I work overnights and on my days off I keep my strange hours, which means I go to bed around 6:30 or 7:00 am every morning.
Jamie gets off work at 11:00 pm and is usually in bed around midnight. Saturday morning, when I decided to go to sleep, I found Jamie draped diagonally across the mattress at such an angle I found it impossible to crawl into bed.
Here's what happened next, and bear in mind that Jamie didn't open her eyes once during this entire interaction:
"Hey, scoot over," I said.
She waves me away with one hand.
"I can't get on the bed, scoot over."
She shakes her head no.
I pat her knee to indicate she needs to scoot over.
"Beat it, geek."
She legitimately said that. She has no memory of it, but it happened. Eventually, she finally scoots over. The dog hops on the bed also, and I start to pet him.
"Stop petting the dog," Jamie says.
"Why?" I ask.
"So that I can get some SLEEP!" Jamie yells.
Well, alright then.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Some Things I've Been Up To, or "What Up, Yo?" Vol. 1: My Years With Def Jam
Blog Part I-- Quick Notes:
A few quickies not worth an entire blog:
1. Why did Aerosmith get to write so many songs about vaginas?
2. Speaking of songs, if Jay does successfully learn to play the guitar, do you think he’ll write many different songs about his penis, or do you think he’ll take the Axl Rose path and strive for years to write one perfect, epic rock ballad about his penis?
3. Once people in this country can finally get gay married can we start work on forcing those little Nazi kids to finally give the Twix rabbit some cereal? I know this isn't a new revelation, but I really do hate those commercials. Though perhaps legalizing pot should take precedence over the Twix rabbit. After all, you'd think legal pot could only help people agree to give rabbits cereal.
4. I just watched the first season of “Life” via a dvd set borrowed from an annoying co-worker (the trading card guy). It focuses on a detective, recently released from twelve years of wrongful incarceration, who solves shamefully easy cases while eating fruit and spouting zen. It’s frighteningly realistic. Some have even commented that it is an almost picture perfect documentary of my life. However, these people ignore a few subtle differences. For instance, I may enjoy fruit, but I certainly haven’t based a character quirk around it, and I am much more interested by Buddhist philosophy than Zen (though the two beliefs do tend to intersect). Also, I’m not a detective. Or rich or handsome or interesting. Other than that, I must say that I do see the similarities.
Blog Part II: My fiancée is cheap. That is, in the “thrifty” sense of the word, not the “trampy” sense.
I will state my case using examples from the past two days only. I’ll start small and get bigger, like my bedroom behavior but in reverse (if you want, I’ll even stay awake and cuddle after):
Yesterday she flat out refused to buy me Fruity Pebbles, because she feels they are exorbitantly priced—not that she said that. She just looked back and forth between me and the price tag saying “Ouch!” and “Geez!” until I said I didn’t want them anymore. Postnote: She then bought a $1.00 donut because she wanted half of it. And I know I can buy my own cereal, but that’s not the point. This is a woman who gets money from scratch tickets and immediately “re-invests” the money into additional, non-winning, scratch tickets.
This one is about two weeks old, but she recently spent an afternoon shopping for a Valentine’s Day card before deciding they were all too expensive and making one with folded typing paper and a black ink pen instead. Though, to be fair, that card was legitimately awesome.
Saturday Jamie decided that she needed to save money and cut the dog’s hair herself. The results were tragic and irreversible:
A few quickies not worth an entire blog:
1. Why did Aerosmith get to write so many songs about vaginas?
2. Speaking of songs, if Jay does successfully learn to play the guitar, do you think he’ll write many different songs about his penis, or do you think he’ll take the Axl Rose path and strive for years to write one perfect, epic rock ballad about his penis?
3. Once people in this country can finally get gay married can we start work on forcing those little Nazi kids to finally give the Twix rabbit some cereal? I know this isn't a new revelation, but I really do hate those commercials. Though perhaps legalizing pot should take precedence over the Twix rabbit. After all, you'd think legal pot could only help people agree to give rabbits cereal.
