About ThisAbout Me
Email Me
Bookmark
Charlie Hatton
Brookline, MA
It’s not the blog that gets you. It’s the humidity.
Hey, all — just a short note this time.
(I think I’ll have an entry ready for you tonight. I’m mixing the chemicals now, so if I can manage not to blow myself up, the concoction should have cooled enough to post by this evening. It’s the last drop of vitriol that tends to turn things rather explosive, but I think I have it under control. So stay tuned for that.)
Anyway, I wanted to send a big honkin’ ‘Thank You’ out to Hilatron over at Blogatron, who selected my submission for her first blogcation entry! Yay, Hilatron!
Now, my entry over there is the same sort of crap that I post here just about every day, and she’s on vacation for a week, so I’ll have to give you different instructions depending on what you’re used to. If you’ve:
So, to recap, thanks to Hilatron, read both blogs, and don’t forget to spay or neuter your pets. (Not to mention most children, but that’s probably a longer post…)
Oh, and yes, Hilatron, you got it right; I am a guy. I had no idea that this stuff was gender-neutral enough to possibly pass as being from a girl.
(An angry, disturbed, sometimes-pantsless girl, but still, a girl.)
I suppose that’s a good thing. Maybe I’m closer to Universal Truths™ than I thought. Woo hoo!
Permalink | No CommentsBlog — the choice of a new generation
I’m not very good with ‘principles’. I mean, the big ones, I can handle. I’ve never killed anyone, or drop-kicked my dog, for instance.
(Though I’ve been sorely tempted to do both, at one time or another.)
I try not to piss my wife off, I pay my taxes, and it’s been years since I’ve tied paper bags around a cat’s paws to amuse myself. Or at least months. I forget, really. But I’m working on it, okay?
So, anyhoo — I think I’ve pretty much got the major things covered. It’s developing principles for the little, day-to-day things that I have trouble with. Well, to be precise, I don’t have any trouble in developing those principles; it’s sticking to them that I can’t seem to get right. I come up with these grandiose, well-considered schemes, and they sound perfectly reasonable, but then they simply fail to fit into my lifestyle, and I end up chucking ’em out the window.
Here’s a recent example: over the past couple of years or so, I’ve become fed up with a lot of advertising, especially on television. Nothing surprising there, right? Everybody’s seen at least one ill-conceived, horrendous commercial that fails more or less completely to interest any rational person in the sponsor’s product. Sometimes, the product’s not really featured in the ad; other times, the concept is simply ludicrous or asanine, and leaves you wondering about the sanity of everyone involved in the production. In any case, it’s obvious that millions and millions of dollars were wasted, and you’re completely turned off.
My favorite personal examples are the recent Old Navy commercials. I get this twitch over my left eye when one of these spots comes on now. Even with a quick trigger on the remote, I end up seeing much more of these ads than any human should ever have to suffer through. They’re annoying, cloying, and nonsensical. I know they’re shooting for ‘camp’, but it’s not even good enough to qualify as campy. ‘Crampy’, maybe, or just plain ‘crappy’, but not ‘campy’.
Anyway, think about these ads from the company’s perspective, whose goal is to attract more business. Bringing back washed-up semi-stars from the past thirty years of television drivel and making them sing grating, sugary jingles doesn’t seem to me — now this is just me, mind you — like the best way to sell cargo pants, or rugby shirts, or whatever the hell they’re peddling. Look, I can understand bringing back an ‘A list’ actor or actress from the recent past to shill your shit. I really don’t have anything against that. Think of Bill Cosby — at the height of his popularity, you couldn’t think of the ‘Cos without a ‘puddin’ pop’ in his mouth.
(Which may say more about Cosby himself than it does about his Jell-o ads, but I’m gonna leave that one alone. This time. ‘Hey hey hey!‘)
But that was fine. His star faded, and he hung up the popsicle sticks, and now he stays largely in the background, as washed-up old celebrities are supposed to. These people they’ve been parading out to do the Old Navy bits, though? They’ve been out of it for years — decades, in some cases. Their careers have been dead, buried, and forgotten forever, so why cake makeup over their wrinkles and wheel ’em back out for this? Did their Social Security checks stop coming? Are they raising money for another facelift?
(Speaking of dead, did they bring Sherman Hemsley back from the grave? He doesn’t look so good, for one thing, but I thought he went the way of Redd Foxx back… well, back around the time Redd Foxx did, come to think of it. Didn’t they party together, back in the day?)
So, I made a Big Decision™. I decided to create an Inviolable Principle for myself, and the principle was this:
I shalt not frequenteth those places of business or buyeth those products whose advertisements annoyeth me or maketh me cringe.
(Yes, it’s best to use the Biblical vernacular when creating Inviolable Principles for yourself. For one thing, it makes it feel more like the voice of God, or Buddha, or Allah, or Nature, or whatver you follow, speaking to you directly. Or in my case, saying your new Inviolable Principle out loud will make you giggle. And it’s always good to start on such a solemn, important journey with a goofy grin on your face.)
So this should be a piece of cake, right? I made the rule, and I’m the only one who’s bound to follow it, so how could it possibly go wrong? Well, lots of ways, as it turns out. First, I realized more or less immediately that I wasn’t going to follow the inverse of the rule. That is, if a company makes a good, clever commercial, then I’m not going to run out the door and buy whatever they’re selling. I don’t buy Budweiser beer just because those frogs were a cute idea. Or if Massengill, for instance, or Tampax were to ever quit with the ‘not so fresh feeling’ crap and make a really good, entertaining commercial — well, I can honestly say that it wouldn’t affect my buying habits with respect to their products in the slightest. Oh, I’d still buy the panty liners — the ones with wings are great for wiping up spills in the kitchen — but I wouldn’t really change the way I shop. So that was a little disappointing; you always want an Inviolable Principle to be sound enough that you can use it from all angles, and this one already had holes poked all around it. Still, the rule itself was intact, so I soldiered on.
