Courtesy of Joe...
"It's not quite the fluffy beaver... "
http://www.tagtele.com/v/11924
Saturday, March 14, 2009
matching hearts
This is a cheesy but true story. Every time I think of it I smile.
Jonas and I were in Florence, Italy, and we had gone to this club. It was really hot and crowded inside, and the music was loud, so we took our drinks outside to enjoy the evening. There were tables set up outside the bar and we could watch people walking on the street, one of my favorite things to do in a foreign city. When we walked outside we saw a little girl sitting against the wall on the sidewalk outside of the club. She must have been around 7. I believe she was German but I'm not sure.
I was worried about her because it was about 1130 at night, and while Florence is safe, I wouldn't leave my 7 year old outside by herself. Using various pantomimes, and finally drawing a picture on a piece of note paper from a note book that I was carrying around, we finally figured out her parents were inside the club. Jonas went in to look for them. I think he asked the bartender to find them and the parents finally came out. I told them I didn't think it was safe for them to leave their kid outside (they spoke English). They waved a hand at me "oh, it's okay".
I didn't think it was okay. At all. They brought her a sprite and she came and sat down at our table. She had a stylish little white purse with pink flowers on it. I told her I liked her bag and she grinned at me even though I don't think she understood me. I started telling her a story and drawing pictures in my notebook from events of the story. It was one of my favorites as a kid, about this kitten that has to go to a baby sitter's house. The kitten puts all of his toys in a wheel barrow to take to the baby sitter. I don't know if she was getting the plot or not, but she started drawing kittens with wheel barrows too.
Then she pulled this foil packet out of her purse and opened it. Inside there were grapes. She offered us some in this very cute hostess kind of way. I kept talking to her in English and she kept responding to me in German (I think it was German). I was talking about the moon and drew a picture of that. Then she filled in the picture with stars. I added an alien and she laughed.
After we ate all the grapes I took the foil and turned my back to her, making a big deal of doing something sneaky. She wanted to see what I was doing but she was very polite. I folded the foil into a little heart and hid it in my hand. Then I put my hand out to her and she opened it and pulled out the heart. Her face suddenly lit up and she was all smiles, babbling away in German (I think). Jonas and I were looking at each other kind of puzzled, and then she pulled out a necklace that she was wearing and it was a heart the same size as the one I had made her. This coincidence made her very happy and I was happy too.
Shortly afterwards we decided to leave because we were tired so we took her in the bar and left her with her parents in there. I hope they took good care of her.
Jonas and I were in Florence, Italy, and we had gone to this club. It was really hot and crowded inside, and the music was loud, so we took our drinks outside to enjoy the evening. There were tables set up outside the bar and we could watch people walking on the street, one of my favorite things to do in a foreign city. When we walked outside we saw a little girl sitting against the wall on the sidewalk outside of the club. She must have been around 7. I believe she was German but I'm not sure.
I was worried about her because it was about 1130 at night, and while Florence is safe, I wouldn't leave my 7 year old outside by herself. Using various pantomimes, and finally drawing a picture on a piece of note paper from a note book that I was carrying around, we finally figured out her parents were inside the club. Jonas went in to look for them. I think he asked the bartender to find them and the parents finally came out. I told them I didn't think it was safe for them to leave their kid outside (they spoke English). They waved a hand at me "oh, it's okay".
I didn't think it was okay. At all. They brought her a sprite and she came and sat down at our table. She had a stylish little white purse with pink flowers on it. I told her I liked her bag and she grinned at me even though I don't think she understood me. I started telling her a story and drawing pictures in my notebook from events of the story. It was one of my favorites as a kid, about this kitten that has to go to a baby sitter's house. The kitten puts all of his toys in a wheel barrow to take to the baby sitter. I don't know if she was getting the plot or not, but she started drawing kittens with wheel barrows too.
Then she pulled this foil packet out of her purse and opened it. Inside there were grapes. She offered us some in this very cute hostess kind of way. I kept talking to her in English and she kept responding to me in German (I think it was German). I was talking about the moon and drew a picture of that. Then she filled in the picture with stars. I added an alien and she laughed.
After we ate all the grapes I took the foil and turned my back to her, making a big deal of doing something sneaky. She wanted to see what I was doing but she was very polite. I folded the foil into a little heart and hid it in my hand. Then I put my hand out to her and she opened it and pulled out the heart. Her face suddenly lit up and she was all smiles, babbling away in German (I think). Jonas and I were looking at each other kind of puzzled, and then she pulled out a necklace that she was wearing and it was a heart the same size as the one I had made her. This coincidence made her very happy and I was happy too.
Shortly afterwards we decided to leave because we were tired so we took her in the bar and left her with her parents in there. I hope they took good care of her.
iTsucks
Well, I've just spent the entire day trying to unfuck my music library. Thank you iTunes. You fucking suck.
I should mention that I got my first MP3 player back in 1999. I used MusicMatch. It was a GREAT program. Volume leveling. Discovered new music on its own. NEVER created duplicates. NEVER deleted songs (iTunes will delete music that it thinks you downloaded illegally - how fucking controlling is that?).
But then I got an iPod. I would throw it into my alley and run it over with my car if I didn't have it hooked up to my stereo so I don't have to carry around a billion CDs. But STILL...
First of all, I tried to add new music that Joe gave me to my library. It wanted me to add each individual folder. Like I have time. And, since it had to convert to the fucking stupid fucknut iTunes format, it was taking FOREVER.
So I decided to blow my music library away and start over. Should be easy. Point fucking iTunes to my music folder and come back in six hours. But no. It wasn't easy. Fucking iTunes randomly decided to not import certain albums. For example, it imported After Hours from my Nina Simone folder, but not Here Comes The Sun. I only discovered that when I started making playlists. So now I don't even know what music is missing until I go to listen to it.
Also, the fucking fuck of a program some how did not save my ratings for songs. How FUCKING stupid is that? That information is stored WITH THE SONG. It remembered all the other meta data. So now I have to go through my music library AGAIN and rate my songs.
Volume control. Well, I won't even get into that. But maybe some asspipe at Apple might want to one day get off his ass and work out. Then maybe he'll realize how fucking ANNOYING it is to constantly turn my player up or down depending on the song.
