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Archive for March, 2009

Cotton Candy, Nostalgia, and a Beat-Down Averted

Thursday, March 26th, 2009

I stood in line waiting for cotton candy on the 4th of July in a crowded fairgrounds, not because I wanted cotton candy, but because my wife wanted cotton candy. I don’t, in fact, even like cotton candy, and she, I don’t really believe, in her heart of hearts, likes cotton candy either. Really little kids like cotton candy. I think it just sounded nice to her, like something whimsical from childhood. But like most things from childhood, cotton candy was delightful and whimsical because of who you were, and not because of what it is/was. So, inevitably, when my wife takes a bite of the cotton candy and it gets on the tip of her nose and on her chin and in her hair, and it’s sticky and unpleasant, and tastes sickly-sweet enough to put a Care Bear into a diabetic coma, the magic will be gone, and one more cherished thing from days gone by will be tarnished by the lucidity of adulthood.*

And, yet, here I stand, because I love my wife and if she wants me to wait in the line for her for a meaningless bit of fluff that’s completely void of nutrition, by jove, I will queue up like I’ve got a pair.

I stood there for 20 minutes, not moving an inch, and then my wife and her friend left to find the ladies room somewhere off in the distance of the fairgrounds. I could see, some ways in front of me, that there was a small crowd at the front of the line that then became single-file for about 15 people until it reached me, then it continued through me and on behind me for 20 more people. It occurred to me that not only has this line not moved a single inch since I got in it, but there aren’t any people walking (or skipping) away from the front of the line holding cotton candy. But I had reached the point of no return, the time at which I had waited so long that I couldn’t quit, it would mean defeat, it would mean that I’d been beaten somehow. I don’t know how these things work, I’m not on trial here. But now I meant business. I looked at my watch, but, of course, I haven’t worn one in years, since an excruciating bout with carpal-tunnel syndrome. I sighed.

The man standing in front of me turned around to see how long the line stretched out behind him, which was when I noticed that he looked not unlike one of the Elves from the Lord of the Rings movies. I moved my head a bit forward and to the side to catch another look at him, in a side profile. It was remarkable. Really elfish. I tried to remember any snippet of Elvish from the movies, only to amuse myself, but couldn’t.

I realized at this point that I was being foolish, pig-headed, and tragically romantic and should just leave the damned line. I could buy cotton candy somewhere else, couldn’t I? Online perhaps? Might be a shorter wait…

I turned around to look at the person behind me and saw that she was a young, weathered-looking woman with her stomach hanging out of the top of her faded blue jeans, the top of which was only just covered by a dirty white tank-top, and she was balancing an infant on her not-insubstantial hip. Her infant was playing with her stringy, dirty blonde hair. And by ‘dirty blonde’, I don’t mean her hair color was a blondish-brown mix, I mean it looked like it had dirt and grease in it. If some sorry sap had chosen to come up and ask this woman on a date while she’d been standing in line next to me, she could have told them that she couldn’t because she needed to wash her hair that night and that would have been highly believable. Encourageable, even. I mean, I would have encouraged that. I might have chipped in a few dollars for shampoo.

Anyway, she looked back at me and gave me a tight-lipped smile. I tried to be friendly to, you know, pass the time.

“Quite the line, hmm? I hope the cotton candy’s worth it.” I said, smiling. The gender of the child was impossible to tell, so I couldn’t say the old tried-and-true “What a beautiful boy/girl!” Plus, in this case, it would’ve been an outright lie. (Zing!)

“What the FUCK?” she shouted, startling me and looking just past me, and past my friend from Middle-Earth. He turned back to see who or what she was yelling at and we both followed her gaze toward a small group near the front of the line. It seemed that a hispanic couple were visiting with someone near the front of the line, talking and laughing. She then looked at me and said, “Are they FUCKING cutting?!”

“I don’t think so…” I said, trying to defuse her. It occurred to me that perhaps they were cutting. What, was I going to call them on this? It seemed sort of juvenile, and I didn’t exactly want to start a fight over something so trivial with such friendly looking people. My swearing line-friend, however, seemed to have no qualms over instigating line-violence herself, and was getting herself worked up into a foamy lather.

“They don’t SEEM like they’re visiting. They SEEM like they’re cutting.” she hissed. Her infant began to look alarmed. I, also, I’m sure, began to look alarmed. “I’m gonna have to go up there and beat some ass!” She repositioned the child on her hip and I wondered if she’d actually start a fight while still holding her kid. Which would have really been something.

