clintclintclintclint

baseball.

2011-11-22T07:42:00.000-08:00

Baseball season is over. Finally. Thank goodness. I think it’s hard to deny how awful watching that game can be. The immense boredom it oozes has on more than one occasion caused me to reach for the dictionary just to make sure that I correctly understand the definition of the word game. Because I don’t know about you, but I was raised to understand that that word connotes some degree of fun. And—let’s get honest—the level of fun provided by watching baseball falls somewhere between trying on dress slacks and Swiffering.

One of the least tolerable aspects of the professional baseball season is the length. A 162-game regular season sounds like something that started out as a joke and eventually everyone forgot that it was a joke and so it gradually became kind of normal, just like faux hawks or Bill O’Reilly or anything that’s a throwback to the 80s. Add to that an eight-week spring training and a post season of approximately equal duration and the whole racket spans something like thirteen months—virtually every moment of which I find torturous. “Hey, here’s a sport that is super boring. But don’t worry; there’s a freaking ton of it.”

When fans discover the loathing I harbor for baseball they invariably respond by referring to their beloved pastime as “the thinking man’s game.” Somewhat offended at their implication, I typically reply by asking them what their least favorite food is. “Oh, so you hate pineapple, huh? Well, it just so happens that pineapple is the thinking man’s food. How unfortunate that your personal preference contradicts such a completely arbitrary assertion and therefore disqualifies you from intelligence.” As if baseball is so darn complex that the only explanation for not liking it is an inability to comprehend. I plangently disagree. If I can figure out what those daffy Ikea assembly instructions are getting at, I’m sure I can figure out baseball. As is the case with Lost, it's not that I can't follow what's going on; I just don’t care.

Fans refer to it as America’s pastime. I think that’s a fairly antiquated characterization. If Americans are anything like me, they don't often want to simply pass time. And when they do, that kind of mindlessness is now reserved for activities such as Will It Blend? and Nicolas Cage movies. These days we view our free hours as valuable. People want to be entertained, enlightened, or at the very least briefly deadened to the painful disappointment that is their respective daily lives. But none of those experiences are provided via the all-too-real halt of the sixth inning in which Jonathan Paplebon warms up by pitching to no one for twelve minutes. It’s unflinching archaicism like that that causes individual games to stretch on seemingly forever—three, four, five hours in length. And who in the world can afford to invest that much time into a single sporting event? It’s utterly preposterous. Unless, of course, we're talking about football.

shoes.

2011-07-18T08:57:00.000-07:00

Call me old-fashioned, but I am of the staunch opinion that things should function for the express purpose for which they were intended. I know it might sound a little crazy, but I would never purchase a see-through shirt, a spoon with a large hole in the center of its typically sound basin, or cubic car tires (no matter how well they complimented the shape of my automobile). For me, functionality is primary. My shirts must cover my skin. My spoons must reliably convey to my mouth the brownie batter that I am too impatient to let fully bake. My car tires must facilitate motion. Yet, quite surprisingly, this is not an opinion shared by all. My wife, for one, disagrees with my stance vehemently; namely, it is her position that the primary task of shoes is to be cute. Conversely, I hold that shoes should, if nothing else, aid in walking.

In the name of what they broadly deem "cuteness," my wife and countless other women prance about on footwear that not only fails to aid in, but actually substantially hinders, the task of transporting oneself. These women attempt to prop themselves upon long skinny stiletto heels which fundamentally oppose the physical laws that govern balance and stability, providing virtually unending entertainment for those who feel inclined to perform Youtube searches for such key terms as "Miss USA falls down" and "Maria Shriver hits the deck."

But perhaps this fight in which women are constantly engaged to keep themselves upright is worth it. Perhaps these seemingly deliriously conceived shoes are in fact so supernally comfortable that their inherent inconvenience is merely a figurative bird-sized mosquito that must be endlessly shooed while touring the breath-taking Amazon rainforest. That would be understandable; if that were the case, I could certainly see enduring even a constant lack of balance for the sake of almost otherworldly comfort. Except that's not it at all. These shoes, it is almost universally reported, actually hurt like the freaking dickens. They crowd the toes like ornately polished sardines. They birth and rebirth bunions. Their stark edges can eat straight through skin with severity not altogether different from that ushered in by MRSA, and their practically pernicious absence of padding causes bone spurs to crop up like weeds over an untended grave. Such shoes are hardly suitable for lounging on the couch, much less hiking around the office for eight hours a day. Yet, due to their perceived cuteness, the women of the world persist in every morning strapping themselves into devices which could reasonably be expected to at any time transform a fashionable stroll along the edge of a public sidewalk into a messy demise beneath the massive tires of an oncoming city bus.

When I see my wife roll her ankle right off her high heel and crumble onto the living room rug like a game of Jenga which has reached it natural conclusion, I often wonder about the person who first invented shoes and what he would say if he could see her. "You're missing the point!" he would scream, as he stands in the world's first pair of shoes, which he tirelessly wove from palm branches over the course of six months and then lashed around each foot in hopes of creating a barrier between him and the reef upon which he must daily tread while mostly unsuccessfully throwing spears at much-too-fast fish swimming in the water below. "How, in shoes like that," he will ask both skeptically and loudly, "will you be able to track the water buffalo needed to feed your family? What if a wooly mammoth charges you? Good luck getting away in shoes like that!" In an expression of true sympathy colliding with exasperation, he would begin to unlash his palm branches and offer them to Angela, that she might have some decent footwear for once.

All this talk might make it seem as if I am opposed to the idea of high heels for the sake of aesthetics. That is not the case at all. I can see the appeal. I am not entirely immune to the concept of fashion over function. Really. I just think that if there is a time in a woman's life wherein she ought to enjoy footwear that is eye-pleasing but counter productive for walking, that time ought to come in the period before which walking becomes a major facet of life. This is why I've recently become a cash investor in a new product line aimed exclusively at infant females. It's called Baby High Heels and it is precisely what it sounds like. Since our main clientele merely rolls around on the floor or is carried by people equipped with the necessary footwear for standing, functionality is of no concern at all. Subsequently , the world's shoe designers are now free to really let loose in the creation of footwear that is strictly fashionable in the purest sense of the word. Twenty-inch long stiletto heels? Well, if the shoes are never to be walked on, why the heck not? Gigantic flowers the size of an adult cranium hot-glued to the top of a shoe's toe area? There's no tripping if there's no walking; let's go for it! Bedazzling atop bedazzling atop bedazzling until the shoe is essentially a sparkling disco ball into which a parent slides the child's foot? It's already in production.

I would wager a healthy sum that even the inventor of the world's first palm-branch shoes so many thousands of years ago would look at a baby clad in disco ball pumps and think to himself "See, now that makes sense."

camping.

2011-05-31T13:22:00.000-07:00

Angela has long accused me of being an unsatisfactory outdoorsman. Apparently, before our marriage she was somehow under the impression that I was the type to camp for long periods, to shave my face using only a straight edge and frigid mountain stream water, and to jump at the chance to remove the skin of a sentient being whose life force I had just watched slowly seep from its eyes due to a bullet accurately discharged into the artery in its hindquarters. Yet, to her chagrin, our marriage has proven many times over that I am just not a big camper. She thinks it stems from an excessive attachment to my electronic devices or a desire to limit my oft-repeated tendency to somehow manage to transform my pant leg into a conduit for any camp fire built within a football field's distance of me. But that's not it at all. I avoid camping because of one thing—mountain lions.

A few years ago, I saw a Discovery Channel special on mountain lions. Before this time, I knew them only as the cartoon-y mascots of local high schools. After watching this program I came to understand that mountain lions are, for all intents and purposes, just like the infamous African lions of the Serengeti, except that mountain lions live in the mountains by my house. The way I figure it, never in a billion years would I opt to unroll a sleeping bag on the plains of Mozambique or Botswana and attempt to nap, knowing full well that all that separates me from a pair sabre-esque canines sinking themselves into my neck flesh is a thin layer of tent fabric. This being the case, why would camping in Arizona be any more acceptable, given that all that substantially differentiates a mountain lion from an African lion is a mane—a hairdo, really. To me, a murderer rocking a pompadour is no less or more scary than a murderer with a buzz cut. Hair just isn't of prime concern. The way I see it, the teeth are just as powerful; the claws are just as deadly; between the cats there is no appreciable difference in hunting acumen, especially if the prey they stalk is a group of vacationing suburbanites occupied by the challenge of bending a clothes hanger in the most optimal fashion for s'more production.

I think an important difference lies in the way a person would react when attacked by these two different lion varieties. Amid the grasslands and herds of hippopotami, to be attacked by an African lion would be horrifying, but not necessarily shocking—like being mugged on a street you knew you shouldn't have walked at so late an hour. But to be attacked by a lion while hiking the hilly nature trail a stone's throw from the Circle K where you and your friends purchased Thirst Busters for the trip—that would be truly shocking. And I think it'd be a real pity to spend my final moments on earth reflecting not of my wife, or family, or of how I probably shouldn't have embezzled those hundreds of thousands of dollars from that Alzheimer's charity (they don't remember anyway), but wondering to myself, "Am I really being attacked by a lion? In Arizona? This doesn't seem right."

It is this scenario of a distracted and mis-focused demise, in concert with my historical preference to not be mauled, that causes me to conclude that camping is just too risky. Especially when a microwaved s'more provides about 85% of the tastiness of a camp fire s'more.

stainless steel

2011-05-15T16:34:00.000-07:00

I think stainless steel may be one of the most deceptive products ever perpetrated. Sure, it doesn't stain permanently, but it dirties up like the dickens. You can't touch the stuff. Given stainless steel's propensity for attracting and displaying smudgy fingerprints, I must infer that whoever originally conceptualized its use on household appliances like microwaves, dishwashers, and refrigerators must have been raised in a home wherein formal long white gloves were standard issue, as if a trip to the fridge to fetch a Snack Pack were a distinguished affair on par with attending an awards ceremony or a black tie save-the-whales benefit. I've noticed that, at least in our house, breaths breathed from the whole other side of the kitchen show up on our stainless steel refrigerator as if I'd wiped an un-showered and therefore greasy forehead back and forth across the french doors and between refrigerator magnets for a solid half an hour.

I find it unbearable the way that all our stainless steel appliances live in a state of constant discoloration that can only be undone with the most generous application of liquid cleaner and the most earnest scrubbing, at which point the smudges and blemishes do finally relent. So, technically, yes, it doesn't stain. But naming it stainless steel seems somewhat nebulous, as if to underscore the material's singular and rather oblique merit, while failing to mention it's far more audacious defect. It's a little like naming the criminal act of battery and assault "murderless touching." Or referring to maleria as the "cancer-free bug that's been going around." Or dubbing Osama Bin Laden as "Mr. Not-Hitler."

So now I know what you're thinking: "Did he really just equate stainless steel to Osama Bin Laden? That seems rather excessive." Well, now you know just how strongly I feel about fingerprint smudges.

tattoos.

2011-04-25T07:01:00.000-07:00

From what I can tell, tattoos are pretty hip these days. And by these days I mean the period from about 1960 to present. Despite the allure of the ring of barbed wire around what I can only presume was a once toned bicep belonging to the female night shift clerk at the gas station near my house or the illogic of Polynesian tribal tattoos on suburban white males, I highly doubt that I will ever indulge in such permanent hypodermic adornments for myself. Who among us has not looked back at photographs from high school and laughed at the ridiculousness of sagging pants or the frumpiness of a perm that seemed so right in the moment? It seems to me that proponents of tattoos are doomed to repeat this lesson over again, except instead of a photo album serving as a pre-requisite for the profound reminder that general fashion and personal tastes change, all one must do is look in the mirror. That's a pleasant thought: after a few years, your skin acts as the constant admonition that you have a hard time picking up on basic patterns. I do admire the confidence that such people have though. "Oh yeah man, I will never get sick of this Volcom logo emblazened into the center of my back. It will always be cool." And then three years later, Volcom is selling patterned Christmas sweaters in the little boys section at Target. This is not to say that I don't respect a person's right to get a tattoo. I absolutely do. Nor do I intend to convey that I have never encountered a tattoo that strikes me as nice lookin'. I certainly have. It's just that I, a man whose former and absolute abhorrence for brussel sprouts has transformed into a full-fledged love affair, simply do not trust my tastes to stay fixed long enough to justify such a permanent commitment. I just don't have those kind of feelings for foot roses.

On a related note, I find it fascinating, the unending expansion of what is considered an adequate amount or location for body art. Why, just a few decades ago a forearm anchor or a single punctured heart above the name of one's mother was deemed sufficient. Nowadays, there is hardly amount or area that is considered off limits. I was shocked the first time I saw a neck tattoo. I hoped that its owner was independently wealthy or could at least afford a whole collection of turtle necks for the next time he had to seek gainful employment. Because, at least to me, any neck tattoo, whatever its likeness, might as well be capital letters arrayed in a earlobe-to-earlobe swoop that reads "UNEMPLOYABLE." It seems as if the expansion of tattoos to the neck area only became generally popular as space on arms, legs, and chests became scarce, sometime around 2002. As a result, many of today's necks are almost full to the brim with the names of ex-girlfriends or oversized puckered lip prints that would indicate some sort of romantic encounter with a dolled-up pituitary giant.

I wonder where tattoos will venture to next. The face and head are obvious possibilities. But I think it is a well established fact that face tattoos highly correlate with mental illness, prison, or both. (But if that's the message you're looking to send to the world, more power to you.) Perhaps instead people will begin to think outside the box and start to have grafted to their torsos whatever undamaged limbs remain from car crash or heart attack victims. Think of all that untouched flesh--a blank canvas upon which one can illustrate his lack of forethought or express all his current brand loyalities! At the DMV, on the forms to apply for a driver's license, there will be a checkable box beside which are the words "Tattoo Donor," just in case a horrible accident strikes the driver down before he or she has time to memorialize on skin his or her own drunken decision making.

And until the day that limb grafting is considered to be cost effective, I imagine that folks will continue to cram more and more tattoos onto themselves. The only difference is that with so much body art already present, new tactics may have to be employed to ensure that the new tattoos can be noticed amongst the old. May I suggest italics? Underlining? Double underlining?

signatures.

2011-01-20T12:30:00.000-08:00

There seems to be an expectation amongst the world’s human population that early in our lives each should select one certain way to sign his or her name and then never deviate from it. If at the crucial era of decision Julie decides to insert an obscenely large loop into her “J,” well, then that giant loop she is expected to maintain to her very grave.

But the problem is that I never agreed to keep the same signature for the duration of my life. When I signed the back of my first library card at around age five, or my school ID as a teenager, or my driver’s license at age sixteen, there was no disclosure provided to me, no document to indicate that the signature I then used would serve as the standard by which all of my future signatures would be measured. In what government building lobby is the single signature for life regulation posted? In what free and fair election was this system voted into law? Never do i recall being asked if I was amenable to these terms. Never.

So you know what I say? Screw convention and social expectation. My signature is my signature. If one day I want it to be half print and half cursive and the next day I want it to increase in size with each progressive letter until the final “N” in Hardison takes up a full half of the sheet of paper, then, by goodness, that is my prerogative.

The far reach of this unofficial but much enforced protocol has caused my rebellious juices to stir. For years now I’ve gone out of my way to not only frequently modify my signature, but to change it beyond recognition. Eventually, I started signing receipts with the names of my favorite notable personalities. It was all in hopes that whatever establishment I had patronized happened to employ some individual whose job it was to filter through each receipt for accounting or other purposes. He’d be sitting in a dimly lit and tiny room in the restaurant’s kitchen, just a few feet from the deep fryer, the stink of grease forever saturating his flesh. He’d shuffle through stacks and stacks of crinkled white receipts and finally see in blue ink the name “Michael Jordan.” The employee’s heart rate would rise and his mind would race as he wondered if the Michael Jordan had come to this lowly restaurant and, somehow, he’d missed it. Think of the unrealized photo op, the autographed napkin that would never be. What rotten luck.

The next phase involved signing the names of dead people. For a period of about a year Abraham Lincoln, Sunny Bono, Karl Marx, The Linbergh Baby, The Beatles, Henry VIII, Hitler’s girlfriend (I would have put her actual name had I known it), and Waldo of the Where’s Waldo book series (I'm sorry to have to be the one to inform you that he's dead) each frequented various restaurants and gas stations in the Phoenix metropolitan area’s East Valley. After that method grew stale, I began to just draw pictures. Boats mostly.

After multiple years and a host of different receipt-signing techniques, I think I’ve found something that I can stick with as my signature—the one with which I can forget my roving ways and settle down for good. It’s odd because the whole thing started as a rebellion against the implied expectation of fidelity to a single signature. But now I do it not because I must, but because I like the signature I’ve chosen for myself. Here's how it goes: a scraggily gas station clerk slides the receipt across the counter, past the rack of jerky and king-sized candy bars. With leashed pen in hand, I take it and, using up far more than the allotted space provided, jot in large, all-capital letters my patented signature and casually slide the slip of paper back across the counter top. As he rotates to deposit the receipt in the undertray of the register, he cannot help but notice the giant scrawl I've produced. His brow crinkles dramatically. He looks at it again, more deeply this time, to make certain that the words read as they first seemed to. They do: "YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE."

The receipt still in his hands, the drawer still open, he looks back at me as I stand, all stoic, and cracking my knuckles before the backdrop of innumerable Baked Lays and extreme-looking energy drinks displays. I gaze at him through squinted eyes, my shoulders flexed in subtle threat, and nodding my head ever so slightly, as if to say, “Yes. You read correctly. Your worst nightmare.”

cosmetic surgery.

