blogging is like time travel in reverse

Honestly, I'm not quite sure what I meant by that - it popped in my head, and I went with it.

So, it's been over 2 months since my last entry - I told Rock this weekend that I should post some news to my blog, and he said "you have a blog?". It's official - I've waited so long to post that people have forgotten I still have one. Can't blame them, seeing as I'm pretty damn inconsistent with this thing. Oh well, I blame Jesus.

So, lots of stuff has been going on, as usual. Work is psychotic - for anyone that is interested, IM me and I can tell you why I've been putting in long hours, and occasionally going home to drink. Let's just say that 2007 is shaping up to be an incredibly interesting year - no idea yet if it will be good interesting or bad interesting, so that just makes it more fun.

As you all should know, I am engaged. Who saw that coming? I'd say I did, but since i never expected to (and am continually surpised that I did) live past 25, I guess I'd be lying. Wedding preparations are in full effect - from choosing where we are having it to picking out cake designs, I have been reluctantly involved in most of it so far. I know it's not fair to have one person take on the majority of the responsibility, because that's putting too much stress on one person - but on the flip-side, I really couldn't give a shit how the cake will be designed. As long as it's not in the shape of a giant penis, I'm pretty cool with whatever.

I'm enjoying my wii - except the name, i wish they would have called it something else. It's fantastic, I love all the little improvements - like a power button on the remote, which has increased my post-wii laziness even more - but my biggest gripe is simply this.... if i move my hand in the same manner (same direction, same strength) 10 times, why does it not translate to the same move 10 times? I mean, i almost had an anuerysm because of my bowling inconsistencies. But I guess it's a good thing, seeing as how I'm terribly inconsistent bowling in real life.

I'm off to see the Wii-zard,
Dys

"stupid horse, the sign says 'deer crossing'!"

Well, it certainly has been awhile. I haven't updated you on my trip to Omaha, nor have I kept you in the loop on the daily. I will get this pre-emptive strike out there - happy birthday to me! I turn 28 today.... which is funny, because I woke up feeling 60. Oh well.

So, teaser here..... stay tuned for a BIG ANNOUNCEMENT. I would imagine you could get this big announcement as early as tomorrow........

Dys

PS. Thanks e-ninja :)

Kicking and screaming....and limping

So, I'm back. It's been busy (as always). I went down to Roanoke this weekend to participate in the Marine Corps' annual Toys for Tots 5k Mud Run. I've got a friend that lives in Roanoke, so it was a chance for the Supavillains to gather and do some damage.

The Trip Down:
-Friday morning I woke up drunk. This means that my hangover happened around 2pm, while I was just starting the trip. Not cool.
-Wendy's chili is actually pretty good. But they just put chunks of hamburger into the chili, which caught me by surprise.

Roanoke:
-I stayed near downtown Roanoke.
-Roanoke is not a nice place. It's pretty much a ghetto.
-Speaking of ghetto, I saw a guy run from the cops in our neighborhood. No one who lived there was surprised.
-Again, ghetto: they found a dead body in the park across the street that Thursday.
-Really, I mean ghetto: they don't just have hookers walking the streets - they have lines that would put drive-thrus to shame for hookers. At 4:30am on Sunday morning, I saw two hookers get out of a car. Within 10 seconds, 4 cars pulled up to try to get the hookers.
-The Chick-FilA is really nice... the manager came over and talked to us, and refilled our drinks. I mean, we were sitting 5 feet away from the fountain machine, but it was still a nice guesture.

The Mud Run:
-You would think if you were going to run at 11am, you wouldn't stay up until 5am drinking. You would be wrong. A group of like 15 of us played flip-cup until the wee hours of the morning.
-The river was much higher this year. Trying to go upstream sucked.
-The first time the current took me under, I hit my head on a rock... but I still managed to save my cigs. I probably shouldn't be proud of this, but I am.
-The mountain sucked. I should probably quit smoking/drinking, or at least quit doing charity runs.
-The mud this year was the craziest yet. You definitely couldn't even walk in it - my legs kept getting stuck. There were a lot of lost shoes.
-I had to throw away every single piece of clothing I wore - shoes, socks, pants, drawls, shirt, hat, and tie. Don't ask about the tie - if I get them, I will post pics that explain everything.

