It's 6:41 am here in sunny Houston, TX.
I just had a heated discussion with my 4 year old son regarding the conditions of a "shart".
For those of you not in the know, it's a fart that comes with more than you bargained for.
To prove his point, the 4 year old demonstrated.
<sigh>.....bath time.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Sunday, November 14, 2010
"It's On Like......"
Reading Yahoo News this morning, and it says that Nintendo is trying to trademark the phrase "It's On Like Donkey Kong". Among other issues they face include a potential fight with Ice Cube due to the use of the phrase on one of the tracks of his '92 CD.
Really, Nintendo, you're gonna pick a fight with Ice Cube? Have you even heard any of his old stuff? Not a good practice to take on one of the "Straight Outta Compton" pioneers of Gansta Rap y'know. I wanna see the Lynch Mob (Ice Cube's old, post-NWA group) show up at Nintendo HQ in full garb. End of story.
I nominate a new phrase...."It's On Like Ice Cube Kicking Some Nintendo Exec's Butt".
 |
| Forget "Are We There Yet". This is the Ice Cube I remember. Kinda scary and ready to pop a cap in Mario's behind. |
Really, Nintendo, you're gonna pick a fight with Ice Cube? Have you even heard any of his old stuff? Not a good practice to take on one of the "Straight Outta Compton" pioneers of Gansta Rap y'know. I wanna see the Lynch Mob (Ice Cube's old, post-NWA group) show up at Nintendo HQ in full garb. End of story.
I nominate a new phrase...."It's On Like Ice Cube Kicking Some Nintendo Exec's Butt".
Saturday, November 13, 2010
My Childhood Can Beat Up Yours
On Saturdays, because of the nature of our jobs and schedules, my wife brings our kids to the office so that they can spend the afternoon with Dad while she goes to work. They usually spend most of this time outside chasing each other when the weather is favorable. I usually let them run around each other in circles until they fall out.
Makes putting them to bed a little easier, y'know......
The other day, I was watching the two of them play (aged 4 & 7) and I began to think about the things that I did as a kid and how they shaped my adult life. If you're near my age, do you remember some of those games? They were not for the squeamish, if you recall; and by today's standards they were probably borderline violent. I honestly don't think today's kids (even mine) would survive half of them; but childhood was very different back then.
Do you remember "Roll Over Red Rover"? This was a childhood phrase for "let's clothesline your friends". A bunch of kids interlocks hands and you try to run through to break the chain. Inevitably you make the mistake of trying to run through the kid that has the Gi-Joe Kung Fu Grip with one of the other kids and (when you were the short kid like me), you get blunt force trauma to the neck.
....but you shake it off and do it again anyway......
How about "Tackle the Man With the Ball"? Way back when, it had a much less politically correct name. Imagine this: toss a football into the air. Someone has to catch it. If you are that unlucky sap, run like hell because your former friends are now trying to wipe you off of the planet. Assuming you survived, you get to throw the ball to your buddies and be one of the attackers. Cool points are scored by knocking a friend out of his shoes and sending him home crying.
...and the next day, you apologize, hop on your bikes together and go riding around the neighborhood together.
Now that particular game, when I was a kid, was played EVERYWHERE. If you couldn't go to the park, you played it in a friend's yard. If you didn't have a yard, you played it in the street, or a parking lot. You got bruised, bloodied, and you laughed about it.
....this brings us to my next favorite. "Spread Eagle". This game was essentially dodge ball with executioner's rules. The abridged version goes like this:
I could go on, but my point is that childhood games sorta toughened you up a bit. They're never played anymore either. The only time we played touch football is when they made us play it in school; and everyone thought it was silly. Football was played without pads, at the park, and usually right after it rained. When you tackled someone, you tackled them like they owed you money and cursed your mother. Then you all got up and laughed about it, assuming that everyone's still breathing.
