Wednesday, November 30, 2005

If you get any closer...

Kelly and I went to Toys R' Us to look for some Christmas presents for Jack and Aeryn; what happened was that we ended up leaving twenty minutes later with me in a royally foul mood. What could happen in a simple toy store you may ask?

The Human Enema. That's what. Worse, they were yuppies. Real honest-to-goodness BMW driving, trenchcoat sporting, soap opera named ones. If there's one thing I can not stand when I'm at the store, it's the human enema. For example, when I'm walking through the mall and some jerkoff walks so closely behind me I'd be unable to squeeze a fart out between us. Usually there's nobody on either side of me and no reason under the sun they couldn't simply walk around me if they're in that much of a hurry. But no, oh no, they'd much rather form a suction seal on my ass.

I was looking at one of those electronic writing toys that teach kids to spell; my niece could really benefit from one and I'd seen them on TV and wanted to check them out in person. I walked up to it, pressed two buttons and picked up the pen that came with it, and all of the sudden, out of nowhere comes 'Trinity' marching up behind me. Slinking is probably a better word, she just appeared in my peripheral vision. She was close. Very close. Just standing there silently in her trenchcoat, peering over my shoulder with exaggerated jerks of her neck, 'straining' to see around me.

I got pissed (go German temper!) and stepped away making a comment about not being able to focus when someone was crawling into my anus. I turned around and she spits off 'Oh, Devon, come see this!'

Devon had on a nice buton up shirt tucked into his designer jeans. His metrosexual ensemble was completed by a pair of $500 italian leather shoes and a matching jacket which he carried flung waiter-style over his arm. For some unknown reason, it just popped into my head that they must have a BMW. I even made a comment to Kelly to this effect.

A few minutes and several frustrating encounters with 'Trinity' and Devon later, we left. As we got to the car, what was parked next to us? A black BMW with sport rims. I'm sure they managed to fit the Power-Wheels ride-on Hummer in the backseat so they could take it home and appease the materialistic demands of their yuppie spawn on Materialismas.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

B to the Izzo T to tha CH

I haven't had an anti-in law moment in a while now, and evidently I was overdue. I sometimes wonder if God created my Mother In Law specifically to be my arch-nemesis. She's my Lex Luthor, I swear to God. Every thought that somehow sparks in her head has not only the qualitative features of feces, but also the aroma. I seriously wonder if she's even aware of the near-infinite degree of utter arrogance she posesses. I could rant about this for hours, days even. But, I'll spare you the chance reader the full brunt of the story.

Here's the latest entry. Jack was upstairs playing for a bit and decided he wanted to get out his little play tunnel and crawl around in the living room quietly. She suddenly demands (!!???) he put it away. Why? 'I can't stand kids playing after 8 pm.'

I stood in the doorway, the smile on my face from watching my son play slowly fading as a feeling of 'What in the fuck did I just hear come out of her mouth?' washed over me like a wave of fresh bullshit. I've learned over the years to not bother attempting to respond. It's wasted breath. I'd have a better response rate trying to convince corpses to get up and do the cha-cha-cha.

i just grabbed Jack, gave him lots of love, and took him to bed. Not to placate her, but to get him the hell out of her unholy sight. He doesn't need to be exposed to that, and neither do I. I turned to Kelly, and said simply, "I'm going downstairs." I took Jack to bed and came downstairs to vent. I wonder if she realizes that every time she's around and says something stupid I leave. My God I wish someone would give her some kind of anti-bitch pil. She makes my skin crawl, and this is only the latest mild example of why.

Television is the Antichrist

We're sitting here in the living room watching kids TV shows. More precisely, Kelly is sleeping on the couch, Jack is watching Blue's Clues, and I'm sitting here with the computer on my lap. Now that I've successfully managed to illustrate the situation, I've got a few thoughts on TV.

While I was selling cars, I virtually never watched TV. I lost track of Battlestar Galactica, which was my favorite show at the time, and now I really couldn't care whether I pick back up with it or not. It's a little odd to actually be home so much and get to watch so much TV. I forgot exactly how little I really liked it to begin with.