4. I just watched the first season of “Life” via a dvd set borrowed from an annoying co-worker (the trading card guy). It focuses on a detective, recently released from twelve years of wrongful incarceration, who solves shamefully easy cases while eating fruit and spouting zen. It’s frighteningly realistic. Some have even commented that it is an almost picture perfect documentary of my life. However, these people ignore a few subtle differences. For instance, I may enjoy fruit, but I certainly haven’t based a character quirk around it, and I am much more interested by Buddhist philosophy than Zen (though the two beliefs do tend to intersect). Also, I’m not a detective. Or rich or handsome or interesting. Other than that, I must say that I do see the similarities.
Blog Part II: My fiancée is cheap. That is, in the “thrifty” sense of the word, not the “trampy” sense.
I will state my case using examples from the past two days only. I’ll start small and get bigger, like my bedroom behavior but in reverse (if you want, I’ll even stay awake and cuddle after):
Yesterday she flat out refused to buy me Fruity Pebbles, because she feels they are exorbitantly priced—not that she said that. She just looked back and forth between me and the price tag saying “Ouch!” and “Geez!” until I said I didn’t want them anymore. Postnote: She then bought a $1.00 donut because she wanted half of it. And I know I can buy my own cereal, but that’s not the point. This is a woman who gets money from scratch tickets and immediately “re-invests” the money into additional, non-winning, scratch tickets.
This one is about two weeks old, but she recently spent an afternoon shopping for a Valentine’s Day card before deciding they were all too expensive and making one with folded typing paper and a black ink pen instead. Though, to be fair, that card was legitimately awesome.
Saturday Jamie decided that she needed to save money and cut the dog’s hair herself. The results were tragic and irreversible:
(It looks much worse in person)
I’ll admit this might be a little unfair. There is a chance Jamie’s not cheap, just insane. To wit:
While I was taking my bi-monthly Sunday night shower, Jamie screamed “Do you love me?” and then fell off of the toilet. She was standing on it in an attempt to dump a glass of cold water on me. I told her that absolutely no part of me would find anything funny about that gag, and she responded with giggling and an excited “I know!”
Yesterday she shouted “come here and let me pet you, you little bitch!” to our dog and then interrupted the movie I was watching to incorrectly sing “You’re the Wind Beneath My Wings” four feet from my face.
And then there's this, which I won't explain. Just know it wouldn't have happened without Jamie's fervent insistence:
Well, you'll have to imagine your own closing line now, because I'm going to go make a sandwich with three different kinds of meat.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
MAGIC!! (Not the Card Game)
As you may or may not know, I have possibly the most helpful brother in the entire world. For instance, I recently changed my phone number. My sweet, gentle brother took time out of his day to tell me that it was “the single gayest phone number” he had ever seen. Thanks, brother! He also regularly lets me know that Jesus hates me. It isn’t just pointless criticism, either. He gives me reasons why Jesus hates me (presumably so I can improve myself, although Jay has never said as much). Another theory of mine that I (assume) my brother disagrees with is that I generally trust Magic to fix problems in my life.
You see, I might be dying. I have weird leprosy spots of dying skin littered over my (manly? burlesque?) physique. Sometimes they itch and I feed them lotion, but other than that they spend their time quietly spreading over all of my body. Sometimes one of my eyes gets inexplicably blurry. The specific eye that blurs varies, but it is always just one of them at a time. Which is nice, I suppose. Also, one day I was trimming my mustache and I think my gums started to bleed. I tasted blood. I would’ve investigated further (probably by continuing to stand in front of the mirror and opening my mouth) but I was tired and went to bed instead.
Why don’t I see a doctor, you ask? Well, I’m poor. And if the liberal media has taught me anything, it’s that poor people are refused health care. I mean, I could try, but what’s the point? (As an aside, I’m thinking of having that last sentence tattooed on my forehead, next to a picture of a stick figure shrugging. It’s about as good a summary of my life as anything.)