I made a list of all of the companies whose products I wasn’t going to support. Old Navy was at the top of the list, of course, followed by Dell Computers (‘Dude! You’re goin’ to Hell!‘), Mazda (that ‘Zoom zoom‘ kid needs a wedgie. Badly.), Enterprise Car Rental (they’re using Paige Davis from Trading Spaces in one of their ads. For the love of God, people, don’t encourage her! What the hell were they thinking?), and a whole host of others. And life was good. I never liked Old Navy anyway, I had my last two computers custom-built locally, and I already own a non-Mazda car, which kills two birds with one auto. Sweet!
That’s when it all came tumbling down, of course. I was minding my own business, watching some drivel or otheron television, when it happened. My show went off, and Britney Spears appeared and started prancing around my screen, mewling like a sick kitten about the ‘Joy of Pepsi’ and being generally rather annoying. And then I saw another of the ads, and another, and another. PepsiCo had gone and signed her to some multi-commercial deal, no doubt worth millions, with the money apparently contingent on emulating as many different American pop culture bimbos as possible. Wonderful.
Now look, friends — I’ve been around the block a few times, and I’ve seen many a blondie bimbo traipsing around onscreen. That’s fine — I honestly have no problem with these folks trying to make a buck or two, as long as they generally keep their mouths shut and stay out of the way of the real entertainers and entertaineresses. They can host an MTV special if they like, or cameo on a sitcom, and they can do Conan or Leno if they get enough ink, but otherwise, they should show up, wave to the nice people, and know when the hell to leave.
(See ‘McCarthy, Jenny’ for a good example of how to handle one’s bimbosity more or less correctly.)
The last thing I want one of these trashy tramps to do is to hawk my favorite non-beer beverage in a mega-series of commercials just after I’ve made a resolution to boycott any advertising that annoys me. Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch!
So now, I’ve got a dilemma. Stop drinking Pepsi, or violate my Inviolable Principle. Well, that was a no-brainer. You see, folks, when it comes down to fundamental values, I’m fundamentally weak. I chucked my resolution out the window and grabbed a can of my favorite cola. Oh, I avoided the commercials as best I could, and bitched about them when I failed to switch channels fast enough, but I continued to drink Pepsi, regardless. My rule lasted all of about a week, and even at that, it was one of my more successful Inviolable Principles.
(Come to think of it, I should really come up with a new name for those, seeing as how I’m always, um, violating them. Which makes it sound dirty, too, doesn’t it?)
Anyway, there you have it. I’m weak, and I play loose with my principles. When the going gets tough, I tend to err on the side of personal comfort and established routine. In short: I’m a man. All of my really inviolable rules these days get handed down from my wife.
(And occasionally from the dog, but I think it’s okay to do what she’s asking, because she hasn’t instructed me to kill anyone. Yet. I’ll have another dilemma when she does, I suppose.)
I think the best thing for me to do is just to give up trying to better myself on my own, and await instructions from whoever’s willing to give them. I may not end up doing the most noble or virtuous things that way, but at least I can tell myself that it’s no longer my fault. And really, at the end of the day, what more principle does any man need?
Permalink | No CommentsThis product may impair your ability to operate heavy machinery. Please blog responsibly.
My dog is staring at me. This is not a good thing.
No, not because she’s likely to jump up and bite my face off (though she is a pit bull). Nor is she sending telegraphic messages of any kind to my brain through her gaze.
(Though when she does, the message is usually something like, ‘You will feed me more Snauuuuuusages. You must replace the couch legs with pepperoooooni logs. You are compelled to tile the kitchen with slices of pooooork roooooast.‘ Yes, my dog think-talks like Mesmerino, the canine hypnotist. And no, she doesn’t know the word ‘compelled’. I’m paraphrasing. Deal.)
Anyway, she’s staring at me because she wants to pee. Now, let’s be clear about this, folks. She doesn’t need to pee; she only wants to pee. If she really needed to pee, she’d walk into the kitchen, through the doggy door and into her outside kennel, and pee. She’s done it dozens of times before, and she knows just how the procedure works. Finding the right place — or even a marginally acceptable place — to relieve yourself is not rocket science, unless you’re just absolutely wasted. Which my dog very rarely is, so you can understand my annoyance when she comes to me because she has to take a whiz. Like I’m in charge of the Holy Golden Doggie Bedpan or something, and I’m gonna hold it underneath her, and wipe her bottom when she’s done. No. Not doin’ that. She’s got her spot, and the door is always open. She doesn’t need an audience to take a proper piss.
