I'm done. Finally. After three days of highlighting, reviewing and surfing the web for meaningless details, I'm spent like the only sheep in a town of cowboys who haven't seen a chick in months.
Did I forget to mention I also read a 200-plus page magazine for this exercise? If I studied this hard in college I'd have my own castle along the Sicilian coast and a personal scrotum-washer to follow me around town. I'd be so intelligent that my brain could kick Will Hunting's bean on any given Sunday. I wonder how he'd like them apples?
And what will all this hard work get me in the long run? Come Thursday, it will help me decide in the 16th round of our fantasy football draft whether to select a kicker with an impossibly long Euro name or the sixth-string wide receiver for Cleveland Browns.
It's that time of year - fantasy football season. Every year, 10 of us dorks from the prison work camp get together at a restaurant, or this year the Compound, and pick names as if we're the GMs of these spoiled science experiments known as football players. We come in with colored sheets that would look more in place at a gay pride rally than in a living room full of football geeks. We talk like we know our shit - "Well, with Joe Pokebuddy's arrest for chicken fucking last week, the Seahawks will need someone to man the left side of the OLine otherwise Hasselbeck will be picking his nuts off the turf after each pass." - and as we wait for our turn to pick we hide our cheat sheets and work more secretively than NSA domestic spying squad.
Of course, the inevitable question is: Has any of this extensive studying helped you in this league? My answer: Aside from developing a hemerroid the size Qualcomm Stadium from sitting at my computer for six hours a night each August, I would have to say that's a big, fat, fly-drawin' NO.
Four years, two playoff appearances, in the money once. Never better than third. You do the math.
More times than not its $50 flushed into the football toilet. That's right, fifty bones - 30 to get into the league, and because SportsGeek (who's the league Fuhrer) is a greedy pipsqueak we charge for all player pick ups aside from the initial draft. Want another QB? Pony up $3 big spender. RB? WR? Instead of using that $2 on a Chinese hooker, hand it over to the commish. And since I'm the Daniel Snyder of fantasy football, I'm never happy with my squad so I throw money at the problem and pray that the fourth string RB which the Cowboys just picked up off an Oil derrick in Odessa will run for a few hundred yards and score a couple of touchdowns against Baltimore.
Every year, as I'm pouring through stats that look more Indian hieroglypic than English, I wonder, is it worth it? When I'm watching as my starting quarterback is dragging what's left of his left knee off the field behind him I think no, that 30 bucks would have been better off being bet on dog fights in Virginia. Then, there's days when my wide receivers are catching everything but gonorrhea on the gridiron and I thank the lord I am me.
Last year was doubly tough, not only did I finish the prison work camp football league in dead-ball last, but to boot I went to San Diego for the game that shall no longer be named. Football, after that, was dead to me. It took - I shit you not - until mid-July to get me mildly interested in football, specifically fantasy football. I still loved my Chargers, but it was bitter love like the kind you experience when you learn your better half wants you to dress up like a pink Easter bunny for sex because quote - I have really fond memories of Easter and bunnies - endquote.
A month later, and I'm panting in draft anticipation. My sheets are highlighted, the bye weeks are circled, I have my draft war area cordoned off on the family room floor and I'm fretting over whether Mike Hawk will be available in the eighth round.
And come mid-December, when I'm scratching my head at another last place finish, I'll start preparing for the 6 - SIX - fantasy baseball leagues I'll be in.
I guess you can say I live in a fantasy world.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to check out my fantasy NASCAR team.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Monday, August 27, 2007
Solving world problems one beer at a time
I hear it at the prison work camp all the time.
"Your generation (that would be us slack-ass pot smokers born between 1965-1977) just aren't involved like we (those self-agrandizing, 'we changed the world, so nonny, nonny, nonny' Baby Boomers) were back in the 60s."
I sit near some hardline Democrats in the office, one of which is a yippie (old hippy turned yuppie) and every year when election talk heats up they bemoan the fact that our generation hasn't grabbed their torch and set fire to the political structure. They ask if I watch Hardball, Olberman, MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, blah blah blah. And when I tell them no, but I did see a hilarious clip on Youtube that invovled a dude bowling a midget into milk carton pins they just roll their eyes and ask what is coming of our country if this generation can't take things seriously. But really, how can we take the Boomers seriously when they give us folks like Bush, who bombs everything; Clinton, who bangs everything; and John Ashcroft, who bugs everyone?
Tally up the last 20 years and what do you get? A country that's messed up politically, economically, and judiciously, all thanks to those damn hippies from the 60s.
The last two presidents - Baby Boomers.
The majority of lawmakers now - Baby Boomers.
CEOs, city government, county government, commissions, board presidents, liquor store owners, strip club owners, all helmed by Boomers by and large.
With a house full of slightly inebriated (12 hours of drinking, but who's counting) Charger fans - and one Cardinals fan because Bolt fans need a token representative - see, we support affirmative action - politics and the country's direction was the choice topic. The last time I was in such a intellectually stimulating conversation at 2 a.m. I was crammed into a UNLV dorm room taking bong hits while hypothesizing whether Scooby and Shaggy were gay potheads or just really fond of each other and high-fat sandwiches.
In the kitchen of the house I own - Boomers often miss the fact many Xers are buying homes at a younger age than back in their LSD-soaked days - we covered more ground than a CIA-sponsored carpet-bombing mission in some oil rich country. Who are the viable Democratic presidential candidates (sorry Hilary, you didn't make the cut lady)? Jesus freaks are no different than Islamic jihadists. We're a jaded bunch now who trusts the media about as much as we trust the politicians that they're reporting on. In our book they're as crooked as a three dollar bill. And while solutions weren't found there was a better understanding of how our country has reached dysfunction level 5 (I think that's an orange threat level, or chartreuse at the very least).
Our generation realized long before the Boomers figured this out that the news media has been playing a game for nearly 30 years, and the viewers are the game pieces. It manipulates the game board and molests the pieces (the viewers) to fit the vision it wants to portray in the newspaper and on the television. But its in real trouble now as the media slowly learn that we get more information via alternative methods - the web, The Daily Show or the Colbert Report. Humor has as much truth in it as Chris Mathews or Bill O'Reilly. My question is how are those outlets any different than the talking heads on the other alphabet soup channels?
Among our little group of think tankers Saturday night, time and again I brought the conversation back to the Boomers. They deserve plenty of thanks for setting the stage for future generations to question their leaders and fight for what's right. But they must take the blame for where our country is today as well, rather than shift it on to past generation or the next generation (us). The past didn't deal with the problems and all we do is bitch about the problem.
Am I naive to believe they didn't talk the same way about the Depression-era generation? Hell no. The '50s, for as milquetoast as Leave it to Beaver made that decade out to be, there was plenty of hinky shit going down in Washington, there just wasn't an open pipeline of information flooding Americans' homes back then. But to think we're not as involved as the rock-throwing, fire-hosed hippies of the late '60s is wrong. We may not hit the streets like pack of angry daytime hookers, but dammit we want this country to get right, and we want to be allowed to watch midget porn without some snoopy Boomer hacking my IP address everytime I (um, I mean someone) venture over for some little people fun.
