my new years promises

1. Start drinking again, I have been too darn happy lately and filling my body with depressants is obviously the way to go. Try to get drunk at least twice a day just to make sure I am doing it right.
2. Start smoking again, I quit 2 years ago and well, I still want one. I will just give in to the craving and enjoy life much less. Hopefully get up to 2 packs a day to get more exercise for my lungs, I haven't been coughing enough.
3. Eat lots more fatty and high carb food and put on a lot of weight. I hate that smirk on my face when I look in the mirror, getting fat will fix that!
4. Live more dangerously by uninstalling my anti-virus program that thought it was necessary to update itself for 10 minutes while I was in the middle of typing #3. It cares too deeply for the welfare of my PC and I love that it annoys the hell out of me at least once a day.
5. Have less sex, being sexually satisfied is waaay overated and frankly bores me to tears.
6. Be more rude to people I don't know, why should I worry about being pleasant when it's obvious they don't give a damn.
7. Be more rude to people I do know, that way they will know I at least care enough to go out of my way to be rude.
8. Be kinder to telemarketers when I am busy making an imaginary $20,000 on Jeopardy reruns and they call and annoy the bejeesus out of me.
9. Stop leaving comments at people's blogs that I admire so they won't feel so special anymore. I hate when they feel more special than me, so that's gotta stop!
10. Think more negative, being positive that things will get screwed up is bad for me, from now on I will be negative and know that things will not work out badly.

Just Kidding! Happy New Year!!

bag girl

Stopped at a light I spotted a young woman struggling with a shopping cart in a parking lot. A wheel was caught in a hole in the pavement. I noticed her long, pretty red hair, somewhat wavy, she was wearing a knit cap and a long dress. She briefly turned to my direction and I was struck by her face, haggard is how I can best describe it. That's when it dawned on me she was much more than an ordinary shopper. She was a "Bag Lady" one of the people that are always amuseingly depicted in TV and movies, except I couldn't feel amused by her predicament.

She appeared to be 30ish and it just doesn't feel right to call her bag lady,"Bag Girl" seems more appropriate because of her age. I wasn't sure whether I should feel sorry for her, the brief peek I got of her eyes made it seem as though she were blissfully unaware that she was in a "predicament" What is it about people like her that captures our imagination? Maybe they have found the true secret to enjoying life, by living a life of abject isolation from the mainstream. Closed off by the customs of our society, sentenced to a place where there is possibly no hope of recovery. Or maybe they just don't know any better. I like to think they are happy with things the way they are, but I am pretty sure I am wrong. What do you think?

/////////////////////////////////////////

The Monkey and the Cue Ball

A man walks into a bar with a monkey on a leash.

"Hey, Mac, mind if I bring my monkey in? He's well trained and won't bother anyone.

"Sure no problem, what will you have?"

The man orders a beer and looks around, meanwhile the monkey amuses himself on a barstool by sneaking pieces of fruit from the garnish tray on the bar. The barkeeper notices and yells at the man to make the monkey behave. This frightens the monkey and it scampers over to a pool table and picks up the cue ball and swallows it whole.

"Hey, get the hell out of here and take that damn monkey with you too"

A week later the man stops back in to the bar.

"Hey bud, I'm sorry about my monkey eating your cue ball, I will gladly pay for it. Mind if we come in? I promise to make him behave"

"Yeah, I suppose, come on in"

The man settles in with another beer and the monkey perches on the edge of the bar. It was well behaved at first but started getting fidgety and soon enough sneaks a cherry out of the garnish tray. It then bends over and sticks the cherry up it's ass, pulls it out and then eats it!

"Holy mackerel! Did you just see what your monkey did? He stuck that cherry up his ass then he ate it! How disgusting!"

"Yeah he's been doing that ever since he ate that cue ball, tries everything he eats for fit before he eats it."

blog o'the week

I got this idea after doing some "Next Blog" surfing last night and repeatedly ran in to 99% pure drivel, teen angst, wish i were dead, alternating caps crap, browser snatching, transition fading, cursor dingleberry programmed, weird ass music playing that you can't turn off, "Next Blog" button removing, update browser demanding that you have to dump the page to get out of, blinding background using, wildly colored teeny tiny text using, with super cool fonts they are running so that all the text looks like little squares cause nobody else has that font installed, blogs.

I decided I could be helpful by pointing out that 1 in a thousand that doesn't suck.The requirements are simple, it has to be fairly new, does not include ANY of the above mentioned crap, the writer has to be literate, has at least 6 posts or more and has no comments to speak of, yet. And shows possible promise of being a good blogger. I am not going to judge them myself. That's for you guys to do, well do I have to do all the work? Pitch in!

Remember how discouraging it was when you feared no one would read you and you were just a cry in the wilderness? I do and I thought maybe I could help someone out. My first blog o'the week is called "yet another blog..." and can be found here and also a link near the top of my sidebar called of course "Blog o' the Week" So give it a shot, maybe you will like it, if so, leave a comment of course!

We first met as children, her parent's were friends with mine. We saw each other infrequently as we got older. I developed a small crush on her in my early teens ...

As we aged I saw her more frequently as we went to similar places and hungout with the same crowd. We both seemed to be attached to someone else all the time ...

