I'm a technical whiz

My phone screen use to look like this...


After a jailbreak and uploading of other folders and such, it now looks like this.......

Look at that....I'm an adult prodigy.

Not really.

But I'm an adult idiot who knows how to follow instructions.
You can do the same to your phone by clicking here.

Life is boring so shuffle your iPod

Out of sheer laziness to post anything about my day today..and the fact that I live an uninteresting life as you can tell from older posts. I've decided to show you the first 10 songs on my iPod when I put it on shuffle.

Trust me....this beats my original post about how I really think the USA Network has the best shows on television. Which is true. It does.

1) The English Beat - Save it for later

2) Hot Snakes - Braintrust

3) The Pernice Brothers - Dumb it down

4) The Jam - The Place I love

5) Fugazi - Provisional

6) Phoenix - Girlfriend

7) Sebadoh - Magnets coil

8) Lenka - The show

9) Saves The Day - Freakish

10) Beulah - A good man is easy to kill

Happy Birthday to my daughter

My daughter turned 3 years old today!

While we were at the bookstore today she turned to me and asked me if it was still her birthday. She's the cutest thing ever.

Yes Gwen...it is STILL your birthday!

Best Of the Best - B.O.B.

The following things have been said to me in the last week.

This is what a Russian dude said to me after meeting me:
"Your name is Bob.....Best Of the Best. B.O.B."

This is what my friend Alex said to me the other day out of the blue:
Alex: Hey Bob
Me: Yes Alex.
Alex: ...you have a fuzzy teddy bear personality.
Me: Umm...thanks?
Alex: No Bob..this isn't a good thing.

It's not porn...but it's close.

I know...two video posts in a row. I'm sorry. Won't happen again. But this one is fun. Imagine two dudes wearing bacon skirts doing kung fu moves and beating each other with sausage nun-chucks. Because this is exactly that. Pretty much every mans dream.

Hitler finds out Michael Jackson has died

Found this gem here. Just thought I'd share the fun.

Birthday

I celebrated my 40th birthday yesterday. The average lifespan of a male is 74.5 years. If my math calculations are right that puts me at more than half way to being dead. :(

Knife fight vs mini golf

During an email thread about what we can do at job #1 for a staff team building exercise, I jokingly suggested a knife fight instead of mini golf.

My director responded with the following:

"I can understand how the knife fighting has relevance to what we do here but putting a ball into a clown's nose.......well......maybe it does apply".

I have one of the best jobs ever.

Confession

You think I'm listening to music or watching a movie. I'm actually not listening to anything at all. I just don't want to talk to you.

P.S. I look lame in this green polo shirt. I wish I was wearing something different.

Nerd Alert!!

Yeah..I admit it. I'm a bit of a nerd. So much of a nerd that when I was a little kid I had 7 different pairs of Star Wars underwear so I could show my loyalty all week long. Good god, I spent a huge chunk of my childhood sitting on Luke Skywalkers face. Anyhoo, this years Comic Con gave attendees a sneak peak at another of my childhood nerdy obsessions. The long awaited Tron sequel titled Tron Legacy. Someone managed to sneak a camera in and recorded it for all us non attendees. It's grainy like a bigfoot photo but you get the idea. Looks pretty awesome.

You know, when I think back on my childhood underwear, I remember wearing them until there was basically nothing left them. It was like one half Darth Vader, the other half my ass.

UPDATE: In case you actually care, they officially released the trailer in HD. Clickie here.

Breakfast of Champions

I would bet good money that Tom Cruise eats this combo every morning. He's successful.

Karma

I threw money into this tip jar expecting some good karma. What I got was a stomach ache. Boo.

I imagine if I could grow a mustache, it would look a little like this.....

I got double teamed by puke and shit

Photo taken before things went wrong.

Dizzy is the top and Digger is at the bottom.

I'm taking care of my friends two black labs while they are away for a couple of weeks. Dizzy is a rambunctious 3 years old and Digger is a wise 14 years old. All I have to do is feed them, give em water and walk them. Basically keep em alive until they come back. I got a list of numbers in case of an emergency as well as details about the daily care of the dogs and what to watch for. One of the details was the dogs will take advantage of any situation that involves food. Being the imbecile that I am, I accidentally didn't secure the lid on the dog food one morning leaving them alone with an all you can eat buffet. While I was at work, the two dogs got into the dog food and ate what looked to be about half of a forty pound bag of food. And when I returned I walked into what I can only describe as the scariest thing I've ever seen (this vision would soon become the second most scariest thing I've ever seen). There were piles and piles of puke and shit everywhere. The dogs ate themselves sick and then crapped all over the floor. It was everywhere. I can handle puke. And I can handle shit. Trust me. I've had my fair share of both. But I can't handle puke and shit together. But I did what I had to do and cleaned up the mess and moved on. What I didn't realize was that was just round one of an ugly two round fight.