Boomers should also remember one thing: Guess who'll be deciding your welfare in 20 or 30 years? That's right! Treat us well and we won't put you in adult diapers and take you to the old folks home before your time.
"Your generation (that would be us slack-ass pot smokers born between 1965-1977) just aren't involved like we (those self-agrandizing, 'we changed the world, so nonny, nonny, nonny' Baby Boomers) were back in the 60s."
I sit near some hardline Democrats in the office, one of which is a yippie (old hippy turned yuppie) and every year when election talk heats up they bemoan the fact that our generation hasn't grabbed their torch and set fire to the political structure. They ask if I watch Hardball, Olberman, MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, blah blah blah. And when I tell them no, but I did see a hilarious clip on Youtube that invovled a dude bowling a midget into milk carton pins they just roll their eyes and ask what is coming of our country if this generation can't take things seriously. But really, how can we take the Boomers seriously when they give us folks like Bush, who bombs everything; Clinton, who bangs everything; and John Ashcroft, who bugs everyone?
Tally up the last 20 years and what do you get? A country that's messed up politically, economically, and judiciously, all thanks to those damn hippies from the 60s.
The last two presidents - Baby Boomers.
The majority of lawmakers now - Baby Boomers.
CEOs, city government, county government, commissions, board presidents, liquor store owners, strip club owners, all helmed by Boomers by and large.
With a house full of slightly inebriated (12 hours of drinking, but who's counting) Charger fans - and one Cardinals fan because Bolt fans need a token representative - see, we support affirmative action - politics and the country's direction was the choice topic. The last time I was in such a intellectually stimulating conversation at 2 a.m. I was crammed into a UNLV dorm room taking bong hits while hypothesizing whether Scooby and Shaggy were gay potheads or just really fond of each other and high-fat sandwiches.
In the kitchen of the house I own - Boomers often miss the fact many Xers are buying homes at a younger age than back in their LSD-soaked days - we covered more ground than a CIA-sponsored carpet-bombing mission in some oil rich country. Who are the viable Democratic presidential candidates (sorry Hilary, you didn't make the cut lady)? Jesus freaks are no different than Islamic jihadists. We're a jaded bunch now who trusts the media about as much as we trust the politicians that they're reporting on. In our book they're as crooked as a three dollar bill. And while solutions weren't found there was a better understanding of how our country has reached dysfunction level 5 (I think that's an orange threat level, or chartreuse at the very least).
Our generation realized long before the Boomers figured this out that the news media has been playing a game for nearly 30 years, and the viewers are the game pieces. It manipulates the game board and molests the pieces (the viewers) to fit the vision it wants to portray in the newspaper and on the television. But its in real trouble now as the media slowly learn that we get more information via alternative methods - the web, The Daily Show or the Colbert Report. Humor has as much truth in it as Chris Mathews or Bill O'Reilly. My question is how are those outlets any different than the talking heads on the other alphabet soup channels?
Among our little group of think tankers Saturday night, time and again I brought the conversation back to the Boomers. They deserve plenty of thanks for setting the stage for future generations to question their leaders and fight for what's right. But they must take the blame for where our country is today as well, rather than shift it on to past generation or the next generation (us). The past didn't deal with the problems and all we do is bitch about the problem.
Am I naive to believe they didn't talk the same way about the Depression-era generation? Hell no. The '50s, for as milquetoast as Leave it to Beaver made that decade out to be, there was plenty of hinky shit going down in Washington, there just wasn't an open pipeline of information flooding Americans' homes back then. But to think we're not as involved as the rock-throwing, fire-hosed hippies of the late '60s is wrong. We may not hit the streets like pack of angry daytime hookers, but dammit we want this country to get right, and we want to be allowed to watch midget porn without some snoopy Boomer hacking my IP address everytime I (um, I mean someone) venture over for some little people fun.
Boomers should also remember one thing: Guess who'll be deciding your welfare in 20 or 30 years? That's right! Treat us well and we won't put you in adult diapers and take you to the old folks home before your time.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Anticide
Our little corner of Arizona was a war zone.
Specifically, our in our house.
And the kitchen was the battlefield.
It was the Moors and Christians. The Spanish and Brittish. Losties and The Others. Jerry Seinfeld and Newman - an undeclared war that featured early morning skirmishes, a late night offensive in the garage, and chemical weapons. Many recon parties cris-crossing countertops, surveying the dishwasher, transmitting data to unseen soldiers waiting for their prime directive to start the invasion. They tried to assassinate the top military officer, who 90 minutes before executed operation "Flood the Little Bastards." And, since seeing other two-legged beings cart off the military leader to the MASH unit, they believed that said military officer was now worm food and decided that Kitchen Offensive was a go.
With the other civilian gone and the livestock sleeping the day away in what this army saw as future battlefields, they took the countertops, sink and anything stationary in the kitchen.
What they did not anticipate, however, was that the military officer was still alive, armed with a hydrogen bomb in a bottle and a cranky disposition thanks to medication he had to take to combat the affects of their midnight raid on his tootsies two nights before.
One sight of my kitchen counter sent me into Rambo-mode. I ran into the garage - the arms locker if you will - and came out Ortho a-blazin'. The ants screamed in retreat, but it was too late, they pissed off this military leader and he wasn't going to stop until every army ant, soldier ant, queen ant and piss ant was bathed in enough spray to choke a wombat. If I had half a brain I would have added pics to this post - the carnage was a sight to behold. Once the adrenaline of battle wore down I surveyed the battlefield. The counter resembled those history book pictures of post-Civil War battles. My kitchen was Antietam, and the ants were the South.
But I didn't let it stop there. I followed their retreating soldiers outside, down the wall that shares the kitchen and into a crack inside our screen room. Once I deemed that to be their command center, I layered the area with "mines" - Amdro - and followed that with some Ortho covering fire along the baseboard leading up to the mine field in case any deserters tried to flee. With these little buggers, you can never be too careful. I come from a mountain town that had red ants. If they got hold of you it'd sting for a little bit and then fade into memory. Out here, in the desert tundra, there are ants that will take your pinky tow without warning or remorse. Stand near their hill and suddenly King Kong on the Empire State Building and they're the U.S. Air Force, pecking the hell out of your legs with their death mandibles.
Maybe I wouldn't have gone nuclear on my kitchen against the ants if they hadn't tried to have me whacked like Paul Castellano Saturday night.
While shutting down irrigation, I felt a pair of stings on my foot. Because my vocabulary consists of a half dozen words and 50 forms of every curse word imagineable, I let go with a late night "cockhound" and quick-stepped it to the pool to drown any ant who thought it'd get a free ride into the house with its mandible's firmly clamped onto my hobbit-like, hairy feet. Two large, whitish welts remained and I thought that would be it. I could handle the week of itching associated with ant bites.