I got married. She got married. We still ran in to each other occasionally.Sometimes hanging out together as couples and frequenting the same nightclubs ...

I divorced and didn't see her for a while but she remained on my mind. I heard she had moved to a different state and remarried ...

I divorced again and heard she was still in the other state, happily married. She eventually divorced again and returned to the place we had grown up together ...

I was involved in a long term relationship that failed and ended up moving back to the place we had grown up together. I thought of her often but had no idea how she was or where she lived ...

I was dead for two years and once again alive and now wondering about the woman of my dreams ...

Her mother was in touch with mine recently and she was mentioned. She was single again and not far. I got her phone number and my heart leaped as I dialed her number ...

We chatted and got caught up on old times and laughed. I soooo wanted to gush my heart out to her. Tell her about my secret love for her. Tell her how I ached at the thought of her. How I admired her beauty and compassion. And most of all that I wanted her ...

Then she mentioned she had just met a really nice guy.

This just in....

I thought I would share this, no idea who wrote it #24 is my fav...

1.) A king size waterbed holds enough water to fill a 2000 sq. ft. house 4 inches deep.
2.) If you spray hair spray on dust bunnies and run over them with roller blades, they can ignite
3.) A 3-year old Boy's voice is louder than 200 adults in a crowded restaurant.
4.) If you hook a dog leash over a ceiling fan, the motor is not strong enough to rotate a 42 pound Boy wearing Batman underwear and a Superman cape. It is strong enough, however, if tied to a paint can, to spread paint on all four walls of a 20x20 ft. room.
5.) You should not throw baseballs up when the ceiling fan is on. When using a ceiling fan as a bat, you have to throw the ball up a few times before you get a hit. A ceiling fan can hit a baseball a long way.
6.) The glass in windows (even double-pane) doesn't stop a baseball hit by a ceiling fan.
7.) When you hear the toilet flush and the words "uh oh", it's already too late
8.) Brake fluid mixed with Clorox makes smoke, and lots of it.
9.) A six-year old Boy can start a fire with a flint rock even though a 36-year old man says they can only do it in the movies.
10.) Certain Lego's will pass through the digestive tract of a 4-year old Boy.
11.) Play dough and microwave should not be used in the same sentence.
12.) Super glue is forever.
13.) No matter how much Jell-O you put in a swimming pool you still can't walk on water.
14.) Pool filters do not like Jell-O.
15.) VCR's do not eject "PB &J" sandwiches even though TV commercials show they do.
16.) Garbage bags do not make good parachutes.
17.) Marbles in gas tanks make lots of noise when driving.
18.) You probably DO NOT want to know what that odor is.
19.) Always look in the oven before you turn it on; plastic toys do not like ovens.
20.) The fire department in Austin, TX has a 5-minute response time.
21.) The spin cycle on the washing machine does not make earthworms dizzy.
22.) It will, however, make cats dizzy.
23.) Cats throw up twice their body weight when dizzy.
24.) 80% of Men who read this will try mixing the Clorox and brake fluid.

Women will pass this on to almost all of their friends, with or without kids
a) For those with no children - this is totally hysterical!
b) For those who already have children past this age, this is hilarious.
c) For those who have children this age, this is not funny.
d) For those who have children nearing this age, this is a warning.
e) For those who have not yet had children, this is birth control.

Tell me your fav!

What did I get for Christmas?

• Popeil Pocket Fisherman - I love these thing's! No really I do. You can fish from your car. Just stop on a bridge and cast right out the window and BAM you got fish! Thanks Auntee Mae! I'll bring you some fish! bones you old hag. i'll store it with the others i got the last couple years.
• 1yr Readers Digest- thanks Uncle Johnny! now I won't need to buy tissue for a whole year, i'll keep these by the john.
• Musk Cologne-Oh Aunt Margie! You should'nt have! And jeez it's so huge!the half gallon size is great a few more of these and i can make a bomb.
• Musk Cologne-Uncle Ray, dude, you rock! now to find out who the hell said i liked musk cologne and keel him.
• Light House Calendar-Thanks Mom! I love you! what can i say? she reads me!
• Socks-Thanks again Mom! You are so sweet!
• 1yr Sports Illustrated-um thanks Dad! well at least i can look forward to the swimsuit issue, sigh. and it's better than a bag o'broken glass like last years.
• Bright Red Reindeer Sweater-Gee thanks Aunt Jane! if my mom suggests I go put it on I swear....
• Hawaiian Theme Ceramic Ashtray-Thank you so much Auntee Louise! Oh you made it yourself, huh? Yeah, this will look great with my contemporary decor. i think i'll stick it under her car tire before she leaves
• Keychain Swiss Army Knife-Awww Aunt Mary you are so sweet! now if i join the swiss army i can learn to kill with the plastic toothpick

What a wonderful bounty of potential regifts,

wouldn't these make your day too?

if I were Picard.....

things would be a bit different on the Enterprise! Here are a few example's.