And yet, here she is, all starey and fidgety, and just about ready to make it official. See, we taught our dog to bark when she wants to go outside to pee, or for a nice number two. I think we made that very clear. Oh, we’ll walk you from time to time, just for ‘shits and giggles’, we said, but if you bark for our attention, then it had better be because you need to make ‘shits and tinkles’. That’s what we told her. But what did she hear? She heard, ‘We have now designated your bark as a signal. Treat it like a little service bell that you keep around your neck at all times. If you ever have any desire that requires our attention, just give a bark, and we’ll be there to help. We are at your beck and call, and live only to serve you, oh slobbering furry mistress.‘
So now we filter. Now when the dog barks, we play CSI: K9 Corps in our head. When was her last trip? What did she do then? Is there a squirrel, or a bird, or a particularly interesting bit of some other dog’s poop, that she’s obviously barking about? Am I wearing any pants right now? The answers to all of these questions, and often more, get culled into one big decision about whether the dog is being a pain in the ass, or might actually have a pain in the ass. It’s like playing Dogshit Roulette. You never know when she’s going to have to legitimately go twice in an hour because she drank a gallon of water, or she’s sick, or she ate the neighbor’s cat. Again. So you spin the chamber, and choose ‘yea’ or ‘nay’, and just hope that you’ve chosen wisely. Give in too often, and she owns your ass, and you’ll be hearing that bark every twenty minutes for the rest of your life. Ignore even one genuine desperate plea, and you’ll be cleaning fresh ‘pile’ out of your pile carpet for a month or more. It’s a fine line, and there’s dog piss on one side, so you tend to lean in the other direction. And hold your nose, of course.
Such was life for the first three years that we shared an apartment with our dog. We erred usually on the side of caution, with a few rare, but hauntingly unforgettable, exceptions. In short, we were dog owners, and we made every effort we could to minimize the filth that we had to live in.
But that all changed when we bought our house. Or rather, it should have. See, the previous owners of this house lived with two beagles. Well-behaved, easily-trained, non-manipulative beagles, by all accounts. Sweet dogs, grateful for their owners’ affection, and glad for the roof over their heads and the kibble in their bowls. They were walked regularly, for exercise, but they — these majestic, gorgeous beagles — had learned that any between-walk emergency was handled by finding their way out the doggie door so lovingly provided, and into the outdoor kennel erected solely for their benefit. Once in the privacy of said quarters, all bets were off. All manner of bodily fluids or solids could be deposited there, with no hard feelings, and would be ‘taken care of’ later, by the humans in the house. Everyone had a role, and everyone understood it. It was a virtual utopia, with every creature working together to crap, or to clean, with no assistance needed from the other side at any time. It brings a tear to my eye even to describe it.
For you see, my dog — much as I love her — is apparently not a ‘team player’. Or maybe she’s too much of a team player. Either way, she’s decided that she requires an audience to witness her excretions. They’re like performances, and the curtain can’t go up, or the turdlets come down, until someone’s watching. Which is made even weirder by the fact that she doesn’t want you to actually watch her. Actually eyeball her while she’s making tinkles or dropping cigars, and she’ll give you this horrified, baleful expression. ‘No! No one can see me like this — avert your gaze! Have you no pity? Have you no soul?‘ But leave the scene, and the show is cancelled altogether. She’s a strange and mysterious creature, to be certain.
So, anyway, I’ve done my best to get her to go by herself, but so far to no avail. And, just at the moment, as she often does, she’s staring at me, daring me to look her way. If I look, she barks, and I’ve got to trudge downstairs, get her leash, escort her to the doggie door, let her go through, walk outside, watch her piss, and then take her for a walk. Oh, and I should probably put some pants on in there somewhere, too. Old Mrs. Johnson next door is almost out of her nitro pills, so I don’t want to give her another late-night shock. She got pretty worked up after the last, um, episode, but she was okay. She asked for some mouth-to-mouth, but I respectfully declined. Daddy’s not takin’ care of you if you don’t put your dentures in, Mrs. J. Quid pro quo, dear, quid pro quo.
What was I saying? Oh, right, the circus of taking the dog out.
The whole procedure with walking the dog is like a three-hour tour, but I’ve got the carpet stains to prove that it’s still the right thing to do. And so I’m gonna have to take her soon. One day, she’ll learn. But for now, I’ve got to coax her to the kennel myself and tell her to ‘tinkle!’ before she lets loose a single drop.
(Yes, I have a keyword to make my dog wee, and yes, it’s ‘tinkle’. You think I’m happy about it? You think I like walking her through the neighborhood, past suits and construction workers and hot chicks, and saying, ‘Okay, widdle girly-kins. Make tinkles!‘ No. No, I fucking don’t. But in a more lucid time, back when we first brought the dog home, I thought it through, and that’s the choice I made. Even now, I see the wisdom in it, given that the alternative is to stand over her and scream, ‘TAKE A PISS, YOU FAT BITCH COW!‘ While I imagine it would actually make her pee (hell, it’d work on me!), that sort of thing tends to scare the children in the neighborhood, not to mention old Mrs. Johnson. And given that the latter likes to cop a feel when I have to give her CPR, I’d really like to avoid startling her, if I possibly can. Thanks just the same.)
So, that’s the story of my dog and the amazingly convenient doggie door that she refuses to put to good use. But we’ll get her there. The ‘accidents’ are happening closer and closer to the door these days, so maybe she’s getting the message. Why, in a couple of years, she’ll probably be pissing right in the kitchen, and soon after, right by the door itself. A few months later, and we might just have our little girl broken in, after all. Now if I can just train her to aim the stream at Mrs. J’s begonias, maybe we’ll have something to really talk about. I’ll keep you posted.
CRAP (see this post for the CRAP 411):
You know, in a way, I’m a little jealous of the system my dog’s got working. Shouldn’t life work the same way for us biped types of folks? I mean, we’re supposedly more evolved and all, but dammit, I’ve tried looking expectantly and bug-eyed at whoever was talking to me when I decided I needed to pee, and not one of those bastards stopped talking and let me go. Not one. Wouldn’t that be a cool societal rule to introduce, though? It’s embarrassing to excuse yourself to go to the rest room in the middle of a conversation, right? And at least a little more embarrassing to just let loose right there, so your options are not good.