But fret not, my dear four readers! I have faith I will survive… Through the power of MAGIC. This isn’t a baseless hope. MAGIC has helped me before.
Sometimes it helps me in little ways. Once, back in high school, the TV in my room started smoking and smelled like cap gun pellets. I shut it down for two weeks and when I turned it back on, MAGIC had fixed the problem. That TV lasted me until last year. Another time MAGIC made Creed break up. If more people believed in MAGIC (it’s like Santa Claus, Jesus, and Tinkerbell—it gets more powerful the more you believe in it) than maybe Scott Stapp would’ve been hit by a car instead of just outed as a douche, if he hadn’t been already.
The best example of MAGIC benefiting my life comes from college. Let me tell you a little tale! My freshman year of college was not the most hygienic year of my life. Occasionally I would sniff the day’s underwear before I went to bed to test if it was clean enough to put back in my drawer and wear again. One time I peed down the stairwell. I angered my dorm-mate every Sunday morning because I would use his Foreman to cook one of my favorite meals (chicken with a side of steak or vice versa) while lying down on our futon. I still maintain that this makes sense—that way I got to cook, eat, and nap without having to do anything more strenuous than rolling over.
Probably the least hygienic thing I did, however, was drink Kool-Aid. You see, we didn’t have a dishwasher in our dorm, and I was too lazy to do the dishes anyway. So I just made new Kool-Aid on top of the old Kool-Aid residue and drank straight from the pitcher (no sense in dirtying a glass). I started doing this my first week in college, and by the end of October I had successfully worn down my body’s defenses. I was sick. The hurts to breathe, “did I just cough up really solid mucus or a very runny testicle?” kind of sick.
I was sick enough that time that I actually did go to the doctor. Well, not the doctor, exactly, but the Iowa State Student Health Center. So kind of like a doctor in Mexico. At the end of my visit, during which I spoke to four different “doctors,” I was given a prescription for a bottle of happy pills. Incidentally, the doctor that prescribed the pills was the one who had spoken with me the least. When I filled the prescription, the guy at the pharmacy desk said what you hope to hear when you’re handed a bottle of pills: “One of these will slow you down. Two of these… will really slow you down.”
I took two pills and went to class. Holy shit was I high (legally, mind you) but my throat still hurt like the dickens. So scratch science. At least qualified science. My next step was to self medicate. Saving my super-duper pills for when I was healthy enough to enjoy them, I decided to cure my throat with a concoction of two different cough medicines, some of that spray stuff that numbs your whole mouth, cold pills, Advil (why not?) and Sucrets. Five days passed. I was still breathing thumbtacks. I decided to stop self-medicating, although my head did feel pleasantly lighter than the rest of my body. I switched tactics, by which I mean I quit trying and got outrageously drunk. The next day I awoke with mysterious drunken leg soreness (am I the only one who gets that?) but a clean bill of health. I breathed without pain. I breathed again, just to test it. I stopped breathing, not wanted to be greedy. I started breathing again when I remembered I would die otherwise. It was beautiful. MAGIC had cured me.
Not everyone believes my version of this story. When I told my mom, she said “Well, sometimes all you need is a really good drunk.” I’m sure you’ve all heard the same thing from your mothers countless times. However, I maintain that MAGIC fixed me. And like everything else in life, it's no less magical if it is aided by alcohol.
I just hope the MAGIC happens soon, because I’m really starting to itch.
You see, I might be dying. I have weird leprosy spots of dying skin littered over my (manly? burlesque?) physique. Sometimes they itch and I feed them lotion, but other than that they spend their time quietly spreading over all of my body. Sometimes one of my eyes gets inexplicably blurry. The specific eye that blurs varies, but it is always just one of them at a time. Which is nice, I suppose. Also, one day I was trimming my mustache and I think my gums started to bleed. I tasted blood. I would’ve investigated further (probably by continuing to stand in front of the mirror and opening my mouth) but I was tired and went to bed instead.