Jack loves Blue's Clues, the Wiggles, Dora the Explorer and Go Diego Go. I've watched about 700 episodes of each, and I can still tolerate them. Dora and Diego are a little creepy with their oversized eyes. I think they wait for the parents watching the show to look away so they can do something obscene. They also get into these situations where they want the kids watching to shout out a word, so they'll say something like "You have to say backpack. Say backpack!" That in and of itself is quite harmless, but it's the unnaturally long pause they then take while staring unflinchingly at my son. He stares back. They seem to wait about 5 seconds too long for the kids to actually respond. Maybe I'm just being weird, but it creeps me out.

All in all the kids shows seem to be pretty good. I wish I could say the same for the stuff Kelly watches, but I just can't. I love her to death, but she's an avid watcher of 7th Heaven. There I said it. I married a 7th Heaven fan. Every week, it's virtually the same setup. One of the kids says or does something, or avoids saying or doing something, which causes some colossal misunderstanding amongst the rest of the family. Hilarity ensues. (Not really, but that's the intent.) Then at the end of the episode, there's a big preachy resolution and the kid gets in some sort of minor trouble for causing the whole shenanigan. All of this set to acoustic guitar riffs.

It's either that or some show about people buying a house, remodeling a house, remodeling a yard, building a house for poor people, cleaning out a house, having a fashion makeover or a baby. In and of themselves, the shows aren't THAT bad...well, some of them are. What really drives me insane is the fact that they deem it necessary to play about 15 of them in a row.

Ugh. Yes, I hate TV.

Saturday, November 12, 2005

Baked Apples, Cold Peaches, and Headbanging

The past two days I've been wringing my hands over what in the name of all things holy was causing my iBook to run at an obscenely high temperature even at idle. Just turning it on it spiked to over 170 degrees, which was a little un-nerving to say the very least. Jack accidentally broke my power brick, so I have to replace that as it is. Staring another repair in the face was making me sweat. Sure enough, a little peek under the hood revealed my stupid HP printer drivers were sucking up 98% of my CPU cycles. I quit the process and breathed a little easier when the temperature dropped over 30 degrees right off the bat. HP, get your shit together, seriously. I dropped my Compaq to go Apple, and I will gladly find another printer manufacturer. Carly really f*cked you guys up in more ways than I thought possible.

We took the kids to the park to play tonight, but it was particularly cold. We ended up bundling them up in the strollers and doing a quick lap of the park, and for some reason, I was the only one complaining. I'm the one who usually drives with the AC on even in winter. I'm always the one who is too hot, and I was shivering like a chihuahua on crack.

Speaking of hot, I've been expanding my digital music collection now that I've finally managed to wrestle my laptop away from Kelly. I finally fixed her PC and now she's spoiled by the bliss that is Mac. Ugh. That's an entirely seperate post. I just got the new CD by Demon Hunter, called The Triptych. These guys are awesome, it's Metal at the core, with plenty of melodic moments and actual singing woven in. You've got to hear it to understand. It's catchy as anything, and definitely a must listen. I 'm listening to it as I write this, and I've already hit repeat more than once on more than one track. It's that good.

Friday, November 11, 2005

Do you do the Dew too?


Mountain Dew has done it. They've officially created the most addictive energy drink ever. For some reason this new 'MDX' soda has me completely hooked. It takes some wickedly powerful stuff to actually get me firing on all cylinders and this manages to do it. Only Red Bull (blech!) has been able to manage that herculean task up till now.


While sitting here sipping on it, I got the urge to look it up online, and came across the Death by Caffeine site. I love the calculator that tells you how much of the stuff you'd have to drink in order for it to literally kill you. Looks like my German genetics would let me down a full 195 bottles of the strangely anti-freeze looking brew before I kicked the bucket. Not only informative, but cool.

In completely unrelated news, somehow, Jack is actually taking a nap. I don't know what form of black magic is afoot here, but he's actually sleeping. For some reason he seems to have given that up recently. Oh well, the Terrible Twos are approaching, and I say bring em on.

I just realized Kelly and I aren't going to my parent's house for our customary Friday night pizza. It's my great-aunt's birthday, and we never RSVP'd since no one was available to watch Jack and Aeryn. Not a big deal though, we'll find something to get into. Hopefully Kelly can make a better meal for us tonight than the shameful excuse for chicken I tried to pass off as a meal last evening.