Then, as if all this stuff wasn't bad enough, I realized iTunes duplicated about half the songs it imported. Why, I don't fucking know. And then I realized that some music I burned in WMA format (my other player plays that, and MP3, pretty much any format except for iTunes) didn't import. So I manually imported it. I was prompted about converting the format to iTunes. Fine. And what do you think happened? It imported THREE copies of EVERY SONG.
And finally, iTunes smartlist. Well, guess that depends on your idea of smart. It created some jacked up, mashed up playlist of songs. You can't delete them. You can TRY to reset the parameters for the smart list, but it doesn't take them. Now I have this stupid playlist that I can't even SEE when I look at the playlists on my iPod, but it's the first playlist that plays when I switch over to my iPod when it's hooked up to my car stereo.
Oh, and when I synced my iPod it only took 6 lists of the 20 I created, even though there's room on my iPod for more songs.
My other MP3 player is a Creative Zen. It doesn't force me to make a library, I can import from the Explorer. It volume levels my songs. It...works.
I will never, ever, ever, ever buy an Apple product again.
I should mention that I got my first MP3 player back in 1999. I used MusicMatch. It was a GREAT program. Volume leveling. Discovered new music on its own. NEVER created duplicates. NEVER deleted songs (iTunes will delete music that it thinks you downloaded illegally - how fucking controlling is that?).
But then I got an iPod. I would throw it into my alley and run it over with my car if I didn't have it hooked up to my stereo so I don't have to carry around a billion CDs. But STILL...
First of all, I tried to add new music that Joe gave me to my library. It wanted me to add each individual folder. Like I have time. And, since it had to convert to the fucking stupid fucknut iTunes format, it was taking FOREVER.
So I decided to blow my music library away and start over. Should be easy. Point fucking iTunes to my music folder and come back in six hours. But no. It wasn't easy. Fucking iTunes randomly decided to not import certain albums. For example, it imported After Hours from my Nina Simone folder, but not Here Comes The Sun. I only discovered that when I started making playlists. So now I don't even know what music is missing until I go to listen to it.
Also, the fucking fuck of a program some how did not save my ratings for songs. How FUCKING stupid is that? That information is stored WITH THE SONG. It remembered all the other meta data. So now I have to go through my music library AGAIN and rate my songs.
Volume control. Well, I won't even get into that. But maybe some asspipe at Apple might want to one day get off his ass and work out. Then maybe he'll realize how fucking ANNOYING it is to constantly turn my player up or down depending on the song.
Then, as if all this stuff wasn't bad enough, I realized iTunes duplicated about half the songs it imported. Why, I don't fucking know. And then I realized that some music I burned in WMA format (my other player plays that, and MP3, pretty much any format except for iTunes) didn't import. So I manually imported it. I was prompted about converting the format to iTunes. Fine. And what do you think happened? It imported THREE copies of EVERY SONG.
And finally, iTunes smartlist. Well, guess that depends on your idea of smart. It created some jacked up, mashed up playlist of songs. You can't delete them. You can TRY to reset the parameters for the smart list, but it doesn't take them. Now I have this stupid playlist that I can't even SEE when I look at the playlists on my iPod, but it's the first playlist that plays when I switch over to my iPod when it's hooked up to my car stereo.
Oh, and when I synced my iPod it only took 6 lists of the 20 I created, even though there's room on my iPod for more songs.
My other MP3 player is a Creative Zen. It doesn't force me to make a library, I can import from the Explorer. It volume levels my songs. It...works.
I will never, ever, ever, ever buy an Apple product again.
Friday, March 13, 2009
the more sense it makes, the less sense it makes
I was watching the movie Nowhere in Africa, which is about a German Jewish family that moves to Kenya at the start of WWII. One thing, as a side note, that I didn't know until I saw the movie, is that the Jews in Africa were interred at one point during the war, by the British. They weren't kept in the same conditions as a concentration camp, though the movie clearly shows that the British didn't really like the Jews. Eventually the men were allowed, if selected by the British forces, to fight in Germany against the Germans. Anyway...
In the movie the wife Lisl, is about to depart to meet up with her husband, who's been in Kenya for 6 months getting things ready. It's obvious Lisl is not happy about going to Africa. She meets with her husband's father, who tells her "In any relationship, one person always loves more. And that person always suffers." It's obvious the person who loves more is Lisl's husband, who puts up with her affairs until he finally gets to the point where he leaves her.
I had been thinking about that quote for a while, when someone else, in an email, asked the question "why would anyone have sex with someone who was treating them badly?" The asker was a guy of course. I started to wonder, should you not have sex with someone who is treating you badly?
Of course, there's bad and then there's bad. Would I have sex with someone who was treating me like a punching bag? No. Would I have sex with a partner that had cheated on me? Maybe. And does cheating fall into the category of treating someone bad, or is it something else? And don't most relationship guides say that you should have sex even if you're mad at your partner because it can help relieve the tension and make you less mad?
Maybe the logic goes something like this...a person is ignoring you. Then that person suddenly shows interest in you. You don't know why that person was ignoring you but now you're happy that they seem to like you again. It's a common thing in relationships, summed up nicely in TTMR when Marge says (paraphrased) "When he is paying attention to you it's like the sun is shining on you. And when he loses interest it's very cold". So what do you do? Try to use intimacy in the hopes of keeping their attention, while giving yourself the impression that you are somehow connected to the person. Is this incorrect logic?
Or should you assume, if they don't give a shit about you before you have sex with them, they won't care afterwards either. In fact, they'll probably resent you even more. It may work for people that are avoiding a relationship due to emotional issues, but I imagine that's not a very large group. So, I guess I concur with the idea of not having sex with someone who is being an asshole.
But, then there's the whole relationship dynamic. What if you are the person who loves the other person more? Should you leave that person and find someone that loves you more than you love them so you can be the asshole? And not get laid? Unless the person you are with thinks it's okay to have sex with someone who is treating them badly? Or maybe find someone that loves you equally as much? You'll never get laid because that relationship does not exist.