Why don’t I see a doctor, you ask? Well, I’m poor. And if the liberal media has taught me anything, it’s that poor people are refused health care. I mean, I could try, but what’s the point? (As an aside, I’m thinking of having that last sentence tattooed on my forehead, next to a picture of a stick figure shrugging. It’s about as good a summary of my life as anything.)
But fret not, my dear four readers! I have faith I will survive… Through the power of MAGIC. This isn’t a baseless hope. MAGIC has helped me before.
Sometimes it helps me in little ways. Once, back in high school, the TV in my room started smoking and smelled like cap gun pellets. I shut it down for two weeks and when I turned it back on, MAGIC had fixed the problem. That TV lasted me until last year. Another time MAGIC made Creed break up. If more people believed in MAGIC (it’s like Santa Claus, Jesus, and Tinkerbell—it gets more powerful the more you believe in it) than maybe Scott Stapp would’ve been hit by a car instead of just outed as a douche, if he hadn’t been already.
The best example of MAGIC benefiting my life comes from college. Let me tell you a little tale! My freshman year of college was not the most hygienic year of my life. Occasionally I would sniff the day’s underwear before I went to bed to test if it was clean enough to put back in my drawer and wear again. One time I peed down the stairwell. I angered my dorm-mate every Sunday morning because I would use his Foreman to cook one of my favorite meals (chicken with a side of steak or vice versa) while lying down on our futon. I still maintain that this makes sense—that way I got to cook, eat, and nap without having to do anything more strenuous than rolling over.
Probably the least hygienic thing I did, however, was drink Kool-Aid. You see, we didn’t have a dishwasher in our dorm, and I was too lazy to do the dishes anyway. So I just made new Kool-Aid on top of the old Kool-Aid residue and drank straight from the pitcher (no sense in dirtying a glass). I started doing this my first week in college, and by the end of October I had successfully worn down my body’s defenses. I was sick. The hurts to breathe, “did I just cough up really solid mucus or a very runny testicle?” kind of sick.
I was sick enough that time that I actually did go to the doctor. Well, not the doctor, exactly, but the Iowa State Student Health Center. So kind of like a doctor in Mexico. At the end of my visit, during which I spoke to four different “doctors,” I was given a prescription for a bottle of happy pills. Incidentally, the doctor that prescribed the pills was the one who had spoken with me the least. When I filled the prescription, the guy at the pharmacy desk said what you hope to hear when you’re handed a bottle of pills: “One of these will slow you down. Two of these… will really slow you down.”
I took two pills and went to class. Holy shit was I high (legally, mind you) but my throat still hurt like the dickens. So scratch science. At least qualified science. My next step was to self medicate. Saving my super-duper pills for when I was healthy enough to enjoy them, I decided to cure my throat with a concoction of two different cough medicines, some of that spray stuff that numbs your whole mouth, cold pills, Advil (why not?) and Sucrets. Five days passed. I was still breathing thumbtacks. I decided to stop self-medicating, although my head did feel pleasantly lighter than the rest of my body. I switched tactics, by which I mean I quit trying and got outrageously drunk. The next day I awoke with mysterious drunken leg soreness (am I the only one who gets that?) but a clean bill of health. I breathed without pain. I breathed again, just to test it. I stopped breathing, not wanted to be greedy. I started breathing again when I remembered I would die otherwise. It was beautiful. MAGIC had cured me.
Not everyone believes my version of this story. When I told my mom, she said “Well, sometimes all you need is a really good drunk.” I’m sure you’ve all heard the same thing from your mothers countless times. However, I maintain that MAGIC fixed me. And like everything else in life, it's no less magical if it is aided by alcohol.
I just hope the MAGIC happens soon, because I’m really starting to itch.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
