I Saw This on the Interwebz...

So I saw this somewhere or other and I have some things to say about it... watch the video so we have a shared knowledge base.

• My brother uses (used?) an alter ego where he claimed he was a hand model. George Costanza was a hand model. Neither of them are quite as annoying as the chick in this video.
• I received a pedicure when I visited Las Vegas in June of 2007 (or so) and was told I have "flawless feet". Maybe I should pursue a career as a foot model.
• The way she moves her hands... woah. Creepy. Her hands are in perma-claw mode... except claws presumably have a bit of strength to then. Her hands look like noodles that are about two minutes away from being al dente.
• "So for me, that means no cooking, no cleaning, no taking out the garbage... no gardening, no sports." Hmm... I've already got the "lazy" part of being a hand model down.
• "These hands have not seen the light of day for ... about fifteen years." Another thing we have in common!
• "Most people are still really amazed that I can make a full-time living off, you know, about five inches." Uhh... no comment.

Movie Review: Paranormal Activity 2

Here's my entire review of Paranormal Activity 2, which I saw (for the chart purposes, below) at time period six.

Tale from the Front: Misspeaking to a Miss

This weekend was a "Gone Dancin'" type of one.

To recap, at a high level, my thinking about dance clubs and my presence therein:

1. I am a bad dancer. I know that.
2. I enjoy dancing with women, but I don't go there to dance with women.
3. I am simultaneously sickened and amused by how lots of guys seem to disagree with the first two points.

So, with those general concepts in mind, I will relate another key opinion that was critical to me making a fool of myself this weekend: I really don't like it when married chicks try to dance with me. At best, they are trying to have fun and are being inconsiderate of my appreciation of women. At worst, they don't take their vows seriously and are trying to make me a pawn in their dysfunction.

(Actually, at worst I guess they are aliens that have been sent to destroy the world but only after eating my cats in front of me...)

Here's a basic decision-making matrix that happens when I'm on the dancefloor and I'm approached by a woman:

Given how much I tend to drink when I dance, "basic decision-making" is pretty much all I'm capable of.

So this weekend, I was moving on the dance floor when a woman started dancing REALLY close to me... too close for it to be accidental. I noticed she had a wedding ring (or at least an engagement ring, or a big ol' "I'm SERIOUSLY pure, bitches!" ring) so I vacated the area and went. For another drink, naturally.

A bit later I saw the same woman, prompted by her friends, backing up towards me. "Backing up" sounds like she was doing some sort of crazy dance move, when in fact she was merely edging back into my space... it was deliberate enough, thought, that I felt she was doing it on purpose, so I left again. I think I might have grumbled something as I did so, to let her know that she should stop making me feel like she wanted me to cuckold her hubby.

About 90 seconds later, I noticed it wasn't the same woman. She was wearing a similar black top but she had no wedding ring on. She was just some other chick who'd wanted to dance with me. Oops.

About 90 seconds laterer, I decided to relieve her of the burden of rejection at my hands and so I approached her and started talking to her.

(In the text I've typed since the graph, above, I've outlined at least three errors I made that night. "Started to talk to her" might have been the biggest one.)

Me: Hey.
Not Married Chick: Hi.
Me: So... I wanted to let you know something.
NMC: What's that?
Me: I didn't avoid you because of--
NMC: What? "Avoid me"?
Me: --yeah, it was because I thought you were married, and--
NMC: I'm not married.
Me: --I know, but I thought you were another chick and I don't like it when married chicks dance on me.
NMC: ...
Me: ...
NMC: OK. Have a good night.

Oh, man. "Have a good night." The perfect end to a truly embarrassing conversation.

I'm used to doing embarrassing things in clubs, but most of them are dance-related. This did NOT help me have a good night.

Monterrey: Part III

It was Thursday evening and I was in Monterrey, Mexico, waiting for my friend Diecinueve to arrive. I wasn't sure what, exactly, we were going to do, but I was famished and a bit stir crazy. Pretty much anything would have been just fine.

Seeing her for the first time was... less weird than I might have guessed. I can't remember the last time that I had seen someone for a few hours and then, 32 months later, had her knock on my hotel room door to pick me up. There's a first time for everything, right?

She had a project that she was working on at school, and when she picked me up I asked her how it went, and she said that she had a horrible day. I thought she meant, like, "My car's tail light went out" or "I lost my Foursquare mayorship to the local coffee shop today" horrible. In fact, she explained that her best friend had a family tragedy and it was much more horrible than I'd anticipated.

In spite of that news, she took me out to get a sandwich. We went to a place that I would not have associated with Monterrey or Mexico, generally. It was called something like "Peace, Love" and it had a modern hippy/crunchy vibe, with several 60's-esque sayings decorating the place... all in English. Kinda weird.

Also kinda weird? The insane gender ratio. I think that I was one of three or four non-employees who were male, and there must have been three or four dozen chicas there. It was bizarre, and I wondered whether those kinds of places existed in Seattle. Because I like those kinds of places, for some reason.

The sandwich was also quite good.

As we sat and I ate (she was not hungry, but she made sure to point out that she would have bought both a sandwich and a salad; big talker!) and I tried not to stare at the forest of femininity around me, we planned the rest of the night.

She was dressed nicely, and I liked her outfit, but she was aghast at the notion that she'd go out in such an ensemble. I wasn't going to argue with her about how she should dress, but it seemed a bit "Mr. Rogers-changing-into-a-sweater" to me. We needed to go back to her place, then, so she could change, and we were going to meet some of her friends at a bar after that.

There was, naturally, an unexpected snag.

She was driving us back to her place, when she informed me that one of her (five? six?) housemates was home. OK. Fine. It seemed that with that many housemates, the odds would be slim that none would be home. She clarified that one roomie, in particular, was there. And this person did not allow men in the house.


Uh... OK.


Culturally influence? Chemically imbalanced? I am not sure, but Diecinueve dropped me back off at my hotel and picked me up later. No big deal. Just one of the oddities of my trip.


The bar we went to was busy. It wasn't crazy-busy, but it was bustling. I liked the atmosphere, in spite of the fact that there were actually some men in the establishment, unlike the sandwich place.

Speaking of dudes, four of Diecinueve's friends were there, and three of them were dudes. I was introduced to her female friend, Rudolfa, and Rudolfa's friend. The other two guys seemed nice enough but I never talked to them nor got their names. We shared a bottle of rum, though, so I feel like we have a bond that only alcohol can form (a different bond than I've made with women in the past due to alcohol, just for the record).

Rudolfa seemed like a very nice person. I sat between her and Diecinueve at our table and she, like Diecinueve, was very cute. She had long dark hair, big brown eyes, nice legs and... something on the end of her nose.

"Something on the end of her nose?" you might ask. "Yes," I would reply. "Like a zit?" "No." "A birthmark?" "No." "A squirrel?" "Not exactly."

She had, like, a scrape. A scab. Something. I didn't know quite what it was, to be honest, in spite of both Rudolfa and Diecinueve trying to explain it to me. Whether it was a language thing or an alcohol thing, I just couldn't grok how she came to have such an abrasion. I kept getting one-sentence explanations from Rudolfa that were amusing but not entirely elucidating. A couple of my favorites:

"It was his birthday." (Pointing to her friend.)
"It's the climate in Monterrey!"
"I woke up last weekend and a squirrel was nibbling on my nose."

OK. I made one of those up.  (Or did I?)

In addition to the pleasant conversation and the rum and the hot Mexican chicks sitting on either side of me, I had one other encounter of note.

Possibly due to the aforementioned rum, I had to use the little boys' room. It was an odd setup, with a sink outside the entrance to both the female and male restrooms. The bathroom itself was a single room without a sink inside... anyway, I went in, locked the door, and did my business.

There was a knock on the door and I could see, through the frosted glass, that someone was waiting to get in. I'm not sure why a knock on a locked bathroom door (when I'd been in there for about 27 seconds) was perceived to be helpful (other than denying me the luxuriant urination session that I usually indulge in), but the reason I'm telling this mini-story is because of what happened when I opened the door.