People are either going to try to work a relationship to their advantage, or give everything to a relationship. I haven't met a single couple that doesn't have that dynamic. Which is not to say it doesn't shift over time, but isn't that what draws people together? You meet someone that you can take care of, and that person is attracted to you because that person wants to be taken care of. Or vice versa. I love people that say you should not need to be in a relationship before you get into a relationship. Isn't that against everything that makes us human? If someone doesn't want to be in a relationship, why WOULD they be in a relationship? And if someone wants to be in a relationship, why wouldn't you want to be in a relationship with them, because you know that they are willing to devote time and effort into making the relationship good. That's like saying you shouldn't want to have kids before you have them. It's stupid.
Take a mountaineering example. Say I'm going to climb denali. I want to climb it by myself because I'm such a self sufficient mountaineer I don't need anyone else's help. Then along comes some guy who wants to climb with me. Am I going to welcome him with open arms? No, I'm going to resent the shit out of him and hate him. Say another self sufficient mountaineer shows up. Do I care? No, because I'll have no interaction with him, and he won't interact with me, because we're doing our own thing. In either case, there's no relationship that could come of climbing Denali with either of those two people.
But say I'm a mountaineer who wants to climb denali, and I know what my weaknesses are. I would try to find a partner that could help me with those weaknesses, and that I could hopefully help in some way. The experience is good for both of us because we can relax and focus on our strengths because we know our partner has our back on the things we are not as good at. And maybe, over time, we learn to build up our weaknesses by having help from our partner.
Of course, during the duration of the climb, I might fight with my partner, especially if he is doing something that emphasizes my weaknesses. But am I going to desert my partner for treating me badly? Maybe, if I suck. But if I don't suck maybe I will use the situation as an opportunity to help my partner and myself.
So really, if you want to be in a relationship, the key is not to NOT want to be in a relationship. The key is to understand WHY you want to be in a relationship and what you need to get out of your relationship.
Of course, I could be wrong about all this. But no one else has provided me with a more logical explanation.
In the movie the wife Lisl, is about to depart to meet up with her husband, who's been in Kenya for 6 months getting things ready. It's obvious Lisl is not happy about going to Africa. She meets with her husband's father, who tells her "In any relationship, one person always loves more. And that person always suffers." It's obvious the person who loves more is Lisl's husband, who puts up with her affairs until he finally gets to the point where he leaves her.
I had been thinking about that quote for a while, when someone else, in an email, asked the question "why would anyone have sex with someone who was treating them badly?" The asker was a guy of course. I started to wonder, should you not have sex with someone who is treating you badly?
Of course, there's bad and then there's bad. Would I have sex with someone who was treating me like a punching bag? No. Would I have sex with a partner that had cheated on me? Maybe. And does cheating fall into the category of treating someone bad, or is it something else? And don't most relationship guides say that you should have sex even if you're mad at your partner because it can help relieve the tension and make you less mad?
Maybe the logic goes something like this...a person is ignoring you. Then that person suddenly shows interest in you. You don't know why that person was ignoring you but now you're happy that they seem to like you again. It's a common thing in relationships, summed up nicely in TTMR when Marge says (paraphrased) "When he is paying attention to you it's like the sun is shining on you. And when he loses interest it's very cold". So what do you do? Try to use intimacy in the hopes of keeping their attention, while giving yourself the impression that you are somehow connected to the person. Is this incorrect logic?
Or should you assume, if they don't give a shit about you before you have sex with them, they won't care afterwards either. In fact, they'll probably resent you even more. It may work for people that are avoiding a relationship due to emotional issues, but I imagine that's not a very large group. So, I guess I concur with the idea of not having sex with someone who is being an asshole.
But, then there's the whole relationship dynamic. What if you are the person who loves the other person more? Should you leave that person and find someone that loves you more than you love them so you can be the asshole? And not get laid? Unless the person you are with thinks it's okay to have sex with someone who is treating them badly? Or maybe find someone that loves you equally as much? You'll never get laid because that relationship does not exist.
People are either going to try to work a relationship to their advantage, or give everything to a relationship. I haven't met a single couple that doesn't have that dynamic. Which is not to say it doesn't shift over time, but isn't that what draws people together? You meet someone that you can take care of, and that person is attracted to you because that person wants to be taken care of. Or vice versa. I love people that say you should not need to be in a relationship before you get into a relationship. Isn't that against everything that makes us human? If someone doesn't want to be in a relationship, why WOULD they be in a relationship? And if someone wants to be in a relationship, why wouldn't you want to be in a relationship with them, because you know that they are willing to devote time and effort into making the relationship good. That's like saying you shouldn't want to have kids before you have them. It's stupid.
Take a mountaineering example. Say I'm going to climb denali. I want to climb it by myself because I'm such a self sufficient mountaineer I don't need anyone else's help. Then along comes some guy who wants to climb with me. Am I going to welcome him with open arms? No, I'm going to resent the shit out of him and hate him. Say another self sufficient mountaineer shows up. Do I care? No, because I'll have no interaction with him, and he won't interact with me, because we're doing our own thing. In either case, there's no relationship that could come of climbing Denali with either of those two people.
But say I'm a mountaineer who wants to climb denali, and I know what my weaknesses are. I would try to find a partner that could help me with those weaknesses, and that I could hopefully help in some way. The experience is good for both of us because we can relax and focus on our strengths because we know our partner has our back on the things we are not as good at. And maybe, over time, we learn to build up our weaknesses by having help from our partner.
Of course, during the duration of the climb, I might fight with my partner, especially if he is doing something that emphasizes my weaknesses. But am I going to desert my partner for treating me badly? Maybe, if I suck. But if I don't suck maybe I will use the situation as an opportunity to help my partner and myself.
So really, if you want to be in a relationship, the key is not to NOT want to be in a relationship. The key is to understand WHY you want to be in a relationship and what you need to get out of your relationship.
Of course, I could be wrong about all this. But no one else has provided me with a more logical explanation.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
cars
Last night I had a dream that I was walking by the bus station down the street from my house. It was really warm and the sun was unnaturally bright.
I heard someone yell my name and when I looked over there was my brother Bob, running across the street from the bus station. He was carrying a stick over his shoulder with all his belongings tied up in this red hankerchief that had large white polka dots on it.
I was like "what are you doing here?" and he said "I came out to visit you". He was really drunk. But I felt this huge sense of relief that he had come out to Colorado so I could take care of him.
