2004/Don-1.jpg

For some reason, visiting a place of interest is never enough. It's got to be documented--excessively, by photos.

When we return home, we need to be able to prove we were there. A cheesy picture of one of our mugs in front of some statue, waterfront, or crazy panhandler will do just that.

In fact, all we really see on a trip is the back of our camera. At least that's how it is for my wife and me. It'd be easier to just stay home on the couch and look through a kaleidoscope for a few days.

And then there are the occasions where we try to get both of us in the picture. Popular travel destinations really ought to have people you can rent that will follow you around all day and take pictures of you. Photo caddies, essentially.

Not that I'd pay for it, though. I've figured out that the world is a place full of makeshift tripods. A parking meter to one person is a tripod to me. Finding these tripods is one skill, and using them is another.

There are some variables to cope with when using a makeshift tripod. The most dangerous one is wind; a stiff breeze can knock your camera right off it's perch on a fence post, all while you're standing back with a stupid smile.

Then there's the self-timer to deal with. Our camera has a so-called "10 second" timer, but it's only called that. In reality it seems to go off anywhere between 5 and 15 seconds, capturing either me in stride as I'm making my way to my post, or me in anger as I'm marching toward it to see why it's not going off.

Every once in a while you have to resort to the hold-the-camera-in-front-of-you-at-arms-length maneuver, where the camera faces you. I've found one out of ten shots taken like this result in both my wife and I landing in the picture frame. Of that one in ten, a chin or forehead is usually sacrificed. Plus the arm holding the camera looks really big (desirable for guys, not for women).

You can always have a complete stranger take a picture for you, but there are certainly some risks to face with that. First of all, you've got to pick out a person that looks like they won't take-off with your camera once you hand it to them.

I've always imagined filling out a police report for that situation: "How'd he get your camera, sir?" "Well, I handed it to him, then we took 10 steps back and smiled."

Assuming they don't swipe your camera, you've got to deal with the picture they took. They'll always ask you "is it OK?"

Even though you want to say, "No, it isn't. Can you please take another where you don't zoom in on our knees?," in reality you have to say it's fine. Otherwise, if you hand it back to them for a second picture you'll likely be filling out one of those police reports I just mentioned.

So should you leave your camera in its case and just enjoy your visit, capturing the images in your memory? Or should you blow a couple flash bulbs on every trip?

It's a tough call to make: the images in your mind will likely look better than the ones you take with a camera on a makeshift tripod. You'll just never be able to share them.

Happy Holidays to All!

2008-12-28T21:06:00.004-07:00

Sorry, no post this week. But be sure to stay tuned in for the first post of 2009!

Covered parking is something special

2008-12-21T16:45:00.002-07:00

I think the caste system for cars is this; top: garaged cars, middle: car-ported cars, bottom: uncovered cars.

My car is definitely in the bottom category. The poor thing has never been garaged. The only time it's shielded from the night sky is when it's covered in a blanket of snow or ice. Or tree sap. Or bird crap.

In nice summer weather, it's not bad at all for my car to have to sit out under the night sky. But in inclement weather, I feel bad for the little guy. For one thing, it's previous owner installed an aftermarket sunroof. When it rains, it leaks like photos of a celebrity checking into rehab.

And then there are the elements of winter. Snow and ice are horrible for the both of us; it has to be parked in it, I have to scrape it.

I don't know about you, but I have my morning routine down pat. Showering, dressing, eating, etc., are all allotted a specific number of minutes. If I schedule any slack into the schedule, it would have to come out of my sleep time. I'm not willing to do that.

Thus, if I wake up and it has snowed, I know I'll have to pick up the extra minutes needed for scraping my car windows from another essential task. Usually it's the soap lather in the shower that get's nixed; there's no way I'm cutting into my breakfast time.

Then there are the times that I don't look outside once I wake up. I carry on with my usual routine and head out the door at the proper time, only to see a build-up of ice all over my car. It's a race against time to create a couple peep holes in my front windshield.

However, this year I've decided to make the unplanned morning chore of scraping ice from my windows a little more bearable.

I'm going to keep a bottle of fruit-flavored syrup in my car, along with a stack of Styrofoam cups. Then I'll collect the ice shavings that fly off as I madly scrape away. A fresh snow cone could really make the morning commute more enjoyable.

Do-it-yourselfers have to bounce back

2008-12-12T20:27:00.013-07:00

Photo: http://sportzfun.com/photos/boxing/boxing_giant

We were positioned a couple feet from each other, alone in the bathroom. With the door closed, we stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity--neither of us flinching, but one of us dripping.

I tried to mask the fear that swirled inside me, but I knew my facade was transparent. I was heavily unarmed, while it was decisively defiant. A fight was about to break out, and I was coming in as the underdog.

In my heart I knew I had a puncher's chance, and I've watched enough Rocky movies to know that kind of chance is worth something. The bell rang and I immediately went for the cold-water handle. I twisted and pulled until the decorative grip came off and the innards were exposed.

I was in a struggle to stop a leaky faucet, and it was obvious I had no strategy.

By some act of providence, I luckily remembered to turn off the water shut-off valve located below the sink. Then, with my makeshift tool set, I undid bolts and lifted flanges. I tweaked a few things, then put the faucet back together. I turned the water valve back on and took a step back, only to see the drip return.

I went back in for round two, and started to take the faucet apart once more. I freed a couple parts until I got to the faucet cartridge. I pulled up on it, and that's when it hit. A gush of water was suddenly shooting me in the face and drenching my clothes. For all I knew, I was standing over Old Faithful. I shielded my eyes as I tried to see where the attack was coming from.

Turns out I'd forgotten to turn off the water shut-off valve the second time. Little O-rings, springs, and washers were spread around me; I had no idea where they came from, or where they belonged. I was dazed and my clothes were drenched, as was everything else in the room. The match had ended by knockout.

A rematch was scheduled for one week later, and the sink was on lock-down until then. I prepped myself by making a trip to Lowe's to get several new faucet parts, as well as a couple more tools. I made it to the plumbing aisle, where I joined a couple other guys who were staring helplessly before an array of plumbing parts.

We each took several turns picking something off the shelf, looking it over, then putting it back. A drip of confidence couldn't be squeezed from the lot of us.

Eventually, a store employee came by and asked if we needed help finding anything. I glanced around at the other guys in the aisle, and they glanced back at me. Everyone was hoping someone would speak up and set a precedent that it was OK to receive help. But after several moments of silence, the employee shrugged and walked off.

I randomly grabbed a few things and headed home. I felt assured as I walked back into the ring with my new arsenal. I waited for the bell, then in a flash I had the water shut off, the faucet dismantled, and new parts inserted. I turned the water shut-off valve back on and waited, breathing heavily. No drip. I had come back strong, and I'd won by knockout in the first round.

If you don't want to pay a plumber $50/hour, you've got to be willing to put up a fight.

Figuring out coupon etiquette

2008-12-06T11:55:00.014-07:00

Photo: http://www.theonion.com/content/node/43195

I was feeling a bit nostalgic last night, so I decided to take my wife out on a date like the ones I used to take her out on before we were married. The only things real particular to such a date are; 1) plan as you go (I'm rather charismatic under pressure), and 2) keep it under ten bucks.

Naturally, we started out at the Nickel Cade. Our time was well spent; my wife perfected her stroke at the skeet-ball ramp, while I broke the basketball arcade game with my aggressive play. We won enough tickets to cash in for a stretchy sticky-hand and a kazoo.

Afterward we ended up at the Sonic Drive-In, mostly because my wife had a coupon for 99-cent shakes. As we approached the order menu she told me I had to tell the cashier I had a coupon when I ordered. I froze.

No way was I going to announce over a speaker that I had a coupon! My mind raced back to a date I had early on in college, with another girl.

This girl had wanted to go ice skating, so I planned out a date down at the local skating rink. The day before the date, one of my roommates found out about it and gave me a 2-for-1 admission coupon he had lying around.

The dilemma arose: is it OK to use a coupon on a date? Would she think I was a cheap son-of-a-gun, and walk away? I had no idea. Highly concerned, I discussed the situation with a friend at work.

Probably because he was working the same $6-hour job I was, we concluded that I should use the coupon and save $6. However, we agreed that the transaction would need to be made without my date knowing. I'd have to secretly hand it to the cashier with a wink and a nod.

It was on. My date and I arrived at the front counter of the ice skating rink where we were greeted by the cashier. "Two please," I stated confidently. I then slipped her a five and one bill, with the coupon folded inside. I pointed at something to distract my date as the cashier unfolded my money and removed the coupon.

"Sorry, this coupon isn't effective until next month." Time stood still, while the word "coupon" rang loud and clear to me, my date, and everyone behind us in line. It was like an echo down a canyon: "COUPON, COUPON, COUPON..."

I knew the dang things had expiration dates, but commencement dates?

My date looked at me with sorry eyes while my mind raced in terror. She was looking at me like I was unable to pay for the date. I looked like a kid at a 25-cent gumball machine, trying to shove a nickel into the quarter slot: kind of cute, but also kind of sad.

So as I sat in the Sonic Drive-In with my wife, I crumpled the coupon in my clenched fist and called out our order. "Two shakes please, at full price."

I paid double that night, but sometimes that's the price of keeping a little date-night dignity.

Warning:

2008-12-01T20:22:00.007-07:00

The post below (The Gift Cycle: I want out), despite it's healthy dose of cynicism, was written tongue in cheek. I exaggerated heavily to make a point about something I deem important.

Please know that I, the author, still love all the presents I've received and will receive. I also love Christmas, birthdays, and fluffy penguins--I'm not the cold hearted cynic the tone of the post implies I am.

Thank you for your loyalty to my blog.

Rock

The Gift Cycle: I want out

2008-11-30T16:17:00.011-07:00

Photo: http://www.daylife.com/photo/0d6g1SP5XBgwU

I adamantly believe most gifts are given out of a sense of social responsibility. Yeah, I'm sure most of you are saying that is Grinch talk, but I ask that you hear me out before you say my heart is two sizes too small.

My main line of reasoning is that situations have been established in our culture that provide an opportunity, I mean... a requirement, to give a gift away.

Everyone is associated with a day in which their birth will be celebrated, a.k.a. a birthday. On that day gifts MUST be given to the person chalking up another year of life. Same with the Christmas holiday. On that day gifts MUST be given to everyone.

Where does the tradition of giving gifts come from? Perhaps it originates back to the story of Jesus's birth, where wise men came bearing gifts. (Note that the shepherds didn't bring anything, and they weren't turned away from the event.)

Actually, the tradition started even earlier. In ancient Rome people would exchange gifts on New Year's Day. These gift exchanges went on for a long time, but as Christianity expanded the church attempted to halt it, seeing it as a pagan tradition. However, the gift exchanges were too popular with the people so they decided instead to associate gift giving with the Magi at the birth of Jesus, rather than associate it with a Roman holiday.

So that's a brief background on Christmas gift-giving, which we as a culture have extended into birthday gift-giving, because one time a year isn't enough. Furthermore, there are baby showers, weddings, holidays, housewarmings, anniversaries, funerals, graduations, all of which stand as another reason for gifts to be given.

So for those asking what is wrong with established dates of gift giving, first I say it takes the logic out of giving a present. If every year your good friend is going to give you a gift on your birthday, then you in turn will give them a gift for their birthday, why don't you just save your time and money and each just buy something for yourselves? At least that way your guaranteed to get what you want.

Is there any charity involved with giving a gift to someone when you know you're scheduled to get a gift from them soon? Would people really head out Christmas shopping at 4 a.m. the day after Thanksgiving if they knew there wasn't going to be anything under the tree for them on Christmas morning? Would they really buy a birthday present every year for somebody that never got them anything on theirs? Perhaps some would, but I hope my questions make a point.

What's the common phrase heard when people are going out to get a gift for someone they don't regularly exchange gifts with? "I have to, they randomly got me something last year." Yes, most people buy gifts for someone out of the fear that that person might get them something.

Not only that, receiving gifts on particular events has become so ingrained in us that it has become expected. Why the heck do people send out graduation announcements? It's definitely not to announce their graduation; the announcers expect gifts. Why do people hold bridal showers? Why do people hold birthday parties?

