For Shits and Giggles

THIS Did Not Make My “Things To Look Forward To In 2009″ List

Ladies and gentlemen, straight from the Home Office in Leming, Texas (yes, it exists, even if it is short one letter) is tonight’s Top 10 List.  The category?  The Top 10 Things To Do To Prepare For A Night In Jail…

10)  Wear socks, because concrete is very cold on bare feet.  (I was covered there, thankfully.)

9)  Have phone numbers memorized, like back in the good old days.  Your cell phone’s contact list will not be handy.

8)  Wear a hoodie.  Not only is it kept cold in there, but – hey – extra padding for lack of a pillow!  (I get half-points here.  I was wearing a sweater.)

7)  If your vehicle is not going to be impounded, put the cigs in your pocket so that they will be there when you get out.

6)  Gorge yourself ahead of time.  Never before had I seen something that truly qualifies as “mystery meat straight from a human organ”.

5)  Pick the county carefully.  This one is truly awful.

4)  Go ahead and get a DUI.  Hell, make it multiples!  Those people get out much quicker than first time offenders like me (with a charge of “unregistered animal” when our Lhasa/Shitzu mix got out of the backyard).

3)  There is never a number 3.

2)  Have a kick-ass boss who recently had a brother undergo the same silly treatment.  Scoreboard!

1)  Have effin’ cash, because they don’t take debit.

On A Lighter Note…

Some of you may know that my wife works in the admissions department of an institute that just happens to cater to the arts.  This institute also has an audio production program and the running joke around her office when someone inquires about that degree is that the prospective student always has the same answer when asked what they hope to obtain from that degree:

I want to make beats!

Forget all the other career paths such a degree can open up, from NASA to cryptogrophy.  It’s all about the beats to some.

So I have gotten used to her coming home with CDs that her students have given her, most littered with as many cuss words as possible with the requisite use of the “n” word over and over.  Last week, she came home with a CD from a student who goes by the name Paul C.  And, before she subjected me to the “music”, I told her that I had a feeling that this one would be more intellectual, more brainy.  Wanna know why?

Wait for it…

Wait for it…

Because that would make it a cerebral Paul C.

(Insert rim shot here.)

Also, I should mention that I actually liked this CD.  It kind of reminded me of Devo, black-style.  In that vein, I named a new genre of music:  Blevo.

Holy Crap, You’re Reading

I guess that means the pressure is on.  It is time to be funny.  To “git witty wid it”.

Unfortunately, I have always been much funnier in person.  Take my last entry, for example.  The sole purpose for that one was to show an example of how quick with a rejoinder I can be.  And then my long lost UK brother Cliff – a true writer, comedy or otherwise – outdid my joke tenfold with his “Banana Republic” comment.

The bastard.

I’ll bet he even “gets” Steely Dan.

So I am left to wonder what I can possibly write to make you – yeah, YOU – laugh.

I could mention that Dawn got a Tarot card reading from a student today and how I told her that I have only messed with Tarot cards once:  it was the only available deck while playing poker with some friends.  I got a full house, and four people died.

But even that joke is stolen (from the great Steven Wright).

Rest assured, I am going to keep my mind nestled on you (three) readers.  Anything funny I say during the day, that does not compromise my job or my relationship with my wife, will be posted here.

Expect a few quiet days…

But check back often, because you never know.

Low Polo Blow

I am not threatened by homosexuals.

There.  I’ve said it.

I also do not overtly seek out the gays and befriend them, but there are times in my life that make such occasions hard to avoid, especially since I am married to a woman who finds “them” particularly entertaining.  This past week presented a prime example.

As we were speaking with her new “BFF” KC (she later accidentally referred to him as her “BFFF” which garnered a very tasteless butt fuck joke from me), he was regaling us with stories of the places he had worked in the past.  A large portion of this job history focused on his time at the Ralph Lauren store in the Domain in Austin.

He said that he spent $800 on clothes for this job because employees were encouraged (i.e. required) to wear the Ralph Lauren brand while at work.  However, he also said that he could never really pull of the look.  “It isn’t made for people like me,” he said.  “I got fired because they said I wasn’t Ralph Lauren material.”