I said "let's go to the grocery" because I didn't have any food in my house and I wanted to get something to feed him because he looked so skinny. When we got to the grocery, which was a whole foods store I think, he was having problems walking so I put him in this little cart that looked like a car and started pushing him around the store. When we got to a shelf that had food he wanted to eat he would knock the food into his little car.
Then this lady came up and started yelling at me because Bob was smoking a cigarette. So I took his cigarette out of his mouth and put it out on the floor. He got really mad at me so I told him I would give him another one when we left the store.
I pushed him out of the store and as soon as we got out of the door I lit a cigarette and handed it to him. He looked really happy. A guy walked up to us and told us a joke and we both started laughing really hard. I don't remember what the joke was.
Then I woke up.
I heard someone yell my name and when I looked over there was my brother Bob, running across the street from the bus station. He was carrying a stick over his shoulder with all his belongings tied up in this red hankerchief that had large white polka dots on it.
I was like "what are you doing here?" and he said "I came out to visit you". He was really drunk. But I felt this huge sense of relief that he had come out to Colorado so I could take care of him.
I said "let's go to the grocery" because I didn't have any food in my house and I wanted to get something to feed him because he looked so skinny. When we got to the grocery, which was a whole foods store I think, he was having problems walking so I put him in this little cart that looked like a car and started pushing him around the store. When we got to a shelf that had food he wanted to eat he would knock the food into his little car.
Then this lady came up and started yelling at me because Bob was smoking a cigarette. So I took his cigarette out of his mouth and put it out on the floor. He got really mad at me so I told him I would give him another one when we left the store.
I pushed him out of the store and as soon as we got out of the door I lit a cigarette and handed it to him. He looked really happy. A guy walked up to us and told us a joke and we both started laughing really hard. I don't remember what the joke was.
Then I woke up.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Nick gets dumped for a corner fart
And one of my favorite stories of my ex...
We had just attended an engineering dinner where we were doubling with my boss, Nick, and his new girlfriend, I think her name was Sam. Nick was driving us around in his mustang. Given the length of my legs, and the narrowness of the back seat of one of those things, I knew disaster was going to strike eventually. And my ex had a tendency to behave badly around my co-workers. The night was a little tense for me.
Anyway, the dinner ended with me getting in trouble for breaking a piece off of a peanut brittle sculpture that apparently was not meant to be eaten. But after I took a huge chunk off of it everyone else did too. The restaurant people were pissed.
Then we decided to go to this bar, Buena Vista, where the first Irish Coffee ever was served. My ex had one, despite the fact that he's lactose intolerant. As we left the bar and were walking back to Nick's car, debating whether or not we were going to go to a club, we were stopped by traffic at a street corner. As we stood there, my ex let out this HUGE fart. I was like oh my god, around people I work with! Then Sam smacked Nick really hard and said "That was SO disgusting!" Nick was like "it wasn't ME!" and she was like "What ever. Why do you always have to do things like that?"
I started laughing and was going to tell her it was my ex, but then she was being such a bitch I didn't. My ex was acting as if nothing had happened, which was making me laugh harder. They argued the rest of the way back to the car.
Then, when we got to the car, and had by that time decided to not go to a club because Sam was being a bitch, I had to climb into the back seat of the stupid mustang. I was wearing stilettos, a short skirt, and no underwear. I had also just had knee surgery and so was having problems balancing. As I went to get into the car my foot got tangled in the seat belt and I ended up falling head first onto the back seat, mooning Sam on my way down. She didn't say anything, but I could tell she wanted to strangle me as I laughed the whole ride home.
The next Monday at work I saw Nick in the gym (we both worked out first thing in the morning). He was not in a good mood. I asked why and he said that he had broken up with Sam. I don't know how much was triggered by the fart and the mooning. I felt bad.
Nick went on to retire and marry some LA lady who is a producer or something (read: super rich). Sam is probably still making guys miserable. And my ex is probably still eating dairy around unsuspecting people.
We had just attended an engineering dinner where we were doubling with my boss, Nick, and his new girlfriend, I think her name was Sam. Nick was driving us around in his mustang. Given the length of my legs, and the narrowness of the back seat of one of those things, I knew disaster was going to strike eventually. And my ex had a tendency to behave badly around my co-workers. The night was a little tense for me.
Anyway, the dinner ended with me getting in trouble for breaking a piece off of a peanut brittle sculpture that apparently was not meant to be eaten. But after I took a huge chunk off of it everyone else did too. The restaurant people were pissed.
Then we decided to go to this bar, Buena Vista, where the first Irish Coffee ever was served. My ex had one, despite the fact that he's lactose intolerant. As we left the bar and were walking back to Nick's car, debating whether or not we were going to go to a club, we were stopped by traffic at a street corner. As we stood there, my ex let out this HUGE fart. I was like oh my god, around people I work with! Then Sam smacked Nick really hard and said "That was SO disgusting!" Nick was like "it wasn't ME!" and she was like "What ever. Why do you always have to do things like that?"
I started laughing and was going to tell her it was my ex, but then she was being such a bitch I didn't. My ex was acting as if nothing had happened, which was making me laugh harder. They argued the rest of the way back to the car.
Then, when we got to the car, and had by that time decided to not go to a club because Sam was being a bitch, I had to climb into the back seat of the stupid mustang. I was wearing stilettos, a short skirt, and no underwear. I had also just had knee surgery and so was having problems balancing. As I went to get into the car my foot got tangled in the seat belt and I ended up falling head first onto the back seat, mooning Sam on my way down. She didn't say anything, but I could tell she wanted to strangle me as I laughed the whole ride home.
The next Monday at work I saw Nick in the gym (we both worked out first thing in the morning). He was not in a good mood. I asked why and he said that he had broken up with Sam. I don't know how much was triggered by the fart and the mooning. I felt bad.
Nick went on to retire and marry some LA lady who is a producer or something (read: super rich). Sam is probably still making guys miserable. And my ex is probably still eating dairy around unsuspecting people.
and I would do it again
One of my favorite farting stories...
I was in Hania, Crete, in a cute little hotel overlooking the harbor. I was there with a guy that I later married (and divorced). It was our first trip together, and the first time we had stayed in the same bed.