Round two came the next day when the food they didn't puke up or shit out yesterday, made it's way through their system and eventually out their ass. Only this time it came out like a bat out of hell. Because those dogs crapped...I mean CRAAAAPPED...and those poor dogs PUKED. This site quickly made yesterday seem like a picnic. I had no idea it was even possible to crap that much and that big. It was like they crapped out a litter of puppies made out of turd. And to add to the situation, there was still undigested food in their bellies...which they threw up next to, away from, and on top of the litter of puppies made out of turd. And to really make matters worse, I was under the impression that they puked and shat all of the food the day before. So I fed them that morning. Which meant there was even more food being puked up. Imagine what 20 pounds of shit and puke would look like and then imagine you cleaning it up. While I was cleaning it up I was actually able to see what food was consumed that morning and what food was consumed yesterday. Same goes for the shit. I had no idea that puke and shit could mingle like that. It was everywhere. In the end I had a garbage full of puke and shit. I got double teamed by puke and shit.

It's been a day since round two. So far the dogs seem to be in good spirits and healthy..and oddly enough....hungry. You'd think a day of puking and shitting may keep you from eating. Nope. Not these dogs. These dogs a true champs.

Party

Not sure what I missed but I'm glad I wasn't invited.

Albany, NY

I took this photo almost a year ago and forgot all about it until I stumbled across it this morning. It looks like someone nuked Albany.

I could really go for a couple of hot dogs and fries.

New haircut

You know how you get a haircut and you walk out thinking you look pretty good. And then days later you realize your new haircut looks like shit.

I got this haircut a couple of days ago.

It's possible

I imagine this conversation is happening somewhere in the world after someone wakes from being in a coma since 1983.

Coma patient: So wait...Steve Perry left Journey? And he made a solo record that SOUNDS just like Journey. And Journey replaced Steve Perry with a guy named Steve Augeri who SOUNDS just like Steve Perry.

Doctors: Yes.

Just overheard this conversation on the patio at Uncommon Grounds

Woman #1: I don't like that shit.

Woman #2: Did you say shit or sheets?

Woman #1: I said shit.

Woman #3: Are you talking about sheeps?

Woman #2: No, sheets.

Woman #1: No, I said shit.

Woman #3: Hahaha..I thought you said shit.

Woman #1: I DID say shit! Hahahahah!

All women then laugh together.

See. Don't you wish you were hanging out with me?

The not so good looking waiter

I have two jobs. Job #1 at Skidmore College and job #2 as a server at a restaurant in downtown Saratoga. This story is about job #2.

So me and this other dude named Alex (who happens to be an awesome dude) were the closing servers last night. Alex had a table full of obnoxious idiots who were doodling on paper while they drank their semi-expensive wine, being loud and disruptive to the entire bar. They hung out for about an hour and then left leaving their doodles on the table knowing we'd look at them. One of them was titled "the not so good looking waiter - NOT ALEX". Ouch!! Hey, I know I'm not a good looking guy. It's okay. I've looked at this face every morning for years. Trust me. I know I'm not good looking but you don't have to tell me. So what did I do to you guys to provoke you guys to so mean? I wasn't even your waiter. I didn't even go near your table. Basically you were being mean JUST to be mean. So since we're gonna go down this road of being mean I have a couple of remarks about all of you. Hey..you guys opened up this can of worms, not me. I know no one from that table will read this..but it'll make me feel a tidbit better by getting this off of my chest.

edited on 7/6/09
Yeah..so I edited this part a bit. Because even though they were being mean to me..it doesn't mean I have to SCORCHING mean to them. So I scaled it back a bit.

To the lady in the turquoise dress:

That dress you wore was either too small or you were too fat for it.

To the lady in the white dress:

Your ankles were bigger than your head.

To the gent:

Triple chins are hot. No. Really.

What people don't seem to understand is that we're only there to help you. To serve you. To make your dining experience enjoyable. I'm not there to win a beauty contest. I'm there to make a some extra money by making sure your evening goes well. Just because you are tipping us at the end of your dining experience doesn't mean you can be shitty to me or any other server. And it definitely doesn't mean you can leave a note at your table telling me that I'm "not so good looking".

To make myself feel better I tried to coax my daughter into telling me that I was handsome. She refused and instead told me I looked like a monkey and then laughed.

I sure do love that kid.

Loathing leads to suffering. Suffering leads to egg and cheese sandwiches.

I was telling someone today that American poet Henri Cole hates me. Which is true. He does. He's actually hated me since last year..at least I think he hates me. For all I know he has no idea who I am and it's all in my head. But here's the story of his hatred. Henri Cole is a faculty member here at the Summer Writers Institute where I work and he got upset with me last year because I didn't dedicate an entire section of the bookstore to his books. In an attempt to let him know why we couldn't give him an entire section I called him Henry instead of Henri. He quickly stopped me in my tracks and said it's pronounced On-Ree and then gave me a deathly stare. How was I suppose to know that's how you pronounced it? Anyways, I saw him this morning on campus and he gave me that same deathly stare. The kind of stare that said I hate you. Then someone pointed out to me that since he's a poet he probably doesn't hate me. He most likely loathes me.