First: an aside. An aside about expectations. When I go to see a movie, I try to keep expectations low (so I don't have Star Wars Prequels anger). When I talk to someone I don't know, I assume that they are well intentioned simpletons (so I don't get disappointed when they say "irregardless" or use "literally" incorrectly with no self-awareness). When I get out of bed in the morning, I remind myself that a lot is probably going to go wrong (just kidding on that; I don't actually start thinking until about 25 minutes after I get out of bed).

I learned to temper my expectations not through a long spiritual journey or in one of the innumerable post-secondary classes I'm still paying student loans on, but through a post-Nerf basketball session at a friend's house where I took a big swig of iced tea that I thought was apple juice. It tasted like ass--not because it was bad iced tea, but because I was expecting the sweet payoff of apple juice.

Expectations being at odds with reality can lead to disappointing things (like the end of my trip to Monterrey, in my next blog post, or the Obama administration) or to funny things (like the Obama administration).

In THIS case, I opened the door and saw a guy whose eyes were about ten inches lower than mine. He stepped aside so I could get to the sink, and I prepared to descend the step to the sink area.

I prepared to descend that step not because I remember its presence but because I saw a guy whose eyes were ten inches lower than mine and I assumed I was elevated.

Nope. He was just a short dude.

The expectation of that (imaginary) step, helped along, perhaps, by the oft-aforementioned rum, led me to lose my balance and almost sprawl onto the floor. While I'm sure that a common sink area outside of a pair of bathrooms in a Mexican bar has a squeaky-clean floor, I preferred not to end up with a Rudolfa-like nose injury, and I was able to regain my balance, wash my hands, and make it back to the table.

All without laughing at the really short guy that caused me the trouble.

We finished our drinks without further incident. Rudolfa gave me a stuffed chili (like a felt and fabric-stuffed one; not a cheese and goat stuffed one) for some reason upon my return. Diecinueve and I made loose plans regarding Friday and Saturday, and she dropped me back off at my hotel.

The first two days of my trip had gone off well. Not without a hitch, but without a kidnapping and without a major letdown.

That would, unfortunately, change. Next time, you'll learn whether I was kidnapped and beheaded or let down by the rest of my trip. I'm sure the uncertainty is maddening!

Monterrey: Part II

The first thirty hours of my trip to Monterrey, Mexico, were pretty good. Catching up with Patrón, catching up with my sleep, and enjoying the highest pillow:person ratio on my hotel bed were all good things.

At this point, it was Thursday night and I was waiting for Diecinueve to come meet me at the hotel.

I'd met Diecinueve over two and a half years earlier. I'd gone up to Vancouver, BC, with TravelMate 2000 and Flowers and we'd stayed there two nights. The first night we went, TM2000 met a girl and Flowers met a girl, whom I will call Flowers' Friend. I met no girls... or, rather, I met no girls that were particularly interested in meeting me.

Flowers' Friend gave him her number, and so the second night we decided to go to where she (and, allegedly, some female friends) was. It was a dance club, and there was a line. Flowers' friend was in the club and we decided to wait in line (which is a bit atypical of us). So we waited.

And waited.

Eventually we were close to the front, and Flowers' Friend came out to check on us. She brought a friend, and it was... a bit deflating.

What you're about to read exposes me as a bit of an asshole. Not, perhaps, unlike most guys, but... an asshole. My apologies if this is news to you.

OK. Something about Flowers' Friend. She was cute--nice smile, good hair, cute Mexican accent--and she was fit. "Fit" is a good adjective in terms of what women (and, I guess, all people, although I tend to care significantly less about dudes on that front) ought to be. Or, at least, ought to be if they prefer to have me find them physically attractive. (I know that "fit" wasn't part of my CHC scale. I need to think about that one.)

So. Cute. Fit. Good...

Flowers' Friend's friend, who I will call Flowers' Friend's Friend, was not particularly cute. And definitely not fit. In fact (and this is the asshole part) she was more than a bit fat.

Which is OK. I understand that some people are overweight, and I'm sure she was a delightful girl. But I didn't stand in line for 35 minutes to get into a club so I could dance with gordas.

But... we consciously acknowledged the sunk cost effect and decided to stick it out until we got into the club. There was, after all, at least one cute girl who liked Flowers well enough, and we'd already put in the time to get to the front of the line (sunk cost) and ... where else were we gonna go?

So we went in. Paid our way in with the Canadian funny money and approached the dance floor.

Fortunately, Flowers' Friend had more than one friend at the club.

A quick aside about me, at this point: I was wearing a blue blazer over a pretty awesome t-shirt. This t-shirt had a microphone in it and lighted up more as the volume increased. Let me show you, courtesy of a random YouTube video I found:



Silly? Of course? Awesome? Some think so.

Diecinueve was one of those who thought so, which was tremendous news for me.

When we walked onto the dancefloor, we all said hola to Flowers' Friend, and my eyes locked onto Diecinueve and her eyes locked onto my shirt and we ended up hanging out for much of the rest of the night. She was fun and adorable (and fit) and she enjoyed touching my shirt, which distracted her from my intolerable dancing skills.

It was not until later that night, when I learned that Canada had a younger drinking age than the US, that I learned she was ... significantly younger than I'd anticipated. Hence her codename in my blog.

But... who cares, right? Almost everyone is significantly younger than I am, and so we stayed in touch off and on for the next couple of years, and I was about to see her in person for the second time ever when she was meeting me at my hotel on Thursday night.

More on that next time.

Monterrey: Part I

Originally I had planned on going to Monterrey with a buddy to see the Seattle Sounders play. I find soccer a generally boring sport, but I appreciate the impact and popularity it has around the world, so I thought it'd be fun. I also have a couple of friends who live in the Monterrey area, and it's always nice to have people willing to show you around and apologize more fluently when you upset the natives.

Unfortunately, my buddy ended up not going, but I decided to go anyway, and I decided to skip the soccer game... me navigating Monterrey alone to see an event I wasn't particularly enthused about struck me as madness, and I was more excited about the prospect of hotel nap than that.

Soo... I took a redeye Tuesday night through Houston and arrived at the hotel around noon. Here are some thoughts/experiences from the first half of my trip:

The weather was disappointing. Hazy/muggy/unsunny. There are beautiful mountains ringing Monterrey but I couldn't really see much of them because of the clouds. Compared to the massive flooding the city experienced over the summer, though, from Hurricane Alex, I obviously had little to complain about.

Patrón picked me up and we had lunch together. I hadn't seen her in person in about 15 months, and one of the first things she told me was that I look old. I informed her that I am, indeed, oldER but that I was also operating on about three hours of sleep. Always a nice thing to hear from a friend, in any event. :|

Another odd thing? A consistent topic of conversation (or at least comment) that kept cropping up: marriage. She talked about the people she dated in terms of marriage, she pointed out where people get married, she pointed out where SHE wanted to get married, etc. There's nothing at all wrong with this, but I think she might be pretty ready to get hitched sometime soon. Just a guess. :)

We went to a museum and it was pretty cool. It had art on the wall and architectural models in a special exhibit. At one point I leaned in to see one of the models and, although I wasn't touch anything, I guess I got too close, because one of the security guys said something. Of course, lots of people say things, and since I can't understand Spanish very well I ignored him. Patrón had to poke me and tell me that he was telling me to back up. Oops.


Wednesday night was uneventful; Patrón had a class and then had to pack for her trip to Vegas the next day (ironic given the circumstances in which I met her)... we loosely planned on meeting up for dinner later that night, but it didn't work out. There was no proper goodbye with her, but at least I got a good night of sleep.

The next morning I got out of bed around 10:30. I went to the gym in the hotel and lifted a little bit, and then I wandered across the street to a mall to get some food. Inside were all the exotic food options one might expect: Subway, Chili's and McDonald's among them. I guess a mall is a mall, right?

After some deliberation, I remembered that Mexican McDonald's had not, the last time I'd checked, changed their fruit pies from fried to baked. I have no idea how much worse, health-wise, a deep fried apple pie is than a baked one, but I have a strong opinion on how much better they taste. Much better.

