A Mildly Amusing List

Phrases I Have Read This Week In Other Blogs That Would Make Good Band Names

The Stingy Vaginas

Cobra Kai

Frequently Naked Neighbors

Heels Or Flats

The Dutch Rubs

Superior Brew

The French Style

Chinese Five Spice

Looming Manhood

The Ginormous Zucchinis

Black Life Forms

Glorious Tooting

Lexicon of Love (more of an album title, really)

The Chupa Chups

Deathtoilet

Great Aunt Helga

The Blogging Tools

Sexy Menz

Sullen Teens

Fun With Camera Phones

Fun with camera phones at the sporting goods store!


I can't tell you how relieved I am to learn that these golf balls are experienced and professional. Those golf balls you hire right out of college aren't worth shit.


I'm glad the marketing pros at Sportcraft have taken pains to assure their customers that this is their good bean bag toss. Not to be confused with their bad bean bag toss, which I can only assume is not a top seller. I imagine it consists of two old coffee cans and a Ziploc bag of actual beans.

Desk Hero

Klank thumpthump klank thumpthump klank thumpthumpthump klank klank

“All right!”

Klank thumpthump klank thumpthump klank thumpthumpthump klank klank

“I got somethin’ to say!”

After my thunderous drum intro, Mark took over on guitar and proceeded to rock this place to the ground. I don’t know how to play drums and he doesn’t know how to play guitar. But we had played the hell out of “Rock Of Ages” just the same.

We’re not a band. We’re Desk Band.

When you spend about 12 hours a day cooped up in a room with two other guys with nothing to entertain you but each other and three iTunes-equipped laptops, you have to make your own fun. Desk Band started innocently enough, with Mark drumming the pads of his wrists on the desk to the sounds of Rage Against The Machine. Like that hackneyed movie cliché where one guy stands up in an auditorium and claps alone only to slowly be joined by the entire room in a standing ovation, our officemate Shane and I chimed in and forged a three part cacophony.

Shane was cashiered from Desk Band in a matter of days for utter lack of rhythm. There was none of the usual acrimony attendant when such things happen though, as he is our production assistant/flunky/errand boy. It was but the latest of his humiliations. Desk Band lives on as a two-piece act. Whenever we’re bored or stressed or mad, you can feel it coming. Just crank up the volume, and it’s showtime.

Dutdut dutdut dutdut dutdut dutdutdut THUMP

“I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord…”

That's What She Said (Really)

This morning our PA was dispatched to the Apple Store to pick up our boss's computer, which had been in for repair. The clerk at the store called to ask my boss if our PA was "authorized to pick up your unit." The clerk actually stifled a chuckle as he realized what he said, then let out a proper laugh after hearing my boss laugh. This has led to an hour's worth of "unit" jokes in the office, after which I've come to learn that there are about twenty minutes' worth of good "unit" jokes. The incident made me think of this classic gaffe by my old roommate Edie.

Edie and I were in Vegas for the weekend and we were trying samples at a fancy chocolatier in the Venetian. Edie was a particular fan of fudge, and asked to try the milk chocolate flavor. As she tasted it, a glow of infinite joy lit up her face and she immediately asked for a quarter pound. The clerk asked if she would like it wrapped in a box or loose in a bag. "Just put it in a bag," she said. "I can't wait to cram it in my fudge hole!" The clerk and I immediately started laughing, although he tried to stop himself. I absolutely did not. It took a second for her to realize the alternate meaning of what she'd said, and when she did she tried to apologize through her laughter. "Don't apologize," said the clerk. "That's the best thing that's happened all day!"

Edie and I make "fudge hole" jokes to this day. They're way better than "unit" jokes.

The Lottery Hostage

I don’t care what psychologists say. Negative reinforcement can be at least as strong a motivator as positive reinforcement.

Two weeks ago, the MegaMillions jackpot was $170 million, which proved high enough for all the Denizens of the Double-Wide here at work to get together and chip in $10 each to buy a bunch of lottery tickets. I’m not a big lottery player because I am good at math. But hey, for $10 one time I can put logic aside and engage in some workplace camaraderie.

