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Charlie Hatton
Brookline, MA
WARNING: Keep away from eyes and mouth. If ingested, induce vomiting immediately.
Okay, so now I’ve gone and scared myself with my own tagline, just a little. Must be leftover drilled-in paranoia from those Mr. Yuck stuckers way back when. You’d think I’d be over it by now. Especially after seeing the little green guy who posed as Mr. Yuck also appear on the Hitchhikers’ Guide cover, and later — with a bit more makeup — in the Grinch cartoon. But, no — that little green bastard will always be Mr. Yuck to me. Sorry, dude — I guess you’re just typecast. Hollywood’s a bitch.
All right, on to happier things. I made another CD run yesterday.
(You’d be surprised how not having a job leaves so much time to go out and buy things. Or, um, maybe you wouldn’t. I suppose it’s pretty obvious, come to think of it.)
And once again, waves of nostalgia washed over me until I was left exhausted, waterlogged and drippy, and with a few dozen dollars’ worth of new old music. I started out as I usually do, rummaging through the used CDs looking for that elusive Call or old Beat Farmers nugget. And, as usual, I forgot about ninety percent of the CDs on my ‘want list’, and ended up flipping through the ‘Various’ piles of letters that seemed promising. Take ‘S’, for instance. Your typical ‘Various S’ used CD stack in a large store might hold such gems as the Sugarcubes, the Spoons, Squeeze, and Joe Satriani. Which, if you’re interested, I — in order — already have, already have, never really got into, and have pretty much gotten over.
(These are just examples, folks — I can’t tell you what I really want, or you’ll go buy it before I get there. I know how you people are.)
So, I came up largely empty. I did finally pick up the Foo Fighters disc that came out three or four years ago.
(Yes, I’m just that cutting edge, people. Jump back!)
I also decided it was worth taking a chance on the Deep Blue Something CD that includes the song ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’. Okay, I’m not sure what hold that song has on me — there’s really no good reason that I should like it, but I do. Maybe it has some sort of dirt on me, or incriminating naked pictures of me; I can’t really say. I just know that I like the song, despite my best efforts. This shit happens from time to time — you’ve all got those sugar-pop bands that you don’t want to like, but you just can’t help yourself. You know you do, so stop your snickering, all right? And just because my list of ‘What the Hell? Bands‘ also includes A-ha, Real Life, and Naked Eyes doesn’t give you license to point your bony little fingers at me, either. At least I never owned a Tiffany CD, or bopped to Menudo, Hansen, or N’Sync, all right? Yeah, that’s right. I thought that’d shut most of you up.
Anyway, I’m not sure I’d normally go for the ‘one hit wonder’ band like that, unless I knew more about them, but I couldn’t really resist. The CD — full-length, mind you — was forty-nine cents. Cents! As in pennies. I mean, c’mon, people — you can find forty-nine cents in the crack of your ass if you dig hard enough. That’s chump change.
(Okay, really nasty chump change, if that’s really where you get it from. And just because I brought it up doesn’t mean I recommend that particular method of gathering coins. You’re likely to find many, many loathsome and horrifying things before you accumulate forty-nine cents from way up in there. I’m just saying it’s possible. That doesn’t mean you should run right home and lube up to give it a shot, all right? Let’s keep some minimum air of decorum around here, shall we?)
So, what I’m trying to say is, the thing was cheap. Dirt cheap, so I bought it. And I walked around with a couple of other selections for a while, until I saw it — the reason I’d walked into that store that day, without even knowing it: a two-CD box set of early They Might Be Giants, containing the self-titled disc and Lincoln, and B-sides from each album’s singles.
‘But wait! Don’t order yet!‘ it screamed to me. Because there were also eight or ten bonus tracks on each CD. Bonus tracks, for the love of Christmas! Well, grease my weasel, I couldn’t afford not to buy it, now, could I? That’s seventy-two songs in total, on two discs! So I put back most of the other shit I’d picked out — two-CD sets cost actual money, you see — and stepped up and bought the sucker. Oh, I kept the Deep Blue Something disc — forty-nine cents, remember — and I held onto the Foo Fighters CD, too. Mainly so the checkout guy wouldn’t think I was some retro-freaky Dr. Demento wannabe or something. I even put it on top, to avoid the checkout chit-chat that invariably ensues when I buy something really interesting. Without that one ‘normal’ purchase of a disc cut in the last ten years, I have to endure conversations like this:
Checkout Dude: Hey, there? You all set?
Me: Yep, I think so.
Checkout Dude: Okay, let’s see… Big Country, the Alarm, and the Smithereens… Dude! Shouldn’t you have your collar turned up and a skinny tie?
Me: Yeah, very funny. How much you makin’ at this job, skippy?
Checkout Dude: Hey, hey, I’m just kiddin’. Man, you old people get so defensive.
Me: I’m not… all right, fine, I am old. But I’m not defensive! Just gimme my albums.
Checkout Dude: Heh. You mean CDs. *snicker* Look, I’m sorry. Here, I’ll make it up to you.