So I approached the woman behind the counter.

And it was suddenly weird.

Not McDonald's. That wasn't weird. It was weird.

I was weird.

I've studied Spanish for enough of my life that I should be able to speak it reasonably well. I should be able to say standard things like, "Where is the bathroom?", "I would like a Big Mac and an apple pie, please," and "How old are you, pretty girl?" in Spanish without freezing up.

Normally I don't freeze up. If properly motivated, I can talk to business people, homeless people and beautiful people without too much trouble.

At that McDonald's? I simply couldn't communicate. Couldn't understand what she said. Couldn't say that I wanted a Big Mac. It was an odd feeling and not one I enjoyed very much.

After stumbling over my words in two languages for about 20 seconds, I figured out that McDonald's wasn't open yet so I went over to Chili's and had a breakfast skillet.

Got back, took a nap, hit the gym again, showered again, and waited for Diecinueve, my other friend in Monterrey, to pick me up for dinner.

Monterrey: Prologue

I've been to Mexico before. Over a decade ago--right before I started law school--I spent two weeks with Big Cole and two other high school chums in a fortnight trip that included Puerto Vallarta and Mazatlán. I lost some paperwork and I was in a serious relationship, but it was a good time.

I went to Cancún and Playa del Carmen for my honeymoon. As fun as it is to talk about my marriage on my blog, I'm gonna skip that trip except to say the combo of beaches and Mayan ruins was incredible.

About two years ago I went back to Mexico. TM2000, Flowers and F-Bomb accompanied me to Puerto Vallarta. I was single and I was alcohol-friendly and I had high hopes.

Ugh.

The April 2008 Mexico trip was the biggest bust ever. Two of my three companions were recently involves with girls (one is engaged to the woman; the other is not) and it was Spring Break.

Good? Uh...

HIGH SCHOOL spring break.

It was a disaster.

And so I came back to Mexico for a fourth time. By myself. Hoping for the best but preparing for four days and nights of hotel gym time and HBO Signature.

That's a prologue. I'm at the end of night #2 and tomorrow, when the rum has worn off, I plan/hope to give a recap of my trip so far.

Mixed Signals

A prelude: I haven't written many blogs lately. I don't know if it's because I am content in life, busy in life, or have given up on life, but I haven't felt a compulsion to do so.

I'm writing in a state of rather severe intoxication, which might result in some typographical errors but is almost certain to result in a more transparent communication of the weirdness that help fill in the gaps of my life between sleep and work and porn viewing.

Tonight was a Friday night. I didn't have plans, and the guys I usually hang out with had other plans (F-Bomb presumably was with the future Mrs. F-Bomb and TM2000 was with a group of people that I no long hang with). I got home from work and the gym about 5:30 and played some Civ IV and ate some leftover pizza and took a nap.

The alarm went off at 8:00 PM. I was confused, as I heard the alarm, regarding where I was and why I was being awakened.

It was like my life distilled down to its essence.

Since I had no plans, I turned off my alarm and rolled back over to go to sleep.

No dice.

I decided that I could hang out on my own Friday night. I could put away clothes that had piled up and do laundry that had piled up and do situps to counter the chubby stomach that had piled up... but I decided to wander to Ozzie's.

So I took a shower. I put on a rather subdued outfit that had, as its sole bit of flare, a red patent leather belt that I had bought for my Adam Lambert Halloween costume. As it turns out, no one saw it all night, but (A) it fits better now than it did last October (gym participation ftw!) and (B) I was a bit worried that I was wearing it for the same reason some guys wear womens' underwear.

In any event, Ozzie's was fine. It was an odd night and I was pestered by a Nebraskan Amazon, but .... whatever. The reason I am writing this long prologue is due to what happened after closing.

Let me say this: with the exception of January 2008, when I am within a bar I feel pretty safe. I recognize that I am a terrible fighter and that if it came to a real brawl I'd lose teeth and an eye and maybe a toe or two. Within most bars, I play it cool and trust that security will limit the ridiculousness of the assholes who want to fight.

Outside of bars is often more interesting, unfortunately, than inside them. After closing everyone pours out (eff me... it took four tries to type "pours"... it was "ous" and then "pusaja" and then "pous" before "pours") and people are all more... equal. It's weird. The power dynamic between men and women levels out and anything can happen.

Of course, the downside of this is that ... anything can happen. There is security, but someone can take out a tooth or an eye or a toe or two before anyone can do anything. Also, I've seen American History X.  Curb-stomping is scary shit.

So... I'm hanging outside of Ozzie's after close. The rain is pouring down, and I'm standing beneath overhangs and whatever to try to stay semi-dry.

Somehow I'm surrounded by dudes. Not guys I know, but guys who are willing to talk to women. So I stand there and listen. There's a woman with an umbrella and she talks about how she's not from Washington... she's from California. I'm from California so I pay attention and it almost gets me knocked out.

How is that? Because about 20 minutes later I've moved a half-block away to get away from the dude-bro's and drunk women who want to go home with them and/or punch them in the neck and then act like they shouldn't be punch back because they're chicks.

So. I got some space. I'm txting TM2000. I'm waiting for (ideally) the rain to let up, even though I only have two blocks to walk to my apartment.

Who should stumble by me but the chick who was born in California. She has an umbrella and I'm tired of being wet so we have this conversation:

Me: You're from California?
Her: Yes! I hate the rain!
Me: I'm originally from California, too.
Her: Oh, yeah? Where?
Me: A naval air station in Hanford.
Her: Hanford? Yeah. I know that. I'm from Oakhurst.
Me: Really?
Her: Yes. You've heard of it?
Me: Totally. My grandmother and aunt lived there when I was young; I visited there a few times.
Her: Really? Cool. You wanna get under my umbrella with me?
Me: Uh, sure. But I'm sure that your boyfriend would not approve. [Note: I didn't know she had a boyfriend. It was a test.]
Her: He's over there. He's cool. It'll be fine.
Me: OK. Uh. I guess.

At that point I got under her umbrella with her. It wasn't a small umbrella.  There was no touching. I was just slightly less drenched due to her kindness.

Of course, no good deed goes unpunished. She and I were talking about her hometown when suddenly a guy cruised up.

He was short and he was very pale/redhead and he had a VERY short haircut.

He was also this chick's boyfriend.

We had this conversation. It was awesome.

Him: Dude. I'm gonna knock you out.
Her: Haha. He's kidding.
Me: What?
Him: If you don't leave right now, I will drop you.
Me: What?
Her: He's kidding.
Me: Is this your boyfriend?
Her: Yes. He's cool.
Him: I'm not fucking around. I will punch you in the fucking face.
Me: (Backing up.) Dude. It's cool.
Her: Haha! He's funny.
Me: Are you kidding?
Him: No. I will knock you out.
Me: (Backing up.) OK. It's cool.
Her: (Advancing, grabbing my forearm.) He's TOTALLY kidding. Isn't he funny?
Me: ...
Him: Seriously. Leave.
Me: I'm waiting for a friend. (A lie.)
Her: (To me)  He's just joking. Don't worry.
Him: I'm not joking.
Me: OK. Byebye.
Her: No! He's kidding!
Him: No I'm not.

It was bizarre. I don't see how they could have legitimately been on such different wavelengths, but I don't understand why she would keep pursuing me as he's threatening to pummel me.

Yes, he was shorter than I was.

Yes, I am not a gelatinous tub of goo.

But I don't know how to fight and I am the first person to admit it. There's no way I was about to stand my ground and call him and his girlfriend out as being totally ridiculous.

So I stepped out from under the cover and into the rain. I waited for them to stagger off and I set off for home.

It was an odd night. But I have all my toes/eyes/teeth, so I consider it to be a success.

For my birthday? An ulcer!

Of the strengths I have, one is standardized test taking. I kinda joke about this fact occasionally, but one reason I believe that I do well is because I remain cool under fire. I don't get anxious about stuff very easily... whether it's because I can manage stress well or just have a general indifference is a fair question.

For some reason, though, I get stressed out around my birthday.  Which is funny, not just because I rarely get stressed out, but because I sort of (at least internally) mock those who get more emotional around certain times: the holidays, weddings, menstrual cycles.