2011-01-17T13:02:00.000-08:00

On many occasions in my life, children—those supposed fountains of unbridled truthfulness—mostly nieces and nephews, have approached me and asked the following question: “Why is your nose so big?”

Every time this happens, I find myself a little disappointed. Old issues about body image are drudged up from the proverbial basement of my psyche. In that moment, I’ll often grab for my nose, covering it self-consciously with wrapped fingers, wondering if it could only be, as these children indicate, plus size.

With evasive insecurity, I’ll think on how my nose must not really be that large. Certainly, I lack of the type of regal nasal endowment of an Adrian Brody or a Manu Ginobili, because were my nose of such a stature, comments regarding its size would flood from not only children but from adults as well. And adults almost never say anything about it at all. So obviously, my nose is nothing to write home about, no aberration from the boring old norm, barely if at all beyond the crest of the bell curve. But how I wish it was.

You hear about people whose smiles brighten up a whole room, actors whose trademark looks make them instantly recognizable, and captivatingly striking girls whose arrival to the school dance causes the music (which is obviously being projected via an mp3 player plugged into a PA system) to inexplicably halt with the screeching properties of a needle being dragged from a vinyl record. The whole crowd turns to watch her step across the gym’s threshold and into poorly executed decorative themes as logically incongruent as “Prom on the Moon” or “Romance in Bubonic Plague-era Europe.” And that’s the kind of thing I want from my nose. I want to enter a room and see every eye fixated on the protruding center of my face. I want to be repeatedly accosted with horribly unoriginal Pinocchio-related jokes about my having recently fibbed. I want a nose that causes car accidents as oncoming drivers become mesmerized by its sheer volume and forget how to brake.

Unfortunately, the most attention my nose has ever garnered has been, as stated, from little children. And most of them won’t even have their driver’s licenses for years. It has me thinking that if I really want a nose that people will talk about, I may require assistance beyond what was naturally gifted to me. And so I contemplate a nose augmentation.

The notion of cosmetic surgery might seem silly to some. “Clint,” they’ll say, “you already have the biggest nose in the family. There’s no need to make it bigger. You’re perfect the way you are.” And they might be right. I may very well be the possessor of the largest nose of my family or of all my co-workers, and may even be in or above the eighty-fifth percentile for nose size in these United States, but until I can look in the mirror and feel comfortable by having the end of my nose touching the reflective glass while the rest of my face is still a full eight inches away, I don’t think I’ll feel completely okay with myself.

My only hesitation has to do with the type of example that this sets for the next generation. I don’t want kids hinging their worth as humans upon their nose’s capability for water displacement. Because after my surgery is complete, no way will they be able to surpass my record-setting figure of forty-seven milliliters. And I’m not sure what effect that might have on their self-esteem.

blow-out.

2011-01-14T09:50:00.000-08:00

One time Angela was driving on a freeway interchange and had a tire blow-out. Her car spun and shimmied and eventually she found herself at the center of a smoking mess of twisted metal violently halted by a concrete median. For months, when describing this mild catasrophe she referred to it as her “blow-out on the freeway.”

On a related note, we have a whole gaggle of nieces and nephews. Many of them are toddler age or younger. They trot around in diapers, make incoherent pleas to be held, and acquaint themselves with new objects (such as my now water-logged cell phone) through direct and heavy application of the object to their tongues. Occasionally, their parents will share horror stories about just what is to be found mashed into the cottony paper of their kids' diapers. They habitually refer to the truly massive and disgusting discoveries—especially those too large for the diaper to fully contain—as “blow-outs.”

As soon as this term is mentioned by one of the parents, I make a point to matter-of-factly note to all present that Angela once had a blow-out. On the freeway. And it was so bad that it made her crash her car.

preparation.

2011-01-09T21:18:00.001-08:00

As my personality predisposes me for procrastination and forgetfulness, Angela sure loves it when she finds me prepared and ready to go in a prompt fashion. If, for instance, on Sunday morning I am standing at the bottom of the stairs, dressed in white shirt and tie, slacks ironed, and shoes shined a full ten minutes before church is scheduled to start, she exudes appreciation and delight. This is why I was really surprised the other day when I was closing in on Angela to kiss her and, in the very spirit of preparation that she so enjoys, stuck my tongue out while still some twelve to fifteen inches away from her face; as I continued my tongue-out descent towards her mouth, I was shocked to see her grimace and turn away, gagging.

I must say, I just don’t understand women. So darn fickle.

angels.

2011-01-08T09:43:00.000-08:00

There is an old myth—you’re probably quite familiar—that whenever a bell rings, an angel gets its wings. To me that is one precious notion. Whenever my push to the aluminum-framed glass entry door at my local Ace hardware causes the string of attached bells to jingle, it doesn’t just indicate to the clerk that a customer has arrived, but also that a messenger of God in some distant corner of the cosmos has had two new and oddly inhuman limbs added. A young child, freshly free of training wheels, may fall from his or her bicycle and in the process break a clavicle or severely chip the one adult tooth that has already arrived. It’s utterly dreadful, right? Well, not if the young child’s thumb or arm happened to graze the bell affixed to the handlebars on the way down. If that’s the case, this mild medical emergency is actually a cause for heavenly choirs to break into million-part harmony.

Being struck as I obviously am by the link between bells and angel promotion, I long ago invested a meager few dollars in a teacher’s bell. It sat right next to my computer monitor. With the flat of my palm I descended upon its shiny, top-loaded button multiple times each day and basked in the high tone that it produced. It was nice to know that even when I had writer’s block or had grown too weary to continue my study of real estate, I could at least accomplish something by ringing that bell. Sure, I might not have remembered offhand the sequence of quantitative adjustments or the differing costs associated with split-faced concrete block verses slump block, but maybe with one of my many rings, I told myself, I had helped my long-deceased great grandmother Opal finally attain senior status amongst the many other less fortunate and flightless spirits of heaven. Sometimes I’d ring the bell a lot. I’d dedicate minutes at a time. It was mostly due to my notion that if some departed legend like Jimi Hendrix or John Lennon was going to get angel wings, I wanted to be the one to grant the privilege. That way, when we finally meet, they’ll owe me one—redeemable in the form of a celestial jam session employing cloud guitars and drum sets made from leftover halos.

I do have to wonder, however, if my ringing hasn’t been a little on the excessive side. At its height, I was ringing that bell a few dozen, maybe even a few hundred, times a day (at which point my wife left to find less compulsively tintinnabulative company). I think that it’s a distinct possibility that at some juncture all my ringing caused heaven’s supply of qualified angel candidates to become entirely depleted. After that crucial breaking point, the surpassing of which was unknown to me at the time, I imagine that each of my rings subsequently forced heaven’s hand, compelling it to obey its own laws, dictating the promotion of heavenly beings that, in some cases, might not have been ready for the duties of angel. I think the proof of this theory’s veracity can be seen in the recent and corresponding up-tick in accidents the world over. Car wrecks, spilled milk, twisted ankles, random impalement of individuals by formerly roof-bound icicles, diarrhea, balding, hemorrhoids, sunburns, bad haircuts, bad jokes, the unintended announcement by the guest of a future surprise party the existence of said party to the subject of said party, the proliferation and misspelling of the word “dog” to refer to one’s close associates, or whatever else—would all be the direct result of inexperienced guardian angels missing their vital cues in preventing bad things from transpiring. I am ashamed to say that, unfortunately, during mid- to late-2007 I was doing a whole heck of a lot of bell ringing right before the onset of the sub-prime mortgage crisis and can’t help but feel a little bit responsible.

The bell is gone now. I never ring it anymore. I’ve seen too much carnage. Maybe some day, when the work force of qualified candidates for angel-hood are not in such short supply, I will fetch the bell from its perch in the closet atop all the boxes of still-in-cellophane board games we got ourselves a few Christmases back when we were briefly convinced that board games are fun. But for now, I’m on a quest. It’s a quest to find the antithesis to the bell ring. If the beautiful, chimey noise of bells can grant angels wings, there must be some opposite noise, some direct reciprocal whose acoustic characteristics are entirely contrary to the splendor of the bell ring, a sound that can perhaps serve as a sort of aural antidote if you will, a sound that has power to dispossess angels of their wings in an similar, though inverse, fashion. So far, my hunches tell me that farts just might do the trick.

south beach.

2011-01-07T12:50:00.000-08:00

bloody gulch.

2011-01-06T23:29:00.000-08:00

Those stalwarts of all Mesa-dom, the women at I Heart Mesa, asked me to write an Arizona-themed piece for their blog. I did. Here it is:

When I was in fourth grade, my teacher, a lovable woman whose skin was strongly reminiscent of alligator flesh, initiated a program to broaden her students’ limited horizons. It was her idea for our class to correspond with another fourth grade class—nine- and ten-year-olds just like us, except from a strange and exotic place. That’s what she told us. I imagined receiving envelopes with elaborate postage stamps on them, stamps featuring the tiny, unframed portraits of crowned monarchs the likes of which my scant decade of life experience as an Arizonan child would hardly allow me to conceive. I wondered how we were to communicate with our pen pals, considering that they probably wouldn’t speak very good English, and I didn’t know a lick of Swahili (or Burmese or Gaelic or whatever wacky native idiom our counterparts would employ). However, it was to my utmost chagrin when our teacher ultimately informed us that the exotic place to which she had alluded was to be Moundsville, Ohio.

My elation dashed, I found little to talk about in my first letter. I figured life in Moundsville was probably pretty similar to life in Mesa—modest homes arrayed in rows, gathered around churches, schools and parks, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So in my letter I asked about favorite television shows, recess, the Cleveland Cavaliers, and what their grocery stores were called in Ohio. When I received my pen pal’s first response, I was a little surprised. The student, whom I will, for lack of actual recollection, refer to as Martin, didn’t answer a single one of my questions. (To this day, the void that is my ignorance regarding eastern Ohio supermarket chains still lingers.) Instead, his letter consisted of one wild, misguided inquisition after another:

“Are there ever gunfights?”
“Do you have a rattlesnake as a pet? Has it ever bit you?”
“Is your house a cactus?”

In no more time than it took me to read these questions, I developed a very poor opinion of the Ohio public school system. I mean, what kind of school produces fourth graders that are unable to tell reality from Hollywood fiction? How ineffective the local educational process must be to allow nine- and ten-year-old children to still harbor such cretinous notions. Even to me—a peer—Martin’s obtuse perception of Arizona seemed laughable. Did he realize that it was a mailman that dropped his class’s letters off at our modern, air-conditioned elementary school? Or did he imagine his letters sandwiched between dozens of dusty others, placed within the dark confines of a cracked leather satchel that bounced rhythmically across the lap of a Pony Express man riding horseback along ill-defined dirt roads lined with cow skulls and intersected by tumbleweeds, en route to places with names like Vulture Creek or Bloody Gulch?

I responded to Martin. I let him know that Arizona wasn’t the cryogenically frozen Wild West that he hoped it to be. I assured him that, no, I had never seen a gun fight, nor did I work part-time cleaning glasses at a saloon, nor did high noon have any particular significance except to indicate lunch. I did my best to convince him that I was a normal kid, interested in shooting hoops, playing video games, pulling pigtails, and planning the construction of elaborate forts that typically turned out to be a rotten sheet of plywood leaned up to a concrete block fence. After a few more letters from Martin, all of which lacked the enthusiastic curiosity and southwestern drawl of his first, the correspondence between the two classes fizzled.

And then a few years ago, more than a decade after my correspondence with Martin from Moundsville, I was in a grocery store parking lot. It was a windy day, one of those Arizona days when the whole sky looks pink like an impossibly vast mass of spilled grapefruit juice. I noisily wheeled a cart of processed food across the asphalt and towards my car, my pants pocket made musical at every step with the jumping of loose coinage. The cart’s front passenger side wheel was disagreeing so vehemently with the direction I was trying to push that I almost missed it when it happened. Between me and my Honda Accord, silhouetted in the bright pink sky, before the backdrop of the Superstition Mountains, rolled a tumbleweed. With each bounce and roll it left a trail of small, dried and crackling branches to memorialize its path. It looked out of place, the way it tumbled across newly paved asphalt, passed the still-bright yellow paint striping and hybrid cars parked in rows—like a phonograph amidst the plastic and aggressive-looking stereo equipment in the home audio section at any big box retailer.

I wanted to take my cell phone from my pocket and capture with photographic evidence this unique clash of old and new worlds. I wanted all to share in the anomaly that was the tumbleweed in the Fresh n’ Easy parking lot. I removed my cell phone from my pocket and aimed it. Through the viewfinder I again noticed the mountains just a few miles off—the Superstitions, with their stark precipices and their brown-turned-purple hue in the pre-evening. Beyond the parking lot and the adjacent road, up to the mountains’ first subtle inclines there was really nothing, just cacti spread with seemingly no pattern across otherwise bald earth. I wondered, wasn’t it these very mountains that served as the setting for a legendary Dutchman’s lost goldmine? There’s gold in them there hills. That’s what my dad used to say when we drove along US-60 past those mountains on our way out of town for the weekend. What’s more, I thought I’d heard that the famous Indian Geronimo—whose name I had sung playfully many times in my youth, holding the last syllable for seconds on end while jumping from high dives or while throwing oversized rocks into canals—was known to gallivant upon those mountains. I kind of recalled learning in school about a cave there in which he obscured himself while eluding the U.S. army. As the wind caught and emboldened like a sail of a tiny boat the plastic bags in my cart, I mulled it over and realized that, yes, I had heard each of those stories all while growing up and each did indeed refer to the Superstitions just a few miles away. Then I remembered that the road that goes past those mountains—Ellsworth Road—leads right to the remnants of a historical gold-mining town, portions of which were known to have been abandoned due to recurrent hauntings. I’d been there once as a kid. I remembered the town as a fully functioning tourist site, with an old-fashioned ice cream parlor, a saloon (complete with those dwarfish swinging cafe doors), mock gunfights every weekday at high noon and twice on weekends, and handle bar mustaches as far as the eye could see.

By this time, I’d now been lingering in the parking lot, trailing the tumbleweed with my cell phone camera, absorbing the view of the desert-scape, for what a casual observer would likely characterize as an abnormal amount of time. I thought to myself, “Holy crap. I live in a place with tumbleweeds. Tumbleweeds! And saloons. I live in a place with innumerable cacti. Lost freaking gold mines. And gunfights every day at high noon and twice on weekends.” I stood a moment longer and continued to watch the tumbleweed labor on southward. Now, it was the asphalt and the finely manicured green grass in concreted planters and the hybrid cars and the Auto Zone just north of the Fresh n’ Easy that looked out of place, not the tumbleweed. It all seemed to interrupt the generally dusty, cow-skull ambience created by the nearby herd of saguaro cacti and the looming Superstitions. Perhaps if the nearby Auto Zone had been rumored to be a haunted Auto Zone, things would’ve jived better, I thought. I was fairly certain, however, that no such rumors existed.

Lest my milk warm unnecessarily, I resumed pushing the cart towards my car. But I am pretty sure that on my way there and almost without trying, my legs starting to bow ever so slightly. The rattling of change in my pocket sounded less like currency and more like the tinkling of spurs at my heel. I could see how Mesa could just have easily been named Bloody Gulch or Cow Skull Trail or whatnot.

And now, I kind of want to write an amendment to my original response to Martin. I’d apologize for all the times I’ve chuckled when the thought of his obtuse little letter crossed my mind. I’d confess that as I’ve come to know my home, I’ve come to realize that his conception of a wild, western Arizona was at least as real as my conception of Arizona as a suburban haven of normalcy. I’d explain that part of what makes this state awesome is that my house is literally closer to a lost gold mine than it is to a public library, roller skating rink, or Thai restaurant. And I’d let him now that, yes, there are at least nine gunfights a week.

dream home.

2010-11-19T23:44:00.000-08:00

We’ve been thinking about our dream home lately. Angela wants wood floors and corner windows and hundred-year-old trees. She’d cope with a small kitchen if it was charming and historic enough, but under no circumstance is carpet to be tolerated.

I, on the other hand, have spent most of my imaginative energy thinking about the wardrobe. We would keep it in a rarely visited (and sometimes misty) room in the house. The wardrobe needs to be big—tall and wide enough for a person to stand right in it—and kind of majestically creepy, maybe a little ominous, and, most importantly, built right next to a wall. Its hinges will creak. A decorative lion’s head the size of an apple may or may not be carved into each of the two French doors.

We’ll have friends over for lunch. It will be a little cold inside and I’ll be busily stirring the spaghetti—too busy to stop and fetch myself one of the furry coats we keep in the wardrobe.

“Can I do anything to help?” our guests will ask.

“Why yes,” I’ll reply. “It’s a wee bit chilly. Greg, could you grab a coat or two from the wardrobe in the room down the hall. Get me the grey-ish one from the very back if it’s not too much trouble. Third door on the left.” He’ll head slowly off, a little perplexed at the unorthodoxy of the response to his generally insincere offer. He’d expected at most to have been handed a slimy-wet potato and a peeler.

A few minutes will pass and Greg’s wife Laura will ask where Greg went. Angela and I will shrug our shoulders in unison. The three of us decide as a group, now that the spaghetti situation seems to be fully under control, to set off in search of him. We’ll reach the wardrobe. The inch-wide crack of the open wardrobe door will be emphasized by the warm light squeezing through it. We’ll approach slowly and perceive the sound of Greg’s voice. He’ll be shouting.