On a positive note, my co-worker just gave me an egg and cheese sandwich on a hardroll.

I can see!

I just realized that if I wore my glasses, which I've owned for over a year now, I can actually see things better. Funny how that works.

Desk is still a mess but I'm working on it. I know it looks worse but I swear, I'm working on it.

Sheer madness

What the hell is going on in this world!

First Farrah Fawcette, then Michael Jackson...now Billy Mays!!!

When will all this madness end! When!!! How many people have to die before this all stops!!

In other news...

My feet hurt.

Casual Friday

Nothing says casual like a douchy looking polo shirt.
Enjoy your Friday everyone.

Seven inches of hot beef

Commercially right. Morally wrong.

Stains

Not sure if you can see em. But I'm pointing at two stains on my shirt. I thought they were from today but they are not. I put on a dirty shirt this morning even though I have a closet full of clean shirts. Why? No idea. Though I have a sneaking suspicion that it's because I was feeling lazy and didn't want to iron a shirt.

I actually remember getting those stains. The one on the left was from french onion soup and the one on the right is from a french fry disaster. As for the stain on my face....well that isn't a stain at all. It's 2 weeks of facial hair growth. I'm in summer mode baby. Summer mode.

My desk is a mess. I know.

Scary Owl

Man, I love being a father. Yesterday was Fathers Day and me and my almost 3 year old daughter played a game that she made up called Scary Owl. Rules are simple. One person pretends to be asleep. The other person pretends to be a scary owl and hoots and howls until the sleeping person wakes up. It ends when both the sleeping person and the scary owl are screaming at a very loud volume. It was the most fun I've ever had.

Just thought I'd share a little.

What the hell was in that bag?

In an attempt to be a nice person today I ended up being a bad person. I held the door open for a woman today and as she approached the door she gave me a look, which looked more like a snarl, and told me she didn't need help from a man and that it was typical of a me to assume that she needed the door held. So like any good man, I let go of the door and walked away. The door closed on her bag that apparently had something special in it and crushed whatever it was. I heard this sound that sounded like a plastic cup being crushed and then she lost her shit and started screaming about the contents of her bag. Once the door had her bag thoroughly pinned she then started to cry. I tried to help her but she told me to go away and then threw a pen at me. Luckily for me she had lousy aim and missed me because that pen could have easily been a hatchet. Or bullet.

See what happens when you try to be nice.

Not the actual angry pen throwing woman.

Photo borrowed from my friend Ally's blog to help you get a mental image of what occurred today. Just imagine an angry face instead of the face of a happy grandma who just gave you a birthday card with your name misspelled and a dollar in it.

I promise to love it every day.

Will someone please get me one of these?

I promise to never get it wet.
I promise to keep it out of bright lights...especially sunlight.
And I promise to never, EVER feed it after midnight.

Keep the change you filthy animal

When I say help...I actually mean a turkey/bacon/avocado sandwich. And when I say send, I actually mean buy me one.

Please.

Dear lord. Why.

Not sure what movie they are filming, but this photo alone tells me it's gonna suck. Just saying.

hamburger cupcakes

I can't say I came up with the idea, because I didn't. I actually saw these on a foodie blog (can't remember who) a few months ago and thought it would be a fun thing for me and my daughter to do.

I think they came out pretty dang cute. Almost as cute as my daughter. Actually...that's not true because my daughter is pretty freaking cute. She laughed so hard when we finished making the cupcakes and then proceeded to run around the house yelling "hamburger cupcakes" over and over.

Damn you

I hate you for being so delicious.

Open letter

I have a message for the ungrateful man sitting a few yards from me bitching out loud to his wife and kid about why he has to spend the day at the park with them when he could be home watching baseball.

Fuck you.

I almost died from cancer, almost.

I went to the doctor to have him look at weird rash on my back. He said it wasn't a rash..was a bit concerned and then did a biopsy and told me to come back in two weeks for the results.

So it's two weeks later. Here's a picture of me waiting at the doctors office to see if I was going to die from cancer. Noticed the tired look on my face. That's because I couldn't sleep. I was up all night trying to figure how I was going to react when the doctor walked into the room and said "its positive...you have cancer...you only have days left....I'm sorry". There are only so many ways you can react when you get news of this magnitude. You could be angry and just yell "WHY WHY WHY!!" and then start busting shit up inside the doctors office in hopes that the doctor will tranquilize you. Or you could sob uncontrollably and look like real douche in front of the doctor. Or you could be calm, walk out of the doctors office and be pissed that you might not make it to see how LOST will end next year. I figured I'd keep my dignity and just remain calm. Plus I was too tired from the night before and wasn't sure if I had the energy to throw anything around. I had the doctor take a photo of me with my camera before he told me the results. He seemed pretty excited about the idea. Turns out it was just a weird form of eczema.