Me: I don’t know, man…
Checkout Dude: No, really. Look, I’ll give you this Bananarama compilation. It’s —
Me: Nooooo!
Checkout Dude: What? Oh, don’t like them, eh? Okay, here’s an old Phil Collins —
Me: No! Blech! Pfffft!
Checkout Dude: Okay, okay, wait. What else do I have? Um… let’s see — Huey Lewis and the News?
Me (running in circles holding my ears): La la la la la la la…
Checkout Dude: No? Uh, how about… Heart?
Me (twitching on the floor): Ack! Sppppt! Hrooooo!
Checkout Dude: Um, shit. Uh… Adam Ant?
Me: Ttthhhhhhhppp — wait. Adam Ant, or Adam and the Ants?
Checkout Dude: There’s, um, a difference?
Me: Well, sh-yah! Which is it?
Checkout Dude: It’s, er, Adam and the Ants.
Me: ‘Stand and Deliver’ on there?
Checkout Dude: Uh… yeah.
Me: Sold. Here’s your cash. Thanks.
Checkout Dude (waving as I leave): Okay, thanks for shopping with us. Enjoy reliving your wasted youth, old dude!
Clearly, no one wants to have to go through that, least of all me. On the other hand, I actually don’t have that Adam and the Ants disc. Maybe I should add it to the ‘wish list’, assuming I can find it somewhere for a quarter or so.
Anyway, back to They Might Be Giants. This was actually quite a major find for me, for reasons that may not be immediately obvious. You see, when I was a senior in high school, I got to work as a DJ at the local college radio station. I had a two hour slot every week, and got called in occasionally on weekend mornings when the regular guy was too hungover to get his shit together. It was a fun gig, and I got to be silly on the radio, and take requests, and generally pick and choose what I wanted to play, as long as most of it was from the ‘heavy’ or ‘medium’ rotation bins.
But the really cool part was that I could come in anytime I wanted and tape whatever I could get my grubby paws on. So, of friggin’ course, I did. I spent hour after hour pulling down obscure songs and artsy crap from bands that no one had ever heard of then, much less now. On the other hand, I had the coolest fucking musical tastes of anyone I knew. While the mindless drones around me were dimming their bulbs with Starship and Bon Jovi and Whitney Houston and Great White Lion Snake, or whatever the hell they were called, I was gettin’ down with the Waxing Poetics and the Long Ryders and the Del-Lords and the Throwing Muses and Wire Train and the Replacements and Husker Du and a thousand other kick-ass bands that could run circles around the mega-station saccharine crap that was passing itself off as pop at the time. Or now, for that matter.
So, of course, just as I got onto a They Might Be Giants kick because of their odd, quirky, bohemian style and nonsensical lyrics, I went off to college. In Kentucky. To a tiny little pissant liberal arts school, in a tiny little pissant town, where eighty percent or so of the students came from inside the state. (Or as I liked to tease them with, ‘So you loaded up the truck and moved to uni-ver-si-ty, eh, Clem?‘) In any case, it wasn’t exactly a Mecca for alternative music. Or any music, for that matter, unless you count ‘blowin’ jugs’ and spoons as legitimate instruments. Which I might, if they’re not used in songs about dogs or trucks or ‘mah woman leavin’ me’. Sadly, though, those were just about the only types of songs around the place, at least until I came along with my bootleg tapes and alterna-rock.
Now, you have to understand — these folks weren’t ‘mildly resistant‘ to my brand of musical entertainment. These were real live country music bumpkins. They paid homage to ‘Hank’, and ‘Hank Junior’, and ‘Boz’ and “Bocephus’. Some of which may have been the same person; I really never asked for the ‘long version’ of those sorts of things. And their god, apparently, was this ‘Garth’ something-or-other; at the mere mention of his name, the moonshine jugs would come out and they’d fly into some complicated synchronized square-dancing thing that resembled a small village of halfwit cowpokes trying to shake waterbugs out of their boots.
Honestly, I never really understood what the hell they were doing, or why the hell they’d want to listen to that twangy, drawly crap when there were so many people out there with normal voices (and unrelated parents) playing actual instruments and making music you could rock to. Or think about, or even just tap your toes to, appreciatively. But those yahoos stood by their ‘gettin’ drunk music’, and wore their boots and watermelon-sized belt buckles, and blared that shit at every opportunity. They knew what they liked — to their credit, I suppose — and they wouldn’t stand for anything different. Oh, Skynyrd was okay, and a dose of Charlie Daniels wouldn’t kill ’em every once in a while, but everything else was just so much cow shit to them. Billy Idol? ‘Punk ass bitch. Needs a haircut,’ they’d say. Bruce Springsteen? ‘Pussy.‘ Poison, or Ratt? ‘They’d get their ass kicked in a real hoedown.‘ And so it went.