And so I want out. I don't want out of giving gifts, per se, but I want out of the gift cycles society has created. I don't want some blasted store telling me when I should be buying someone a gift. I want to give when I feel the need to give, and that can't be pinned down to a day on the calendar.

Only problem is, I need people to join me. Until then I'll look like a jerk at birthday parties.

Then again, I don't know... maybe I'm wrong. Maybe we're not ready for truly sporadic giving. Take away all our holidays and anniversaries and birthdays, and we'd probably never give each other a dang thing.

Useless decorations

2008-11-23T09:12:00.014-07:00

Cultures are distinguished by their living quarters. Many of those native to the North American continent made tepees and wrapped them thick with animal skins. The skins kept their house insulated from the cold. The early settlers of the Southwest caked mud on the inside of their walls. When dried, it protected the house from the blistering heat.

I worry that the current condition of our living quarters may throw some future anthropologist off. A few modern household decorations, in my opinion, are completely non-functional:

Lots of pillows on the bed. I don't know why, but for some reason my wife thinks our bed looks better when it's overflowing with pillows. If it wasn't for the purple and green pillow-covers, the bed would stand for a cumulus cloud.

The annoying thing is, you have to take them all off when you want to sleep in the thing. But that's the easy part--you can just chuck 'em on the floor. What sucks is placing them back all pack on in the morning in their appropriate order. My wife is trying to figure out a way to number them because I can't ever place them right; all I know is the cylindrical one goes last.

Along the same lines, our bed features a folded blanket at the foot of the bed. A "runner," I believe it's called. According to my wife's rules, it can't be used as a blanket. It's just placed after the bed is made.

So if our house were to sit as is and was unearthed later on, the discovering anthropologist would have to conclude we slept with our necks propped up at 90 degrees and our feet were always freezing. They would also assume our bodies were only about three feet long, since the pillows take up the other three feet of length.

The barn star hung on the house. You don't have to drive around suburbia long before finding a large and rusty star nailed to the front of someone's house. For those out of the loop, it may seem that someone just forgot to take down a 4th of July decoration. Not so, some people think it's a great way to add a rustic accent to their home. People who hang these usually have a kitchen themed after some type of farm animal (e.g., cows, pigs, roosters).

Future anthropologist will quickly realize the barn star served no structural purpose, and therefore conclude it was a religious symbol. They would figure inhabitants worshiped it as they came and went.

Fake fruit. Utilized as a decoration over real fruit because it doesn't draw fruit flies, fake fruit is found in many homes today; a bowl of rubber grapes on the end tables in the living room, a pile of plastic pears on the table in the dining room. No doubt, fake fruit has gotten amazingly realistic over the years. The real thing is mimicked down to the wood-grains in the stems, to the dimples in the peels.

This decoration will really throw anthropologist a curve ball. After much deliberation, you'd have to imagine they'd think the homes with fake fruit were homes of the peasants. They couldn't afford food, but they didn't want visitors to think their cupboards weren't stocked. So they'd form fake fruit and set it out all around the house.

Whatever the case, as a man I'd hope future anthropologist would realize we didn't adorn our homes with non-functional decor because we were a regressing society. We did it because we realized the best way to progress as a culture was by keeping the wife happy.

Photo 1: http://www.fdlhome.com/index.asp?PageAction=COMPANY
Photo 2: http://www.picanswers.com/questions/530-barn-stars-made-in-the-united-states-
Photo 3: http://www.seefred.com/cgi-bin/shop.pl/page=newfruit.htm

New Sport: Competitive Blood Donating

2008-11-15T08:37:00.008-07:00

I'm a card-carrying blood donor. I don't donate as often as I should, but I usually do it at least once a year.

I got a donor card from the Red Cross on my first time. It says "A Positive" underneath my name. Whenever my wife tells me I'm being too negative, I pull out my donor card and correct her. "No, I'm a positive." That's about all I've been able to use my card for so far.

I had the opportunity to donate a couple weeks ago. As I'm sure you're aware, I started out by going through the rigorous screening process. I had to answer questions like...

"Have you ever made love to a cow from the UK?"
"Have you ever spent more than five days in Little Rock, AR?"
"Do you eat at Arby's more than twice a week?"
"Do you swim in public pools?"

I guess I cleared the screening, because I was sent over to sit in one of the reclining donor chairs. The nurse that was going to tend to me was just getting another guy started. He seemed rather confident, as the nurse prepped him for the needle. She worked mechanically, and it was easy to tell she was nearing the end of her shift

"This will be 6 gallons," he said proudly, and then waited for the nurse to give a compliment. It never came. "If you want to look away, now's the time," she said. "I don't," he said with a smirk, and he stared at the inside of his elbow as she inserted the needle.

He must have thought he could win a date with her if he came across as the bravest patient she's ever had, or something. Once she hooked him up he clenched his teeth, furrowed his brow, and started pumping away like he was in a competition.

The nurse walked over to me, went through my paperwork, and then started to clean my arm. "You're going to want to come over here, I'm almost done," the cocky guy shouted triumphantly. It looked like he'd broken a sweat. "Yes, you're about done," said the nurse. She then unhooked the blood bag. "What's my time?" he asked. Without emotion, she said, "4 minutes and 39 seconds." The guy's eyes lit up and he shouted "yes!"

I didn't realize they'd be timing me. I wondered if it actually was a competition. She walked back to me and again started cleaning my arm, then asked me if I was allergic to iodine. "No, I don't think so. What's it used for, anyway?" "It kills all the icky little germs."

I sure was glad she threw "icky" in there, because I wouldn't have understood germs were bad if she didn't. Apparently I look like an idiot when I'm about to give blood.

She placed a mini foam football, enveloped in a paper towel, into my hand. Then she inserted the needle and told me to pump away.

I was concentrating on two things; 1) trying to beat 4:39, and 2) trying to pump the foam football in my hand without having my hand come into contact with it. I figured the nurse must have placed it in a paper towel for a good reason; I believed the person before me had boogers on their fingers.

I finished, and the nurse unhooked everything. "6 minutes and 42 seconds," she said. I had thought everyone that donated blood was a winner, but at the moment I didn't feel like one. The donkey next to me had beat me by two minutes.

I sat in shame as I consumed my trail mix at the recovery station. However, as I moved on to my apple juice a thought came. I realized it was time for me to live up to my blood type, and be "a positive" person. I had just given life. I was a donor of a vital body fluid. And I'm sure the receiver didn't care if it took over 6 minutes.

Phot0: http://ia.utep.edu/Default.aspx?tabid=31047

Upset with any election results? Try out no-man's land.

2008-11-08T08:41:00.010-07:00

The results of this past election seemed to have ticked off a lot of people. Now some people in the US are going to get taxed more. Now some people in California can't get married. Now some people in Michigan can smoke pot if they're sick. The list is longer, but in sum, a lot of things did or did not pass and now a lot of people are in an uproar.

I'm not president elect, but if I was, I'd have a solution. Our country needs a no-man's land, a safe zone between the trenches. It needs a place where people can be ruled according to what they believe should be the law.

First off, this no-man's land would require some land. I checked out a map of the US, and there appears to be a good chunk of unused land in northeastern Alaska. The map I looked at labels it "ANWR." I'm sure it's up for grabs. There's also a healthy piece of waste-land real estate in the middle of Nevada.

Let's go with Nevada--they're already flexible in their tax, casino, and prostitution laws. A large no-man's land in the middle of their state shouldn't phase 'em. So Nevada would be shaped like a doughnut, with its doughnut hole being the new no-man's land.

In the doughnut hole anything would fly. It would be the place for people to go who are ticked at what and who the majority of the people in their home town, state, or country passed and elected. It's citizens would each be governed by the laws and lawmakers they prefer.

In the no-man's land you'd have hundreds of thousands of little townships, and such townships would often consist of just one household. You could go over to your neighbors, who are from Nebraska, and they may be waiting for someone to sit in their electric chair.

There would be no mayor, governor, or president of no-man's land, because of course, everyone in the place has their own. In one household/township they'll call John McCain their president. In another they'll call Ralph Nader their president. Nader would of course stop by the Johnson's house in no-man's land every January to give the State of the Union Adress:

"I'm sorry I haven't been able to get much through congress so far, Mr. and Mrs. Johnson (lots of clapping). It's just that (lots of clapping), uh, they don't regard me in the same manner as you do (lots of clapping). Anyway, the state of our Union is, um, well how are you guys doing?"

"We're doing just fine, thank you."

"OK then, I'd say the state of the Union is, um, fine (lots and lots of clapping). God bless, and good night (lots of clapping)."

Don't think no-man's land would just be full of a bunch of no names. I'm sure Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, who will only get married when gays are allowed to, would be citizens. Yes, I believe no-man's land would be the site of the biggest Hollywood wedding ever.

Actually, as president elect I would be informed by my advisers that Area 51 is in the middle of Nevada. That would be a problem, because a number of "townships" I'm sure would make it legal to marry the aliens. Plus, I'm sure a lot of the Green Party folks would be upset about the bomb testing.

Maybe it should get moved to that ANWR place. However, if the government wanted to start drilling for oil there, we'd then have to worry about disturbing more than just caribou.

Photo: http://www.pierce-evans.org/Election.htm

I guess I just look suspicious

2008-11-01T12:35:00.005-06:00

Photo: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5353901/

I'm the slowest shopper in the world. The last time my wife sent me to the store for some cold-sore medicine, I came back 2 1/2 hours later with a case of ginger ale, some exotic piece of fruit from the produce section, and a pack of cinnamon graham crackers--totally forgetting the medicine. Now, when she sends me to the store, she packs me a lunch and writes the item she needs on my forehead, so the cashier will ask me about it as I'm buying a bunch of useless crap.

I just get lost in supermarkets. I'm wide-eyed and mystified by everything available for purchase. Not only that, every little purchase is a HUGE decision. If you're buying salsa, you'll need to choose mild, medium, or hot. Then you'll need to decide between the off-brand and the name-brand. Say you go with the medium name-brand. But then you notice the off-brand mild features a peach and mango variety. Well that, my friend, is a wrench thrown in your, uh, gears.

Needless to say my methodical shopping has gotten me into trouble, not only with my wife, but also with the law (kind of the same thing, though).

As you recall from a previous article, it's taken me quite some time to find a good deodorant. Every time I purchased a new stick, I'd spend a very long time scrutinizing all my options. One particular time, as I was taking forever as usual, I noticed a store clerk kept coming by the aisle I was in. She was acting very casual, but it all seemed a bit peculiar.

After walking by a number of times, she eventually came closer and started to look over the shelves next to me, as if she was scanning price tags or something. I figured I was in her way, and I knew I would need at least another 10 minutes to make a final decision, so I quickly left and walked over to the next isle to wait for her to finish. Just then she came full-speed around the corner at the other end and walked briskly towards me.

"Take out whatever you put in your pocket and give it to me!" she demanded. I told her I didn't have anything, to which she replied, "I've got security at the front door, you're not getting away." I handed her my coat and turned my pant pockets inside out for her to check everything out. "Obviously you already got rid of it," she scowled. We stood in silence for a moment, one as the accused and one as the accuser, then she stormed off.

While that happened a few years ago, just yesterday I was at a department store looking for a new set of hair clippers. I live and die by the buzz cut, so this new set of clippers I was buying was very important to me. Once I got to the aisle where they were sold a world of options was opened up to me. Did I need a cordless set? Should I pay another $8 for titanium blades? One set came with a nose-hair trimmer; should I be trimming those?

After a while I found one set of clippers that was in a partly opened box and I was able to pull out the user's manual to get some information that wasn't printed on the outside of the box. I put it back together and placed it back on the shelf.

About 30 minutes later, after carefully studying each one, I nailed down my choice and started to walk off with it. Just then I noticed two store employees waiting for me at the end of the aisle. They quickly turned away and acted like they didn't notice me. I got past them, only to have a security officer step in front of me. I knew right then what was about to go down.

"Do you need help finding anything?" he said, cynically. "No, I'm good," I replied. He followed close behind as I walked towards the nearest cash register. I looked around and figured that most of the store's employees were gathered to watch me.

I had wanted to look for a few more things, but I figured I'd be wrongfully arrested if I stayed around any longer. I checked out and walked proudly through the security beeper things by the exit doors. No alarm went off as my innocence was proved, and my refusal to make a rash decision, even if meant having a code red called out in the store, was sustained.

