The bearable likeness of being

I'm going to ask you to bear with me now as I launch off on another series of me Photoshopping my face on things. It amuses me if no one else. Actually my 19-month old daughter seems to be getting a kick out of it. Every now and then she toddles by, points at the screen and says, "Da Da!" I love how she just accepts it as me and doesn't judge.

We all could learn a lot from toddlers. Well, except for attention spans. They pretty much don't have any. But that does make them a perfect focus group for what works on the Web.

But I digress.

I think if there was a Guinness record for Photoshopping your face on things I'd have it hands down. I pretty much will try to Photoshop my face on anything. I am willing to bet I am the only one who has ever Photoshopped their face on whale vomit. There is a certain distinction in that. The only thing that has really stumped me so far is trying to Photoshop my face on an elephant. Some day I'll figure that out, too.

I don't apologize for grafting my face to things. It is a harmless diversion. Though one person did get pretty ticked off when I put my face on a Picasso painting. They seemed to think I was defacing fine art. I actually thought I was making them my own. Regardless, I didn't feel bad that the person was offended. I was more offended that they were offended. I was nice about it at the time. I shrugged when I really wanted to flip them the virtual finger and tell them to go darken the towels at someone else's blog.

That person eventually stopped dropping by anyway. Most people do. I suppose there is only so much interest anyone can have in a blog essentially dedicated to Photoshopping the blogger's face on things. Though I like to think I slip in a little philosophy and off color humor in there now and then to spice things up.

Wait, I just told my daughter to take the Swiffer Dust Wand she is running around with and dust the cat. I want to see how it plays out. Just a second. I'll be right back.

Okay, that wasn't quite the good idea I thought it was. Oh well, we have other cats. Anyway, as I was saying, it is hard to maintain a high interest level on any blog unless you mix things up now and then. That's why I go back and forth between nasty rants, heart tugging reminiscences about my childhood and just plain old brain farts. Rest assured that the one thing that remains consistent about my blog is my face. Somethings may not be pretty but they bear repeating.

Making a Pope out of myself

This photo is not unlike my previous photo. For some reason I am reminded of the Coneheads. I have to admit the coolest thing about being the Pope would be to wear all of those funky hats.

But back to making myself the Pope. This is not something I would be allowed to do if I was paid to create this crap. Everyone I worked for would panic thinking somehow they'd be blamed for Tim being too colorful. That could lead to lawsuits and firings. The Vatican has a bigger legal department than Elvis Presley Enterprises. So at some level my judgement would be overturned by some one's act of self preservation and I'd be forced to post a photo of me as a bunny or something less controversial.

Which is just one more reason I'm glad I'm not wildly popular. Even if you are just standing on a dung heap, someone is bound to be pissed because you have a better view of the swamp.

Note to self: Start keeping a list of your original colloquialisms for submission to a publisher. Perhaps working title should be the Idiot's Guide to Colloquialisms.

Note to self: I can't believe I spelled colloquialism correctly without running a spell check.

Back to talking to you (whoever you are):

It is not that I don't have limits. Even I think some things are beyond good taste. I can't think of one right off the top of my head, but I'm sure I'd know it if I said or did it. I happen to think most of what Howard Stern (the radio shock jock not Anna Nicole Smith's lawyer) says and does is in remarkably bad taste. Degrading people isn't funny, it just illustrates you have pretty low self-esteem. Personally I've always thought Howard Stern looks like a drag queen doing a bad impersonation of Cher.

I suppose there is a fine line between making fun of someone and pointing out the obvious. George W. Bush is a perfect example. Even late night talk show hosts have given up trying to make fun of him. It's like pointing out the village idiot every day. It may be funny the first time, but then it is just sad.

But generally I've found, you can find offense in anything if you look hard enough. Any presidential candidate can tell you that. If people spent as much time looking for good in things as they do for reasons to feel offended, everyone would be happy.

If I really was the Pope I'd issue one of those Holy Writs (or whatever they call them) making it so.

Note to self: Holy Grits would be one hell of a name for a breakfast cereal in the Bible Belt. Maybe the Pope would endorse it. If not I could. "Holy Grits make for one hell of a breakfast" or "Holy Grits fortify the spirit and the bowels" or "Holy Grits: Moral fiber for your next religious movement."

Note to self: I think I've discovered another one of my limits of good taste.

Making an ass out of myself

Speaks for itself, doesn't it?

Colorful character

I often wonder what people think about me. I imagine more often than not, they don't. But please shoot me if anyone ever starts referring to me as a "colorful character." It's right up there with being referred to as a "delightful old codger."

Oh, I think it is okay to have a colorful character, you just don't want to be a colorful character, especially if you are middle aged.

I actually think I was more of a colorful character when I was a young man. I remember going to a company Christmas party dressed in black jeans, a white double breasted tux jacket, a black turtleneck with a native American choker and black boots. I also had a ponytail and an earring. Our finance director introduced me to his wife as "our resident Bohemian." I have to admit I did fancy myself as part of the artist fringe crowd. Now I would have just called myself a poser.

I've mellowed quite a bit in my old age. I don't regret losing the ponytail, though. There isn't a middle aged man in the world who looks good in a ponytail. Or an earring. Life after 4o for men is pretty much Tommy Bahama, Dockers, t-shirts and sweats. I am grateful that leisure suits peaked when I was in my 20s.

Perhaps I should design a fashion line for middle aged men. Every thing would be in black gray or dark blue. It would have to include fashionable slacks cut full and discretely expandable at the waist. Shirts would all be untucked and oversized to mask the belly. The collar would somehow lift and pull back the double chin. I'd market it as the Fountain of Youth line. It would make you look 20 years younger. I'd open up shops in malls. Maybe I'd call them Methusala's Closet or Wrinkle in Time. I'd make it hip to be old.

Sometimes I amaze myself.

Recline of civilization

"I sit therefore, I am."
--Tim Id

Everyone should have a chair. More precisely, everyone should have a chair that is pretty much their chair and not subject to free range sitting.

Mine is a leather easy chair with a matching ottoman. Before I was married, my chair was a faux leather recliner. Before that it was a thrift store orange velour recliner that had a tendency to lose parts when you reclined.

I'd say my butt has come up in the world.

My father never really had a chair. He had one end of a sofa. It wasn't even strategically positioned to have the best view of the television. He liked sitting on the sofa, though. He used it to spread out his maps, treasure magazines, books and notebooks that he used to take notes about the lost treasures he hoped to one day find.

He never did. So he might as well have had an easy chair and enjoyed his leisure time in comfort.

My easy chair is positioned in the best position to watch our big screen television and the optimal position to appreciate the surround sound. It is also a great place to sit with my laptop and peck out blog posts when nothing worth watching is on the big screen television (or sometimes when something worth watching is on television).

Actually I'm watching the season finale of Desperate Housewives right now. I'm not sure whether I classify it as worthwhile or not. And did you hear they cancelled Men in Trees? I'm telling you, it was the writer's strike that ruined television as we know it. And now we're heading into the summer with nothing but America's Got Talent, Last Comic Standing and a Nashville version of American Idol hosted by Billy Ray Cyrus.

But I digress.

With television sucking the way it has of late, I may resort to using my favorite chair for...gasp...reading a book.

Timwulf

Every now and then I feel a surge of testosterone and get the urge to watch films that appeal to the warrior guy in me. Braveheart was one of those films and 300 (the film about the 300 Spartan warriors) was another. Pop those puppies in the DVD player and you immerse yourself in some good old fashion sword slashing mayhem. I say, "hoo yah."