Wouldn’t it be a lot better if you could just start staring at someone when you had to go, until they realized that you were giving ‘the signal’, and they should shut the hell up and let you go about your — um, business? No muss, no fuss, no need to use foolish terms like ‘potty’ or ‘little boy’s room’. I think we’ve got to get Miss Manners or Martha Stewart or somebody on board to support this, and it’ll take off like wildfire. Or like a shred of dignity at an AARP-sponsored wet T-shirt contest. Whichever works for you.
(Hey, some people are scared of wild fires. I’m just trying to help.)
Sure, my scheme has some limits. It wouldn’t work while you’re on the phone, for instance… but who refrains from a little release while they’re on the phone any more, anyway? Hell, in most of the calls I make, one or the other of us is ‘just running some water’, or ‘starting a lawnmower’, or ‘strangling a sheep’. We all know what we really mean, and Ann Landers signed off on that practice long ago. This staring thing is much better, and doesn’t involve talking to anyone while you’re making bathroom faces. Really, it’s an idea whose time has come. Spread the word, people. Make a difference.
Permalink | 1 CommentIf you only read one blog this year… dude, frickin’ read faster!
Hello, boys and girls. This time, I thought I’d offer you a peek into the world of blogging. Many of you are not bloggers, and have therefore until now been shut out of the experience. My goal is to break down that ‘fourth wall’ today, and to give you a glimpse of the trials and tribulations of being an avid blogger. (Not to mention a raving lunatic; it’s pretty much a matched set, I’m afraid.) And for the rest of you who have blogs of your own, well, I’m going to assume that you have at least half a brain, which is about three-quarters of a half more than I have. So you may get some kicks in reading about a blogger who’s also a horrendous fool. Unlike you. Of course, if you’re a blogger and a horrendous fool, then you should read this, too. You know, just so you know you’re not alone. Sad, maybe, and pitiable, but certainly not alone.
(Now if this was the SAT, I’d ask you how much of a brain I have, given the fraction word problem above. But it’s not, so I won’t. And no, ya brown-nosin’ types, you don’t get extra blog credit for doing it on your own time. And no, it’s not because I don’t know the answer myself. Not just because of that, anyway. I just don’t like to encourage your particular type of asininery. Oh, and if you reread the brain thing now, and can’t help but figure it out in your head, then you truly are a dork. I should know. I just did it myself. I have one-eighth of a brain, and apparently no friggin’ life. *sigh*)
Okay, so here we go. I decided not to talk about the things which take up about ninety percent of (my) blogging time, which are:
So, even though those activities take up most of my blogging time, there’s really nothing in there that’s of any interest to the outside observer. All of those things are dreadfully boring. They’re like watching paint grow, or grass dry. Or watching that hair growing out of grandma’s mole get bigger.
(Yeah, you know the one. It’s like a bad car wreck, and you can’t take your eyes off of it. Every grandma’s got one. I think it’s some biological thing — a sympathetic response to their child having a baby of their own. Just as their first grandchild is snipped away and wiped off, the mole stubble starts sprouting, and it just gets queasier and queasier after that. My grandma’s got one the size of a number two pencil. Well, lengthwise, anyway; it’s only about half that thick. I don’t want to exaggerate, of course. It just sits there on her neck, grossing me out and wiggling in the breeze. I sometimes want to walk over and get a good grip with both hands and yank! the thing out of there, to help us both out.
(Not to mention anyone else who has to look at the thing.)
But I’m honestly not sure that it wouldn’t pull her arm out of joint, or shift her whole face in that direction. Something that big has to be anchored pretty damned well to something, and I don’t want to risk pulling grammy’s spine out of whack by jerkin’ on the thing. And so, as many families do, we’ve learned to live with our new, um, visitor. We just try not to touch it, or even look directly at it. It might be contagious, and nobody wants to develop their own hairy mole until it’s time.)
Okay, where was I? Ah, the magic of blogging. Moving right along, then…
So, most of blogging would be pretty dull to describe. I thought that I’d instead tell you about a few specific things — good and bad — that I’ve encountered in my travels, and you can play along and pretend it’s interesting. Cool? Cool. Okay, here we go:
Am I Hot, or Not, or What?: Many of you are probably familiar with the premiere voyeuristic scope-out spot on the ‘net, ‘HOT or NOT?‘. For those of you who aren’t, it’s a moderately entertaining way to waste a few minutes every now and then, by checking out submitted pictures and rating folks on their looks, or hot-ness, or shag-ability. You get the idea. For some folks, it’s also a horrendously embarrassing, nightmarish way to discover that some ex-lover has posted an old photo of them in their ‘fat pants’ and a sweatshirt, eating / wearing an ice cream sundae. Actually, I have to believe that most of the photos on the site get posted more or less in that way. Most people — myself firmly included — are probably content going through life judging themselves a nice 7, or maybe 7.5, and really don’t want to find out how horribly wrong they are. I’m guessing that only the most self-centered, or insecure, or ‘hunk-alicious’ (that’s ‘babe-adelic’, for you ladies out there) among us actually post their own pictures to see what the world really thinks of their mug. The rest are just pranks, or ‘payback’s a bitch’ posts, as far as I can tell.