It's absolutely emerged in my consciousness, however, that I get more stressed out around my birthday than I should.

Two years ago I was supposed to meet people at Ozzie's for a semi-party and the night had a stressful pre-semi-party set of circumstances that led to me going home early and pissing off at least one friend who was kind enough to come with the intention of hanging out with me.

Last year was more serene, I think, but this year I had another little hiccup that threw me off and almost resulted in me hang out alone on my birthday evening. Which would not have been the end of the world, perhaps (although perhaps it would have been; fortunately we'll never know) but it would have been a bit of a waste, too.

Thinking about why I get stressed makes me more stressed, and I think I'm going to leave that as an off-blog topic of self-examination/recrimination. Instead, I will live you with this image:

Safeway Musings

As I so often do after going to the gym, I stopped by my local Safeway for some foodstuffs. I had a few thoughts during the expedition:

Hot Sauce? Hot Damn!

I grew up eating a particular kind of hot sauce. La Victoria Salsa Brava.

Is it authentic? No. Is it particularly spicy? No. Is it anything other than familiarly tasty? No.

The problem has been that for a couple of years now, I have been unable to get it in "Hot" flavor. Mild? Yes. Medium? Sure? Hot? No.

Until today. I was stocking up on the Medium when I saw they had Hot and it was on sale. I bought three bottles (enough to last a couple of months, at least) and I smiled more broadly than any condiment should cause me to.

Don't You Tell Me How to Live My Life

Whenever we check out at the grocery store, we can (a) provide our own bag, (b) use paper, or (c) use plastic.

I wouldn't be opposed to option (a) except my self-awareness indicates that I would bring my cloth bags from my car (with groceries) and then they'd sit there, rather than be brought back to my car... rendering them useless the next time I went to the grocery store.

I should, arguably, opt for option (b) since my father worked for many years in the now near-defunct timber and paper industry in Oregon (OK... I don't know if it's nearly defunct or not, but it's dead to me). Of course, my dad used to be part of a union, too, and heaven knows how I feel about organized labor.

The tie-breaker is that my cats use the kitty box. A lot. They use the kitty box quite a lot. And I need to clean it to have any chance to ever EVER have a visitor to my apartment come back (trust me; I had one woman abandon a pair of shoes and her pants at my place, rather than ever return, due to my cats (man... that sounds kinda bad when I tell the story like that)).

So, in spite of the massive plastic bag pollution that is a terrible thing, I get plastic bags so I can use them to dispose of my used kitty litter. I don't feel great about it, but I do it.

What I do NOT need is, as the checkout guy is restocking the plastic bags so he can put my La Victoria Salsa Brava (Hot) and other goodies away, is for him to say, "Let me get more of the evil bags."

Fuck you.

That's like a cop rolling his eyes as he recites the Miranda rights or a prostitute being glum over getting out a condom. None of these things make me happy, but they're necessary. Stop giving me grief.

A Poisonous Idea

Last week a 14 year-old robber shot and killed someone. Bad? Sure. No 14 year-old should be robbing, let alone killing. I gotta think, though, that it's not THAT uncommon... the reason I read about it is because she killed her victim after being made fun of for being so young.

Can you imagine that? Being robbed by a tween is sort of embarrassing, and a bummer, also. But being killed by one due to one's inability to stifle mockery? That totally sucks.

So imagine when I saw someone that looked like Bret Michaels today as I unloaded my groceries. I so wanted to tell her she did a great job hosting the Miss Universe pageant.

Yes, it was a her.

And, yes, Bret Michaels has had phases where he looked like a chick, but this chick looked like Bret Michaels when he looked like a dude.

I can't say I really thought of the victim of the 14 year-old robber when I bit my tongue--I'm not really someone who talks shit to people in an unprovoked way as we're both walking down the street--but I think that if I do choose to start comparing strangers to celebrities, I'll start with, say, Selma Hayak. Or Justin Bieber.

The Grossest Thing

Earlier this week I was under the weather.

I felt myself coming down with a little somethin' somethin' on Sunday evening, and all through Monday I sniffled at work and then Monday night I was shivering in bed and barely slept. I called in sick (well, emailed in... do people still "call in" anywhere?) and spent much of the day in bed.

At some point I made soup and then, for dinner, I felt like something sweet. Unfortunately, my choices were limited.

Let me comment about my refrigerator before I continue.

My fridge is pretty well-stocked. I usually have an apple or two and some lettuce; several types of cheeses (including cheddar, for late night quesadilla adventures); a doorful of condiments (mustards and steak sauces and whatnot); lunchmeats; beers that people have brought over and not consumed.

In other words, lots of stuff. As a single guy who can barely keep his half-dozen (up from three!) plates washed, I'm pleased that I keep myself in a position to be able to make food if I really needed it without leaving my apartment.

The thing is, not all of that food is good. Half of the lunchmeat is out of date, there are two half-consumed two liters of soda, and I don't even want to open the more distant tub of sour cream.


In other words: I'm good at buying food, and I'm decent at eating it, but I'm bad at cleaning out my fridge.

If you read the title of this blog, you might be worried after this preamble. But this is not a blog about fungus or rancid meat or gerbils who have sprung, fully formed, from head cheese (I don't even know what head cheese is, and I'm disgusted to learn it's a meat product; I was going for an Athenian birth allusion... )

No... this blog is based on the grossest thing I have encountered in my refrigerator:

Chocolate chip juice.

"What is chocolate chip juice?" you might ask.

There are two answers I can give you to that question: the first is that I have no idea what it was--chemical breakdown of the chocolate chips? condensation from the fridge? Spilled water from my Brita filter that I never use but has been sitting on the top shelf right above the bag of chocolate chips at the back of the fridge for a long time?-- and the second is that it was a liquid I found intermingled with the chocolate chips in the Nestle bag.

The problem was not just that I had impaired chocolate chips, but that (a) I had already mixed the pancake batter, and (b) I had my heart set on chocolate chip pancakes, and (c) I had no second bag of (unrunny) chocolate chips.

So... I powered through. I pulled the strainer out of my cupboard and poured the chocolate chips into the strainer and I rescued a few lucky chips from sharing the fate of their brown brethren (the trash can) and put them into the half-dozen flapjacks I made.

They melted strangely and weren't quite right, but they were close enough in terms of taste to stave off my sweet tooth... and I am still alive so it seems the chocolate chip juice was not poison nor was it the antidote to otherwise poisonous chocolate chips.

Earlier today, though, I stepped on a sticky spot on my kitchen floor. I thought I was rid of the chocolate chip juice, but I will have to spend time mopping that mystery sauce before it's gone once and for all.

From the Mind Vault

Sometimes I have something happen to me that is worthy (in my estimation) of a blog, but I don't get around to writing it, or I wimp out due to the subject matter.

Well, this happened to me some months ago, and I was 50/50 on writing a blog about it... and I never did. I feel it's a story that needs to be told, and given the chances of me going to Mexico next month and never coming back, I might as well let it all hang out... Ed O's Blog style.

Or something.

So here it is.

I was in Safeway the other day, buying a few things. I see the same people pretty much every time I check out, but the checkers see so many people I'm not shocked that they don't remember me. I'm reminded of the saying, "You have a lot of clients as a lawyer, but your client only has you as a lawyer" and so I hold no ill will.

Going through the express lane, I noticed there was a new woman, and we had this exchange:

(Ring up hot dog buns) Beep
(Ring up gallon of milk) Beep
(Ring up pack of gum) Beep
Checker: Do you want to keep this outside of the bag?
Me: No, I'm good.
Checker: OK.
(Ring up can of energy drink) Beep
Checker: Do you want to keep this outside of the bag?

Me: No, I'm good.

Checker: OK.

(Ring up box of condoms) Beep

Checker: Do you want to keep this outside of the bag?
Me: No, I'm good.
Checker: OK.
(Ring up box of condoms) Beep
Me: I'd like to keep those outside of the bag.
Checker: What?
Me: Nothing.