Then my arms started to itch. And my head. My ears. My ... um ... well, everything. I took a shower, and every part of my body turned red as if a tomato ate me whole and puked me back into the real world. Then bumps started to appear along every square inch of my skin and before I knew it my face looked like an old-style catcher's mitt and the balls of my feet were puffy balloons of flesh.
That's what landed me in the hospital Saturday night - an ant hit job. And it was a good attempt, too, Tony Soprano whacking Phil Leatardo good. It came complete with a double fainting at the triage desk, a siezure (which a I'm told was quite theatrical with clutching and rigid legs - I'm nothing if not a method actor, folks - you hear that Scorcese), a ride on a gurney and a CT scan of my melon where the docs got quite the show I'm sure (I apologized to the docs for thinking about a Mexican donkey show, it just crossed my bean like the Stay-Puff Marshmallow man crossed Ray Stantz's mind). The doc was a joker too. As if I hadn't suffered enough, he prescribed allergy meds that would make my heart race and force me to to "shake the dew off the lilly" every seven-and-a-half minutes. Oh hell yeah I timed it, what the hell else was I going to do since I was up all night with a racing heart? Real funny, ya quack. I didn't need some shut-eye before work this week, anyway. I would have been better off with an examination from the "Deadwood" Doc.
So, if the Prez Jughead needs a battle tested military leader to get shit done in the Middle East, I'm sure he has my number. My war wounds and battle acumen speaks for itself.
Specifically, our in our house.
And the kitchen was the battlefield.
It was the Moors and Christians. The Spanish and Brittish. Losties and The Others. Jerry Seinfeld and Newman - an undeclared war that featured early morning skirmishes, a late night offensive in the garage, and chemical weapons. Many recon parties cris-crossing countertops, surveying the dishwasher, transmitting data to unseen soldiers waiting for their prime directive to start the invasion. They tried to assassinate the top military officer, who 90 minutes before executed operation "Flood the Little Bastards." And, since seeing other two-legged beings cart off the military leader to the MASH unit, they believed that said military officer was now worm food and decided that Kitchen Offensive was a go.
With the other civilian gone and the livestock sleeping the day away in what this army saw as future battlefields, they took the countertops, sink and anything stationary in the kitchen.
What they did not anticipate, however, was that the military officer was still alive, armed with a hydrogen bomb in a bottle and a cranky disposition thanks to medication he had to take to combat the affects of their midnight raid on his tootsies two nights before.
One sight of my kitchen counter sent me into Rambo-mode. I ran into the garage - the arms locker if you will - and came out Ortho a-blazin'. The ants screamed in retreat, but it was too late, they pissed off this military leader and he wasn't going to stop until every army ant, soldier ant, queen ant and piss ant was bathed in enough spray to choke a wombat. If I had half a brain I would have added pics to this post - the carnage was a sight to behold. Once the adrenaline of battle wore down I surveyed the battlefield. The counter resembled those history book pictures of post-Civil War battles. My kitchen was Antietam, and the ants were the South.
But I didn't let it stop there. I followed their retreating soldiers outside, down the wall that shares the kitchen and into a crack inside our screen room. Once I deemed that to be their command center, I layered the area with "mines" - Amdro - and followed that with some Ortho covering fire along the baseboard leading up to the mine field in case any deserters tried to flee. With these little buggers, you can never be too careful. I come from a mountain town that had red ants. If they got hold of you it'd sting for a little bit and then fade into memory. Out here, in the desert tundra, there are ants that will take your pinky tow without warning or remorse. Stand near their hill and suddenly King Kong on the Empire State Building and they're the U.S. Air Force, pecking the hell out of your legs with their death mandibles.
Maybe I wouldn't have gone nuclear on my kitchen against the ants if they hadn't tried to have me whacked like Paul Castellano Saturday night.
While shutting down irrigation, I felt a pair of stings on my foot. Because my vocabulary consists of a half dozen words and 50 forms of every curse word imagineable, I let go with a late night "cockhound" and quick-stepped it to the pool to drown any ant who thought it'd get a free ride into the house with its mandible's firmly clamped onto my hobbit-like, hairy feet. Two large, whitish welts remained and I thought that would be it. I could handle the week of itching associated with ant bites.
Then my arms started to itch. And my head. My ears. My ... um ... well, everything. I took a shower, and every part of my body turned red as if a tomato ate me whole and puked me back into the real world. Then bumps started to appear along every square inch of my skin and before I knew it my face looked like an old-style catcher's mitt and the balls of my feet were puffy balloons of flesh.
That's what landed me in the hospital Saturday night - an ant hit job. And it was a good attempt, too, Tony Soprano whacking Phil Leatardo good. It came complete with a double fainting at the triage desk, a siezure (which a I'm told was quite theatrical with clutching and rigid legs - I'm nothing if not a method actor, folks - you hear that Scorcese), a ride on a gurney and a CT scan of my melon where the docs got quite the show I'm sure (I apologized to the docs for thinking about a Mexican donkey show, it just crossed my bean like the Stay-Puff Marshmallow man crossed Ray Stantz's mind). The doc was a joker too. As if I hadn't suffered enough, he prescribed allergy meds that would make my heart race and force me to to "shake the dew off the lilly" every seven-and-a-half minutes. Oh hell yeah I timed it, what the hell else was I going to do since I was up all night with a racing heart? Real funny, ya quack. I didn't need some shut-eye before work this week, anyway. I would have been better off with an examination from the "Deadwood" Doc.
So, if the Prez Jughead needs a battle tested military leader to get shit done in the Middle East, I'm sure he has my number. My war wounds and battle acumen speaks for itself.
Monday, August 20, 2007
100 thanks
I logged on this morning with designs on gabbing about the Saturday evening Wife, myself and the in-law units spent in the emergency unit at the hospital. That was before I noticed that this very post would be numero 100.
I'm a milestone sort of dude. I get all misty-eyed when players near those benchmark numbers. 500 homers. 3,000 hits. 300 wins. 100 touchdowns. 15,000 yards rushing. I couldn't add two numbers together if you had a shotgun pointed at my twig and berries, but ask me to compute someone's batting average and I'll spit out the data like I'm Charlie Epps. For some reason, I see magic in those numbers.
Maybe because I didn't believe I'd get to this point on this blog - and I have countless unfinished fiction stories to attest to the theory that I like to leave things unfinished - that getting to this point holds a special little place in my otherwise cold, black heart (I ain't blowing smoke up your kazoo, Wife will gladly tell you my heart holds no emotion). Seriously, who'd want read the ramblings of schmuck from SoCal, transplanted in the middle of the Sonoran Desert, where all he talks about is poop and midget porn (OK, maybe me, but really I have to be in the minority here)?
And while I don't know how many of you are out there, I have to thank you. If it weren't for you folks bringing up my foibles (and as you can see, those foibles are many) over a beer or 8, on e-mail, at the prison work camp, or in sky writing above Lake Pleasant, this little piece on the World Wide Web could have gone the way of Milli Vanilli - a one post wonder typed by another person, or more likely a chimp.
So thank you all for pushing me - especially Wife, who I'm sure gets me to blog so I stay out of her hair - to keep typing poop jokes and midget porn references. Keep it up and I promise to do the same.