There are still good people in this world.

2008-10-25T19:50:00.010-06:00

http://www.grimacenyc.com/Peeps.htm

It's amazing what every-day functions have become second nature. You sniff when your nose drips. You close a drawer after you open it. You put your wallet back in your pocket after you've paid for gas.

Actually, not so much on that last one. A couple days ago I was at the gas station. I had just swiped my credit card at the pump and was thinking very seriously about running into the convenience store for a Slurpee. But I was also running really late.

I drove off without the drink. About 10 miles down the highway, I also realized I had driven off without my wallet. Apparently my mind was unable to process simultaneously the decision to not get a Slurpee and the mental effort involved in putting my wallet back in my pocket.

Immediately I began wondering what my life was going to be like over the next couple weeks. Without my wallet I would be nothing. I'd have no power to buy, no power to vote, and no power to enter night clubs and get my dance on. Essentially, I had been stripped of all my rights and reduced to the social ranking of kindergartner.

Without a drivers license on my person, I flipped a U and headed back to the gas station. I was bracing myself for the worst. I figured my identity had already been stolen and the thief had already applied for a job as a porta-potty cleaner under my name.

Not only that, I knew darn well my credit cards had been maxed out to buy car parts for illegal street-racing. Plus, I assumed the thief had already used my insurance card to get a free doctor's visit, since robbers can't have much of a health plan (but I was sure the thief would regret it after finding out that doctor's visits are only covered in full every-other new moon by doctor's that went to medical school at a university that rhymes with orange).

The only hope I had was that the thief would buy one more sandwich at Subway to get the last needed stamp for my Subway Card, and as a token of appreciation mail it back to me so I could get a free sub. Even then I'd need some money to purchase the medium drink required to claim it.

Finally, I made it back to the gas station. Just as I had figured, there was no wallet lying around the pump where I had filled up. With a skeptic heart, I wandered into the convenience store--just in case the thief was like me and had forgotten his wallet, I mean my wallet, while he purchased a quick doughnut.

My wallet was there; someone had turned it in! All the credit cards were in their place. Even the $2 cash I had was untouched. Unfortunately, I still needed one more stamp on my Subway card.

The whole ordeal was a wake-up call. The world around has made me a hard and cold cynic. I've turned into a New Yorker (yes, I'm stereotyping). But all truth be told, when I lost my wallet my first thought was that it would be stolen, not that it would be turned in. It's time for me to start seeing the sunrise in people, and not just the sunset. There's good out there.

Mr. or Ms. Wallet-Turner-Inner, if you read this please contact me. I'd like to shake your hand and buy you a Slurpee.

As a man, I don't know what look to go for.

2008-10-18T16:11:00.019-06:00

I'd love it if I could buy clothes just once and call it good for the rest of my life. Unfortunately I'm regularly ruining my clothes, causing my wardrobe to run thin. Just the other day I was tapping on my khaki pants with an ink pen, having no idea the lid was off.

I think buying clothes is a nightmare. Most the stuff in stores now a day is made for men that aren't really men. It all looks like it's trying to be too fashionable.

With that attitude, I was recently shopping at some outlet stores with my wife and doing my best to find something worthwhile. As I wandered aimlessly from store to store, I came to realize something. All the casual-wear clothes I was sorting through, from shoes to pants to shirts to hats, fell into one of three categories:

1) The prep-school/croquet look. This all-around look covers a man whether he's docking his sailboat in a New England harbor or playing a pick-up game of Lacrosse at the park. The key to the ensemble is the neck covering; in the summer months a popped collar will do, in the winter months a scarf is a must. Solid, assertive colors rule among men of this look. Not only should their conversation be about Thoreau's works and their late father's trust fund, but their fashion should be as well. Finally, the whole outfit is for not if the hair isn't combed and a bottle of sparkling water isn't in hand.

Vendors include Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger, and Gap.2) The Northwest/outdoor/organic look. While the look poses as rugged, if any guy actually showed up to a real mountain-man's cabin dressed as such he'd be beaten to tears and thrown to the wolves. Inspired by pine trees, granola, and waterproofing, the clothes in this category are ideal for walking along a forest trail while eating a yogurt. Most selections are found in earth tones. If this look was a car it would be a Subaru.

Vendors include L.L.Bean, Eddie Bauer, and Columbia Sportswear.3) The California-dude look. It screams cool. Maybe too cool. The letters on the shirts and sweaters are always large, usually white. Most of the garb looks faded--suggesting that the individual is often out in the California sun. Belts are key, and they come in either brown or white. Slightly wrinkled is preferred. Footwear is usually in the sandal family. Many of the suppliers, by their ads, would have you believe you'll look just as good with their shirt off as you will with it on.

Vendors include Hollister, Aeropostale, and Abercrombie & Fitch.
To be honest, I don't want to join any of those ranks. Isn't there another option for casual wear? I know if I don't join one of the above categories, I'll have to continue cherry picking the border-line items from each one. I need some common theme in my wardrobe. What about the Australian Outback look, or the Norwegian/Slavic look? Have any stores popped up supporting those?

Photo: http://www.gamespot.com/pages/forums/show_msgs.php?topic_id=26548349&page=3
Photo: http://www.guardianecostore.co.uk/guardian/product.aspx?topGroup=106&subCat=0&subGroup=2707
Photo: http://blog.nj.com/fashiontoday/2008/06/summer_stock.html

Why do I live in a place that gets cold?

2008-10-12T17:51:00.006-06:00

It snowed last night. It was the first snow fall of the season. So today I'm wondering, "why the crap do I live somewhere that gets cold?" I usually spend the first half of every winter pondering that question.

I just don't get it. It doesn't make sense. I live in a place where for half of the year it's uncomfortable to go outside. I suppose I, like most other people, live somewhere in the vicinity of where my ancestors settled. So why did our ancestors settle in cold places?

Of the 13 original colonies, only 3 were in the south. Here's the real kicker--Florida wasn't one of the original colonies! What were those Puritans thinking? Were Florida's sandy beaches and palm trees too extravagant for them to claim it? A life by the Boston Harbor where temperatures linger in single digits for several months was more preferred?

I know Christopher Columbus landed somewhere in the Bahamas. What did he tell all the Europeans when he got back? "Oh, we found some all right places, but if you guys go north when you make your pilgrimage to the New World you won't have to deal with all the mangoes and exotic birds and lush, tropical vegetation."

Whatever the case, they did settle in cold places and so now many of us have to deal with nasty winters. However, I'm still confused/bothered by those around me that are so chipper about the winter months.

"Oh, the fresh snow is so beautiful," and "it's nice to get a break from the heat" are phrases I often hear. Snow looks OK, I guess, but the knowledge that it's cold once you walk into it turns me off fast enough. Besides, it ends up looking brown and dirty by the end of the day anyway.

And I don't see how people would rather have it cold outside than hot outside. Your fingers don't get sore and numb when it's a hot day. And I've never had to spend the first five minutes of my morning letting my car run while I scrape the windows because it was a warm day.

Furthermore, the winter optimists around me lose all credibility because they still go on vacation to warm places. In January they take off to places like Cancun, Orlando, and Las Vegas. Show me a winter enthusiast that escapes to Fargo, ND in the middle of winter and then I'll be convinced.

I understand San Diego is already jam packed with people in my line of thinking. Plus a 1/2 bedroom, 1/2 bathroom apartment there costs as much as a the whole state of Wyoming does. So one of these years I'll just have to go settle in some little corner of the Amazon or the Sahara. The heat won't bother me, but the spiders or the dust storms might take some getting used to.

Photo: http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2007/12/23-week/

Rubber cement boogers vs. cell phones in school

2008-10-04T09:13:00.010-06:00

I recently read an article in the local paper about the trouble schools are having with students and cell phones. You've got 2nd graders texting in class, 3th graders checking stock prices on the bus, and 4th graders calling the weather hotline before recess.

Apparently a lot of teachers don't know how to deal with the new distractions brought about by the cellular telephone. I guess the distractions that were around when I was in middle school have taken a back seat to the new technology.

My schoolmates and I used pen and paper to draw Picasso-like pictures of our teachers, the nose and eyes exaggerated to the extreme. We used Elmer's Rubber Cement to make fake boogers. We disassembled spring-loaded ball point pens and reassembled them into small rockets.

We used our calculators to text each other. We'd write secret notes by way of digital numbers; "316008," turned upside down, spells "BOOgIE." Furthermore, "07734," turned upside down, spells "hELL0." If we were looking to stir things up, we'd leave off the zero and just write ""7734."

Our digital vocabulary was about as large as our verbal vocabulary.

In high school the distractions became even greater. Once we got into trigonometry and calculus, we were given scientific calculators. That's when all 7734 broke lose. They were basically little computers intended to graph curves on an x and y axis. But with their technological capabilities, they could also store simple games. Suddenly Tetris and Space Invaders was being played during every class.

What we were doing as students is nothing compared to what's happening now. The article I read said students are using their cell phone cameras to take dirty pictures and send them to one another. I guess that provides new ammo for students to use when they're arguing with their PE teacher about not wanting to shower after PE.

Teacher: "Everyone has to shower. If you're caught getting dressed without one I'll dock you 10 points."

Student: "But Chuck lurks behind the lockers and and takes pictures with his cell phone when we do."

The article also said they're using their cell phone's video cameras to record after-school fights. Frankly, I wish we would have that technology to record some of the fights I saw in Jr. High. The one where Josh Bell got punched in the face and had his glasses broken wasn't half bad.

Or, maybe recording such fights would be helpful to some students. In 5th grade, when I got in a fight with Aaron Bean by the tetherball courts, maybe I wouldn't have gotten detention if some student had recorded it. Then it could have been proved that I was merely fighting in self defense because he wiped grasshopper guts on my arm.

My final word to today's teachers: if you take cell phones away from students, they'll just go back to making rubber cement boogers.

A depression would take some getting used to

2008-09-27T15:07:00.001-06:00

I always wondered what life in a depression would be like. Everyone is saying that we'll be in one if the $700-million dollar bail-out plan doesn't pan out.

What's that? It's $700 billion? Well, whatever. $700 mil, bil, tril... is there a difference?

So how do the legislative negotiations work on that, anyway? When negotiating the price of a new car with the dealer, you usually start wheelin' and dealin' with $100 amounts, or so.

What amounts do you start with when you're working out a $700-billion plan? If the senator from Wyoming stands up and says "we should shave $10 million off the plan," is he laughed out of the room for pinching pennies?

If the bail-out plan ends up being $701 billion instead of $700 billion, will anybody care? When did billions become such trivial common place?

Sorry, I got off track. So back to the depression. From what I understand, everything will be very dry. Dust will swirl around and plants will shrivel. Fashions will change. All males will start looking like washed up businessmen--top button undone, wearing a dusty, gray suit. I say "gray" because color will be gone. If you're attached to reds, yellows, and blues, get over them.

Dogs will just run loose in alleys. Wendy's chicken nuggets will no longer be "all-white meat." People will regularly sleep on park benches, whether they have a home or not. It's just what people do in a depression.

"Sorry honey, but it's my turn to sleep on the bench down at Cherryhill Park. I'll see you in the morning." Not only that, but when it's your turn for the bench you can't use a blanket. Only newspapers will do. Newsprint is the only cover that will keep the dew off, especially in a depression.

Lastly, TV, Wii's, and laser tag will be gone. For entertainment we'll have to gather around an old radio and listen to nothing but the news and boxing matches.

No, a depression won't be any good for anyone. For that reason, let's root for the bail-out plan and hope the legislators don't hold things up by squabbling over just a few billion dollars here or there.

Photo: http://library.thinkquest.org/03oct/01794/pictures_page.htm

The halfway hamper

2008-09-22T18:13:00.007-06:00

Item #47 on my wife's list of reasons why I don't deserve to be married is the statement "he can't put half his clothes in the laundry after he's worn them."

Ok, so maybe that list doesn't really exist--at least on paper.

Anyway, I've explained the issue many times, with logical reasoning. Yet she still gets upset with the dirty laundry, or so she mistakenly calls it, that piles up in front of my dresser or on the closet floor. But the problem is not with me; it's with the system.

Since the introduction of the washer and dryer into the average American home, the domestic process has dictated that once you wear something you should put it in the laundry pile to be washed. Dirty clothes go in the hamper; clean clothes go in the closet or dresser drawers.