I told someone the good news and he thought I should celebrate by going skydiving. I don't understand why people think jumping out of a plane is living life or living on the edge. That's just seems stupid to me. I mean you could die. You want to live on the edge? Try taking a shit in a public restroom at a place with lots of traffic and not locking the door. That's living on the edge.

Squirrel attack!!

This cute little baby squirrel almost tore my friends face off the other day. The thing was no bigger than a cellphone..yet totally fearless. I was able to walk right up to it and snap this photo of the beast before it charged us. We screamed and ran like babies down the street. Not me. My friend. Not sure why I said we.

Love You Mom!

Click image for larger view. Don't stare.

I thought this was a little weird. I was walking around the mall today and stumbled across this window display at Victoria's Secret promoting something for Mothers Day. It's a giant photo of a busty half naked girl with the words "Love you Mom!" on it. Is it me or is that weird? I got three different takes out of this.

1) Mom bought daughter hot sexy lingerie and daughter took a photo of herself to send to mom to prove to mom how hot and sexy daughter looks in it with a note that says "Love you Mom!". To me that's a little weird.

2) Its telling you to buy lingerie for your mom so she can look hot and sexy..just like the girl in the photo. Who the fuck buys their mom sexy lingerie?

3) This photo is a photo of your hot single mom in her lingerie. In which case, if it is.....is there any chance she's into sad lonely guys who happen to still be in love with their ex-wife and has a daughter that he loves more than anything. Guys who can't seem to move forward with their life because they're holding on to hope that their ex would take em back, and would be okay with being dumped immediately if the ex-wife took them back. If so...then you should have her contact me....because I might know someone. He's a friend of mine.

You live in Manhattan cocktail?

I love it when people say they live in New York city and then when you ask where in the city do they live they respond with...well..I'm actually outside of the city. Well what is it. You either live in the city or you don't.

Speaking of NYC....my new summer drink is the Manhattan cocktail, which isn't very summer-like at all..at least I don't think of them as being very summer-like. When I think of Manhattans I think of old relatives who have been dead for years or guys like Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr(FYI: They are dead too). Not hanging out on a patio somewhere downtown on a nice sunny summer afternoon sipping drinks with your buds. I'm embracing my old age. But at the same time I'm being a pioneer. I'm the new old and it's gonna be the summer of the Manhattan cocktail.

So today is mothers day. I have a mother. My daughter has a mother. I will be out doing all the things that celebrate mothers. Speaking of my daughter...I love her.

"What are you?"

I don't know who's who in this photo.

"What are you?" Yeah, I get that question a lot.

It's a known fact that all Asian people look the same. Even the halvesies like me. There's even a website dedicated to this phenomenon.
www.alllooksame.com

I never really thought about it until recently when on Thursday night I was out a local drinking establishment drowning my lonely lonely sorrows in an ice cold beer....where there happens to be a guy who works there...who happens to be Asian. And this guy (not the Asian guy. A white guy-JUST SAYIN!) who I don't know comes up and says "Oh hey, you work here". And I responded with "no, sorry. I don't. You must be confusing me with the OTHER Asian guy in the room who DOES work here". The guy sort of looked embarrassed and then I felt like a huge douche. So I quickly turned it around and we talked about how nice the weather was. Yeah. Awkward.

But then the next day I was at Walmart getting some prescriptions filled (only $5 bucks there!) and this girl that I know...well sort of know. I actually know her brother. But this girl comes up and says (while she's on the phone talking to someone else)"Hey George..how are you? How are you and Brittany doing?" Okay...a little background for all of you. The George she is speaking of is this OTHER Asian guy who lives in town and is dating this girl Brittany. So to spare this girl from total embarrassment, I tell her that I am fine but Brittany and I broke up because she found my stash of anime porn in a box labeled "kitchen utensils". And before I even get a chance to tell her I'm kidding she starts to run off and says "Thats sooooo wonderful....good to see you....chow" and goes off continuing with her phone call. I bet she wasn't even paying attention to me. Asian people get no respect.

In case you ever wondered if there was some sort of hierarchy in the Asian world. Here it is. Well, according to my friends mom who's Chinese (atleast I think they're Chinese).

1) Chinese
2) Japanese
3) Korean
The rest are all fabled creatures.

Cumby Stache

I know some of you find this hard to believe but I do shave. As a matter of fact I've been shaving for a few years now. Granted, I shave about once a month. It has something to do with my heritage. But hey, I'm shaving. The beard/stach, or as my friend use to call it, my *cumby stache was getting a tad thick so I got up extra early to shave off my facial growth.

I know you might not think it's possible. But I swear. Since I shaved, I think I can run faster now.

Check out that razor. It's a state of the art Gillette Fusion. Same razor that Tiger Woods and Roger Federer uses. Those guys are champions. I feel like a champion when I shave.

*A cumby stache is what you find on the faces of those weird pre-teens that hang out in front of your local Cumberland Farms mini mart on weekends.

Final Chipotle update

One barbacoa (shredded beef) burrito went into my mouth and never had a chance.