So when I saw the film Beowulf was available on Netflix, I slapped it into my list thinking I was in for a macho treat of blood and guts in the Braveheart tradition. Okay, there was plenty of blood and guts, but Beowulf is really nothing more than a computer-generated comic book.

Bummer.

The film had some well know stars like Anthony Hopkins, Angelina Jolie and John Malkovich. You can recognize them in their CGI (or whatever technology it is) doppelgangers, but they are freakish in the same way the characters in Tom Hanks Polar Express were. They are lifelike in a not lifelike kind of way. These characters were like Shrek on steroids.

I watched this film in the same way you'd watch a train wreck. And then I watched the Making of Beowulf segment in the DVD's special features section. And I discovered the really disturbing part of the film. The actor who plays the megabuff Beowulf --Ray Winstone -- is a middle aged man with a major pot belly.

Okay, on one level this gives hope to the rest of us middle aged dudes with pot belly's who want to be buff heroes without working out. But on another level it creeps me out royal. This Beowulf spends half of the movie prancing around nude with his tally whacker hanging in the wind and having sex with Angelina Jolie. It was kind of okay when he was a mythic hero with major abs. But to find out he really is just a blob with more chins than Jabba the Hut is kind of like pulling the curtain back on the Wizard of Oz.

Okay and don't get me started on the guy who played Grendel the monster Beowulf slays. It's Krispin Glover (Marty McFly's father in Back to the Future). Grendel looks kind of like a cross between a zombie Popeye and the Hunchback of Notre Dame. Freaky as the monster is, it is still less freaky than Krispin Glover in real life. Nuff said.

Oh well, I suppose this was pretty cool technology, but I don't really get the point of having real actors doing all the work only to turn them into moving mannequins with spooky eyes. I can see computer generating monsters and mythical sets, but why real people when you have them right there creating the scenes?

Though it would be sweet to have a six pack belly, major bicepts and being able to slay a dragon without having to do a single sit up. I guess I'll just have to settle for my own Photoshopped world.

Getting along famously

With the plethora of programs like American Idol, Survivor, Last Comic Standing, America's Got Talent, etc, it dawned on me that there will probably come a point when everyone in America is famous. Then what we will we do? What's the point of being famous if everyone else is, too? Who is going to take your photo, ask for your autograph or stalk you?

Perhaps we need to start developing reality programs that promote obscurity. How about Who wants to be mediocre?, Biggest Loser (literally), America's biggest victim, or Who can't can't dance, sing or tell jokes?

Just a thought.

Butt, who nose

I am well aware that many of my posts tend to be on the negative side. But let's face it, negative stuff is much more funny than the positive stuff as long as it doesn't get too mean spirited. Okay, sometimes even the mean spirited stuff is funny, too.

Other than calling Gary Busey a whack job and occasional jabs at George W. , I try to confine my insults to categories of people and things and not personalize it too much. And I try to balance things out a bit by beating up myself.

But enough apologizing. I get sick of apologizing for potentially offending someone. Perhaps it is a side effect from living in Seattle. This land of political correctness has so many special interest groups that you can't swing a dead cat without offending someone. Now I've probably offended PETA, cat owners, vetrinarians, and swing dancers.

Jesus Christ on a crutch. Now I've offended Christians and people with disabilities. Sometimes I think if I haven't offended someone, I'm doing something wrong.

Obviously I struggle a bit with this issue. Because part of me has always wanted to be liked. But you can't always be liked, especially when you point peoples foibles. Fortunately nine times out of ten, most people with foibles don't know what the word means.

Insults just come naturally to me. Ironically, more often than not, I insult people I like. It's kind of my way of letting people know I like them without actually revealing I do.

Wow, that sounds pretty messed up. And I called Gary Busey a whack job. Maybe it's my dogs who have treed the invisible raccoon in the wrong tree.

But, who knows?

Too loose law trek

I have never been real good with other languages, including English. I took two years of German in high school and a semester in college. If I am ever in German speaking country I am confident I can find the library as long as it is "um die Ecke" (around the corner). Unfortunately, once I am there, I will be unable to read a single book.

Spanish would have been a much more useful language for me considering all the time I've spent in Spanish speaking countries (including Texas). And I love the way Spanish sounds. German always sounds as if you are shouting while gargling. Spanish sounds like poetry...very fast poetry, but poetry nevertheless.

Don't get me started on French. French is incomprehensible and unpronouncible. Plus it reeks of arrogance and assholes. And I say that with the utmost respect.

English is blah. Americans got the short end of the stick when they got stuck with English by default of colonization. It is not an exciting language. Perhaps that is why we mumble so much.

Though I don't believe many Americans speak English English. We pepper it with slang and accents that identify what part of the United States we hail from and what our economic status is. If someone uses the phrase, "Wellll, sheeeeIt" alot you can bet they are from Texas.

Of all of the American accents, I think New York accents are the worst. Even hello sounds like "fuck you" coming from a New Yorker.

I'm not sure what kind of accent I have. It meanders through the English language with educated white trash overtones that defy geographic pigeonholing. Idaho has no accent it calls its own. Most western states don't. Our accents are the eroded ones from our east coast and southern ancestors migrating towards the west. Half the time I think we just mimic sounds we hear on television.

So I suppose it is a good thing this is a written blog and not an oral one.

ShheeeeIt, yes.

Stop making sense

I was always a good headline writer. It's an art few outside the journalism realm appreciate. Because you don't catch a fish with the pole, you catch it with the hook. And a good headline hooks a reader into a story.

Or not.

Headline writers are notorious punsters. And not everyone appreciates (or gets) a pun.

It was my ability to write headlines that drew me to advertising and eventually marketing. Because I think good advertising is headline writing on steroids. Think about it. A good copywriter has 60 seconds, a sentence or one quarter page to attract you, reel you in and stun you with a fish whacker. It's like writing the Lord's Prayer on the head of a pin.

Think of the ads that endure and how deceptively simple they are: Got Milk? The Real Thing. Just Do It! Be all that you can be! Where's the beef? Who made the salad? Have it your way! My weiner has a first name...You are in good hands...King of Beers...How do you handle a hungry man? Plop, plop, fizz, fizz.

Obviously I am a child of television.

My days as a headline writer and copywriter are pretty much over these days. I am what they refer to as a "client side" advertising manager. I pay other people to be clever and sit back and bite my tongue to avoid blurting out puns and clever sayings to the ad agency people who work for me. Because there is nothing more annoying to a copywriter than for someone else to give them suggestions. So I just smile and nod at the clever things I'm presented.

Sometimes I wish I was just a copywriter again. It didn't pay squat, but it was sure fun.

Oh well, my 60 seconds are up.

Blogging: So easy a caveman could do it

Technically, I suppose it should be that blogging is so easy that even a Neanderthal could do it since caveman is pretty much a generic term and lumps all prehistoric or early man in one big primeval ignorant stereotypical ooze. Regardless, the point is that it is so easy to blog that just about anyone does. Blogging turns writing in to one big paint-by-numbers kit for non-writers.

Okay, it's nice to have a hobby. But do we really need to cast Aunt May's paint-by-number masterpieces into cyberspace to float around in the ether when they should be in a trunk in the attic?

The problem with millions of people blogging is that we are numbing the judgement receptors that normally would allow people to tell "shit from Shinola." If Shakespeare was alive today and blogging, I imagine he would be struggling for hits and comments on Hamlet while some some illiterate S&M goat lover in the hinterlands amasses a small but significant following.