Well, it's time to get back to work. It's been fun, and maybe if I ever have a free minute again I can entertain you further.

Dys

work avoidance strategy has gone desperate

It's a sad day when I blog to avoid working - mainly because i rarely blog, so if I journey here it's either important, or I'm really stretching.

Got back safely from the wilderness this weekend. Who builds a cabin with 22 beds but no air conditioner? Don't they understand that the more people you put in a shack, the hotter it gets? And when I say 22, that's a rough count that I am comfortable with. Our bed actually had a spare bed underneath, just in case someone wanted to sleep with us but didn't want to seem inappropriately interested. Thankfully we arrived early enough to have someone look out for us and give us the last available double bed. That left 2 couples to figure out the arrangements of 6 twin beds. And get this - the owners must really be evil, because they twin beds are different heights.... so pushing them together is a stubborn act of futility.

Besides the incredible amount of drinking we did, there were actual activities planned. Friday night was the 'jack & jill party', which appeared to just be an excuse to give both the bride- and groom-to-be dirty presents in front of each other. After the party there was some swimming which resulted in injuries. I personally injured the boys each time I jumped off the diving board, no matter what my form was. I could have somersaulted in and hit the water head first, and somehow the pool would smack me in the nuts. I think some investigating is necessary, so maybe after this I will get on the phone with some physicists. The cops also showed up, which is ridiculous. First off, its a bunch of people in their mid-30s and up sitting around chatting, with minimal horseplay in the pool (the water was frigid, which kept most people out). Secondly, the cops actually asked us if this was the right address several times, because they thought we were the ones who had called them (and not the actual offenders). All ended well - thankfully the cops took it in stride when the bride-to-be assumed they were strippers. We continued partying, the cops went to talk to the neighbor about complaining for no good reason, and the evening resumed. Most people cashed out by 4am, with the exception of myself and the ringleader, who stayed up until about 6am.

Now, lets fast forward 3 1/2 short hours to 9:30am, when I get up and wander downstairs. The ringleader is up and cooking breakfast, obviously still drunk from the night before. In fact, the majority of players were still drunk from the night before (including Teach) with the exceptions being me and the weiner dog. I didn't understand it - with the amount of alcohol I drank, even the weiner dog should have been stumbling. After helping to cook a massive amount of breakfast burrito fixings, we got our stuff together slowly and made it out to the river, where we canoed for about 5 hours. Good times were had by all.

Saturday night, most people (including yours truly) decided to forego the partying and catch some z's. I think I crashed about 10:30, and I was not the first. Sunday was clean-up and prep for the 2+ hour drive home, which was also nice. Teach and I both agreed that if we had been hungover, the trip down the mountain in the jeep would have been messy.

Well, that's it for now - I think I successfully stalled until lunch.

Hasta luego,
Dys

crispy turtle fritters

That's it, I think I've lost it. Time: 6:56pm ET. Sanity departing on the last train. Have you ever looked at random numbers so long they started talking to you? Let me tell you, for some reason 38 really hates 796. Friggin primadonnas. I struggled with that word - two n's or one? Fuck it, you get the point.

I should start a business where you hire a celebrity lookalike, and fight them. Who wouldn't want to kick Dolly Parton's ass? Although I would assume hitting her in the chest would shatter all the bones in your hand, but regardless.... and don't say irregardless, because that's just a stupid made-up word people use to sound cooler than they are.

Well, I'm gone - time to go home and make friends with that bottle of booze in my fridge.
Dys

"I will karate-chop you in the ovaries"

Bah. Time doesn't just fly, it pulls a superman and shoots off at subsonic speeds. I tell you, the man that invents some sort of time-management device that allows me to actually freeze time, that man will instantly qualify as my new best friend.

So, dinner was fine. My parents and Teach's are similar, so there was no violence or anything. There was definitely an uncomfortable moment on my part when both sets of parents started talking about how great I was...yipe. Accepting compliments is hard for me to begin with - I don't know why, but old people giving them makes it worse somehow.