I'm a milestone sort of dude. I get all misty-eyed when players near those benchmark numbers. 500 homers. 3,000 hits. 300 wins. 100 touchdowns. 15,000 yards rushing. I couldn't add two numbers together if you had a shotgun pointed at my twig and berries, but ask me to compute someone's batting average and I'll spit out the data like I'm Charlie Epps. For some reason, I see magic in those numbers.
Maybe because I didn't believe I'd get to this point on this blog - and I have countless unfinished fiction stories to attest to the theory that I like to leave things unfinished - that getting to this point holds a special little place in my otherwise cold, black heart (I ain't blowing smoke up your kazoo, Wife will gladly tell you my heart holds no emotion). Seriously, who'd want read the ramblings of schmuck from SoCal, transplanted in the middle of the Sonoran Desert, where all he talks about is poop and midget porn (OK, maybe me, but really I have to be in the minority here)?
And while I don't know how many of you are out there, I have to thank you. If it weren't for you folks bringing up my foibles (and as you can see, those foibles are many) over a beer or 8, on e-mail, at the prison work camp, or in sky writing above Lake Pleasant, this little piece on the World Wide Web could have gone the way of Milli Vanilli - a one post wonder typed by another person, or more likely a chimp.
So thank you all for pushing me - especially Wife, who I'm sure gets me to blog so I stay out of her hair - to keep typing poop jokes and midget porn references. Keep it up and I promise to do the same.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Buds are burning
It didn't taste funny to me.
And therein lies the problem.
We sat down last night for a sweet, Rockwellian family dinner at the parental in-law units compound. Green beans, Caesar salad and hamburgers; the cornerstone of any all-American meal. But the meal could have been comprised of chicken turds, cat piss dressing on a scraps of moldy cabbage and dried scorpions and I would have been happy as I'm wont to binge eat after a hard few hours of napping after work. I had every intention yesterday of working out - I even pulled on the workout attire - but once dressed I don't remember what happened. I'm going with the theory that the bed chloroformed me, thus knocking me out before I made it to the gym. When Wife, who also fell victim the chloroform-attacking bed, and I finally pulled ourselves away from the mattresses' tentacles mom-in-law was calling us over for our gourmet, Ronald Reagan and Apple Pie meal.
We all went bunless - between the four of us we couldn't find any hamburger buns - which was fine by me because I didn't want the bread (nevermind that I had a muffin the size of a lunar lander at the prison work camp this morning) and I doused it with a hefty dose of mustard. It looked tasty, and it was tasty until mom-in-law spoke.
"Does this burger taste funny."
Wife, who's battling a sinus thingy, didn't answer. Dad-in-law shrugged. Myself, I kept tossing the meat down like it was my last meal. I'll admit, the meat was funny tasting, and not ha-ha, tickle in your throat funny, but more like "if you take another bite me you'll hurl up your gall bladder by 8 tonight" funny.
But I couldn't stop myself. Dad-in-law pushed his burger away, Wife tossed her fork across the room and ran for the Listerine, hoping to kill every stomach-eating nugget of bacteria that was sliding down her throat like it was giant slip-and-slide. Mom-in-law suggested Fuddruckers to finish off dinner. And I kept piling the burger down until Wife grabbed a broom handle and pushed the plate out of fork's reach from me.
Funny-tasting food doesn't scare me. Fear Factor contestants can't hold a candle to my gut. Give me turtle tongue with a side of monkey nuts and I'll throw each bite down the gullet like it's lobster tail and jelly beans. Aside from olives (the fruit the devil, really ) my taste buds haven't met a food it doesn't like. Hell, I've been known to eat turkey sausage that has been tried by everyone at the table, including myself, accepted its foul tasting and then proceed to finish the offending turkey wiener. Why? Because it's there, plus we have starving folks in East Phoenix who'd pay top money for a link of breakfast sausage that tastes like a dog just farted on it.
So, when mom-in-law asked me if I thought the burger taste bad, my only response was, "if you bad as in metallic with a scent of rotted citrus, then yeah, it taste bad, but don't tell my taste buds, they think it's fine."
And while the three of them were deciding on Fuddruckers, I proceeded to snarf down the salad green beans for fear the hazmat crew would come in and steal those plates as well. I'll be damned if I was going to lose out on green stuff, too, be it lettuce or algae-covered oleander leaves disguised as salad.
And therein lies the problem.
We sat down last night for a sweet, Rockwellian family dinner at the parental in-law units compound. Green beans, Caesar salad and hamburgers; the cornerstone of any all-American meal. But the meal could have been comprised of chicken turds, cat piss dressing on a scraps of moldy cabbage and dried scorpions and I would have been happy as I'm wont to binge eat after a hard few hours of napping after work. I had every intention yesterday of working out - I even pulled on the workout attire - but once dressed I don't remember what happened. I'm going with the theory that the bed chloroformed me, thus knocking me out before I made it to the gym. When Wife, who also fell victim the chloroform-attacking bed, and I finally pulled ourselves away from the mattresses' tentacles mom-in-law was calling us over for our gourmet, Ronald Reagan and Apple Pie meal.
We all went bunless - between the four of us we couldn't find any hamburger buns - which was fine by me because I didn't want the bread (nevermind that I had a muffin the size of a lunar lander at the prison work camp this morning) and I doused it with a hefty dose of mustard. It looked tasty, and it was tasty until mom-in-law spoke.
"Does this burger taste funny."
Wife, who's battling a sinus thingy, didn't answer. Dad-in-law shrugged. Myself, I kept tossing the meat down like it was my last meal. I'll admit, the meat was funny tasting, and not ha-ha, tickle in your throat funny, but more like "if you take another bite me you'll hurl up your gall bladder by 8 tonight" funny.
But I couldn't stop myself. Dad-in-law pushed his burger away, Wife tossed her fork across the room and ran for the Listerine, hoping to kill every stomach-eating nugget of bacteria that was sliding down her throat like it was giant slip-and-slide. Mom-in-law suggested Fuddruckers to finish off dinner. And I kept piling the burger down until Wife grabbed a broom handle and pushed the plate out of fork's reach from me.
Funny-tasting food doesn't scare me. Fear Factor contestants can't hold a candle to my gut. Give me turtle tongue with a side of monkey nuts and I'll throw each bite down the gullet like it's lobster tail and jelly beans. Aside from olives (the fruit the devil, really ) my taste buds haven't met a food it doesn't like. Hell, I've been known to eat turkey sausage that has been tried by everyone at the table, including myself, accepted its foul tasting and then proceed to finish the offending turkey wiener. Why? Because it's there, plus we have starving folks in East Phoenix who'd pay top money for a link of breakfast sausage that tastes like a dog just farted on it.
So, when mom-in-law asked me if I thought the burger taste bad, my only response was, "if you bad as in metallic with a scent of rotted citrus, then yeah, it taste bad, but don't tell my taste buds, they think it's fine."