But — as is my wont — I digress. The point is not that I posted a glamour shot of myself in a leopard-print G-string to ‘HOT or NOT?’. (I mean, sure, I did, but apparently I’m a 2, so I certainly don’t want to make that ‘the point’. And I’m rounding up, by the way. By like, four.) No, the point is that now the genii who brought us the original ‘HOT or NOT?’ have returned, with a vengeance, a vision, and a whole new venture. And so now we have ‘Blog HOT or NOT?‘ It works in much the same fashion — babbling, ignorant strangers from all over the world can now rate you by your rambling diatribes, rather than your outward appearance. It’s a little like judging a book by its footnotes, rather than its cover. It’s beautiful.
So, while I’m not a vain person, or one so unsure of myself as to need nearly constant encouragement… well, my blog entries are. They’re high-maintenance, feet-stamping, impatient, cocky little bitches, and they want to world to applaud them as the perfect ’10’s they make themselves out to be. I resisted at first — you never want to feed a blog’s ego, let me tell you — but in the end they overwhelmed me.
(They threatened to superimpose the leopard-skin picture with similar shots they found online of Pauly Shore. And while I don’t mind debasing myself in that way, I couldn’t stomach the implied association. Even I have limits.)
So, anyway, I signed my belligerent blog up for ‘Blog HOT or NOT’. Or so I thought.
See, it seems that when you sign up to add your own blog, the site sends you an email to confirm that you are who you say. You click on the link in the email to confirm your registration, and then you can get down to the business of making an ass of yourself by publicizing your rantings to the world. What could be better? Only, in my case, it didn’t work that way. I got the email, clicked on the link, and was taken to the Blog HOT or NOT site and told that my sign-up was complete. Faboo! But wait. Not faboo; not faboo at all, my friends. No, for you see, when I tried to log in at the site later on, I got a message that my registration was not complete, and that I should click on the link in the email that was sent. Well, I’d deleted the email, of course. I’m not one of those weird, creepy sorts of people who actually save emails and information that might be important until I’m sure it’s not needed any more. What kind of pervert does that?
Still, things looked salvagable. Right on the same login page, there was a link to have the email sent again. O frabjous day! So I clicked it, reasoning that my memory of successfully registering must be another of my many hallucinations, and I sat by my emailbox to wait. And wait, and wait, and wait some more. Oh, I got mail — mortgage refinancing come-ons, porn ads, penis enlargement raves, even offers to download spam blockers. But nothing from ‘HOT or NOT’.
(And by the way, while I can see the delicious irony in sending spam about a product that purports to block spam — ‘Hey, if you already had our product, you wouldn’t be reading about it right now!’ — I still want to find the people who send that crap, pull their underwear up over their faces, and give ’em all a big blindfolded swirly, just like the rest of the spam sleaze-bos. The ‘spam blocker’ bitches are no better than the rest of those assholes, just because what they spam about is likely to decrease the competition for eyeballs by reducing spam volume. It’s like buying up all the raincoats in town, so you can be the only flasher in the park at night. Just because it’s marginally clever doesn’t mean you’re not a sicko, too.)
So, anyway, the email never came. I’ve clicked on that damned link on the registration page a dozen times or more, but still, I got nothing. And so my poor blog will never know whether it’s HOT, or NOT. Or, quite conceivably, ROT. It’s possible that there’s some sort of backlog, and my mailbox will soon overflow with a glut of responses sent all at once. More likely, though, it’s just not to be. I figure that I either did something stupid when signing up (not that it’s ever happened to me before… course not), or I’ve been blackballed for that G-string pic of mine. I knew I should’ve posted the one of me in the tiger-striped teddy instead…
Where in the World Is ‘Where the Hell Was I?’?: My next adventure went a little more smoothly. I decided to sign up with GeoUrl to provide geographic information for my site. You know, so bloggers and others who live close by would be able to physically come by my house and beat my ass in person.
(I’m nothing if not considerate of my audience. You people don’t know how lucky you are.)
So, anyway, to sign up, I actually had to find my own coordinates. Luckily, the fine folks at GeoUrl have a resources page, listing sites that help you do just that. I chose the AcmeMapper, because when faced with multiple choices in life, I always stop and ask myself, ‘What would Wile E. Coyote pick?’
So, in short, this AcmeMapper is amazing. It’s got a whole boatload of satellite pictures, all at different resolutions and gridded together, so you can scroll back and forth across the country, zoom in, whatever you like. So I played with it for about an hour (the Mapper, dude, the Mapper. I played with the Mapper. Fo. Cus.), and I finally found my house (which is where this blog is written, at least until my padded room at the clinic is ready). So I zoomed way in on it, and got as close as I could, and pulled out the coordinates from the map, and stuck ’em into the blog. No problem. And now, I have this handy-dandy ‘GeoUrl’ biutton on the sidebar that will tell me — and you! Try it out! — what blogs are physically close to me. You know, in case I need to go kick somebody’s ass for not reading my site. That sort of thing.
So, actually, I suppose getting the coordinates onto my site really wasn’t all that traumatic. The only really disturbing thing about it all was the resolution that’s available to any Jane or Joe off the street who wants to cruise around looking at satellite pics. The level of detail is remarkable. Which, to be honest, leads to the other disturbing thing I found — apparently, the close-up satellite image of my house was taken a couple of weekends ago, when the weather around here was unbearably hot. So, of course, in the picture I used, you can see me, sitting in a rubber ducky wading pool in the back yard, wearing my Speedos and sipping spiked lemonade through a bendy straw. Very embarrassing. My wife says that she can even make out bubbles coming up from the bottom of the pool, between my legs. But I’m fighting that one, dammit. This is my house, and I say emphatically that I did not pootie in the pool, satellite surveillance be damned! I mean, who’s she gonna believe? Her own husband, or a trillion dollars of precision electronic gadgetry, floating up there in the ether? Oh. Yeah, it doesn’t sound so good when I put it that way, huh?