When I was a child, McDonald's didn't catch heat for fattening our kids because our parents could never catch us to actually go to McDonalds. We'd spend the entire day at the park if you let us. We'd climb trees and fall out of them. We'd jump our bikes over sewage ditches (and sometimes not make it). We would catch snapping turtles (yes, actual Alligator Snappers) with our bare hands. We'd get hurt and have stories to tell on the next school day.
Childhood was an adventure back then.
Makes putting them to bed a little easier, y'know......
The other day, I was watching the two of them play (aged 4 & 7) and I began to think about the things that I did as a kid and how they shaped my adult life. If you're near my age, do you remember some of those games? They were not for the squeamish, if you recall; and by today's standards they were probably borderline violent. I honestly don't think today's kids (even mine) would survive half of them; but childhood was very different back then.
Do you remember "Roll Over Red Rover"? This was a childhood phrase for "let's clothesline your friends". A bunch of kids interlocks hands and you try to run through to break the chain. Inevitably you make the mistake of trying to run through the kid that has the Gi-Joe Kung Fu Grip with one of the other kids and (when you were the short kid like me), you get blunt force trauma to the neck.
....but you shake it off and do it again anyway......
How about "Tackle the Man With the Ball"? Way back when, it had a much less politically correct name. Imagine this: toss a football into the air. Someone has to catch it. If you are that unlucky sap, run like hell because your former friends are now trying to wipe you off of the planet. Assuming you survived, you get to throw the ball to your buddies and be one of the attackers. Cool points are scored by knocking a friend out of his shoes and sending him home crying.
 |
| This is essentially the same concept behind "tackle the man with the ball", except you're the only one being chased. |
...and the next day, you apologize, hop on your bikes together and go riding around the neighborhood together.
Now that particular game, when I was a kid, was played EVERYWHERE. If you couldn't go to the park, you played it in a friend's yard. If you didn't have a yard, you played it in the street, or a parking lot. You got bruised, bloodied, and you laughed about it.
....this brings us to my next favorite. "Spread Eagle". This game was essentially dodge ball with executioner's rules. The abridged version goes like this:
- Find a wall - when I was a kid, the outdoor wall of an apartment complex, bordering the parking lot was usually perfect.
- Get 4 - 6 tennis balls.
- Line up anywhere from 4 - 6 kids.
- You have ONE person throwing. The others dodge like their lives depend on it (because they do).
- If you're the unlucky kid that gets hit with a tennis ball, the rest of your so-called buddies all get a ball of their own, you "spread eagle" on the wall and everyone gets a free shot at you.
 |
| Not even these guys would survive the version of Dodge ball I used to play. |
I could go on, but my point is that childhood games sorta toughened you up a bit. They're never played anymore either. The only time we played touch football is when they made us play it in school; and everyone thought it was silly. Football was played without pads, at the park, and usually right after it rained. When you tackled someone, you tackled them like they owed you money and cursed your mother. Then you all got up and laughed about it, assuming that everyone's still breathing.
When I was a child, McDonald's didn't catch heat for fattening our kids because our parents could never catch us to actually go to McDonalds. We'd spend the entire day at the park if you let us. We'd climb trees and fall out of them. We'd jump our bikes over sewage ditches (and sometimes not make it). We would catch snapping turtles (yes, actual Alligator Snappers) with our bare hands. We'd get hurt and have stories to tell on the next school day.
Childhood was an adventure back then.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
It Runs In the Family!!
David Casssidy was busted for a DUI last night.
Okay everyone, sing along with me........"c'mon get happy!!" If you don't know that song then you're too young to read this.
And talk about one heck of a DUI too....wine, hydrocodone, and a half a bottle of bourbon. Wow, I haven't drank like that since.....well, I've never drank like that.....
Danny Bonaduce must be so proud.......at least they're keeping it in the family.
 |
| full story on tmz.com |
Okay everyone, sing along with me........"c'mon get happy!!" If you don't know that song then you're too young to read this.
And talk about one heck of a DUI too....wine, hydrocodone, and a half a bottle of bourbon. Wow, I haven't drank like that since.....well, I've never drank like that.....
Danny Bonaduce must be so proud.......at least they're keeping it in the family.