I could bite my tongue no longer…  I had to jump in before the joke suffered a painful, left-in-the-throat demise.

“So you were a little too Lauren, not enough Ralph?”

(Insert rim shot here.)

For the record, KC’s boyfriend laughed his ass off at my joke.

Then KC picked it up and fucked it.

“Kimchi” Sounds Like A Dennis Miller Pop Culture Reference

Imagine Dennis Miller saying something like “The room was so odorous, it was as if Pol Pot had been feasting for hours on bulgogi and kimchi.” (Insert his silly giggle here.)

But kimchi, in fact, it is a Korean side dish. And, in typical Dawn fashion, she was craving Korean food a few weeks ago and she implored me to try it out.

“You have to try bulgogi!”

So I did. And somehow lived to tell about it.

The bulgogi (definition here) itself wasn’t that bad. However, like a lot of ethnic foods that come from not-so-clean countries, there was the hint of dirt in the taste. For the record, I feel the same way about tortillas in Mexico – like they were cooked on a griddle that had been coated with street grime or was used to dry the sweat off of clothes after a long day in the fields. I could tolerate this beef dish, though, even though I found it greatly overrated.

Then I moved on to the side dish. The devil. The kimchi.

I put a bite in my mouth and immediately blanched as I attempted to chew it. There was no way I was going to make this food go down, at least not without it coming right back up. So I did the polite thing… I lowered my head right above my plate and spit that shit out. Then I took a long pull on my diet soda and headed straight for the bathroom just in case.

While gone, a woman sitting near us with her husband asked Dawn if it was the kimchi that did me in. She was disappointed because now there was no way her husband was going to try his. But I feel pretty proud because I saved that guy.

If you haven’t checked out the link with the definition of kimchi above, let me just say that it is a cabbage-based side. Unfortunately, the only cabbage I ever eat is when it is turned into cole slaw. In fact, many times I have walked into my mom’s house wondering who has been farting up a storm only to realize that she boiled cabbage – perhaps as many as two days ago. And to make matters worse, the cabbage used in kimchi is fermented. Take a moment to digest that.

(Ironically enough, if I had swallowed it, I would have digested it in a nanosecond. Forget “a moment”.)

So this has been a public service announcement denouncing fermented meals. And, yes, that includes yogurt. Gross.

I hope that the guy at the restaurant is not the last person I help in this regard.

Yay, dirt!

Another “You Had To Be There” Joke

There was no Ranger game on Austin TV tonight so I took a break from following the action online to lay down with Dawn on the couch downstairs as she cleaned up our DVR. (I had no idea how many episodes of “Leave It To Beaver” that TVLand airs in a single day. After all, there never seems to be an episode on when I am in the mood for accidental sexual innuendos.)

Part of the hard drive clean-up included watching episodes of “Jon And Kate Plus 8″. I have mentioned this show before because I am of the belief that Kate is an unrelenting bitch that makes my blood pressure rise when I see the way she talks to her husband (who reminds me an awful lot of Ray, by the way).

So Dawn was really excited because they were showing the episode in which the family loads up all the kids – plus a Uhaul trailer for the luggage and snacks – to visit Disneyworld. Jon began driving the family down around 5:00 in the afternoon with the intent of making it from Pennsylvania to South Carolina before stopping at a hotel in the middle of the night.

And here is where the joke kicks in: Dawn remarked about the shoddy place to stay that they picked. “You’d think they would stop somewhere nice”, she said, “but that place just looks like a Motor Inn.”

So I replied, “What’s your price for flight?”

And I’m still not sure what is worse… that I issued the “joke” or that Dawn got it.

Sometimes, being a simpleton is nice.

It’s A Dirty Job, But…

My Aunt Jo is a nut – but in a good way. She likes to give me the business about leaning liberal versus conservative, but she does make a pretty mean batch of scalloped potatoes. So I guess that evens out in some weird, culinary/fascist kind of way.

Another thing she likes to do is say that I look like Mike Rowe from the Discovery Channel’s Dirty Jobs. And the only reason I bring this all up is because…

… my feet stink. I mean, they absolutely reek. They sweat like a mountain gorilla in heat, thus permeating the socks and the shoes. When I take my shoes off at the end of the day, the dogs in the neighborhood quit barking, our cable goes out, and the national terror level is bumped up a notch.