BlogShare, and BlogShare Alike: Finally — not because there isn’t a veritable plethora of other blog-related bonehead moves I could tell you about, but because I can see that you won’t be able to stand much more of this — that brings me to the BlogShares experience. This is definitely a case where I’ve gotten ahead of myself without reading the manual or asking for any help, and just charged in willy-nilly and gotten all confused and disappointed.
(Much like sex the first couple of times I tried it. But eventually, I learned what all the steps were, and how to do them in the right order, and everything’s been fine since then. The hardest part was figuring out that ‘fall asleep’ always comes last. Believe me, that’s not one that you want to get wrong, folks. Not only does it rather annoy your partner, but it can double or triple the clean-up time afterward.)
All right, where the hell was I? Oh, BlogShares. ‘k.
So, without knowing what on Earth I was doing, I signed up for an account. That got me some free play money, but again — back to the blog ego trip thing — what I really wanted to do was add my blog to the queue, so it would leave me the hell alone for a while. So after some futzing and putzing around, I finally managed to notify BlogShares that yes, there was a new blog out there, and no, nobody gives a damn about it yet, but maybe this is a step in the right direction. So that went fine, and then I think I had to go through another step to link my account to the blog that I’d entered, to show that I actually owned it. The whole damned procedure started feeling like a mortgage application after a while. But in the end, I went through all the steps (I think), and now have a nice little status page that has my account, and my blog, and everything’s just peachy. Except for this line, under ‘Status’:
Just Added. Not yet indexed. Not available to trade. Claimed by owner.
Now, I don’t know what the hell kind of indexing that BlogShares does — I didn’t read the help, remember? — and I don’t know how often it’s supposed to happen, or what voodoo incantation that I’m supposed to do to make it index my site, but that message has been there for about two weeks now, and I’m starting to suspect that I’ve done something wrong. So now I can’t use my fake money to buy shared in my own blog, and no one else can invest in my insanity, either. And I can’t figure out why. I’ve read enough of the registration docs to decide that I’ve done pretty much all I can, but I gather that I really should have been indexed my now, so I don’t know what’s gone awry. My best guess is that the BlogShares folks also saw my picture on ‘HOT or NOT’, and they’ve blacklisted me as well. I suppose it serves me right for not shaving my back for that photo shoot. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
So, there you have it, folks. Just a taste of what it’s like to be a professional blogger. Well, okay, fine — technically, I don’t get paid to do this, so I’m not a professional, per se. But as of Monday, I’m not getting paid to do anything else, so I might as well call this my vocation, at least for the moment. If any of you out there need a good solid writer for a column, perhaps, or a travel guide, or maybe to type up menus, give me a call. I’m not proud; I’ll write whatever you want. And it might even make a bit of sense, too, if I can keep access to my online wordsmithing tools. (And if you can keep me on schedule for my meds.) Hey, if the money’s right, I’ll even wear my leopard-skin G-string for you in the office. That’s a plus, right? And if you’ll give me healthcare insurance, too, I might even shave my back this time! How can you lose?
Permalink | No CommentsBlogging’s just like riding a bicycle… your legs are gonna get sore, and you should really wear a helmet.
Tomorrow’s the end of an era for me, boys and girls. It’s my last day of work at my current job, and then it’s off to the Island of Downsized Misfits. It ain’t Toyland, or even Wonderland, but it’s not EuroDisney, either, so it could be worse. Much.
(Can you imagine what it would be like to actually work at EuroDisney? Besides the fat screaming German children and the sappy It’s a Small World After All music grating on your nerves all day, you’d have to listen to every damned announcement — whether about a special at Minnie’s Mini-Golf Pro Shop or a lost, blubbering kid wandering around the Francois Fun House — in seventeen different languages, many of which sound like asthmatic macaws trying to whistle Zippity Doo Dah. The ‘No Littering’ message alone would take three hours to translate into the language of every pissant little postage stamp of a country in the area. And if that’s not enough, you’d also have Goofy going around the park all fuckin’ day, scarin’ the children and chanting, ‘Le hyuk, le hyuk, le hyuk‘. Which is about the only thing the rest of the French people would bother to say to you, assuming you have the audacity to have not been born in their country. Honestly, I’m surprised some kid in a Donald Duck costume hasn’t gotten all liquored up by now and gone le postal on the whole friggin’ place.)
Anyway, after tomorrow, I’ll join the ‘ranks of the unemployed’, as they say.
(I wonder what rank I am, anyway? I think I’d like to be a Lieutenant. Or maybe a Captain. ‘Captain Jobless, at your service!’ Nah, that wouldn’t work. It sounds like a lame superhero; some guy with a big ‘J’ on his chest and a three-day beard, fighting crime in his grimy underwear while he waits for ‘the call’, so he can turn back into a mild-mannered office monkey again. The bane of gainfully employed men and women everywhere, Captain Jobless scours the globe in search of minions — here, ruining a report with a coffee spill; there, breaking up a job interview with prank phone calls about inflatable boobs. Captain Jobless works tirelessly to free the corporate heathens from their honest, well-paying, insurance-providing chains. The Captain shall not rest until all are out of work as he is, eating Ramen noodles and recycling aluminum cans for spending change.
