Where's the Beef?

Last Saturday we'd just finished playing 18th holes of golf, it was a nice and warm sunny day, the Gin & Tonics were ready, my suit was on, towel in hand, and.......the Sheriff's department is over at the jacuzzi checking out a 911 call. Great, can't I ever catch a break?

Upon arriving on the scene, the sheriffs (who turned out to be quite mellow and cool) found a man sitting inside the jacuzzi area - but not in the jacuzzi - who was 'disoriented and unsure of who he was and where he was.' Uh....okay. My first thought was drugs. Gotta be, right? I'm thinking he's hit his meth too hard, but what the hell do I know?

So we trot over in our trunks, cocktails in hand, towels slung over our shoulders, witnessing this whole thing going down not more than 15 yards from the jacuzzi. We've got 2 Sherriff's, 4 firemen, several EMT's, more emergency workers showing up to be waved off, and me and my dad are chilling front row in the jacuzzi. Half of me felt like it was a bit irreverent, and half of me knew that I was on a schedule: I had 45 minutes before I had to be at my sister's for my stepmom's birthday celebration. It was now, or not until tomorrow to soak in the jacuzzi with a fine Sapphire & Tonic. Unless asked not to, I was gonna to sit in the jacuzzi.

Long story short.......too late, it turns out that this guy is actually in the middle of a diabetic shock. His blood sugar is so low that he's sitting on the ground, only remembers his first name, is not sure where he lives, and he's laughing and moving like a jelly skeleton. Very unnerving once I realized how close this guy came to dying really.

Fast forward to Monday. Come 11:30 a.m., I felt as though my blood sugar was getting low. Not to be funny, I know it wasn't getting dangerously low, but I was feeling really sluggish, and knew it was only time before I became irritable and cranky, and then the total A-hole all who know me have met before. My solution? Protein. Fastest and tastiest method of getting said protein into my bloodstream? In-N-Out Burger.

In the last year, I moved down from the Double-Double to the Single. Yeah, okay, call me a pussy. I just decided that I didn't need all that meat. And once I tried a Single, I realized I was fine. That was a perfect amount of food for me. But this day something deep down inside of me was crying out for more. It ached, and pleaded, so I indulged it. Double-Double, fries, soda. No problem. I must've finished every single peice of food on my tray w/in 4 minutes. One word: deliciosa. Translation: f'ing goooooooood!!!!!

Hey! You! Yeah, you!!

I guess the consensus is not going Gene's way....

But onward and upward!! It's Thursday and I'm waiting to eat some pizza and drink some wine. Mmmmmm, good for me.

Mr. Frey of AMLP got lambasted (apparently, I didn't see the episode) by Oprah today. I read about it in the news and then even heard about it on NPR. Well, I guess we get what we get......or, we reap what we sow......or, something like that.

I still like the book. The second one is boring me already, but it's such fast reading I'll finish it. I'm of a lower order and books with big words and no pictures can be tough on me, forcing slumber is the usual result. Lucky for me, I love to slumber.

What else? Congo Slapper sent me an email a couple of weeks ago, telling me he liked a particular post and that he would leave a comment answering some of the questions I was looking to have answered. So I was excited, and eagerly looked forward to the comment. Everyday I hurriedly skipped home, almost tripping over the Slip N' Slide to get to my mailbox, hoping that Congo Slap had replied. So far, nothing. Thank goodness he's not playing Santa Claus for all the kids under 8 years of age who still believe.

Now he leaves a comment asking why I'm not posting?? Maybe I'm just waiting for him to come through with his unsolicited comments? But seriously CS, I would like to hear your thoughts on this.

Bears.

I guess the war in Iraq is costing the U.S. $6-7B every month. Not bad. Money well spent.

Lucky for us:

God is always on the side of big battalions.
-Voltaire

Cowpie

What does it really mean when someone thanks you in advance for you support, patience, assistance, and understanding? It can't really mean exactly that, can it?

Xenophobia

Oftentimes I have a harder time understanding what message English-speaking peoples are trying to convey to me than foreigners.