Now, buying condoms is not like buying toilet paper. One involves a signal of accomplishment (or at least aspiration) while the other seems... not. Even I, though, who rarely shy away from my selection and purchase of birth control, could not be so brazen in my joking. Maybe someday.

Mayor of Mexican Nightclub Kidnapped by Drug Hitmen

MONTERREY | Sept 26, 2010 1:55pm EDT



Mexico (Reuters) - Suspected drug hitmen have abducted the foursquare mayor of a local discoteca near Mexico's northern city of Monterrey in the latest surge in violence threatening to undermine industry and scare off social media geeks.

Gunmen with automatic weapons burst into Classico early Sunday morning in San Pedro Garza García, an affluent suburb of Monterrey, police and officials said, and targeted Ed O, a tourist from Seattle.

"He was led out of the club by armed men. He wasn't beaten, he wasn't hand-cuffed or tied up," Alejandro Garza, attorney general of Nuevo Leon state, which includes Monterrey and San Pedro Garza García, told a news conference.

Nuevo Leon Governor Rodrigo Medina said Ed O was probably targeted for his efforts on foursquare, a popular social media network. The tourist's family has not received any ransom demands.

Ed O's foursquare feed reveals he had checked in at Classico earlier in the evening and had become mayor by default. "The regulars know better than to claim Classico. The cartels just don't like people who use foursquare," explained Medina.

The abduction follows a spike in social media-centered violence over the weekend in northern Mexico, where rival gangs have engaged in bitter Tweet flame wars and have allegedly phished their competing Facebook community pages.

I Lack Flavor

Let's talk politics here for a moment before I get into something that a chick told me over the weekend.

I don't vote. I appreciate that people vote (although I am torn between being relieved that there's not a true oligarchy and that too many "normal" people are just too stupid to be making laws that affect me) but I don't consider it to be worth my time.

I also tend to be more rightward-leaning on the political spectrum when I am bothered to think politics in practical terms, which means (a) that any vote I made would probably be useless, since it would be going in favor of the loser, and (b) it makes speaking politics very sketchy with people in real life because most other people are more emotional and/or cocksure about political perspectives than I am.

With this being said? I consider myself progressive on several issues, and when I go out and about on a Thursday night I rarely think about race (someone might say that's because the places I go are predominantly white, and there might be some validity to that). I was forced to think about it rather late this past, Thursday, though, because of an exchange I had with a woman at Ozzie's.

I was waiting for my turn to sing, and I was at the bar solo, and I was speaking to a nice young lady. She was Asian, but (in spite of the fact that so many of my friends are currently dating Asian women) that didn't really matter to me. Race, though, was clearly on her mind, and it became apparent about 15 seconds into our conversation:

Her: What are you?
Me: What?
Her: What are you?
Me: You mean, like, what? Like, "I am awesome"?
Her: No. Your race. Are you Asian?
Me: Oh, uh... well, my mom was adopted, but--
Her: Because I don't date white guys.
Me: [ignoring the fact that I didn't want to date her, necessarily] What? Why not?
Her: White guys lack flava.
Me: They lack flavor?
Her: Yeah, flava.
Me: Flavor. Uh, OK...

I think we had a few more sentences exchanged, but I wasn't about to debate her as to whether we have flavor or not, and she CLEARLY wasn't picking up on the fact that I was hitting the "r" in flavor pretty hard, just to goad her into calling me on it.

Boo, racism!

Tuesday Night (or: Fat Grizzly Adams)

I used to go out on Tuesdays quite a bit. Especially during funemployment, I could wander in really late and sleep the morning away and be no worse off. Last night (a Tuesday) I had planned to stay in, do my dishes, talk about cleaning other parts of my apartment, and generally relax.

But it was not to be.

I received a chat message from Winner right after I got home, and I got this chat:

6:02 PM Winner: edo, why are you you?

  and what are you doing tonight?

 me: i just got home

  can I have 5 minutes?

 Winner: no

  fuck you

  we're going out tonight

  (courtesy of Big Apple)

  :D

 me: wowzers

6:03 PM heh

 Winner: let's say 10

  be ready

  with your hair did

6:05 PM and no stache (from Big Apple)

Winner is not really the kind of person that says, "Fuck you" to me (indeed... few people do, even in jest, on account of my legendary temper and penchant for eye gouging), so I wasn't shocked that it was Big Apple who was in charge.

I was in the middle of making dinner, and had no intention of shaving my mustache just yet, so I txted back that I wasn't sureI was going to make it out. And then it happened.

(Hopefully that sounds super-dramatic. It wasn't, but I like adding spice to blog entries occasionally...)

Big Apple txted me and asked why I was trying to ruin her night out. Ugh.

I hadn't seen Big Apple in over a year, and I will be honest: I am particularly susceptible to suggestion when it comes to her. I don't really know why--I generally am rather skilled at ignoring peer (or near-peer, when I'm feeling particularly superior) pressure--but she could probably get me to do just about anything for her. And she probably knows it.

So, when she said we were going to sing karaoke, I just rolled with it. I had a drink and the two of them picked me up and spirited me off to Hula Hula... a place I used to frequent but haven't been to in the last year or so.

It was fine. It was fun. It was good to see the ladies, even if they didn't sing... I got in four songs, which made for a busy night.

A bit before midnight, we decided to go to another bar. I didn't catch the name of it, but Big Apple wanted to see another friend and so we drove to Belltown and parked and walked into the Two Bells, which I had been to for lunch but didn't really know was a bar that people went to at night to drink and hang out.

Well, if last night was any indication: it's not a bar that many people go to to drink and hang out.

There was a bartender, Big Apple's friend, another chick with a guy, and two dudes sitting with one another. It was a friendly enough place, although I knew I was done drinking for the night and I was wondering if I was going to be able to get a ride home or if I'd end up hoofing it.

I was sitting in a booth, talking to Winner, and Big Apple was bellied up to the bar, between her friend and one of the two dudes sitting with one another.

Let me say some things about this guy, who we will call Fat Grizzly Adams (see picture to the right). He was fat and had a bushy beard. And a bit of an attitude, but we'll get to that in a moment.

Big Apple and her friend were talking and looked over my way and I asked them what they were talking about and it was, of course, my mustache.

I have a love-hate relationship with my facial hair. Up until relatively recently, I was pretty much unable to grow any significant amount, and I'm still in the "it's fun to play with growing it in different ways" kind of immaturity that, presumably, many guys grow out of in their junior year of high school. I'd let my facial hair grow for a bit over a fortnight and then cleaned it up so I'm left with a rather tidy 'stache and soul patch.

Crappy? Yes. Ironic? Yes. Awesome? Yes. When it comes to facial hair, these concepts all get intermingled and confusing.

In any event, Big Apple and her friend had a conversation (between the two of them, but staring at me) that went something like this:

Big Apple: He needs to shave the mustache.
Big Apple's Friend: I dunno.
BA: He does.
BAF: Mustaches are hard to pull off, but he does it.
Me: I do, huh?
BAF: Yes, it's a tidy mustache.
Me: Oh, yeah?
BAF: Maybe it's the hair.
BA: Yeah, the hair! You make the hair just right so it goes with the mustache.
Me: Uh, no, actually, I...
BA: You do! You stand in front of the mirror, adjusting it so it all works.
Me: Uh, OK...

Watching this exchange, of course, was Fat Grizzly Adams. Remember: he has a beard. A big bushy beard. Big Apple turned to him and had this exchange:

Big Apple:  You! You have a beard.
FGA: Yes, I do.
BA: You grew it to show him what a real man looks like!
FGA: Yes, I've grown it for a year to show him what a real man looks like...
BA: It took a year to grow that?
FGA: Yes.
BA: Oh. You're not a real man, then.

I don't think he appreciated that jibe, although he probably was so shocked and delighted that she was talking to him that he didn't mind too much.

One thing he did appreciate was when I decided to leave. I think that most guys, no matter how far out of their league the girls are, and no matter whether the girls have boyfriends (or even like guys) or not, would prefer that other guys leave women unattended. It was past 12:30 and Big Apple was talking about getting waffles and I just decided to walk home. I bid Winner adieu and then wandered up to the bar...

