The Deadening

My burps taste of bile and I sneezed before and something amber brown flew out.

No fancy blog tonight. Maybe something else small in the afternoon.

For now, here is a photo I tweeted earlier of a book I found in the men's room. Apparently someone had questions he needed answered, but top much shame to actually buy the title.

U.S. seeks J-Lo's Left Nipple | Missed Connections

"The only malfunction here is my hairdo."

So I completely missed that the Oscars were happening, until I started seeing multiple red carpet tweets from friends in the media industries.

Then I saw two people who are just witty assholes say they saw Jennifer Lopez's nipple.

So that's a thing, again, a celebrity's nipple. Good job. We've proved it exists. If it's like Christina Ricci, I'm going to pretend like this never happened and she is still pristine and unspoiled.

But it raises a question I've had for a while now:

Why has no one created a website dedicated to extrapolating a celebrity's nude form from various partial nip-slips and wardrobe malfunctions and racy Guess Jeans ads I'm sure if I wanted to, I could find shots of J-Lo's side-boob and underboob to match against her notorious cleavage. Really, all I'd be missing in the center, which is really just a little discoloration and a chilly wind away, given the right shirt and some Photoshop. If you really want to be a stickler, toss on Halle Berry's from "Swordfish."

"Breast Guess Dot Com." No, wait, that's already a site to ID celebrity boobs out of context. Really? Alright, well another name would be found. Maybe "Compile-A-Nude" for now.

A little 3D modeling software is all it would take to build this into an HTML-5 web-app. One could load up a bunch of pictures, model them onto the 3D rendering of a famous physique, and BAM! Naked movie stars. It could even be applied to the humdrum and non-famous. There's always that one girl who posts 3,795 inappropriate photos to her facebook feed. Given enough time and enough sources and enough monkeys banging on Wacom tablets, you could have practically anybody naked.

But of course, that would be creepy and wrong, so let's just hope attractive people get horribly embarrassed on television in front of millions of viewers.

Call Me GENERAL Lando

Driving behind a car with the license plate "HOME 1" tonight caused me the desire to pull up next to it, motion to roll down his windows, and shout that I—in my tiny grandma-gold Corolla—am Gold Leader, and that I am "going to start my attack run."
After that I drove directly into the heart of a 280 kilometer wide technological monstrosity of space station.
At which point I wondered why I of all people don't have at least the audio of Star Wars synced onto my iPhone already.

Heterosexuality Deferred

I was supposed to go shopping and then get a fashionable haircut, but that seemed a little gay.

So now I'm standing in line at a lingerie store next to half-naked models for the chance to be one of three dudes in the store, entering a raffle for shopping sprees and shirts and other prizes.

If I don't win the iPad, I really really misjudged the situation here.

Location:Smith Haven Mall,Lake Grove,United States

Tea Fest | Live Blogging

Willford Brimley is having none of this.




Sergeant Pickering is appalled and a little aroused.




It does not work as well, however, when you already have a mustache.

12:54 - Fun Fact: Tea is a diuretic. And NYC deli French toast is a laxative.

12:18 - "Aura Picture Reading." That's bullshit. I know people who can read then right off you, no photo gear. Legit.

12:04 - Bullet energy drink is just Red Bull in a British can. Which makes me wonder if we imported all those english cartoon characters.

11:30 - Barista Competition. Douchey-haired dude in tie talking way too much, severe, podgy German boy with latex gloves straightening everything, and some stoners who it back last week just to save their coffee shop (I guess). Molecular gastronomy. Winners get to harvest coffee themselves. Basically, you become a Mexican migrant worker.

11:20 - bunch of paintings of flowers that are essentially Georgia O'Keefe portraits.

11:17 - teabean - white tea and coffee blend. Spokeswoman is half-black. Apropos.

Location:W 37th St,,United States

Tea & Crumpets

Today I will be attending a tea festival with friends, where I will eat a bunch of free samples and maybe find something tasty to go with my amazingly perfect "Aunty Lilokoa'i" Hawaiian passion fruit honey mustard which is expensive as balls to fly in.

And maybe I will let you taste some of it.

On Swagger

I saw a man walking down the street who had some serious swagger going on. He was swinging his arms, shoulders back and out-of-time with his step. Boy was on his game wearing that black and yellow, leather track jacket, all oversized and baggy.