• Institute wacky hat nights on the bridge. Imagine Worf in a British Admiralty hat. Picard in a Romulan Asshat. Data with an old Yankees cap.
• Metallica blasting over the super galaxy class warp powered sound system.
• There are no speed limits in space, so it's warp 9 all the time babeee! None of that silly ass warp 3 b.s.
• Install one of them big ass barefoot looking gas pedals on the floor at Data's console.
• Giant trucker mudflaps on the engine nacelles with chrome trim and naked ladies.
• Big ass air horns on top to scare the bejeesus out of alien life forms and have em play "You Got Another Thing Comin" by Judas Priest to announce our arrival.
• Keep the life support system set to a cool 65F so the ladies in their skin tight jumpers will have nard hipples all the time.
• Sticker in rear window: Turn Signal Broken, Watch For Finger
• Use phasers to write my name on the surface of planets below. Also great for writing "Bite Me" that can be seen from 100,000 miles away.
• Drag race for pink slips with the Ferengi's after Data and Geordi installs nitrous oxide boosters and huge blowers to the warp drive.
• Custom candie apple red paint job, need I say more?
• Order No1 to go take a No2 often. (shamelessly ripped from Beavis/Butthead)
• Allow practical jokes like hiding Geordi's visor and then rearranging Engineering section.
• Fill photon torpedoes with bright red paint and launch em at Klingon ships then haul ass for fun!
• Engage? what the hell does that mean? "Nail it, Data" would be better.
• Be sick often to get those ooo so delicious sponge bath's from Dr. Crusher.
• Install gigantic subwoofers under the ship to make loud low booooom sounds and cruise slowly around the Klingon home planet to annoy the hell out of them.
• Talk more hip: Mr Worf, dude, crank up them phasers and show them asshats we ain't messing around! or: Romulan vessel, back off beyotch or we gonna shoot photon torpedoes so far up your ass you'll be shittin nuclear turds for a month!
• Have crew wear cool T-shirts with stuff like "Jesus may love you, but everyone else thinks you're a Klingon asshole!" or: "I Went to Romula and All I Got Was the Ferengi Clap" (credit: Kristin)
• Bumper sticker: "My other starship is a Harley"
• Program holodeck emitters to make ship look like the Oscar Meyer weenie mobile or a lowrider 1960 chevy impala.

This is an interactive list, if you brought some funny to add let me know!

Inspired by the evil overlord list

truly madly deeply (caution, mushy content ahead)

take all 3 words and apply the deepest meaning that you can possibly imagine to each one and know, from the bottom of your soul that it is barely enough to describe the feelings you have for her when gazing deeply into her eyes.

take all 3 words and apply the deepest meaning that you can possibly imagine to each one and know, from the bottom of your soul that it is barely enough to describe the feelings she has for you when she gazes deeply into your eyes.

i want that in my life again.

what did you want for Christmas and know that you are not going to get?

i bet you didn't know....RE-UPDATED

these fun facts about New Orleans:

1. If you are caught pronouncing the name of our city as New Orleens, the local gendarmes will pick you up and whisk you away to a hidden underground bunker at the Royal Sonesta Hotel on Bourbon St. where Gerard Depardieu will beat you silly with a catfish until you can pronounce it correctly. Correct is either N'Awlins or New Awlins or New Alunz depending on how close you live to downtown.
2. If you can pronounce the name Tchoupitoulas St. correctly you are either a local or a long time resident or ya just got lucky. Correct pronunciation gets you a lifetime subscription to Shrimp & Crawfish Magazine.
3. If you call crawfish "crayfish" you are immediateley labeled a yankee and sent away to see #1.
4. Everyone that lives north of Baton Rouge is a yankee. period. no if's ands or buts. That's only 1 hours drive north.
5. If you douse your breakfast eggs with Tabasco hotsauce and chase em down with extra strong cafe au lait you are a true fan of New Orleans food. Keep a picture of those eggs in your wallet, flashing it will keep you from going to #1.
6. Spicy Red Beans and Rice w/ hot smoke sausage are always eaten on Mondays. Anything with seafood in it is eaten on Fridays, list includes: raw oysters, catfish, crabs and shrimp and tasty cooters at Hooters.
7. Attending the biggest, most lavish Mardi Gras parades will net you the coolest beads thrown. Rex and Bacchus parades are two excellent ones. Save them suckers for next year and skip the parades. Wear ALL of the beads previously caught to Bourbon St. on Mardi Gras day where they can be exchanged for LOTS of tittie and naughty bits flashing and be sure to have your camera ready.
8. If you attend the "Cajun Fais Do Do" at Tipitina's every Sunday then you are a true fan of the cajun undergound culture.
9. If you get body blocked by a small child while reaching for a cheap ass pair of beads thrown from a float, then and only then can you understand the true spirit of Mardi Gras.
10. If you come to N.O. and hang out at the Hard Rock Cafe then your ass sucks canal water and we don't want to know you. You are better off hanging in the quarter at some seedy bar with female impersonators pretending like you are a local along with the 800,000 other tourists that do.
11. If you walk into a restaurant and order a sandwich called a poor boy and pronounce it that way, see #1. Correct is po'boy.
12. Jambalaya and shrimp or crawfish etouffe or seafood gumbo and boudin cajun sausage are good to eat any day of the week!
13. The term "riding the streetcar" can be considered both actually riding a street car on Canal St. or as sexual innuendo.
14. It is perfectly normal to meet men named "Michele" it's a good cajun name.
15. French people (from France) are a buncha whiny assed, fruity looking, Gauloises smoking, chicken shit cajunposerwannabes that smell bad. We can communicate in french but it is NOT the same.
16. You might think you would look tacky walking aound downtown wearing 100 pairs of cheap ass plastic brightly colored and gaudy beads, but trust me you will blend right in.
17. If you come to N.O. and don't eat a muffelata at Central Grocery, expect Mr. Hands to show up at your house, with his own personal catfish and beat you silly.
18. If you shagged your girlfriend in Pirates Alley behind St. Louis Cathedral, then you automatically become a member of the Krewe of Cajun Booty Pirates.
19. If you and your girlfriend ever shagged late at night in the tres spooky City of the Dead aka. St. Louis Cemetary, you got my respect cause it's spooky as hell even in daylight!
20. The Cafe Du Monde is a wonderful outdoor place to sit and enjoy some of the worlds best cafe au lait (latte and au lait are NOT the same, click link)the old fashioned way and eat chewy powdered sugar coated donuts called beignets (benyays) while gawking at all the tourists walking by. The waiters bring big old-fashioned kettles of boiling hot coffee and another with scalding hot milk and pour them simultaneously right into your cup at the table. Most delicious. Do not miss this landmark across from Jackson Square and the St. Louis Cathedral!