The good news was that after dinner, I got to retreat to the Mexican's casa and play some 1-on-1 beerpong. The bad news is that for some reason, I lost badly every time I played, and apparently I'm quite chatty when I'm drunk. I believe that it will have no long-lasting impact, but I have suspicions that I may have mildly irritated Teach with my crazy-random stories and threats of martial arts mayhem to her reproductive organs. We shall see.

Work is hectic. I have a meeting with... well, I suppose he's the closest thing to a nemesis I have here at work. When we are in a room together, the air practically hums with ominous intent, so I guess he qualifies. There has been some sort of battle going on for years now, which has mutated so much that I bet neither one of us are really sure how it started, and now we just despise every facet of the other's being much like a lobster's relationship with a chicken. If you've never seen it, you should run out now and buy a live chicken and lobster (the dead ones don't react the same way surprisingly) and put them in a cage together. It's some sort of evolutionary grudge match, which starts with instinctual rage and degenerates into a terrible bloodbath. Not that lobsters really bleed that much, but you get what I'm saying here.

Dys

now this should be interesting

...or at least terribly awkward. My parents are meeting Teach's parents for the first time tonight - we are all going out to dinner. Yay... at least it gives me a reason to drink heavily tonight. As if I needed a reason.

And eepie, I know you are asian - perhaps I should have been clearer. Your hair is now "big trouble in little china" asian, its "fast and the furious 3" asian.... hell, it's anime asian. It's so asian it hurts, like those weird singers in Blade - like the crazy Fuk Mi/Fuk Yu twins in Austin Powers. Hell, I'm just gonna come out and say it, it's stereotypically asian. There.

Dys

did coke make them gay?

Taken out of context, this is still odd and funny. An excerpt from a good, if unconventional writer:

On the second floor, I buy a coke from McDonald's and drink it. Michelle and the others are sitting near me, pretending that we don't know each other. They're laughing and talking, and I wonder what they're talking about. Sheryl really does dress like an idiot. She's great. They both are. I walk up to the front, and slam the coke down on the counter beside the cash register. "The manager," I say to the twelve year old girl they've got working. I think she's twelve, anyway. I have no idea how quick girls develop these days. I saw something on TV about it, I think. All these hormones in their milk at breakfast, in their cereal, fucking them up. Maybe little girls are born with tits now? She's still young enough to be a ballerina, isn't she? I've missed so many opportunities. I'll never be a ballerina. It's too late. I missed the boat. I made the wrong choices. I couldn't even be a high school dropout if I wanted to. Still, I'll get to be a cantankerous old man, one day, with a walking stick to shake at all the little five year old girls with their tits all hanging out.

The manager is skinny and balding. "Is there something I can help you with?" he says, and I give him a long stare, and then look down at the coke. He follows my gaze. "There's something wrong with your beverage, sir?" he asks. "You tell me," I say, and push the coke towards him. "I bought this coke five minutes ago. I thought I would stop off on my way home and buy a book at the mall, maybe have a coke. It's my girlfriend's birthday, though, so I didn't want to take too long. I planned on slipping her the dick, if you know what I mean." "What seems to be the problem, sir?" he says, and it's like he's reading lines out of a fast food manager script. Everyone talks the way they're supposed to these days. It's like we've become the voices for our institutions. He's the fast food manager, and I'm the disgruntled customer. In a few seconds I'll go back to being the frustrated genderqueer faggot and he'll be the frustrated manager. Either way, you could listen to us talk for five minutes and figure out who we are. "This coke made me gay," I say. I hold out my hand for him to examine it. "Look at that. I've never had a manicure in my life, but now my nails are neat and tidy. Neat and tidy! I work in a factory, man. I can't have the guys at work thinking I've been filing my nails instead of biting them down." "The pop made you gay?" he says, and now he's the sarcastic fast food worker, embittered etc. The big-titty twelve year old is covering her mouth, pretending not to laugh. He gives her a dirty look. "What am I going to do now?" I say. "I have a girlfriend at home, waiting for my Johnson Special, and all I'm thinking about is how to do her hair!" The manager is looking behind me now. "Hey! I said my girlfriend loves cock! You look at me when I'm talking to you about my lost heterosexuality." "I'm sorry, there are customers waiting," he says. "If you have a valid complaint, you can call the head office." I open my mouth to say something, but Michelle interrupts me. "I don't mean to interrupt," she says. The manager is smiling again, and he shakes his head. "Not at all, ma'am." He says. "Is there something I can help you with?" "I sure hope so," she tells him. "I think this coke turned my friends gay." She points over her shoulder, where Gilyan and Sheryl are making out in their chairs. Customers all over the store are staring.