Me: OK, I'm outta here, Big Apple.
BA: You're leaving? OK. Are you walking?
Me: Yep.
BAF: Where do you live?
Me: Lower Queen Anne.
BAF: Ah... well, that's not too bad.
FGA: That's not bad at all!

...

Notice the exclamation point at the end of Fat Grizzly Adams' statement. That exclamation point is to indicate both the energy level with which he made his proclamation and its ludicrous nature (see picture to the left).

This is a guy who looks like he hasn't walked a mile in the last month, let alone at 12:30 AM on a Wednesday morning. No offense to fat people generally, but some offense to THIS fat person: shut up. Don't tell me what a good or bad walk is. I was already leaving you alone with my lady friends... no reason to get all uppity.

I made it back to my 'hood in one piece, and I ended up getting a pretty good night of sleep. I'm not sure that Tuesday outings are going to become a part of my regular agenda, but I had a good time and look forward to resting up tonight without having Fat Grizzly Adams irk be beyond reason with five simple words.

The Risk of Eccentricism

Last night I saw a guy in a hat. Not a backwards baseball cap, to his credit, but one of the hats that are in fashion these days. A fedora or something similar.

Good and fine. He looked different and a bit daring... until a guy with the same hat showed up. It reminded me of this:

Important Things with Demetri Martin
Coolness - The Dragon Man
www.comedycentral.com

Of course, it's likely that 18 months from now fedoras will be everywhere... the dragon tattoo thing probably would remain less common.

Compliment?

Part of the fun of going out is looking different. Different shirt/shoes/whatever. Being the same can be boring and getting attention (either good or bad) can be much more interesting than blending in. From blue contacts to old Keyshawn Johnson NY Jets jerseys, pushing the limit of what I'm comfortable wearing and looking like keeps it interesting.

Last night I was in a bar that I go to quite a bit, and although I don't know the name of a single person that works, there, I am enough of a regular that I talk to the employees occasionally. I had gone with a different look--parted/slicked hair and a mustache, essentially--and I had this exchange with the barback:

Her (from behind the bar, after looking at me): Haha!
Me: What?
Her (doing a circular indicative motion in front of her face): This whole thing.
Me: Me?
Her: Yeah.
Me: Ah...
Her: You look handsome.

And then she wandered off.

With compliments like that, who needs negs?

Digital Divide

Last night I was drinking and waiting for the dance floor to warm up. I was at the bar by myself, and I had my phone out to occupy me. I'm rarely EAGER to start dancing, and I need to have a crowd to have some sense of anonymity and solitude.

I was standing next to a table of three women and they were talking amongst themselves as I killed time txting and looking at websites and taking notes about those around me (I tend to forget things when I'm mid-drinking binge, so I type them up to remind my future sober self). I had the sense that I was amongst their topics of conversation.

Normally I discount that sense--it makes me feel paranoid and egocentric--but one of the women rotated on her chair and chastised me for txting.

I smiled and talked to her for a bit, and even managed to speak to her much cuter friend for a couple minutes. I don't think she knew, though, that I was more eager to blog about talking to her than I was to actually talk to her.

Walking before running

As my last post noted: I've had a bit of a creative block lately re: my blog. I've had some half-baked ideas but lacked the energy to complete them.

My response? Itty bitty blog posts.

Rather that post about 10 things and try to stitch them together, I'm going to post a series of one-off encounters or observations. I don't know how it'll turn out, but at least I'll get something written.

Here goes..

Momentum

First of all, let me aknowledge: it HAS been a while since I've written a blog entry. I have gone through these patches before where (a) nothing happens to me worth blogging about and/or (b) I lack motivation to blog.

I can't quite tell which it's been recently.

One thing I've been pondering is how I will answer the "what's new?" question. What IS new, I wonder.

Work? The same. Good.

Girls? The same. Sort of. Which is the same.

Friends? Cool people. Mostly absent.

Night life? Cats? Porn? Dishes? Laundry? Recycling?

The same.

None of this is bad, but it makes for some boring catching-up with friends and family that I haven't talked to in, say, a month.

My life is not boring... don't get me wrong. Stuff happens. Just not stuff that I can talk about (either because it's sort of sensitive or because without context it makes no sense).

This has carried over to my blogging.

I'm sorry. I'll try to do better soon, including a blog entry about some of the type of people that I experience when I go out dancing.

USA Wins Lottery

When the USA stepped into a corner market in San Jose, California, it just wanted a late-afternoon snack. It ended up getting a lot more than that.

"I hadn't eaten any gummy bears in a while, so I grabbed some and then saw that the lottery was past fifteen trillion bucks, so I decided to give it a shot."

That shot paid off, as the former hegemon was the sole winner of the $15,101,982,332,288 jackpot announced last night. Needless to say, the country has big plans for the winnings. "I've got some bills that I should probably pay down, but I also want to do some traveling. North Korea's been looking at me funny, and I might wanna throw some money at that."

While debt elimination and military projection of power may seem like the responsible thing to do, the USA has more whimsical ideas, too.

"Maybe I'll get, like a dozen iPads so I can put them on my wall and have some sort of virtual window onto an alien landscape. Or go to Mars. Wait and see, right?"

The winning numbers were (4, 8, 15, 16, 24, 42) were selected through a lucky confluence of cultural literacy (the USA is "a big Lost fan") and incompetence (the USA "totally got one of the numbers from the show wrong").

The windfall is a change of fortunes for a nation that has recently seen the BP oil spill, an early elimination from the World Cup, and Justin Bieber.

This is How We Do It...

There is a line.

When you are, as a single guy, talking to a woman, there is a line.

It's boring to compliment her eyes. It's rude to talk about her boobs. It's homosexual to gush (figuratively) over her shoes (literal gushing over her shoes might lead to the police being called).

Any woman that's worth speaking to is probably used to being spoken to. Being like other guys is something that won't help out, unless she's already decided that she wants something from you. While some guys probably have the burden of fending women off irrespective of what they (the guy) say, I don't have that problem. I would like to think that I am not offensive, visually, but I have no illusions that I can merely strike a pose and wait for attractive women to start grinding on me.

So... I need to be different. Different, as I told Canberra earlier today, can be very good. Or, as I discovered earlier tonight, it can be very bad.

I was at Chopstix tonight in the presence of The Regular and TM2000. The ratio of chicks to guys was amazing... before they showed up, I had counted a 36:6 chick to guy ratio (I guess that's a 6:1 ratio, but enumerating the population helps clarify the picture). By the time they were both there, things had evened out a bit, but the primary fact remained: women outnumbered men, but quantity did not mean quality.

In other words, there were a lot of women there, but very, very few who were physically attractive enough to be worth talking to (yes, throw me under the bus if you must as a shallow asshole, but that's the first (significant!) filter I apply as a single guy, and I don't think I'm at all unique in that).

TM2000 and I were monitoring the people entering the establishment, and it was a great chance for me to practice my poker face. As the rum entered my bloodstream and the fuglies piled into Chopstix, it became more and more difficult for me to keep a straight face. I didn't begrudge women who hadn't seen the inside of a gym (or a dentist's office, for that matter) this millenium getting out and having some fun, but the law of averages dictated that a fair number (4%? 7%?) of those women should be relatively attractive.

But... nope.

Incredibly, I was approached by one of the women who wasn't bad looking. She had a friend with her, and the friend was, in the estimation of both TM2000 and myself, the best-looking chick in the place. In spite of that fact, I held fast to the precept that being like other guys is boring, so I was being slightly contrarian.

It didn't really work. To wit:

Blond Chick: Hi!!!
Me: Heya.
Blond Chick: This is my friend... she just moved to Seat--
Me: (To Brunette Chick) Hi, there.
Brunette Chick: Hi.
Me: Is it your birthday?
Brunette Chick: What? Uh, no.
Blond Chick: She just moved to Seattle.
Me: Ah. I thought she said you just turned 21.
Brunette Chick: No. I am 25.
Me: Oh, really? I would have guessed 35.