I think that's the secret, really. The trick to having swagger is just to walk like you're wearing a jacket at least two sized larger than you should be. Gotta keep the torso up and out, high and wide, wear the gate of a child, keep daddy's jacket on.

And I mean, try to look all angry and badass, too.

Don't be like the next guy I saw down the street, suited-up and professional, walking like he's traveling between places, not going somewhere. That guy's got no swagger. He's got power walk. Saunter if he's lucky.

Of course the next person was an old lady with what I could only describe as "shuffle," so power-walk while you still can, I guess.

License Plate Ninjas

Been seeing some rather choice pieces of vehicular graphical expression, lately.

They sure do. Well, except the ones that do it in the park with children watching.

I can definitely back this. 

EWW! Gross!

Alright, this one takes some explaining. ENHANCE!

I wish she had been more attractive, but considering she was in line at the McDonald's drive-thru,
it could have been worse. Still, she could always have a promising career at a female domination-based
phone sex operation.

On Furries

I asked a furry today what her fox tail was made of.

Don't ask me why I was talking to a furry. That's not the point.

No, you don't need to know. It's no one you know, alright? Not some sordid thing a mutual acquaintance hides from the light of day. I swear we've known at least one person you walked around in high school with a faux tail clipped to their belt loop, so this certainly isn't some great thing you need to focus on, it was just some furry girl and that's not important.

Jesus, yes, a her, alright? I was talking to a person, yes, on the internet, who happens to be a low-grade furry. Come on, this is not that big a deal, let's be mature about this.

No, I was not hitting on furry girls. I don't cruise the AOL Instant Message chatrooms looking for vulnerable 16 year old Arkansans who got really into anime last year. There's an internet. Let's just accept that on it you will meet some really interesting people and some of them will be really gross and some of them will be really boring and sometimes you just meet someone interesting enough for a good story, and let's leave it at that, okay?

Anyway, it turned out her tail was real fox, which I think is pretty fucked up, like killing your own spirit animal, or something.

I mean, think about it, we keep lists of the only human beings to go around wearing human skin. We write books about them. Movies are made and remade to scare us. Students get their doctorates for studying these lunatics. What kind of psychotic furry goes around wearing real dead animals?

Maybe it's revenge-motivated, like the guy who goes vegetarian because a carrot killed his father.

Tangent: go watch "Some Like It Hot." Great movie.

Maybe that one fox did something really really bad to her. Maybe he cheated on her with Minerva Mink. I wouldn't be surprised, that chick was pure sex down at the Warner Bros. lot, back in Burbank. I'm sure the furries were lining up around the corner to get at a piece of that between takes on the Animaniacs set.

Oh, don't look at me like that, I know damn well you only watched Chip and Dale's Rescue Rangers for Gadget and her little purple jumpsuit. And don't think I've forgotten about Roxanne and "A Goofy Movie."

You ain't got a leg to stand on here, pal. Just remember that.

On Hoarding

A couple days ago someone described a mess left behind in a public place by unruly patrons as, "hoarding."

Well, no, see, if they were hoarders, they would have taken their garbage with them.

They were just assholes. But in the defense of real hoarders, I get the impulse. It's that misguided belief that, yeah, you probably could seem really cool just pulling out that one random thing somebody really needs right this minute. I've previously mentioned my love of this type of thing. The grappling hook and utility belt in my car, the mannequin parts, the bizarre hats, even recently my inability to pull out a denim jacket for a cowboy costume because I decided to live like a healthy human being and donate clothes I didn't wear to a legitimate charity, albeit one for people too poor to care whether or not they appear stylish.

But I guess hoarding is genetic. In third grade we had to build models for a project on Columbus, and my thought was (in kid terms), "Man, f*** that garbage, everyone's gonna be building ships. I'm gonna build a model of Columbus." So I described my idea to my grandmother, about snagging a Ken doll and her sewing machine and some paint and just modding the hell out the poor plastic eunuch. She was immediately on board. I described a material for his shirt that was "white-thread-on-white," a rudimentary grasp of "embroidery," and she ran upstairs, looked through two drawers and pulled out an L of cloth maybe two feet to a side. And she made the little man a shirt.

We later discovered she had been saving this fabric since she used it to make my father a similar shirt. When he was one.