Chipotle update

So Chipotle opened up finally and haven't made it over yet. I even missed free burrito day. Sad. I know. So I guess there is no REAL update other than the fact that they've opened their doors to the public and I wasn't there to cut the ribbon. But I'm sort of glad I didn't go because I heard there were long lines that looked like this.....

In case you are bored at work and need a little food inspiration, check out this site. Some guy scans his delicious sandwiches so we can all cry while we choke down our shitty lifeless slice of pizza. Yeah. Lifeless pizza is a real moral killer.
www.scanwiches.com

This is what I look at a good portion of the day.

Now get over here and do my work.

My new official eating theme song

I'll be singing this song when I'm at Chipotle cramming a burrito into my face.

But seriously. This song kind of kicks ass.

Watch Nom Nom Nom Song on CollegeHumor

Open letter to skateboarders who cause havok in local parking lots across America.

I am amazed at how obnoxious you are considering I've never seen any of you pull off a trick. Ever.

Chipotle update

Wow. It's beautiful. The signs says burritos are 100% off on April 23. That's free for all of you art majors.

My evening

My hair was getting long and I looked like shit. So after work I went over to the place where miracles can happen to sad people like me. JC Pennys! You can get everything there. I saw people buying clothes, while others where buying one of those toasters that turns two pieces of bread and whatever you cram between them into homeade hot pockets. Me....I got a haircut!

Before

After

I look lame. I know.

Fish is meat and my name is as red, white and blue as the American flag

Hey vegetarians. You should know that fish are animals. Therefore they are meat. I don't get people who say they are a vegetarian but eat fish. It just doesn't make sense to me.

You know what else I don't get. I wasn't born in this country yet I have the most American name out of all of my American born friends. This little fact was pointed out to me today by this lady.

Awww crap

I forgot my mothers birthday today. God I'm such an asshole. I've been so freaking out of my mind these last couple of weeks. I'm not sure if it's because of the lack of sleep lately, stress or the long hours at work. Apparently I was texting and calling people in my sleep last night at 4AM. I noticed it when I went to turn the alarm off on my phone and I could see my outgoing texts. I was freaking horrified to see text messages being sent by me at 4AM. Some made sense, some didn't. I also looked at my call log this morning and was even more horrified to see some of names on the list of my early morning sleep dialing. I spent part of the day calling and texting people to apologize. Which is weird because I was apologizing about the calling and texting. The thing is I vaguely remember waking up at around 4AM panicking about work. So I'm guessing thats when things happened. Crap. So anyways..yeah. I forgot my moms birthday.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!
Much love,
Your idiot son will make it up to you when I get some free time - Edited on 4/14/09 for the sake of not making people sad.

By the way, that's my new name from now on.

P.S. The ice cream I ate earlier today is giving me a belly ache. :(

Chipotle update

The sign out front is glowing. At night it's like a beacon of hope. Like a lighthouse that brings storm tossed sailors hope for the bright dawn to come. Like a symbol of hope and comfort in a troubled world. Like a guardian of hope. Yeah...it's a lot like that. Only it says "Chipotle".

Rumor has it they are giving out free burritos on April 22. Yes. Free burritos. Please forgive me. I think I may cry.

A friend sent me this. So awesome.

Great ideas

Okay..so the following are being removed from my list of "great ideas":

Taco Bell after 1AM.

That's it.

It was a lot of Taco Bell. I'm actually sort of ashamed of myself. I mean it-was-A-LOT of Taco Bell.

Mexican? YES WE CAN!!

I just found out that one of my favorite restaurants will be coming to Saratoga Springs this summer. El Mexicano which is located in Hudson Falls, will be opening another restaurant here. The place is legit. Best Mexican food I've ever had. You hear that world....BEST MEXICAN FOOD I'VE EVER HAD!!!

Pig eating pig

This is a picture of local idiot hero Curtis Fera eating a sandwich with 14 slices of bacon. I'm pretty sure this can't be good for you. Curtis is a true champ though. If anyone can do it, he can.

Are you kidding me!!?!??!!!

Another car parks on the crosswalk. What is it about this crosswalk that people don't seem to understand?

I took a nicer approach to my note this time. I was feeling good today.

The Decemberists

Will someone please step forward and admit that this band sucks. Oh, I guess I just did.

Can we also finally admit that the Lord of the Rings trilogy sucked. Is it too soon to say that?

I could really go for a Subway meatball sub today.

Chipotle update

Drove past the location of the proposed Chipotle. This is all they have up. A sign they made at a local Kinkos that says "Soon" and two pieces of wood covering a door. What the hell. Don't they know how important this is? Build the damn place already.

What part of toasted don't you understand?

Toast

Not Toast

The concept of toasting bread or any type of bread like product (like a bagel, for example) is simple. You put the bread in the toaster, give it a few seconds (sometime minutes depending on the toaster) and then you got toast. Toast being bread that has a bit of a char on it, a good crunch, slightly stiff so it can hold all that melted butter or topping of your choice and a slightly different (almost nutty) flavor. To me, that's toast. Any type of toaster works. This means the top load toasters that you find in most homes, conveyor belt style toasters, toaster ovens. It's a freakin chemical reaction that any unsupervised 10 year old can do. Heat is applied to the bread. Shit happens in the toaster and like magic, you got toast. Easy, right? What is so fucking hard about that?

