Category: Uncategorized

I went to the library the other day on my lunch to educate myself…or pick up the Walking Dead graphic novels.  They have words, so I count them as books.  I also decided to hop online and check my emails.  There was an older man exasperated talking to one the library staff, an older woman.  My inner thoughts will be expressed in ( ).

“I can’t log off my emails!  What if someone gets on here and steals my info?”  (I’m sure a 73 year old man has a shitload of relevant emails.  AARP, Viagra, Werther’s Original coupons…the chain of info is damning, for sure, if it falls in the wrong hands.)  “Well…(oh boy, this lady has no clue) did you try clicking the X?”  “That doesn’t log me out!”  She stared at him, her hand instinctively pointing at the X.  “Hmm.”  Then nothing for about 20 seconds.  “I’m sure it’s fine.  Click the X.”  I couldn’t take it anymore.  “See your name?  Click that.  Then sign out.”  (I could have helped the Somalian next to me easier than this.)

I then realized the flaw of helping a stranger as he filled my next five minutes with stories of internet fraud gone by.  He at least should have given me a Werther’s Original.  I guess I’m impressed he had email.  I gave my Grandma a 1993 unconnected desktop so she could play solitare.  She saw a story where thieves could steal your internet and freaked out, even though as I said, she had no internet connection in the entire house.  She thought they could just sneak in via magic robot energy and steal her Elder Beerman card with its $250 limit.  She also thought Mormons ran every nursing home in Ohio.  I don’t want to get old.

My fiancee flew out of town for a week, so I decided to keep a log of some of the highlights.

Day 1 – I noticed there are foods that require delicate preparation.  This is no good.  Not one can of Chef Boyardee, Hormel or Chunky Soup.  I may starve to death.  Side note: I did immediately get beer before food.

Day 3 – I did my open mike then went to see Kyle Kinane headline the Woodlands show ran by Dylan Shelton.  I’m sure at this point in the week I have forgotten something important, like feeding the dog or flushing the toilet.  Just kidding on the last one, I have been using the backyard.  It’s so liberating.

Day 6 – I have managed to eat poorly enough to wreck my insides completely.  Today, I purchased a $6 sausage pizza that feeds around five people and took half of it down.  This is the fourth time I have had pizza thus far, but I have at least added Beano for dessert.

Day 8 – Now begins the frenzied cleaning projects I have put off most of the week.  No time to blog…must clean…Wow, if I recycled my beer cans, I could probably quit working and live off the money I get from the cans.  Math wasn’t my favorite topic in school.  I now also realized I have to change my shirt when she gets back.  This one has different colored sauce stains on it.  I don’t remember eating wings…

Well, she’s coming back today and the animals are still alive (and so am I) so I think I did OK.  Good thing too, in addition to me missing her, I am out of canned meats and cheese, so I am unable to make anything other than Pop Tarts at this point.

Thanks to comedy miles beating the hell out of my car, I have had to spend some hard earned cash to keep it moving.  The latest money pit item was a control arm.  What is a control arm, you ask?  Answer – something that takes $724 to fix, apparently.  I need to learn how to fix cars myself…oh look, a beer!  What were we talking about?

I picked up the rental no problem.  Upon the return, it got stranger.  One gentlemen was trying to get a different car.  Not because of the size, fuel efficiency or something normal.  He didn’t like the color.  On a rental car.  “I’ll wait, I prefer a red one.”  I was secretly hoping he got a red car, then he accidentally drove into the Running of the Bulls and got gored repeatedly.  MOVE YOUR ASS.

After waiting behind a young lady who didn’t know who her car insurer was (that wasn’t frustrating), I finally returned the keys.  The sales rep was busy, so my new friend Brent gave me a ride back to the shop.  Brent wasn’t much of a talker.  I don’t like strangers, but it was uncomfortable riding in silence.  “Getting colder today.”  He waited about 9 seconds, then said “Yep.”  Another 8 seconds.  “Yep, maybe snow.”  Then nothing.  Five minutes passed in deafening quiet.  I had to try again because I think he was looking for a place to hide my body.  “That guy had some crazy Halloween stuff in his yard.”  Without making eye contact, he took about another nine seconds.  “Yep.”  When we pulled into the shop, I nearly injured myself getting out of the car while it was still moving and said thanks in a brisk trot.  It reminded me of my dates in high school.  One girl I took out almost lost her leg bailing out before I stopped.  Now I know what you felt like, every girl I dated 1995-2002.