"Wait," my grandfather paused us. "Elaine, when did you buy it?"

"Oh, when making doll clothes, so I must have been sixteen?" 65 years in storage and she knows precisely where it was. That's pretty badass hoarding, frankly.

Took a screenshot. They still sell it, apparently.
Side hoard: the other jacket had a shrunken
gloves in the pockets and a ticket stub for a
1994 Pink Floyd show at Yankee Stadium, and my
dad remembered bringing a radio to listen to the
end of the NY Rangers Stanley Cup game.

Tonight my father and I were watching the show American Pickers for some reason that escapes me, and the skinny guy found some vintage motorcycle jackets and pants made by Bucco, a company started by someone who worked for the leather company Perfecto. I said, "That's a pretty good price for three pieces, even today. Back before I took my test I was looking at motorcycle gear; I good jacket's at least $250."

"Did you ever get one?" My father asked.

"Aw, no." Before I finished I knew what to expect but it seemed so unlikely. Despite my dad never to my knowledge even ridden a motorcycle–though knowing his frat brothers and closest friends did, I'm sure now he must have at some point–ushered my the the hall closet stuffed with jackets and pulls out two different motorcycle jackets and a leather trench coat for me to try on.

So yeah, I've got a pretty sweet James Deen jacket made by Perfecto, now. Pretty sure the only reason it fits is because dad bought one for him and another a size-down so my mom would have one.

If nothing else, I am also awestruck and terrified at how awesome I'm going to be able to be if I can get a house large enough to hide all of my own bizarre crap.

What I Learned from the Local Lincoln Society

"Be excellent to each other."

• When celebrating the abolitionist qualities of someone, it is best to have more than two-and-a-half black people in your society.

• Yes, it's pretty much rich white people celebrating each other for actually giving a little bit back to the community in some way. Usually by thanking the one rich white guy who actually did that in any meaningful way.

• No one under the age of 40 actually joins these things, they only get dragged along as family or interns.

•  There are still those among us who would strive to ensure that we never truly forget how people remembered things in the past, even if it means genuinely ignoring the present.

•  Even a lesbian reverend sounds too churchy reading from a soldier's prayer book.

• It's really sad when aging Lincoln impersonators get too old and you have to call an actor to come and put them down.

On Justifiable Censorship

Sometimes you just say things you shouldn't say.

Not malicious things, but ideas so profoundly stupid or useless it would have likely been a better world had they remain unvoiced.

Like "Dick Apparel Dot Com," a website dedicated to selling penis-emblazoned clothing and accessories. Scarves, ties (both straight and bow), drinking straws with balls molded into the plastic so when you suck on it the balls fill up first and then empty into your mouth.

These things don't really need to happen. But good conversations, though. We're just about a revised business model away from looking for seed money.

With A Little Help From My Friends

Funny, I didn't know "With Friends" was a German brand, but I suppose "Zynga" does sound a bit Teutonic. At least I know they make really great stuff.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. You don't accept seminal Superman villains as appropriate word plays? I dunno, Vince, I'm starting to doubt whether this product family is as wow-mazing as it's cracked up to be.

… And that settles it. From now on I'm buying all of my Scrabble-related off-brand entertainment products from that British guy who shills all the Billy Mays' stuff since Bill had that coronary back in 2009.

A Serious Question

Something's been bothering me for about a week now, and I really want you to give it some serious thought before you say your answer. I don't mean to put you on the spot, or call your own choices into question, I just want you to think carefully and then tell me your honest feelings.

Available from SuperheroStuff.com!

What socks do you think Batman wears?

I'm genuinely asking. I mean I'm sure at this point they're most likely to be some kind of padded, reinforced number built into the body stocking he wears under the layered armor and gizmos, a lot like what samurai wore beneath their lacquer and theatrically embellished helmets.

But at some point, early on, before all the gadgets and climate-optimized, sweat-wicking body suits, Batman must have had something simpler. If Year One is what we're basing his career from, the first times he went out he was simply disguised as an average goon in a brown leather and denim, maybe a biker helmet. Did he put any thought into utility beyond authentic disguise? Not really. He certainly didn't mull his choice of socks over any further than "Would this look atypical on a street thug?"

So basic black, then?