“Greg,” Laura will say as she quickens her pace to the door and opens it. She will peer in, push aside furry coats and step a few feet forward, into and through the wardrobe, only to see Greg galloping about on a unicorn.

“Hey honey,” Greg will shout with wonder in his voice while his steed tromps about between the many lush trees that constitute a real-life thicket.

“What is this place?” Laura will ask, thoroughly mystified.

Angela and I will share a glance and silently convey to each other our deep satisfaction at insisting that our home be built with a wardrobe with no back, that leads directly out of doors to our tree garden where we keep our horse to whose forehead we’ve rubber-banded a birthday party hat—all so that we could watch every one of our guests have their minds blown and wonder, if only for a second, if they have found a whole other world inside of our wardrobe.

no.

2010-10-04T11:53:00.000-07:00

Me: Hey, can I borrow the stapler real quick?
Receptionist: No.

Hmm. That’s interesting. Enduring a long and uncomfortable pause, here I stand, a loose-leaf stack of papers in my clutches. A few seconds ago, my objective was to simply fasten them together. Now, I find myself engaged in some sort of weirdly psychological game of chicken with a gum-smacking receptionist. Rather than simply sliding my tidy stack of bright white, still-warm-from-the-inkjet-printer paper between the stapler’s protruding metal arms, stamping down, and proceeding on my way, I am faced with the challenge of deciphering this receptionist’s clandestine motives. Oh, fun. The situation requires me to start right at the top of the list of possible explanations for her inconvenient deviation from normal office etiquette. I would surmise that the most basic, though somewhat unlikely, possibility is that she is truly some sort of twisted malcontent, hardwired for domination of the communal office stapler, sincerely bent on preserving exclusively for herself its utility. Her somewhat guarded expression, however, does not seem to exhibit the wildness that I would expect to behold were she indeed the sort of psychopath that would so jealously harbor an office appliance like it was the final crumb of food to be shared between Himalayan plane crash survivors immediately before devolving into cannibalism. No, her expression is much more cloaked in Wednesday afternoon boredom than it is unfettered derangement. Perhaps, then, the stapler is out of staples. Perhaps she is simply denying me usage because the stars have aligned at this particular juncture as to produce a stapler void of staples at the very moment in which I am in need of the quick, firm fastening that only a stapler can reasonably provide. I think it’s probably best for me to inquire regarding this particular matter before jumping to any conclusions.

Me: Oh, is it out of staples?
Receptionist: No.

I wait for her to offer some sort of explanation, but she offers none. I note that her retort smacked of a faux sort of curtness. Her brow is crinkling, her eyebrows bobbing almost imperceptibly. I now see that it is sarcasm with which I am forced to wrestle on this busy Wednesday afternoon. I’m glad someone here is amused because I certainly am not. These papers have a destiny. And it’s not to wear out their respective existences in singularity. No, it is to have a single, collective existence as a bundle, a unit, a family. I straighten the already straight stack by tapping them like face cards on her desk. I clear my throat. She shows no sign of budging. But a smile is starting to surface on her lips. She pops her gum. Here I am, standing like an idiot, with a stack of unstapled papers in my hands and she's smiling. I’d make a lunge for the stapler if she were not sitting, so broad-shouldered as she is, like a soviet tank before the westbound entrance to West Germany, between me and it. I think this behavior is inappropriate for the workplace. I might even go as far as to say that this juvenile form of pranking is downright inconsiderate. Certainly, not professional. What if a blast of air-conditioned air was unleashed at this moment from the vents just a few feet above? The sheets would surely fly from my grasp, scatter all over the office floor, un-collate. Un-collate! Page seven would settle right atop page two and page thirteen would fraternize not with its natural and immediate kin but with page nine. Oh, all the sorting that such a scene would necessitate, the man hours wasted, the paper cuts that lay in wait. And where’s page eleven? It’s missing. Where the bloody heck is page eleven?! It's really inhuman and debasing the sort of maltreatment she is subjecting me to. I don't like being subjugated and I am pretty sure I am being subjugated. I’m sure she would just watch from her perch on that squeaky office chair as I bent and crouched and scrambled to collect the debris, her one hand still protectively stroking the stapler’s smooth black metal, its hard lines and soft curvature.

Me: So, can I use the stapler?
Receptionist: No.

I am going to run you over with my car. That is what I will do. And then I will staple my stack of paper with the utmost satisfaction and not the least inhibition by office staff. She is smiling now, smiling unabashedly. It’s sick the satisfaction she gains from this. It’s all a big gag, a big hilarious joke. Don't worry, I get it. I ask politely to use the stapler. You reach into your bag of comedic genius and pull out a morsel of unique brilliance: you will defy convention and expectation by denying my polite and reasonable request; you will wait and wait and wait until the discomfort grows so unwieldy and clumsy like untrimmed hair before finally relenting and allowing me use of the stapler that is just as much mine as it is yours—maybe even more mine, because I would never establish such unrighteous and discriminatory regulations to its handling; and you’ll chuckle because that’s all your life is; that’s all you have going for you. It’s clever I must admit. It’s right up there with tapping a person on the shoulder in trying to get them to look the wrong way or with your finger identifying a spill on a another's shirt only to flick them in the nose as they look down to investigate the purported stain. It’s all part of your jocular shtick. Real cutting edge stuff, definitely pushing the comedic envelope. Great. I get it. But give me the stapler. Give it to me before I explode. Because I will explode. And though it will not be the type of explosion that ends with my blood and guts splayed all across this office foyer, it will end very badly. It will end at a high decibel and you will be crying because I will have dismantled you. You will be a puddle on the floor and I will walk right through you and place my stack of paper in the stapler's path and calmly squeeze the arms together. If you do not give me the stapler, that is what will happen. I grit my teeth and ask one final time.

Me: May I use the stapler?

You look a little concerned now. Is it because of the tick that has formed above my left eye? I think it might be. Your smile is gone, likely because no smile of mine was ever party to this perverted interchange. Who’s feeling awkward now? Huh? Not I. The tables have turned. We both know that now. In fact, the tables aren’t turned. They are brand new tables. Tables you never could have anticipated when you started this little charade of yours. You’re moving slowly, cautiously swiveling for the stapler. That’s right, nice and slow. You’re wise to concede. These papers cannot wait another moment. These have to be filed now, sandwiched by manila in a lack of space behind the sliding drawer of a metal cabinet, not to be looked at for years, and maybe never. Give it to me. Give me the stapler.

Receptionist: Here you go.
Me: Thanks.

a haircut.

2010-04-20T23:55:00.000-07:00

The first time someone spoke the words “Nope, I got them all cut” in response to the question “Hey, did you get a hair cut?” I bet it was downright hilarious. The way that answer just cuts right through the communicatory haziness that we’ve all overlooked for so long—a haircut, a hair cut—it’s genius! And what a surprise it is the first time a person encounters that clever retort. Bam! That’s what it’s like—a sucker punch of specificity to counter an innocuously imparted piece of lingo. And, if you ask me, there’s nothing quite as awesome as an excessively literal response to an only moderately literal question.

Except maybe an excessively literal response to an excessively literal response. Allow me to illustrate:

“Hey, did you get a haircut?”
"No. I got them all cut.”
“Gross. That is way more information than I wanted.”

See. That’s much more awesome.

do-it-yourself.

2010-04-13T10:28:00.000-07:00

I love the do-it-yourself aesthetic. To me, there’s something terribly charming and quaint about handmade goods, something endearing in art or music that’s heaped with humanity rather than stamped with barcodes and wrapped in cellophane. A few weeks ago Angela and I spent the day at a craft fair and watched as individuals hocked purses and jewelry and stationery produced not in sweatshops, but within laundry rooms or garages or back patios that had been gradually converted to single-person factories. Perhaps one of the most striking features of the fair (and the DIY movement as a whole) was the repurposing of old materials into new products—letterpress cards made from recycled paper, purses constructed from tattered books, shoes and belts made from what was formerly a living, breathing cow. I think it goes without saying that I am a staunch supporter of any aesthetic that so motivates individuals to cleverly modify the mundane into the unique and distinctive.

Except when it comes to t-shirts.

And I don’t mean the creating of family reunion t-shirts or even t-shirts meant for public sale. I’m mostly talking to those few misguided, but bold, individuals who feel inclined to add a personal touch to a t-shirt by liberally cutting yards of cloth away from a previously functional shirt. Practically every trip I take to the gym I encounter at least one such soul, whose creativity appears to have no other outlet than the drastic expansion of sleeve holes and necklines. The worst, in my humble opinion, is the fellow who lances off the sleeves in their entirety and cuts an oval down the side of his shirt large enough to fit a vinyl record or large three-topping pizza through. From almost every angle, his nipples are exposed—and if not his nipples, his moles and scraggily, broom bristle-like armpit hairs. He’s essentially undermined the integrity of the t-shirt, robbing it of the very utility it was engineered to provide. A few more snips and that t-shirt would take on the form of a tunic, and few more after that, a spaghetti-strap top or, worst yet, a dangling, ragged necklace.

And while other products, such as those at the craft fair, which proclaim their allegiance to the DIY aesthetic seem to similarly sacrifice their source material for the sake of a new creation, none bothers me the way the surgically dissected gym t-shirt does. Perhaps it’s because a book made into to a purse or a letterpress card constructed of recycled paper does nothing to increase the public’s exposure to big, gross, pepperoni man nipples—the unbridled exposure of which, I must say, constitutes one aesthetic movement that I just can’t get behind.

dateline.

2010-04-12T19:37:00.000-07:00

The other night Angela and I were watching Dateline. It was the Friday edition. The episode was about this lady who murdered her husband and made her kids bury the body in the backyard. It decayed there for a couple of decades, virtually undisturbed (except by the predictable onslaught of maggots and other pests dutifully participating in the great miracle that is the circle of life) until the trigger-pulling mother was all blue hair, excess neck skin, sun spots and aged bones. By the time the truth came out, she had long been accepted by her neighbors as the kindly old woman on the block—a giver of cookies at Halloween time, a wrapper of shrubs with strands of only occasionally functional bulbs at Christmas time, a ready and willing fill-in babysitter for parents victimized by last minute cancellations, a frequent and patronizing customer of the many lemonade stands that over the years overcharged for poorly mixed and lukewarm juice. So you can imagine the shock of her neighbors when a forensics team could be seen excavating dirt-caked bones from the woman’s backyard. Predictably, a crowd formed along the perimeter of her property. Men and women gossiped and watched in awe the unearthing of a crime so unlikely that had anyone proposed just one day previous a theory halfway resembling its perpetration, the whole neighborhood would likely have responded with a unified and resounding scoff and together panned the conjecture as wildly far-fetched—less credible than even fictional murder mysteries. It just couldn't be so. To think of those brittle hands—the very same ten fingers that most summer nights had crocheted to the tune of a creaky rocking chair massaging the wood slats of a picturesque Idaho front porch—that their weakly metacarpals had once squeezed six chambers in the direction of the woman’s husband—well, it was almost too incongruous to believe. But it was so. And you know what this episode did to me? It made me sad. But not so much sad for the dead husband or the children forced to bury their step-father’s remains between the family dog’s doghouse and the withered old tool shed, or even for the kindly old woman sentenced to spend her final Halloweens and Christmases attempting to survive unwanted encounters with butch inmates behind the bars of an Idaho state women’s correctional facility. Mostly, I felt sad for myself. And for my wife. That on a Friday—an evening almost universally renowned as the quintessential evening for riotous merriment—we were home, watching Dateline.

waving.

2010-02-02T20:00:00.001-08:00

A faint acquaintance approaches from across the high school campus’s courtyard, her arm outstretched in salutation. Wow. She’s awful friendly, I think. I mean, we haven’t ever really talked much or even gotten along all that well, but, shucks, we did have that science class together in ninth grade. I think we may have even been in the same lab group. Actually, I’m sure of it. I remember how little attention she paid to the experiments and how she copied the answers from the rest of us at the very last second. But apparently, she was more attentive than I thought—not to science, but to me. She’s walking right at me, waving with the concentrated fervor of a New Yorker hailing a cab in a rainstorm. Perhaps the heat of the shared Bunsen burner had fused some connection between us too deep for words, a thing so raw and powerful that it required a few years to sit dormant before manageable enough to warrant mutual and public acknowledgment this way. I can’t believe I was so obtuse to not notice our bond. But she, approaching with a grin and a wave, she didn’t miss it. From the look of things, she’s been waiting for this for a long time. I’d bet that any time she encounters the smell of burnt chloride or happens across the sight of a petri dish, she can’t help but think of our time together, of me. Of course she wants to talk to me.

So I raise my hand, an olive branch extended, and wave. Not too soft, though. She’s waving pretty adamantly. I wouldn’t want her to feel silly. So I match her enthusiasm. I make eye contact, attempting to establish a tractor beam sort of influence that will aid her in her final descent towards the cove of lockers that surround me. But she doesn’t seem to be meeting my eyes. It’s more like she’s fixated on my shoulder. No, wait, above my shoulder. Holy crap.

This is the moment at which I wish for any number of things to happen. The apocalypse, for one, would be welcome. Atomic warfare, earthquakes, a school shooting—all would not only serve as adequate distractions from the humiliating corner into which I have painted myself, but also as vastly more pleasant alternatives. Because now I know. And it will only be seconds before she’ll realize too. I wish a disease, one that makes people feel sorry for you, would instantly infect me, rob me of my hair and make me stick thin. No one mocks the diseased the way they would mock a well person in the same situation. It’s not fair.

I’m quite sure of what’s happening, but I’m still waving and so is she. I can’t just stop. I am acutely aware that behind me and out of view stands another student, the intended recipient of her wave. He or she is probably waving too, but not so unrequitedly as I. I can’t bear to turn and look, but I know it’s the truth. I’m still waving and she’s still approaching. I notice that her gaze has drifted some and is now right upon me, slowly surveying the situation. She cocks her head sideways in bewilderment, causing her ponytail to squirm like a caught fish in its final movements. For one long second, she stays that way—head cocked and eyes curious—and continues to walk forward, except slower, more pensive. I wonder if there’s a chance that she won’t get it, if somehow she won’t perceive me as the imbecile that I am. Crazier things have happened. Gods smile upon the meager inhabitants of this planet intermittently. People win lotteries, stumble across cures for diseases, find soul mates amidst billions and billions of incompatible partners. God flicks his wrist and seas part. Why not for me then? Why not today? Why can’t God extend a finger down into the surface of her brain and scramble things just a little, just enough to keep her from realizing? But suddenly her head snaps back straight and her stride resumes and I know she knows.

She is blond, but not naturally or convincingly so. My eyes are those of a pet on the verge of euthanasia. They whimper. Please don’t tell everyone. But she has averted her stare momentarily. It wouldn’t matter anyways. I’ve seen her standing in a circle with all the other unconvincing blonds. They chatter like hyenas, waiting for just such fodder, like the way African children will make a soccer ball from just about anything. Their cackles haunt me already.

I’m still waving. She’s closer, maybe twenty or so yards away. I now recall one conversation we shared over the Bunsen burner all those semesters ago. She had rambled on and on about a Friends episode. About how Rachel’s nose kept changing and how Chandler was so funny and how she thought nothing would be greater than hanging out in a New York coffee shop, drinking from oversized and pastel colored mugs. Oh how she belabored the subject of those mugs, describing in detail the hypothetical flowers that would decorate her designated coffee receptacle. And how I wanted her to shut up. This was the girl to whom I extended an olive branch? One whose life goals revolved primarily around ceramics? What a fool I am.

My wave is growing tired, flimsy, but persists. I am suddenly incredibly aware of its flapping and how it has cursed me. The bones and flesh and ligaments, typically tools by which I am made able, today work against me. She is looking right at me again, this time fully cognizant and acknowledging with attentive eyes my humiliation. There is no kindness in her stare, no sign of mercy. For one hazy moment, I see myself in third person, as if the real essence of me is levitating in the air above my body, watching the scene unfold. Students, with their backpacks and books and haircuts of which they will be ashamed in fifteen years, scatter in every direction, some engaged in conversation with friends, waiting for the bell to ring. Dozens stand beyond the approaching girl and I envy them. I envy that they were not standing where I was standing, faced with the same confusing salutation that faced me. Why could I not have been one of the lucky ones, one of the many that stand beyond?

That’s when a synapse fires, maybe two. Grey matter crinkles just so, or does whatever it is that grey matter does when an individual is blessed by the advent of an idea. Whatever that process entails, that’s what happens to me, on the surface of my brain—an idea. It’s a long shot, certainly, a full-court overhand huck as the buzzer sounds, but it’s all I have.

She is ten or so yards away. I’m still waving. Taking great pains to appear effortless, I shift my gaze from the general area of her make-up covered, faux tanned face and scan the many students walking beyond her. I lock in on a brown-haired, bowl-cutted sophomore I’ve never met before. Spinning a pen in one hand, he cuts across the lawn in front of the administration building half a football field away. I reinvigorate my wave, infuse it with conviction and direction. This she notices. “Hey Greg,” I yell as I begin to walk directly to him. He doesn’t as much as raise an eyebrow at me. Why would he? He’s no Greg. For all I know, he could be deaf since birth or a Latvian foreign exchange student. But I don’t care. I walk straight at him.