My wife--and as she claims, the rest of civilized society--sees no middle ground between clean and dirty. However, to me it's not all black and white. I see a large gray area.

Before I found a reasonably effective deodorant, pretty much every shirt I wore was a lock for the wash. But now that I'm staying dry for longer periods of time, a few shirts come off me at the end of the day with a little more life still left in them. They may be able to go another half a day, or even more.

Where can a shirt in such a classification go? It isn't clean, so I don't want to put it back on a hanger in my closet. It isn't dirty, so I don't want to put it in the hamper. It's in the gray area, and thus it is homeless.

To my wife's frustration, it ends up on the closet floor where it will remain until I can find an appropriate time to utilize its remaining life.

That's why I created the halfway hamper. It was a large bin for me to throw gray-area clothing into. It was a pit stop for clothes halfway through their wear-and-then-wash cycle.

Unfortunately, my wife found out about my clothing's midpoint and secretly began emptying the whole thing into the wash on laundry day. It hurt; my wife was washing the clothes from my halfway hamper behind my back, despite our relationship built on trust and integrity.

Now I'm going behind her back in publishing this post. My hope is that this article will inspire the halfway hamper's use in more homes until one day I can tell my wife we're not with the times by not having one.

Until then my clothes are getting washed excessively. Please help.

Getting carded for cola

2008-09-16T21:46:00.005-06:00

I don’t drink, so I haven’t spent a lot of time in bars. However, last week I was on a trip with a few co-workers. They all drink, so I spent a lot of time in bars and lounges.

The non-alcoholic options are quite limited in such places. If I wanted something to sip on while I chatted with my co-workers, I’d order a water. If I wanted something a bit harder, I’d order up a Coke. But if I wanted to get sloshed, I’d get a Coke on the rocks and keep the refills coming like waves on a beach (I'm only a social soda-drinker; I don't drink it alone very often).

On one particular night, in a lounge at the hotel we were staying at, I was socializing with a glass of cola (on the rocks, of course). I had drank about two when the bartender walked up to the group I was with and asked to see my ID.

“I’m only drinking a soda,” I stated defiantly. The bartender, undeterred, remained until I grudgingly pulled out my driver’s license. It was the first time I had ever needed to prove I was over 21 in order to finish up a glass of pop.

It was a good thing that bartender was there to keep me on the right track. Nobody should be able to drink a pop and watch other people get drunk unless they’re of age.

Getting carded in that lounge got me thinking. Young people should be getting carded in other settings and situations. It could do them good.

The first place to start would be plays and musicals. I know I would have liked getting carded when my mom would talk my family into attending a play. I’d read the program from start to finish about 8 times and there would still be another hour until intermission. A boy at the age of 12 does not have the judgment necessary to agree to attend one of those things.

Another place to start would be sports-card shops. When I’d walk into those places as a young buck I had no self-control. If people would have carded me at those places my savings account would currently be double what it is. You have to buy a lot of packs of cards in order to find the one rookie card you're searching for.

The same goes for firework stands. If I would have been carded by the vendors who supplied me with explosives, the field above my aunt’s house wouldn’t have caught fire and I wouldn’t have gone deaf for a week after lighting a firecracker with a wick the length of a piece of beard stubble.

Yes, if you're going to require ID for a pop in a bar, you might as well take the policy further and really do some good.

What I learned from the conventions

2008-09-08T18:30:00.007-06:00

The good thing is, no matter who wins we’re all going to be living in a utopia.

When the candidates were narrowed down to the two idiots we’re currently left with, I was rather disappointed. As a voter, I was going to have to choose between a grouchy war Veteran that married a beer heiress and a hip baller from Hawaii who won’t throw his terrorist friend under the bus.

However, my disappointment fell short at the Democratic convention. That’s when I heard Obama tell me everything was going to be OK. If he wins the presidency, we’ll all be swimming in the love of change.

From his speech, I understood we were going to the doctor for free. There won’t be any more poor people. Someone else will pay our credit card bills. Our mortgages will be forgiven. Everyone will get a college degree. They'll come in the mail to those who don't have them now, like a stimulus check. Nobody, except evil people, will have to pay taxes.

He also informed me, in his speech, that John McCain is horrible person that eats bunnies and puts people in slums.

Then I started to worry. What if he didn’t win? I’d be left without everything he was going to give. I'd have a bunny-eater as my president! However, my worry fell short at the Republican convention.

McCain guaranteed some good things. Based on what I interpreted of his speech, if he won we'd have a fully-decorated war veteran fighting for us. He'd snuff out evil and rip up opposing countries with his bare hands. On election day he'd walk into the White House and punch all the incompetent people in the face. He'd lower taxes even though he's going to go to war with every country that his advisers tell him exists. And McCain would do all this while still maintaining his reputation of a family man.

On the other hand, he indicated, Barrack Obama would flush the country and it's economy down the drain while starring in Hollywood movies.

They sure make themselves sound good in those convention speeches. So what's a voter to do? I don't think it matters. They both said they're going to win the election:

...I intend to win this election and keep our promise alive as President of the United States. -Obama

But let there be no doubt, my friends, we’re going to win this election. -McCain

So what we'll have on our hands, fellow Americans, are two winners in November. Yes, for the first time in history we'll have two winners, two presidents. We won't have to worry about the character of the VP candidates; there won't be any room for one.

A good ol' biarchy. Except we shouldn't get too worried about the new form of government we'll face. Based on what I saw from Hillary in the presidential race, I think we experienced a biarchy from 1992 to 2000.

Big hunting trucks don't scare me

2008-08-31T09:19:00.001-06:00

A few weeks ago my wife's cousin from France was in town. She had brought along her husband and two little boys. We took them to several local places of interest, trying to show them what amazing lives we Americans live.

However, her two little boys were never that interested in the attractions we attended. They were more intrigued by what was in the parking lot, namely the big trucks. I guess in France you don't see many Chevy Silverados with extended crew-cabs, Vortec 6-liter V8 engines, and tires the size of Paris Hilton's sunglasses.

I was so used to seeing such rides that I never saw them as unusual. So earlier this week, as I was driving on the freeway, I took note as I was passed by a beefed-out truck [truuhhk]. After the cloud of black exhaust from it's six tailpipes cleared I noticed an elk-antler silhouette on the back window. Above the antler insignia were the words "ELKOHOLIC." A couple days later I crossed paths with a similar truck, but the elk sticker on the back of it read "RACK 'EM."

Even though I come from a country town where hunting abounds and "'em" is often substituted for "them," I never remember seeing stickers like that on the back of anyone's truck. If you shot an elk or a deer you would make jerkey from its meat and turn its antlers into a lampshade, but you never put a sticker representing its head on the back of your rig.

In an attempt to understand the psychology behind such a move, I've conjured up a few reasons why the hunting dude might be inclined to paste a big elk decal on the back of his truck.

One, maybe he put it there to let everyone know he shot a really big elk. It's the only way everyone on the road will know he's the big cheese and they should watch out. But unless he wrestled the elk to death with his bare hands, I'm not impressed.

Besides, can you really be proud of shooting a big elk, especially when a little elk is a smaller, therefore more difficult target? It takes the same amount of strength to pull the trigger on either one. I want to see a truck with a decal of a young, nimble elk on the back window, then I'll give the goateed, cut-off sleeved guy in the driver's seat props.

Or maybe it isn't an ego-supporting sticker. Perhaps the elk decal adhered to the dude's back window isn't boasting about the animal he shot; maybe it's paying tribute it. A guy like that values his truck, and he won't just put anything on it. He's paying homage to his kill because once he slayed the thing it became delicious nourishment.

In that case, I should put an Otter Pop decal on the back window of my Accord. I slaughter a couple of those each day... and reap delicious nourishment each time. Above the decal I could put the words "OTTER SLAUGHTERER."

In other words, maybe the "RACK 'EM" truck-dude has a chest freezer full of elk steaks, but he's not any tougher than a guy that buys his meat at the supermarket.

The night the tire won

2008-08-23T12:16:00.013-06:00

My wife and I were on our way to dinner, celebrating our two-year anniversary. She was dressed to kill; my shoes matched my belt: all was set for a romantic evening. As I rounded the corner a block away from the restaurant, I turned my head to look at one of the stupid things I like to look at.

I turned my head back towards the road just in time to see the curb I was going to strike. A few days prior, my obsession to have one of the most fuel-efficient cars on the road led me to the gas station where I topped off all my tires at exactly 1 more psi than the manufacture recommends. Thus the air was frantically looking for a way out, and the hard edge of the curb provided an escape.

Upon my collision, my wife started to chuckle and immediately saw the moment as an opportunity to fire back for all the times I had criticized her driving. "Yeah, you'll really laugh when we have a flat tire," I said sarcastically. Just then we heard a rushing wind.

I pulled off the road quickly and parked the rig. As I stepped out, I realized I'd never before needed to fix a flat! I tried to mask my ignorance by walking around the car and grumbling about the wrench I thought I'd need.

I opened the cover at the bottom of the trunk and was delighted to find a spare. Even so, my disguise of competence withered quickly as my wife had to find the jack for me. But I recovered by using the term "undercarriage" as the we situated the jack.

Things went smoothly from there as the car was raised and the nuts were removed from the wheel. Then, just as I pulled the damaged tire from the bolts, the jack tipped over and the car leaped forward like Michael Phelps at the start of the Men's 100-meter butterfly race. My wife said "uh oh," I said "a bad word," and the bare rotor landed on the pavement. My dang car looked like a three-legged beached whale.

I guess you're supposed to set the parking brake when you change a tire.

The car was so low to the ground that the jack wouldn't fit under it any more. I needed to lift it a good inch. It would take a miracle, even an anniversary miracle. I heaved and hawed, and up went the sagging quarter of the car. My wife quickly slid the jack back into place, and I tried to put my back back into place.

On pins and needles we again got the car jacked up, the spare on, and then let the jack down. The spare was flat.

We jacked 'er up again, took the spare off, and tried to figure out where the nearest psi supplier was. I hoisted the spare into my arms and we walked about 6 blocks to a closed service station. Not interested in wandering around with the heavy spare any farther, I walked up to the front door and peered inside.

Luckily, there was some guy still in the dark place who either was a manager working late or a robber thumbing through the cash register. Based on his reaction upon seeing us, I suspected the latter, but he still opened the door and filled up our spare tire.

We trekked back to the car and put the newly-filled spare back on. We then went to dinner where I ordered my chicken curry to be made "spicy" instead of "medium" in an attempt to convince my wife I still had a measure of manhood. It took several return trips from the waitress to refill my water, but I think it worked.

Upon leaving the restaurant, I noticed the spare was looking low again. We held our breath as we raced home; I asked her to throw her jewelry out the window in order to free up some weight, but she wasn't interested in helping the situation.

Nonetheless, we made it back home where I could put the car down for the night. If the whole fiasco had happened when we were dating I probably wouldn't have been celebrating a two-year anniversary with her that night. And my shoes probably wouldn't have matched my belt.

Surviving Church

2008-08-16T23:56:00.000-06:00

Every week I face a long, grueling battle, and the opponent has many facets. It's me against sitting for too long. It's me against hunger. It's me against boredom. Etcetera, etcetera.

Based on the medical knowledge I gained from ripping heads off grasshoppers during recess in the 4th grade, I diagnosed myself with ADHD a few years ago.

I should have been diagnosed earlier, by a physician, so I could have had an excuse when my mom and dad came home from parent-teacher conferences. Instead, they disciplined me as if I was perfectly capable of controlling myself.

School was tough to endure, but it was broken up by recesses, lunch, and pogs. The boredom found at Church, however, was impossible to overcome.

After observing the way I responded to boredom, my Sunday School teachers would become fed up with me. They attempted to punish me in all sorts of ways, and finally they just started kicking me out of class. But I quickly realized I enjoyed it more on the OUTSIDE of the classroom than the INSIDE.

I went on to milk that consequence for all it was worth. I'd sit in Sunday School for about 3 minutes, get bored, raise hell, and bam!, I was a free man in an empty hallway.

Now that I'm an adult, that strategy doesn't have the same affect. Everyone just looks at me funny, and nobody kicks me out. So I have to resort to other methods. Here's my short list of ways to get through it all:

1. Bring food. Once, right before Sunday School started, I told my wife I had to go to the bathroom. I ran home and got some fruit snacks. She was really mad..., until I pulled out a pouch of them just for her.