And that’s where I came in, with shit they’d never even dreamed of, and They Might Be Giants in heavy rotation. And once I found out how much it annoyed the piss out of most of them? Well, that was about all I played for the first year, until I finally relented and obsessed over Pearl Jam for a while. But in the meantime? It was all ‘Youth Culture Killed My Dog’ and ‘Put Your Hand Inside the Puppet Head’ and ‘Toddler Hiway’. It was fucking spectacular, people. After a while, I got them exactly where I wanted them — well, the immediate neighbors in my dorm, anyway — and they’d beg, ‘Please, please, anything but that! Play anything else!‘ So I’d dig out Camper van Beethoven and poke ’em with ‘Where the Hell Is Bill?’ or ‘Take the Skinheads Bowling’. Yay! Fun with slope-browed goobers!
So, I’d like to say that I turned some of them on to better music. Even one. But I’m afraid I can’t. We coexisted as best we could for four years, and then I scrambled off to civilization, leaving them with their ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ and their ‘Poop Chute Boogie’, or whatever it was called. I’m pretty sure none of my good medicine ‘took’ with any of them. Still, you never know. Maybe, just maybe — out there on the farm somewhere — there’s a guy my age, sittin’ in his overalls, milking Ol’ Bessie (yes, I’m hoping that’s his cow, and not his wife or daughter or sister, and certainly not his pet name for Mr. Wiggles). And just maybe, when the wind blows just right through the trees, without even knowing what he’s doing, he starts humming ‘Ana Ng’ or ‘Nothing’s Gonna Change My Clothes’. Maybe even ‘Chess Piece Face’, though that would be wicked hard to hum, under any circumstances. Anyway, something that he heard from me, and thoroughly despised, and yet now is stuck somewhere in the back of that thick skull.
And now, I’ve got the originals again, on CD and laid down as MP3s, so I can sing along with his absent-minded humming. And that makes me Happy™, in a very big way. This is what I mean when I say I want to make a difference in people’s lives — I’m really looking to slip cool shit into the subconscious minds of people that would be simply aghast if they knew what the fuck was happening. Ideally, it’ll eventually dawn on them, and they’ll go nuts trying to figure out what the hell it is, who put it there, and how they’re going to get it out. But even that’s not necessary. Just knowing it’s there is enough for me. Hey, maybe you feel the same way out there. If so, grab those They Might Be Giants CDs for yourself. I’m sure I infected somebody with those over four years in the backwoods, and now you’re in on the joke, too. Grab the soundtrack, and you can sing along, too! Whee!
Permalink | 3 CommentsWhere the trains of thought have no brakes, and the engineers are asleep on the job.
My dog may soon become a star.
Well, okay, not so much a star as an anonymous minor celebrity. And a local one, at that. Still, that’s better than you or I are likely to achieve, unless you’re one of those people who go heroically pulling children out of wells, or giving Heimlichs to random passersby. And even those sorts of selfless acts of bravery aren’t guaranteed to bring you accolades, as I found out myself. (As it turns out, you don’t get credit for a well rescue if you’re the one who boots the kid in there in the first place. Also, people seem to appreciate a Heimlich hug somewhat less if you administer it when they’re not actually choking. Pick, pick, pick.)
Anyway, my dog’s already pretty well-known in certain local circles. She was one of a group of dogs featured in a small daily newspaper, and she’s visited schools for children that are, um… what’s the term I’m supposed to use this week? ‘Differently abled’? I think that’s it. And everybody — I mean everybody — who visits the training place where we leave her while we’re at work just adores her. I can’t get in and out of that place without some new person saying, ‘Gosh, that’s your dog? She’s fantastic! What a sweet dog. I love her!‘
Which is nice and all, but do each and every single one of them then have to look me up and down with that expression that says, ‘Are you sure that’s your dog, ’cause I can’t see how a dingleberry like you could possibly have a dog so cool.‘ Thanks. No, really. Thanks so much.
(That reminds me, I’ve really got to work harder on teaching her the ‘bite ’em in the ass’ command. You wouldn’t believe what I have to go through to try to get that one across. Suffice it to say that it involves lots of peanut butter, a soft fluffy pillow in my pants, and lots of Bactine. And I don’t want to talk about it any further. Or think about it, really.)
I suppose our puppy deserves all the attention. She is a very good pooch, and simply loves people. She’s just about the friendliest, tail-waggingest, crotch-sniffingest pup you’d ever want to meet.
(And nothing but nothing says, ‘I love you‘ quite like ‘*SNNNNNNURF* Gee, your pubes smell terrific!‘ Truly, it’s the international language.)
My only concern is that I haven’t found a way to turn my dog’s sunny disposition and (relatively) good manners into cold, hard cash. This is America, after all, where the national creed is ‘Exploit first, ask questions later‘ (‘E pluribus unum‘, my lily-white, rosy-cheeked ass. How many people even know what that means, do you think?) But she’s too distractable to go into acting, and she doesn’t really have the ‘classic look’ the dog photographers seem to dig. I’ve thought about loaning her out as a professional chick magnet — if I were in the market for a lady friend, I would have had boatloads of opportunities to strike up a conversation, given all the cooing and stroking the dog gets from women on the street.