From the Archives of the Original: "Beware of One Uppers"
I was reading this on my original site this morning and it made me laugh again. Figured it was worthy of reproduction. I did this one on 4/11/2007. Enjoy!!
Because I work in an office with all guys, I get a good cross section of male personalities. Some of them are actually a lot of fun, others are irritating as hell.
I’m complaining about the more irritating ones today. One type in particular. You’ve probably seen him before, because he exists in more than one circle of friends. He’s the “one-upper”.
One uppers know everything about everything and always have a story that tops yours….no matter what you’re talking about. This is of particular irritation to me because I constantly remind myself that I know jack s*it about jack s*it. That revelation is now the source of much personal humor. If I don’t know anything about a subject, I’ll listen to you.
…that is, if you were invited into the conversation to begin with.
My parents taught me a lot of person-to-person etiquette as a kid. One rule was not to butt into someone else’s conversation if you’re not invited. That’s seen as rude. One-uppers don’t believe in doing this. They figure everyone wants to hear about their latest exploits. Ever been to the moon? Even if you haven’t, let a one-upper hear you talk about it. You can bet he (or she) turned down a job offer as an astronaut within the past 5 years. You’ll hear all about it.
One-uppers also tell unfunny jokes and laugh at them…even when no one else does. My dad used to have a saying about this. "If you tell a joke and no one laughs, then the joke wasn’t funny." This sounds like simple advice; but it’s difficult for one-uppers to follow. They like to spread their unfunny jokes.
There’s something else my parents taught me as a child. It was to always be sure to look someone in the eye when you’re speaking with them. If you know me then you know that my body language is pretty easy to read. If you’re in the middle of saying something and I abruptly break eye contact then I’ve abruptly dismissed you. Either you no longer interest me, or you have managed to say something so irrelevant to the conversation that I don’t deem you worthy of speaking to me anymore. Sorry.
It’s funny to watch one-uppers get ousted from a conversation too. I’ve seen entire groups turn their backs on them (literally). They continue to talk, completely oblivious to the silent vote that ‘no one wants to hear about that time you raced a Lamborghini in your Geo Metro and won’.
Conversation is a give and take, y’know. In a social setting you take turns sharing stories, experiences and inexperiences. You have a few laughs along the way. Like I said, I don’t know everything about everything, but that doesn’t necessarily mean I want to hear your take on it if I wasn't talking to you to begin with. If you’re such a cornucopia of knowledge, then how come you work at the grocery store and live at home with mom and dad? Leave me alone.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
My house is haunted.....by my stupid cat
I've been watching too many TV shows about ghost hunting.
If you're like me, then there's a small part of you that wants to know what it's like to have an "encounter" with the supernatural. We may not always voice it; but it's part of the reason why we watch those shows. There's a part of us that wants to see that other side.
Was it Fox or Mulder that said "I want to believe"? I dunno....I never watched X-Files cause I had enough friends telling about each episode.
Repeatedly.
Anyway, I recently thought I had a genuine ghost encounter at my house; and was ready to break out the ghost-busting gear, find myself an Ouija board and call Harold Ramis (directed the movie "Ghostbusters", folks....keep up with me here) to document it so that the truth could be known. This was my ticket, folks. I was gonna get rich by having Ghost Hunters, Oprah and maybe even Dr. Phil over at my house.
...well, maybe not Dr. Phil.....he's hard to get rid of once he comes over.
It started a couple of weeks ago with some mysterious noises from my hallway. Now, let me give you a little background here. We live in a 4 bedroom house. The hallway leading to the bedrooms is separated from the living room by a door which can be closed shut. At night, everyone's door is closed so that should someone get up in the middle of the night (or early, like I do when working shift) so that the other family members are not awakened. Still, because of my "parental hearing", when a kid gets up, I usually hear it, and I'm wide awake by the time the child reaches our bedroom door.
If you are a parent, you probably understand "parental hearing" and how it affects your sleeping habits. I've actually heard a snail pooing in the neighbor's yard. Woke me up like a gunshot.
....but I digress.