And while the three of them were deciding on Fuddruckers, I proceeded to snarf down the salad green beans for fear the hazmat crew would come in and steal those plates as well. I'll be damned if I was going to lose out on green stuff, too, be it lettuce or algae-covered oleander leaves disguised as salad.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Cheap entertainment
Kids never fail to baffle me.
We had three younguns over to the house Saturday for an evening of swimming and burgers, along with their parental units - a poker buddy and recent parolee from the prison work camp, and his wife (who, as a side note is joining Wife tonight at the exercise bootcamp because my better half likes to lure friends into the middle of the desert - where their screams won't be heard - during the summer's hottest day and torture them with squat thrusts, chair dips, push ups and something called fire hydrants, which really doesn't sound pleasant unless water is spewing out of it to cool ya down). According their units, the rug rats were fairly new to swimming and we were more than happy to let them crash our pool. Wife and I found two-player Marco Polo was about as much fun as throwing a tennis ball against the wall 400 times, so getting a chance to have playmates in the dogs' water bowl (our pooches have a 25,000-gallon water bowl because we like to spoil our pets) was a bonus.
As we made our way out to the pool, the motherly unit produced pool toys for the brood - retrievable cups, a plastic Winnie the Pooh and a plastic Care Bear. Wife threw the toys around the pool, and the younguns with their floaties keeping their little noggin's above water would chase their toys around the pool. The toys looked new and I remembered thinking, man, the only pool toys we got when kids were rolled-up, used socks and Ziploc baggies - the gallon freezer bags at least - that you'd have to zip quick to trap the air. That was our floaties. Dear Ma would duct tape to Ziploc bags to each side of our chest and toss us into the pee-warm water of the neighborhood pool. Since the duct tape hurt like a bugger to yank off after swimming, I learned how to swim quick. Lil' Sis was not so lucky. And when she and I asked for pool noodles the Ol' Man gave us a Styrofoam block and told us to use our imagination to turn it into a noodle.
A Winnie the Pooh pool toy would have put us with the town's elite, I'm sure.
As far as Wife and I go, the extent of our pool toy toy box are noodles and a battery-powered fish that will nuzzle your bung hole if you're not watching. We chose not to pull out the friendly fish with the kids around.
After an hour or so of being pulled around on the noodles and chasing their cups, filling them and then proceeding to dump the pool water on any adult's head within arm's reach, the ankle biters realized there was a whole lot more to the yard than just the pool.
"What's this, Daddy?" I heard one of them asking their pop, and I knew it could be one of three things: rotted hunk of citrus, fallen pine cone, or one of the pooches presents they like to leave me. Thankfully it was the second one.
"It's a pine cone. It came from their pine tree."
"Wow! Look at all of them on the ground."
"Let's grab them all," said another sub-three-footer.
Wife and I exchanged glances. We didn't have to say anything, we both knew what the other was thinking. Who needs to mortgage the house to buy fancy pool toys when you have pine-cone shedding pine trees? That's our toy store. We'll gather every fallen cones and stock them away until we have a munchkin or four of our own. Once they're ready for water toys we'll pull out the cones and explain these are what all the kids want to play with. Just ask Daddy's poker buddy what his kids play with now - you got it, junior, pine cones.
I'm still pulling cones out of my skimmer basket, two days later, but I'll have to say it was worth watching them haul every pine cone they could find and dumping it into the pool. I learned that while you can supply the rug rat with with his or her own jet ski and pet dolphin, kids will always find something a little more interesting. It might seem mundane to those of us over the age of six, but to the younguns something like a pine cone is like finding the Holy Grail of pool fun. And that must be the cool thing about having freeloaders of your own, everything is new, and different, and fun whether it be a salad spoon or Daddy's chainsaw.
Now I'm not saying you can't buy our freeloaders a nice water basketball hoop or a floating fortress because we have pine cones and we plan to placate our kiddies with fallen palm fronds and pine cones, by all means charge it to the card and bring it over. You can even be proactive and buy the pool toys now, it will give Wife and I a chance to test them out before we get a munchkin or four.
And anyway, I'm getting tired of beating Wife at one-on-one Marco Polo.
We had three younguns over to the house Saturday for an evening of swimming and burgers, along with their parental units - a poker buddy and recent parolee from the prison work camp, and his wife (who, as a side note is joining Wife tonight at the exercise bootcamp because my better half likes to lure friends into the middle of the desert - where their screams won't be heard - during the summer's hottest day and torture them with squat thrusts, chair dips, push ups and something called fire hydrants, which really doesn't sound pleasant unless water is spewing out of it to cool ya down). According their units, the rug rats were fairly new to swimming and we were more than happy to let them crash our pool. Wife and I found two-player Marco Polo was about as much fun as throwing a tennis ball against the wall 400 times, so getting a chance to have playmates in the dogs' water bowl (our pooches have a 25,000-gallon water bowl because we like to spoil our pets) was a bonus.
As we made our way out to the pool, the motherly unit produced pool toys for the brood - retrievable cups, a plastic Winnie the Pooh and a plastic Care Bear. Wife threw the toys around the pool, and the younguns with their floaties keeping their little noggin's above water would chase their toys around the pool. The toys looked new and I remembered thinking, man, the only pool toys we got when kids were rolled-up, used socks and Ziploc baggies - the gallon freezer bags at least - that you'd have to zip quick to trap the air. That was our floaties. Dear Ma would duct tape to Ziploc bags to each side of our chest and toss us into the pee-warm water of the neighborhood pool. Since the duct tape hurt like a bugger to yank off after swimming, I learned how to swim quick. Lil' Sis was not so lucky. And when she and I asked for pool noodles the Ol' Man gave us a Styrofoam block and told us to use our imagination to turn it into a noodle.
A Winnie the Pooh pool toy would have put us with the town's elite, I'm sure.
As far as Wife and I go, the extent of our pool toy toy box are noodles and a battery-powered fish that will nuzzle your bung hole if you're not watching. We chose not to pull out the friendly fish with the kids around.
After an hour or so of being pulled around on the noodles and chasing their cups, filling them and then proceeding to dump the pool water on any adult's head within arm's reach, the ankle biters realized there was a whole lot more to the yard than just the pool.
"What's this, Daddy?" I heard one of them asking their pop, and I knew it could be one of three things: rotted hunk of citrus, fallen pine cone, or one of the pooches presents they like to leave me. Thankfully it was the second one.
"It's a pine cone. It came from their pine tree."
"Wow! Look at all of them on the ground."
"Let's grab them all," said another sub-three-footer.
Wife and I exchanged glances. We didn't have to say anything, we both knew what the other was thinking. Who needs to mortgage the house to buy fancy pool toys when you have pine-cone shedding pine trees? That's our toy store. We'll gather every fallen cones and stock them away until we have a munchkin or four of our own. Once they're ready for water toys we'll pull out the cones and explain these are what all the kids want to play with. Just ask Daddy's poker buddy what his kids play with now - you got it, junior, pine cones.