"I don't mind or anything," Michelle says, "I mean, six in ten people are queer these days or something. Whatever. It's just that we have to get to a swim meet, and I'm worried that they'll be too busy thinking about vaginas to focus on their warm up exercises. Is there anything you can do? Have you got any pepsi, maybe?"

"You probably have to call the head office," I tell her, and Michelle nods, thoughtfully.

*excerpted from http://www.lockpickbook.net/ - It sort of leaves you feeling violated and possibly thoughtful, blatant with self-hate and a message that you can almost see, if you squint hard enough.

Dys

this sh** truly IS bananas, Gwen!

Damn, that song will stay in your head for years after the last time you heard it. You will be doing something, someday - maybe standing in line for the bank, or being held hostage in a bank, and that song will pop into your head and you will be forced to sing it. Probably not a good idea in the hostage situation, just a word of advice.

Dys

A severed foot would be the ultimate stocking stuffer

I'm not sure I can relate this story so it's nearly as funny as I think it is... but of course I will try. Yesterday I went to lunch with 2 female coworkers - one of which is wonderfully well endowed. This female - which I will refer to as Busty LaRue - was wearing a low-cut shirt, and I was doing my level best not to look at her chest. Which, considering I am such a breast man there are bras named after me, was a herculean feat.
Today, I was talking to the other coworker about Busty, and I remarked that it was difficult for me to not stare. She said, and I quote: 'I know, I just gave up and stared. They are scrumptious." I literally fell over with laughter and laid down in the hallway, where other a third coworker was concerned that I was having a heart attack.

Scrumptious, indeed!
Dys

Google, you broke my heart

So, I was reading this week's Newsweek - in it, there's a brief article about Google, Yahoo and Microsoft providing search engines with "built-in censorship of critical political content, news sites and information about democracy" to China. This makes me sad. China is not the nicest place in the world to learn things on your own, what with ISP policing and the need for underground Internet cafes - but is it necessary for these 3 giants to change what they essentially do just to get a business contract? I understand, China is just behind the US in Internet users (130 million and counting), but didn't Google kind of start their business because of circumstances like this? Hell, Google's motto is 'Don't be evil' dammit! When did it change to 'Don't be evil, but conform to evil if the money is good.' They came up with a search engine that was revelant because it didn't filter for anything other validity. I don't know what I'd do if I used Google and their search results didn't contain valid sites I was really interested in just because someone paid them not to show it to me. Oh yeah, I'd boycott them.

I'm going to go and have a good cry,
Dys

24: Season 2 - some things I'd like to see

So we finished the second season of 24 today, and it got me thinking... I did some brief researching, and it appears that about 115-120 people got killed in season 2. Of that, Jack killed about 30 people. I think that for each season, there's a lot of side stories that could be told:

1) whenever someone in law enforcement fires their weapon (much less kills someone), they have to fill out a lot of paperwork and go through an investigation to determine if it was justifiable homicide. I'd like to see some time devoted to the interviewers in the hearings.
-interviewer #1: Jesus, it's Bauer again?
-interviewer #2: How come this guy isn't dead or in jail yet?
-interviewer #3: I don't know why you guys are complaining, Jack's the reason I could afford my 2nd house and that new bmw in the parking lot.