I'm sure Bruce Wayne is always immaculately dressed. He still has a habit of donning mostly black, so maybe a simple pattern here and there, if Alfred picked it out. I'm sure he'd find anything simple and solid-toned satisfactory. Comfort and style don't play a huge roll in protecting the innocent and mauling criminals unless you're Booster Gold.

Buy what if, just what if, maybe, somewhen, Batman has little duckie socks on under his stomping boots?

Just what if, guys?

Lower-Upper-Middle Class White People Problems

Tonight I rushed out of work after staying late and getting paid for it, and stuffed a whole bunch of fast food into my mouth just to make it to the local bar's Trivia Night on time, only to find out the guy who runs it was sent home for being a little sick.

Now I'm genuinely depressed, moping into a $5 pint of something awful that wasn't what I ordered, of which I decided to give half away so I could leave early and let my friends go get giant hot sandwiches at midnight.

If I may quote Meghan from work, "I completely acknowledge that all my problems are white people problems."

Well, except sickle cell anemia.

On Anal Sex

Either a 12 year old girl or a 10 year old boy called up the book store I work at and asked me if I had the book "Anal Sex."

What I said, as (s)he giggled, was, "Cute," and promptly hung up, because what I wanted to say was not appropriate for a public work environment.

What I wanted to say was:

1. First off, you suck at this. You're supposed to try to get me to say "anal sex," not just ask me and say it yourself. Were you just looking for a reasonable excuse to say  dirty word? Because you blew it, my friend. You are worthless at prank calling. I went to high school with two kids who would tag-team local establishments during Free Period as an incestuous hillbilly household, complete with phony voices. One of them is a motivation speaker and life coach. That is how to be a success. You are just garbage. All you've done is look like an idiot and waste about seven seconds of my day. Congratulations. I'm glad you found a way to entertain yourselves at 3:43 on a Monday afternoon between getting dropped off at your bus stop and your parents coming home with Chipotle.

2. There is no such book as "Anal Sex." I know this for a fact. A) Because I work in a book store and I've seen every sex book we carry, carted off sometimes two-at-a-time to the back of the Children's department by groups of teenagers looking to chortle and pop a chubby to the Kama Sutra line drawings accompanying Dr. Ruth's explanations of how to properly digitally stimulate your woman's clitoris, and B) because I'm a huge perv and I've been on the internet for longer than a minute and a half. Listen, I could find you "Anal Sex for Dummies," or "The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex" for men or women. Anal Health, Prostate Health, Healthy Marriage, Sex Coupons, "Why Do Men Marry Bitches?" "The Good Girl's Guide to Bad Girl Sex," I've seen all of them. The ones about butt sex? Yeah, we don't typically carry those in the store. Give me 2-4 days and I can get one to you, either here or shipped, discretely, straight to your house. Or gay to your house, I don't care. I changed out of work clothes in the handicapped stall of the men's room after work last week, and I found an open copy of Playgirl wedged in the baby changing station. Second time that's happened. I really don't give a care about how you get your swerve on.

Just don't be an asshat, kids.

Love Your Woman Like A Woman | Love Your Man Also Like A Woman

A woman I worked with once asked me, "David, you're a guy. Why are men so stupid?"

I told her she could have the short answer, which she wouldn't like, or the long, real answer, which she would probably absolutely hate. She requested the latter.

Men are societally conditioned to be non-communicative. Our job is to solve problems, to zone-in on the exact issue at hand, find a way to neutralize it, and walk away with the minimum expenditure. When a man is upset by something, he figures out what exactly upsets him, and he does a thing so he won't feel upset. This is the end of the matter and he is returned to homeostasis.

If you ask a man how's it going, "Fine," he'll say.

"What's up?"
"Nothing."
"You okay?"
"Yup."

Unless there is something wrong, there is no need to communicate, if there is something wrong, it needs to be dealt with directly, so the status quo can return. It's the apocryphal tale of Albert Einstein not speaking until he was five and his dinner had lumpy mashed potatoes.

"Why haven't you ever spoken before, Albert?!"
"Until now there wasn't a problem with the potatoes."

Incommunicado is the male standard.