Such is blogging. It trades art for memes and nearly naked Thursdays.

But what should we expect from a country that thrives on reality television and celebrity fuck ups.

Og's head hurt. Must stop now.

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah

Today I blah, blah, buh blah blah blah. Then I blah, buh bah, blah blah blahed. It's not that I blah, blah blah. It's just that I blah, blah blah.

But I blah.

Blah, buh blahed, last night. The blah is still blahing the same old blah. It's as if I never blahed the blah blah. Then I stopped by blah. Same blah.

Why does everyone blah the blah blah? They blah blah blah and blah blah blah. I blah, they say, blah and blah. But they never really blah.

I refuse to blah, blah blah the same old blah, blah, blah. "Blah you, you bloaher," I say.

Sorry for the blah, blah, blah. It's just that blah blah blah really gets me blah.

That's blahging for you.

Is this thing on?

"A horse walks into a blog, the blogger asks him, 'Why the long face?'"

I love that joke. Maybe that is part of the problem. I see humor in the oddest things.

This blog for example. It cracks me up. And I don't say that in a conceited way. Because I pretty much think I'm in the minority here.

It occurs to me that blogging is a bit like talking to yourself out loud...alot.

I was coming out of the train station Monday morning on my way to work and while waiting at the crosswalk for the light to change (we wait for lights in Seattle) a street crazy struts up in a tank top carrying a large plastic bag and starts shrieking obcenities at the commuters. It was a racially themed tirade with political thread. It occurred to me that if the guy hadn't been a homeless raving lunatic, he would have made a great blogger.

But I digress.

I suppose in a way, I'm a frustrated standup comedian. I love making people laugh. I imagine part of it is trying to get people to laugh with me than at me. When I was in junior high, I was one of those quiet kids who would mumble funny things that only the kid sitting next to me could hear. I considered it a coup if I could make someone laugh out loud in class and get creamed by the teacher while I sat their innocently pretending I was taking copious notes.

I catch myself trying out new (and old) material on co-workers as I wander the halls at work as if it was open mike night. If something works, I may repeat it five or six times in a day until I've got the timing just right. And like a real standup comedian, I often go to far in the adrenalin stoked high of making people laugh and step over the line in my search for a laugh. Then there is this awkward silence and I slink on back to my office.

The problem is, I'm not a standup comedian. It's hard to foster a professional image and advance your career when you are always pretending you are warming up the room for the headliner.

But seriously folks...take my blog...please.

Ha, ha, ha...

Is this thing on?

Gary Busey is a whack job

I think I am stating the obvious about Gary Busey along with the disclaimer that I have never met Gary Busey. And it is probably not fair to judge someone based on lots of video clips of them babbling incoherently on television while hopping around in a straightjacket, but I think it is a pretty good sign that all of that good ol' boys dogs ain't barking.

I have never really paid much attention to Gary Busey. I am sure he would say the same thing about me. I was just watching some stupid gossip television program like Inside Edition while I was picking up EM's  toys. They were showing the usual stupid teaser clips about hairless cats and chimps who won the lotto. And then they flash to a clip of Gary Busey in a straightjacket screaming, "Let me out of this thing."

Okay, I have seen Busey guest starring on episodes of Entourage acting freaky and I'd briefly paid attention to the bizarre shots of him at the Oscars bursting into a Jennifer Garner interview and kissing her on the neck. But I assumed the straightjacket was just a publicity stunt for something. And it sort of was. He was doing a photoshoot for a book called the Dirty Side of Glamour. The proceeds are supposed to benefit Katrina victims. Something tells me that Busey wasn't really acting though.

Okay, the dude was in a motorcycle accident in 1998 where he wasn't wearing a helmet. So I suppose we can forgive him being a whack job and believing he channels Buddy Holly. But I don't think he deserves to be a celebrity. I get enough of this kind of bizarre shit on the streets of Seattle. I don't need to see this squirrel bait threatening to rip out someone’s endocrine system if they make him wear a straightjacket (which he puts on five minutes later).

I imagine this could all be an act like big time wrestling, but if it is then Gary Busey is a pretty pitiful whack job. And it is a pretty sad statement about our society that watching a raving looney in a straightjacket has become primetime entertainment.

But watching a Star Wars themed Deal or No Deal...well, that's entertainment.

Edgy, or groovin' in the grass is a gas baby can you dig it?

I mowed the lawn today. Then I began the tedious task of edging the front lawn. This is not a normal task for me. I bought Tess a manual edger for Christmas (she said she wanted an edger...how was I supposed to know she wanted an electric one...I didn't even know they made electric edgers...but I digress). I am not an edger kind of person. Edgy, maybe, but I have never to the best of my knowledge edged a lawn before.

So suffice it to say it was out of character for me to finish mowing the lawn and then decide to edge the puppy. It didn't take me long to realize why I had never edged a lawn before and it didn't take me much longer to understand why Tess had wanted an electric lawn edger. Edging a lawn is not easy. But it looks pretty cool once you have done it...well in an OCD kind of way.

I edged both sides of the driveway and the front area where my lawn meets the sidewalk. I had to quit when the rain began. The tricky part will be edging the parts near the flower beds. I mean, the sidewalk and driveway give you a line to follow. The flower beds are more freeform and there is nothing to guide the edger. I mean, how can you edge without an edge?

Note to self: Potential title of book, "Zen and the art of edging or how can you edge without an edge."

Maybe not.

Anyway, I kept looking out the window all day looking at my newly edged lawn. It looks so finished. But then it occurred to me that it won't last long. Just as the friggin' grass grows out in a week or so, the edge is going to creep back over the line and I'll have to redo it, over and over and over.

This has me on edge. What if it snows next week like it snowed last week? I won't be able to mow and manage the edge. Even now, I can hear the grass growing and the edge creeping.

I think I'm going over the edge here. Just don't get me started on beauty bark.

Do you smell that?

I was watching an episode of Weird Travels on the Travel Channel while I was working out on an elliptical machine at the gym yesterday. This episode was about Bigfoot. I was only catching maybe the last 15 minutes of the show but it was your usual guys trudging around in the woods setting up infrared cameras and to take pictures of Bigfoot and usually just snapping shots of squirrels and deer. But then they cut to a segment of these guys in Oklahoma tracking Bigfoot with the aid of a rather large Seminole Indian guide. The camera guy is filming the back of the guide and all of a sudden he stops and turns to camera, smiles and asks, "Do you smell that...do you smell that? The stink? That really bad stink?"

Okay, all I could think was the big guy farted and was enjoying gassing out the stupid white guys who probably paid him a bundle to shuffle around in the woods and pretend he was tracking a giant apelike creature. I don't know who was stupider, the guys filming the crap or me for watching it. Because all of these shows are the same. They build up a lot of drama about nothing, show you some grainy photos of what could be anything and waste an hour of your time without producing a single shred of evidence of anything. And adding insult to injury they film a fat guy farting and try to make you think they were showing you video footage of someone smelling Bigfoot.

I feel just as cheated by programs about UFOs, JFK conspiracy theories and the plethora of reality programs about haunted houses. You never see anything but bad video that looks like an outtake from the Blair Witch Project. I'm beginning to believe Bigfoot doesn't exist, there are no UFOs, Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone and ghosts are nothing more that dust on your camera lens.

Well pull my finger. That just stinks.

Global warming?