Before passing her, I can see her stride slow some. Her crumpled brow radiates the consternation that has so suddenly befallen her. She blinks rapidly, straining to grasp newly turned tables which had once seemed so sturdy and immovable. I don’t stop. I walk, aware that within her sun-bleached teenage mind the whole situation has been blanketed with a layer of doubt, like fresh snow fallen upon and having momentarily beautified the ugliest ghetto of the most rundown industrial city. I feel delivered—as if seas have been parted this day for me as much as ever they were for Moses. So I accelerate my pace towards the one that I dubbed Greg, propelled by the knowledge that behind me is a blond girl feeling utterly ridiculous to have believed it was she to whom I was waving, when in fact it was someone else entirely.

boredom.

2010-01-23T17:36:00.001-08:00

There are certain things about life that I don’t and may never understand—things like soul patches and pelvis fat and glitter and vampire-themed entertainment. But perhaps foremost of those things which I lack the mental dexterity to grasp is boredom. I’m not even certain that I’ve ever experienced the state of mind to which people refer when speaking of “boredom.” There is just too much stuff I want to do. There’s always a book to read, a song to write, a nearby napkin upon which I can doodle an offensively exaggerated portrait of whomever it is that I happen to be with, or a minute aspect of existence which begs to be analyzed in excruciating detail (fire, cake cups, hugs, et cetera).

But let’s say that all that stuff evaporated in a flash, was transported to another dimension from which it could not be reclaimed; I still wouldn’t be bored. I’d simply resort to my list of just-for-the-heck-of-it activities, which I’ve been accumulating for years. One such activity I occasionally utilize in the passing of time requires a trip to Wal-Mart. You think the old folk greeters at that particular big box establishment are all smiles and white hair and creepy questions about your kids, but in reality, they are the Walton’s last line of defense against shoplifting. So one way to spice up an otherwise drab afternoon is to, like I said, go to Wal-Mart. Once there, select any item (preferably something small and light). Pay at the register and insist on foregoing the plastic bag, but double check to take and safely stow your receipt in a trustworthy pocket. Once you’ve got the product in hand, place it under your shirt or in a pocket in such a way as to create an obvious bulge. Walk towards the exit. When the drooping and sun-spotted neck flesh of the greeter draws your sight, causing you to draw all sorts of silent comparisons to chicken skin, pan your view up a few inches to make eye contact with the greeter. But make sure that it's uncomfortable eye contact, the accidentally-shared-between-elementary-school-crushes type of hyper self-conscious eye contact. As soon as you feel confident that the greeter has noticed you, run. Break out into a full sprint. Pump those knees and flee as if from a burning building, without even stopping to get the cat. You can bet your socks that at that moment the greeter will put his at least seven-decade-old bones into motion in hot pursuit of what he perceives to be a shoplifter.

Now, I ask you, is there any situation so boring that an impromptu footrace with a senior citizen across the parking lot of a Wal-Mart wouldn’t effectively banish from you any lingering sense of tedium? I think not.

fire.

2010-01-19T11:49:00.001-08:00

Whoever came up with the old axiom “you have to fight fire with fire” is an idiot, or at the very least, has never had any personal experience with fire. If your couch bursts into flames, the absolute worst thing you can do is start another fire and then hope that the second fire out-fires the first fire. I’m not even sure what bizarre sort of mind would expect such an improbable turn of events—definitely not the type of mind that we should trust to be creating the axioms that define our society and definitely not the type of person who should be allowed to own scented candles. What’s missing is a basic understanding of how fire works. See, even if the second fire did engulf and overcome the initial fire, now all you have on your hands is a fire that is doubly strong and even more threatening. Because now you have a fire that has developed a taste for fire. And if there’s one thing that sounds worse than fire, it’s a fire that has added cannibalism to its long list of sinister properties.

Still, maybe the principle behind the axiom is what the author was really after. Perhaps he or she was trying to say something more akin to “Fight Indian burns with Indian burns” or “Fight punches with punches”—a sort of inverse of the golden rule: what others do to harm you, you should do to harm them. It's a notion as rife with moral indifference as the classics “eye for an eye” or “finders keepers.” But obviously, such sayings aren’t really concerned with perpetuating brotherly love or cuddling or the 3 AM sharing of homemade baked goods and most embarrassing moments at slumber parties. No, these are results-oriented sayings. And I believe that if results was what the author was after, the “fight fire with fire” or “fight punches with punches” axiom falls a little bit short. If we could combine the two, then we’d have an axiom that really gets us somewhere. May I suggest the synthesis, the sum of which is far greater than its parts: “Fight punches with fire.” Now, the principle behind that axiom has got some legs. If abided by, I promise, no one will ever punch you twice. That’s results.

literally.

2009-11-22T21:02:00.000-08:00

I am often very skeptical as to whether or not certain people know the meaning of the word “literally.” I mean, if I hear you say “Oh my gosh, this soft pretzel is so freaking hot. Man, it just burned my tongue off. Like literally, my tongue has third degree burns,” well, then, at least in my mind, when you stick out your tongue, it better look like it’s been through trench warfare. But way too often, people use the word “literally” to describe statements that are actually the exact opposite. For instance, a man telling a story today at church said, “Literally, you could have cut the tension in that room with a knife.” Really? With a knife? I ‘d like to see someone literally cut an abstract concept like tension with a knife. I’d bet any attempt at so doing would just look like a crazy man walking through an already tense room thrusting a knife with seemingly no direction.

If we think about it, the soft pretzel patron should have said something to the effect of, “Like figuratively, my tongue has third degree burns.” That kind of verbal specificity and precision fosters genuine and trustworthy communication. And integrity of communication is a thing that is really important to me. Because when someone tells me that they have third degree burns on their tongue, and they stick out a tongue that for the most part looks like any old boring tongue, I am always disappointed.

hoth chocolate.

2009-09-30T13:41:00.000-07:00

This morning, as I was on my way to work, I noticed a discarded object in the middle of a street not far from my house. I stopped my car to inquire and was made utterly, utterly speechless by what I beheld:

You guessed it—a Star Wars-themed cookbook. It was just laying face down in the asphalt, all lonely-like. You can bet that there is some little poindexter out there somewhere, heartbroken to have misplaced it, demoralized at the prospect of having to eat boring old earth food for dinner tonight. The pictures and recipes are downright hilarious. Observe:

This next one is my favorite:

I think this proves that something can simultaneously be both pathetic and amazing.

dinner table conversation.

2009-07-16T19:22:00.000-07:00

As I've mentioned before, Angela and I are of a dying breed—the young, somewhat newly married, and still childless couple. Almost all the other couples our age are up to their elbows in babies and baby paraphernalia (toys, puke, rotting diapers, etc.). There seems to be a social partition between pre-parents (us) and parents (pretty much everyone else). We work, do homework, come and go as we please, speak in adult voices, sleep through the night and so forth. They, on the other hand, use the word “onesie” at least a dozen times daily. Instead of discussing crocodile wrestling or introducing the concept of hugs as currency, their blogs are meaningful, doubling as scrapbooks, serving to document Olivia’s first steps or Jack’s hilarious crayon tirade.

I’ve noticed that many of these other couples don’t really like to talk about the things Angela and I talk about. Music? Not really. Good design? Nope. Books? There’s hardly time for a good night’s sleep, much less pleasure reading. But one thing’s for sure—they love to talk about their kids. And when discussing their kids, it seems that any subject is deemed appropriate. For instance, the other night at a dinner we attended one mother explained to the rest of those present, “Oh, little Cannon is doing so good at going on the potty. Yesterday I walked by the bathroom and caught him staring into the bowl of his mini-toilet. I asked him “Did you poopy?” and he shook his head yes and held out his hand for a candy reward.” Everyone laughed. “Oh that Cannon…” The story is plenty cute and all. I just think it poses an awful double standard; at the dinner table a mother can discuss the disgusting details of her son’s bowel movement, but not a full five minutes later I ask one hypothetical question about whether or not you would go to the bathroom through your nose for the rest of your life for ten million dollars and everyone looks at me like I’m some sort of sicko.

M & M's.

2009-07-16T19:01:00.000-07:00

So I guess everyone is probably aware that the M&M’s have been dubbed “the milk chocolate that melts in your mouth, not in your hand.” I’ll admit that that is one catchy slogan. It really rolls off the tongue—almost with the sort of mellifluence typical of a Shakespearean couplet. But I guess it’s the logistical implications of the slogan that bother me. For me personally, chocolate melting in the palm of my hand hasn’t been a huge problem. In fact, I can’t remember the last time that happened. Typically, if I have chocolate in my hand, it’s only there as a sort of pit stop between candy jar and mouth. If you’re holding chocolate in your hand long enough that it starts melting, I really think that that is a you problem. Maybe you just really like holding things without ever using them for their intended purpose. If that was the case, then certainly I could see the M&M’s slogan really resonating with you. You could hold those tasty treats all day and not worry yourself one bit. But then again, if you’re just into holding things why not try a stapler or a paper clip? Those objects aren’t equipped with an intrinsic proclivity to melting in the first place. You could hold and cling and heft them to your heart’s fullest desire and not for one second teeter on the perilous precipice of melt-ation.

But what’s worse is that until I heard M&M’s slogan about their candies not melting in your hand, I didn’t even think of melting as a fate for which my candy might be at risk. The existence of the slogan causes me to assume that all other candies absolutely will melt in the palm of my hand—for they don’t have a slogan to assure me otherwise. Therefore, my plan is to launch a product that is exceptionally similar to M&M’s—small, beadlike, colorful shell-covered chocolates—except my slogan will be “the milk chocolate that melts in your mouth, but doesn’t explode in the palm of your hand, maiming you for life.”

soap-on-a-rope.

2009-07-16T18:50:00.000-07:00

a brief note to reality television

2009-07-16T11:48:00.000-07:00

Reality television, you are the bane of my existence. If it wasn’t for you, Family Guy and the various incarnations of Law and Order would utterly rule the universe of television programming, never absent, not for a single second. But no, you, reality television, with your empty promises of momentary fame and brief cases overflowing with prize money lure otherwise decent people into shoving as many maggots into their mouth in thirty seconds as possible.

Craftily, you’ve convinced us that no top models, national idols, dog groomers, chefs, or survivors can be crowned without heaps of melodrama, annoyingly prolonged pauses and text-in poles. Whatever happened to the job interview? What of the days when a person could attain a desired position or job on the grounds of experience, talent, and a fake list of references? “Hey Josh, would you do me a solid and forge my old boss’s signature? And can I put your cell phone as his office number?” That’s America. Not all this hubbub about who’s got talent and who’s the top whatever. I’m downright tired of it all. It almost makes me wish for the return of the late 90s quiz show era when Regis Philbin and his fluorescent-lit, futuristic-looking set ruled the primetime airways.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, whether or not my vote really means anything, reality television, I vote you off the island.

self-concept.

2009-04-16T10:54:00.000-07:00

I learned a long time ago that it’s a bad idea to compare yourself to other people. It’s a lose-lose situation. By so doing, you anchor your self-concept to a moving, relative target, thereby setting yourself up for surefire dissatisfaction. That’s why many moons ago I decided to never compare myself to other people. So maybe Johnny rolls on twenties. Good for him. Oh what’s that? By the time Doug was my age he’d already started a successful grout company and fathered three beautiful children. Well great! It’d be pointless for me to compare myself against Johnny’s inefficiently dimensioned wheels or Doug’s grout biz. It does no good for me or them.

So I don’t compare myself to other people. Instead, I’ve found that it’s much more effective to compare myself to other animals. My house is way bigger than any bird’s nest, beehive, or beaver’s dam. And my party etiquette and small talk, no matter how uncomfortably awkward or crassly inappropriate, is leagues ahead of the sort of bum sniffing that so many dogs engage in upon encountering a new acquaintance. And if I’m feeling a little less than confident about my physical appearance, by all means, I’ll just do a Google search for that species of monkey with the big, disgustingly red butt and suddenly I feel like a regular Tom Cruise.

Really, comparing yourself to animals is perhaps the best approach to developing a strong self concept. How else will one be made to feel superior simply by going to the bathroom in a toilet instead of leaving refuse scattered randomly around the house? It’s a great system.

ducks: the hottest new thing in headwear.

2009-03-31T22:18:00.000-07:00

worst pain possible.

2009-03-25T07:51:00.000-07:00

The other day, Angela and I visited Angela’s dad in the hospital. Hanging on the wall of his hospital room, right above the fire-truck red plastic bin where they deposited the used-up needles and other medical waste, was the following “Pain Rating Scale”:

Now, it’s a good thing I’m not a nurse. The way I figure it, people love sympathy and they don’t mind lying to get it. You see at the far end of the number scale there on the upper right-hand corner of the picture where it says “worst pain possible”—see it? If I was a nurse and my patient told me that their kidney or ankle or chest discomfort was causing them to experience a “10” on the pain scale, I don’t think I could avoid calling them out on it.

“Worst pain possible huh?”

“Yeah, it’s definitely a ‘10.’”

Bam. (That’s the sound of me punching the patient right in the face.) My patient would grab at his nose, see the smattering of blood dotting his palm, wince in new, more immediate pain, and maybe even start crying.

Then I'd look him square in the eyes. “Liar.”

when a cowboy misplaces his hat, he has to make do with whatever is available

2009-03-20T17:00:00.000-07:00

the doctor's office.

2009-03-19T08:52:00.000-07:00

The other day I went to the doctor. I hate going to the doctor—not because I'm afraid of needles or tongue depressors or anything. It’s mostly because I think it’s a giant waste of time. I go to the trouble of getting work off, setting an appointment, locating my insurance card amidst all the frequent bread buyer and yogurt club cards, and nine out of ten times the doctor does next to nothing to alleviate my symptoms.

“It’ll run its course,” he’ll say.

And that’s when I punch him. Right in the kisser. Or at least I imagine it really vividly. I wonder what it must feel like to charge people for nonexistent services. If I wanted a passive prediction of bodily regeneration, I would’ve just drove right past the doctor’s office and gone to my parents’ house. My mother would undoubtedly have uttered the very same vague pronouncement that everything would turn out all right. And she would’ve scooped me a bowl of cookies and cream ice cream to soften the blow and improve my otherwise phlegmy day.

But I don’t explain this line of thinking to the doctor. I just stare at him with arms crossed, brow furrowed and demand, “Are you at least going to scoop me some ice cream?” He looks at me puzzled, but my resolve and countenance are unflinching. I want my ice cream.

a pear-shaped man is rarely comfortable at the beach.

2009-03-18T20:04:00.000-07:00

manliness.

2009-03-17T22:35:00.000-07:00

It’s no secret that machoness isn’t my forte. For proof, just take a look at that first sentence. No macho man has ever used the word “forte.” But I use it all the time. One time, right after I used it, my father-in-law called me a metrosexual. It really caught me off guard. I didn’t know if his declaration was the type of thing where he’d recently learned a new vocabulary term and wanted badly to put it to practical use, or if he really thinks I’m a little on the femmie side. Either way, it got me thinking.

I’ll admit that I’ve long found myself partial to a nice pair of tight-fitting jeans and even once owned some maroon corduroys. But that doesn’t make me floppy-wristed. So what if I’ve never shot a gun or sliced through freshly dead deer hide with a pocketknife or even successfully closed a pocketknife? That doesn’t mean I’m any less of a man. And so what if one time when I was working behind the counter at a local frozen yogurt store a toddler asked his mom why I had hair like a girl? So what? If I hadn’t been occupied adding gummy bears to his sugar cone, I would have asked his mom why her son required Velcro shoes and spoke with that ridiculous lisp.

But what does he know? There are plenty of manly things about me. I have never met a jar I couldn’t open. I eat meat occasionally (even if most of the time it’s grilled chicken tossed over a cozy bed of organic baby spinach (dressing on the side)). And unlike the conventional metrosexual, I wouldn’t be caught dead within five miles of an open container of clear nail polish. Not five miles.

Frankly, it’s a good thing Angela and I had plans later that evening to pick out fabric for her new sofa, otherwise my day would have really been ruined.

grammar (again).

2009-02-24T15:35:00.000-08:00

We all love grammar. For years, I counted myself an avid grammarian. Not only does it facilitate communication, but outside of glasses and an extended pinkie finger when drinking from any cup with a handle, it’s maybe the quickest way to show how much smarter, and therefore, better, you are than everyone else.

“Whom.”

“What?”

“You said, ‘I didn’t know who the cookies were baked for.’ It’s ‘whom.’ You didn’t know for whom the cookies were baked. Pardon my interrupting. Please continue with your asinine retelling of that riveting tale of the dispossessed cookies.”

But as useful as it is, grammar can be a dubious mistress. Once a person establishes himself as a grammarian, it’s as if a bright red bull’s-eye has been painted on his forehead. Everyone’s out to correct the corrector. As the grammarian desires to do the correcting before providing the opportunity to be corrected, discussion soon devolves from an exercise in human bonding and an exchange of pertinent information into a callous stakeout for linguistic folly.

“Dad, hurry! We have to get mom to the hospital right now! She’s bleeding pretty bad!”

“Tut, tut, tut, son. We need to get mom to the hospital right now because she’s bleeding pretty badly. In this house, we use adverbs.”

But I’ve surprised myself lately. My commitment to grammar has begun to wane some. I’ve started to wonder who these grammar gods are and where they get off imposing their arbitrary will on us decent, hardworking Americans.