I'm still pulling cones out of my skimmer basket, two days later, but I'll have to say it was worth watching them haul every pine cone they could find and dumping it into the pool. I learned that while you can supply the rug rat with with his or her own jet ski and pet dolphin, kids will always find something a little more interesting. It might seem mundane to those of us over the age of six, but to the younguns something like a pine cone is like finding the Holy Grail of pool fun. And that must be the cool thing about having freeloaders of your own, everything is new, and different, and fun whether it be a salad spoon or Daddy's chainsaw.
Now I'm not saying you can't buy our freeloaders a nice water basketball hoop or a floating fortress because we have pine cones and we plan to placate our kiddies with fallen palm fronds and pine cones, by all means charge it to the card and bring it over. You can even be proactive and buy the pool toys now, it will give Wife and I a chance to test them out before we get a munchkin or four.
And anyway, I'm getting tired of beating Wife at one-on-one Marco Polo.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Baseball bondage
It's been a tough week as a Dodger fan.
First, with the Snakes in town and first place on the line, the Dodgers get shutout 1-0 by Doug Frickin' Davis (that's his middle name, because that's what I called him for 9 inning Friday night - "How can you bums be losing to Doug frickin' Davis?" "Quit swinging at the first pitch, he's Doug Frickin' Davis. He don't know what a strike is.")
Saturday night, the Dodgers dig themselves a 6-1 hole by the fifth, leaving me to grope the remote while wondering whether there's a rerun of "Man vs. Nature" on before the men in Blue start crawling back into the game. Nomar parks one in the seats to make it an 8-6 game, and then Ethier knocks one out in the eighth and suddenly that Dodger well of hope springs like a desert flower. Then they whimper away in the ninth and by that time "Man vs. Nature" was over. To complete the trifecta of misery, Barroid Bonds ties Hammerin' Hanks homerun mark in San Diego, which figures since Padre pitchers fold like bad oragami when the pressure is on the line (look up the last two All Star games and check out what numskulls gave up the winning runs in both ... yep, Padres).
Sunday was the battle of team aces (I use that term loosely when speaking of the Dodgers' pitching staff) and by this point I just couldn't watch anymore. Thanks to picture in picture technology - the greatest thing since the self-starting lawn mower and edible undies - I stuck the Dodgers in the little screen and watched (oh, I'm gonna hear about it now) the NASCAR race on the big screen. That still didn't save me from getting my ass in a pucker. The Blue Crew outhit the Snakes, but still were shutout. They left more men stranded than a blind search party, and right there, as I watched Kurt Busch roll through the finish line at Pocono, I vowed not to watch another Dodger game for a week.
And I held to that Monday, because it was an off day.
But since I was plopped down at the computer Tuesday, I figured, what the hell, lets see how many runs they won't score tonight. And when the Reds pulled up 4-0 in the sixth, I gave up and headed over to the TiVo box for a recorded "Entourage" before the Giants and Barroid came on. I needed something that would make me laugh, although you could say watching the Dodgers the last three weeks was like watching a bad '80s sitcom ("Blossom?"). But I also needed more pain I suppose, so I watched as Bonds doubled, singled and then broke the most hallowed of records in sports.
And you know what, I actually applauded him. I didn't holler, or cheer, or slide around the house as I'm wont to do when the Chargers win a big game, but I clapped.
Let me explain before one ya call the troops for an intervention. After he tied Aaron's mark Saturday, I decided it was time I reviewed Bonds' career numbers.
Holy fuckin' shit! Sorry, but that's the only thing you can say when you see his numbers. He was the best player in baseball, and wow, or gee whiz, or jumpin' jehosaphat just doesn't cut it when looking at how good he really was. The only dude who comes close is Ken Griffey Jr., who, by-the-by, has an outside shot of passing Bonds' mark (OK, that's the first time I said/wrote that and that shit just doesn't sound right, kind of like saying Superbowl Champion Arizona Cardinals - right, who am I kidding? That won't happen). Throw A-Rod in there, too. If not for the number of strikeouts he has I'd say he's better than Bonds. But right now, I think Barroid tops him, also.
And I'm not even talking about the "steroid years." And so what if he did roid up (aside from the obvious wrongness of his nuts shriveling up to the size of Beer Nuts)? Since testing began in baseball, more pitchers have been suspended than hitters. You have to believe hurlers were spiking veins as much as hitters. Steroids was as inherent to the game as greenies were to players in the '60s. Not to mention, no one has proven that it helps a player see the ball better to it. And again, so what? Football players roided up in the '80s (RIP Lyle Alzado and John Matusak), bike riders were walking chemistry sets in the '90s, and for some reason the media wants to pour shit on Baseball. Last time I checked, you're innocent until proven guilty, and no one has convicted Bonds. I'm suspect he did, but that's all anyone has at this point - suspension.
So, yeah, as a Dodger fan I applauded Barry when he knocked Mike Bascik's 3-2 pitch into center field Tuesday. Oh, I still despise the man because he represents all that is wrong with sports - he (and Terrel Owens) are the poster children for spoiled athletes - and would have been much more excited about this assault on Hank's record if it was someone a little more fan friendly, but it was baseball history and as fan I had to respect it. The thing is, even as a Dodger fan, I found other Giants who pissed me off more. Matt Williams always seemed to hit a homerun at the most inopportune time, Will Clark was always on base, and any former Dodger who defected to the Dark Side always seemed to knock in the winning run. Barroid hit plenty of big shots, and spun a number of homerun pirouettes against the Blue Crew, but aside from one in 1997 I can't remember any that really hurt them.
So with ESPN's Bonds dick suck finally over, I decided I needed one baseball-free night. I didn't watch a game or pop over to a computer to see what the score might be. Instead, Wife and I ran errands, and I was at peace for the first time in weeks. Then, the Dodgers dropped a cherry bomb in my mental toilet and the peace was ruined. I caught the final score to the Dodgers game, 1-0, and realized they were dropped to fourth place for the first time this season.
Behind Colorado. Colorado!
All is right with the world, now, though. Barroid didn't hit one out today and the Dodgers scored a run. Five in fact. And they ended their six-game skid with an 11 inning, 5-4 win.
Like guzzling a 2-liter bottle of Pepsi, hope bubbles up again.
First, with the Snakes in town and first place on the line, the Dodgers get shutout 1-0 by Doug Frickin' Davis (that's his middle name, because that's what I called him for 9 inning Friday night - "How can you bums be losing to Doug frickin' Davis?" "Quit swinging at the first pitch, he's Doug Frickin' Davis. He don't know what a strike is.")
Saturday night, the Dodgers dig themselves a 6-1 hole by the fifth, leaving me to grope the remote while wondering whether there's a rerun of "Man vs. Nature" on before the men in Blue start crawling back into the game. Nomar parks one in the seats to make it an 8-6 game, and then Ethier knocks one out in the eighth and suddenly that Dodger well of hope springs like a desert flower. Then they whimper away in the ninth and by that time "Man vs. Nature" was over. To complete the trifecta of misery, Barroid Bonds ties Hammerin' Hanks homerun mark in San Diego, which figures since Padre pitchers fold like bad oragami when the pressure is on the line (look up the last two All Star games and check out what numskulls gave up the winning runs in both ... yep, Padres).