It snowed here in Edmonds, Washington on April 18. This is wrong in so many ways. A week ago I was mowing the lawn in 78 degree weather without a cloud in the sky. I'd say our weather is officially screwy.

I know that the theory of global warming doesn't mean we'll all get tropical temperatures and a tan. I understand at some level that melting ice caps dump freezing waters into warmer waters which in turn cool the air and create colder temperatures in some areas that weren't used to it.

It just all seems so topsy turvy. I mean April showers are supposed to bring May flowers and Mayflowers are supposed to bring Pilgrims. What are we supposed to say now? April snow flurries bring May worries?

I suppose the good thing is that when it snows here, people drive less which reduces the emissions that create the greenhouse effect and cause global warming.

Ironic isn't it?

Achealy's Heel

I had another ephiphany today. One of my downfalls as a writer...and as a person in general...is my adversion to criticism. I don't take it well. I absorb it and dwell on it obsessively. And too often my reaction to it is to projectile vomit right back at whoever is providing me with the criticism.

So I go out of my way to try and do everything right so I can avoid criticism and the emotional anquish it causes me. And since no one can do everything right (except in their own head) I still get criticized. And I take it even harder since I go out of my way try and avoid it by doing the right thing.

This makes my life quite challenging at times.

This ephiphany came after readying Kat's blog post about writer's groups and what other people's experience has been with them. It became crystal clear to me when I tried to formulate a response to that question, that I avoid writer's groups and creative writing classes like the plague because I can't stand criticism. My response when someone tells me how they would have written some passage I've written is generally visceral: "Well good thing I'm not you, then, isn't it?"

When I was younger, I used to think I didn't like criticism because it was always unfounded. I would do extremely complicated mental gymnastics to justify my rightness even in the face of evidence to the contrary. If someone couldn't see the genius in what I was doing or saying, then they were an idiot. As I've aged, I realize that isn't a position that endears you to people. But it is a hard habit to break. It is so much easier to always be right and know everyone else isn't.

Though now that I know that I'm not always right, I am facing this crisis of confidence wondering if I ever was right and ever will be. I realize rationally this isn't any more realistic than thinking I'm always right. I imagine, though, that it is an offshoot of my theory that the older I get, the less I know.

So where does this all leave me? I'd like to be able to accept constructive criticism (an oxymoron in my book) without wanting to shove it back down the critic's pie hole. I want to be able to put it in perspective. I also want to be able be realistic about myself. I can't always be right and I can't always be wrong.

BTW, I'd tread lightly if you have the urge to question something I just wrote here, asshole.

Whoops.

Middle aged cool

One of many things I notice about being 50 is that it isn't easy being cool. It is easy to look stupid (especially if you are trying to look cool at 50). People just don't think of you as cool once you've been invited to join the AARP.

Actually I think it is impossible to try and look cool at any age. To look cool, you have to be cool first.

I think there are some cool looking old guys. I've always thought Sean Connery was cool (except when he had a ponytail in a couple of movies). Pierce Brosnan is cool. Most of the James Bond dudes stayed cool except for Roger Moore. Maybe it's the tuxedo's they wear. It's hard not to look cool in a nice tuxedo (note I said nice).

Paul Newman used to be cool before he started playing geriatric roles. Robert Redford is kind of cool, though he spent way too much time in the sun (I suppose that is why they had him play the Sundance Kid...ha, ha, ha). Harrison Ford is kind of cool as Indiana Jones, but he needs to lose the stud earring. I have pierced ears, too, but I realize that I would look stupid if I wore an earring at this point in my life. Because I would be trying to look cool.

None of the Rolling Stones are cool, especially Keith Richards. If they weren't famous, they'd be sitting at a bus stop muttering to themselves with urine running down their pantlegs. Nor are any of the other former heavy metal band rockers cool. No one over the age of 28 can pull off being called Slash, Boss or Boner. No one with a ponytail and Birkenstocks is cool. No one wearing a Speedo is cool. No one driving a Porsche, Corvette or Trans Am is cool.

It is hard for a man over 50 to be fashionable and cool because fashion is for the young. If I try to dress GQ or Details, I would look pitiful. Plus they don't make those clothes in middle aged men sizes. And clingy polyester is just wrong for most body types except Rob Thomas. Most of us older guys opt for Aloha shirts because we think they hide our bellies. Deep down I know that Aloha shirts are just maternity wear for middle aged men and they hide nothing. It's more like putting a shower curtain over an elephant.

Each older generation also thinks the younger generation dresses like crap. When we were on our cruise, there were some young 20-somethings walking about with what I thought were 80s throwback looks. One sported a mohawk and the rest had various stages of long stringy hair. One idiot wore a Yoda backpack thing on his back. I essentially wanted to do a General Patton on the kid and dope slap him across the Promenade Deck. But then I saw the older guys in their Speedos, black socks and ponytails walzing around with buckets of beers and I had to stand down.

I guess bad taste is just bad taste.

Survivor

I surpassed the 700 mark in blog posts a few posts ago. There was no fanfare or confetti. That is the way with blogs. Sometimes they are loud and boisterous. Sometimes they are quiet as a tomb. To survive in them you must be that bug on the windshield that hangs on despite the wipers and the wind.

Blogs are like life. Sometimes you just have to hang on.

I have never really been one of those overly social bloggers. It mirrors my life in that I have never been one of those overly social people. So I have a hard time engaging in the game that requires that you constantly read and comment on other people's blogs in order for them to read and comment on yours. I despise memes, avoid weekly rituals of nearly naked Thursdays and I don't post cartoons or jokes. I don't like lists and I refuse to ever again take part in any experimental blog communities that use the word freedom in vain.

The cheese stands alone. So does the vanilla ice cream cone it seems (inside joke).

But I digress.

I really am shooting for that 1000 post mark in my blog world. I realize there won't be any fireworks or parades for it either. But I do believe there will a little happy dance of my own to celebrate the milestone.

Beacon

Isn't this photo inspirational? Doesn't it just scream at you at you some cliche like, "See the light...see the light...see the light?" Well, I took it! And I enhanced it a bit with yes, you guessed it, Photoshop. Because it was taken in bright afternoon sunlight when we were sailing away from the L.A. World Cruise Center and the beacon wasn't on.

Isn't technology amazing? I've created a kind of digital black velvet painting. That's what I call art. And a pity that it is only digital. Because damned if I wouldn't hang this puppy on my wall.

Of course that is kind of what I've done. I've hung it on the virtual wall of Dizgraceland where I can enjoy it anytime I want. And the beauty of digital art is that even if someone steals it, it is still there.

Now that is inspiring.

Tequila

What the cluck?

I have always been fond of random things. Mexico is a good place for random things. I have learned not to question what most Gringos might label as illogical when visiting Mexico. After all, we are the ones paying thousands of dollars to invade their coastal towns to fry our skin while we snap picture after picture of anything that moves or doesn't move.

There isn't much to be proud of when you are an American tourist in Mexico. They are loud, obnoxious and definitely ugly. They haggle over everything and even try to talk the poor little girls selling Chicklets down on their price. I think the t-shirt vendors have the right idea when dealing with American tourists. They let themselves be talked down to three shirts for $10 smug in the fact that they are still making a $9 dollar profit and the shirts will shrink so much after the first washing that only the family miniature poodle will be able to squeeze into it (if the poodle will be caught dead in a "One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor" t-shirt).

But I digress. I snapped the photo above while frying my skin in the town square of Cabo San Lucas. We'd paid a kid to cart us into town with his bicycle. It is the Mexican version of a rickshaw. He charged us $10. A cab would have only cost of $6. I am a shrewd man with money while on vacation.