If anyone has any cool fun facts to add to my list, let me know!

The Advertiser Slogan Generator Fun Fun Fun

I ripped this cool toy idea from FoFuSa at SNAFU in Sweden.
It's a slogan generator, just put in any name or whatever and it automatically generates a silly slogan. I used my favorite word and gf: Bitchcakes

• I'm only here for the Bitchcakes.
• It's not TV. It's Bitchcakes.
• Whatever you're into get into Bitchcakes.
• Snap! Crackle! Bitchcakes!
• You like Bitchcakes. Bitchcakes likes you..
• The Bitchcakes Breakfast.
• There ain't no party like a Bitchcakes party.
• See the USA in your Bitchcakes.
• Go crack a Bitchcakes.
• Good honest Bitchcakes since 1896.
• Bitchcakes-Australian for Beer.
• Come see the softer side of Bitchcakes.
• It takes a tough man to make a tender Bitchcakes.
• And finally: Bitchcakes Born and Bred!!

sshhh don't tell Bitchcakes about this post.....

The link to the Generator is in the Title above or here. Have Fun!

What the Hell is All that Noise! I got Vertigo!

I used to work at an auto repair shop in the Atlanta area that was right across the street from the main north/south rail line that went through the city and was also adjacent to the Naval Air Station on the northwest side. Now I know you're thinking, so what, but i'm gonna tell ya so what. This has to be one of the noisiest freakin spots on earth and I am not kidding. How loud was it, well, The Who are on record for having THE worlds loudest concert on record and I have seen them and they sound like an old tinny handcranked Victrola compared to this shit. Why was it so loud? Well apparently Navy fighter pilots need a shitload of practice to touch down on aircraft carriers at sea safely and they have painted a sort of replica of an aircraft carrier deck on the runway and these guys make 'touch & go's" all farkin day long passing DIRECTLY over the shop just a few hundred feet in the air for practice. So close you think you could hit it with a rock, I tell ya. They SCREAM in and touchdown briefly on the "deck" then full throttle up and back up into a 1 mile wide or so circle SCREAMING through the air to come around and do it again, over and over and over....

Now the first time you see this happen is extremely thrilling, I mean it sends goosebumps all over ya at just the sight and sound. Totally amazing to see one of the entire worlds most powerful weapons of destruction passing so close. I mean this is the sound of freedom, baby and ya gotta love that! Right? Well sadly enough a few weeks of the "extremely thrilling sound of freedom" is enough to put you in the nuthouse. Now I know you're shaking your head and labeling me some kind of wussy ass whiner at this point, but, I have more. How much more?

Well remember I said we were across the street from the main rail line? Yes well, it has trains running on it, going both north and south, sometimes at the same time, trains that are a mile long and then when you think that sucker is just about done passing so you can take a breath and hear yourself speak, along comes 4 MORE engines in the middle of the train to drag another mile of cars behind it. Yeah, well you can imagine how loud this must be when added to the "extremely thrilling sound of freedom" constantly happening while the trains are a merrily passing. Take some Dramamine cause you gonna get seasick from the vertigo, yah I know I am still a wussy assed whiner right? Wrong, cause I ain't done yet. Oh, what do ya mean?

Well the road the shop was on is a very busy 2 lane blacktop with a wide crossing over the tracks to the very busy Naval Air Station directly across the street. One of those old ones with big loose boards that go bump bump rumble rumble every time a car passes over it and a shitload of cars and trucks cross every single day all day long. Now when ya add up the "extremely thrilling sound of freedom" to the sound of the trains passing and all the cars going over the tracks would be purty damn loud right? Well ya I would think so, wouldn't you? But I am not quite done yet.

The city/county decided that we wasn't getting quite enough noise in our diet so they decided to widen the road from a quaint little 2 lane blacktop to a very wide main thoroughfare with 4 lanes and tunnels and shit for cars to pass under the tracks and medians and turn lanes and all kinds of modern conveniences that are almost as cool as indoor plumbing. Needless to say these improvements would take up part of the shops parking lot directly in front of the building, we figured no big deal right? Wrong wrong wrong boys and girls.