(Of course, that sort of thing wouldn’t have really worked for me, even if I weren’t already married. I was never able to talk to a woman that I didn’t know, but wanted to know. You know, KNOW. Intimately and sweatily and, if all went well, moanily. Okay, so I didn’t often think quite that far ahead, but I still found a way to psyche myself out to the point of slack-jawed babbling.
(You think this shit is bad; you ain’t seen nothin’, folks.)
So even if I’d had the dog way back when, I’m sure I’d have managed to mumble, fumble, stumble, and/or bumble my way out of lots of girls’ pants. Or I’d have overcompensated and said things like, ‘Yeah. I like to be petted, too!‘ or ‘Boy, it must be nice to be able to lick yourself any time you want.‘ Which would eventually get me thrown in jail, I suspect. Where I might get more action, but not the kind I’m looking for. Though if I still had my ass pillow and Bactine, at least I’d have a fighting chance in there.)
So, anyway, the dog — while very popular and a joy to have around, when she’s not horkin’ on the floor or playing peek-a-boo with skunks — has cost far more money than she’s made. Which is fine, I suppose, but she hasn’t made any money. Not one red ugly-ass cent. Meanwhile, she’s got food, and bones, and treats, and peanut butter, and toys, and beds, and all manner of grooming crap. And as I write, she’s just lying here, rolled half over, not even trying to bring in the dough. Lousy shiftless bitch.
But all that may change soon. You see, our puppy may soon be featured on Zoom. I don’t know whether you’re familiar with this show. It’s a for-kids, by-kids, with-kids kind of deal. Okay, so it’s probably not by kids, since I don’t remember the cameras shakin’ all over the place, or the scripts littered with ‘booger’ and ‘cootie’ references. But there’s a bunch of kids in it, and they… um, sing and play and talk to each other, I guess. It’s been quite a while since I’ve actually seen the show, I have to admit. I discovered it when I was still pretty young — maybe ten or twelve — but probably a little too old to really appreciate the show for its entertainment or educational value. I’d already graduated from Sesame Street and Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and had given up on most of the Electric Company. (Though the Spiderman and Letterman bits were still worth watching, if you didn’t mind sitting through some counting and spelling and other learning crap.) So I didn’t watch Zoom a lot, and when I did tune in, it was mainly to see what the cute girl with the freckles was up to that week. And it was never anything interesting, like ‘striptease for beginners’ or ‘looking pouty for the camera’. So I lost interest pretty quickly.
(Okay, okay, so I probably wasn’t really thinking about such things at the time. I was a little young to be having that sort of fantasy about a girl on a kids’ show. That sort of thing came later, when I circled back to watch Shari Lewis and Lambchop. Sure, Shari was a little old for me at the time, but she beat the hell out of those ugly chicks on You Can’t Do That On Television. (And yes, music fans, that was pre-Alanis, if you happen to think she was hot at fourteen or so.) And you gotta give Shari points for perk. Any woman with a voice like that and her hand up a lamb’s ass is at least moderately hot, no matter how long she’s been around. Am I right, guys?
And anyway, I soon got wind of the Spanish-language kids’ shows, and turned over to those. Holy hell! Have you seen these things? They’re all bikini girls and confetti and dancing. I don’t know how the kids ever learn anything, but they kept me entertained, that’s for damned sure. You know, I hear women say that Latin men are some of the most… how to say it, aggressive and enthusiastic lovers, to the point of being frenetic, and sometimes starting fires from all the static and friction and such. But can you really blame them? Shit, they’re learning their ABC’s and uno-dos-tres from strippers at age five. Their version of Mister Rogers models wears fuck-me pumps and tasseled pasties. I think I’d be a little anxious for the rest of my entire damned life, too!)
All right, let’s whoosh back to Zoom for a moment.
So, on Wednesday the folks from Zoom are going to visit the place where our dog stays during the day. And she and one of the other pups are scheduled to help out with whatever the hell they’re going to do there. I don’t know — I don’t really have a lot of details. But I do know this — there’s a golden opportunity here. If this goes well, we can turn our penniless dog into a cash cow. Sure, we’ll get nothing from the Zoom folks — lousy public television non-profit goobers — but maybe, just maybe, our pooch will steal the show. And maybe some local real TV exec will be watching the show with their small child, and he or she will be mesmerized by this street-smart, sophisticated drooly canine, and then things will really take off. How, I don’t really know. The dog is still gonna be distracted by food, and the possibility of food, and shiny objects, and objects that might become shiny if someone would just clean them up and polish them. She’s flightier than Logan Airport on Christmas Eve. She loses focus faster than my near-sighted absent-minded grandma sitting on her bifocals — again. She’s… well, I think you get the picture.