Revenge of the Mexicans

Here I go with the second post referencing something Mexican in under a week. This time the scourge of my existance is the delicacy known as the Taco. Historically, tacos and I have enjoyed a very comfortable relationship. I eat them, they make me happy, etcetera. Not this time. Oh no. This time, the tacos got mouthy with me. I ate them. Two of them. They left me alone for a few hours, evidently taking the time to plot the scope of the sneak attack they planned on my innards.

At 2 AM the other morning, I awoke with a sudden sense of unease. No nausea, just the knowledge that something was amiss. I drifted back to sleep and woke up again around 5. This time, though there was still no nausea, my spidey-sense told me something was up. Around 5 after 5, the first attack by the intestinal insurgents detonated suicide taco bombs at both the front and back doors to the Chris compound. The simultaneous nature of the attacks led Fox News to conclude it was Al-Qaeda. It was more like the Angry Dinner Liberation Front. Reeling from the onslaught of the attacks, I was rushed back to bed where I spent the entire remainder of the day sleeping off my nausea and fatigue in a pepto-bismol and phenergan induced coma. I think I'm going to cede this victory to the enemy. I'm pretty much done with Mexican food. I don't think I could ever enjoy it quite the same way. Not after this.

The flip side is, I ended up sleeping on the couch, remaining awake long enough to catch a few episodes of Star Trek The Next Generation on SpikeTV. Crap channel, good show. It's amazing that I'm still obsessed with it so many years after it's demise. Of course, I did start watching it when I was 10 years old so I effectively grew up with it.

Wow, way to almost lose my post Firefox. Good ol' Safari saves the day. Anyway, today was somewhat better; I still had the requisite 'blahs' but I think I'm pretty much better. I'm a horrible sick person so I'm sure Kelly's going to be thrilled.

I saw a funny commercial today for Burger King. Some guy is trying to light the grill and it won't start...then a stormtrooper from Star Wars walks up and pumps three laser rounds into the grill. The manager scolds him with 'What did I tell you about the blaster?" So he pumps another round in and struts off. Good stuff.

Monday, November 7, 2005

Disregard the Melatonin and Pass the Dew

Here I sit staying up late surfing again for no real reason other than I don't want to go to sleep. I've got a lot on my mind, but I'm too tired to let any of it actually matter. A few things circulating in my head tonight:

Why in the hell do Mexicans always walk around in groups of three? I'm not being racist at ALL here; I live in a heavily hispanic town, and I see this all the time. It's always three of them, and almost without fail one is wearing a cowboy hat, cowboy boots and an obscenely large belt buckle. I just want an answer here, and I think I'm entitled to one. Am I the only one that notices this stuff?

Why do movies of the week always feature pseudoscience so ridiculous it makes me feel ashamed that I ever even conceived of tuning in in the first place? I clicked over to 'Category 7' tonight for all of ten minutes, eight of which were spent with my mouth agape in horror at the utter disregard for anything even approaching real science. Of course, I did understand that is was called Category 7, when the scale only goes up to 5. Guess I kind of deserved this one. I just don't watch TV much at all anymore, and I thought this would be a nice break. Wrong.

We had a good day today, nothing too exciting really. We actually got out and went to church today, which we've been trying to do for weeks. We went over to mom and dad's kind of early, and Kelly and Mom went out and took the kids shopping for a few hours. It was kind of nice to be able to totally pimp on the couch and catch up on some sweet History Channel goodness. I'm obsessed with this show they have now called "Shootout" where the go over an individual battle or gunfight in miniscule computer recreated gloriously insane detail.

Jack was again driven by some unknown force to smear yogurt all over everything within arm's range at dinner. You have to laugh when he pulls that stunt. Aeryn got sick this afternoon, but seemed to feel better immediately. Poor girl.

Well, I need to get to sleep. First thing in the AM I need to finish up getting my paperwork in order for the web-design business, and I need to finish tweaking my site. It'd be kind of stupid to be a designer without a site. I hope my bonus check from work gets here soon.

Friday, November 4, 2005

The 900 Dollar Bet

Well, I did it. Thursday I quit selling cars. I'd had enough. Sticking it out for four months was about the limit of my endurance. I knew going into it that the hours would suck. They in fact did. They brought new meaning to the word suck; and brought my quality of life to a whole new depth of suckitude.