The questioning of my faith started with the word “fun.” For years, I, like many others, had jumped at the chance to announce that the correct method for adding comparative degree to the word was not “funner” but “more fun.” Sometimes when I was a kid, I would even pose questions as a sort of trap for my friends just so I could correct them.

“Hey Billy, which do you think provides you more fun—roller coasters or water slides?”

“Hmm…that’s a toughy. I don’t know, maybe water slides are a little funner.”

That’s when I would pounce. As you might expect, I didn’t hang on to friends very long.

I remember when it hit me. It hit hard. I was babysitting a three-year old cousin. He was trying to express to me a preference for the trampoline instead of the swing set. Of course, I had to interrupt and inform him that it’s “more fun” and not “funner.” Then he asked a simple question that absolutely floored me.

“Why?”

I had no idea why “funner” is not correct. “Faster” is correct. “Taller” is correct. Even “toastier” works. Why not funner? It could have been the trampoline that I was standing on, but at that realization, I swear I felt my world shifting beneath my very feet.

Now I don’t know where to turn. No grammarian I’ve encountered seems to have an answer for why “funner” is incorrect. I’ve dug my old grammar books from the closet and studied them closely. I’ve taken long walks in nature, pondering any and all possible explanations. Despite my efforts, I have found no valid answer. As a result, somehow, grammar doesn’t seem as pure or as tidy a system as it used to. Suddenly, the grammar gods seem silly and small with their spectacles teetering on the edges of their noses and their pinkies all haughtily protruding. Thus shaken, I don’t know if I'll ever correct someone’s grammar again.

exit strategies.

2009-01-29T19:52:00.000-08:00

I don’t really like attending parties. I find all the small talk to be really uncomfortable. But it’s not because I am one of those people who stinks at starting conversations. In fact, I am awesome at starting conversations. I just walk right up, stick out the ole’ hand, and unleash a string of stock questions designed to pull from my new acquaintance all sorts of information-laden, discussion-spurring talk. They’re simple questions like: “Are you from Phoenix? Oh. What brings you here then?” or “How do you know the host?”

Then ensues a discussion of cozy general interest topics like the concept of a “dry heat” or a comparative analysis of the freeway systems of major U.S. cities or why Baked Cheetos far surpass regular Cheetos in both flavor and wholesomeness or the various exchange policies of big box chain stores. (“Bed, Bath and Beyond will exchange gift certificates for cash?! You’re kidding!”) Yet one can only discuss freeways and weather and consumerism for so long. I know that as soon as the word “rubberized” finds its way into conversation, the exchange has run its course.

Like our recent president, upon entrance into this volatile encounter I obviously took no thought as to my exit strategy. So while my counterpart continues talking, I mentally survey my options for concluding the conversation. But by the time I’ve found an appropriate method for disembarking, my partner is already a few minutes into a discourse on his polished rock collection or reenacting one of the plays from the high school state championship football game he participated in seven and a half years ago. As much as I’d like to, I can’t just interrupt and end things. That’d be horribly rude. So I listen, contributing the occasional “Huh. Really?” or “Snowflake Obsidian—you don’t say?” or “Wow. All those practices everyday for three years and you still couldn’t win. Shucks.”

So, I face the fact that I am stuck. But it’s not a benign stuckedness like a decapitated gummy bear beneath a movie theater seat; it’s a stuckedness that gradually worsens, approaching oblivion ever so slowly, like quicksand or aging. Any means that I can conjure for possible escape gets swallowed in the ever-deepening entity that has become The Conversation. Who knows how long the banter will persist or in what mind-numbing direction it will next meander? All that is certain is that it is awful.

Think not that I am alone in my inability to create succinct, apt conversational conclusions. Even those whom our society celebrates as exceptional and exemplary, suffer from this shortcoming. Haven’t you noticed that Batman, the caped crusader himself, bears my same affliction, often silently vacating a conversation before things grow uncomfortable? One second, he’s chatting like a schoolgirl with Commissioner Gordon. The next second, Gordon peers away ever so briefly, and poof, Batman is vanished. It’s a very effective method. I tried it myself for a time. As soon as my conversational counterpart would look away or down, I’d dart off for the nearest pillar, bush or closet. Unfortunately, I’m not very fast. Most of the time they’d see me right before I got myself adequately hidden, immediately turning a potentially uncomfortable situation into an extremely uncomfortable one. Sometimes, even if I knew I wasn’t fully concealed, I’d pretend I was. After a few minutes, the other party would get bored or weirded out and head off to chat up someone else.

Though that approach proved unsuccessful, I still have one trick up my sleeve before I consign myself to a lifetime of driveling small talk. Never again will I attend a social function of any kind without a chain of smoke bombs strapped to my chest beneath my shirt. Just as a conversation begins to sour, perhaps the other party starts playing the do-you-know-so-and-so-person-from-your-high-school game, I’ll reach imperceptibly between the buttons on the front my shirt and pluck a single smoke bomb. At their faintest wayward glance, I will spike the smoke bomb into the carpet as if celebrating a touchdown. The room will fill with smoke. People will become disoriented, coughing violently and inhaling the smoke bomb’s potentially harmful chemicals. Amidst all the fuss, no one will notice that Clint has successfully averted further conversation and relocated to the snack table where he is munching gleefully on a handful of Baked Cheetos.

gift-giving.

2008-12-16T15:43:00.000-08:00

I love Christmas time. Especially the gift-giving part. There are few things so satisfying as to watch a loved one animalistically tear wrapping paper from a boxed gift like flesh from a fresh zebra ribcage strewn lifelessly across the yellow grasses of the Serengeti. It’s thrilling. Then comes the wild, toothy grin of ecstatic appreciation and shouts of jubilee: “Oh my gosh! How did you know?” Finally, the giver and receiver embrace, together reveling in the success of an inspired gift.

But as intense an experience as it is to give the perfect gift, it is far more intense—though oppositely so—to give the dramatically errant one. The horribly telling pause. The scrunchy-browed look of miserable contemplation. The contrived assurances and poorly delivered thank-yous. It’s all part and parcel with the Christmas gift belly-flop. Everyone in the room knows the ill-fitting giftiness of a rock garden or wooden spoon set or tie dye t-shirt kit. But no one says a thing. The silence itself conveys the unfortunate message. It’s a situation everyone wants to avoid and that I’ve found myself party to one too many times.

That’s why this year, I’m not trusting my intuitive gift-giving instincts alone. Instead, for the sake of Christmas, I’m investing in roofies—those pills that conveniently provoke unconsciousness and memory loss. Now it is a sad truth that these pills are often used for sinister and deplorable purposes. But that’s not how I operate. I will use roofies only for good. Casually and while sipping a mug filled with eggnog, I’ll chat with one of the members of my family. We’ll laugh and joke together, rehearse memories of Christmases past. And then I’ll ask them point blank what gift would most thoroughly complete their Christmas wishes. Just as they finish divulging the vital information, I’ll slip the roofie in their mug. “Drink up,” I’ll suggest. “It’s not every day that you get to enjoy eggnog without looking like a weirdo.”

Twelve hours later they’ll wake up with no memory of the event and I’ll be on my way home from the mall with the very present that will make them squeal. On Christmas morning, amidst piles of wrapping paper from less inspired gifts, they’ll open mine, look me square in the eyes and elatedly ask, “How did you know?”

recession-proof employment.

2008-11-26T00:07:00.000-08:00

They say the economy’s bad. Real bad. Everyone’s worried about job security. To do my little bit to ease the suffering, I have accumulated a list of recession-proof jobs worth scouting out. They are as follows:

1: Professional basketball player

Think about all the starving people in the world. What do they all have in common? They’re short and they can’t shoot. Have you ever seen a seven foot four inch western European guy with a sweet baby hook begging for nickels? Me neither.

2: Teacher

The way I figure it, whenever a recession sets in, the quality of teaching in public schools drops precipitously. Why? Job security. Teachers watch each other’s backs. By advancing to the next grade students who have learned little or nothing, teachers ensure the need for subsequent teachers to teach the idiot kids the basics they’ve yet to apprehend. It’s a system that spans all the way up to college. Don’t believe me? Why do you think you learn about mitosis in seventh grade, ninth grade, eleventh grade and in college? Exactly. It’s a big inter-teacher conspiracy.

3. Body guard

If ever there is a time that my desire to attack celebrities is in full bloom, it's during a recession. Why should no-talent, brainless hacks like Paris Hilton get all the money while everyday stiffs like myself have to work through four years of college just to prove possessive of the capability to work away the remainder of life? It’s downright unfair. However, I’m pretty sure tackling an over-paid incompetent like Nicholas Cage into a lamppost would really help me blow off some steam. Then to further even the score, I’d steal his Rolex and hock it in order to buy bread for my children. So what does that make me and the host of people equally upset regarding celebrity excess? Bodyguard job security. Think about it. Plus, I think the sunglasses are standard issue.

4. Dictator

Sure, it’s a tough gig to wrangle, but once you do, you’re set. And don’t you worry about recession-time layoffs. Your subjects will be so used to poverty that they won’t even notice the stock market plummeting. Heck, if you play your propaganda cards right, they’ll never even have heard about private ownership, much less the stock market. Plus you control the food and water supply. Just make sure they are too malnourished to ever organize a revolution. Seriously, it’s a lot of legwork, but after a few years, really, you’re golden.

5. Democratic Presidential Nominee

This one’s no mystery. When the economy is in the dumps, Americans stampede, with palms extended and pockets outturned, to democrats. If you find yourself as Democratic presidential nominee, don’t worry about utterly breaking the back of the capitalist system that has served as the catalyst for American ingenuity and progression for hundreds of years. Seriously, just promise money to everyone and they’ll love you. They'll elect you to whatever position you want. You’ll be like a kid who brings poison cup cakes into class to celebrate his birthday. Almost never do people connect the violent diarrhea hours later to the cup cakes that tasted so good just before afternoon recess. They just remember that you did them a solid by ponying up thickly iced cup cakes. You’re home free.

These are just a few of many possible jobs with which to thrive in a down economy. But don’t limit yourself. Be creative. Maybe you could start a money-counterfeiting ring. Or perhaps you should consider starting a casino. Don’t overlook the timeless tactic of kidnapping/ransom. I hear they have some very realistic-looking ransom note fonts these days. Think of all the time you’ll save now that you don’t have to hunt through magazines looking for an appropriately sized and sinister-enough-looking letter ‘J.’ Throw those scissors in the waste bin. Sore cutting wrists and paper cuts are a thing of the past. Everything is streamlined these days. Really, the sky is the limit.

don't let me down.

2008-11-24T07:34:00.000-08:00

I hope that someday I have occasion to be admitted to the hospital. I don’t want anything life threatening, but whatever malady does beset me, it must be serious enough that the doctor has to come out into the waiting room and update Angela regarding my status. I’m thinking like a high ankle sprain. Or some sort of table saw-induced finger loss. Even a burst appendix would be fine as long as they caught it before my own lethal juices began poisoning me. It all sounds like good fun.

But why, you ask, would I wish injury upon myself? Simple. Months ago I made Angela promise that if this situation every arose, she would look the doctor square in the eyes and insist that he “pull the plug.” He’d get all flustered and confused because I wouldn’t even be plugged into anything. Not thirty seconds previous he watched me leaf through the pages of the Home and Garden magazine I found on the bedside table in my hospital room. He’d try to explain to Angela that her husband is plenty able to breathe and eat and sustain life on his own, but, in accordance with our agreement, Angela would interrupt. She'd rehearse that her and I had discussed the issue and I had made my wishes abundantly clear. “He wouldn’t want to continue living like this,” Angela would sputter. “Pull the plug, doctor.”

The doctor would protest. Or sit in silent shock. I don’t care which. I just want to see his face when he returns to the side of my hospital bed.

My only fear is that Angela will break her promise. Instead of accomplishing the prank we’d together conceived, she might act all worried and junk. She might even feel bad messing with an ER doctor on hour twenty-two of his twenty-four hour shift. But she better do it. She promised. And if she doesn’t fulfill her promise, I just don’t know if I’ll be able to trust her ever again.

parenthood.

2008-10-27T00:18:00.000-07:00

I am twenty-four. Angela is twenty-three. We’re practically spring chickens. Right? I mean, based on our fairly conservative, non-smoking, always-look-both-ways-when-crossing-the-street lifestyle, I would gage that we both have somewhere between sixty and eighty years of life left in us. Maybe more if we lay off the Diet Coke and cellular telephones. That leaves us plenty of time to engage in the archetypal activities of adulthood—traveling, investing, quietly developing hemorrhoids, shopping at JC Penny, replacing the rock n’ roll music in our CD cases with whole albums of ocean sounds, and perhaps most importantly, procreating.

But if you compare us with our peer group (straight, college-age, suburban, excruciatingly white, Mormon newlyweds), we are falling behind at a rather alarming pace—especially when it comes to that “procreation” part. Some of our friends and acquaintances are on their second or third pup by now. All the potentially sharp edges in their homes are behind flimsy plastic gates or under multiple layers of egg-carton foam. But not our house. It’s a virtual death trap. A child probably wouldn’t survive ten minutes. We keep our knives in a knee-high drawer. Our poisonous cleaning products sit on the tile of the pantry floor, just inches from bottles of organic lemonade. Once we left our iron piping hot and sitting on the carpet for nearly two hours because we got wrapped up in an episode of Law and Order: SVU (and then Monk, which came on right after it). What kind of environment is that for a child?

In essence, we just haven’t yet converted to the parental way of thinking. If you ask me how old my twin nephew and niece are, I will tell you they are one year old and be done with it. A true parent, on the other hand, thinks differently. “Oh Olivia here, she’s twenty-two and a half months.” The conversation comes to a dead halt while I carry a six or contemplate what to do with a remainder of nine. I eventually give up. “So what’s that make her, like four?”

But this isn’t to say that Angela and I don’t want kids. We do. Especially Angela. She makes a real spectacle of herself whenever we encounter a newborn, infant, toddler or other variety of pre-adult. She fawns over them, suddenly unable to compose a cohesive sentence. Sometimes I think she is silently coveting the child. Or even waiting for the parent to look away so she can snatch the baby and run. I await the day when a valley-wide Amber Alert warns of a brown-haired, twenty-something woman in a slate grey, late model Mazda. She’d be spotted heading south on I-10. The authorities would assume that she was en route to Mexico, but they’d be wrong—just on her way to the Baby Gap outlet in Casa Grande.

But I think having a child will be far more fulfilling if it’s legitimately ours. Things always seem more worthwhile when you work for them. And I can only imagine what it would feel like to hold in my arms a little creature of my own creation. It’d have my nose or Angela’s feet. I’d be really excited to watch it to grow. Forget ounces and pounds. Everyday I’d compare its size to the breadbox that sits on our kitchen counter. “Angela, Angela! Guess what? He’s definitely bigger than a breadbox!” When it was older I’d teach it all about the interesting nuances of humanity like blue darts and that thing with Mentos and Diet Coke. The whole prospect excites me very much, especially with all the Hollywood stars that seem to be endorsing parenthood lately. I figure if a coked-out Brad Pitt can handle a half dozen kids, so can I.

But the real question is “Am I really ready for that kind of responsibility?” and honestly, I’m not sure of the answer. A little less than half the plants we’ve bought since we got married are now dead. I guess that gives the hypothetical kid about a fifty percent chance of survival. Sixty percent on a good day. I figure if worst comes to worst, we could always have another one.

optimism.

2008-10-16T00:08:00.000-07:00

I am all about the power of positive thinking. I try very hard to be a the glass is half full kind of guy. I even try to encourage other people to have positive attitudes. For instance, whenever I go through the drive-through at a fast food restaurant I always let the workers know that they probably won’t be stuck in their sucky job forever. “Just hang tight buddy. Things will get better,” I assure them while reaching out my car window to apprehend the grease-drenched bag. “Oh, and my wife would like a different soda. She says she saw you touch the straw. Thanks.”

Why do I do it? Well, because I am of the opinion that pretty much everybody would benefit from cranking up the optimism a notch or two. The only exception is gambling addicts. As a group, gambling addicts are way too optimistic. Collectively, we need to bring them down a peg. But other than that, yeah, pretty much everyone. Go optimism!

muggings.

2008-09-16T14:50:00.000-07:00

I hope I never get mugged. Partly because I’m really ticklish. If someone jabbed a gun between my ribs, I’d have a hard time not giggling. And if there’s one thing that would really ruin the whole scary, life-threatening ambience that a mugger is going for, it’s giggling. Everyone knows how awful it feels to be laughed at. The mugger would probably take it really personally—hurt feelings, etc. I imagine that since the mugger turned to mugging in the first place, he’s already susceptible to low self-esteem. I’d have to explain that it’s not him that I’m laughing at. “No, no, you’re doing a great job. I am very, very scared. Terrified even. I’m just really ticklish. Hey, here’s my wallet.” But of course, despite my numerous attempts to reassure him, he wouldn’t believe me. His pride wounded, his fragile ego shattered, he’d scamper off and probably not even enjoy the drugs he would purchase with the cash from my wallet. His day would be totally ruined. And I’d feel awful too.

painting tips.

2008-09-15T08:22:00.000-07:00

Angela and I spent some time painting the living room recently. I learned a lot from the experience. For instance, I learned that applying a layer of calk along the edge of the blue painter’s tape can actually do more harm than good. That dang calk peeled our drywall right off. Additionally, I learned that 90% of a paint job’s success is in the preparation. Any bozo can slap paint on a surface. The real art is in how you tape the plastic tarp to the baseboards. And perhaps most importantly, I learned that just because a building has an extravagant, every-color-of-the-rainbow paint job, that does not necessarily mean that it is a paint store. Also, I learned what a gay bar looks like.