(To be fair, Captain Jobless has always recycled, due to his keen sense of environmental responsibility. But this time, it’s different. It’s personal. There’s beer money involved.))
All right, I had a fucking point lying around here somewhere; I’m sure of it. Ah, right — the job thing.
So, tomorrow’s it for this job. I’ve got to grab my books, and my headphones, and my meeting slinkies, and as many of their pens and notebooks and staplers as I can carry, and get the hell out. I guess I have some mixed feelings about the whole ball of goo. After all, I did work there longer — almost three years — than anywhere else I’ve ever been employed.
(My previous record was two years. Nine jobs in the last eleven years — I’ve had more positions than a Kama Sutra pop-up book.)
And the people were generally pretty nice, and only a few of them talk too loud on their phones, or belch loudly at random times, or gather in each others’ cubes to giggle over drivel while I’m trying to work. Of course, to be fair, a few people there do do those things, and they’re raging assholes. So fuck those people. Right in the hoo-hah. Bastards.
But the rest of the folks are fine, and I suppose I’ll miss my professional peeps. Anyway, it’s not a time to dwell on the negative. Rather, it’s a time to remember the positive, and to show up at work drunk, and to stock up on random office supplies.
(No, really, I’m Jonesin’ for this a little. I haven’t gotten to show up drunk since the last day of my last job, and that was three years ago. And I telecommuted, so it really wasn’t the same, frankly. For one thing, the whole ‘stealin’ shit on your last day’ thing went right out the window.
(I did mess the place up a little, though, just to make myself feel ornery.)
Plus, I started working at 10am in my pajamas every day, anyway, and nobody was ever there to give me shit about that. So it really wasn’t all that different with a buzz. Which ended up sucking. Not only was I disappointed that my little rebellion went completely unnoticed (until my wife got home that night and asked about the new stains on the carpet), but I was absolutely mortified that I hadn’t thought of it before. Hell, I could’ve been loaded three, four days a week, and no one would’ve known. I’m still kickin’ myself over that one…)
So, anyway, things are wrapping up here, and I get to play golf for a few weeks while I look for something new to be no good at. I’d say that I plan on really letting myself go, too, since I don’t have to be presentable or anything… but I really don’t have very far to go, to be honest. I’m pretty much doin’ the bare minimum as it is to avoid arrest for indecency or disturbing the peace (not to mention public intoxication), so I’m not sure exactly how I’ll manage to express my new-found freedom. I suppose I could walk around the house with my fly open or something, but you never know what the dog’s gonna decide is a chew toy (I did mention she’s a pit bull, right?), so I think I’ll play it safe and keep my boys in their own neighborhood. Thanks just the same.
I suppose I’ll miss some things here at the office — the place down the street makes a killer chicken sandwich, for one. And the people that I don’t loathe, and the bits of work that didn’t give me screaming conniption fits… hmmm. Maybe there’s not so much to miss after all. Oh, wait — I know what I’ll miss the most now. The Elevator Olympics. Yah. I’m in a seven-floor building, and the possibilities to annoy people with elevator-related chicanery is unlimited. Elevator games are the coolest, and here are some of my faves:
The Great ‘Vator Race: This one’s simple. Two people. Two ‘vators. One person in each. The starter yells, ‘Go!’, and the athletes push all the buttons as fast as they can. They have to stop on every floor (usually spoutin’ smack to each other while the doors are open), and the first to the top wins. You get bonus points if you can pick up passengers and still win, ’cause that’s much harder. You know, given that the people getting onto your elevator might actually want to go to another floor, and are gonna get their butts all scrunchy when you start pounding on the ‘Close Doors’ button the millisecond that they open. Plus, you’ll likely be shouting something like, ‘I’m kickin’ your ass, bitch licka!‘ to the other elevator, so you can see the conflict of interest that your co-passengers might be feeling. Needless to say, this is a game best played after the suits have scrambled for the day.
The Chinese Lift Drill: I know, I know — it’s culturally insensitive. But I didn’t name the damned thing, nor the ‘Fire Drill’ before it, and I don’t know what else to call it. Just deal, baby. Anyway, this game’s similar to the Race above, but it requires a bit more synchronization, since the contestants actually switch elevators at each floor. (Try this one with three or four elevators — now that’s entertainment!) The first one to the top still wins, but it’s possible to lose this one along the way, if you can’t make a clean exchange and get into the other person’s ‘vator before the doors close. Believe me, folks — there is no lonelier feeling on the planet than running a Drill and staring at the closed doors of the other guy’s lift. Men cry, women wail, and friends and family gnash their teeth. Okay, so mostly, people just call you a dumbass. But there’s some gnashing, and the occasional wail. Work with me, here.
The Shithead Shutout Shuffle: Or S-cubed for short. I have a friend who’s favorite saying is: ‘People get off. People get on. How fucking hard can it be?’ He likes to say this to dumbasses who just have to scurry into a full elevator before the passengers have gotten off. Sure, they deserve it. And yes, somebody should say it. And no, he doesn’t really have any other friends. But that’s not the point. The point is, like every good smartass pissy idea, it’s now become a game. Here’s how it works — in anticipation of one of these slobbering boobs trying to skitter past you into the elevator, work your way to the front of the crowd of passengers. When the doors open, someone — there’s always one — will try to make their move. That’s your target — you’ve identified a shithead. Now comes the tricky part. The goal of the game is to pretend, as convincingly as possible, that you’re trying to get out of this diddle-dick’s way. Of course, what you’re really doing is bobbing when he bobs, or weaving as she weaves, so as to stay right in front of your target at all times. The longer you can last without obviously being a dick, the better. It’s a little bit like bull-riding at a rodeo. Much like it, in fact — there’s a fair chance that you’ll get trampled or gored, making eight seconds consistently will win you some championships, and though there will be numerous clowns around you most of the time, they really don’t help much until it’s too fucking late. Oh, and you get an automatic win if you can manage to sneak forward as you perform your ‘dickhead dance’, and keep your opponent occupied until the elevator door shuts behind you. That’s the ‘Shutout’ part, and it’s an automatic free beer where I come from. Your mileage may vary, of course.