Sunday was the battle of team aces (I use that term loosely when speaking of the Dodgers' pitching staff) and by this point I just couldn't watch anymore. Thanks to picture in picture technology - the greatest thing since the self-starting lawn mower and edible undies - I stuck the Dodgers in the little screen and watched (oh, I'm gonna hear about it now) the NASCAR race on the big screen. That still didn't save me from getting my ass in a pucker. The Blue Crew outhit the Snakes, but still were shutout. They left more men stranded than a blind search party, and right there, as I watched Kurt Busch roll through the finish line at Pocono, I vowed not to watch another Dodger game for a week.
And I held to that Monday, because it was an off day.
But since I was plopped down at the computer Tuesday, I figured, what the hell, lets see how many runs they won't score tonight. And when the Reds pulled up 4-0 in the sixth, I gave up and headed over to the TiVo box for a recorded "Entourage" before the Giants and Barroid came on. I needed something that would make me laugh, although you could say watching the Dodgers the last three weeks was like watching a bad '80s sitcom ("Blossom?"). But I also needed more pain I suppose, so I watched as Bonds doubled, singled and then broke the most hallowed of records in sports.
And you know what, I actually applauded him. I didn't holler, or cheer, or slide around the house as I'm wont to do when the Chargers win a big game, but I clapped.
Let me explain before one ya call the troops for an intervention. After he tied Aaron's mark Saturday, I decided it was time I reviewed Bonds' career numbers.
Holy fuckin' shit! Sorry, but that's the only thing you can say when you see his numbers. He was the best player in baseball, and wow, or gee whiz, or jumpin' jehosaphat just doesn't cut it when looking at how good he really was. The only dude who comes close is Ken Griffey Jr., who, by-the-by, has an outside shot of passing Bonds' mark (OK, that's the first time I said/wrote that and that shit just doesn't sound right, kind of like saying Superbowl Champion Arizona Cardinals - right, who am I kidding? That won't happen). Throw A-Rod in there, too. If not for the number of strikeouts he has I'd say he's better than Bonds. But right now, I think Barroid tops him, also.
And I'm not even talking about the "steroid years." And so what if he did roid up (aside from the obvious wrongness of his nuts shriveling up to the size of Beer Nuts)? Since testing began in baseball, more pitchers have been suspended than hitters. You have to believe hurlers were spiking veins as much as hitters. Steroids was as inherent to the game as greenies were to players in the '60s. Not to mention, no one has proven that it helps a player see the ball better to it. And again, so what? Football players roided up in the '80s (RIP Lyle Alzado and John Matusak), bike riders were walking chemistry sets in the '90s, and for some reason the media wants to pour shit on Baseball. Last time I checked, you're innocent until proven guilty, and no one has convicted Bonds. I'm suspect he did, but that's all anyone has at this point - suspension.
So, yeah, as a Dodger fan I applauded Barry when he knocked Mike Bascik's 3-2 pitch into center field Tuesday. Oh, I still despise the man because he represents all that is wrong with sports - he (and Terrel Owens) are the poster children for spoiled athletes - and would have been much more excited about this assault on Hank's record if it was someone a little more fan friendly, but it was baseball history and as fan I had to respect it. The thing is, even as a Dodger fan, I found other Giants who pissed me off more. Matt Williams always seemed to hit a homerun at the most inopportune time, Will Clark was always on base, and any former Dodger who defected to the Dark Side always seemed to knock in the winning run. Barroid hit plenty of big shots, and spun a number of homerun pirouettes against the Blue Crew, but aside from one in 1997 I can't remember any that really hurt them.
So with ESPN's Bonds dick suck finally over, I decided I needed one baseball-free night. I didn't watch a game or pop over to a computer to see what the score might be. Instead, Wife and I ran errands, and I was at peace for the first time in weeks. Then, the Dodgers dropped a cherry bomb in my mental toilet and the peace was ruined. I caught the final score to the Dodgers game, 1-0, and realized they were dropped to fourth place for the first time this season.
Behind Colorado. Colorado!
All is right with the world, now, though. Barroid didn't hit one out today and the Dodgers scored a run. Five in fact. And they ended their six-game skid with an 11 inning, 5-4 win.
Like guzzling a 2-liter bottle of Pepsi, hope bubbles up again.
Monday, August 06, 2007
Cox castration
Maybe it was the fact that I whined about technology last week or proclaimed proudly that I will never have a cell phone's wee wee stuck in my ear, but whatever it was the information super highway - and by extension my ability to write to you folks - was severly hindered to the point of castration this weekend.
All I wanted to do Friday after dinner out with the parental units-in-law - Texas Road House where they just don't pull your pork, they pull and serve it up slathered in enough bbq sauce to coat a barn and an outhouse in Texas - was come home and watch the Dodger game and Giants game on the Internet simultaneously (technology is like a high-maintenance nympho girlfriend - sure the sex is hotter than anything you'd see on late night Cinamax, but the attitude is enough to yank your balls out and shove them in your nostrils). The game was on TV, sure, but I'd much rather listen to someone who is actually watching the game and knows what the hell he's talking about (Vin Scully) rather than two putzes (Darren Sutton and Mark Grace) who would rather talk about ballpark hot dogs and the amount of beach balls at Dodger Stadium than give their viewers interesting nuggets about the players involved sprinkled with some fun baseball stories. That's right, I've been spoiled. It's what happens when you listen to the greatest announcer in any sport.
But I digress.
Beer in hand - because that's the only way to enjoy a Dodger game - I saddle up to the computer and log onto the world wide web. After waiting the typical eight minutes to boot up - my computer is slower than a doped-up hippo tugging a piano - I click on the Internet icon and type in mlb.com. Nothing. I hit "stop" and type the address again. Zilch. OK, I say to myself, there's more than one way to skin a midget hooker, so I type in dodgers.com. They're site will have a link to the video feed. White screen of oblivion greets me.
I turn on Wife's machine. Her computer zips up to ready mode in less time than it takes me to ask a bartender "another beer, please." (I'm nothing if not polite) I click on the Internet icon and type in the same thing. It's like the information superhighway has been closed for one of those late night repair sessions. What the hell are they doing installing rubberized asphalt on the damn thing?
Finally, defeated and inebriated - the perfect mixture to a) watch the Dodgers blow another game this week, and b) see Dodger enemy Numero Uno, Barry Bonds, hit record-tying homer 755 (which thankfully he didn't Friday night. The big softie waited until Saturday when I was much cooler-headed, otherwise there'd be a size 8-1/2 Nike stuck in the big screen).
But it troubled me that both computers had flaky Internet connections. I tried some other sites that weren't so multimedia involved, and those seemed to pop up, albeit slow, but navigatable. I rebooted with no success. I restarted the Internet. Still, with the same results, and when I clicked to close it down up jumped 60-some-odd browser windows. 6-0. If I were trying to hide porn, I'd lose the game. Naughty nurse nymphos would be splashed in every nook and cranny of my computer screen.