Women are pressured to be expressive, to feel the emotion behind every thought and action, every word, chord and brush stroke. A woman is intuitive of others' needs, without having to be asked. If a woman is upset, a man can undo whatever it is that upsets her–kill the spider, remove the ex's phone number, agree to no longer announce the performance of certain bodily functions–but this will not remove a woman's feelings. Feelings remain in the absence on stimuli, they last until they have run their course, because women express their feelings, not just facts.

Women want men who understand this and work with it. They want men who act like men and think like women, forgetting that many women claim to hate interacting with other women.

I said that this is borderline insane and Machiavellian, lightyears beyond the simple "Find it and fix it" attitude men are traditionally taught, the stoicism and utility we are convinced to dumb ourselves down into. Men need only live with the facts of their lives, women must come to grips with how those facts make them feel.

What would John Wilmot, the second
Earl of Rochester do? He'd have sex.

I said that if the two genders, thought both entirely performative, are ever to meet in common understanding, it is going to have to be women who make the effort, for while their methods might be insane, they are brilliant. Men are taught to be useful, but dumb, and–frankly–it is far more reasonable to ask a mad genius to try to think like a fool than ask the fool to anticipate brilliant strategy.

I said this all in a blinding whirlwind, knowing that, though she asked for the least desirable answer I could give, I was likely to be chastised and dismissed for my dearth of sympathy and seeming shirking of actual, male responsibility.

Instead she nodded her head in fervent agreement and asked, "Why don't you have a girlfriend?" as if she were asking the Dali Llama why he was attending Catholic mass.

Dumbfounded, I could only think to answer the truth:

"Oh, crippling emotional issues."

TGI Fridays | Secretly Islamic Game Night?

Alright, I can't find this anywhere, but I've definitely seen a commercial recently, and I'm pretty sure it was for TGI Fridays Late Night.

Part of the reason I might not have seen it was the "Late Night" logo looked exactly like this:

That would be the hilal of Islam. You know what that means, right? Secret Muslim food franchise. And what does that mean?

It means anything on the menu not a bacon-cheeseburger is probably halal! The Muslim kosher! Yes! Now I have a place to take hot Dubawii girls after mosque on Fridays!

Thank you, delicious conspiracy theories!

For reference, I finally found the ad, minus the Late Night tag.

Some Professions Just "Do It" Adjectively

Authors do it between the lines.

Cartoonists do it in the gutters.

IT support does it on the phone. Also using the Kama Sutra.

Michael Bay does it with After Effects.

Violent Madonna Stalker Escapes By Walking Away

"Violent Madonna Stalker" Robert Dewey Hoskins Hoskins will never be a serial killer, as he has one-too-many names. Also, he just escaped from a mental facility where he was undergoing treatment for his incredibly violent psychotic tendencies, following a ten-year stint in prison for stalking Madonna.

My guess is after seeing her superbowl performance he plans on going home, making a life for himself, and starting an inappropriate obsession over Selena Gomez instead.

On Virtual Interaction

© Zynga or something. Love you guys.
Gave you money. Please don't sue.

So, percentage-wise, at least, this past week most of my social interactions have been through iOS apps.

This isn't nearly as bad as my facebook "City of Eternals" phase, in which–unlike every other nerd in an RPG, I exclusive ran around leveling up and solo-questing, only battling other players because I hated them as much as real people, if not more so, really.

No, this time I'm playing "With Friends" games against my actual friends whom I see in real life. And occasionally some people from high school or college, but mostly people I legitimately see every week.

However I can pretty much guarantee this is the most we've interacted in many months, you know, sober.

"Hanging with Friends: We'll keep you talking until you can find more beer."

What Russian Scients May Find at the Bottom of Lake Vostock

1. Megatron
   
   
   
   
2. Cthulhu. Alternately: Godzilla, Nessie, or lizard men guarding an opening to the inside of our hollow Earth
   
   
   
   
   
3. Bacterial to destroy us all
   
   
4. Amelia Earhart, married to Aquaman and ruling Atlantis
   
   
5. M. Night Shyamalan.
   
   
   
   
   
6. Some previously unknown species of little shrimp or something.

Tech Support Help Kits Should Include Whiskey

I can handle any tech support a customer can throw at me. I've dug up dirt our own service representatives don't learn until "Tier 2" support status, in half and hour. I've fixed problems with other companies' software, hardware. Hell, I've set up our major competitor's device, just to compare the two. I'm the best there is at what I do, and what I do is completely unintelligible to most grandmothers.