I wasn't satisfied with my level of sales, but I wasn't upset with my presentations either. Sometimes, people just don't want to buy a car. Unfortunately, Adam, my manager, didn't see it that way. While I had three...count em THREE customers in the showroom, he pulled me into a back office and proceeded to tell me (not to put me down, of course) that I essentially sucked at selling cars and needed to start training all over or else I should switch jobs, etc.

This coming from someone who redefines the term asshole on a continuous basis. Look up the word Kaizen. That's what he brings to being an asshole. Well, regardless, I sucked it up, went out, sold a car and fought like hell for another one. The third customer was way too far upside down to buy anything, but they left happy.

So I drove home and stewed on what happened. Then I did the math. I made 900 dollars last month. I worked about 70 hours a week. Doing the math told me I made about 3.23 an hour. All of that so I could piss away what little I did make in gas to do the 120 mile daily commute, never see my family, and listen to Adam's shitblast.

I decided Thursday morning I was done. I talked it through with Kelly, and she agreed. I HATE to give up a paycheck, but I felt as if the toll it was taking on my family was far too great. I can find another paycheck, but I can't replace the time with my family.

The past few days we've taken the kids to the park, let Jack run and play, and have just been catching up on being a family. I honestly didn't realize how much I missed it. Kelly and I spent a good part of the morning discussing how to get my web design business off the ground, which I think will at least help supplement whatever income I find here shortly. Anything's got to be better than what I was bringing in after working those ungodly hours. I'm actually really excited about doing websites. More so than I've ever been, and I'm much more serious about it than I've ever been. I'm not world-class yet, but I have some skills that I can offer to people at a pretty reasonable price and still make some halfway decent money at it. It's about time I did something I enjoy.

Tomorrow, I'd like to work on getting some business type stuff done, and I need to call the General Manager from the dealership who called to inquire what happened with me. He's a nice enough guy, and I owe him a call back. I'm moving on to greener pastures now though. This morning I got up, went out to get some OJ, came home, fired up the laptop and worked for about 5 hours. It just felt right. I can do this, I know it.

Wednesday, November 2, 2005

Kapunkin!

Jack said something which sounded exactly like "kapunkin' the other day when we were showing off our newly carved Jack-O-Lantern to him. From that point on, he was obsessed with the pumpkin. He said the word pumpkin over and over and over. It was so cute; I was amazed how much he seemed to love it. On top of that, he eats my roasted pumpkin seeds like candy.

Tuesdays are so great; my one day off through the week. I get so little time with Kelly and the kids anymore that I really soak up every moment of my Tuesdays. We took Jack and Aeryn out to breakfast at Cracker Barrel, which is now our new official hang out, then ended up at the park this evening to let Jack run around and burn off some energy.

It's officially Wednesday now. Has been for almost an hour. I guess I'd better get some sleep since today's my first 9 to 9 day.

Aeryn's awake!

Tuesday, November 1, 2005

Sing, Monkey Boy

Sitting here listening to the hard rock station on iTunes, I just realized how very much I loathe bands with a political agenda. Everyone's favorite communist band, Rage Against the Machine just preached some more about how horrible America is, and then Green Day came on, rambling on about some BS anti-war hippie liberal crap. I might as well take off my Doc Martens and start wearing Birkenstocks. Is that patchouli I smell?

If I wanted to listen to political discourse set to music I'd take an iPod to a Poli-Sci class. When did bands stop rocking, and start with all the posturing? I don't mind a little social commentary, sure, but all of this America is evil bullshit needs to stop. Last time I checked, we weren't the ones flying airliners into buildings, and blowing ourselves up in subway tunnels, but I digress.

What I'm getting at is this: exactly when did selling lots of pop music CDs give someone credibility with regards to U.S. Foreign Policy and world affairs? To be even more concise, why do people even care what these drug-addled singers have to say about anything? It's really the modern day equivalent of a court jester giving advice to a king.

This is the world we live in; Madonna is giving spiritual advice; telling people the world is going to hell and priests are mostly gay. This coming from a woman with the morals of a two-dollar prostitute and more partners than a square dance.

Shut up about what you think you know and do what you're best at. Do the world a huge favor and just sing.