Hot Potat-evator: This is a cool game, because you can play it with a friend, a la the first two games, or you can play it with a clueless nincompoop, as in the ‘Shuffle’. (And if your friends are clueless nincompoops, you can probably have twice as much fun playing it with them… but dude, you really need new friends.) Anyway, the goal is simple — just be the last person to push the call button before the elevator arrives. When you’re playing with someone else ‘in the know’, this usually degrades into some sort of slappy, keep-away-from-the-button nonsense. Some people dig that. If so, fire away. It’s no-holds-barred. If you’re the last to click, you’re the last to click. If you gotta give your friend a poke in the eye or an Atomic Levitating Wedgie to get there, then so be it. This ain’t Switzerland. Get in there and win the damned game, and your buddy can pull their undies outta their ass when you get to your floor. Personally, though, I prefer to play the more sinister version, where some knucklehead comes up, sees that you’ve pressed the call button, and — guh! — hits it again. (I’m especially snarly if this happens on the top/bottom floor, where there’s no question that you’re already waiting to go the same damned direction, and have clearly pressed the button in an appropriate manner. People that do this need to be deboned, on the spot. With a spork.) Anyway, when this happens, don’t fuss and fume. Just mosey over to the button, and — with a meaningful glance in their direction — push it again. Press it, and let go with a flourish. Voila! Then see what they do. Either it’s game on, and you can feel better when you kick their ass (and they’ve got their panties stretched over their head), or they’ll back out. In which case, you’ve made them feel like an ass, you’ve frightened them just a little, and you’ve won by default. Do a victory wiggle, and put another notch in your elevator cable. (That might be a sexual euphemism; I haven’t decided yet. It sounds a bit painful, frankly.)
Musical Chairs for Morons: Okay, this one isn’t really a game, per se. It’s just a way to really annoy people, and quite possibly get your ass kicked. It works best in a really tall building with lots of people using the lifts. It also works best if you’re a linebacker or body builder of some kind (see the section on ‘ass kicked, getting your’ above). Anyway, the fun begins when someone steps out of the elevator, and then wants to get back on. Often, people will — very politely — step just outside the door of a crowded elevator to let folks off and on, and then slip back inside before the car leaves. Less often than that (but far more often than you might think for a species that invented wonders like the vacuum tube, and the Swiffer, and the reversible vest), you’ll see someone paying no attention whatsoever and hop out on the first floor that comes along, regardless of where the dildo originally thought they were going. We’ve all done it — I’ve done it, and yes, on that day, I was a dildo. Okay? We’re equal opportunity assholes here, and you have to remember: there’s a little dildo in all of us. (Do with that one what you will. A gift, from me to you.) Anyway, the real goal here is to keep the person from getting back on, just out of random, heartless vindictiveness. I’m not very good at this, I’m afraid — I need a deserving target to really be a cold-killin’ bitch smiter, but it’s up to you if you want to go for the gold. You can kick ’em, trip ’em, yell ‘Ooga booga!’ at ’em, whatever. Keep ’em off, and you get the grand prize. As for me, though, I’m more interested –as usual — in the booby. Er, prize, that is. The red ribbon for second place. And the way to get that is, monkey do as monkey see. Every floor you stop on afterwards, get out of the elevator, just like your new friend, and then get back on. Whether s/he does it again or not. Just step out, for no apparent reason, and then step back in again. It’s most effective where there are lots more floors for you to practice on, but fewer and fewer people on the elevator. It’s a bit like playing solitare, or that game where you have pegs in holes on a board, and you jump them around until you’re left with just one. The goal, of course, is to have the elevator all to yourselves, just you and your target, and still be doing it. The bravest — or largest — of us might even push a few extra buttons at that point, just to drag the victory lap on a little longer. Of course, this is the point where the person is likely to slice you open like a fresh fish when you step back into the elevator, but hey — who’s afraid of suffering a little for their art?
So, that’s it. That’s what I’ll miss the most, and I don’t mind shedding a tear over my loss. Hopefully, when I hook up with the corporate world again, I’ll be in a high-rise and I can start another play-group. Ooh, and maybe there’ll be advertising execs in the new building! They’re the best for doing clueless shit that prompts these sorts of smackdowns. So, anyway, I hope you’ve enjoyed it, and maybe even learned a thing or two to use in your own office. I’m certainly gonna miss it. And hey, I’ll have to find a way to stay in practice, just in case. My wife oughta be home soon — I think I’ll go hang out on the porch, and see how long I can keep her from getting in the front door. I just gotta watch out for her backhand coming towards my noggin. That’s her weapon of choice these days, since I had to start going commando to prevent her goin’ for that wedgie. See, I don’t screw around, man. I’m a pro.
Permalink | No Comments
![[Subscribe]](/blog/images/subscribe.png)