So maybe the dog won’t become our ticket to the high life. Or maybe the Hollywood folks have some sort of training regimen, or wonder drug, that’ll transform her into an alert, focused acting machine. Whatever. Either way, the pup’s gonna be on Zoom, and that’ll be fun to watch. I’m definitely gonna tune in, and probably get it on tape, too. Hey, I wonder if that freckly girl is still on there? That’d be cool. She’d be in her mid-twenties by now, at least — maybe they’ll have her do that striptease bit, after all! How cool would that be? Now if I can just get the producers to have her put on a sock puppet and talk in a high, squeaky voice while she’s peeling down, then we’ll be getting somewhere!
Permalink | No Comments100% natural blog from concentrate. Now available with extra pulp!
Well, that was quite a weekend. It’s a damned good thing I don’t have a job, folks, because if I did, I would at this very moment be trying to figure out an excuse for calling in sick tomorrow, just for the extra snoozies.
That’s the beauty of getting a new job, of course. Your Excuse-O-Meter resets to zero, and all that lame shit you came up with to get out of work just melts away. In the blink of an eye, the wand is waved, and all of your imaginary ‘car trouble’ is but a distant memory. Your ‘chickenpox’, your dog’s ‘measles’, and your wife’s ‘toe replacement surgery’ are suddenly back in play, and ready to be used on a new set of managers. All those ‘aunts’ and ‘uncles’ and ‘elderly grandparents’ that you put in the hospital, or claimed were visiting, or conveniently killed off (shame on you!) are magically alive and well and ready to go through the wringer again. It’s a beautiful thing. I can’t wait to land a new job, so I can start making up reasons to miss work again. This sitting around on my ass because I’m supposed to is starting to get old.
See, most things in life are like that. When you’re not supposed to be doing them, you want to. And when you are supposed to be doing them… well, that’s usually when you’re engrossed with some other thing that you’re not supposed to be doing. It’s the siren song of the forbidden fruit. The thrill of the guilty pleasure. Or, to put it simply, ‘taboo is faboo‘.
(That one’s a freebie, folks. Feel free to use it in your daily conversations.)
Actually, that same yearning for ‘otherness’ is what got me into my current profession in the first place.
(Well, not my current current profession, since I’m between jobs at the moment. I suppose my current occupation is probably holding my desk chair down on the floor with my ass. And, despite my best efforts to the contrary, I actually seem to be becoming rather an expert at this particular vocation. Not only do I put in eight-hour days, and then some, but my ass is actually getting heavier and wider, to better fill the position of ‘Senior Chair Keeper-Downer, Internet Division‘. I’m all for going that extra mile, people — I was just never told that the mile would end up being the distance across my ass cheeks. That shit wasn’t in the contract, you understand.)
Anyway, back to my latest profession of choice that actually paid money.
(Though, of course, if any of you are interested in sending me money for blogging, I’ll certainly be happy to call this my profession. I’ll even keep talking about my ass, if that’s what you want. Send me cash, and it’s all about what you want. Principles, shminciples. I’ll make this the Ass Blog — all ass, all the time. Two hundred channels, and there’s nothing but ass on. Really. Hell, send me enough money, and I’ll post pictures of my ass, in various unflattering positions.
(Because that’s really the only option when my ass is involved. The position hasn’t yet been invented that will paint a pretty picture of my ass, I’m afraid. You can’t get blood from a stone, folks. Or my ass, come to think of it — that’s just about where I draw the line. Pictures, yes. Bloodletting? A most emphatic, ‘Stay the hell away from my ass, freakbag!!‘ We all have our limits.)
All right, let’s put away the asses for a while, shall we? That was like a whole month’s worth of ass in just a couple of paragraphs. You must be stuffed to the gills with ass by now. (Yes, I know — I’m still doing it. Sorry. I just couldn’t resist, once I had the mental image of a fish stuffed to the gills with ass. C’mon, that’s funny! Close your eyes and picture it. See? Now aren’t you happier I got that last assing in?)
So, anyway, I’m a computer programmer by trade.
(I don’t know who the hell I traded with, but I bet they got the better end of the deal. They’re probably a bartender, or a circus juggler, or an astronaut, or something cool like that. Bastard.)
But I wasn’t always a coder. I’m actually trained as a research biologist. Four years’ worth in college, and four years after that, as a matter of fact. And that’s about all I could take, frankly. I started fiddling around with computers on the side, sneaking off to learn HTML, and bits and pieces of UNIX administration, and later real live coding, in real live languages like Java and Perl and SQL.
I left science because it got old. Research sounds cool and all, but it gets pretty repetitive and drab and dull. There’s a reason scientists wear those pristine, plain white lab coats, and not clown gear, or bunny rabbit suits, or slick nylon pimpin’ togs. All of those would work just as well — or better — at keeping nasty chemicals away, but scientists aren’t known for their sense of humor. Or social skills. Or bathing habits, in many cases. No, biologists are there to ‘figure shit out’, and nothing else. Most of ’em wouldn’t recognize a joke if it crawled up their ass and had a litter. Which probably is for the best — with all the attention to detail and precise measurements and focused observations, you probably don’t want someone who likes to go out on dates, or attend parties, or who’s going to be distracted by the latest knock-knock gag. So clearly, I wasn’t the man for the job, and I let myself wander into something more appropriate.