The city/state people showed up with what I like to call "the loudest goddamn machine in the entire free world and beyond" and in fact I think they had that painted on the side of the thing. What did this machine do? It broke concrete into teeny tiny little bits of rubble, rubble that would have made Fred Flintstone proud, really. But the damn thing was so loud it made The Who look like a buncha sissies all by itself. And it went on and on and on for hours, nearly as long as this post is getting. Now add all this up and what do we get, well, let's see we got the "extremely thrilling sound of freedom" and we got the trains a passing and the cars a crossing and "the loudest goddamn machine in the entire free world and beyond" to add to....

All the noises that are normal in a busy auto repair shop. Stuff like air tools and grinders and air compressors and a dynomometer and telephones ringing and welding machines and big sanders. Well, now, I think you might have an idea just how loud all this shit really was. We are talking major vertigo here folks, brain numbing, mind bending major league vertigo like you hopefully will never ever experience. I swear it was enough to make you want to go van Gogh on yourself. Why didn't I wear earplugs? Huh? Did you say something? Dammit I can't hear ya, speak up, for craps sake

Mardi Gras in the Air!

Not even Christmas yet and N.O. is gearing up for one of the biggest parties in the world, Mardi Gras. The "Krewe du Vieux" had their fund raiser on December 03. The invites stated "costumes encouraged, nudity qualifies". Along with the "Krewe du Vieux Doo", and the "Krewe of Drips and Discharges". I am sorry I missed "Anne Rice" my fav vampire queen's party at "Les Temps des Vampires"

Also, check out the "Baggage List" at Bitchcakes blog, very funny!
And what I want to call the "Injury List" at Kristins blog, like what if Chevy Chase had been a woman.

Laissez le bon temp roulez!

Concrete Enemas

Browsing through the news today this thing caught my eye on the msn.com webpage "Adware Cannibilism" and my imagination being what it is immediately put itself into gear and showed me what it would look like if adware people picked up spears and stuck bones thru their noses and attacked each others corporate offices looking for fresh meat to throw into their huge black kettles they keep boiling in the lobby with a fire going 24/7 and a software witchdoctor doing a jig around the entire staff and singing "waah a wah tusi" and tossing shredded bits of magical "holy paper" to ward off evil rival hackers that devour other evil rival hackers evil programs. After clicking on the link I see "Adware cannibals feast on each other" further reinforcing previously described image. Apparently these assholes are suing each other for the "right" to load their malware/foulware/snoopware crap that secretly peeks at everything you do on the web to make more effective, targeted popup ads that nobody wants in the first damn place. Their programs are now designed to destroy previously installed programs that probably got their without you even knowing about it. My opinion is these people should be made to bend over and take a quikrete enema and hold it till it hardens, bringing a whole new meaning to the term "shittin bricks" which is what they been doing to us all along, shovin it right up our collective asses. What do you think? Drop your brick in the comments below. Woo that was fun =)

Today Hardly Sucks At All

Not like usual days that suck just a little bit, gorgeous day outside, 70ish and sunny with a crisp feel in the air, gotta love that. Had to go out so I got my ass washed up and even shaved. For amusement I went to WalMart to gawk at the holiday crush and I was not disappointed. What fun! Even saw a few attractive women, but mostly the usual freak show, never fails to entertain me. Yah, I know, i'm easily entertained. I didn't buy anything there just browsed a bit. Stumbled across the big screen HDTV display area, what a sad joke that was. Very nice TV's but they were set up in a regular aisle and you couldn't get back more than 4 ft or so. How the hell can you watch a huge 50+ inch screen while standing right on top of it, tsk tsk. Oh well, time to go now, decided to head for the local mall, yeah that's the ticket, the mall!

Had to stop for gas, pulled in to an Exxon place with card machines built right in, love those, you don't even need to go in, it prints you a receipt on the spot.
So I punch in all my settings and feed it my card, fill up and wait for a receipt. What? NO RECEIPT! The thing said go inside for receipt. DAMN I yelled so loud I think Beelzebub dropped his flaming feather pen while signing up a new soul to keep. I frikkin hate (<---use lots of inflection here) when that happens. Inside there was a woman cashier that looked like she had been vomited up from hell knows where with smoke stained teeth and skin and badly mangled hair that probably hadn't seen a brush since she was queen of the New Jersey state fair in 1962 or something. Yah, major Wal Mart reject. Now I was really sorry I had to go in. I figured it couldn't get any worse so...

Off to the mall I went. I stopped in at the food court area. I think every mall has one of those? Probably all called the Food Court too, heh. I was in the mood for some S&M (spanish&mexican) so I got in line at the Taco Bell. Taco Bell is dirt cheap and decent food I really enjoy eating there. I once thought about working there, but I probably couldn't pass the taco bending exam. I tried doing it at home and broke every frikkin one! Anyway I noticed this nicely attractive woman several places in line behind me and decided I wanted to talk to her, I think she smiled at me, whoot! After I got my food I watched where she sat to see if she was attached and she was alone. Double whoot!! I noticed a trash bin near her table and after I was done I moved in to nonchalantly look for a ring. Damn! she had a ring on her left ring finger so I blew it off. Oh well.