Anyway, the town square contains a gazebo, the carcass of a dead whale and this bush trimmed to look like a chicken or dove or some kind of bird. I think it was quite clever actually. So I did what all Americans do. I took a picture of it. Tess refused to pose by it. EM ignored it completely. She is not old enough to appreciate art.

The real highlight of Cabo is a visit at 10 a.m. (on a Sunday no less) to Cabo Wabo for my traditional shot of Cabo Wabo tequila. I'll download the video later. This was our third visit to Cabo Wabo. It is a night club owned by aged rocker Sammy Hagar famous for his hit song, "I can't drive 55." He should put out a new song called, "I can't afford to drive 55." Anyway, the place is famous for some reason for Cabo Wabo tequila and t-shirts.

Oh, we also stopped at Hard Rock for a traditional Mexican lunch before catching a cab back to the dock and our tender for the cruise ship. I never knew hamburgers and potato skins were a Mexican dish. But now I have a Hard Rock shot glass from Cabo to prove I've been there.

Our final stop was the market at the cruise terminal where I'm sure you can really get the best prices. I bought a larger silver chain and a hat that says Cabo San Lucas (and Pacifico Beer). The chain really looks cool when I'm doing my Al Pacino impression from the movie Scarface.

That about sums up our trip to Cabo. I love cultural experiences.

Fru Fru Drinks

After an eight-day cruise with a toddler and my pregnant wife, you'd think I'd have lots to write about. But for the life of me, I just haven't felt like writing. I even checked out this book from the cruise ship library called Chicken Soup for the Writer's Soul. It was chock full of inspirational crap by writers that was supposed to inspire all of us failed writers to keep writing. All I could think reading it was that it is always easy to be inspirational when you are successful. Plus I kept getting distracted by Jerry Seinfeld's Bee Movie that was playing on the postage stamp sized television in our postage stamp "mini suite."

I even had my laptop with me on the cruise. But it cost 45 cents a minute to use the Internet, so I used that as a justification not to blog.

I find lots of excuses these days not to write...turning 50, becoming a father (twice in less than a year), the writer's strike (solidarity my brothers), clipping my fingernails, clipping my toenails, staring off into space...the usual things. Again, it isn't that I haven't got things to write about. After all, they teach you in those creative writing classes that you need to have experience to write about before you can write. And I have 50 years of experience now. Trouble is, I feel as though it has all been written about.

I also feel like complaining a lot. For example, I ordered a new camera online to take on the cruise. It was a Canon Rebel XT digital SLR. I was sick of my current digital camera's delay of about a second from between the time you pushed the shutter and the photo was captured. The Rebel is supposed to take four frames per second. This is especially crucial when you have small children you are trying to photograph.

Anyway, I ordered this camera from a place called Broadway Photo in New York. They had the cheapest price anywhere on the Web and I felt pretty smug that I was getting a bargain and not having to pay sales tax. I placed the order and then got this e-mail from them that I needed to contact their customer service department to confirm the order. I thought this was odd. I called and the "customer service" rep proceeded to confirm my order and hard sell me on a bunch of accessories that jacked the price up to almost double before I could get off the phone. I am the sucker PT Barnum was always talking about.

The camera arrived three days before the cruise along with all the crap I didn't really need to go with it. I charged the battery and popped it into the slick looking new camera. I popped off three shots and it stopped working. Broadway Photo doesn't deal with defective merchandise despite their "Complete Satisfaction Guarantee." They only take things back if you haven't opened or used them. Any problems with the actual product has to be dealt with by the manufacturer. I had to pay $17.70 to ship the stupid camera to Canon for a warranty repair the day after I got it. Needless to say I didn't have it for the cruise. And Broadway Photo (may they experience jock itch for eternity) never even responded to any of my complaints.

But I digress. The cruise itself was my 16th cruise. It was my third on Norweigan Cruise Lines. And I have to say it was one of the worst cruises I've ever been on (the second worst cruise I had ever been on was my second cruise on Norweigan). Oh, the ports were fine and the weather was great. But it was the worst food I've ever had on a cruise ship. I had better food when I was in college living in a dorm.

As I mentioned, the cabin was miniscule even though it was billed as a suite. The bed was like sleeping on the floor. And Norweigan Cruise Lines wins the prize for the most expensive drinks and figuring out every way possible to get as much money out of you as possible once you are on board. I am suprised they didn't charge for toilet paper. They do provide complimentary hand sanitizer throughout the ship (including the elevators). Even my daughter began holding out her hands everytime we passed one of the dispensers. She still got sick (which led to a $142 charge to visit the ship's doctor).

Norweigan is extremely proud of their "Freestyle Cruising." Their marketing hype says this means you can do anything you want when you want. In actuality it means you spend a lot of time in line waiting to eat, get off the ship and do just about anything because nothing is organized. It should be called "Chaotic Cruising Without Any Semblance of Class." Even the formal night is optional. I was one of about three guys (not counting the waiters in the main dining room) wearing a tux.

Freestyle Cruising attracts freestyle cruisers. I've never seen so many guys in shorts wearing black socks with sandals in my life. And these same guys are also carrying around buckets of beer shaped like football helmets so they can get six beers for the price of five (and a free baseball hat or Red Stripe t-shirt). It was about 50 degrees out the last day of the cruise when we were sailing back to Los Angeles and these guys were walking around with their buckets of beer at 10 a.m. waiting for the grill to open up on deck so they could chuck down some dogs and burgers.

But I digress. I really don't feel like writing.

Blog reruns

One of the downsides of the golden years is that you can become forgetful. Stress doesn't help the situation. Lately I've been catching myself losing my train of thought mid-sentence. This doesn't help when you are trying to come up with a new blog topic. Some great idea will pop into my head and I'll start to jot it down and then it will dawn in me that I had that great idea in a post a couple of years ago.

Like tonight, I thought I'd title a post "Give us this day, our daily blog." Then I realized I wrote that post back in February of 2006: Give us this day, our daily blog.

Well, it was a good idea for a post anyway. But repeating the same blog is right up there with repeating the same joke. Eventually people get that frozen smile on their face that doesn't match their eyes and start avoiding you. I suppose that is one of the pitfalls of blogging way too long.

I fear at times I have run out of original ideas. I might as well start writing plots for sitcoms. They appreciate rehashing plots there.

If the truth were to be told, I sometimes like to go back and read some of my old stuff. The plus side of not remembering anything is that it all seems fresh and new to me. It's as if I am reading something someone else wrote. I catch myself chuckling and saying, "This guy is funny." Then I remember I wrote it and slap myself for such conceited thoughts.

But some of it was really funny.

I wish I could write as well as that guy again.

Sigh.

Do the right thing

We were driving home from taking Tess' mother out to Easter brunch in Olympia (a city about an hour and a half north of Seattle). It was pouring rain and traffic sucked. But then again traffic always sucks around here. I was driving in the HOV lane on Interstate 5. It is a lane reserved for cars with two or more passengers. And although it is the left hand lane on the freeway, it is not the fast lane.

I was driving the speed limit. Okay maybe 65 tops, but basically around the speed limit. A car whips up behind me. Then it pulls into the lane next to the HOV lane, passes me and whips back into the HOV lane in front of me. Then the driver deliberately and very plainly flips me the finger. Yes, he flashes me the bird, the nasty digit, the ultimate sign of disdain. And it is merely because I wasn't speeding in the carpool lane.