That, my friends, is going for broke. That is taking all of your chips and pushing them into the pot when you're holding a pair of 10's. Probably (although I am too ignorant of the math to know for sure and too lazy to Google it for confirmation) a losing proposition but... who cares?

That's the beauty of it.

The reason professional golfers choke is because they overthink things. The reason (I'm guessing) poker players make mental mistakes is because they get nervous about their investment in the pot (which is entirely different than Flowers' investment in pot).

I can hear the age of an attractive woman. I can add ten years to said age, and I can say that she looks like she's ten years older than she is. And I can shrug off if she gets huffy and walks away, because I know the clever women--the women who potentially GET me--are going to fire off a question about where I was when JFK was shot, or asking if I'm pissed that my Social Security benefits don't kick in for another six years (when I turn 62).

If the chick gets offended, rolls her eyes, and turns away? Good riddance. It doesn't mean that she's a moron or that she's not a good American or that she doesn't have super-awesome taste in underwear, but it DOES mean that she is incompatible with me. Which is unfortunate for her... because I have managed to identify some incredible people--male and female--who get me, and some of them happen to be incredibly smart, fun, attractive females.

After the blond and the brunette turned away, I looked at TM2000 and The Regular and felt a pang of guilt. They didn't nominate me as the asshole who turns away (relatively) hot chicks, but they had to bear the consequences of my actions. I was able to placate myself knowing (a) TM2000 doesn't need my help meeting chicks, and (b) The Regular has idiosyncratic challenges re: women that are independent of my personal style with the fairer (if less logical) sex.

The women went back to their table, never to return. They were, in fact, driven from the dance floor by my single neg. We never learned their names, and we saw them go home with average-to-douchey-looking guys towards the end of the night.

That, though, is single life. The women might have been physically attractive, but they lacked a particular sense of humor and have ended up as bit characters in a single blog entry.

Their loss, right?

Violence on the Dance Floor

I know I'm a bad dancer, but I don't let it get me down. It's mindless fun that I partake in occasionally.

Actually, it's less mindless than it should be because when I dance I make every effort to not touch anyone. I like my bubble, and I assume, short of quite explicit indications otherwise, that others like theirs, too. So I end up apologizing a lot for bumping people. I know it's ridiculous, but I can't help myself.

You know how you should leave two car lengths on the road in order to allow proper stopping distance? (Or something like that...) And you know how sometimes someone fills in that gap by darting in front of you, spoiling your good, safe driving?

That happens to me on the dance floor. I give a couple of body widths between myself and dancing women, and more often than not some dude jumps in front of me to grind on the girl. Making it awkward because he leaves me in a position of trying to back up or being RIGHT up against his butt.

Anyway.

In spite of various frustrations, I honestly try to be a considerate dance floor participant. Maybe I do it because I'm polite or maybe I do it to atone for my utter lack of skill.

In any case, my good nature did not help last night in a bit of a frenzied environment.

It started off normally. It was about 11:30 and the dancefloor was reasonably busy. Not terrifically so, but not much room to maneuver outside of one's bubble. I was flopping around in time to the music when I saw a guy dancing near me go flying about five feet forward. It was out of the ordinary, so I looked to see who had pushed him.

Two women were giggling and looking guilty and I locked eyes with one and said, "Wow. Really? Haha." She laughed and we talked for about 10 seconds when I (BOOM) felt an odd sensation in my groin region.

This sensation was not due to the stimulating conversation, it was due to a third woman thrusting her butt into my crotch.

BOOM

The assault repeated itself and it was clear that it was not a sexy dance move. It was not joking. She was trying to move me and trying to cause pain. And was succeeding, at least, in the latter.

Wincing from the testicular assault, I engaged her in conversation and we had this brief chat:

Me: Why? What's going on?
Her: That's my sister and my cousin.
Me: Your mom is your aunt?
Her: They're not interested in you.
Me: Uh, OK. (Looking towards the first two women, who were giggling about 4 feet away) Was I being disr--

BOOM

There comes a time when one's patience is stretched too thin. I learned last night that my personal patience is stretched too thin at an accelerated pace when my nads are being mistreated.

So... after getting hit in the balls for a third time, I put my hands on her waist and I grabbed her and... pushed.

I'm not the strongest guy in the world, and I'm not proud that I would have to push anyone (let alone a chick) but I was sick of being crushed, so I pushed.

And she went flying.

Not, like, against the wall. Not to the ground. Just... away. Away from me and away from my family jewels.

Of course, while it might have helped preserve my chances for fathering children some day, it did not go over well with the pushee. The woman came storming back, screaming and flipping out. And she was joined by a fourth woman, who was significantly bigger and decided to stick up for her friend.

As these two angry women were converging on me, I stuck my hands in the air to indicate I had no interest in fighting or otherwise interacting with them.

The pushee just yelled, but the big girl took my defenselessness as an opportunity to put me in a death grip.

Well, given that I am typing this and given that I would be totally ignorant as to how to escape any kind of death grip, I suppose it wasn't an actual, bona fide death grip. But it WAS her grabbing my throat with her right hand.

So there I was, standing on a crowded dance floor with my hands up in the air with one woman screaming at me and another on with her hand on my windpipe.

My life is awesome.

Movie Experiment IV: Bananas

Sometimes planning just doesn't work as expected. Sometimes, like last night, it does.

The fourth Movie Experiment night came off flawlessly. The movie, #4 on my top 10 list, was Bananas, a 1971 farce involving Woody Allen as a sniveling loser whose search for love takes him to foreign lands. (I don't wear glasses, so I don't relate too closely to the character.)

Travelmate 2000 was kind enough to host the event, which was not held at my place because of Viewmaster's allergies to cats... allegedly there are three level of cat irritants, ranging from no effect to, like, swell up and stop breathing, and I didn't want to take a chance that one of my feline menagerie would be of the lethal variety, so I let TM2000 host.

Another deviation from the original concept: the four person party morphed into a five person party. Motown and Skynet responded as a pair to my invitation to participate in the Movie Experiment, and I wasn't sure if they HAD to go to the same movie or not, so I invited them both.

We had pizza (thank you, Pizza Hut's $10 for any pizza deal) and salad (thank you, Viewmaster) and banana nut bread (thank you, me, for taking the time to make and bake it) and we watched the movie.

No one in attendance, other than me, knew anything about the movie. Well, I think TM2000 knew Woody Allen was in it, but other than that? Nothing.

The movie itself is silly and it's got some dated material. It has fun with Howard Cosell (who died in 1995) and the Wide World of Sports (which went off the air in 1998). It also has obscure references (does anyone really know what the I Ching is?)

But the silliness is timeless. "Who am I going to leave this hospital to?" is one of my favorite parental laments ever. And this is a gem:

I had a good relationship with my parents. They very rarely h-... I think they hit me once, actually, in my whole childhood. They, they, uh, started beating me on the 23rd of December in 1942, and stopped beating me in the late Spring of '44. 

There's also the occasional wince-inducing line which portends the societally unacceptable relationship Mr. Allen has had with his current wife, "Doing a sociological study on perversion. I'm up to Advanced Child Molesting."

(Yes, he probably didn't have sex with her before she was 18, but marrying your lover's adopted daughter is weird, I think we'd all agree...)

After the movie, we talked for over an hour about... stuff. About the movie a bit, but mainly just telling stories. We got into an interesting motif of telling funny hotel/sleeping situation stories.

Viewmaster told a tale of a ski trip she took with some male buddies, including one who pulled an engaged chick back to their shared king-sized bed. Motown talked about a baseball trip he took once with six dudes in a hotel room. I told the story about Vancouver (January, 2008). And about Hawaii (July, 2008) and the other story about Hawaii (July, 2008) and fleshed out the Las Vegas (April, 2009) story a bit.

It sounds like a talked a lot. Maybe I did. I didn't mean to. :)

We also touched upon how my sense of humor rubs people the wrong way, both on Facebook and in real life. All four participants last night are enthusiastic about my blog at some level, which was an ego stroke, and it was nice to talk about the people I've offended and have the gang chime in with comments like, "They just don't get you!" and "Some people need to relax!"