It was early morning and the sun was coming through the window because the night before we had forgotten to close the shutters. I was looking out at the boats, feeling groggy, laying on my back trying to decide whether or not I was ready to be awake.
I had woken up because the guy, let's call him X, had woken up. He was (and probably still is) a morning person. He rolled over on his side and started talking to me about a conversation we were having while falling asleep the previous night, but I wasn't really listening, I was still half asleep. The conversation was about how, to have a good relationship, we should be able to tell each other anything, and do anything, without the other person getting pissed or upset.
I vaguely remember him saying something sweet to me, and me smiling, feeling totally relaxed, and then him suddenly rolling right on top of me. I was caught by surprise and accidentally farted really, really loudly. There was a moment of stunned silence from the body laying on top of me, and then X said "I can't BELIEVE you just did that!" I was trying to think of something to say that might bring back the romantic mood, but I was also trying to not laugh. Then he, just as suddenly, rolled off me and that caused me to fart again.
"GOD dammit! You've completely spoiled everything!" he yelled at me, throwing the covers onto my face and storming into the bathroom.
I yelled back at him "But I thought you said last night that we could tell each other anything!" and then proceeded to have an epic giggling fit that continued on the bus ride to Heraklion and while we were touring the temple of Knossos.
He eventually forgave me, married me, and, oddly enough, I never farted for the rest of our time together. He used to say it was because I talked so much the air never had a chance to get down to my intestines. Medically speaking, I don't know if there could be any truth to that.
I was in Hania, Crete, in a cute little hotel overlooking the harbor. I was there with a guy that I later married (and divorced). It was our first trip together, and the first time we had stayed in the same bed.
It was early morning and the sun was coming through the window because the night before we had forgotten to close the shutters. I was looking out at the boats, feeling groggy, laying on my back trying to decide whether or not I was ready to be awake.
I had woken up because the guy, let's call him X, had woken up. He was (and probably still is) a morning person. He rolled over on his side and started talking to me about a conversation we were having while falling asleep the previous night, but I wasn't really listening, I was still half asleep. The conversation was about how, to have a good relationship, we should be able to tell each other anything, and do anything, without the other person getting pissed or upset.
I vaguely remember him saying something sweet to me, and me smiling, feeling totally relaxed, and then him suddenly rolling right on top of me. I was caught by surprise and accidentally farted really, really loudly. There was a moment of stunned silence from the body laying on top of me, and then X said "I can't BELIEVE you just did that!" I was trying to think of something to say that might bring back the romantic mood, but I was also trying to not laugh. Then he, just as suddenly, rolled off me and that caused me to fart again.
"GOD dammit! You've completely spoiled everything!" he yelled at me, throwing the covers onto my face and storming into the bathroom.
I yelled back at him "But I thought you said last night that we could tell each other anything!" and then proceeded to have an epic giggling fit that continued on the bus ride to Heraklion and while we were touring the temple of Knossos.
He eventually forgave me, married me, and, oddly enough, I never farted for the rest of our time together. He used to say it was because I talked so much the air never had a chance to get down to my intestines. Medically speaking, I don't know if there could be any truth to that.
the talented Mr. D
I will preface this dream by mentioning that I watched The Talented Mr. Ripley last night.
Last night I dreamed that my co-author's father (though I have no idea what he looks like in real life, in the dream he looked like the father in TTMR) hired me to go to a college in Calgary because, he said, "my son is causing a huge disruption on the campus, and if you can't stop him he'll be thrown out of school".
So I was given this magic car that could get really big or really small depending on what size I wished it would be. It was this cool shade of blue, kind of like a dark blue but with grey in it.
I got to the campus and found these huge scaffolds all over the quad that had Star Wars action figures on them. People could barely walk around because the scaffolds were every where. I saw my co-author building yet another scaffold. I yelled to him and he came over to my car. I was like "what are you doing?" and he said "I'm building shelves to house my star wars collection". I said "you can't just build them where ever you want because it's causing a disruption on campus". He started to get upset so I said "look, why don't I park my car and you can show me your collection".
So he told me to park in this steeply sloping parking lot, and I started to drive down it but realized there were no spots, and worse, that there was a huge cliff at the end of the parking lot that I almost accidentally drove off. I was really mad at him so I backed my car up and said "no, I need a parking lot that still has spaces and that isn't on a cliff". So then he sent me to this other parking lot that had one tiny space left. I shrank my magic car down to its smallest size but right as I was doing that my co-author made all the cars in the parking lot larger so I was boxed in between all these cars and couldn't move forward or backwards.
Then my co-author's dad appeared on this TV screen inside my car (looked like the TV in Jeffy's FJ) and said "you must become a bicycle!" and I was like "I don't understand" and he said "think about it! think about becoming a bicycle!" So I thought about becoming a bicycle and my car turned into a bicycle. I was like ha ha, now I can get out of the parking lot! I rode the bike up to my co-author and was like "okay, now I need a place to park my bike". I could tell he was irritated that I was able to turn my magic car into a bike. He showed me this white u-shaped stand (like the ones you see in any city) and I chained my bike to it. But as soon as I started to walk away the bike stand turned into a white dog and the dog ran away with my bike. I was like fuck, now how am I going to get home.
Then my co-author started to show me all the scaffolds he created. There was one huge one that I thought was going to fall on me. It had hundreds of these figures that looked like Jesus statues. I was like "what is this?" and he said "This is the main star of star wars. He's the angel of star wars." I was like "No that isn't. It's Jesus. And there was no "angel of star wars"." Then my co-author got mad at me again and said "Yes there was. You just didn't see that version of the movie."
I was starting to think that my co-author was really crazy and that I should call his dad except that a dog had run away with my magic car and I could only communicate with people using the TV screen. Mean while my co-author had walked away and I couldn't see him anymore in the maze of scaffolds. I was afraid the Jesus scaffold was going to fall on me.
Then I woke up.
Last night I dreamed that my co-author's father (though I have no idea what he looks like in real life, in the dream he looked like the father in TTMR) hired me to go to a college in Calgary because, he said, "my son is causing a huge disruption on the campus, and if you can't stop him he'll be thrown out of school".