I think making gay bars look just like paint stores is cruelly deceptive. It's like putting anti-freeze in a Mountain Dew container and sticking it in the refrigerator. To the casual observer, the two look virtually identical. Confusion and the disastrous consumption of a toxic fluid not meant for ingestion (by which I mean Mountain Dew) are at risk of occurring. Similarly, regarding the paint store/gay bar situation, what you have is one of two potentially uncomfortable situations:

1. A fellow in old, paint-speckled cargo shorts, tennis shoes and a faded college t-shirt asking the Freddy Mercury look-alike behind the bar where he keeps the paint rollers, or,
2. A costumed cowboy in skimpy leather chaps, thoroughly disappointed to find nothing but a closed, empty, disco-ball-less paint store on a Saturday night.

Personally, I’d prefer if neither ever happens again.

keeping agreements.

2008-09-13T01:13:00.000-07:00

If someone says to you “I’d tell you, but then I’d have to kill you,” and you really, really want to know whatever piece of information that person possesses, the only good response is to say “Okay. It’s a deal. You tell me, and then kill me. That’s how badly I want to know.” Ninety nine times out of a hundred, you’ll find out that the person you’ve been talking to really isn’t very serious about keeping agreements. I guess people just don’t value being your word the way they used to.

fame.

2008-09-13T00:58:00.001-07:00

I want to be famous. But not for the reasons you’d think. Assuredly, I do not seek the material wealth that so often attends fame. Oh no. Besides a few pieces of vintage guitar paraphernalia, a wardrobe full of adequately long t-shirts and a pantry’s worth of salty snacks, there are almost no material possessions that I deem worthy of aching for. Also not my motivation for apprehending disgusting amounts of fame: inclusion within Hollywood’s ranks of shallow, collagen-injected, megalomaniacal A-list society. Almost without exception, celebrities make me want to pull my hair out. I can hardly stand them from hundreds of miles away, much less up close. Really, when it comes down to it, there is only one aspect of fame that could claim my heart—the paparazzi. More than anything, I want a herd of paparazzi constantly at my boot heels, snapping pictures, rummaging though trash bins, and splattering my sunglasses-clad visage all over their grocery store tabloids.

Before long, the obsessively gimmicky media would morph Angela and I into one person—Clangela Melzhardison, or ClaMel for short—and simultaneously initiate the pregnancy, adoption and break-up rumors. Two weeks later beach photos would surface, complete with sprawling captions that discuss the cellulite dimpling all over my right buttock. The soulless leaches would follow me everywhere—the drycleaners’, the Post Office, Arby’s, wherever—all the while producing ridiculously over-bolded yellow headlines from the minutia they collect and distort. “Clint Takes Dress With Suspicious Stain to Drycleaner.” “Is Clint the Unabomber? Seen Carrying Package.” “What A Gyp!” Says Clint of Arby’s Prices.”

Then, with my vast wealth (not the object of my fame but a likely eventuality), I’d turn the tables. I’d begin a campaign of my own to trail a few select paparazzi. I would photograph them in their element (which, among other things, may very well be them photographing me) and publish those pictures along with my unfounded and inflammatory conclusions about the paparazzi in my own weekly grocery store checkout magazine entitled ThemWeekly. Huge block letters would crowd the cover. “Carl Forgets to Remove Lens Cap! Slipping into Senility???” “Tony Goes Back For Seconds! Extra Holiday Pounds Seem Inevitable!” “Sheila Forgets Parent-Teacher Conference!”

Soon thereafter, I’d exit my Los Angeles area loft, dressed in most recognizable attire except for my face, which would support the classic fake nose and moustache combo. I would casually proceed to my day’s affairs as if fully confident that my disguise was impenetrable. And when the bulbs started to flash, I’d act utterly shocked to have been recognized. Then, I’d probably run out of ideas for ways to mess the paparazzi and turn my attention, as many celebrities do, to a charity work. With the ungodly clout that I as a celebrity would possess, I’d establish and perpetuate ridiculous non-profit causes like “Kill the Whales” and “Kill the Whale Killers” and “StuffingtonCor: Providing Teddy Bears to Everyone.” I’d wear a t-shirt that says “Save the Tuna” and explain that everyday millions of tuna are caught in the nets of fisherman intending to catch tuna. What a shame.

dreams.

2008-08-26T01:37:00.001-07:00

I never feel more important than when someone informs me that they dreamt about me. It means that I, like old baseball statistics and the lyrics from seventh grade pop songs, have infiltrated the subconscious. The dreamer will explain how, curiously, it was the first day of third grade and I was their bus driver. Or how George Clooney morphed into me after stealing their favorite pair of sneakers. Or how I saved them from an untimely pancake-related demise.

But in the worst and most common of all cases, the dreamer will blabber on and on about every minute detail of the dream, describing the fifteen fluidly evolving scenes before and after my presence. They’ll rehearse the color of the walls of the prison that contained them and how it suddenly burst into flames and became a mall and how they were accused of shoplifting and though they were innocent, a number of Haggar slacks and slap bracelets were inexplicably found in their purse, and how the floor wasn’t really a floor but it was a floor and how before they knew it, they were on the beach and running away from a murderer but they could only move at turtle speed and how long after graduation, the school’s administration tried to convince them that they had failed to take one required course and now they had to go back to college and how it was Easter and…

It’s too much for me to handle. After about fifteen seconds, my patience is up. My mental absurdity filter is uncomfortably full. Not one more iota of useless information is welcome. But somehow, I’m stuck there, listening, completely at the mercy of the dreamer. If they wanted to go on and on for a full thirty-six or seventy-two hours I’d have no way out. You can’t just interrupt someone in the middle of their dream retelling. They’ll think you’re saying, “Your innermost workings are of absolutely no use to me. Please desist immediately,” when in reality you may be saying, “I love you, but if I have to absorb one more inconsequential detail about shape-shifting toaster ovens or naked speeches before the senior class, I will explode.”

Really, the best strategy is just to wait it out. Try to think of something else—something relatively more pleasant, like road rash or acne scars. And if you starve to death waiting for an opportune pause during which to shift conversational topics, so be it. You’ve played your part.

What the world needs is a code of conduct for the retelling of dreams. I'd suggest that we go ahead and make legislation of it. That would save a lot of poor souls from having to choose between hurting the feelings of an over-zealous dreamer/loved one or suffering inane-information-induced explosion. Here are the simple tenants I propose:

1. Avoid telling any individual about your dreams unless it involves that individual. Even then, relay only the parts of the dream that directly include said individual.
2. If you must tell an individual about one of your dreams, do so in fifteen seconds or less. Almost every detail you think is vital is not. Get to the meat and potatoes.
3. If it doesn’t make sense to you, it won’t make sense to a far-less interested third party. Keep it to yourself.
4. Avoid discussing uninteresting stock dreams experienced by most everyone: flying dreams, naked at school dreams, impossibly slow escape from a murderer, etc.
5. All dream retelling rules reign supreme except in the rare case that your dream is some sort of communication from God. In that case it’s not a dream, but a vision. Tell no one at all, except maybe your spouse.

I honestly believe that if abided by, these five tenants will revolutionize the art of meandering, pointless conversation the way the Constitution revolutionized modern-day nation building. In both cases, noncompliance should be handled swiftly and sharply. Think long, ironic prison sentences where the offender is forced to nod along to the nonsensical dreams of a schizophrenic. And if somehow, the offender ends up usurping control of the dream conversation from the schizophrenic, and resumes the practice of relaying the frivolously wild dream details, well, then there’s always solitary confinement.

harsh harold.

2008-08-26T00:28:00.000-07:00

I try to be polite. I really do. But there are certain circumstances in which I am forced to relinquish both tact and self-control and tell it like it is. For instance, if you happen to mention to me that you like one of those absolutely awful radio bands like Maroon 5 or All-American Rejects, I will not hold back. “We can’t be friends anymore,” I’ll state flatly. I probably won’t even offer an explanation because if you’re really the type to think that Linkin Park is music worthy of appreciation, you’re probably also the type that a cohesively structured cause-and-effect sentence would utterly baffle. Maybe I could text you a simplified explanation with lots of unnecessary acronyms. WDYT?

And if you’re an amateur science fiction or horror writer, I am really going to try hard to be nice, but let’s be honest—you probably suck. By the end of the first paragraph of your story, I already know the end. Horribly lurking, inhuman creatures, only visible to your main character, will slowly surround him. And just as the group of unsightly beasts pounce towards his throat, he’ll wake up. “Phew, it was just a dream,” he’ll say, drenched in sweat but immensely relieved. But then, as he pulls away, one of the creatures, gnashing teeth and all, will be seen clinging menacingly to the bumper of his car. It’s really bad, but I’ll scour your paper for some ray of sunshine hidden beneath the piles of inept blithering—anything at all that I can speak of positively or compliment. But we both know that when I praise your indenting skills or the precision of your one-inch margins, that it just means I hate your story.

I don’t mean to be a harsh Harold, but I just can’t encourage these kinds of behavior. And however humble my contribution, I feel that if I serve as a soldier in the war against crappy awfulness, I’ve done my small part to make the world a better place.

olympics schmolympics.

2008-08-12T10:19:00.000-07:00

So the Olympics seem to be a pretty big deal lately. Everyone’s all a’rage about the swimming. But to me, it’s not that impressive. Even though the swimmers are probably going pretty fast, I easily go four to five times that fast everyday in my car. And no one ever gives me a medal. If the Olympics people want swimming to appear more impressive they should dedicate the middle lane not to some hairless wonder with a speedy qualifying time, but rather to an average person. That way, when all the Olympians finish a full six minutes ahead of Barbara Kowalski, thirty-six year old bank teller from Sheboygan, Wisconsin, everyone will be like “Wow, did you see how Phelps freaking rocked that bank teller? That was impressive.” Ratings will skyrocket.

number twelve.

2008-07-28T22:28:00.000-07:00

Shirking modesty, I would like to announce that in 2002 I did just about the coolest thing anyone has ever done. I wrote an essay about it. Click on the man with the plunger stuck to his head to download and read that essay.

--{ :)

(Because the essay is closely based on a real event, I have blotted out any sensitive names that do appear, thereby avoiding unnecessary weirdness).

Enjoy.

the painometer.

2008-07-08T20:45:00.001-07:00

For the last few days I’ve been flirting with a state of deathly illness, fighting both bouts of debilitating flu tremors as well as a condition I call “Tabasco Throat,” which transforms swallowing into a fate less desirable than the Boo Box featured in Disney’s 1991 modern adaptation of the Peter Pan story, Hook. I’ve stayed home from work buoyed only by very occasional (and very mild) expressions of sympathy from family and friends. I think if everyone knew how much pain I was in, they’d be more lavish in their condolences and quicker to send compassionate fruit baskets. But a person can only say “I think I’m going to die” so many times in his or her life before the expression’s efficacy begins to taper off (and I imagine the intentional melodrama that has so much defined my life thus far has pushed me well over the acceptable limit). Therefore, I find myself rather committed to inventing an invention that will revolutionize human sympathy as we know it. I call it the Painometer.

I’m still ironing out the kinks, but at its essence the Painometer is like a thermometer that measures on a scale of zero to ten the level to which a person is experiencing pain or discomfort. Installed somewhere blatantly visible like the forehead, the Painometer will bring clarity to otherwise potentially sticky social situations. For instance, one Painometer patron might express, “Jeez, I have the worst headache,” to which his nearby friend could respond, “No you don’t. You’re headache is yet to even reach a 4, liar.” Expressions of sympathy, no longer watered down by doubts regarding the severity of the condition of a whiner, could be stockpiled and used only in appropriate circumstances. (Should we say in cases of pain level exceeding 6.5 perhaps?) Even better, ailments like ingrown toenails, paper cuts, and sandy swimsuit-induced chafing could finally receive the sympathy they have long merited but rarely reaped.

Obviously, the Painometer would be incomplete without the release of it’s sister product, the Sympathometer (sold separately). Surgically inserted on the forehead immediately next to the Painometer, the Sympathometer would display in a similar zero to ten fashion the degree to which a person is experiencing sympathy. Ideally, the combination of these two products would usher in the demise of verbal communication that text messaging and e-mail have only alluded to. A husband having lunch with his wife might begin to experience chest pain triggering a 7 or 8 reading on his Painometer, to which his wife’s Sympathometer would proportionately react, expressing instantaneous and genuine pity—all without a single word. Talk about human progression.

the married life.

2008-06-29T15:29:00.000-07:00

I think most people have a repertoire of jokes, stories or comical observations that they catalog and use whenever a suitable situation or conversation topic arises. I am no exception. I’ve recycled my same old jokes for years, in each circumstance basking in the laughter they trigger. Unfortunately, the passage of time has shown some of my favorite old jests to be ill suited or no longer as funny, applicable, or poignant as they once were. Therefore, with this post I officially announce the retirement of one of my classic situational jokes, the gist of which is elaborated below:

Within about ten minutes of being married I was already sick and tired of the oft repeated and marginally sincere question, “So, how’s the married life?” Soon, I graduated from offering a vague and positive response to a more perplexing and intentionally discomforting one. When someone would ask “So, how’s the married life?” I’d pause and gaze at my feet before replying in a most downtrodden though matter-of-fact tone “It was alright.” Without exception, my crafty response would send the asker into a fit of analysis: “Alright? Was?!” Feeling grossly unsure regarding my marital status and inconveniently uninformed of any tumultuousness that would’ve necessitated such a speedy dissolution, the asker would stand for a few long, pregnant moments of silence, searching for some yet evasive words with which to salvage the conversation. Feeling justified in my attempts to punish those who pose such hackneyed questions, I would offer no branch with which my comrade could pull himself from his conversational quicksand. Rather, I would soak in the moment, invigorated by the awkward silence I’d manufactured.

Godspeed little quip. You have served me well.

why i hesitate to ever hire a painting crew.

2008-06-20T22:50:00.000-07:00

One time I saw this thing on NBC’s Dateline about panhandlers that drive BMW’s. Ever since, I’ve been really ambivalent about giving money to beggars. I was so affected by that piece of hard-hitting journalism that I can no longer as much as drive by one of the many tousled, pee-soaked, cardboard sign-touting homeless guys that stand guard at our freeway exits without wondering if he isn’t in reality some flashy investment banker or the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. And though my faith in humanity has been crushed by Stone Phillips and his gang of sensationalistic underlings, I still want to help out where help is genuinely needed. So I’ve adopted a policy of still offering money to homeless individuals, but only to those homeless individuals that don’t ask.

So if you’re homeless and minding your own business in the shade of the decorative landscaping adjacent to Bashas’ or busily constructing a fort from discarded mattresses in a vacant lot, you can bet your shopping cart I’m going to offer a little help. I always feel really good about assuming the role of benefactor, however meagerly. And my beneficiary is often taken aback by the unsolicited financial donation and together we rejoice. Except for that one time that I, with a small wad of cash in my extended hand, approached a truly disheveled-looking fellow in the parking lot of Milano’s who turned out to be a painter walking home from a long day’s work and not a homeless transient. On that occasion, no one rejoiced. But one of us was angrily sworn at.

(I hope I never run into that guy. That would be really uncomfortable).

I will be your undoing Tom from Astoria.

2008-06-18T16:35:00.000-07:00

Parade magazine does this thing where they print a captionless cartoon and ask their readership to invent a clever caption. Here's last months cartoon:

The winning caption read: "You're waiting for Wonder Woman? I'm waiting for Wonder Woman!"

I am personally of the opinion that my caption is leagues better. It is as follows: "Have you ever had that dream where you're rescuing someone and you look down and you don't have any underwear on the outside of your pants?"

Despite the tardiness of my entry, I sent an e-mail to Parade demanding that they dethrone the old winner (one Tom Camastra from Astoria, New York) and crown me in his stead. I await their reply.

litter.

2008-06-18T10:37:00.000-07:00

I’ve long appreciated the portable nature of some of God’s tastier creations. The banana, for example, is specifically designed to be enjoyed en route. Its thick skin protects the delicious insides from damage and just begs to liven up my painfully dull brown lunch bag with its bright yellowiness. This magical fruit’s usefulness doubles when enjoyed behind the wheel; not only does it serve as conveniently self-packaged sustenance, but also as a declaration to other motorists of one’s own superiority due to a commitment to healthful snacking.

However, as soon as the banana is consumed, the peel’s former glory is abruptly forgotten. The skin that was once a marvelous example of God’s handiwork quickly transforms into slimy, rottening trash adding unnecessary grossness to a cup holder that is already lined with a layer of goo that fluctuates between melty and hard depending on the temperature. The idea of allowing such a disgusting instrument to even momentarily linger in my car’s cabin is too much to bear. It is at this point that my Super Mario Cart reflex sets in and I expel the banana peel from my car via sunroof, creating a serious hazard for any Koopas or Toadstools driving behind me.

Almost this precise scenario transpired some months ago while Angela rode passenger in my car. The very moment my rear view mirror showed the discarded peel colliding with the roadway behind us, Angela set into a wicked tongue-lashing cast passionately at my side of the car: “What do you think you’re doing?! That’s littering! You can’t litter!”