With foreigners, and this includes EFL (English as a First Language) who have strong accents, I'm usually having trouble understanding the words coming out of their mouths. Once I get a hold of that, I'm usually good.

On the other side of the burger are these people who I have no trouble whatsoever understanding the words, yet somehow I have no fucking clue what they're talking about?

Or......

Just a small town girl, livin' in a lonely world
She took the midnight train goin' anywhere
Just a city boy, born and raised in south Detroit
He took the midnight train goin' anywhere
A singer in a smokey room
A smell of wine and cheap perfume
For a smile they can share the night
It goes on and on and on and on
Strangers waiting, up and down the boulevard
Their shadows searching in the night
Streetlight people, living just to find emotion
Hiding, somewhere in the night
Working hard to get my fill,
everybody wants a thrill
Payin' anything to roll the dice,
just one more time
Some will win, some will lose
Some were born to sing the blues
Oh, the movie never ends
It goes on and on and on and on

Ripley's

With an Oakland Tribune reporter and 20 people looking on in November in a parking lot in Fremont, Calif., Tu Jin-Sheng, 50, "grandmaster" in one of the Chinese arts of Qigong, pulled a rental truck several yards using only a piece of fabric tied to the base of his genitals. Jin-Sheng is supposedly a leader of the branch of Qigong known as "Iron Crotch," whose 60,000 adherents worldwide believe that strengthening the genitals increases energy. To warm up for the pull, Jin-Sheng had an assistant kick him hard between the legs. [Oakland Tribune, 11-23-05]

Babyhead, now that's funny

Shoes, Shoes, Shit......

Today I polished my shoes. I don't mind polishing shoes, but if someone else would do it, and hopefully do a better job of it, and not charge me for it, I would never polish another shoe again. Does this make me cheap?

Yesterday my wife bought me a pair of shoes b/c I always wear the same shoes I bought over a year ago. So that got me to thinking about my shoe purchasing. I realized that since I've known my wife, I've bought one (1) pair of shoes. A pair of brown, slip-on Clarks from the yearly Men's Sale at Nordstrom's for $60. That's it. Before that I bought these Salomon hiking shoes for $80, but that was 5 years ago. Whoa, just remembered that I was given a pair of Rainbow flip-flops for Christmas 2004, but I didn't buy them, so that doesn't count anyway.

She also bought me a pair of jeans b/c currently I have two pairs. One pair has been deemed the "nice, go out" pair, and the other is the everyday selection. The everday selection has worn a hole in the crotch, so the wife decided that I needed a new pair of jeans. Something nice, something that she thinks is sexy. Who am I to complain? I'm the American Gigolo with the sugarmama, and I think that's schweet.

So if I develop even more of an attitude, please understand why. I just got a new pair of jeans and a new pair of shoes, and I think I'm better than you.

Whatever.

Funny things happened to me all day, but I'll have to recount those later. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I procrastinate. I'll also get into (later) why I was at www.thesmokinggun.com, but while I was here, I ran into these numbskulls:

Midgets?
Buzzed??
Read the story on this guy.

In other news, our Dishnetwork is not working. It's happened before, but not too often, so I let it slide. This time my experience was.....well, interesting from a consumer standpoint.

Turn on TV.
Message: Satellite Acuiring signal.
This is common, only takes about 20 seconds. 10 Minutes later, it's time to call Customer Service.
Speak with Derrick. Derrick runs through the usual checks, decides there's something wrong with the dish getting the signal from the satellite, and determines that somebody needs to come out and fix the mofo. So far, my attitude is "okay, cool." I've only spent about 15 minutes at this point. So he puts me on hold to transfer me to Advanced Tech..............dial tone. Attitude shifts with the breeze and is now heading north of "okay, cool."