So here we are, in the middle of the night, and everyone is "sleeping".
I hear the door separating the bedroom hallway open and close.
I don't hear footsteps.
As I shake off the grogginess, my mind begins to process what I've just heard. Normally, I can figure out what's going on in a relatively short period of time, including who got up and the reason why. It's a parental survival tactic to keep you from losing your mind.
Anyway, I lie in bed analyzing what I've heard, and it doesn't make sense. Needless to say, for a brief period in her life, daughter #1 was a regular sleep walker. She'd get up, come to the bedroom, have some non-descript conversation with me or the wife and trudge back to her room to finish her slumber. It was weird, but slightly humorous; and she's pretty much outgrown it. My initial reaction was that the sleepwalking had returned; but the fact that I didn't hear footsteps kept getting into the way of my logic. I can identify my kids by footsteps alone......and not hearing any kinda gives me the willies.
Now, I know what you're saying....it was the cat, and that's the end of the story....why did you bring us through all this?
Lemme explain a little more here.
I have a cat named Patches.
My wife isn't crazy about my cat.
Okay, my wife hates this cat.
Beth inherited Patches when she and I moved in together and eventually married. While Patches does not reciprocate her rather harsh feelings, I can understand her position for a number of reasons:
Ever hear a cat licking a plastic trash bag at 2am? You'll lose your religion.
Anyway, I had dismissed the idea of it being Patches because, quite simply, he doesn't have access to the area. Logic led me to the next plausible possibility:
GHOSTS!!
The sheer mention of this, of course, gets my wife all up in arms....and suddenly, she's scared to be in the house alone. Still, I did what I could to keep the situation calm. The "visitor" was not harming anyone, so I figured perhaps we could live with it for a while. Still, the wife was taking no chances, so she went out and bought a padlock for the door. This would be utilized to keep any unwanted visitors out (since the ghosts evidently prefer to actually use the doors in our house), and if it did indeed prove to be daughter #1's sleepwalking habits, it would keep her from getting into any late night trouble while unconscious.
Problem solved.
...or so we thought.
...at least until the wife remembers one small detail.
Back when we lived in the apartments, Patches had actually figured out how to "test" a door to see if it was locked. This cat would actually stand up on his hind legs and attempt to open the door by playing with the door knob. I can only imagine that he'd learned this by watching me and the wife use it. Few things (even the bag licking) will rattle your nerves like hearing what sounds like a freaking person trying to get into your room in the middle of the night when you know your kids are sound asleep. I swear, I've almost shot my cat twice.
....but the house doesn't have door knobs. It has levers.
Patches has been opening the door and mulling around the corridor area looking for a room to explore, bags to lick, stuff to throw up on, etc.....
So the door, my corridor door, mind you, now has to be locked at night to keep my stupid cat out of the hallway, since he can't resist trying to get in. My dreams of getting rich by having a haunted house are now dashed; and I'm still slipping in cat puke when I get up at 5 am to make my coffee.
...damnit......
If you're like me, then there's a small part of you that wants to know what it's like to have an "encounter" with the supernatural. We may not always voice it; but it's part of the reason why we watch those shows. There's a part of us that wants to see that other side.
Was it Fox or Mulder that said "I want to believe"? I dunno....I never watched X-Files cause I had enough friends telling about each episode.
Repeatedly.
Anyway, I recently thought I had a genuine ghost encounter at my house; and was ready to break out the ghost-busting gear, find myself an Ouija board and call Harold Ramis (directed the movie "Ghostbusters", folks....keep up with me here) to document it so that the truth could be known. This was my ticket, folks. I was gonna get rich by having Ghost Hunters, Oprah and maybe even Dr. Phil over at my house.
...well, maybe not Dr. Phil.....he's hard to get rid of once he comes over.
It started a couple of weeks ago with some mysterious noises from my hallway. Now, let me give you a little background here. We live in a 4 bedroom house. The hallway leading to the bedrooms is separated from the living room by a door which can be closed shut. At night, everyone's door is closed so that should someone get up in the middle of the night (or early, like I do when working shift) so that the other family members are not awakened. Still, because of my "parental hearing", when a kid gets up, I usually hear it, and I'm wide awake by the time the child reaches our bedroom door.