I wandered off and was browsing in one of those specialty wacky gift stores for ideas for presents and stuff. I turned around and Bam! (sorry Emeril) there was the lady from Taco Bell right in my face. I said Hi and she said Hi back with a smile. Hmm I thought this was just too much of a coincidence to run in to her again in this huge mall pressed with hundreds of people. She had wandered off browsing and stuff and I decided to make a go. I thought for a few minutes and came up with a Farkin Brilliant Plan! I walked over to her and said Hi. (pretty brilliant huh). Exscuse me Miss but are you attached, I asked. She said yes, she was attached with a look that said too bad sailor, cause if I wasn't I would be jumpin your bones right here! (sorry err sometimes my imagination just runs around all by itself) She actually said No I'm sorry with a nice smile. Double Damn!! I said to myself. I was horribly disappointed so I decided to spend some money to feel better. So I wandered off and ran into...

Frank Davis! He was signing books at the B. Dalton book store. He is the local guru of ragin cajun cooking and fishing and other ex french-canadien pastimes. Cajuns will eat anything, especially if it lives in a swamp, swims backwards or walks sideways. He has a lil' TV show on the news. The book is titled Frank Davis Cooks Naturally N'Awlins. I bought a copy for a gift for someone and had him sign it with a dedication. Too cool, too cool. The day was suckin far less now and I stopped at a jewelry kiosk and bought myself a new ring. Big and gaudy silver with cryptic symbols pressed in and the center rotates around the body so you can play with it while wearing it. Ok now the suckiness was almost gone. I figured a new CD would really get me crankin' so I picked up a copy of Lacuna Coil's new burn. Never heard of them? They sound sort of like a gothic mix of Metallica and Type O Negative with a female vocalist. Really rocks, and the female lead singer has a really great haunting voice. I like haunting voices! I am listening to it right now, very moving. So I headed home from the mall and as I pulled into the driveway I thought about this woman that lives across the street. Single and attractive, shoulder length light brown hair and green eyes. I been meaning to talk to her but never seemed to see her much, very few opportunities. So...

I walked over and knocked on her front door, yah, just like that. She asked who I was cause we never met before so I introduced myself and said I just came over to err say Hi and stuff, yeah. She turned out to be pretty cool. We sat out on the veranda and talked, she drank iced tea and I drank nothing. (actually it was more like a front porch but I always wanted to slip the word veranda in a sentence somewhere, cool huh) She told me her husband died of cancer 16 months ago and she was sort of aimless and hanging with friends for fun, no dating yet. We chatted for a bit and got the usual formalities out of the way, and we made a date for lunch this wednesday!! Triple whoot!!! oh and a Bam! for good measure. (sorry again Emeril) Anyway, now, all the suckiness is totally gone and the day turned out pretty cool. Hope you guys had just as much fun.
Keep tha faith!

A Diving Tale

Many years ago I was employed in the deep sea diving business as an apprentice diver aka a tender, because you attended to your assigned diver and took care of his personal equipment. This included his diving helmet, wetsuit, gloves and harnesses and kept his knife sharp and tended his air hose/comm cable bundle while he was in the water. This was intended to prepare you to become a diver yourself. I never became a diver and I'll tell you why further down. These guys looked upon scuba divers with disdain and called them scubydoo's. The type of work being done here was underwater construction, repair and stuff like connecting huge pipelines together undersea with huge bolts as thick as your arm. They had to be physically strong and know how to work with real heavy duty equipment and put up with extreme temperature variations for long periods of time. In other words, girly men need not apply.

Practical jokes were part of the daily routine and it was pretty wild the way an entire crew of 20 or more diving personnel would stick together to perpetrate a prank on a newbie. One tender we called Diver Dave was really gungho about the entire diving scene, fresh out of dive school and annoying as hell to everyone because even though he was a nice guy he drove everyone nuts with constant chatter about diving. One day the plan was put in motion, we took an old diving air hose/comm cable assy and chopped the end off all the sections in a rough fashion and threw that end in the water and had a guy tend the hose right at shift change. When Diver Dive came on deck the dive superintendent told him to relieve the guy with the hose, the crew then pretended there was an actual diver in the water, even getting the rigging crew involved with radio commands to adjust the rigging the phantom diver was using. When the super announced the diver was coming up he signaled Diver Dive to pull up the hose slack and eventually he saw there was NO DIVER on the end and the hoses were cut. Needless to say Diver Dave nearly went in to convulsions thinking the diver had gotten injured or killed somehow before surfacing. He started shouting and ran around trying to drum up some help but after a few minutes he finally realized he had been had, big time, very funny and very cruel I know, but that was the nature of life at sea.

Real Diving

Why didn't I become a diver? After a couple years I realized that these divers didn't need to be real smart, they are basically underwater ditch diggers and I wanted more challenge, so I became a technician that designed, built and repaired diving equipment. I'm not taking anything away from these guys because they were real hardworking men with guts and courage to take on tasks that no one else would dream of doing, without them we wouldn't have oil flowing from offshore to keep this country fueled.

Nuthin' but rednecks and stuff

I got nothing, really I don't. I love how Mr. Hands says he has nothing then ends up turning it into something. All I got today is dumbass redneck style jokes. If you already heard all the redneck jokes don't bother to read further.