So I was given this magic car that could get really big or really small depending on what size I wished it would be. It was this cool shade of blue, kind of like a dark blue but with grey in it.
I got to the campus and found these huge scaffolds all over the quad that had Star Wars action figures on them. People could barely walk around because the scaffolds were every where. I saw my co-author building yet another scaffold. I yelled to him and he came over to my car. I was like "what are you doing?" and he said "I'm building shelves to house my star wars collection". I said "you can't just build them where ever you want because it's causing a disruption on campus". He started to get upset so I said "look, why don't I park my car and you can show me your collection".
So he told me to park in this steeply sloping parking lot, and I started to drive down it but realized there were no spots, and worse, that there was a huge cliff at the end of the parking lot that I almost accidentally drove off. I was really mad at him so I backed my car up and said "no, I need a parking lot that still has spaces and that isn't on a cliff". So then he sent me to this other parking lot that had one tiny space left. I shrank my magic car down to its smallest size but right as I was doing that my co-author made all the cars in the parking lot larger so I was boxed in between all these cars and couldn't move forward or backwards.
Then my co-author's dad appeared on this TV screen inside my car (looked like the TV in Jeffy's FJ) and said "you must become a bicycle!" and I was like "I don't understand" and he said "think about it! think about becoming a bicycle!" So I thought about becoming a bicycle and my car turned into a bicycle. I was like ha ha, now I can get out of the parking lot! I rode the bike up to my co-author and was like "okay, now I need a place to park my bike". I could tell he was irritated that I was able to turn my magic car into a bike. He showed me this white u-shaped stand (like the ones you see in any city) and I chained my bike to it. But as soon as I started to walk away the bike stand turned into a white dog and the dog ran away with my bike. I was like fuck, now how am I going to get home.
Then my co-author started to show me all the scaffolds he created. There was one huge one that I thought was going to fall on me. It had hundreds of these figures that looked like Jesus statues. I was like "what is this?" and he said "This is the main star of star wars. He's the angel of star wars." I was like "No that isn't. It's Jesus. And there was no "angel of star wars"." Then my co-author got mad at me again and said "Yes there was. You just didn't see that version of the movie."
I was starting to think that my co-author was really crazy and that I should call his dad except that a dog had run away with my magic car and I could only communicate with people using the TV screen. Mean while my co-author had walked away and I couldn't see him anymore in the maze of scaffolds. I was afraid the Jesus scaffold was going to fall on me.
Then I woke up.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
farts - are they really that funny?
My uncle sent me this. How can you NOT laugh at a story that is head lined "city council meeting interrupted by farts":
http://www.fox8.com/wjw-news-medina-fart,0,2761320.htmlstory
Or maybe something is wrong with me.
http://www.fox8.com/wjw-news-medina-fart,0,2761320.htmlstory
Or maybe something is wrong with me.
naked me
My two favorite naked stories, from college...
The summer before my freshman year my right achilles tendon tore completely off the bone. They put a cast on my leg that went from my hip to my toes. It sucked ass. I had to put this huge yellow rubber thing over it to protect it from water when I showered.
So some bitch girls on my hall thought it was funny to take my towel while I was showering because, what was I going to do, chase them on my crutches? It became an almost weekly event. Normally I would rip down a shower curtain, wrap that around myself, and go to my room, but this one day I decided fuck them, I'm just walking back to my room naked.
I should mention that I lived in a co-ed dorm (Ambler Johnston, location of the first shootings at tech in 2007). I knew I might run into some guys but I was so pissed I didn't care. I went crutching down to my room like a crippled rabid dog, screaming about my fucking towel and beating the shit out of who ever took it.
It was this day that I found out the girl across the hall was mormon. I found this out because her two mormon buddies, who were on that bicycle tour thing they do, had stopped by to see her right around the time I came down the hall. Picture it. I'm sopping wet, on crutches, with a huge cast that has a yellow rubber thing on it, yelling profanities directed generally towards all the girls on my hall. These two guys were looking at me like I was the anti-christ and a porn star rolled into one. The mormon girl screamed and then fainted.
After that, no one ever took my towel.
The other story is from my senior year in college. I was hanging out with my biker friends at a party at an apartment complex. It was a really warm night in the middle of April and we were getting drunk. My friend Omar gets this idea: he and I should take off our clothes and go swimming in the apartment complex pool.
This is the same apartment complex that my friend Brad almost burned down when he got stoned and dropped a flaming newspaper off a balcony onto a hay bale they were using for the grass. Also where another friend was kicked out because he was throwing water balloons at sorority girls walking to a formal. And where my friend Bryan ran me over with my own motorcycle while we were trying to ride it up the stairs from the first to the second floor.
So, naked in the pool...that seemed very tame and acceptable.
We walked down to the pool and took off all of our clothes, except that, and I should have been suspicious about this, Omar did not remove his shoes. I put my toe in the water. The surface was covered with leaves, a bit ick, but the water felt pretty warm. Omar was like "jump in and I'll follow you" so I jumped in.
The water was FUCKING cold. And, worse, I realized as soon as I jumped in that the pool had a tarp over the top of it that had filled with water. I wasn't actually in the pool. I was in a tarp, filled with rotting leaves and other shit, on top of the pool.
Around this time Omar heard sirens and like a typical Egyptian ran off and left the Jew to suffer whatever consequences were to follow. I tried to get out of the pool but I couldn't because the sides of the tarp were so slippery with leaf muck that I couldn't grab on to anything. Also, being really drunk probably wasn't helping.
A cop walked over to the pool with his flashlight. He said "you look like a turtle that flipped over on its back". I was like ha ha, get me the fuck out of here. He pulled me out with his riot baton (back in those days, for the record, they didn't need stuff like that at tech). Right after he got me out of the pool he recognized me because I was teaching self defense classes at dorms and sororities and would often recruit the local police to show up at my classes so the girls would have a real guy to beat up. This kind of sucks, I thought to myself. I was also worried my karate instructor would find out what I did and break my head in half. He is quite omniscient and has emailed or called me at various times in my life when I was about to do something really bad. I don't know how he knows, but he does.