Which is not to say, ‘ideal‘. Computer nerds aren’t really known for their eloquence or pith, either.
(Sorry, is ‘pith’ even a word? I mean, ‘pithy’ has to have a non-adjective form, but that just doesn’t look right. I always have trouble with ‘pithy’, anyway — in my mind, all I can hear is Eric Cartman saying, ‘Don’t get all pithy, bitch!‘ Which is cool, but only rarely helps me with however I’m tryin’ to use the word. Damn you, South Park!)
So, eight years in science, including school, and then I needed a change. So I went from being a science geek to a computer nerd. I traded in my taped-over-the-bridge thick glasses for a pocket protector and pants hiked up to my nipples. Joy. Still, the hours are better for programmers, and you can find the occasional code jockey who’ll go out for beers now and then.
(If you look hard enough, that is — and I did. Who wants to drink alone?)
So, if nothing else, I made it from the fire up to the frying pan. Whoop-te-doo.
And now, as I look back, I see that I’ve been slinging bits and bytes around for almost exactly eight years. The same span it took me to tire of science and lab work and cutting open mice to see what’s inside.
(Well, okay, I could never tire of that. Some things are fun, no matter what profession you’re in.)
And now I’m looking for a job. And wondering what I really want to do when I grow up. And blogging when I’m supposed to be looking for a job. Uh oh. I think I’ve been on this merry-go-round before.
What does it all mean? Honestly, I don’t know. I just know that I owed you nice folks a post today, and I’ve filled up several paragraphs explaining how I got to this point. Where’s the next stop? Computer squaresville? Maybe. Is there any other option? Dunno. After the weekend I’ve just had — burgers and brats and comedy on Friday, an all-day, all-night pool party yesterday, and spending today walking around like a slack-jawed drool-dribbling zombie — I think I’m just gonna have to sleep on it. I’ll have more for you tomorrow, and hopefully it’ll make more sense. This writing in a half-coma thing is tough, dude. But a few hours of rest will get me back on track, I think. And if not… well, you’ll know what happened when I call up and tell you that I think I’m coming down with the chickenpox *cough*, or that my dog looks swollen and puffy and red. And God forbid I need more time to recover — that’s when the relatives start dropping dead, to buy me time. And I don’t wanna put Aunt Gracie through that again.
Permalink | 2 CommentsFor when you care enough to blog the very best.
Well, it finally went and happened. After a couple of weeks of playing the ‘timestamp game’ and conjuring posts at insane hours, I finally went and missed a day. I didn’t register a post here for a full calendar day. Friday, August 22nd, 2003 shall evermore be known as ‘The Day The Blog Passed By‘.
Or something. Basically, I got lazy, and missed a day. I’m sure you’re all crushed, and shocked, and a little sweaty. I know I am. But it’s okay; I’m doing my best — or some reasonable facsimile thereof — and the mega-posts I’ve been banging you over the head with lately probably more than make up for an unscheduled off day. Assuming anyone’s reading this on a regular basis, anyway.
Besides, it isn’t like I didn’t write anything, anyway. I just didn’t post it. Or more correctly, I didn’t post it here.
(No, no, the first was more correct, actually — I didn’t post anything, but I did email a post to someone else, and they posted it elsewhere. Whew! I’m awfully glad we cleared that up, aren’t you?)
In any case, the post in question was most graciously and nicefully prepared and posted by my good friend the Soup Lady over at The Joy of Soup. The post is about my recipe for bratwurst that I unleashed on unsuspecting party guests at our barbecue last weekend.
(And again, on rather more suspecting guests, last night.)
It’s also about six million words long, so be warned. Still, if you like this stuff, you’ll probably enjoy that stuff, so go check it out. And be sure to browse the Joy of Soup archives — SueP (that’s Sue Playdee, get it? Hey, I don’t writes ’em, folks…) has got a veritable plethora of soup recipes, tips and hints, and other fun facts for food freaks. Or even phood phreaks, if you happen to be one of those. So go there. You know you want to. And many, many thanks to SueP for the opportunity to litter another site with my blithery prose. It’s good to spread the love.
So, look, not to neglect you fine folks further or anything, but I’ve got another shindig to go to later today. And I’m not sure exactly what shape I’ll be in when I get back. So please accept this mini-post, which points you to a much, much longer post, as a token of my appreciation, and a promise to do better tomorrow. Really. Cross my heart. So, until then, peace, folks. I’ll be back soon. And do try not to miss me. I’ll be thinking of you. Really!
Permalink | 2 CommentsIt’s not what you know that counts. It’s what you blog.
Isn’t it funny how a tiny little word or two can make a big difference?
Oh, I’m not talking about ‘thank you‘ or ‘please‘ or ‘not pregnant‘. Sure, those can make a big difference as you go through life (and, in some cases, save you a hell of a lot of money), but this is Where the Hell Was I?, not Reader’s Digest. I don’t care about all that kissy-kissy nice-nice crap.