911 operator: Hello what is your emergency?
redneck: Oh my god! me and my buddy was huntin' and my shotgun went off and hit my friend and I think he is dead. What can I do?
911 operator: Well sir, first thing is to make sure that he is dead.
redneck: ok hangon ( moments later a shot rings out)
redneck: ok he's dead. now whut?

police officer: Sir I pulled you over because you were speeding. Give me your license and registration.
redneck: Officer, you are wrong, I wasn't speeding, I never speed.
rednecks wife: Don't lie to the man, you always speed on this road!
redneck: Hush up you, let me handle this!
police officer: Sir I also noticed you weren't wearing a seatbelt, I will have to write a ticket for that as well.
redneck: Officer, I was wearing my seatbelt, I just unhooked it to get my wallet out.
rednecks wife: There you go lieing to that police officer again. You're going to burn in hell!
redneck: Shut up woman, or you'll be sorry when we get home!
police officer: Exscuse me ma'am, does your husband always treat you like that?
rednecks wife: No sir, only when he's been drinking.

And now for something completely different. (credit monty python) There is a website called Operation Truth that features blog posts from soldiers in Iraq at the front lines. They use them to stay in touch with family and friends, often Mom at home knows what's going on over there before it comes on the news. Very interesting stuff to read about what's going on in their head with their life on the line daily. Enjoy

Too Many Scents Is Just Senseless

Ever notice just how many scents we wear on a daily basis? I'll work from the top down. First off we have the shampoo, I personally use that new Garnier Fructis stuff, you know the one with the commercials showing all the young people having fun tossing their hair around and stuff. I wanted some of that fun so I bought a bottle and if I had known it would make my head smell like a 2 day old fruit salad I wouldn't have. (sort of like the herpes commercials, those people are always out cycling and boating and having a great time, almost makes you wish you had herpes too!) Moving down I use Clearisil pads on my face because I tend to have oily skin but these things have their own chemical scent, I don't know how long it lasts but it definitely clashes with the eau de fruit salad.
Moving further down we come to the deodorant, I like Old Spice with a scent called Pure Sport, whatever the hell that means, all I know is it smells good and it amazingly does not clash with my Old Spice body soap also scented Pure Sport. I steered clear of the one called Red Alert or something like that, the idea that commies might attack my pits was just too much. Unfortunately I can't find an Old Spice cologne with the same scent so I use one named Whitewater and again what the hell is whitewater supposed to smell like? I dunno but it smells pretty good, I get compliments on it and it doesn't seem to clash too badly with the Pure Sport scents, but they all clash with the eau de fruit salad odor.
Are we done yet? Oh no, no we have to consider the odors from our detergents we use to wash our clothes and the dryer sheets or softners that have various odors, like "spring fresh scent" which can take on entirely different meanings depending on whether you live next door to either the city dump or a sewage treatment plant. And those odors always clash with all of the previous mentioned.
Now to the problems women face. I am pretty sure they have all the above mentioned clashes plus even more. Face make up has it's own scent, maybe not perfumed but still has a scent. I have also noticed that lipgloss/lipstick can have it's own odor as well. Mint or fruity scented facial scrubs can also add to the smorgasbord. If a woman likes to wear Obsession for example, can she buy a vaginal deodorant with the same scent? Not as far as I know. It's also funny how they market underarm products, take Secret for example, is it called that because we like to pretend that women don't get offensive pit odors like men?
Commercials for men's underarm products are always bold and brash claiming their products can tame that dastardly pit odor! Anyway what better way to start or end your day with so many wonderful thoughts about odors, enjoy!

Senior Citizen's should be Banned!

from fast food restaurant lines during the noon rush hour between 12 & 1. As a working man with only a half an hour for lunch they clog up the works horribly. You stand in line for up to 20 minutes or more because these retired people descend upon the local eateries at precisely 12, just before you arrive in a hurry to get lunch and back to work. If you are lucky you may have 10 minutes to wolf the food down and get back to work on time. I'll defend their right to eat anywhere they please, but do the have to eat at 12 frikkin o'clock? Hell no, they have all day to eat at their leisure! Recently overheard conversation from the eldely couple just in front of me at a Wendy's restaurant AFTER the cashier asks for their order. Picture this at a very leisurely pace:

"Ok, Harold what do you want to eat?" says the lady, now looking up at the menu board for the first time since they came in.
"Oh, I don't know Martha. Let me take a look." Now he looks at the menu.
"Well I think I had the chicken sandwich the other day, so I don't want that, hmmm what do I want?" grrr like some one else here would know.
"Harold, why don't you try the fish sandwich , that's real good."
"No, no, not the fish, I don't feel like fish today." squinting at the menu board.
"What about you? What do you want?"
"Me? I think I'll just have a hamburger and a coke." the cashier punches in the order.
"Ok sir what will you have?" asks the cashier.
"Oh just give me what she's having that, will be good."
"Wait, can I get that hamburger with cheese, please?" says Martha.
"Oh me too, I want cheese on mine too" says Harold. Then the cashier corrects their orders.
"That will be $7.37 please." says the cashier.

Just then you get this terrible sinking feeling as the lady reaches in to her purse and pulls out the OH MY GOD! NOOOOOO!!, not the little bitty change purse, and then she dutifully and carefully counts out 37 pennies to the cashier.
By this time you are a nervous wreck and seething with anger because you now have only 5 minutes to eat and make it back to work on time!