The cop (his name was JC) let me pick up my clothes. He marched me to the squad car. I looked up at the balcony of the apartment where the party was going on and noticed way too many people standing on it watching what was happening. As soon as the cop put me in the back seat of the car, they all went inside.
The cop told me he was going to let me go. He drove the 100 yards or what ever it was, to the building where the party was. He opened the back door for me and I got out of the car and walked up the stairs to the party completely naked. Everyone in the party was clapping. As soon as I walked in the door my friend Bryan threw a bottle of ketchup on me. Then my friend Tawfiq threw barbecue sauce at me. A huge food and beer fight erupted. My last memory of that night is hiding in the shower with Tawfiq waiting for people to stop throwing stuff, and that I was wearing Bryan's robe, and that I hadn't wiped the ketchup and barbecue sauce off before I put his robe on.
And waking up the next morning on the floor of Bryan's room realizing I had stacked a bunch of motorcycle helmets around me, thinking that it would protect me from anyone trying to fuck with me. I ended up getting an ear infection from the water in the pool, and the weather went back to being cold which was depressing.
Bryan is married now, and an accountant. Has kids. No idea what happened to Omar. Tawfiq was working for World Bank in Italy, but I'm not sure where he is now.
The summer before my freshman year my right achilles tendon tore completely off the bone. They put a cast on my leg that went from my hip to my toes. It sucked ass. I had to put this huge yellow rubber thing over it to protect it from water when I showered.
So some bitch girls on my hall thought it was funny to take my towel while I was showering because, what was I going to do, chase them on my crutches? It became an almost weekly event. Normally I would rip down a shower curtain, wrap that around myself, and go to my room, but this one day I decided fuck them, I'm just walking back to my room naked.
I should mention that I lived in a co-ed dorm (Ambler Johnston, location of the first shootings at tech in 2007). I knew I might run into some guys but I was so pissed I didn't care. I went crutching down to my room like a crippled rabid dog, screaming about my fucking towel and beating the shit out of who ever took it.
It was this day that I found out the girl across the hall was mormon. I found this out because her two mormon buddies, who were on that bicycle tour thing they do, had stopped by to see her right around the time I came down the hall. Picture it. I'm sopping wet, on crutches, with a huge cast that has a yellow rubber thing on it, yelling profanities directed generally towards all the girls on my hall. These two guys were looking at me like I was the anti-christ and a porn star rolled into one. The mormon girl screamed and then fainted.
After that, no one ever took my towel.
The other story is from my senior year in college. I was hanging out with my biker friends at a party at an apartment complex. It was a really warm night in the middle of April and we were getting drunk. My friend Omar gets this idea: he and I should take off our clothes and go swimming in the apartment complex pool.
This is the same apartment complex that my friend Brad almost burned down when he got stoned and dropped a flaming newspaper off a balcony onto a hay bale they were using for the grass. Also where another friend was kicked out because he was throwing water balloons at sorority girls walking to a formal. And where my friend Bryan ran me over with my own motorcycle while we were trying to ride it up the stairs from the first to the second floor.
So, naked in the pool...that seemed very tame and acceptable.
We walked down to the pool and took off all of our clothes, except that, and I should have been suspicious about this, Omar did not remove his shoes. I put my toe in the water. The surface was covered with leaves, a bit ick, but the water felt pretty warm. Omar was like "jump in and I'll follow you" so I jumped in.
The water was FUCKING cold. And, worse, I realized as soon as I jumped in that the pool had a tarp over the top of it that had filled with water. I wasn't actually in the pool. I was in a tarp, filled with rotting leaves and other shit, on top of the pool.
Around this time Omar heard sirens and like a typical Egyptian ran off and left the Jew to suffer whatever consequences were to follow. I tried to get out of the pool but I couldn't because the sides of the tarp were so slippery with leaf muck that I couldn't grab on to anything. Also, being really drunk probably wasn't helping.
A cop walked over to the pool with his flashlight. He said "you look like a turtle that flipped over on its back". I was like ha ha, get me the fuck out of here. He pulled me out with his riot baton (back in those days, for the record, they didn't need stuff like that at tech). Right after he got me out of the pool he recognized me because I was teaching self defense classes at dorms and sororities and would often recruit the local police to show up at my classes so the girls would have a real guy to beat up. This kind of sucks, I thought to myself. I was also worried my karate instructor would find out what I did and break my head in half. He is quite omniscient and has emailed or called me at various times in my life when I was about to do something really bad. I don't know how he knows, but he does.
The cop (his name was JC) let me pick up my clothes. He marched me to the squad car. I looked up at the balcony of the apartment where the party was going on and noticed way too many people standing on it watching what was happening. As soon as the cop put me in the back seat of the car, they all went inside.
The cop told me he was going to let me go. He drove the 100 yards or what ever it was, to the building where the party was. He opened the back door for me and I got out of the car and walked up the stairs to the party completely naked. Everyone in the party was clapping. As soon as I walked in the door my friend Bryan threw a bottle of ketchup on me. Then my friend Tawfiq threw barbecue sauce at me. A huge food and beer fight erupted. My last memory of that night is hiding in the shower with Tawfiq waiting for people to stop throwing stuff, and that I was wearing Bryan's robe, and that I hadn't wiped the ketchup and barbecue sauce off before I put his robe on.
And waking up the next morning on the floor of Bryan's room realizing I had stacked a bunch of motorcycle helmets around me, thinking that it would protect me from anyone trying to fuck with me. I ended up getting an ear infection from the water in the pool, and the weather went back to being cold which was depressing.
Bryan is married now, and an accountant. Has kids. No idea what happened to Omar. Tawfiq was working for World Bank in Italy, but I'm not sure where he is now.
Joe gets a surprise courtesy of the Town Pump
Yesterday I got the following email from Joe and laughed so hard I choked on my yerba mate:
"Good thing we did have two eggs left over for pancakes.
I am making lunch and was about to use those two we bought at the Town Pump.
Turns out they are hard boiled. And you thought I was so skilled to not break them when I put them in my down coat pocket...
Guess I need to reconsider what I'm having for lunch."
Though, I'm curious. What could one possibly make for lunch that would require eggs? Cupcakes, maybe? I wish someone was making me cupcakes for lunch today.