2. Create your own hymns. Being a seasoned rapper, I often compose my own hymns while sitting on the pews. Once I've made up enough for a hymnal, I'll submit them to be published for churches in the more urban areas.

3. Draw. Whether it's a depiction of a mighty war between two pirate ships or a portrait of the bishopric, a detailed sketch can make the time move along quickly.

4. Play the "Who'd Be More Likely To... ?" game. While sitting in church, look around and ask yourself, or someone next to you that is also looking for a mental escape, "Who'd be more likely to suddenly snap and start swearing like a sailor at the next church activity, Sister Jones (the 75-year old choir director), or Brother Hammond (the 50-year old high priest that claims he saw Jesus)?"

Heaven knows any soldier will need more than four ways to make it through a 3-hour set of meetings. But this is a quick list for all of you who'd like a starter-kit of ammo for this week's battle.

My nemesis, the blender

2008-08-09T07:59:00.000-06:00

Most father-in-laws put their son-in-law candidates through some type of mental test to ensure they're qualified to marry their daughter. Mine put me though a physical screening.

It was my first time at his house, and I had recently proposed to my wife. I woke up to find him in the kitchen, running the blender. He didn't say much, just added a few more ice cubes, pureed for a couple more moments, and then poured me a tall glass of a highly viscous concoction.

"I made you some breakfast," he said with a smirk. "I drink this every morning." Understanding the task before me (and the award ahead), I buckled down, braced my spine, and started to gulp the drink of doubt. My spine almost gave way.

It was packed with spinach, but that was the good part. I assumed the strong tang to it was some sort of fish oil, but I couldn't identify the crunchy chunks that lodged in my throat. I was hoping they were some type of nut, but I wouldn't have been surprised if he had thrown in the skull of a dead mouse.

I continued to gulp it down. As I reached the half-way point he leaned in expectantly, waiting for it all to come back up. Little did he know, I had experience with such a texture and taste. Growing up, my mom went through some health phase where she'd regularly drink a similar blended concoction for breakfast each day.

My younger brother and I called it "The Green Devil." It was named by its color, and because we figured it was the choice of drink in hell. We used to dare each other to drink the portion remaining in the blender after she poured her glass. Being the younger, he was usually forced to take the dare.

Today he suffers from regular heart burn, a condition that could likely be traced back to "The Green Devil."

I went beyond the half-way point with my future father-in-law's drink and continued on until I saw the light at the end of the tunnel (i.e., the bottom of the glass). I couldn’t see it in his face, but I could tell he was amazed. He acted nonchalant as he grabbed the blender and filled my glass once more.

Yeah, I haven’t had great experiences with blenders. My wife and I still talk about “The Fiasco of ’06.” I was trying to make some frothy chocolate milk. The lid to the blender wasn’t on correctly, and I didn’t notice as I went on to hit the “smoothie” button. Suddenly I was getting showered in Nesquick, and so was the kitchen.

And just last night, my wife and I decided to make a couple shakes with some frozen fruit and ice cream. We loaded up the blender, and I placed it on the control station. But there was an error when I docked it. The flanges of the spinny thing that turns the blades weren’t in line with the flanges of the thing on the control station.

I turned it on full power and chunks of plastic and frozen fruit began shooting off in all directions. My wife took cover in another room. I ducked behind the counter and felt my way around until I grasped the cord and yanked it from the wall outlet.

Now we're without a blender, and I think I like it that way.

Passing the Safety and Emissions Inspection

2008-08-02T07:33:00.000-06:00

I just got my Utah Motor Vehicle Registration Materials in the mail. I might as well have been given hell in a hand basket.

This horrendous undertaking first struck me last year. I had been going around with an out-of-state license plate on my car, so I was free from the stranglehold of the Utah vehicle-registration process. But after residing in the state for about 4 years, I decided I had better break down and get Utah plates.

I found out that in order to register, my wife and I's car would need to pass a so-called "safety and emissions test." I come from a state where safety and emissions inspections are unheard of.

If the thing moves, you can ride it down the road, whether it's an automobile, ATV, tractor, or some sort of livestock. Yes, you can ride a cow into town as long as you use the appropriate hand signals at 4-way stops.

Not knowing what to expect when bringing my car in for a safety and emissions test, I took my car to some shoddy looking building off the side of the road, paid the fee, and they passed my car. Figuring that was all there was to it, I had my wife take her car in a few days later, but to another location closer to where she worked.

Bad idea. The sleazy mechanics raked her over the coals. They looked for any and all reasons to fail her car, and they found plenty--all of which were "conveniently" able to be repaired right there in the shop. A $40 pair of windshield wipers. $15 to get the windshield-washer fluid level up to the "full" line. I think they even charged her for each psi it took to get her tires properly inflated.

A year later, it's time for round two. Only now I've got a crack in my windshield the size of The Grand Canyon. And when I first start my car in the morning, there's a noise in the engine that could only be matched by a rattle snake strung out on 4 cups of coffee.

My wife's car is fine, other than the squeal it emits everytime you make a turn. It's incredibly high pitched. Every once in a while you'll make a turn and not hear it, but at that moment every dog in a one mile radius sticks its head in the ground.

I have a feeling we're not going to pass. At least under the "standard inspection process."

Ever since moving to Utah I've heard of back-alley mechanics that will pass off your car if you hand them 50 bucks, followed by a wink and a nod. I haven't been able to find these underground ruffians, but they sound a lot less expensive than the guys at the local service station.

If I can't find someone to pass me off, legally or illegally, then maybe I can file a safety and emission inspection exemption with the State.

I could say the vertical crack in my windshield serves as a cross hair for aiming my way through traffic. I could say the rattle in the engine is meant to tell me my engine is running, because it's so efficient that you wouldn't know otherwise. Lastly, I could say the squeal in my wife's car is actually a glorified turn signal, making it the only car in the state that warns blind pedestrians when making a turn.

I can save the airline industry

2008-07-26T18:25:00.000-06:00

Not long ago I was watching talk-show host Glenn Beck interview some CEO of an airline company. They were discussing the rising costs the airline industry is facing and how consumers will be affected. The CEO predicted that eventually ticket prices will get so high that flying will be something the average person does only once or twice in a lifetime.

I was astonished! If what I heard was true, it would be the end of regular vacations and business trips.

To keep from getting to that point too quickly, airlines have begun to take action. They're reducing the number of flights offered, cutting out snacks, and charging $15 per suitcase.

Well I'm here to offer some real help. I now direct my words to Mr. Airline, CEO...

Dear Sir,

I've brainstormed some great ways for you and your associates to come up with significant savings in the airline industry.

So you've cut the peanuts and pretzels, but you're still serving branded drinks, such as Coke and Pepsi? Come on, you're throwing money away! Next time a passenger requests a Sprite, hand them a Shasta Twist. When they request a juice, hand them a cold glass of Berry Blue Kool-Aid.

Next, why are you placing all the lowly coach-passengers in bucket seats? Give 'em benches. You can fit more people on a bench than you can in lined-up bucket seats. Would people complain about having to sit on a bench for three hours? Not necessarily. If they go to church regularly they're already used to it.

Furthermore, why are you paying workers to load your passenger's luggage? Make them walk it out and load it into the airplane themselves. Maybe they'll think twice about bringing home that bag of sand from the beach when they have to hoist their overloaded suitcase up into the cargo door by themselves.

On that note, you should take a lesson from the Unites States Post Office; charge according to weight. It's simple math. Starting from JFK Airport, flying the Clinton family to Arkansas is going require more fuel than flying the entire New York City Ballet to Paris. And it'll require more chips and dip.

So place a weighing mechanism at the boarding gate that everyone must walk across before they get on the plane. Kind of like a livestock scale, just not as nice (i.e. pricey). At that point, compare the passenger's weight with the normal body mass index for a person of their height, age, and gender.

If they're under, give them some in-plane credit towards earphone rentals, blanket use, and extra drinks. If they're over, make them shell out a few more bucks to get on board. Sure, you may have people throwing up their breakfast while they wait in line because they want to make the cutoff, but I'm positive you've got extra barf bags handy. Speaking of which, could those be reused... ?

To the future of affordable flights!

I, like Tiger, started golf when I was young

2008-07-19T07:46:00.000-06:00

Where I grew up in Southern Idaho, we had one golf course. I think the only folks who played on it were out-of-towners. Farmers don't golf, and in my hometown you were one, were married to one, or acted like one.

Golf scores weren't shared at gatherings. If a guy said "yeseree, I shot an 8 yesterday," he wasn't talking about the number of strokes over par he was. He was referring to the number of points on the antlers of the buck lying in the back of his pickup.

If a guy said "I'm gonna buy me a new driver," he wasn't talking about a new club. He was referring to hiring a new guy to haul his potatoes.

Even though I'd never seen my dad play, one summer my brother and I happened upon his old set of clubs in the garage. We didn't know what the heck they were. So naturally, we lugged them out to the garden and started hacking squash.

One zucchini exploded after another. We liked the irons best--their flat edge and sturdy metal head did the most damage. The putter was used on the tomatoes. By days end, we had broke half the golf clubs and moved my family's vegetable inventory from one side of the yard to other.

With that as my background in the sport, I was at a golf scramble last week for work. A few of my co-workers and I are invited to a couple golf tournaments each year. Last year's was a disaster. After 4 or 5 holes I made up some excuse about a dental appointment and got the heck out.

This year, in preparation for another tournament, I went to the driving range the evening before. I brought my wife along to watch the other golfers. While I practiced I had her give me tips based on their swings. "That guy over there has his arm like this," and "I don't think you're supposed to contort your hips like that, no one else is."

Of the 50 balls I hit, 10 of them skipped out a few yards in front of me. The other 40 soared a good 250 yards, but they sliced over the driving range's fence and into the public park on my right. Not kidding.

I had hoped my time at the driving range would prove worthwhile at the tournament. It didn't. I lost an average of one ball per hole. I'd go wander through the rough and find another golfer's ball just outside the fairway, pick it up and tell my team "this one's mine, it was just off target," knowing full well my ball was another 50 yards away. Since we were playing "best ball," nobody ever noticed that I had a different ball on every hole.

However, I did have one shining moment of the day. It came when we had to chip a shot out of some dirt and onto the green. The 3 co-workers on my team all attempted, but had no success. I stepped up and chipped a beautiful shot within a couple feet of the hole. I looked down on the ground on which I stood... I was on garden-like terrain. If only my ball had been a squash, then I probably would have sank it.

The river wins every time

2008-07-13T15:43:00.000-06:00

Every July "the running of the bulls" is held in Pamplona, Spain. Thousands of idiots crowd cobblestone streets to run in front of an angry mob of bulls. 33 were injured in this years’ run. 15 have died since the tradition started. To outsiders, the event may seem ridiculous. But to the participants, there is probably some intangible splendor that comes from getting mauled each year.

I think I can relate. Every July “the river run” is held in Provo Canyon, Utah. My friends and I, all idiots, set out to float the unforgiving waters of the mighty Provo River. To the casual observer, the river looks peaceful as it winds through the canyon’s terrain. But to us it is death.

The annual river run started a few years ago, in college. My roommates and I gathered up some flimsy inner tubes from a service station and entered the river as brave seafaring men. We came back as frightened little girls.

The water was frigid; as in it would’ve been one big block of ice if its temperature had dropped just one more degree. We were also not equipped for the rapids we’d face. Gripping to our inner tubes, we tumbled around like clothes in a dryer. Moreover, there were jagged rocks lining the bottom of the river, all of which laid claim to our backs, butts, legs, and arms. Many of us still have scars from that first run.

We swore we’d never do it again, but year two came around and we were once more summoned to “the river run.” We again took a beating. This last weekend marked the third annual river run, and it may go down as the most dreadful of them all.

The “proper” way to float the Provo River is in some kind of raft, or if not that a heavy-duty tube wrapped in fabric, like the kind you’d pull behind a boat. But this year many of us tried out pool toys.

One person rode down the river on an inflatable lobster that barrel rolled every time it hit rapids. Others rode on tubes shaped like lounge chairs, two of which popped on the first stretch of the river. I rode down on some little donut-shaped tube I got from ShopKo. I think it was designed for an anorexic child, because it sat about 6 inches below the water the whole time.