"I'm gonna support the fuck out of this call."
- A Canadian

So when you start disparaging yourself for being an idiot, I'm going to coddle you a little. I have two grandmothers who are not exactly elite hackers. One still occasionally sends me blank New Messages instead of a Forward, but at least she knows what the internet is. The other is somewhat more painful. Believe me, you're fine. Don't worry. There's a learning curve on everything and, frankly, unless you were born after some time in the middle of 1982, you probably have some trouble setting up your VCR. Deal with it. Learn and move on.

Now when you keep interrupting my answers to your questions, with the same question, I'm not going to protest as hard or as convincingly when you next call yourself an imbecile.

When it takes less time to 'fix' something that's not actually a problem just to get rid of you, because you're wasting my time and you smell terrible?

That's when I run to the back for two Asprin and wish I had something stronger than grape Fanta to wash it down with.

Which brings me back to the idea that, under prescribed circumstances, I should be allowed to drink at work.

Even the Developmentally Challenged Can Be Assholes

Chris Burke was the man.
Very much not an asshole.

Being in the middle of the bell curve doesn't give you a monopoly on being a jerk.

When I was in middle school I was in all the "smart classes." Even for shop. Which is weird because you'd figure shop class is where all the nerds can't use their hands for crap, then they get their first C and they try to kill themselves with a flare gun they stash in their locker like Anthony Michael Hall back before he was cool and a psychic.

Anyway, this was the kind of shop class where you build Popsicle bridges to learn proper drafting techniques and make rocket-powered cars for little eggs. And since we were so advanced, we must have been kind, because nerds never attack each other over who was a better Starfleet Captain or anything.

::cough:: Han Solo killed them all ::cough::

So they paired us up with the Special Ed kids, and everybody was really cool about it and got along well with their partners. Except me, because I got the king jackass of the kids it's not cool to make fun of. He was a jerk! Always sneering and taking no interest in the project, calling me stupid and gay. I already had a bullying problem, how was I supposed to confront that?

"You're stupid."
"Yeah? Well you sit at a desk with padded corners."

That shit's not cool. I couldn't say that. So I just took abuse from this scrawny white kid who was a little slow and whose life's ambition was to grow up to be a famous rap star. Fuck me and my side of the bridge, this kid had plans.

And that white kid grew up to be Lil Wayne, so there's your moral.

Bally Go Down the Hoooooole…

The other day I heard a little kid say, "Look, Daddeeeee," just like baby Plucky Duck from Tiny Toons and 1994 smiled a little.

"Look, Daddeeee! A rocket ssssip!"

The Second Coming of Steve Jobs

I think I'll repost this when the next iPhone comes out, but since I couldn't get this out of my head last week, here's Steve Jobs descending from heaven.

Joe Paterno | Well, I'm going to Hell, now

Someone scanned a special Sports Illustrated Joe Paterno issue today and the readout said it belonged in Music magazines.

Huh.

Knowing Joe, I'm surprised it just didn't say anything at all.

"Our House" | Did you know it was a song before the Folger's commercials?

I may be 30 years late in saying this, but I wasn't around thirty years ago to make the point then:

The band Madness seems really concerned with reminding everyone where their house is.

Is their a party there, or something? Are they trying to explain a weird kind of cul de sac to a delivery guy? What's going on?

And is it some type of British turn of phrase, or were they just never informed that "the middle of the street" is a shitty place to build a house? Try one side of the street or the other, guys. I think you'll find that gets you more rest and fewer cars through your living room during peak-traffic hours.

Bonus Blog: The Good Men Project

For anyone who's interested, I have a new article up over at The Good Men Project.

It's about body image and working out and being a manly man.

On Metrics

Look, if the British wanted us to consider the metric system seriously, they would have changed the name to "Scotland Meter."

Royal Caribbean Cruises Overthinks Marketing Strategy

That's a really cute, innovative, original commercial with a good hook and a simple catchphrase not too punny as to fester in the back of one's mind like the rotting refuse of most "Buy Me Now" product plugs.

Of course, this year all they really needed to say was "Royal Caribbean: We won't fucking sink on you."

At least they pumped some money into that suffering, meager Hollywood commercial production industry. Sigh.