"Good thing we did have two eggs left over for pancakes.
I am making lunch and was about to use those two we bought at the Town Pump.
Turns out they are hard boiled. And you thought I was so skilled to not break them when I put them in my down coat pocket...
Guess I need to reconsider what I'm having for lunch."
Though, I'm curious. What could one possibly make for lunch that would require eggs? Cupcakes, maybe? I wish someone was making me cupcakes for lunch today.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
pac men and pizza
Last night I had a dream that I hired a guide to climb Denali, and when the guide showed up it was Angelina Jolie, only she was a lot taller than in real life.
We started walking on this path that was surrounded on both sides with these beautiful rose bushes and I was following behind her when she suddenly said "we have to find a place to hide!" I was like "why?" and she said "the rollers are coming!" She pushed me into this huge bush and told me to lay on my side and not move.
A few seconds later these creatures that looked like pac man came rolling down the trail. They were eating all the rose bushes that lined the trail. I couldn't see any teeth on them but they were obviously sharp because they were ripping the bushes to shreds. I became afraid they were going to eat me. They had eyes like a great white and every time they bit a rose bush their eyes would roll back. Angelina whispered "why the fuck did you have to wear that pack?" because I was wearing a bright blue pack and she was afraid the rollers would see me. Although, she had a bright red pack. I thought it was an unfair thing to say.
After the rollers ate the bushes these roses would start growing all over them and then they couldn't roll any more so they would come to a stop and fall asleep. After they started falling asleep Angelina waved me towards a big rock. I stayed on one side of the rock and set up my tent and she was on the other side of the rock. I couldn't see her but I could hear her voice.
I was like "is it over?" and she said "no, now the sheeshes are coming". I didn't know what those were so I crawled into my tent and then looked out the flap to see what would happen next.
These worm-snake like creatures came racing down the hill and started climbing all over the pac men as they were sleeping. I was like "what are they doing?" and Angelina said "they're eating the parasites". I was like huh. Then more creatures started coming down the hill. There were these dark blue triangle creatures that kept flying into the trees and sticking there like darts. There were also green ovals that were like gnats flying in a swarm and making a bad noise like bees. I thought "now we're never going to get to climb Denali". And then I woke up.
It was 430 in the morning so I read an article and then went back to sleep. This time I dreamed I was staying in Gadd's house, but it was in France and had red tiles on the roof. I was out on the patio smoking a cigarette when I heard Gadd come home with a friend. I ran down to the basement when I heard them go down there.
The basement had the room I was sleeping in and a big bar, like a restaurant bar. There were sliding glass doors going outside so the basement had a lot of light in it. Gadd was showing his friend the latest climbing magazine, which featured his daughter. She was 2 in the pictures but was climbing this huge wall in Tanzania. She was wearing a blue suit like ski racers wear.
While Gadd was showing his friend the magazine I was trying to sneak behind the bar without him noticing. He kept talking to me and I was answering him without looking at him. I was trying to get to the bar refrigerator where I had hidden a pizza. I was worried that Gadd and his friend would find my pizza and eat it. I pulled it out of the refrigerator and put newspapers on top of it. Then I started to casually walk out of the basement. But then Gadd was like "hey, I'm in that paper!" and grabbed it off the top of the pizza. I was like shit. And he said "oh, is that a pepperoni pizza?" I started to run up the stairs with the pizza but Gadd and his friend tackled me by grabbing my legs.
Then I woke up.
We started walking on this path that was surrounded on both sides with these beautiful rose bushes and I was following behind her when she suddenly said "we have to find a place to hide!" I was like "why?" and she said "the rollers are coming!" She pushed me into this huge bush and told me to lay on my side and not move.
A few seconds later these creatures that looked like pac man came rolling down the trail. They were eating all the rose bushes that lined the trail. I couldn't see any teeth on them but they were obviously sharp because they were ripping the bushes to shreds. I became afraid they were going to eat me. They had eyes like a great white and every time they bit a rose bush their eyes would roll back. Angelina whispered "why the fuck did you have to wear that pack?" because I was wearing a bright blue pack and she was afraid the rollers would see me. Although, she had a bright red pack. I thought it was an unfair thing to say.
After the rollers ate the bushes these roses would start growing all over them and then they couldn't roll any more so they would come to a stop and fall asleep. After they started falling asleep Angelina waved me towards a big rock. I stayed on one side of the rock and set up my tent and she was on the other side of the rock. I couldn't see her but I could hear her voice.
I was like "is it over?" and she said "no, now the sheeshes are coming". I didn't know what those were so I crawled into my tent and then looked out the flap to see what would happen next.
These worm-snake like creatures came racing down the hill and started climbing all over the pac men as they were sleeping. I was like "what are they doing?" and Angelina said "they're eating the parasites". I was like huh. Then more creatures started coming down the hill. There were these dark blue triangle creatures that kept flying into the trees and sticking there like darts. There were also green ovals that were like gnats flying in a swarm and making a bad noise like bees. I thought "now we're never going to get to climb Denali". And then I woke up.
It was 430 in the morning so I read an article and then went back to sleep. This time I dreamed I was staying in Gadd's house, but it was in France and had red tiles on the roof. I was out on the patio smoking a cigarette when I heard Gadd come home with a friend. I ran down to the basement when I heard them go down there.
The basement had the room I was sleeping in and a big bar, like a restaurant bar. There were sliding glass doors going outside so the basement had a lot of light in it. Gadd was showing his friend the latest climbing magazine, which featured his daughter. She was 2 in the pictures but was climbing this huge wall in Tanzania. She was wearing a blue suit like ski racers wear.
While Gadd was showing his friend the magazine I was trying to sneak behind the bar without him noticing. He kept talking to me and I was answering him without looking at him. I was trying to get to the bar refrigerator where I had hidden a pizza. I was worried that Gadd and his friend would find my pizza and eat it. I pulled it out of the refrigerator and put newspapers on top of it. Then I started to casually walk out of the basement. But then Gadd was like "hey, I'm in that paper!" and grabbed it off the top of the pizza. I was like shit. And he said "oh, is that a pepperoni pizza?" I started to run up the stairs with the pizza but Gadd and his friend tackled me by grabbing my legs.
Then I woke up.
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