Most casualties on this year’s river run occurred at The Bridge. As the water rushes through the support columns of The Bridge several narrow chutes are created. As you approach you must decide which chute you want to run, and paddle accordingly. You always choose one, then at the last second change your mind and try to go through another, only to be flipped upside down and wrapped around one of the support columns. Then you drown for a few moments as your tube races on like an unsaddled horse.

When it was all said and done, everyone was miserable. Many were suffering from the first stages of hypothermia; many were bleeding from lacerations caused by wrecking on the rocks, and many felt like they’d been run over by a bull. I know I have a cut on my knee that probably warrants stitches.

It was another river run in the books, and in 12 more months we’ll be ready for our next mauling.

Celebrating the 4th, Miley Style

2008-07-05T09:40:00.000-06:00

In economics a "free rider" is someone who enjoys a public good or service without paying a fair share of its cost of production. Among other things, I usually free-ride fireworks. Why pay to go in the venue when you can see it all just fine from outside the gates?

Every year, Provo, UT puts on concert/fireworks show called "The Stadium of Fire." It traditionally features some mediocre country star, followed by a surprisingly good fireworks show. Except the ignorant folks running the show always launch the fireworks above the rim of the stadium, so there's never been a need to pay to get inside the thing--except for this 4th of July.

Keeping up with tradition, the event managers invited Billy Ray Cyrus for this years' Stadium of Fire. But he, like Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail, was not very eager to come to Utah. So he sent his daughter Miley, who you may know only by her alias, Hannah Montana. And she was probably fine with it, because I doubt the 15-year old pop-star even knew where Utah was on the map.

At least that's how I think they got Miley Cyrus to come to Provo.

My wife wanted to go, and I'm not cheap and I don't care about money (cough, cough), so I forked out a stack of bills and picked up some last-minute tickets.

The show started out great; some sky jumpers parachuted into the stadium, I enjoyed a bag of gummy bears that I smuggled past security, and jets flew over the crowd.

Then a thousand or so youth dancers from around the area put on a show that was supposed to be a representation of Team USA in the upcoming Beijing Olympics. As long as Team USA looks like a bunch 11-year old girls in pig tails running around like lemmings, it was spot on.

Then out came Miley, who really knew how to wake up a crowd of teeny boppers. She effortlessly triggered one earth-shattering scream after another from every girl in the stands, as well as many of their mothers.

I quickly realized that the earplugs I had seen being sold at the concession stands for $1 weren't for the fireworks...

Actually, for a 15-year old she handled herself pretty well. Except for the time in between songs when she tried to get sentimental and said "I know God has a plan for us, and I'm stoked!!!" and other than the fact that most her songs centered around boys, sleepovers, and recess, it was a decent concert.

I went home with my ears ringing from pre-teen squeals directed at Miley Cyrus, ash on my clothes from sitting under fireworks, and a belly full of illegal gummy bears. And I wouldn't have experienced any of it if I had watched it from outside the gates.

Public Transit

2008-06-27T06:58:00.000-06:00

“Get some sun, you’re in Miami!” shouted the drunk girl partying near us on the beach. I looked down at my blaring farmer’s tan and quickly understood the exclamation was directed at me.

But that wouldn’t be the worst of what was to come… I would soon be lost on a bus, lost on a train, food poisoned, bitten by weird insects, sunburned, ripped off by several restaurants, and thrown off my sleep schedule. Yes, as you might have guessed I was on vacation.

Vacations for my wife and me always turn out to be much more stressful, painful, and hectic than our day-to-day life. But as I keep telling her, we should be thankful our vacations are the way they are—they make our regular life seem so relaxing.

Though it’s my fault, not hers, that our vacations are so rough--I like to get out and explore when I’m in new country. I want the REAL experience. I find the best way to do that is to be one with the locals. I want to shop where they shop, eat where they eat, and commit crime where they commit crime.

However, my wife’s idea of a vacation stems from an absurd idea that when you go on a vacation you are supposed to unwind, settle down, and forget the cares of the world.

I think my tactic for forgetting the cares of the world is better than hers, though: it’s impossible to think of the cares of the world when you’re on a bus to who knows where, getting off who knows when, sitting next to who knows who, who is speaking who knows what. That is why I always try to talk my wife into taking the bus to different sites when we’re in our vacation city.

Despite all our terrible bus-experiences from past trips (like the time on our honeymoon I got us stranded in some back-woods village in Mexico), this last time I swayed her into riding the bus by promising our destination would be a very nice beach in a state park.

However, I left out the minor details of the obstacles that stood in our way: we had to go through several questionable areas of downtown Miami, transfer from our bus to the Metromover, then transfer to another bus, which would take us within a couple miles of our final destination, which would be reached by walking through the outskirts of a rain forest.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if that was the way it went—but we got lost at our first transfer and it was all down hill from there. But I still found bright spots in the voyage. I got to listen to music on the first bus—I sat next to an aspiring rapper who wasn’t afraid to practice out loud. I was eager to give him some tips, but for some reason he didn’t fully comprehend my street cred. Now the kid will never make it big.

Me being the problem-solving explorer I am, I guided us through the mess and we reached the beach I promised. My wife really liked it; she looked very relaxed as she lay on the sand. And I’m sure the journey made it seem even more relaxing.

Cover the tomatoes!

2008-06-14T18:04:00.000-06:00

Some places have tornado warnings. When they go off, you get in the basement. Where I grew up, we had frost warnings. When they go off, you run outside and cover your tomatoes.

The minute my dad heard "frost warning" in the 10 'o clock news he'd drop everything and get into the backyard. From there he'd stumbling through the dark as he made his way to the tarps in the corner of the yard, which were usually employed as the walls of my and my brother's fort.

Last year was the first year I manned my own garden. It came in a small kit with three little pots and three types of seeds. "Simple to grow and harvest!" and "Enjoy herbs in your own home!" were statements found on the box. I suspected they were hoaxing me into growing pot. Never had a chance to find out.

The seedlings sprouted up rather quickly, filling me with dreams of a lush botanical garden in my very own home. The next day they shriveled up like morals in the US Senate.

Despite my failure, I still wanted to try again. Besides, with all the food recalls lately, I feel a lot safer getting my vegetables from my very own garden. Other than the random times the neighbor's cat mistakes our planting pot for it's litter box, my vegetables get nothing but dirt and water.

The stores will tell you otherwise, hoping you'll keep buying their vegetables. "Rinse your produce with water when you get home," they say, "and they'll be perfectly safe to eat."

My wife tells me I need to use antibacterial soap and complete the ABC's song while I wash my hands, at least if I want them clean enough to eat with. If that's correct, I have a hard time believing that running tap water over a bundle of spinach will rid it of salmonella.

So this year I decided to give gardening another chance. I started by going to the store for gardening supplies. Looking at the tomato plants in the Walmart nursery was like looking at puppies in the pound: they all looked terrible, but I felt it was my moral duty to take one home.

I bought three. They looked scrawny and weak, but inside I knew they had heart. Like Mickey did for Rocky, I figured I'd give them the chance they needed to prove themselves. One month later, after regular watering, Miracle-Gro applications, and unconditional love, they still look like the plants I bought at Walmart.

Maybe the frost got 'em.

Door to Door Sales

2008-06-06T21:35:00.000-06:00

What do you do when you can't get people to come buy a product? You go to them.

A few days ago I was home alone and the doorbell rang. I opened it quickly, thinking it might just be the one person I've waited to show up at my door for the last 15 years: the dang kid that stole my Charlotte Hornets windbreaker at Jr. Jazz basketball camp.

I opened our door to find a man holding a large duffel bag. He was overly kind as he started asking me about the condition of our carpet, our bathroom, and the amount of money we're "wasting away" on various cleaning products. I quickly concluded my windbreaker wasn't in his bag.

He pulled out a jug of green liquid and started polishing the brass on on our porch light. "What do you usually use to take the rust spots off this thing, anyway?" he asked. "Oh, just a little spit shine and elbow grease," I replied. Actually, I didn't even know we had a porch light until he pointed it out.

When I was a kid, a man like him showed up at our door. He asked if we had any stains in our house that we couldn't get rid of. I pointed out one on my shirt. He shook his head and asked if we had any spots on our carpet or couch. My eyes lit up as I thought of the stain in my parent's closet where the cat had puked.

I escorted him through our home to my parent's walk-in closet. He crawled under my mom's church dresses and went right to work on the stain. He used every bottle in his bag but couldn't beat the barf with any of them. Eventually he pulled out what I assume was Clorox and bleached the thing.

After he finished he asked if we'd want to buy some of his cleaner. As any good child would do, I told him I was home alone and wasn't sure where my parents kept their money. I then told him I would like to buy some, but couldn't because I was saving up for the new Weird Al album.

Years later, still stupid, I again let the cleaning-solution salesman in the house, even though he didn't really do much for the rust spots on the porch light. He wanted to show me how his cleaner would shine up the bathtub, but when we got to the tub it was apparent my wife had already beaten him to it.

"You're going to have a hard time finding any imperfections in this house, my wife runs a tight ship," I said.

He then proceeded to tell me how his product would make her life so much easier. At that point I just wanted to get him out of our house, so I asked how much the freaking bottle cost. "It comes to $41.89," he said, "and that includes sales tax."

Little did he know he was standing in the home of one of the cheapest persons on earth. I squinted one eye, tilted my head to back, and placed my hand on my chin. "I'll give you six bucks."

"Are you kidding?" he exclaimed. "This stuff is concentrated, man... it will last you for at least a year!"

We both maintained our negotiating stances for a few moments until I broke the silence. "So would a $6 jug of Clorox."

Orphan Rats

2008-05-31T10:11:00.000-06:00

It will be at least nine months until my wife and I have a kid... unless she knows something I don't. Actually, I've always thought her sisters would know she was pregnant before I would. Not just because I'm oblivious to mood swings, but because any news about Target coupons, holiday plans, and babies must be circulated through their phone guild before it reaches the public ear.

With baby plans up in the air, my wife still has the desire to love and nurture something cuter than me. In that light, we went shopping for a fish last week.

Keeping up with my cheap reputation, I made us go to the thrift store for a fish bowl. We actually found a real nice one, without any problems a little Windex couldn't correct. With a habitat secured, we started hitting up all the stores that featured critters: Petco, Animal Ark, and Hot Topic.

Once we walked into the first pet shop I was immediately flushed with memories of my childhood. Whenever I had a few bucks in my pocket I'd hop on my bike and ride down to the local pet shop to buy anything I could sneak back into the house. Over the course of my youth I think I purchased 6 hermit crabs, 2 lizards, 2 turtles, 3 frogs, 1 mouse, and 400 crickets from that store. I was lucky if any of them lived to half their normal life expectancy.

While wandering the isles we were approached by an employee. She asked if we were interested in adopting. My wife's eyes lit up, only to be dimmed when the employee stated, "we have two rats that need to go to a good home, and you guys look like a nice couple."

I couldn't help but think, "wouldn't rats prefer a bad home?"

No way in hell did I want two rats, but I also didn't want to tell the puppy-eyed employee "no." Looking for an easy out from the situation, I mumbled something about not being able to pass a criminal background check. Unaffected, she walked us back to the manager's office.

"They're both adult males," she said as she picked up a cage, "this one here is a hairless variety."

"Oh geez, is it supposed to look like that?" I asked.

"Yeah, hairlessness is a recessive trait, so he's very special. Isn't he beautiful?"

My wife and I took her question as rhetorical and remained silent, except for the sound that arose when I cleared my throat. "Do they pee all over when you take them out?"

"Not really--sometimes they trickle a little bit" she replied. "But that's just to mark their territory," she stated, as if she was their attorney.

"What about their, um, droppings?"

"You don't need to worry about those. Sometimes you'll find them in the corner of the room after you've let them run around, but they're really dry so they pick up easily." She then reached in the cage and picked up one of the pieces of crap. "See?"

After looking at a hairless rat and seeing a girl pick up its droppings, I was ready to come out and tell her we were not going to be the adopting parents for her rodents. At that point, nearly all of the employees in the store had gathered around us, thinking we were going to be the ones to finally take the rats home.