“Litter? That’s not litter” I replied. “It’s a banana peel. It’s completely biodegradable. I’m sure in ten minutes some bird will be using it to build a nest for its chicks.” Well aware that Angela is a complete sucker for applying the human family dynamic to animals and objects, I pursued this course. “Sure. It’s Monday. They’ll probably do it together as a family home evening activity. It’s all good. Don’t worry.”

Angela’s mind may have gone spiraling into a world of highly spiritual bird families, but mine stayed focused on litter. Never had I considered that a banana peel might be considered litter. It’s just a peel; completely natural, and biodegradable. How could such a thing be litter? If I hadn’t eaten the banana out of the middle and rather discarded the peel with the banana still attached, that wouldn’t constitute litter—just an unfortunately misplaced banana. Such a situation would make of me a victim, not a perpetrator. If a banana peel is litter, then what isn’t litter? Can I throw nothing from a moving car with being branded a litter bug?

The rest of our drive was silent, Angela infatuated with her vision of bird families and I grappling with the philosophical definition and ramifications of litter: “What exactly is litter? Certainly, all reasoning parties would uniformly deem an empty soda can discarded at a public square to be litter. But what if that soda can were full? Or an iPod? I doubt anyone would complain if the public square was lined with free soda or iPods. Is it monetary value then that determines whether or not a discarded thing constitutes litter? If so, then what exact value draws the line between litter and non-litter? Five cents? Ten cents? In that case, pennies themselves would be considered litter, making the United States government the largest litter distributor of them all. Furthermore, doesn’t such a value-based definition of litter necessitate that those police officers who issue citations for littering receive training in small item and litter appraisal. We can’t have them issuing tickets all willy-nilly."

Presently, I believe the only way to come to any certain conclusion would be to actually engage in the intentional discarding of a number of items in the direct presence of an on-duty police officer and see which items lead to citation and which do not. Those items which yield citations could be classified as litter. Those items that do not yield citation could be classified as misplaced property. I very much trust this method of engaging in a questionable activity in the direct presence of a police officer as a way to determine the legality of that questionable activity, for by it I came to discover that tickling an on-duty police officer against his will leads to citation almost every time.

finders, keepers; losers, weepers.

2008-06-08T23:20:00.000-07:00

Finders keepers: a policy that really screws blind people.

What axiom will the seeing public next invent to torment the world's blind community—“Kick a seeing eye dog"? It's despicable.

wrestling.

2008-06-01T00:30:00.000-07:00

You hear a lot about people wrestling animals, but I’m not really into that. Some guys might think it’s cool or manly to put a crocodile in a full-nelson, but I just think full-nelsons are uncomfortable, regardless of species.

It’s not so much that I would be worried about my personal safety if I wrestled a crocodile; it’s more a matter of the Golden Rule. I wouldn’t want to be walking down the street, minding my own business, and some crocodile gets all up in my grill and puts me in a headlock. “I have places to go, Mr. Crocodile. I don’t just have time to stop and wrestle whenever you feel like it.”

I guess I just figure that since I wouldn’t appreciate an impromptu wrestling match, I probably shouldn’t impose an impromptu wrestling match on others. It's common courtesy.

momma didn't raise no fuel.

2008-06-01T00:13:00.001-07:00

In hopes of cashing in on the hard work of others, investors are ever watchful for the next big out-of-nowhere-but-hugely-lucrative stock. When the next Microsoft, Xerox or Tickle-Me-Elmo stock does come along, they’ll be there, savagely shaking their clenched fists from which protrude wads of cash like green tops of carrots emerging from soil. Most likely, however, the vast majority of investor hopefuls will arrive just a little too late; the prize will have already been pillaged by another who by now is sailing away in his new yacht called something like “Buy Lo Sail Hi” or “The Investour.”

Fortunately, I’ve found an alternate way to hit it big. Simple and surefire, today’s most lucrative cash cow has been under our collective nose for well over a half century, all the while remaining grossly under utilized. It has an impeccable history of constant appreciation in value and shows no signs of relenting. And whether we like it or not, it is eternally attached directly to the veins of every red-blooded American. It’s gasoline. And it’s going to make me rich.

What did you pay for gas today? $3.80? $3.85? $3.90? Shucks, that's a full $1.50 more than you paid last year at this time. Who knows what gas will go for next year —$5.00? $6.00? Maybe we will stop using dollars altogether and just start trading precious family heirlooms for gas.

So I’ve got a plan. While you’re sitting there moaning about the price of gas, I’m buying it all up. Right this minute I have thirty-four hundred gallons of gas sitting in my garage. My attic is chock-full of the stuff. It’s starting to leak through the ceiling. Yesterday, Angela and I built a fort out of the canisters we’ve been storing in our bedroom and watched the new half live-action Alvin and the Chipmunks movie on her laptop surrounded by gallon after gallon of the very liquid gold that will most certainly secure our future.

Then next year, when gas prices are utterly astronomical, I will open up The Gas Hole, the Hardison family gas station. Gas that I purchased and stored in 2008 for $3.80 will sell for seven or eight bucks in 2009. Sure, my lack of pumps and nozzles and other typical gas station paraphernalia might take some time for customers to get used to, but when I’m in position to undercut all the major gas chains by twenty cents per gallon, people won’t mind scooping their gas with a ladle from a horse trough in my garage. Life will be good.

the haircut cycle of shame.

2008-05-15T15:06:00.001-07:00

I got a hair cut last night. It's a notably clean-cut departure from the intentional untidiness that has for so long characterized my hairdo philosophy. I find myself pleased not only with the cut, but also because it provides me an opportunity to post a haircut-oriented piece that I composed in my high school years. Enjoy:

Oh I got a haircut today. The haircut cycle started over. It’s a five stage process.

Stage one: The most painful—the first week or two after the haircut wherein I look like a third grader.

Stage two: Life becomes livable again, but I am by no means flourishing. Compared to the wholeseome good looks of someone like an Eddie Winslow, I'm barely keeping my head above water.

Stage three: Stage three occurred last Wednesday—peak day—the day that my hair hits the perfect length. You can often tell my peak days because I strut. Hard.

Stage four: Post-Peak Syndrome sets in. The gradual transition from perfect hair to a shaggy mess is a difficult experience. Grumpiness and irritability tend to set in. My advice to you is when you notice that I am suffering from PPS, be sensitive and understand that it is out of my control. Other signs of PPS include low neck line, bushiness around the ears, and moptoppedness.

Stage five (Stage one): The (re)haircut. Preferring a look of scruffiness to a look of pre-pubescence, I try appeasing my mother with all kinds of excuses not to get a haircut, the best of which is "Jesus had long hair mom. Don't you want me to be like Jesus?" As she prepares dinner, I'll spend a few minutes reiterating my arguments while angelically posing next to the Greg Olsen painting near the kitchen. "We're like twins!" I’ll declare while she mulls over my proposition. Such techniques are effective, but only for a few days, no more. Inevitably, a hair cut is forced upon me, once more turning me into a third grader and commencing the whole vicious cycle yet again.

I explain the haircut cycle of shame specifically for all those girls out there who are either insensitive or oblivious to my cycles. I'd appreciate a just a little concern. Thanks.

hugs.

2008-05-03T00:02:00.000-07:00

Don’t tell me to give someone a hug for you. Because I’m not going to. That hug which you gave to me to give to another I will hoard for myself instead.

The value of the American dollar is rapidly depleting. Eventually it will fail altogether. And then we’ll have to find a new form of currency. People will suggest all sorts of things to replace the dollar —gold, baseball cards, those rubbery Lance Armstrong wrist band things, wampum—you know, whatever. And that’s when I will create an extremely powerful and persuasive political action committee to lobby Washington lawmakers. Under the profound influence of my lobbyist henchmen, the federal government will unite to decree hugs to be the new national currency. And because every time someone hugs me and tells me to pass it on to another party I instead keep it for myself, I’ll be the richest man in America. Hugs-wise.

How to Win.

2008-05-02T10:33:00.000-07:00

Because I’ve wanted to win friends and influence people as of late, I’ve been reading the old classic How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. He gives all sorts of helpful advice for people like me who want to either charm or manipulate everyone they come in contact with. I will admit, however, that the book, which was initially published in the 1920’s, does occasionally show its age. For instance, Carnegie devotes an entire chapter to the principle that “you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.” Now, don’t get me wrong—it’s a great principle. When trying to create in others a desire to behave in accordance with our whims, kindness almost always proves a more effective agent than harshness. Yet in this, Carnegie shows just how out of touch his method truly is.

These days, if I want to catch me a throng of flies, I don’t reach for honey. I reach for a roll of fly tape. Fly tape is far more effective than honey. Its concentrated formula contains chemicals that are absolutely irresistible to flies. Intoxicated with the alluring aroma, the flies come aswarmin’, only to be trapped in the gooey adhesive. If catching the largest number of flies as thoroughly as possible is your goal, assuredly, fly tape, not honey, is the way to go.

So our new axiom that we can apply to human interaction is: “you can catch more flies with fly tape than with honey.” From this little logical exercise we glean one very practical application—when attempting to coerce another into doing your will, remember that deceptive enticement followed by entrapment is a more effective policy that kindness. If you want a lick of someone's ice cream cone, ask nicely—then push it in their face and take it. If you’d like a fellow classmate to give you a ride home after class, perhaps some amiable small talk followed by a swift kick in crotch would get the message across. What’s that—you fancy that old lady’s oxygen tank? Well by all means, help her halfway across the street and then rip it from her bony, feeble hands.

I’ve found this principle to be so effective that I’m devoting an entire chapter to it in my upcoming book How to Win. Period.

emoticon artist.

2008-04-20T22:39:00.000-07:00

I disapprove of the habitual use of the emoticon “:)”. Not only is that makeshift smiley face so extremely cheesy as to occasionally induce dry heaving in the receiving party, but it’s also much too vague. Is he or she who types “:)” actually smiling? Or are they laughing? Or are they just experiencing generally pleasant feelings? And if so, which pleasant feelings in particular? Is “:)” a tool used to distinguish sarcasm from direct, unambiguous speech? Or is it just a light-hearted gesture? And what if, however unorthodox, I want to end a parenthetical statement with a colon? In that case, people will perceive a smiley face where no smiley face was ever intended to be.

So to maneuver myself and those with whom I communicate safely around the confusion prompted by “:)”, I’ve developed a batch of much more specific, telling, and useful emoticons. See:

<:)
Translation: I can’t respond right now. I’m at a birthday party.

: A
Translation: I’m eating candy corn while composing this message.

c):)
Translation: I’m wearing my cowboy hat while composing this message.

:{
Translation: I am wearing a fake handlebar mustache while composing this message.

: #
Translation: I’m smiling, but you can’t tell because I have braces.

:?(
Translation: I’m feeling insecure about my larger-than-normal nose.

--{:)
Translation: There’s a plunger stuck on my head and I can’t get it off. But don’t worry; I totally see the humor in the situation.

Feel free to implement these in your daily e-conversations.

wealth.

2008-04-16T12:46:00.000-07:00

I’ll be really surprised if by the time I kick the bucket, I haven’t accumulated billions upon billions of dollars. When my fortune does finally come to fruition, you’ll know, because I’ll probably dress like the Monopoly man and contribute so much money to ASU that Ira Fulton won’t even have as much as a parking space named after him on all of campus. To celebrate our wedding anniversary, I’ll have a huge likeness of Angela’s face painted upon the side the children’s hospital I built for her birthday. While playing doubles tennis, Warren Buffet will ask me what my secret is and I’ll say something understatedly profound like “Warren, whatever you think, think the opposite.” He'll shake his head in awe and spend the next week wondering why he didn't think to think the opposite of what he thinks.

The only problem is that I don’t know what it is that I will do to generate my excessive wealth. Should my eventual business card read “Clint Hardison, Real Estate Tycoon” or “Clint Hardison, Yacht Mogul”? Should I make all my money by establishing a multi-level marketing company that sells a nutritious fruity drink that doubles as face wash? Or should I start a chain of Laundromat/Chinese Buffets? (How better to pass the time waiting for your delicates to dry than to consume inhuman amounts of General Tso’s Chicken?)

But because I just returned from a mission reunion in Utah where I realized that everyone in the world is getting rich off of multi-level marketing but me, my most recent moneymaking idea is indeed to start a multi-level marketing campaign. It’s called Exercise Your Faith. Here’s my pitch:

What’s the number one excuse people give for not exercising? And how do people explain their lack of quality scripture study? In both cases, they whine of there being “not enough time.” Well, it’s time to put that haggard old excuse to bed. By consolidating these two activities, a person can shrink physically while growing spiritually. That’s why we at Exercise Your Faith have developed a series of exercise videos that cater especially to the busy Mormon.

Watch as your extremely modestly dressed host expounds upon the scriptures while leading you in a challenging aerobic workout. Discover the cardiovascular benefits of Primary song hand motions while trotting in place. Unlock the hidden meaning in Isaiah while simultaneously unlocking your body’s hidden potential.

And don’t think that just because the aerobics instructor gave the invocation that she can’t kick some butt. Periodically, she’ll yell through the TV screen “That better not be murmuring I hear!” and “Come on, gird up those loins!” and “Ok, just endure to the end of this lunge and we’ll move onto Jacob 5.”

We at Exercise Your Faith guarantee an edifying workout. So, instead of those inappropriately suggestive beats that accompany most workout videos, you’ll sweat to the spiritually uplifting sounds of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir (aka MoTab). That’s why the first installment of Mormon Exercise Videos is called “Crank up your Motab-olism!”

So get ready to put on the Under-Armor of God and become fit for the kingdom in a whole new way. Order Today!

If you’re interested in becoming a monthly subscriber to or building your own business through Exercise Your Faith please email me at crankupyourmotabolism@eyf.com .

I can already taste the finger sandwiches and Brie cheese that Warren Buffet’s help will bring to quiet our stomachs after a rousing match on the clay.

the angry letter.

2008-04-11T14:06:00.001-07:00

For a long time I’ve been threatening to send letters. To whom, you ask? Well, to anyone—anyone who crosses me. I all but penned a letter to the owner of a guitar shop in Phoenix (Bizarre Guitar) whose extremely rude, leather-pants-clad, pathetically hair-metal employees talked themselves right out of my $1400 cash. Similarly, my angry note to AMPM’s corporate headquarters regarding the ridiculousness of their $.95 charge for use of a debit card is almost complete. Were I a little braver, my former high school math teacher, Coach Hawes, would be the recipient of a vicious tongue lashing put to paper, rebuking him for his many cruelties towards me (including the occasions when he pulled my long teenage hair and hit me). And I’ve even flirted with the idea of writing the Gilbert Police Department just to remind them that I think they are stupid.

However, these letters rarely get sent. Rather, I stop shopping at the offending gas station. Or I graduate. Or I make a pact with my wife that we will never pay a single tax dollar to Gilbert, Arizona. Or I participate in the extremely cathartic activity of throwing eggs at my math teacher’s house five years later. One way or another, I never end up utilizing the angry letter as a means of getting things off my chest—until today.

I recently witnessed two things I love, the Snickers candy bar and grammar, collide. I couldn’t stand for it and a letter was composed and delivered. (Click below for more details).

Surprisingly, the Mars Corporation has yet to respond. I’m expecting a phone call any day . . .

are you what you eat?

2008-04-07T09:48:00.000-07:00

I’ve long been fascinated by the old adage “you are what you eat.” Any time I find myself considering Pop-Tarts to be a potentially suitable breakfast, those words, spoken in my mother’s knaggiest voice (which is hardly knaggy at all), flood into my psyche guiding my reach towards the box of Special K instead.

However well-principled, the old axiom hardly withstands even superficial scrutiny. For instance, it is a well established fact that I am indeed a human. But I don’t eat human. Oh my, I am something without eating that thing—consider the adage officially exposed.

Despite being thoroughly man-handled by my superior logic and reasoning skills, the proverb in question has experienced a resurrection in the Hardison home as of late. For a brief period, Angela was whimsically referring to me as ‘Peanut Butter’ on account of my semi-unmanageable fascination with that gloriously nutty paste. In a kindly retort, I began to call her ‘Smiles’ for so named are the Wal-Mart brand fruit snacks she frequently and fondly consumes. The game took a turn for the hurtful however, when Angela started calling me after a certain breakfast cereal that I find myself partial to—Fruity Pebbles. It was then that I abruptly discontinued our game, putting a stern end to any further reference to my pebbles as fruity.

clint outdoes the economists yet again

2008-03-31T22:00:00.000-07:00

I’m on constant watch. I’m trying to avoid the slow plunge into idleness that claims so many Americans. This laziness ravages those whom it touches, eventually leaving them with no aspirations at all except to make sure to be home with the pizza by the time American Idol starts. I’ll admit though, I can’t claim complete immunity. I realized recently that I’ve stopped purchasing products that say things like “some assembly required” or “ready in minutes” (they try to trick you with that one). Even “just add water” sends me into an illogical tirade directed at the box that contains my would-be dinner: “First of all, don’t tell me what to do. Secondly, why didn’t you do that before the Hamburger Helper was in the box? I mean you already had all the stuff right in front of you; why not just finish the job, Betty Crocker, if that is your real name?!”

As I said, I don’t think I’m alone. I think much of America is riding shotgun in my slow descent into laziness. But that is just a hunch. There are no cold hard statistics to support that claim because laziness is a really tricky thing for economists and other college-graduate-types to measure. But I think I figured out how; I bet the most accurate measurement for America’s laziness is IKEA’s annual revenues. The two variables are inversely related of course. The lazier America is, the less they buy stuff from IKEA (because then they have to put it together). A more robust attitude on the part of Americans translates into higher revenue for IKEA; ergo, we have an easy and accurate measurement for national indolence—IKEA sales.