(Speaking of which, why is it that the prissy little nerdy types get all the sing-song hyphenated descriptions, anyway? They get ‘kissy-kissy’ and ‘namby-pamby’ and ‘goody-goody’. Some of ’em even get ‘touchy-feely’, which is at least a good excuse to clock them. But where’s the love for the rest of us? You never hear of anyone being ‘horny-horny’ or ‘pissy-wissy’ or ‘suicidal… um, -widal’. Okay, so forget that last one. Still, I think it’s time we got in on the action. I say we take over, and beat the shitty-witty out of any puny-wuny pissant that stands in our way. I’m mad-mad as hell-hell, and I’m not gonna take it any longer! Who’s with me?)
Anyway, I’m talking about little words that sometimes get accidently left out of, or added to, sentences by people who just aren’t paying very much attention to what their mouths are doing. And then we, the marginally normal ones, have to deal with the ape gibberish coming out of their pie-holes and try to respond intelligently. Which only drags us down with them into the moron muck.
I had this happen to me just this morning. First, just a smidgen of backstory is in order. In case you’re new around here, I’m currently looking for a job.
(Actually, even if you’re old around here, I’m still looking for a job. I don’t even know why I say these things.)
And I’m collecting unemployment insurance while I’m at it. You know, because I used all the money from the fancy day job I used to have to light expensive cigars, and paper the walls of my house, and wipe my ass. Important stuff, in other words.
(Okay, I’m kidding. I really blew all my dough on beer and Girls Gone Wild! videos. But that’s not nearly as sexy as the cigars and the ass-wiping. So don’t tell anyone, okay?)
So, after a couple of weeks of this, the state gubment decides that it’s had just about enough, and sends me a letter stating that I must sign up for one of their ‘career center seminars’ in the next two weeks, or lose my benefits. And since I’m only up to Girls Gone Wild IX (that’s the Daytona Beach Spring Break one, if you’re scoring at home), I really need to keep the money rolling in. On the other hand, I’m already working with a career counselor that my old company was kind enough to hire.
(I suppose they could see that I’m nearly unemployable, and can use all the help I can get my grubby paws on.)
But I really don’t need a roomful of state employees with their fingers up their noses asking me what a ‘Pooter Pro Grammer’ does. Honestly, my blood pressure is high enough as it is.
(Okay, so if you’re a state employee and you’re reading this, I’m not talking about you, all right? I’m sure you, and all of your friends in the local office are perfectly competent, not to mention friendly, helpful, thrifty, brave, and all that other good shit. And you probably hardly ever stand around picking your nose, I’m sure. No, the people I really meant are those other bastards in your office that you and your buddies hate, who never do anything and are always yelling and getting into pissing contests, and generally making life miserable. Those people. Not you, okay. Unless you don’t know any of those people, in which case you’re those people, and I am talking about you. Shiftless no-good loser-bag.)
All right, what was I saying? Ah, the seminar thingy. Good show.
So, I talked to my counselor about the whole mess.
(Sounds like I’m in summer camp, doesn’t it? Seems like I oughta be making leather wallets and practicing archery and trying to get to second base with the cute redheaded girl during a midnight skinny dip. Of course, during a skinny dip, pretty much any physical contact counts as second base, I suppose. I mean, besides the fact that she’s naked all over, you know she’s naked, which is pretty damned exciting. And which further means that if you’re facing your swimming sweetie, it’s pretty clear what the first thing you touch her with is going to be, whether you mean to or not. And that’s second base, or at least a reasonable enough facsimile for a twelve-year-old boy to hang his hat on. Unless there’s shrinkage, of course, in which case you have to try a little harder. Or try to be a little harder, I suppose. I guess this is one of those cases where adding in a couple of little words really doesn’t change much at all, does it?)
Anyway, swerving back on track, my counselor assured me that she could get me out of the seminar with a simple letter saying that I was already spoken for. Or as I like to call it, my ‘Get Out of Flunky Unemployed Boring Seminar Hell Free’ card. All I had to do was call up the job center, figure out where and to whom the letter should be faxed, and she’d handle all the rest. And it was during that phone call that I was struck dumb by one of those creepy near-sentences that make you want to box somebody’s ears for making you feel and sound like a raving idiot.
Okay, so maybe that was just a tad more than a smidgen of backstory. This is why I don’t cook, by the way. A ‘pinch of salt’ becomes a handful, and a ‘dash of hot sauce’ morphs into a whole bottle, if I’m not careful. It just never works out very well. On the other hand, I do make the homeless people around here very happy when they ask if I can spare a ‘little change’. So somebody’s getting rich off this sickness of mine, at least.
Anyway, I made the call. Here’s how it went:
Lady: Hello, Mass Employment Training Center.
Me: Hi, my name is Charlie, and —
Lady: Can you hold, please? *click*
Me: Um, sure.