Call back, run through the autmoated menu and get Andy. Briefly explain to Andy what just happened and that Derrick had determined that someone should come out. Andy says that he sees that in the notes, but of course Andy is one hell of a buckaroo and he's gotta give it his College try. I'm sort of like Andy in that I don't want to trust the guy before me, so I humor him and let him walk me through the exact same steps that Derrick and I just lovingly walked through (arm in arm of course). When he can't fix it, I figure he's going to finally just send out a technician. Ha ha!! Silly human. Andy wants me to unplug my receiver and trade it out with the receiver in the other room that is working fine, so "we can see if the problem follows the receiver, or if it's local to the wiring or dish." Sounds logical, but now I'm in for about 40 minutes and I ask Andy why I have to do their work for them, when it is I that pays them every month? Andy is not sure. Fine, I'll do this, even though I've done it before and it never fixed the problem and a technician came out in the end, and then I'll call you back.

Do all the b.s., nothing happens, call back. Forget who I'm talking to now, but there's a little more pressing of buttons, and checking settings.......and, nothing. So 3rd rep starts in with insurance and warranty and I can hear it coming like a long, low train whistle. They're gonna try and charge me to have someone come out, aren't they!!?? You bet. $49. But I'm being offered the discount rate, b/c it's normally $99! Sweet, I feel better already. They just saved me $50!!!!

I innocently, calmly, and politely ask 3rd rep why I would do that when I can just cancel my service and get cable or DirectTV and they will gladly set me up for free? He thought I had a good point, but asked me to call DishNetwork first if I decided to cancel and give them the opportunity to fix the problem to my satisfaction. That's funny, I could have sworn that I was talking to DishNetwork!?

3rd rep seemed to miss the sublety of what I was saying here. So I more bluntly, yet still as friendly as a peanut butter cookie, told him that I was talking to DishNetwork right now and that if they had nothing to say more than a $49 service call, I'd almost guarantee it that my next call would be to cancel. He thought that sounded rational, and one more time just asked me to call Customer Service first, to give them another chance. I had to love 3rd rep at this point.

So anyway, probably getting rid of DishNetwork in the morning.

Kumbaya...

"The sage has no mind of his own.
He is aware of the needs of others."

--Forty-nine, Tao Te Ching

What's that have to do with this post? Nothing, just thought it sounded cool and groovy. Or I guess I could make it have something to do with this post, seeing as I have no idea what I'm going to type about anyway.

Was Jesus really the Earth's first punk rocker. He stepped onto the stage, grabbed the mike, and just told the Establishment that he didn't really care what they had to say as long as they went against what he believed in. He told them that many of their ideas were bogus and he wasn't interested. Then he stole some attention, offered a rest to the weariness that many felt, and they killed him for it. Nothing new there though; that's what we humans do with the good ones: we kill them. They threaten to steal power, so we 'turn off' that threat, is that how it goes? And I'm just referring to the World-at-large here, and not anyone in particular. MLK, Malcolm only after he turns to peace from violence, John Lennon, Ghandi, even Old Yeller. But seriously, Ghandi? Yeah, bad dude, we better get rid of him and his insolent malevolence.

A quick, and not so easily answered question I have: why can't Jesus come back and administer the beat down that is deserved? They say it's b/c we have free will, and need to make our own choices, but I want some Divine clarification on what is bad and what is good. Or I need a better explanation as to why Christians - and if you believe in their offering then you must also understand that this goes for every human born - must freely choose to do right if it really exists. Why can't the God of the Universe just come down and set us all straight? Why?

Let's try this again.......

Well, it's a new year, officially. I guess we're calling this 2006. Funny thing is....I pretty much feel the same as I did two days ago. Weird.

New Year's Eve was cool. Drank champagne all day, had parents over for steak and potatoes, and then my mom finished up the evening by detailing my grandmother's cancer. Way to set the mood, Mom. I felt similar to how I felt after seeing "Munich" yesterday. Good movie, kind of a downer though. And I guess the Jews, or Israel, aren't all that happy with Spielberg now. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I'm going to try and weigh in with my Jewish freinds and get some consensus.

What else? I'm re-reading the "Tao Te Ching" as it was in "A Million Little Peices." And, now I'm somehow obsessed with finding out how factual AMLP is. Should I care? Probably not. Do I? Yes. Weird. Also ordered "My Friend Leonard."