Think about it—is a lazy person willing to deal with wordless instructions, wayward hammers occasionally landing upon unsuspecting thumbs, particleboard that becomes an increasingly accurate representation of its name, and countless unmanageable little wood pegs? I think not. According to the website www.ikea’sannaulrevenuesasameasurementofamerica’slazziness.org IKEA’s annual revenues are down. Doesn’t sound like good news for the old American ideals of hard work and industriousness.

I sometimes wonder when America will be so lazy that products with the forewarning “assembly required” will become entirely obsolete. Far off or just around the corner, that day will really rattle the jigsaw puzzle industry. I can only imagine the whole family gathering around the coffee table for some jigsaw-oriented quality time. They’ll open the box, remove the “puzzle” and set it on the table. Done. On the box’s cover it will read “Number of Pieces: 1” and everyone will go back to their video games, web browsing, and reality shows.

This whole endemic of laziness ruffles my feathers enough that I think I just might do something about it . . . but on second thought . . . meh.

cup cakes.

2008-03-28T08:57:00.000-07:00

You know whom I feel sorry for--the guy who goes to prison, but is a true lover of cup cakes. You know if that guy’s grandma or girlfriend or nephew decides to bake him some cup cakes to try to brighten his otherwise dreary and orange-jumpsuit-filled existence, those cup cakes will never reach their intended recipient. All because one too many times someone has attempted to smuggle a small key or chisel or file into a prisoner by baking it into the center of the cup cake. The prison guards caught on to that trick decades ago. Now nobody gets cup cakes. Those bad apples ruined it for everyone. It’s sad if you think about it.

the one about envelopes

2008-03-26T12:44:00.000-07:00

While shopping for envelopes the other day I realized just how uniquely odd a product they really are. I was examining the shelves’ different boxes, trying to decide which variety of envelope would most fully convey my cheery-but-not-cheesy outlook on life, when my attention was nabbed by the instructions on the side of one of the boxes:

1. Place letter in envelope
2. Lick flap.
3. Press to seal.

It struck me that envelopes are perhaps the only product that one can purchase in which the product’s instructions direct the new owner to lick the product. It’s weird. And applied to another product, we see just how weird a directive the above Step 2 really is. Imagine instructions for powering up a new computer:

1. Insert power cord in wall socket.
2. Press ‘Power’ button found on tower.
3. Lick.
4. Wait for Windows to open (and then suck by involuntarily shutting down at really inconvenient times).

It’s just weird that there exists a product that encourages us to lick, a behavior typical of social deviants. But of course there are lollypops and popsicles and other food-oriented products that also engender licking. But there’s no instructions on these foods. The licking is implied. I guess what makes me nervous about envelopes is that I have to be told to lick them. If the need for licking a thing isn’t obvious enough as to not require instructions, I don’t think I want to be licking that thing. The scariest part is that the instructions on the box tell me to do the very same act that in elementary school constituted a dare. “Lick it. I dare you.” “Do you double dare me?” “I double dog dare you.” It seemed like a bad idea then and it seems like a bad idea now.

After some pondering, an idea map, and a flow chart or two, I identified another product that requires (or required) licking—stamps. What is it with the letter writing process and licking? Is there some intrinsic link between the two? It's mysterious and just another reason I prefer e-mail.

oranges.

2008-03-21T10:54:00.000-07:00

Oranges--almost a pocket food.

fashion pickle

2008-03-06T08:00:00.000-08:00

I think we throw the word ‘emergency’ around way too much. If while chopping tomatoes, you slice your finger off at the knuckle, then okay, you can say ‘emergency’ to your heart’s content. But otherwise, let’s reserve the term for situations that warrant its use. And don’t think that just because you put the word “fashion” in front of “emergency” that that makes it okay. White shoes with a brown belt is hardly a reason to get a fire fighter up from his nap. So let’s just collectively resolve to dispense altogether with the term “fashion emergency." Deal? Unless of course your shirt comes to life and tries to strangle you. Or if a guy is cursed to experience the excruciating consequences of zipping up much too fast. If either of those things occurs, then you have my permission to refer to it as a fashion emergency.

"Fashion pickle," on the other hand, might be a more appropriate way to describe a situation riddled with poor clothing selection. "Wow John, that flannel shirt really doesn't go with those leather pants. Looks like you're in a serious fashion pickle."

That's much better.

being original

2008-03-03T09:00:00.000-08:00

Being original seems to be all the rage right now. Which is understandable, because being original is the bee’s knees. But there are some often overlooked downsides to such intentional self distinction. For instance, as some may recall, my high school years were very much characterized by my frequent sporting of a unique hat that I affectionately referred to as the dutchboy hat. I so dubbed it because with its undersized bill and slightly floppy top, it closely resembled the hat worn by the Dutch Boy Painter. See:

For years this hat and I could hardly be severed. Like all unicycle riders, I loved the idea of being unique even if the thing that distinguished me from the rest of the crowd bordered on stupidity. When I went on my mission, I ceremoniously passed the torch of sporting the dutchboy on to my little brother as well as to one Marshall Hunt. (Owing to my obsession with the hat, I purchased an identical one to supplement the first and could therefore bestow dutchboys upon two). During the two-year hiatus I itched for my hat. Without it to support, the only thing my stupid ears were good for was hearing. It is no surprise that as soon as I arrived home, I commandeered the dutchboys I had lent and immediately resumed my trademark look.

Even though it was Angela who originally gave me the hat (which accounted a great deal for my obsession with it) she soon developed a loathing for it. Yet, because of my love for the hat, I denied her repeated petitions to retire it. My resolve was to be buried in that hat and my resolve was unflinching.

Soon though, the dark side of individuality began to surface. Christmas sucked that year. I opened up present after present to find hat after hat. From Cat-in-the-Hat style striped top hats to train conductor hats to Jamaican knit hats with fake dreadlocks sewn into them, every one of them was as gay as gay can be. Apparently my feigned appreciation was thinly veiled because each bestower of each crappy hat felt it necessary to explain the reasoning for their gift—they figured that since I liked one abnormal hat, any abnormal hat, no matter how completely idiotic, would strike my fancy. They were grossly mistaken.

Though annoyed, I was not swayed in my devotion to the dutchboy—at least not until Britney Spears in all her debased frivolity endeavored to boast a hat almost identical to mine in one her music videos. The only difference was that hers was sparkly and lined with diamonds around the rim. Determined not to cave, I continued to rock my hat, now with even more vigor. The first time someone asked me why I was wearing a Britney Spears hat, I sternly corrected their assertion that that wily hussy had been the one to patent the wearing of such a hat and informed them that my dutchboy hat long predated her silly antics. But the comments kept coming. And the curious stares piled up. And more and more girls, most of them being the type that just don’t know when to say when in regards to either glitter or sparkles, began to follow Britney’s suit. Out of sad necessity the dutchboy was forced into an ill-timed retirement and pushed to the darkest part of the closet.

Though the fad initiated by Britney Spears has long passed, the dutchboy hasn’t found his way out of the closet. You can understand—it’s soiled now. Yet it still stands as a symbol—a symbol of the danger of originality, for someday, mainstream culture will catch up to your trademarks, dip them in sparkles, and ruin everything.

my obsession with grammar kills another potential friendship

2008-02-26T15:15:00.001-08:00

I met new my hometeaching companion yesterday. Brother Wolf is his name. I think we may have started our companionship off on the wrong foot. Retrospectively, I can see that the blame for our initial awkwardness could be attributed to the combination of my obsession with grammar and my overactive curiosity gland. Here’s how it went down:

Bro. Wolf: “Hey are you Brother Hardison?”
Me: “Sure am.”
Bro Wolf: “Great. I’m Dave Wolf. I guess we’re home teaching companions.”
Me: “Oh, awesome.”
Bro Wolf: “Yeah, so do you think you’d be available to go home teaching tonight?”
Me: “Yeah. Tonight would be good. Hey, I have a question about your last name . . .”
Bro. Wolf: “Yeah . . .”
Me: “How do you pluralize it? Because when I refer to my family I just throw an ‘s’ on the end of our name and keep right on rolling with my sentence. You know, ‘We’re the Hardisons.’ Boom. Done and done. But that wouldn’t work for your family ‘cus that would make you guys ‘the Wolfs’ and that’s downright offensive (grammatically speaking, of course).”
Bro. Wolf: “Umm . . .”
Me: “So, I suppose if you want to tread the grammatically traditional route you could swap the ‘f’ for a ‘v’ and then attach ‘es.’ That’d make you guys ‘the Wolves.’ And not only does that appease the grammar gods, but it makes your family seem pretty darn tough.”
Bro. Wolf: [blank stare]
Me: “But then again, if it’s toughness you’re after, maybe just avoid the whole mess and call yourselves “the Pack.” I tried to implement that in our family, but ‘the Hardison Pack’ just doesn’t roll off the tongue like ‘the Wolf Pack”, you know?”
Bro. Wolf: “So you think 7:30 would work for you?”
Me: “Umm, 7:30 should be fine.”

the big bopper

2008-02-16T14:26:00.000-08:00

Very much to my own amusement, some recent hard drive tidying lead to my discovery of this smattering of nonsense that I penned well over two years ago. Enjoy:

the most forgotten sign of a way cool fellow is the leather jacket. nobody rocks the leather jacket anymore. see, if it were 1955 and i wanted to put myself on the local map of greaser big whigs, all i would need is a slick leather jacket and a huge black comb. if i had the whole get-up i could lean against my car outside the drive-in burger joint and girls would flock to me like sheep to a shepherd in a hot leather jacket. no matter what my name was, i would have it replaced with some stellar nickname like "the bopper" or "the big bopper". why can't it be that way? you know, i noticed that sonic is really supposed to be like a throw back to the fifties. in fact, it's real name is sonic drive-in. but it's not a very good throw back to the fifties because if it was, then when i went there the other night in my hot leather jacket the girls would've died to get with me. but that's not how it went. all the fellers with their tricked out cars hogged the limelight. i leaned against the side of my car for like 45 minutes. not one bite. dang. i wish i was fonzie. then when my cell phone rang i would have cool lines like "hey baby, fonzie's got to get the phonzie, then we'll go to inspiration point". little would she know that inspiration point is a really good fishing spot i used to go to with my grandmother when i was eight. man, we would catch the most hardcore large mouth bass.

water cup

2008-01-15T22:28:00.000-08:00

When I ask for a “water cup” at a fast food restaurant with a self-serve soda fountain, a rapid exchange of telling glances between the cashier and me ensue. The cashier’s untrusting eyes say "Are you going to steal my soda? Are you too cheap to pay the $.95 for a small drink? I and all my henchmen here in El Pollo Loco will be watching you." With my eyes I offer the maniacal rebuttal “I know you’ll be watching, but what if I sneakily fill my water cup with Sprite? From your distant post behind the counter, Sprite and water look identical. And unless you or your henchmen are willing to smell my beverage to discern the contents of my water cup, I am home free. So go ahead, smell my beverage. I dare you.”

With glares locked in mutual disdain, the cashier hands me my cup and I back slowly towards the soda fountain, never breaking our laser-beam eye lock. Once there, I grasp the flimsy handle affixed to the side of Hi-C dispensing portion of the soda fountain and let the water drain into my cup. As I and my cup again pass by the cashier en route to a seat on the hard plastic swivel chairs along the big aluminum-framed window, I send one last message via my squinty gaze which reads: “Please, do you really think I would sell my integrity for $.95 worth of corn syrup and carbonation? I tread the higher road. I accompany my meals not with the cheap thrills of soda, but with the substantive goodness of water.”

Death by Spontaneous Internal Yeast Suffocation

2007-11-08T17:56:00.000-08:00

A couple of times a week, as my wife and I are sitting in our bed waiting for sleep to befall us, we can hear the not-so-faint cackling of a riotous pack of coyotes that congregate in the vacant land just beyond our yard’s back wall. And though it sounds downright crazy to have a herd of coyotes living just beyond your property line, I assure that this phenomenon is very real.

With the cackling and occasional agonized yelps of the coyotes setting the unnerving backdrop, Angela’s mind begins to conjure up scenarios of super-intelligent coyote committees that work in complete harmony to accomplish such goals as hop our 8-foot tall fence, open our locked doors, enter our home, devour us, and perhaps even steal our most precious possessions including her printer and my PC. Yet, surely there are many holes in Angela’s phobia of hyper-evolved coyotes. (For instance, if the coyotes were smart enough to pick the locks, wouldn’t they also be smart enough to take her Apple computer instead of my PC? I mean, come on, who wants to deal with “this program has performed an illegal operation and must be shutdown” six times a day?) However, in the moment of her fear, logic is placed on the back burner and raw emotion is the plat du jour.

We all occasionally fall victim to our illogical fears that unreasonably beset us and allow emotion to drive us wildly. I, for instance, am plagued with the nagging thought that if I eat bread that is undercooked so as to be doughy in the middle, the yeast will continue to react until it fills my stomach and throat leaving me entirely unable to breath. (Spontaneous internal yeast suffocation (S.I.Y.S.) would be an unfortunate way to go). It’s the same kind of half-cocked logic that makes us think twice before swallowing watermelon seeds lest they burrow themselves into the lining of our stomachs and begin to sprout, or that causes us to check a dozen times to ensure that our fly is in the fully upright and locked position before leaving the house.

Now, some experts might encourage us to question or challenge these preposterous phobias, that we might free ourselves from their grasps. And that would probably be a good idea. The only problem is that one of my illogical fears is that all the experts are together colluding for the purpose of convincing us that our very real fears (of things like coyote committees and death by S.I.Y.S.) are actually illogical. That way, when these “illogical” fears strike, we’ll be caught completely unprepared.

iRate.

2007-11-07T17:07:00.000-08:00

Seeing as how their whole profession relies on their ability to intrigue and motivate their audience, one might expect that people who go into advertising would be the cleverest and most creative our society has to offer.

That certainly is the reputation that advertising-types get—witty, shrewd, keen. I used to subscribe to this theory as well, but recent events have shifted the whole enchilada of my perception on the subject. I now regard the majority of these individuals to be mindless twits, lemmings marching toward the precipice’s edge.

What changed my mind, you ask? Well, it all began when Apple released the now legendary staple of MP3 players, the iPod. Surely, a fantastic product that has revolutionized the way I dust the house as well as an absolute marketing triumph.

But my hot water is not with Apple. Rather, I aim my disgust squarely at the seemingly unending population of marketers who felt it advisable to exploit Apple’s advertising scheme by applying it to their own products.

Since the iPod’s rise to fame, we’ve witnessed the arrival of such ridiculous and pilfered products as the iHair, iFloor, iCast, iGrill, iPaper, iWatch, and iMattress. In fact, if you attach the letter 'i' to the front of any noun (and most verbs) and Google it, you’ll find a product of that name. Is there iFood? Absolutely. What about iPants? Yep. There couldn’t possibly be a product called the iShip-in-a-Bottle*. Oh, there could. And there is.

I am afraid to say that things have grown even more dire than the “Got Milk?” crisis of the 1990’s. For a few dark years, the country was under the dank impression that it was absolutely hilarious to plaster a “Got ____?” (fill in the blank with absolutely anything at all, no matter how completely stupid) sticker onto the rear window of your car.

It was not funny then. And it makes me want to throw up now.

The prime concern is not how far we will sink. (I think we already hit rock bottom with the advent of the all too real iBlood). The question is who among us will be able to refrain? Will the potential profit margins associated with this extremely tacky form of marketing encourage me to capitalize on the public’s undeniable demand for an iNachos? How long until I’m attending iChurch? When, if ever, will I pick up an iNewspaper to check the iPrices of my iStocks on the iStockMarket? It’s all very depressing.

*For the record, the only one of these products that doesn't actually exist is the iShip-in-a-Bottle. Yet.

Ride the snail

2007-11-05T23:00:00.000-08:00

I’m 23 now, and despite my inability to grow a respectable patch of facial hair, practically an adult. I work. I pay bills. I complain about bills. I even look forward to baths and naps and have learned to tolerate, if not enjoy, the taste of mushrooms. (All things which quite repulsed the youthful version of myself).

But I’m not quite ready to relinquish childhood. I still covet the times of yesteryear when laundry would seemingly wash, fold and place itself into its rightful dresser drawer without any doing of my own. I still relish in the occasional round of complete inappropriateness. And when feeling dejected I still find myself just a little tempted to pop a quarter in the mechanical snail with the cowboy hat that sits in front of my local grocery store and go for a ride.

Of course the sight of a six foot four inch tall man riding a mechanical snail while eating an ice cream sandwich might draw some curious looks. Just to grasp the handlebars, I have to tuck my arms close to my chest and reduce my reach to something like that of a tyrannosaurus rex. In order to place my feet in the stirrups on either side of the snail, my knees must extend upwards past my shoulders configuring my lanky frame in most unnatural way. But I’m okay with looking weird. The therapeutic seesawing helps to work out the homework-induced kinks of collegiate life and is a worthy trade off for looking a wee bit foolish.

Blogging.

2007-11-03T08:42:00.000-07:00

It has recently come to my attention that "blogging" is not, as I previously believed, a British word for making out. This comes as good news, because now I can blog to my heart's content without contracting mono.

It has begun.