2) In a similar vein... don't forget that government can be a very stingy place to work, where you have to requisition inventory with 3 different forms all signed by a different member of management. I'd like to see someone in personnel who has to go back and fix the necessary paperwork for Jack's inventory indulgences. I can imagine it would go something like this:
Bauer: yeah, I'm gonna need another box of bullets.
inventory: Again? Why don't you save some bullets for the rest of the agents?
Bauer: Look, I'm Jack FUCKING Bauer. So far today I've been in a plane crash, jumped out of a plane, watched a nuke go off, and my idiot daughter has been kidnapped more times than I've been tortured. Don't piss me off.

3) I think the thing I'd be most interested in - so interested I almost did this myself - is to read Jack Bauer's blog. Can you imagine how odd that would look? Well folks, I can:
4:07 pm - plane crashed. What, did I break a box of mirrors?
4:47 pm - the woman who killed my wife just turned on me. Remind me why I haven't killed her yet?
10:57 pm - jumped out of a plane, got to watch a nuke go off. I wonder if I'm gonna get cancer? Nah, I'm Jack Bauer, cancer ain't got shit on me.
12:36 am - I punched a coworker so hard I broke his ankle. I am a badass.
1:04 am - the bad guy who was trying to make a deal with me got shot, told me I'm a badass. Duh, dude. I'm Jack Bauer.
3:24 am - shot a bad guy. Note to self - stop by inventory and pick up another box of bullets.
3:25 am - shot another bad guy. At this rate, I'm going to run out of bullets.
3:26 am - broke a guy's neck. Bullet shortage not a problem any more.
3:55 am - my dumbass daughter got in trouble again. I swear to god I should just lock her in a closet. Next time she gets arrested, kidnapped, or is in danger of being harmed in any way, I'm just going to wash my hands of her.
5:57 am - daughter called again. This time she's trapped in a closet with a bad guy. I told her to shoot him twice - that's bullets I don't have to waste, and I still get the credit for the kill as far as I'm concerned.

I'm aware it's just a tv show,
Dys

a few words to the wise

Love's blossom can wither and die, but a heart of stone lasts forever.

what's next - a laser razor?

Really, a 5-bladed razor? Gillette, what the hell are you thinking? First the mach-3, then Schick comes out with the quattro (yes, we know, quattro means 4), then Gillette says - hey, since we make Duracell batteries, why don't we start shoving some in disposable razors and see who buys it? and comes out with the m3 power. Now, don't get me wrong, I love the m3 power, because it's the first razor blade in a long time that allows me to not pass out from blood loss once I've finished shaving.... but 5 blades is just fucking scary. I can't wait to just go get that laser hair removal - I can't see myself ever having anything other than a goatee, so I'm fine with lasering off everything else. On my face, you perverts.

Dys

My true feelings

I am naked without you. You are like a second skin, wrapping me in your grip and desperately begging me never to let you go. Whenever I see you, the corners of my eyes crinkle up in a smile that doesn't quite touch my lips. We share a personal joke that no one else gets, shared experiences that I could write down, but would turn into just words, like Cinderella's carriage dissolving into last October's pumpkin. When you aren't near me, a part of me always misses you...I see you out of the corner of my eye, but when I turn, it isn't you. In a way, that makes me happy - to see you out on someone else's arms would burn my heart to ash. I remember when we first met (how could I forget?) and how excited I was, how I knew right then that I must possess you. I could tell you longed for me too, stretching towards me like rays of sunlight. Even now, I miss you - I long to run home and cuddle with you under the blankets, our protective layer against the world. I know I won't have you forever - sooner or later you will fade away or be torn from my body - but that's a far off fact, like the population of China or the distance to Neptune. Sure, they're facts, but they are unrealistic and hard to conceptualize. If I had my way, you'd never change - you'd be there any time I opened my eyes.

This is for you, stretchy orange shirt.

Gotcha, didn't I?
Dys

a little something to make you pee your pants

Anyway, I want a pet monkey. It's hard to find one around here - once I saw a monkey for sale at a pet store, but it was too expensive. So, I tried to steal it by stuffing it down my pants. Did you know monkeys don't like confined spaces? Oh, and they're biters. On a side note, insurance doesnt cover it if you have to get a rabies shot because youve been bit in the crotch by a monkey.

Off to find a toothless monkey to steal,
Dys