Camping the "Y"

I think most guys can agree that taking care of a good woman is essential and in fact can be a lot of fun. But to make this work well the woman has to keep the area clear of extraneous brush and shrubberyand keep it well manicured. If I really like the view the more likely I am to set up camp and really keep the fire stoked so to speak. Mowing it all off is not necessary unless you're into having your woman look like a great big little girl and that comes with the risk of making you feel like some kind of pervert. Of course shaved can be fun at first but the regrowth can be bad news and quite hard on the face.
Women, what do you think? You spend a lot of time on hair, makeup and clothes, why not a few more minutes to do a little bit to keep the playground up. Maybe he will spend more time camping at the "Y". You have nothing to lose for trying. Oh and guys if your lady hasn't been saluting the flagpole lately maybe the area surrounding it needs some landscaping, this works both ways you know. Now excuse me while I go make myself look like a great big little boy, at her request.

I'm Glad My PC is not a Toaster

Why? If they were, we would always be eating burnt toast, a wise man once said. Think about it, the number of conceivable problems and possible errors expands exponentially when you you consider all the possible combinations of hardware from all the different manufacturers such as CD/DVD drives, hardrives, motherboards, cables, processors and then throw in all the possible variables that come with all the different programs and operating systems that we like to install to make them do all the stuff we like, whether it is heavy duty number crunching for video editing or to play some silly little tetris game.
If you have ever gone to Microsoft and done a search to fix a compatibility problem of some type, the number of possible errors that can pop up can be staggering! Even a simple search on Google can return millions of results to fix even the smallest mindnumbing error. I know it's the hotrodder in me that makes me keep my PC's in tiptop shape because I am not happy unless they can really smoke the tires, so to speak. Just like any machine they need maintenence to keep them in good working order from time to time and I don't know about you guys but I hate burnt toast.

Sales People that Don't Suck

I was walking around in the french quarter one day last week looking to see what kind of trouble I could get in to, lol. Taking in the sights smiling at all the cute little tourists and stuff trying to look like the colorful local that I am, but just generally minding my own business when I passed by a display window of a small shop on Chartres St. that sold custom jewelry. A few pieces really caught my eye so I decided to go in and check it out. The way I was dressed is important to this story, so I was wearing a black T shirt I had picked up at a Marilyn Manson concert a few years back with a fallen angel in front and some big red satanic looking symbol on back, scruffy levi's and my big black boots, a belt with metal studs all around, a beard and my hair nicely spiked up, lol.
Inside the store was a well dressed lady in a black dress and heels and she was alone. I started to browse the cases with the jewelry and oddly enough I was really taken by one set of womens earrings that I thought were absolutely stunning, with an antique gold finish and each had a beautifully hand cut tourmaline on the dangly part. Mind you I was not looking for earrings, but for a new ring for myself, nor did I have anyone to buy earrings for at this time. She noticed me admiring them and generously offered to try them on her self so I could see how they appeared while being worn, I said no thats ok I am not looking to buy them. What does she do? She takes them out of the locked case and puts them on anyway and actually modeled them for me on the spot, I was floored but yet I didn't feel like I was being pressured into buying them. What an amazing person to take her time to treat me in a way that seemed above and beyond the call of duty and to a person that probably looked like they couldn't afford the damn things in the first place. Made my day.

Cell Phones and Sales People That Suck

Went to one of those huge ass home improvement stores that always claim to have everything you will ever need to do it yourself, cross our hearts and hope to die, the other day to help my mother buy some concrete catch basins for the downspouts on her house. As we entered the outdoor home and garden area I was elated to see an employee way in the back in the area where the concrete items were stored on the ground and high shelves. It was obvious that the man was on his cell phone and as we got nearer I noticed he moved over behind one of the shelving units as though he were trying to hide from us, as he was too damn busy talking in to his phone to help us, mere customers that we were, we were obviously well below the level needed to interupt the call he was making to his stock broker/drug dealer/girlfriend/momma/old buddy from Detroit/the President/sex hotline/psychic hotline/suicide hotline/gay sex hotline/girfriend in Cincinatti, which I am certain was of the utmost importance, just judging by hard he tried to avoid being seen. Did this deter my mom? Hell no, she homed in like a cruise missle and asked him where we could find the goods we needed. Well he told us the items we needed were just inside the side door of the main building, so we hiked off to have a look and it turned out his info was incorrect and I searched back outside again until I found the things ONE aisle away from where we first met the cellphoneguy. Now this thoroughly ticked me off but I held my tongue when my mom collared him to help get the items down (heavy concrete) while I went to retrieve a platform to load them on to. When I returned the cellphoneguy had sneaked away leaving the items one shelf lower, but within our reach, sigh, what an asswipe he was. Was I through with him? Hell no.
We went up to the front to check out and there were no prices on the items and the girl started making phone calls to Satan to find out the price on these stupid things and after waiting a few minutes I walked to the back and literally ripped the big price tag thingy off the shelf destroying it in the process. The checkout girl sheepishly said "Sir that's supposed to stay on the shelf"
I replied that I know, but this will give the cellphoneguy something to do when he's not on the phone. I smiled and we left.