Wow, I thought. What a violent, crazy bitch! And she’s a mother? How did she ever get someone to sleep with her, looking and acting like that. And then I thought of what the father probably looked like, which was a male version of this blonde sparkplug standing next to me. That poor kid doesn’t have a chance in the world.

I thought about maybe heading her off, and politely asking if the supposed cutters weren’t really just visiting, and thus avoid what might be irreparable damage to the psyche of her poor androgynous child even further. But in the instant I hesitated she had already stepped around me and was marching off towards the offending party. Legolas in front of me turned his head around to catch my eye and I raised an eyebrow at the situation. Without saying a word, we’d communicated and agreed: This was getting good.

She marched up to them and just as I saw her reposition the kid on her hip again, to strike a “don’t-mess-with-me” pose and really free up her other hand for some serious finger-wagging and possibly punching or slapping, the line-cutters said goodbye, turned and walked away, having turned out to be the visitors that I had thought they were. My violent, crazy, line-friend stammered for a second, and then yelled at their backs:

“Yeah, that’s what I thought!” meaning, “Yeah, you best run off scared, ‘cuz I’m one ass-beating mama! I’ll throw down over people cutting into my cotton-candy line! What now! What!”

She then quietly got back in line behind me, and started playing good-natured-ly with her child. I looked at my bare wrist again, and sighed.

* “the lucidity of adulthood” – I don’t know about you, but I seem to remember my childhood as if I were drunk for the whole thing, like I blacked out and it’s sort-of coming back to me. Damn government implanted memory module.

BTW, does anyone remember the movie Johnny Mnemonic? The sizes of data they talk about being in the implants are laughable now. “OMG, 120-GB of data with a ‘doubler’? That’s crazy!!” Yeah. My belly-button can hold a half-dozen 32-GB SD cards in it. (Stay tuned for pics!)

On a related note, I want one of those sweet one-molecule-thick cutting-wires installed in MY thumb. Almost more than I want a functional lightsaber.

Tags: cotton candy, childhood, strangers, trailer trash, beat-down

Tags: beat-down, childhood, cotton candy, strangers, trailer trash
Posted in Humor, Life | No Comments »

Long After You're Gone, I'll Still Remember Your Stench.

Tuesday, March 17th, 2009

Dear Old Fridge,

We’ve been together a long time, right? How long has it been, eh? 3 years? Maybe 4? Yeah, I remember when I first saw you. I walked into the house that the wife and I were totally going to rent regardless of how it looked inside because the landlord told us he didn’t need a deposit and there you were: standing there in the kitchen, empty of food and drinks, but so full of love to give. So full of hope and promise and shelving.

“Retro! Sweet!” I said, noting your mustard-yellow/sort-of-avocado-green exterior. I remember marveling at your separate little egg compartments, your roomy cheese compartment, and your little butter compartment that actually said “Margarine”. I almost kissed the landlord when he said that you came with the place, free of charge. My very own fridge, I thought, how cool is that! I’m gonna put SO much beer in you! You’d like that, huh? Oh yes you would!

But time has passed, buddy, and, well, I don’t know how to tell you this, but I think it’s time for you to leave. Every time I walk into the kitchen, there you are: lurking, looming at me as I try to make a sandwich. You’ve become distant and cold, my old companion, and not cold in the way you were before (which was the good kind of cold) but cold like my 9th-grade English teacher’s heart.

Also, you smell. I’m your friend and friends tell each other the truth, so take this to heart, err, motor. It’s awful. It’s the stench of a thousand pounds of bologna gone bad. It’s an odor that, I’m guessing, rivals Rush Limbaugh’s taint. It’s funky, brosef, and not like Kool and the Gang.

Clearly you can see that both the wife and I have moved on. That beautiful, spacious, non-leaking white box next to you ain’t a curio cabinet, my old friend. That’s your replacement. He’s just… well… better than you are. He’s got removable shelves that you can actually remove and put anywhere you want! He’s even got a water and ice dispenser on his front and… I don’t even have that hooked up yet, but damn that’s cool. I have always wanted one, since I was a little kid.

Plus he doesn’t leak. I can’t stress this plus enough. Many a morning have I stood before you looking for the orange juice and realized that your fridge-whizz is slowly soaking through the bottom of my slippers. WTF, dude.