I had my wife and daughter in the backseat. The weather sucked. I was doing the right thing. And this piece of shit flips me the finger and speeds off into the distance like the frigging lowlife coward he is.

My parents taught me to do the right thing. I don't litter. I use my turn signal. I obey speed limits. I wear my seat belt. I return shopping carts to the cart return. I let people into the lane in front of me (when they signal). I don't walk against the "don't walk" signal. I brake for squirrels. I put the toilet seat down. I do the right thing. I believe doing the right thing defines a civilization. Flipping someone off for doing the right thing destroys a civilization.

It is not that I am a slave to foolish regulations. I step over lines in places that tell you to wait behind the line until called. I don't always color within the lines. But these are not laws that create order. Speed limits and traffic signals do.

I will teach my children to do the right thing, too. I will instill in them that it is selfish and a sign of poor character to think that laws apply to everyone but you. I will teach them to be civilized.

As for the piece of trash that flipped me off in the HOV lane...well, may the next car you flip off be an unmarked police car driven by someone who believes in doing the right thing, too.

Nifty 50s

"Today's 50 is yesterday's 40."
--They say

"Bullshit."
--Tim-Id

Twenty-five years ago I was freaked out by turning 25. All I could think about was that I was a quarter of a century old and I hadn't accomplished much. In another 2 1/2 hours I will be a half a century old and I suppose I have accomplished more than I had when I was 25. But it still kind of freaks me out.

Oh, I know I have quite a bit of living left. I have a lovely wife. I'm a father to an 18-month old daughter and I have a son arriving in July. I don't have time to reflect too much on the AARP sending me an invitation to join.

That is part of the beauty of having children. Your focus shifts. It's hard to be self-absorbed when you are comforting a toddler who has just upchucked lunch on you after a coughing spell. And it is hard not to feel a sense of accomplishment when she falls peacefully asleep in your arms after only 15 minutes of rocking.

So I guess turning 50 isn't so terrible. Just shoot me though if I ever refer to myself as 50 years young.

Reno Cowboys

 

 Years ago my best friend Michael J. moved to Reno, Reno to pursue his fortune in the world of casinos and slot machines. This was a perk for me because I went and visited him at least once a year. 

 I've always had a soft spot in my heart for Reno. I went there for the first time when I turned 21. Harold's Club and the Nevada Club still existed back then. I remember going to my first cabaret show at Harold's Club called Bordello. The first number was, "If you want to see my busoms you'll have to pop my balloons." The dancers actually came through the audience and let you pop a balloon. At 21, I thought that was the height of sophistication. 

Anyway, when Michael J. moved to Reno and started working at Harrah's, I was more than happy to take advantage of it as an excuse to visit him whenever I could. It was an opportunity to drink a little, gamble and little and go shoot groceries on the desert outside the city. While working at Harrah's, Michael met a Vietnam veteran named Joe. Joe liked guns and introduced Michael to the pleasure of driving out to the desert with a cooler of beer, lawn chairs and a .357 magnum with plenty of ammunition. Michael soon learned the Zen art of plinking away at random objects with a handgun. And on one of my trips to Reno, Michael introduced me to the joys of shooting up the desert. 

I was no stranger to guns. I grew up in Idaho. We used to go out on the desert and shoot cans with a .22 rifle. So I didn't really balk at Michael's suggestion that we drive out to the desert and engage in some theraputic target practice. But whereas growing up, we simply shot cans, Michael introduced me to the art of shooting groceries and produce. 

Before we hit the desert in Michael's Jeep, we stopped at a Ralph's Market and stocked up on things we thought would be fun to shoot. This included pineapples, coconuts, bottles of water, light french salad dressing, barbecue sauce and eventually Barney dolls. After the first shooting adventure, I was hooked. The desert shoots became the highlight of my Reno trips. I eventually bought my own pistol -- a chrome plated .357 magnum single-action pistol called, the Marshall -- and learned all the airline rules to pack it and take it on my Reno trips (this was long before 9-11).

Now granted, neither of us were great shots. But nothing makes up for a bad aim like lots of ammunition. One time we put a liter of bottled water on a fence post. I pumped so many rounds into the post, it fell over and broke the bottle. 

Eventually Michael grew sick of Reno and moved back to Seattle. Ironically, I saw less of him once he moved back to Seattle than I had when he lived in Reno. Now I never see him. But I always remember our trips out to the desert where we'd bond our friendship while plinking away at bottle's of Snapple. 

The video above documents what I think was our last shootout on the desert. I can't even tell you what year it was. Judging from how skinny I was, it was a long, long, time ago. But shoot, it was the best therapy in the world and I miss those times. Michael J, if you are out there dude, here's to you bud! Hope you still have the dog's playing poker print I gave you.

Original thought

Being original on a regular basis is hard work. I think the writer's strike was probably more of a ploy to give the poor schmuck's a break from having to come up with new material every day. Not that television sitcoms really need original material. You just need to figure out how to repackage the same old crap in new wrapping paper to be a sitcom writer.

Blogging, however should be original thought. I see very few original blogs anymore (even my own). Bloggers need to learn to leave plagerisim to the professional Web sites and sitcom writers and keep blogging pure by being creative about being unoriginal.

I tell you, what I find the most original and entertaining in blogs are the stories of people's lives. Even the mundane day to day stuff is more original than regurgitating political rhetoric or reprinting crap you've googled on the Web.

Okay there are limits what you should record about your life. I was watching a program the other night about some guy who had documented everything he'd done minute by minute for 40 some years...(2:10 p.m. I chewed a stick of Juicy Fruit gum, 2: 14 p.m. I threw the gum away...2:15 I voided my bladder for about 3 minutes). Okay, this may be original in a mindnumbing sense, but it is also stupid and way too much information. Pretend your life is has been Tivo'd and fast forward through the boring crap. Would you watch a movie that spent the first 30 minutes documenting the character flossing his teeth?

That being said, I need to go void my bladder and floss my teeth.

Head in the clouds

I just got back from a business trip to San Diego. And although I think flying these days sucks, I kind of like looking out the window at the clouds. They almost makes you forget for a moment that you cooled your heels in the terminal for hours after two gate changes, endured surly flight attendants who sneered at you with disdain as they offered to sell you a $5 snack box when you complain about the stale pretzels. And you are almost able to shut out the drone of the captain or co-pilot or whoever it is in the cockpit who thinks it is important for the passengers to know what the airspeed is, your exact altitude and what mountain you are passing. Oh, and the clouds are nice to watch when the same crew member lets you know that "we are experiencing turbulence" as if you wouldn't have noticed the severe shaking and the surly flight attendants using the drink cart as a battering ram for unsuspecting elbows as they dash for their jump seats to buckle down until the pitching of the plane stops.

But the clouds are pretty.

Joining the Confederacy

When a true genius appears, you can know him by this sign: that
all the dunces are in a confederacy against him.
--Jonathan Swift

I do not think I am a genius. I also don't think I am a dunce. But I pretty much know a dunce when I see one. And I tend to see lots of them. They vote for one thing. And they "rise to their level of incompetence" quickly as Lawrence Peter's suggested, in most organizations.

But still the dunces are the majority. And nothing rallys the dunces like perceiving someone is smarter than they are. This is why George W. was the perfect presidential candidate. He didn't threaten the dunces because he was one of them. Al Gore did threaten the dunces.