I got a chance to sit down and play Grand Theft Auto 5, which is a fantastic game.  I also had a chance to learn some things about myself.  Most not good.

– I can’t see the screen that well.  I either need a 90″ TV or have stand three feet in front of the one I have.

– Rear wheel drive is pretty accurate, meaning you can’t corner well.  I know this all too well from hydroplaning in a Mercury Grand Marquis about six years ago.  As bad as that was, having my neighbors stare at me as I banged the rear panel back into place with a rubber mallet in one hand and a beer in the other was the most white trash moment of my life.

– I may be one of four people on the earth who likes the oldies station.  Sure, you have your gangster rap, but I just fired a handgun out my window while Michael McDonald sang “What a Fool Believes.”  I’m crazier than you.

– Much like in real life, I can’t work my phone while driving very well.  I see myself in a nursing home, 2049, carjacking hovercrafts in Grand Theft Auto 26 and complaining that I can’t get my microchip phone to work.

– I’m starting to like this running through red lights too much.  I may start to use this in my work commute.  Then I can sleep in another 15 minutes, only at the expense of public safety.  I think it’s worth it.  I’m a good driver, except when I’m trying to text or hydroplaning.  Maybe I should put down my beer and focus on my phone more as I fly through this intersection.

I did a small town show last weekend.  There was unnecessary excitement, as I got there way too early and decided to relax in my car for 30 minutes.  The problem?  Apparently you can’t listen to the radio, run the A/C and charge a phone without killing your battery.  I had to get a jump from some of the patrons.  I got a jump, they got complimentary beer coozies.  Everyone wins.

I have a joke where I ask the crowd if they’ve ever been drunk and seen something so messed up it sobered them up instantly.  I usually get a few nods and murmurs, but that’s the extent.  Usually.  An older man approached me after the show and decided to tell me his story in front of his very not interested in the story wife.

He proceeded to tell me he went to a farm in Iowa.  Upon getting out of the car, he saw a naked fat man chasing a naked fat woman across the yard, both disappearing into the cornfield.  His wife’s face soured with each word, by the way.  He then told me he went to sleep (passed out, I love when people deny that they passed out).  Upon awakening, he stumbled into a room to look for his buddy and walked in on a legless drunk man having nasties with a morbidly obese woman.  The door opening startled the legless man, who fell off the bed and couldn’t get back up.  He said it sobered him up instantly.

I am pretty sure his wife left him sometime on Sunday after telling that story, but I just wonder how one winds up a party like that or stayed past the first part.  Watching naked people run through cornfields is a bad start to any social gathering, generally.  Think I’m wrong?  Go back to the last party in your head.  Now remove the clothes from the people there.  Exactly.  I’m right.

Thousands of years ago, depending upon your religious beliefs or lack thereof, some people had sex and then their kids mated with some other group of people’s kids (or maybe each other, see ancient Egypt or Appalachia).  This happened a bunch of times and thus, here we are.  Most have been forgotten, but we inherit their traits, good and bad, hoping we carry on some weird legacy of past ancestors.

I tell this meandering tale because I like to think, with the men in my family who built buildings, fought in wars and tamed the wild frontier, I have some manliness in my blood.  Or I used to.  I was trimming my beard and noticed my chest hair was a bit long around the collar.  For hundreds of years, this has been normal and acceptable, but due to the modern new standards, I decided to give it a buzz.  I probably, in retrospect, should have used the guard.

After trying to balance this mistake out, I ended up buzzing my entire chest hair bald.  I then stared, horrified at a bald chest with a very hairy stomach.  Of course it had to go.  Minutes later, I looked into the mirror realizing that any legacy of manliness was now stuck between the blades of a $15 beard trimmer.  I also know I need to lose some weight.  I thought I looked fat before, but holy shit it’s much worse without any hair.  I think I’ll wear my shirt in the shower for the next few weeks.  I look like a surly baby or a pre-op patient hit shaved by an overzealous intern.