Now, right away, this was odd. Sure, a lot of busy places will answer the phone and put you right on hold, but she didn’t do it all in one breath like the pros do. Instead, she let me get my name out, and then banished me to holding pattern Hell. Which made me wonder, ‘Do they know about me already? Am I walking into a trap?‘ When in doubt, folks, I turn to rampant, snarling paranoia. It ain’t pretty, but I haven’t been ambushed by ninjas yet, knock on wood. So it must be working.
But getting back to the phone call. After thirty seconds or so on hold, the lady came back. And this is where she threw me for a loop:
Lady: Hi, sorry about that.
Me: Oh, no problem. So I got this letter in the mail —
Lady: Excuse me. Are you the gentleman I’m talking to?
I mean, seriously, how the fuck do you answer that question? Unless your name is DeNiro, or maybe Pacino, ‘Am I talking to you?‘ is not a rhetorical question. And certainly not during a phone call, when — let’s be clear on this — by goddamned definition, yes, you are talking to me! If you’re talking to someone else, then I can’t see them, now can I? So what the hell was I supposed to say to that? I didn’t know, so I stalled, hoping she’d clarify if I asked her to repeat the offending half-assed question. But, of course, I’m just never so lucky:
Me: Um… what?
Lady: Are you the gentleman I’m talking to?
Me: Uh… well… um, yes?
Lady: Oh, wait. No. You’re not. Hold on a second. *click*
Okay, so I answered the question, in the only logical way I could possibly see how, and — guess what? Apparently, I was wrong! What the hell was it, a date? I had no idea the conversation was going to involve trick questions and unanswerable riddles. I fully expected her to come back and spout, ‘Does this phone receiver make my ass sound fat?’ or ‘What is the sound of one hand clapping?’ Um, well — don’t care! Just get the hell back on the phone so I can get the hell out of the seminar you’re randomly trying to make me go to! Bitch monkeys!
(Anyone still wondering why I have little faith in the state’s best and brightest to run an employment seminar? They’ve got Fannie Gump here working the phones, speaking quasi-English and playing Whack-A-Mole with the ‘Hold’ button. And you’re gonna find me a job? Greeeeeeat.)
After another fifteen seconds or so:
Lady: Okay, I’m sorry about that. I’ll transfer you now to someone who can help you. *BEEP* *BEEP* *click*
Me: Um, thanks. I guess…
Now, I don’t know whether she remembered who the hell I was, and she never asked what the hell I wanted, so I have no idea why the hell she thought she knew who would be capable of helping me. Maybe my paranoia was well-founded after all, and they knew exactly what I was after. Or maybe she mixed me up with someone else. Or maybe, just maybe, she’s a toothless, babbling idiot, because five seconds or so after she dingled on the phone buttons and ‘transferred’ me, I heard an ominous *ka-click*, and then dead silence. No buzz, no Muzak, nothing. Bitch cut me off. Slung me back and forth, left, came back, spouted gibberish, and then cut my ass off. Maybe it was a date, after all. If only there’d been an eighty dollar check to pick up and a firm slap on the cheek for trying to smooch her, the picture would have been complete.
(Not that I would try to sneak a kiss from her, mind you. For one thing, I’m happily married and get all the smoochy-smoochy I need here at home. And for another, the receiver did make her ass sound fat. And I could see from our conversation that she had the IQ of week-old roadkill, so I wasn’t interested. Not by a longshot.)
Anyway, after a bit of thought — and a lot of cursing — I finally realized that what she’d really meant to say was, ‘Are you the gentleman I was previously talking to?’ Or something similar. On the other hand, she repeated her fractured, meaningless question rather than the more coherent version when I asked her, so I still have to stamp her ‘Moron, First Class’. But at least I understand where she meant to be coming from, though the message got garbled as it passed through her headmeat and out through her lips.
And, to be fair, after a couple hundred deep breaths and a few shots of tequila, I called back, and sorted things out rather uneventfully. Maybe I got the same woman, and she’d just had a brain lapse earlier. Or maybe she has multiple personalities, and one of them is Sylvester the Cat. Or Sylvester Stallone, for that matter, and that’s who I’d reached the first time. Or perhaps I just reached someone more competent and phone-worthy when I called back. For all I know, the first lady was some crazy vagrant who’d broken in and started answering phones, until they subdued her with tasers and dragged her by her ankles back to the curb. Hey, it happens. How do you think Stuttering John’s career got started?
So, it all worked out. I got the info I needed, and I got out of a seminar that would have sucked up another two hours of my life that I could never get back. And no, the fact that I just spent two hours blogging about the whole mess is not delicious irony. It’s just coincidence, pure and simple. Besides, this way, all of you learn a valuable lesson — if you decide you simply must open your yap and… well, start yapping, do try and make sure that all of your words are on board, and in the right order, okay? Otherwise, you’ll just freak people out, and they’ll call you names behind your back. And nobody wants that. Not even that headjob crack whore bozo bitch at the career center. It’s too late for her, folks. Don’t you be next!
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