What toast isn't is slightly warmed up bread that looks and taste exactly the same as it did when it went in originally. That isn't toast. That my friends is what I call bullshit.

On a side note. I also have a friend whose nickname is Toast. She's a hippy space cadet who believes in unicorns. She once drove past me and beeped her car horn while I was standing on a corner. She later told me that she wanted to yell "how much bitch!!".

You shouldn't park your car there.

It was a long day at work today. So when I got out I decided to skip the gym and head downtown to get a cup of coffee, read the paper and relax. When I got to the corner I saw that some idiot had parked his car right in the crosswalk. I hate that shit.

So I did what any good citizen would do. I called the cops to inform them of the legal matter. They responded quickly

I also left the owner a note explaining why I was upset.

Hurry up and finish getting built!!

One of these is opening up in Saratoga Springs. I'm more excited about this than the time I found a juicebox in the break room.

If you pinch me I will strike you down

Luke Skywalker had the luck of the Irish on his side when he used his green lightsaber to take down his old man in Return of the Jedi.

Someone told me that if I didn't wear anything green on St Patricks Day I'd get pinched. I've never heard of this. Sooooo like anything else, I must turn to the world wide web for answers.

This is what I found out over at Yahoo Answers.

St Patrick's Day is national pride day in Ireland. Nationalists and Catholics wear green, while unionists and Protestants wear orange in protest. If you're caught not wearing green it's almost like you're choosing to side with the unionists. That's why you get pinched. To make you feel bad and humiliated for not having Irish pride.

Hey...I feel pretty damn bad and humiliated all on my own. I don't need a lack of Irish pride for that.

I'm not wearing green on St Paddy's Day. If you pinch me I will punch you. Just sayin. Getting pinched by people makes me jumpy. Besides...I had a huge shamrock shake yesterday. Isn't that enough?

Top of thee morneeng fat ass

Did you know that people are obsessed with McDonald Shamrock Shakes? I had no idea these seasonal minty shakes that's only available during the month of March for St Paddy's day were so popular. And being that they are so popular, I assumed every McDonalds carried these green beauties but I guess that isn't the case. Nope. Not at all. My friend Kara informed me that she has to drive all the way to Albany, NY (about 30 minutes south of Saratoga Springs, NY) to get one. I mean it's not that bad...she goes to school in Albany so it's not like she's going way out of her way to get one. But still, that's bullshit. She shouldn't have to drive that far. No one should. I'm almost sure they sell them at the Saratoga Springs McDonalds or a McDonalds closer than Albany. So instead of driving to all of my local McD's to find out, I did what any good red blooded fat assed American would do. I sat my fat ass in front of the computer and sent an email to Ronald McDonald himself asking him where I could purchase one.

This is the email Mr Ronald McDonald sent back to me....

Dear Mr O'Carlton,

Thank you for taking the time to contact McDonald's. We appreciate your interest in our Shamrock Shake.

The Shamrock Shake is a "promotional" product offered for a limited time only. Since the decision to offer promotional products is made on a region by region basis, I have forwarded your comments to the McDonald's regional office in your area for their consideration in deciding if they will offer the Shamrock Shakes to their customers next year.

Once again, thank you for taking the time to contact McDonald's and sharing your comments with us. Hopefully, the Shamrock Shake will be offered at your local McDonald's next year.

Bastard sent me a generic email. Thanks for nothing creepy clown. Doesn't matter. Turns out I can buy one at my local McD's. Sweet. I'd better load up on my lactaid pills.

If you want to know where you can get a shamrock shake, go to http://www.shamrockshakes.com/. Or get in the car (fat ass), head to your local McDonalds (fat ass) and find out for yourself. You don't even have to get out of the car (fat ass). Just pull up to the drive thru (fat ass) and take a gander at the menu. If they don't sell them get yourself a 10 piece McNugget (fat ass) so it's not a wasted trip.

Dance for me

Let me start off by saying that I wasn't WATCHING Dancing With The Stars. It just happened to be on the television as I was walking past it and I heard something that made me stop to take a gander. Again..I wasn't WATCHING it. I was just curious.

What peaked my curiosity was one of the couples were dancing to The Clash. I just thought it was weird that The Clash was being played on Dancing With The Stars. I only bring this up because I wonder if any of you out there think it's strange too. I think it's even stranger that Steve-O from Jackass is on the show. And you'd think U.S. gymnast Shawn Johnson would have some sort of advantage.

Again....I don't watch the show.

Watching the Watchmen

Yeah, saw it. Not too bad. I mean I'm not wishing I had the 2 hours and 40 minutes back. But I sort of wished I didn't see it only because I loved the comic book. If you've never read the comic book series then I have a feeling you'll really enjoy it. Visually it looks great, they were pretty faithful to the story and the cast did a good job. I guess the biggest problem to me was it's just better as a comic book. That's all I got to say about it.