If you are a parent, you probably understand "parental hearing" and how it affects your sleeping habits. I've actually heard a snail pooing in the neighbor's yard. Woke me up like a gunshot.
....but I digress.
So here we are, in the middle of the night, and everyone is "sleeping".
I hear the door separating the bedroom hallway open and close.
I don't hear footsteps.
As I shake off the grogginess, my mind begins to process what I've just heard. Normally, I can figure out what's going on in a relatively short period of time, including who got up and the reason why. It's a parental survival tactic to keep you from losing your mind.
Anyway, I lie in bed analyzing what I've heard, and it doesn't make sense. Needless to say, for a brief period in her life, daughter #1 was a regular sleep walker. She'd get up, come to the bedroom, have some non-descript conversation with me or the wife and trudge back to her room to finish her slumber. It was weird, but slightly humorous; and she's pretty much outgrown it. My initial reaction was that the sleepwalking had returned; but the fact that I didn't hear footsteps kept getting into the way of my logic. I can identify my kids by footsteps alone......and not hearing any kinda gives me the willies.
Now, I know what you're saying....it was the cat, and that's the end of the story....why did you bring us through all this?
Lemme explain a little more here.
I have a cat named Patches.
My wife isn't crazy about my cat.
Okay, my wife hates this cat.
Beth inherited Patches when she and I moved in together and eventually married. While Patches does not reciprocate her rather harsh feelings, I can understand her position for a number of reasons:
- Patches lights farts that would clear a room full of skunks.
- Patches has something called "wool sucking" disease, which means he has uncontrollable urges to lick and eat anything from plastic bags to the hair on your head.
- Patches drools. Not spittle, but bloodhound drool.
- Patches pukes. A lot. For sport. It's like a guy and belching. I think he keeps trying to outdo himself. I've found it in kids' shoes. I've slipped in it in the bedroom, I've found cat puke in places that I'd rather not mention here. I think he's going for some sort of record.
 |
| Behind this cute face lie all kinds of nasty habits. |
Ever hear a cat licking a plastic trash bag at 2am? You'll lose your religion.
Anyway, I had dismissed the idea of it being Patches because, quite simply, he doesn't have access to the area. Logic led me to the next plausible possibility:
GHOSTS!!
The sheer mention of this, of course, gets my wife all up in arms....and suddenly, she's scared to be in the house alone. Still, I did what I could to keep the situation calm. The "visitor" was not harming anyone, so I figured perhaps we could live with it for a while. Still, the wife was taking no chances, so she went out and bought a padlock for the door. This would be utilized to keep any unwanted visitors out (since the ghosts evidently prefer to actually use the doors in our house), and if it did indeed prove to be daughter #1's sleepwalking habits, it would keep her from getting into any late night trouble while unconscious.
Problem solved.
...or so we thought.
...at least until the wife remembers one small detail.
 |
| No Zool in my house, only a cat with bad habits. Sorry guys..... |
Back when we lived in the apartments, Patches had actually figured out how to "test" a door to see if it was locked. This cat would actually stand up on his hind legs and attempt to open the door by playing with the door knob. I can only imagine that he'd learned this by watching me and the wife use it. Few things (even the bag licking) will rattle your nerves like hearing what sounds like a freaking person trying to get into your room in the middle of the night when you know your kids are sound asleep. I swear, I've almost shot my cat twice.
....but the house doesn't have door knobs. It has levers.
Patches has been opening the door and mulling around the corridor area looking for a room to explore, bags to lick, stuff to throw up on, etc.....
 |
| I wonder if these guys train pets....... |
So the door, my corridor door, mind you, now has to be locked at night to keep my stupid cat out of the hallway, since he can't resist trying to get in. My dreams of getting rich by having a haunted house are now dashed; and I'm still slipping in cat puke when I get up at 5 am to make my coffee.
...damnit......
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