After telling them our intentions, the employee and her co-workers looked at us like we were the scum of the earth. "How could you be so cold?" said the look on their faces. We decided to skip the fish and we headed home. Now on our shelf at home sits an empty fish bowl. Maybe I'll just fill it with water and see if some form of life originates.

Stimulus Check

2008-05-23T21:41:00.000-06:00

I got a paycheck without doing any work. That hasn't happened since I quit the fast-food job I had in college. Twelve-hundred bucks from Lady Liberty, just for residing between the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean (and for not living in Canada or Latin America).

They're calling it a stimulus check. Of course, the money once belonged to me. All the government did was hold it hostage for a while, then give it back. Uncle Sam: "I'll give back the $1200 I took from you if you file your taxes."

They're like hard-core regifters with these stimulus checks. We are the gifter when we pay taxes to the government. They then regift the taxes--not to someone else--but right back to us, the gifter and regiftee.

Actually, the money was probably going to go towards the cost of running the government, just like all taxes. Though that would probably mean the stimulus check was cut via a loan from the social security program. If so, I should probably should just put it towards my retirement fund because that's where it came from.

Since the U.S. is in a quasi-recession, my gut tells me to save the stimulus check for hard times. Yet economists are telling me to blow it on random junk so I can help pull America out of a recession. Which should I satisfy, my gut or the economists?

In my college Economics class I would eat gummy bears while I took notes. Maybe I should buy $1200 worth of gummy bears with my stimulus check to keep my gut and the economists happy.

Or maybe this is a time to be a true patriot. Perhaps I should return my stimulus check to the government. I could send it back with a post-it note that says, "I'd like this to go towards new hand towels at the White House." Maybe I could even request to have my initials embroidered on them.

I'd go down in history! One hundred years from now, kids would be reading in their textbooks about the man who gave his stimulus check back to the government.

"Ask not what money your country can give you--ask what money you can give your country," is a phrase I would coin.

Maybe those future textbooks would have a picture of me striding across the White House lawn, holding an American flag in one hand and a $1200 gift certificate to Bed, Bath & Beyond in the other.

Interior Design

2008-05-17T08:57:00.000-06:00

I recently watched a show on Home and Gardens TV where a "genius" interior designer walked into a couple's house for a home makeover. After belittling the homeowners and criticizing everything on their walls, the designer reworked their living room so it looked like Ikea on crack.

I grew up around a lot of farm land, miles and miles from any Ikea store. For housewives married to farmers, a common thread in home decorating involves choosing their favorite farm animal, then plastering their homes with it. Our next-door neighbor had a rooster motif. The house next to their's chose pigs.

I guess the country folk figure that since they make their living from these animals, they might as well have the courtesy to dedicate a wall, or two, or three, to them. Now that I live thick in the suburbs, I've noticed the same courtesy isn't duplicated in the houses around me. Last week I walked into the home of a guy who works as a software engineer. For whatever strange reason, the wife didn't decorate their kitchen with computer-related items. I thought a strip of wallpaper featuring keyboards would have looked good above the cabinets.

One of the latest home-design fads is painting verticle pin-stripes on your walls. Considering myself an able striper, I bought a couple rolls of painter's tape and went to town on the wall in our laundry room. "June Day Yellow" was my background color, and "Deep Sea Blue" was my accent stripe--12 inches on center. I envisioned a morning-breaks type of sensation for all who walked into the room.

After I finished, and after the buzz from the paint fumes faded, I stood back to admire my work. It looked like I was staring at the sun through blue prison bars.

My wife walked in and almost threw up. Out of the goodness of her heart she tried to fabricate some form of a compliment, but I quickly butted in with a promise to erase the prison bars. Luckily it only takes about 13 coats of yellow paint to cover a dark-blue stripe.

Despite my home-improvement failures, I really came through as a hero last weekend. As I was driving along a country road, I noticed a large stash of reeds growing by a farmer's field. Earlier, my wife had expressed interest in a large vase with reeds in it, to put in the living room. Unfortunately, a few decorating reeds in a furniture store cost about as much as their new couches.

We went out and picked the reeds I found. They were transported home, chopped down to size, and stuffed in a big vase we got for only ten bucks. Maybe an HGTV designer would have ripped it to part, but it looked good to me.

And maybe it would have looked even better if I had a job in the reed industry.

MPG

2008-05-09T21:04:00.001-06:00

I drive a lot for work. My commute is a good 22 miles, and then I travel around to different sites during my workday. So with gas prices soaring, my car's MPG is a big deal (I know the topic of gas prices is becoming cliche, but please bear with me).

In fact, I calculate my latest gas mileage number every time I fill up. As a kid, I remember my grandpa doing that. He kept a little notebook above the sun visor of his 1970 Chevy and would jot down his mileage when he filled up. I never understood why; I guess I just though it was something all grandparents did. My grandpa loved statistics and figures. He was always rattling off numbers like the inches of rain we got last year, the distance between the rows of corn in his garden, and how many minutes are needed for an effective nap.

Yet here I am in my mid-20s, tracking my gas mileage like it's going out of style. If my MPG is down a little, I start to think up all sorts of reasons for the drop in efficiency. Did I hit an unusually large amount of bugs on the freeway? Did I put a new box of mints in my car? Is there a leaf stuck under my windshield wiper, causing drag?

Yes, these days I'm doing everything I can to keep my car's MPG optimal. The psi in my tires is right on the money, and I'm seeing all sorts of "birds" by driving 5 MPH under the speed limit. I've also stripped my car of any unnecessary weight (e.g., jumper cables, insurance and registration forms, my spare tire).

A few days ago I was reading an article about ways to improve your car's efficiency. One suggestion was to replace the air filter. The article guaranteed it was a do-it-your-selfer, so I stopped by Checker on my way home from work. I walked in the store and started scanning the isles for air filters.

"Can I help you find anything?" the clerk asked. "Yeah, I need to replace the air filter on my '97 Accord." He then proceeded to embarrass me with all sorts of ridiculous questions:

"Is your Accord a DX, LX, or EX?"

"I don't know, it's um, white."

"Is it a 2.2 liter, or a 2.7 liter?"

"Um, probably somewhere in between."

He walked down one of the isles, grabbed something off the shelf, and told me it was what I needed. For all I knew, it could have been a twenty-dollar air freshener.

Installing my new air filter turned out to be the quickest fix I've ever made on my car. I only had to go back in the house once for another otter pop, plus another three times for the correct size of socket wrench. Luckily, there's only three flights of stairs separating my parking space from our third-story condo.

Where I'm from, a man is measured by his ability to look at a bolt and gauge it's size. "Yeah, that's a five-eights incher," I initially thought. But after three trips up and down the stairs, I was loosening the bolt with a three-eights inch socket.

Sometimes just two-eights of an inch separates you from home-town manhood and better gas mileage.

4X4

2008-05-02T20:17:00.000-06:00

Many of you know I'm serving hard time as a scout leader. As part of my sentence, I'm required to sleep outside from time to time. We (13-year old boys and some other leaders) have been calling it "camping."

Last weekend, camping meant driving away from society until we found a place where we could burn stuff without other people caring. Our journey took us to the base of some mountains, where we proceeded to baja-race up an antelope migration trail.

Eventually the trail took us to a nightmare of a slope. The other two leaders, in their 4X4 trucks, scooted right up it without a problem. I was in my little Honda CRV, which my wife and I bought last summer. I had only taken it off road once before, when I had to park on some grass.

I made it half-way up the slope on my first try, then my tires spun out and I had to back it down. There were three scouts in my car; the two older boys in the back were calling me a wuss, and the 12-year old in the passenger seat was in a state of shock.

"Let me out, I want out" the 12-year old screamed. "We'll die if we go up that again!"

"Listen soldier, you're gonna man your position," I said, while locking the doors. "You're not getting out until we ascend this hill."

He looked around for an item of comfort, and found nothing. He eventually grabbed the tire-pressure gauge that was laying on the dash, and clung onto it as if it had some life-saving quality.

We proceeded to climb the slope a second time. My engine started making weird noises, the windshield filled up with blue sky, and dust surrounded us. As I reached the point of failure from the first attempt, I looked to my right. The 12-year old was glassy-eyed and tears were streaming down his face. The tire-pressure gauge was still locked in between his hands. The boys in the back were yelling something about the car rolling over.

I looked up to the top of the hill, and saw the other two leaders standing proudly next to their big trucks. They began to yell things like, "just drop to a lower gear and get your RPMs revved up," and "ya gotta crank 'er to the right, or you'll tweak your driveshaft!" Even though I know nothing of auto mechanics, I wanted to counter with something intelligent. I leaned out my window and shouted, "yeah, I'll just pop the clutch a couple times to boost the alternator's intake." They both stopped yelling and looked at each other.

The soldier in the passenger seat held his ground and we made it to the top. The boys in the back got out immediately and jumped into the other leaders' trucks. "I think my manifold distributor is shorting out, so it will best if I have less weight anyway," I said.

The 12-year old was mad; his face was as red as my check engine light. "Dang it, you should have let me out," he exclaimed. I apologized and told him he could join the other boys in the trucks. He consented and quickly hopped out of my car, still clinging to my tire-pressure gauge.

Preserving Manhood

2008-04-26T08:36:00.000-06:00

Although I do my best to maintain a measure of charisma for my wife, elements of unfiltered manhood still manage to find their way out.

When we were dating, I was able to restrain my inner-man. Maybe I even primped it up a little: it wasn't uncommon for me to use the soap long enough to work up a lather, or push back a cuticle gone wild. Heck, I even purchased a can of Axe body spray. It had a psychedelic green-flame on the side; below the flame was the word "KILO." The stuff smelled like a Colombian drug lord. Anyway, I did my best to be dapper; I had girl to win over.

But all that sissyness would be offset when a date with my spouse-to-be was over. After I dropped her off and kissed her goodnight, I'd go home to wallow in Taco Bell wrappers with my roommates and watch ESPN until our eyes rolled into the back of our heads.

Now that I'm married, I have to be a little more creative in where and when I find my release--my chance to let it all out and be a man. Thus in everyday circumstances, I find low-key ways to validate my manhood.

When walking through the mall with my wife, I like to size up the other guys I see around. I mentally debate whether I could take them or not, if something were to go down. That's how a man has to live his life, as if something could go down at any time... even at church.

A real man has to look for opportunities to bare his chest. For example, no man should ride in the back of a truck with his shirt on. The great outdoors, or any place you can spit on the ground, beckons men to be free of neck lines and sleeves.

Stadiums and arenas are also good places to remove the shirt, but you must enjoy it while it lasts. From personal experience, I've found that on-hand security can be just as demanding as my wife in making me put it back on.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a male bigot, or the like. But I do feel that the line separating masculism from feminism is being blurred. Men, do you know the feeling you get when you're in Footlocker checking out what you think are some cool shoes, only to find out you're in the women's section? If you're like me, you jump to the ground like a marine under artillery fire and crawl back to the men's section.

Well, that kind of thing is going to happen as long as the dang retailers keep selling pink shirts in the men's clothing department! And it's not just pink shirts, they now sell girl's skinny jeans in the men's section--which apparently is one of the latest waves of fashion to roll through the wardrobes of weak men.

Retailers might as well take down the signs indicating the men's and women's clothing sections, and just throw the whole mess into a big pile in the middle of the store. It's apparent that people these days want to end gender segregation in the world of fashion.

Take a stand, men. What we choose to do now will determine what type of men our sons' sons will be. A few wayward steps, and they could end up right back in the Colonial period.

Nopalitos

2008-04-19T12:01:00.000-06:00

Since my wife works and goes to school, we evenly split all our domestic responsibilities: she cleans the bathroom, washes the dishes, cooks the meals, folds the laundry, polishes the silver, mops the floor, and vacuums the carpet--I water the house plants and grocery shop.

As my wife fully understands, I can't hold my own in a clothing store. But gosh, I sure can blaze trails in the grocery store isles. That's right, I thoroughly enjoy shopping for food. I see every trip I take to the market as an opportunity to refine my tastes and broaden my palate.

One of the things I love most about grocery shopping is the thrill of racing home perishable food in perishable conditions. Like an EMT rushing a Coleman cooler full of vital organs to an awaiting hospital, I race home my grocery bag full of ice cream to an awaiting freezer. The longer it sits in the heat, the less good it's going to do the recipient.