We didn’t win. But even more significantly, nobody else did either. So the next time the jackpot was up to $230 million and we attracted a few more players looking to stand on a stage and hold a giant check. I stayed in this time too. “What’s the harm?” I thought. “I’d probably just blow it on beer anyway.”

For the second time, nobody won. The pot now stood at $270 million, and at this point we had 14 suckers on the line. Including me. The only people holding out were the director (who doesn’t need it anyway) and one girl who ditched us in favor of playing the lottery on her own. I suppose 1/15 of $270 million doesn’t go as far as it used to. Losing the lottery sucks, but I can’t imagine anything worse than the horror that would ensue if we all lost and this girl won. Conversely, I can’t imagine a more satisfying scenario than our group winning and her having to watch us jump around like a bunch of drunks at a wedding who just heard the DJ crank “Mony Mony”. Not to mention the fact that she would be the only one left standing after a mass tendering of resignations that might actually delay the release of the film and leave the studio in a considerable lurch.

Which leads me to my current dilemma. In keeping with the fact that it’s easier to be struck by lightning twice while laying down a royal flush on Mars than it is to win MegaMillions, nobody has yet won. Today the pot is worth $331 million, and I have absolutely no choice but to keep playing. Not because my investment in this foolish endeavor has now reached $40 (although I’m keenly aware of that too), but because dropping out and watching the group go on to win would be such a soul-crushing turn of events that I’d have no choice but to commit seppuku. My fear of being the one left out in the cold is far stronger than my hope of winning. So I have again plunked down $10 purely as an insurance policy against a nervous breakdown. I pray that someone wins this week and ends this vicious cycle.

Just as an aside, if you never see another entry on this blog ever again…we probably won.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Blog-block makes you start scrounging for ideas and posting things you never thought you'd post. This is one of them. A few years ago, a friend and I tried a writing exercise. We sent each other random photos and we had to write something about the story taking place in the photo. The photo that prompted this writing is lost to the mists of time, but it was a black and white shot of two girls and a guy leaning over the railing of a ferry heading for the Statue of Liberty. The date is the actual date I wrote this, and I thought of it immediately after 9/11.


Journal Entry
4/10/01

Look at that stupid bitch. She has no idea that in about an hour, she's going to rank with the all time stupid bitches. Typhoid Mary, Mrs. O'Leary's clumsy cow, and whoever decided that a giant wooden horse was a lovely gift. I can't even look at her cute, dumb little blond self without laughing...I get the most inappropriate emotions at very important moments. She's even taking pictures of the Statue of Liberty for my "brother", even though she works there. Which is basically why the poor bitch is in this situation. I think she might really love him, even after only a few weeks. I'm almost embarrassed for her. It kind of irks me that he's fucking her, but it's all for the mission. He still comes home to me at night. I kind of want to tell her this when it's all done...let her live with her shame, even if only for a moment.

I'm sorry to whoever finds this, I'm not being very clear. My name is Heather. My boyfriend's name is Josh. And we're currently on a ferry to the Statue of Liberty. When we get there, Josh's carefully cultivated 'girlfriend' of three weeks will let us in the employee entrance, where security is just a word. We’ll take the elevator to the torch, like good tourists. Then Josh will escort her to the rail to enjoy the view. Then I will plant this thermonuclear bomb that's in my bag, detonate it, and pretty much melt everything from here to the Bronx.

Yeah, so I have a flair for the dramatic. I'm entitled, I'm about to be the most storied terrorist in history. The President is in New York. They're busy patting everyone in the damn city down for a gun, and here I am carrying around Hiroshima X 5 in my Saks tote bag. I guess it's like that old adage about how the bigger the lie, the easier people will believe it. So, the President will be dead. And the Vice-President, who's tagging along. Which means that soon, a third rate senator will be running a country that just lost the largest city in the world.