Kiss vs my cholesterol

I was notified through a friend that the band Cynic was back together again and touring. Which I'm pretty excited about. But this tidbit of music news also made me think of my cousin Gary. Because it was my cousin Gary who got me into the band. Gary was much older than me and back in 1987 when I was a Sr in high school, we use to get together and listen to music. Cynic was one of the bands, and at the time, was one of his favorite bands. He loved that shit, and so did I....but much before that....WAY before that.....back in the 70's. Gary was a HUGE HUGE Kiss fan. He LOVED Kiss. He had posters of the band all over his wall. Had every record. The guy was even in the Kiss Army. I remember being a little kid and going to visit his family on weekends. My parents and his parents would hang out in the kitchen and Gary would be in charge of entertaining me and my little brother. Which meant he'd take us to his room and we'd play board games and listen to Kiss. Only problem. Kiss-scared-the-living-shit out of me. I mean I was terrified. This was around 1975 or 1976. So I must of been 6 or 7 years old. We'd go up to his room and there would be posters of his favorite band member, Gene Simmons with blood all over his face, on every corner of his room. Of course it didn't help that my cousin knew this and would then feed all these crazy ideas into my head to fuck with me. But he was also very kind in the fact that he had bunk beds. So he'd drap over sheets over both sides of the bunk and make a little fort for me. Shielding me from the scary pictures of Gene Simmons and the rest of Kiss. But in order to get to the fort, I had to walk through his room and beeline it to the bed...which was just like walking through gates of pure evil. So there would be a good 10 seconds of total fear on my part. But once I was in the fort, I was safe. From time to time whenever I'd get out of line he'd either threaten to call Kiss(he claimed that since he was in the Kiss Army, they could be summoned by him through an evil chant..which I now realize it was just him closing his eyes, putting his hands together and humming Kiss tunes) to come take me away..or worse, he'd throw me out of the bunk bed and wouldn't let me back in, exposing me to the evil pictures on the wall, where he would then do his chant to summon Gene Simmons to steal my soul and then kill my Mom, Dad and little brother. Then I'd start to cry, his mom would yell from the kitchen and then he'd let me back in. This was pretty much the cycle every Saturday for a couple of years. I remember the drive from my parents house to my cousins house was this hellish anxiety drive because I knew I had to deal with this. And it was always on the weekends! Can you imagine starting your Saturday mornings knowing you could possibly become souless and an orphan by the evil Gene Simmons instead of being at home in your PJ's watching hours of Scooby Doo and Johnny Quest with a belly full of Fruit Loops? Yeah, thanks for mentally fucking me up cuz. Eventually I got over it and realized they were nothing but a shitty rock band from New Jersey who needed a gimmick to get popular. Now days I fear my cholesterol more than anything. Every so often I'll run into my cousin and we'll laugh about it. He'll even do the chant if I ask.

Eventually the 80's came and the next stage of fear came along. My cousin Nicki use to come over on weekends and make me watch hours of Duran Duran video tapes with her.

I'm still in therapy over that one.

Yo La Tengo

L to R: Georgia Hubley, James McNew, Ira Kaplan

I started writing this post when I was in Connecticut but never posted it because I fell asleep. I was writing about the time I saw Yo La Tengo in Albany at a club called Bogies back in the early 90's. I was a huge fan and had never seen them. So I was pretty psyched they were playing. I can't remember how many bands were on the bill, but Yo La Tengo was the headliner. When I walked into the club I was pretty surprised to see Ira Kaplan working the merchandise booth. I figured they had someone to do that for them. But that what was great about bands like them. They were approachable..to a point. So I went up to him, introduced myself, told him my name, told him about my band DRYER (1991 - 2001) and how we loved his band and then I shamelessly begged him to play the song Griselda off of the record FakeBook for me. I mean it was shameless. I think I even grabbed his shirt and begged. He just sort of nodded his head and said "we'll see". They weren't going on for another hour or so, so I figured he'd forget about my request. Which was fine with because all I really cared about was the fact that I was seeing Yo La Tengo. After sitting through the openers, they were finally onstage. They played a great set of songs all night. They were just so amazing to listen to. They played for awhile and right at the end, when I figured I wasn't going to hear my request, Ira starts to tell the audience about how some guy came up to him and begged him to play a song..and that my entire self esteem was riding on it. He even remembered my name. Then they played Griselda. It was awesome. I'll never forget that show. One of my top 5 favorite live shows.

Here's the song from Fakebook. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Hi ma'm. How are you?

I was called ma'm today by a woman who works at the casino. Okay, I admit I'm due for a haircut but it's not that long. And I don't have girlish features other than my awesome man boobies. If I had a beard I wouldn't have this problem. I can't even grow facial hair. :(

I'm still an emotionless robot

Well 3 hours and 20 minutes after leaving Skidmore College campus and another 45 minutes to check into my room and then explore a little bit. I find myself sitting at the bar eating a late dinner and drinking Dupee Martinis (miller lite with an olive). The drive was pretty good. Not as much snow as I expected. So far nothing exciting has happened. I'm counting calories. How's that for excitement?