I mean... I think that's true, too, but it's nice to have people agree with me.

The end of the night sneaked up on us, and we dispersed. I took the leftover food (TM2000 is headed for Vegas in a couple of days, so I felt no compunction NOT leaving food behind for the host) and walked home in the pouring rain. In spite of my lack of a jacket and in spite of the fact that the rain made my leftover banana nut bread a bit soggy, I was smiling the whole way home.

It was a good night.

A Story from 2008: Japanese Chicks in Hawaii

In 2008 I went to Hawaii with a few friends: TM2000, Flowers, and Flowers' gf Ice.

We sang karaoke, we got sunburned, we hiked, and we drank.

TM2000 and I also attempted to meet women. Unless we're in Mexico, that's been known to actually work occasionally.

The last night we were in Waikiki, the four of us met for drinks and TM2000 and I peeled off from the other two, who were probably going to go bump coconuts. And thus begins the adventure.

The Pickup

We weren't sure where to go, and after hitting up a bar we'd frequented, uh, frequently during our stay we decided to go to Senor Frog's. Our expectations were tremendously low... as part of our "No Women Tour of Mexico" some months earlier, we had gone to Senor Frog's in Puerto Vallarta, and while there were some attractive young women there, for some reason the young women are significantly less appealing when their parents are hovering a couple of tables away.

(Translation: the girls were all too young. Even for me. Which is saying something.)

So TM2000 and I took the elevator up to the bar. We ordered a drink. We worked the dance floor a bit (him in a skillful and appealing-to-women sort of way, me in a "oh my God, he's horrible!/someone call the paramedics, because he's going to break something if he keeps moving that spastically and unappealingly" kind of way). TM2000 started talking to a girl, and this is where (finally) things got interesting.

(Actually, things had been interesting the previous night in an adventure I had with a batch of Australian chicks... that will have to wait until another time, though.)

The woman was Japanese and she was there with another Japanese chick. They were being ruthlessly hit upon by dudes, and they were gladly accepting the free drinks that were being thrust upon them.

From my perspective? I almost NEVER buy random chicks drinks. On a date? Sure. A friend I've known for a while? Absolutely. Some girl I just met and might be interested in talking to? No way. I've done that about five times in the 2.5 years, and I have not got a kiss nor a number nor anything but thinly veiled contempt from any of the recipients. I love women sometimes.

If and when I buy a drink, though, for a girl? I think that it'd be a bad sign if she started sharing it with another random guy.

TM2000 was that random guy in this case.

The first Japanese girl, Ichi, had been the recipient of a free drink. A big, colorful, vase-like drink that was probably filled with sugars and liqueurs and odd tropical colors. Evidently it was too much, or she was trying to ditch her patron, or she was just super-interested in TM2000. For whatever reason, she offered him a sip.

I don't even remember if he took her up on it, but I know that it gave us an ability to talk to Ichi and her friend, Ni. The dudeswarm eventually receded and we convinced them to hit up another bar with us. A bar that happened to be on the way back to our hotel room.

The Extraction

Sometimes guys notice when girls are into other guys. Sometimes they do not. This was one of those "do not" situations.

Of all the guys standing around Ichi and Ni, one persevered. The bar closed and the four of us left together, and Clinger was right behind us.

Over the course of the next 15 minutes or so, Clinger followed us. He stayed within about 30 feet of us. He waited at the bottom of an escalator for us. He ignored dirty looks and he ignored when I attempted to get rid of him with a, "Look, buddy, it looks like they're hanging out with us tonight."

Finally, Ichi talked to the guy. She was pretty traditionally Japanese and she was clearly uncomfortable with the "confrontation", but she took his phone number and he finally (FINALLY) went away.

Second Location

After the uncomfortable Clinger portion of the early morning, we made our way to the other bar. It was about 3:00 AM at this point, if I remember correctly, and it was a bar that TM2000 and I had been to several times before.

We had paired off, with Ni sitting next to me and Ichi and TM2000 together in a big booth.  I felt justified in buying Ni a drink, and TM2000 did the same for Ichi. TM2000, though, does things his own way, and his own way is sometimes the cheap way.

Ichi wanted a Redbull and vodka. Presumbaly, given the late hour, she needed energy and it didn't seem to be an unreasonable request. TM2000, however, had memories of our trip to Mexico and me getting stuck with a $16 Red Bull and vodka charge... he also knew there were house specials for the night, so he went ahead and got Ichi a mini pitcher of Bud Light. $3. Done and done.

Ichi wasn't going to say "no," I suppose, so the two of them nursed the value that was the Bud Light mini pitcher as Ni and I enjoyed whatever cocktails I had got for us.

We then decided to go back to our hotel room for after-hours. And for adventure. Although I'm not sure promising "adventure" in a hotel room would be the best move with most women...

The Hotel Room

On the walk back, TM2000 admitted that he was feeling a bit sick to his stomach. He seemed pretty sure that he was going to vomit, but we knew there was going to be a problem. Actually, two problems.

Problem #1: Our hotel room was not that big. It had a queen bed and a cot-like mobile bed, and it had a TV, and it had an attached bathroom. It worked perfectly for us and what we needed, but it didn't provide many soundproof vomiting options.

Problem #2: Women are not really very turned on by the sound of a man vomiting. At least not many women.

So TM2000 had to vomit. We had two women in our hotel room who, presumably, didn't want to her him upchuck on the other side of a very thin door. It was about 4:00, so even if we had an audio source (TV or radio) that could drown out the sound, it could have resulted in issues with our neighbors.

Fortunately, we are creative. And, fortunately, we had a balcony.

TM2000 stepped out onto the balcony to spray the lower floors with partially digested food and beer foam, and I attempted to distract Ichi and Ni. I did so, in part, by asking them what they did for a living.

Ichi was, as it turns out, a massage therapist. After several "happy ending" jokes, which were both racially insensitive and probably lost upon Ichi altogether, I told her that was cool and that she should give TM2000 a massage when he got back in. She agreed and I told Ni that I would give HER a massage, too.

He came back in, had something to drink and/or popped some gum in his mouth. Operation: Vomit was successful, and Operation: Freak TM2000 Out was just beginning.

TM2000 was on the right side of the bed, facing the television (which was tuned to TNT or something equally semi-boring) and Ni did the same a few feet to his left. Ichi straddled TM2000's butt and I did the same on Ni.

I enjoy giving backrubs. I hesitate to use the word "massage" because it seems like that a massage might have some medicinal value and/or require some level of professional skill.

Even though I might not be able to give a proper therapeutic massage, I can perform "monkey see, monkey do".

Ichi bent TM2000's arm one way, and I mimicked her with Ni's arm. She pushed on his neck and I pushed on Ni's. Sounds OK, right? Well, again, there were two problems with this:

Problem #1: I was not sober and I had no idea what I was doing. I had no idea the amount of pressure to apply. I could not tell how far I should be stretching Ni's limbs. She was little and I probably could have really hurt her.

Problem #2: TM2000 was screaming his head off. Remember, he had been outside when it had been established that Ichi did that for a living. Remember, too, that massages can be kind of painful, even when you expect the person to know what they're doing. In his pain and ignorance, gems such as, "You're breaking my arm!" and "What are you doing to me? Aaah!" were exclaimed, although in real life they were more in bold, all caps.

After the massage session, where miraculously no one was injured and no police were called due to the yelling, Ni decided to go home. I walked her down to the taxi and she went home.

I came back up and Ichi and TM2000 were already asleep. I crashed in the little mobile bed and slept soundly.

The Next Morning

I woke up relatively early in spite of the late night, and I cracked my eyes open to ensure it was safe to be looking around. I was confronted with an odd sight.

It was Ichi, on the bed, resting on her knees. She was looking at a sleeping TM2000, and when he finally stirred himself she waited for a moment and, in an oddly pleading tone, said, "Can I go home now?"

It was one of those odd moments in life where I just don't know what I'm seeing. Was she asking for his permission? Was she asking for a ride home? I honestly don't know.

TM2000 dismissed Ichi and we packed for the trip home and it was good.