My dad is just not going to believe this. Dad was an oil company executive, and I spent about half my childhood in Syria. So did Josh. There was a little enclave of American oil types, and that's where I met him. We would go on little expeditions into the city, out of the safety of our little Americatown. We made friends, and got invited to dinner, and did sleepovers, and all the stuff kids do everywhere, I guess. We also saw Islam. And we liked the purity of it. You can bet that the recruiters loved us. We can walk around all over America without being suspected of either bombing things or selling Slurpees. These fucking Americans and their 'religion'. They bitch about going to church for an hour once a week, and then bitch some more when they are forced to eat lobster and crab on Fridays during Lent. I never realized how soft Americans were until I discovered Islam. Our people are killing and dying for religion all over the world, and that's why we're going to win. It's so poetic too...America never thought that in the marketplace of ideas, one of their own might find their merchandise rotting from the inside. I guess that's about to bite them in the ass. They really should have expected something like this to happen. In a world where Friends is dubbed into French and Chinese kids think that the NBA is Fan-fucking-Tastic, it had to go the other way at some point.

Okay, enough of the rhetoric. We're about to dock, and I have to leave this journal here on this ferry and hope it survives. I kinda wish I could watch this from New Jersey instead of being in the middle of it. But hey, a free trip to heaven is a free trip to heaven. Praise Allah.

The G-Chat Diaries, Vol. 8

WWW: Oh, HELL. The Border Grill taco truck was on the lot for lunch this afternoon and I just found out! It's too late!

Chatter X: Oh, no!! It's not still there?

WWW: It left at 2:30. Ten minutes ago!

Chatter X: No one told you? These people are not your friends.

WWW: I had to find out on Facebook from someone who just had some!

Chatter X: WHAT? Your office peeps have some 'splainin' to do.

WWW: No joke. That should be a public announcement. Who doesn't enjoy a delicious taco?

Chatter X: Crazy folk, I'd imagine.

WWW: That could be the only explanation. Or people who belong to a religion that forbids the eating of tacos.

Chatter X: That is possible. Or people who were in a car accident that damaged their olfactory nerves, contributing to a lack of taste sensation.

WWW: That is truly sad. Because tacos are definitely a taste sensation. It's sweeping the nation.

Chatter X: Yeah, even I've heard of tacos, and I don't follow many trends.

WWW: Well, you come from taco country. Or taco country-adjacent.

Chatter X: Yes, it is practically Mexico here.

WWW: Do you know the Frito Bandito?

Chatter X: He is my uncle. Tio Bandito.

WWW: Wow! I can't believe you never told me that.

Chatter X: I had to make sure you were trustworthy, as you can understand. It's like telling people you're Gary Busey's daughter or something. You can imagine the hangers-on and wannabes.

WWW: Wow, yeah. I imagine if someone told me they were Gary Busey's daughter I'd have about a million questions.

WWW: Like, “Are you sure you should be telling people that?”

WWW: But I'm glad I passed the trustworthy test. So is your real last name Bandito? Did your family have to change it to avoid persecution?

Chatter X: Nah, it's a stage name that just means he likes to steal Fritos. His real name is Harold "Ed" Chatter.

WWW: Fascinating.

WWW: So can you get me free Fritos?

Chatter X: Oh, man. Here we go. It's like high school all over again.

WWW: I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking.

Chatter X: It's okay. It's just, everyone wants a piece of you, you know?

WWW: Yeah, I know what you mean. It's like when people come up and tell me I'm really handsome like they're the first one that ever thought of it.

WWW: "I KNOW. Can we move on now?"

Chatter X: Oh, man, I know! That gets SO old. People are lame.

WWW: Well, what can you do? It's the burden that comes from being exceptional. We've both learned how that is.

Chatter X: Yeah, and that sad part is that people don't understand that we're really being sincere when we say it's hard to be so smart and phenomenal-looking.

WWW: No, they think we're saying it like a pro athlete who jumps to a new team for an extra $5 million because he "has a family to feed".

Chatter X: They're just haters. All of them.

WWW: We didn't ask to be born like this. We’re just the way God made us.

Chatter X: We're just doing the best we can.

WWW: I mean, I never complain that I don't get to sit around outside all day like homeless people. Or spend lots of time with my family like the unemployed. So don't complain about my looks.

Chatter X: That is perfectly reasonable.

WWW: I think so. But then again, we’re smarter than they are.