Here's something. I heard Dolly Partons version of Whitney Houstons "I will always love you". I thought it was freaking beautiful. Maybe it's the Dupee martinis talking. Who knows. Still. It was beautiful.

Alright. Time to go.

UPDATE
I guess Dolly wrote it. I'm a certified idiot. Waaah!

Connecticut bound

Well the weather is pretty shitty in the Connecticut area. They are looking at a foot of snow..maybe more. As luck would have it I am traveling there today for work to a place called Mohegan Sun Casino and Resort for a college bookstore conference. For some reason these things are always held at casinos. I guess no one would go if it wasn't. Anyways, there is much to say right now but I'm sure there will be plenty by this evening. I will say this. The last time I was at one of these......well...nothing exciting happened. But you never know.

Stay tuned!!

Egg Fu Young and Potatoes

I went out with my friends Thad and Mike last night for a couple drinks downtown and on the way out of the bar I remembered why I hate going out on the weekends. I decided to leave early so I said goodbye and left the bar by myself. I was minding my own business and walking up Caroline St to my car and some asshole said "Hey chicken lo mein...go cook me up some dumplings". Now normally I'd think that was kind of funny and I think I even laughed a bit. But I ignored him and kept walking. But this asshole just kept going on and on. Calling me everything from your standard "china man" to "egg fu young". He basically called me every item you'd find on Chinese menu. Hey, at least he was creative. I give him that. I tried to ignore him but found it difficult because he kept calling me names. So I found myself turning around and confronting the guy who was obviously incredibly trashed, could barely stand and if I hit him, I knew there was no way in the world he would be able to defend himself. His buddy, who was sober just stood there and kept shrugging his shoulders saying "hey, I can't control him..you want a cigarette?". I brought up the fact that I was walking past him, ignoring him and minding my own business when he decided to be an asshole. At this point he's using his fingers to pull the corners of his eyes back and sticking his teeth out...you know, to make him look Asian. So obviously he wasn't going to listen. So I had this dilemma. Do I just ignore the guy and walk away but hate myself for not sticking up for myself? Or do I teach him a lesson and just beat the piss out of him. But since he was drunk I doubt he'd remember why he got a beat down and he'd have to rely on his friend to remind him the next morning of why his face was all fucked up. Which still didn't seem like much satisfaction to me because violence doesn't resolve problems. So as I was pondering all of this, the guy was calling me "fried won tons" at this point and told me to do his laundry. That's when this other guy, some guy who wasn't a part of this conversation just jumps in and says "what the fuck is your problem with the Irish?!?!" Wait..what? The Irish?....No, he didn't say anything about the Irish. So now I have an angry drunk Irish guy starting a fight with the guy who was starting a fight with me. All the while, his sober buddy was calmly smoking a cigarette and offering all of us one of his cigarettes. At this point the guy stops calling me Chinese food items and starts telling the angry Irish guy about how much he hates potatoes and how Ireland has a shitty soccer team etc etc. Again, kind of funny. Just not funny last night. So now I'm kind a pissed because I'm like..hey man..this is my fight. Well the Irish guy now takes his jacket off and throws it in the middle of Caroline St..which was nuts because it must of been 15 degrees last night. The drunk guy continues to talk shit about the Irish. The sober cigarette smoker is still smoking. And I'm just standing there wondering why am I still standing there. No one is throwing punches and it's obviously not going to get resolved. So as I was about to leave, the drunk racist guy says "hey beef and broccoli I ain't done with you yet". Just as he says this, 3 guys walk out of the bar. Who all happen to be Asian. What are the chances of that? Everyone freezes and the drunk racist points to each one of us and what felt like forever, he goes down the line and calls each one of us a name. Starting with the Irish guy by callin him a "potato eating mother fucker" (putting his finger in the face of the angry Irish guy), Asian guy 1 he calls "beef chow mein" (putting his finger in his face), Asian guy 2 he calls "soy sauce" (pointing and then swirling his finger as if was mixing soy sauce) and then calls the Asian guy 3 "general tso" (then saluted the guy because he assumed he was a general). And then gets to me and says "linguine and clam sauce". Umm yeah, that last one was just sort of awkward. Even his calm, sober, cigarette smoking buddy seemed thrown off with that one. I think I actually laughed out loud at this point. To top it off, he then puts his hands together and bows to all of us. We all stood there for a second and then all of a sudden the jacketless Irish guy just punched the fuck out of the dude. Drunk racist went flying backwards and into the street and was out cold. The 3 Asian guys laughed and kept walking. His sober cigarette smoking friend was still smoking, still calm and just stood there and kept offering all of us cigarettes. And as for me. Well I just decided to leave. Honestly I'm glad I didn't hit the dude. But I'm glad someone did.