On one of my recent shopping trips, I purchased a 5.48 lb container of "Dutch Milk Chocolate Drink." I didn't fully realize how big it was until I opened the can and found not one oxygen-absorbing packet, but TWO.

My first glass of Chocolate Drink gave me a stomach ache. But now that I'm past the break-in period, it goes down smooth as velvet.

You know you're in for a surprise when the noun "drink" follows an adjective like "orange," "cherry," or "chocolate." Orange juice is the liquid from an orange. Orange drink is the liquid from a garden hose, mixed in a large container with a powdery substance composed of sugar, chalk, and artificial flavoring.

During another recent grocery-shopping trip, I was wandering aimlessly through the produce section, my second favorite section of the grocery store (foreign foods is my first). I came across a quaint little basket of cactus leafs, or nopalitos, as my Mexican friends call them. The thought of getting nutritious substance out of such a feisty plant intrigued me.

I carefully placed two of them in a produce sack, finished my shopping, and headed to the check stand. As the cashier was hastily ringing my groceries across the scanner, he carelessly grabbed the bag of napolitos to ring them up.

"What the [edit] was that?!" he said, as he looked at the inside of his hand. Little dots of blood began to sprout up on his palm and fingers. "We sell cactus?"

I ducked behind the credit card machine and mumbled something like, "oh sure, my wife makes them all the time; they're good with, um, bagels and... " I trailed off until a new cashier was called in as an emergency replacement, and I finished my purchase.

I got the epidermis-piercing nopalitos home and asked my wife if we could include them in our next meal. I had to convince her that since they were in the grocery store they must be good for consumption. She finally agreed to make them, and we had cactus leaves in our soup the next day. It was actually really good, if you ate around the cactus chunks.

Bounced

2008-04-11T18:53:00.001-06:00

This week I joined the lousiest, lowest, most-worthless folks in society. In other words, I could've sat down to a friendly turkey-dinner with Bill Clinton, Monica Lewinski, and Vanilla Ice (being cautious to keep Lewinski from eating all the turkey), and been in good company.

Sooooo... I bounced a check. Yes, I understand the consequence of admitting that. There's not a snowball's chance in heck you'll ever talk to me again, let alone read one of my articles. If there's one thing I've learned from life, it's this: people that DON'T bounce checks don't hang around people that DO. But before you start to judge me, or before you judge me even more, or before you tear up that check I sent for your birthday, understand that it was the government's fault.

I had just finished filing my taxes through H&R Block Online (which was, by the way, a horrible experience and I'd rather try to file my taxes through my 4-year old niece than use their Online software again). And as a side note, if you didn't get that birthday check I just mentioned, please contact my new accountant.

For the first time in my short history of doing my own taxes, I actually owed money after filing. Apparently I had been stealing money from the government throughout all of 2007, which I did by exaggerating my exemptions on my W-2s. And they wanted the dirty dollars back.

So instead of fleeing the country with my exemption cash, I took a couple more gulps out of my 2-liter Shasta Zazz (to numb the upcoming pain), wrote out a healthy-sized check to the IRS, and dropped it in the mail right-a-way. Turns out the 'ol Postal Service is processing letters a good deal faster than normal. And as soon as the IRS got my check in their hands they made a beeline to the nearest 7-11 and cashed it, well before I had a chance to look on the internets to see if I needed to transfer any more money to my checking account. Anyway, the check bounced around my checking account like a steel marble in a pinball machine--only to be sent down the gap between the two flippers. Game over.

Upon finding out, my self esteem was as low as Death Valley. I had just bounced a check! My word was no good, because that's what a check is. It's your word on the line that says you've got as much money as you wrote out. I figured my family would disown me, our electricity would be turned off, and my credit would be left in ruins. Luckily, the next day my bank stepped in and patted me on the back with a nice, warm $40 insufficient-funds fee.

Yeah, it's one thing to bounce a check, it's another thing to bounce a check to the IRS. So I'll be busy getting my receipts in order... I'm sure there's an audit coming my way.

Mistaken for Something Great

2008-04-05T08:46:00.000-06:00

As I watched my three-point shot fall short of the hoop in my latest city-leage game, I felt the regular flare of frustration that comes everytime I play ball. And no, I didn't need just a little more "umf" on the shot; it was also wide left. It was the kind of airball that brings the game to a halt so the ref can jog off the court and get the ball from underneath the bleachers.

You see, I'm one of those guys who thinks he's got this large mass of talent bundled up inside him, but just hasn't had a chance to unleash it... and fails to every time he plays. But in my head, and always in my head: the next game will be the time I go off for 30.

You put me alone on a court, in front of a hoop, and I'll make a good 50% of my shots. But if I take a shot in a game, there's about a 13% chance it'll rattle its way in; 8% if I'm wide open. For some darned reason, every time I'm about to shoot in a game, the rim raises 3 feet, the ceiling lowers 15 feet, and a little green troll scampers across the court, distracting the heck out of me.

So that's why I'll never forget the time I was in Footlocker and something great happened. Well, two great things happened. One, I finally found the wheat-colored pair of FUBU boots I'd been searching up and down the entire Wasatch Front for. Two, the guy behind me in the check-out line asked me if I played basketball for BYU.

Granted, I had just buzzed my hair, was wearing a BYU Basketball shirt, and was about to buy a pair of FUBUs. Plus I was with my wife, who looks like the wife of someone who is successful at something. But still, asking that question is like asking Donny Osmond if he opens for 50 Cent concerts. He could've just asked me to crumple up my reciept and try to arc it into the nearest wastebasket, in order to clear things up. But instead, I told him I wasn't on the team and walked off, dreaming of dropping 30 points in my next game.

Shop Like a Man

2008-03-29T10:19:00.000-06:00

Shopping for clothes is already uncomfortable enough for a guy; it's a time when you have to actually acknowledge fashion and make a conscious decision to prefer one piece of clothing over another. For a man, the minutes spent in the isles of a clothing store are minutes void of valor and masculinity, but full of frailty and metrosexuality. In fact, there are only three places where a dude can comfortably take his time to peruse the isles of a store for something that might look good on him; (1) The Nike Outlet Store, (2) Gen X Clothing, (3) Deseret Industries.

If I ever need some new apparel, I go to those three first, except in reverse order. Occasionally, however, a brotha's gotta step into the mall in order to pick up some new threads. Such was the case a couple months ago, when I felt I needed to add a second pair of jeans to my weekly rotation. The ridges in the corduroys I found at DI were just too deep, the 2Pac insignia on the back pocket of the pants I found at Gen X looked like it wouldn't handle much wear, and the Nike store didn't carry any denim.

And so I found myself at an anonymous department store in the mall. I say anonymous because I don't want to increase the possibility of running into any of you if I have to go there again. One of the most awkward things that can ever happen to a guy is for him to run into one of his bros at a clothing store:

"What's up, man?"
"Nothin'. What ya up to, just lookin' for some clothes, or something?"
"Yeah, sorta... just seeing, uh, if there are, um, any good basketball shorts here."
"Oh, me too. I couldn't find any long enough, so I'm just gonna grab some socks and head out."
"Yeah, I gotta go, too. Later, man."

Then they both part ways as quickly as possible, knowing full-well that there aren't any basketball shorts at Aeropostale. Anyway... I was at an anonymous department store looking for some jeans. Historically, I had done my best to never pay more than $20 for a pair. But due to high inflation and a loss of strength in the American Dollar, I was willing to shell out $30. In fact, about two months earlier at this same store, I had purchased a pair for $29.99. Since they fit great, I went over to that same area of the store where I had last found them, hoping to find a slightly different color and be on my way. I did, but I found them underneath a sign that read "$31.99." I paused, knowing full well that $30 was my price ceiling. I looked around and noticed several flashy signs that read, "lowest price of the season sale!"

New jeans in hand, I walked up to the register while explaining to my beautiful wife that I was going to get out of that store without paying more than $30. As I approached the cashier, who was a tall, older man, I said, "I got this same pair of jeans here just two months ago for $29.99; I'd like to pay no more than that." He actually became quite defensive and showed no interest in my plea. I quickly pointed out the signs all over that read 'lowest price of the season sale!," and explained that $31.99 was not the lowest price of the season for the jeans because I got them just two months ago, in the same season, for less. More words were exchanged, the cashier started yelling and shaking the counter, my wife got embarrassed and left to hide in the women's jewelry section, and a long line of impatient shoppers built up behind me. I had every reason in the world to pull out another $2 and have it all end, but I held my post.

Eventually, the manager was called over the intercom and I was pulled out of line so the customers behind me could get on with buying the junk they had in their hands for a price slightly above the lowest price of the season. Things actually went much better with the store's manager. I explained my case, again as kindly as possible. She listened, rolled her eyes, and had me follow her to another register where she rang me up for $29.99.

Customer 1, Retailer 0

Bye Bye, Beto's

2008-03-15T13:15:00.000-06:00

As a run-of-the-mill BYU student, I've had my fair share of trips to Beto's. The Mexican restaurant sits proudly on a prime spot of Provo real estate, a stone's throw away from any hungry coed.

Despite my long-standing respect for the place, I implore you Beto's fans to take State Street a few miles farther the next time you head out for large quantities of cheap, Mexican food. At State and Center in Orem (O-town, Ore-mizzle, Family City USA, etc... ), in the parking lot for Robert's Arts and Crafts, you'll find several men waiting for their wives to finish purchasing expensive crap. And you'll find Rancherito's.

The restaurant actually used to be a Beto's, before 'ol Rancherito stepped in and added some class. What class? For starters, Rancherito reduced the number of weird things you find in your burrito meat by at least 50%. In addition, Rancherito put surround sound up and blasts authentic Mexican music as you chow down and wonder if they cut back on food quality in order to give you such a heaping portion.

Despite the changes, Rancherito's still features the things you love from Beto's; a condiments kiosk featuring freshly cut limes, cilantro, red salsa, and green salsa; cashiers that that don't speak much English; and a hearty load of beans and rice with every dish. So grab a significant other, a 10-dollar bill, and head on over to Rancherito's; you're guaranteed to come out on top.

As a side note, the tamarindo drink is pretty rough.

Rip Off!

2008-03-12T22:39:00.004-06:00

I'm cheap and I don't like cold weather. With that resume, you won't find me on the ski slopes much. Instead, I spend my winter days indoors--thinking about whether it could be possible to center global warming affects in one area. In school I used to hear about a hole in the Ozone layer above Antarctica, which gives the sun's rays an open shot at the earth's surface. If anyone ever wants to relocate that hole, I've got a place for it.

Nonetheless, I was dragged out to "Utah's famous slopes" last Saturday. Not to ski, but to sled. I threw on my thickest FUBU hoodie and stepped into my black windbreaker athletic pants. I finished off my outfit by strapping on my black Adidas basketball shoes (with their shiny plastic exterior, I figured they'd be more waterproof than any other kicks I owned). I was ready to ride through the snow, or the ghetto. My iPod has music appropriate for either.

Before arriving, I had heard rumors of $17 dollars a ticket for a two-hour time slot on the slopes. I winced at the idea, but in keeping a family committment, I listened to my heart and made the 25-minute drive up Provo Canyon with my wife.

Upon arrival, the actual ticket fee became all too apparent. "That'll be $18 a person," the money-laundering 17-year old girl behind the counter said. As the money was transferred, an image of 36 iTune downloads danced out of my reach, never to return. Yes, I had just dropped 36 bucks... or 6 Hot N' Readys, or 600 Otter Pops, or a few gallons of gas on sledding.

As a youth, back when sledding was free, my friends and I would find the most dangerous descent littered with obstacles like trees, boulders, and snowmobile riders. The sledding area at Soldier Hollow has a rope tow that you hook on to and it drags you up. It's nicer than walking to the top of the hill, but probably not any faster. And I'm not sure if "hill" is the appropriate term. If it were a hill, the ride down on my sled wouldn't have taken as long as the ride up.

In fact, the only time I felt anything close to a rush was when I tried to take the speed of the sled run into my own hands. I strategically placed my sled on the top of the "hill", backed up, sprinted forward, and dove headfirst at my sled at a dangerous speed, hoping to propel myself into a hint of fun. But fun was not to be found at Soldier Hollow. I overshot my landing on the stationary sled and landed face-first in the snow. Thus, I rolled down the 3% grade alone--without a tube and without $36.