In my book, when 60 windows fill the screen that's never a good sign.
I concluded, after rummaging through my vast tech skills that roll through my melon (which is to say I can turn the machine on and molest the mouse, that's about it) either we have a bad modem or a virus.
So Saturday morning I wake up determined to figure out the problem. I update the virus scanner on Wife's machine (now she can safely scan Hunky Hugo's House of Hotties.com and shop until her fingers grind down to nubs) and after reading up on problems with Norton, which is on my computer, I purge it from my machine and download a different chunk software that promises to not only wipe out computer viruses, but also cure head colds, mad cow disease and herpes. With our flaky Internet connection, I'm able to download it.
But still our information superhighway is running slower than a constipated senior citizen in search of a bathroom at Casino Arizona. And that's when I throw up my hands and call it a day. My eyes hurt, my head hurts and all I want to do is watch the Fox Game of the Week. The yardwork I planned to do was tossed out, and the only chore that gets completed is sprucing up the bathrooms, because, dammit, if we can't have Internet access at least Wife and I can crap on clean seats.
Then, a wonderous thing happened. Wife, who is smarter than a 3-headed Einstein, decided to check our connection later that evening.
"Hey, I think we're up," she says
"Aw, you're drunk. Stop teasing," I slur (Dodger game was about to start, do the math).
"No, really, I can get on mlb.com."
I hurdle the couch and stampeed a cat on my way to the computer. Lo and behold, she wasn't lying. All the sites I tested over the past two days came up without a glich. It was like I lost my virginity all over again, just longer and a helluva lot more gratifying.
"What did you do," I ask.
"Nothing. Maybe all your upgrading and downloading worked."
"Yeah, I'm sure that's what it was. Bill Gates is nothign more than a telephone operator compared to me."
I learned the reality today, though. I slaved over the keyboards for six hours Saturday only to find out that Cox, our Internet "provider" if you want to call it that, had statewide problems Friday and Saturday. No phone call. No little scrolly message on our TV. Not even a pleasant "Hello suckers. You probably noticed your Internet works about as well as dog shit shoved into a vending machine coin slot. Don't worry, it's not you, it's us. Our bad" e-mail.
So, thanks Cox for eating a hole through my Saturday and shoving a turd bomb through the center. May your customer service department contract the clap from the desk chairs and cold sores from the drinking fountain.
All I wanted to do Friday after dinner out with the parental units-in-law - Texas Road House where they just don't pull your pork, they pull and serve it up slathered in enough bbq sauce to coat a barn and an outhouse in Texas - was come home and watch the Dodger game and Giants game on the Internet simultaneously (technology is like a high-maintenance nympho girlfriend - sure the sex is hotter than anything you'd see on late night Cinamax, but the attitude is enough to yank your balls out and shove them in your nostrils). The game was on TV, sure, but I'd much rather listen to someone who is actually watching the game and knows what the hell he's talking about (Vin Scully) rather than two putzes (Darren Sutton and Mark Grace) who would rather talk about ballpark hot dogs and the amount of beach balls at Dodger Stadium than give their viewers interesting nuggets about the players involved sprinkled with some fun baseball stories. That's right, I've been spoiled. It's what happens when you listen to the greatest announcer in any sport.
But I digress.
Beer in hand - because that's the only way to enjoy a Dodger game - I saddle up to the computer and log onto the world wide web. After waiting the typical eight minutes to boot up - my computer is slower than a doped-up hippo tugging a piano - I click on the Internet icon and type in mlb.com. Nothing. I hit "stop" and type the address again. Zilch. OK, I say to myself, there's more than one way to skin a midget hooker, so I type in dodgers.com. They're site will have a link to the video feed. White screen of oblivion greets me.
I turn on Wife's machine. Her computer zips up to ready mode in less time than it takes me to ask a bartender "another beer, please." (I'm nothing if not polite) I click on the Internet icon and type in the same thing. It's like the information superhighway has been closed for one of those late night repair sessions. What the hell are they doing installing rubberized asphalt on the damn thing?
Finally, defeated and inebriated - the perfect mixture to a) watch the Dodgers blow another game this week, and b) see Dodger enemy Numero Uno, Barry Bonds, hit record-tying homer 755 (which thankfully he didn't Friday night. The big softie waited until Saturday when I was much cooler-headed, otherwise there'd be a size 8-1/2 Nike stuck in the big screen).
But it troubled me that both computers had flaky Internet connections. I tried some other sites that weren't so multimedia involved, and those seemed to pop up, albeit slow, but navigatable. I rebooted with no success. I restarted the Internet. Still, with the same results, and when I clicked to close it down up jumped 60-some-odd browser windows. 6-0. If I were trying to hide porn, I'd lose the game. Naughty nurse nymphos would be splashed in every nook and cranny of my computer screen.
In my book, when 60 windows fill the screen that's never a good sign.
I concluded, after rummaging through my vast tech skills that roll through my melon (which is to say I can turn the machine on and molest the mouse, that's about it) either we have a bad modem or a virus.
So Saturday morning I wake up determined to figure out the problem. I update the virus scanner on Wife's machine (now she can safely scan Hunky Hugo's House of Hotties.com and shop until her fingers grind down to nubs) and after reading up on problems with Norton, which is on my computer, I purge it from my machine and download a different chunk software that promises to not only wipe out computer viruses, but also cure head colds, mad cow disease and herpes. With our flaky Internet connection, I'm able to download it.
But still our information superhighway is running slower than a constipated senior citizen in search of a bathroom at Casino Arizona. And that's when I throw up my hands and call it a day. My eyes hurt, my head hurts and all I want to do is watch the Fox Game of the Week. The yardwork I planned to do was tossed out, and the only chore that gets completed is sprucing up the bathrooms, because, dammit, if we can't have Internet access at least Wife and I can crap on clean seats.
Then, a wonderous thing happened. Wife, who is smarter than a 3-headed Einstein, decided to check our connection later that evening.
"Hey, I think we're up," she says
"Aw, you're drunk. Stop teasing," I slur (Dodger game was about to start, do the math).
"No, really, I can get on mlb.com."
I hurdle the couch and stampeed a cat on my way to the computer. Lo and behold, she wasn't lying. All the sites I tested over the past two days came up without a glich. It was like I lost my virginity all over again, just longer and a helluva lot more gratifying.
"What did you do," I ask.
"Nothing. Maybe all your upgrading and downloading worked."
"Yeah, I'm sure that's what it was. Bill Gates is nothign more than a telephone operator compared to me."
I learned the reality today, though. I slaved over the keyboards for six hours Saturday only to find out that Cox, our Internet "provider" if you want to call it that, had statewide problems Friday and Saturday. No phone call. No little scrolly message on our TV. Not even a pleasant "Hello suckers. You probably noticed your Internet works about as well as dog shit shoved into a vending machine coin slot. Don't worry, it's not you, it's us. Our bad" e-mail.
So, thanks Cox for eating a hole through my Saturday and shoving a turd bomb through the center. May your customer service department contract the clap from the desk chairs and cold sores from the drinking fountain.
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