I have to admit I am torn by the battle over the democratic nomination for a presidential candidate. I am going to break my own rules of not engaging in political or religious discussions and say that I think Hillary Clinton is the better choice than Barack Obama. I think Obama means well. But he is woefully out of his league. And I think he is hovering dangerously close to his level of incompetence and the dunces are clearly coming out to support him. They are clearly being threatened by Clinton who is obviously incredibly intelligent and more qualified to be President. God forbid we elect the right person for the job.

The sad thing is that if Obama gets the nominated (which at this point seems inevitable), we have to join the Confederacy to avoid McCain and the rest of the Mega Dunces dragging us kicking and screaming into four more years of unthinkable Republican rule. I'll vote for Obama, but I think he is woefully naive and I can't help but get flashbacks to Jimmy Carter floundering through the Oval Office trying to do the right thing. That could only open the door to even more conservative dunces.

It is very sad when you have to choose between the lesser of two evil dunces. God politics sucks.

Hair

Give me down to there hair
Shoulder length or longer hair
Here baby, there mama
Everywhere daddy daddy

Hair, hair, hair, hair
Grow it, show it
Long as I can grow it
My hair

I let it fly in the breeze
And get caught in the trees
Give a home for the fleas in my hair
A home for fleas
A hive for the buzzin' bees
A nest for birds
There ain't no words
For the beauty, the splendor, the wonder
Of my...

Hair, hair, hair, hair,
Grow it, show it
Long as I can grow it
My hair
--Hair; Hair the Musical

From the first time I saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan in 1964, I pretty much knew I was going to grow my hair long. And by today's standards, the Beatle's hair wasn't really that long. But by the late 50s and early 60s standards they were scandalously shaggy.

Maybe it was also my own backlash reaction to my mother's do-it-at-home haircuts that inevitably led to me wanting my hair long. And perhaps my mother was tired of trying to even up her slips of the clippers. So my hair grew. I remember my Aunt Erma teasing me unmercifully about it, asking, "Who is this pretty little girl?"

That just strengthened my resolve. I spent most of my youth, adolescence and young adulthood with fairly long hair. At one point in the 90s, I am ashamed to say, I even had a ponytail.

With 50 less than a month away, I keep my hair (grateful that I've kept my hair) respectfully short. I do not want to be one of those middle-aged men who tries to hide from Father Time in the fashions of his youth. I don't wear my ear rings anymore, either. My tattoo is my only concession to rebellion. But I got that when I was 45, so I figure it is exempt from the stigma of a aging man not accepting his fate gracefully.

But part of me misses my flowing locks. I miss my face framed by free range hair. I miss bandanas and headbands. I even miss the constant brushing the hair out of my face. Maybe it is the silver that has strangled the once brown strands and feeds the longing. Or maybe it is the Samson in me longing for that symbol of strength that maturity has robbed from me.

Who knows? Someday, maybe when I'm staring at 60 and more aged than middle aged I'll let the hair grow again (provided I am still blessed with it). Cause no matter how you cut it, there really ain't no words for the beauty, the splendor and the wonder of my hair.

You say you want a....

Timothy is Leery

It's been quite awhile since I've had a theme week on Dizgraceland. For one, it takes alot of energy to come up with a theme and then it takes alot of energy to stick with it for a week. So I've been leery of starting one up again (ha, you wondered how I was going to work leery into the post to justify the photo). But sometimes a theme creeps in unbeknownst to me.

Far out.

I was really too young to appreciate the 60s. I grew up in Idaho and by the time the 60s made it there, it was the 70s. Disco hit there in the 80s and I think they are getting grunge about now. It's just one of those timewarp states.

I was 10-years old in 1968 when the 60s were at their peak. So suffice to say, I missed out on free love and I never dropped acid. But I was old enough to appreciate the music of the 60s as it crackled through the tiny speaker of my transistor radio. I idolized the Beatles. I remember Steppenwolfe, Three Dog Night, Jefferson Airplane (yes, they once were an Airplane), the Who, the Guess Who, Creedance Clearwater Revival and Tommy James and the Shondells. Ironic thing is, most of these bands work has been covered by recent artists so my children will likely be singing the same songs I did when I was 10.

Far out.

Why would anybody...

...want to be President of the United States? ....be famous?

Okay, money, maybe. But I am getting a bit more disgusted than usual at our society's fascination with dissecting the rich, powerful and famous (or infamous). I'm sick of all of the presidential candidates and we aren't even through with the primaries. I am tired of the train wreck they call Britney Spears. And I don't want to know what the mentally ill gunman who opened fire in a Chicago university lecture hall had for breakfast.

Why do we have to know all this crap about people just because they are politicians, singers, movie stars or mass murderers? I don't even want to know these things about people I know. And what human being out there could withstand any of the scrutiny of the slobbering packs of papparazi or press?

And it seems as though there are cameras everywhere so even the non famous are caught doing disgusting things and displayed on the tabloid news programs. Programs like American Idol and Survivor turn even the most vile and untalented individuals into microwave celebrities. But when the bell goes off they are done and has beens.

I used to think it would be cool to be famous. I wanted to be a celebrated author that people marveled at and wrote fan mail. The beauty of being a bestselling author is that you can be eccentric, a recluse and dress badly. And still people will think you are cool. I thought that until Hunter S. Thompson blew his brains out.

I really don't want people sifting through my trash looking for trash. I don't want people snapping photos of me under the bathroom stall at an airport. And I wouldn't want any of my bad days turned into a mental breakdown by the media and broadcast at noon, five and 11 o-clock.

And I really wouldn't want to be the President of the United States and have most of the world think I was satan just so I could age in dog years in the Oval Office while political pundants debated my IQ.

I guess when it comes down to it, being a nobody is really something.

Why do they call them colds?

A cold hops in on little frog feet.
It sits on slimy haunches,
Lurking over nose and sinus,
And then moves on...
....or snot.

With apologies to Carl Sandburg

A cold isn't...cold that is. You usually have a fever. So they shouldn't call them colds. I suppose calling them hots would be more accurate. But lusting after someone already snagged that label (as in "I've got the hots for you"). And why do they call them "the common cold?" Are there uncommon colds or exotic colds?

Rachet a cold up a notch and you have the flu (not to be confused with a fireplace flue which is a shaft that sucks smoke up your chimney). The flu is a cold on steroids.

If you hadn't guessed, I have a cold. It shouldn't be the flu. I had a flu shot. Though I've heard reports that some people are getting the flu anyway because they gave everyone shots for a different strain of the flu then the one going around.


But I digress. You have to forgive me because I have a cold.

Though most people aren't sympathetic when you have a cold because they think they are going to get it from you. But the main way people get colds is by touching things that people with colds have touched and then rubbing their own eyes or picking their noses and thus introducing the cold germs to their system. It goes something like this:

"Cold, meet my system, system meet the cold."

"Hi."

"Hi."

"Got any mucous membraines I can inflame?"

"Yeah, I think there are some in the nasal cavity and up there in the sinuses."

"Okay."

Then the cold makes itself at home like a third cousin on your mother's side who hasn't worked in five years. The only way you can get rid of it is introducing it to someone elses system. It eventually leaves, but you still have lots of dirty towels and no beer left.

I'm not sure why no one has discovered a cure for the cold. I don't even think there is a foundation for finding a cure. I suppose it wouldn't make a very good telethon or charity race. "Race for the Cold" doesn't have a very nice ring to it.