Yes, it is that bad.

So, with Dawn’s urging (if one can call a bull whip and a serrated knife “urging”), I bought a can of fast-acting Tinactin and Odor Eater insoles the other day. And here is how all this ties back in with Mike Rowe.

Most feet are generally offensive anyway, but I would hazard a guess that feet requiring charcoal-lined insoles are the worst. Yet, on the package is this comment:

Unconditional six month guarantee. If you are not completely satisfied, return insoles for a full refund to…

Holy shit. How would you like THAT job? Opening envelopes full of funk that even charcoal cannot diffuse?

Mr. Rowe, one of my many dopplegangers, I smell an episode…

And Goodwill To Men

It seems to be a weekend ritual of ours… a trip to Goodwill to bargain shop.

Before scoffing, realize a few things: There are some damned good deals to be found at Goodwill. For example, my Timberland boots were less than eight bucks and my Old Navy jeans (in the very difficult to find waist size of 31) were less than five. Also, Goodwill stores here in Austin are big business. Hell, they even have commercials on radio and TV promoting new (i.e. unused) merchandise. Dawn was particularily proud of a satin flower arrangement she found for six dollars because the original price tag was still on it. To my disbelief, it was over 200 bucks.

Seriously.

I know. I’m amazed, too.

Anyway, this past weekend, I just wasn’t into it. I have a hard time spending money on myself unless there is a very pressing need or a vice is involved, and neither of those conditions applied on Sunday so I went in because, well, I basically had no other options. And the Goodwill we were at is a very large one, so I knew that Dawn would be browsing for quite a while.

(At least we got to eat some Chinese food first. Of course, while pulling a mussell from a shell, I had the fleshy food bounce right off of my white shirt and onto the floor, leaving a nice brown stain right around the Rhode Island logo in the center of the tee.)

I wasted some time looking at some cool shirts that would be nice to have if I really had a need for them until boredom set in. And when boredom sets in, that is when the comedy bits emerge. Thankfully, at this Goodwill, the only prop needed for my act was there.

Hanging proudly at the end of a rack, on one of those hangers with little clips, was a pair of white undies. No noticable stains, just your garden variety “tighty whities”. I grabbed them and went to search out Dawn to show her what my treasure hunt turned up.

As I mentioned before, the Goodwill we were in was a rather large structure. I thought I’d find Dawn in a few seconds, but I ended up walking around the store several times before finally meeting up with her…

… all the while proudly holding the underwear on a hanger.

For the first two minutes of my search, I was completely embarrassed. After that, I embraced my stupidity. Hell, I probably gave several customers in the store something to talk about for years, all the while ammusing my simplistic self.

Then, as we were getting rung up at the register, when I handed my debit card over to the cashier, Dawn said “You got Chinese all over you!”

I’m not quite sure how the Asian woman who was ringing up the sale felt about that remark…

One-Liner Time

A quick look into the lighter side of life before continuing with the narrative of last week…

I mentioned that Dawn and I are planning a move to Austin, so that precipitated an annual event of ours: Downsizing. The less we have to move, the better. Besides, every other time we have done this, we have been able to sell what we have for more than we paid for it and buy even better stuff off of Craig’s List while having some cash left over.

For example, the couch/loveseat/chair triplets we bought for $125 sold for $200 in a matter of hours this weekend. However, that left us with a gaping hole in the living room. So how did we fill it up? Well, Dawn found a king size bed for $75 that we ended up paying $50 for. And, rather than squeeze it into one of the three bedrooms here, we decided to set it up in the living room since The Boy is at his friend’s house in Highland Park for a couple of weeks. Now our house looks like a hotel room, which is oddly comforting – especially since I have been on the road the last two and a half weeks.

Anyway, the couple we bought it from were very nice. In fact, the guy was a missionary.

So after we got it all set up in front of the telly, I laid on the bare mattress to see how it felt. With my head lying facedown, I said “Hmmm… it even smells like missionary.”

(Pause.)

“No, I take that back. It smells like doggie-style.”

Welcome to our world. Enjoy your stay.