Personally, I think Kleenex probably does what it can to prevent anyone working on a cure for the cold. I wouldn't put it past them to hire people with colds to work in their factories and sneeze on the tissues as they are putting them in those cardboard boxes. There's gold in them thar nostrils. And the big wigs at Kleenex know that a cure for the cold is nothing to sneeze at.

Ha ha ha...

I have to go blow my nose now.

Engaging the commentors (or Y I issnt ignorant)

Today I received a random comment on a post I wrote back in August 2004 when I obviously thought I was incredibly witty. The commentor, someone named Aly, thought otherwise.

Aly has left a new comment on your post "Engaging the enemy: the spam wars":

Amusing enough, but one thing bothered me... It's perfectly reasonable for someone to have a name such as Emmanuel H****. I know a couple who gave their children Korean first names despite their clearly Italian last name. The wife is from Korea and it was important to her. So don't think you're so witty for spotting the difference in name origins when in fact you're just being ignorant. I'm not arguing that it was a fake name, simply clarifying that a name like that is not so uncommon.
Posted by Aly to Dizgraceland at 11:40 AM

I Googled the name "Emmanuel H****" and sure enough seven entries popped up with that name (including my post about spam wars). As impressive as that is, I don't think it supports Aly's "clarification" that "Emmanuel H****" is a common name.

Petty minutia aside, I find it amazing that this person would miss the entire point of the post and call me ignorant for baiting a spammer by questioning their bogus choice of a name to try and scam me. I don't think I am witty for spotting the difference in name orgins. But I do think it was pretty funny to waste a spammer's time. And I think Aly is as sharp as a river rock for honing in on the single most insignificant part of the post.

Hey Aly, go back to My Space and leave us ignorant bloggers be. Or better yet, post your e-mail address next time and I'll forward it on to my spammer friend. Those Nigerian guys love intellectuals like you.

Odds are the 'Next Blog' sucks

Every now and then I give in to the perverse urge to click on the "Next Blog" button Blogger so graciously provides us at the top of our blogs. This random venture into blogdom used to be good for a few moments of diversion. Although it didn't reap you much quality, at least you were exposed to actual bloggers trying to blog. Now, odds are you will bring up some piece of crap, lowlife spam site that uses Blogger's free Web hosting to clog the bandwith with sales pitches. And although I value diversity, I am kind of wondering if anyone in the English speaking world is blogging anymore.

I would love to click on "next blog" and actually be able to read some content, not look at photos of shoes from Hong Kong. Show me the blogs, not the clogs. I want to read about people's lives, not scan endless links of shopping scams.

Okay Blogger, you aren't doing the blog world any favor by not having any criteria for who can have a blog on your server. Why don't you create a certification process for bloggers that separates the blog wheat from the blog chaff? Some of us legitimately have been writing blogs for years and we are obscured by the blog spammers you allow to have Blogger accounts. I'm telling you, what this blog world needs is an enema.

Here I am

The world as I see it

As I see it, the world is divided into two kind of people: those who understand you and those who don't. If you are lucky, you fall in that first category in regards to yourself.

The professional editor in me kind of cringes at the phrase "as I see it." It is pretty much a given that I can only speak in regards to the way I see things. And right now I see that one of the cats has puked next to the sliding glass door and my daughter is seeing it as something to play with. This in itself is an illustration of different perspectives on things.

But I digress.

We like people who get us. And generally in order to get us they tend to be like us. Because to get us, they must understand where we are coming from. They get our references to obscure movies and books because they have read them. I am always amazed at successful standup comedians, because humor is definitely one of those things people only like if they get it. But then again, humans being the sheep that they are, will laugh at a joke if everyone else around them is laughing just so they don't appear stupid, though they obviously are. Alchohol also helps.

Humor is a particularly funny thing when it comes to people getting it. I've discovered this the hard way on more than one occasion. For example, there was this group blog I made the mistake of being part of last year that took offense to a post I made about not liking the label "vanilla" when referring to a large portion of the population who doesn't like their behinds smacked with a hairbrush as part of foreplay. You would think a masochist would enjoy being tortured about their chose of labels. Go figure.

But there I go digressing again. Though it's hard not to digress in a spontaneous discussion of your world view. It's a pretty big topic. It's as big as the world. Ha, ha...

Anyway, back to my world view. Blogging puts it into an interesting perspective because potentially people from all over the world can drop by and either get me or not. Of course, it helps if they speak English. That helps people understand me. Except perhaps for my Aussie friends. Although we share the mother tongue I sense there is still a cultural gap we need to bridge now and then. Perhaps this is why I was dropped from one of my Australian friend's blog roll recently. But no worries, eh?

The problem with people like you getting you is that, if you don't like yourself then you won't like the people who like and understand you. Kind of messed up isn't it?

Well so is the world and it keeps revolving regardless. Mine just revolves around me.

100 years

I know nothing

This may come as a surprise to those of you younger than 40 that I know nothing (or maybe not since you are still struggling with knowing it all). And for those of you pushing 50 or so, it probably doesn't come as a surprise that I know nothing. Because knowing things is a quirk of youth. Not knowing things is a realization of middle age.

I don't write this with much conviction, because that would imply that I know what I'm talking about. I don't. But I feel what I'm talking about.

It is not as easy as you think to know nothing. I spent years perfecting the illusion of knowing something until I finally believed it myself. But in the past few years I began having doubts that my all encompassing knowledge of everything was real. After all, if I knew everything, I wouldn't think that no one would be stupid enough to vote for Bush for a second term or that reality television was just a passing fad. And knowing everything somehow couldn't explain why I am pushing 50 and still haven't become a best selling author.

Epiphany time! I don't know everything! I know nothing! I don't even know enough not to use an exclamation mark several times in one paragraph!

It is a challenge knowing nothing in a world that values expertise. But I think that experts are just people who think they know too much to know nothing. So I have become more or less comfortable with my nothingness.

In fact, I have nothing more to say.

And I feel good about that.

A more elaborate time

My office

Writer's strike

I must admit I don't know anything about the writer's strike. I don't know whether it is justifiable or not. I do know that it is somehow responsible for my inability to find anything decent on television to watch. I also know that the lack of writers hasn't stopped crap like Celebrity Apprentice, Deal or No Deal, or the plethora of other "reality" and game shows of the same ilk from cluttering up the digital airwaves.

It's sad when I look forward to the reruns of Seinfeld and Frasier to come on at 10 p.m. just so I can actually watch something that doesn't involve a competition to lose weight, become a supermodel or marry a vapid, but eligible bachelor.


Hey, if the sitcom and late night talk show writers are holding out for big bucks to turn out crap, I'll just throw my resume in as a scab writer who will crank out the same crap for half the price. I'd be so jazzed to be paid anything for writing that I'd even whip out a few screenplays as a bonus.

I'm not a big fan of unions. My own theory is that collective bargaining for higher wages here has done the most good for workers in China and Indonesia. Even as a kid I could figure out that the more companies had to pay their employees, the more their goods cost. And the higher the cost for the goods, the less people would buy them. So demanding higher wages either could lead to your eventually putting your employer out of business or you were just going to have to use your pay increase to pay higher costs for other people's goods because everyone else was demanding more money, too.

I think we should return to the barter system. I could trade puns for food.

Maybe it would help me lose weight.

But I digress.

Besides, there is an all new episode of My Name is Earl on followed by 30 Rock and then Grey's Anatomy. Somebody is getting paid write again.

I imagine my DirectTV bill is about to go up again.

Sigh...

Gunter lives

More Rain

Just a little moody video I whipped out on this rainy day in Seattle.