Sure, I’ll always remember the good times we’ve had. I’d stick something room-temperature into you and then, later, much later, you’d have chilled it nicely. Sometimes you froze it completely solid, like that carton of eggs I bought a just before Christmas, but, hey, you know what? We all make mistakes. You remember that time I accidentally left that head of cauliflower in your crisper for, like, 27 weeks? Hahaha! Hey, maybe that’s why you smell so much…? Anyway, I digress.

The point is that lately you’ve begun to cast an oppressive shadow over the rest of the kitchen appliances. I can see by its demeanor that you’ve been taking out some of your foul mood on the microwave. It used to nuke up a burrito or a honey-dipped turkey-corndog with nary a whisper, but now it groans and pops with displeasure whenever I get near it. Heaven forbid I should touch the built-in popcorn setting and set off a Chernobyl-like meltdown. And I think the less said about the effects of your passive-agressiveness on the toaster, the better.

Maybe I’m to blame for your depression. Maybe it’s because I’ve been stacking pizza boxes on you lately, instead of putting pizza inside of you? Perhaps it’s the fact that I keep asking people if they need a fridge, right in front of you? Well, whatever it is, let’s try not to dwell on it. Let us not quibble over these things now. Not here, at the end.

In a little while, some crackhead from Craigslist is going to come and take you away because I told him I’d give him a case of Pabst. He’s promised me that he’ll give you a good home on his, uh, farm. You’ll be free to run around (What, your refrigerator doesn’t run? Well then get it fixed! LOLZ. THNX. I’ll be here all night!) and futiley attempt to chill things and he’s got a malfunctioning sub-zero freezer you can frolick with… it’ll be better for you. I promise. Would I lie to you, buddy? Huh? Who’s my brave little fridge, huh? Who’s my brave little fridge? YOU ARE! That’s right! YOU ARE!

In conclusion, try not to fuck up the paint on the door jam on your way out, and always remember that I’ll forever have a place for you in my heart. Just not in my kitchen. Or anywhere around my home.

Attached you’ll find some photos I took while you were sleeping.

Love and kisses,

Zaphod. Err, I mean, Chris.

P.S.: I’m gonna need that box of baking soda I left in you back, for the new fridge. I know, I know, I stuck it in you to try to fight your stench, but let’s be honest here: it’s not doing any good. You’re not fooling anyone: It’s just too powerful an odor. It’s some kind of super-stench that was engineered in a government lab somewhere and was smuggled into you at night. Jesus, my nose hairs are curling just thinking about it.

P.P.S.: And what the hell did you do to the linoleum!?!?!? Fuck me, that’s disgusting.

Tags: refrigerator, letter, craigslist, laura bush’s cold heart, rush limbaugh’s taint, horrible smell

Here you are, stinking up my kitchen...

fridge2

Tags: craigslist, horrible smell, laura bush's cold heart, letter, refrigerator, rush limbaugh's taint
Posted in Featured, Humor | No Comments »

A Blanket Statement, A Phantom Injury, and A Bedroom Scene.

Sunday, March 15th, 2009

Apparently, my lovely wife never attended bed-making 101 or even a remedial blanket-folding workshop. This, I found out one morning while trying to make her parent’s bed, on which we slept last night while house-sitting. Yes, sleeping with your significant other on his/her parents bed is somewhat creepy.

“No, that’s not how it goes. The other way. No, the… how is it that I’m now holding one of YOUR corners?” I called out.

“Well, if you’d stop for a second I could get my bearings…” She replied.

“What ‘bearings’? Who are you? Magellan? We’re folding a blanket, woman!” At this she whipped the blanket to get an errant fold out of it, pulling both corners out of my hands, making us start over. I looked at her with a contemptuous glint in my eye and folded my arms. She smiled sheepishly.

“Well… you should have been holding those corners a little firmer…” she mumbled. “I’ll show you who’s a sea-faring explorer…”

“If you’d just not whip it like that, this would go a lot quicker, and I could be back to my toast and the crossword puzzle.” I said, as I bent down to pick up my corners again. She gave the thing another little whip to ’straighten it out’ that ends up with one of the corners flicking me right in the eye.

“Arg! Do you see what I mean?! What did I just say?” I said.

“I don’t know. Weren’t you listening either?” she said flippantly.

(On a side note, why is it that when you sustain an injury to the head, such as getting flicked in the eye or maybe getting slapped in the side of the head, why is it that you clutch the injury and limp? Where does the limp come from?)

Finally we wrestled the folded blanket into the closet and closed the door. There. It’s gone now. Out of sight, out of mind.

“OWWW!!” she cries out, as we put pillows on the bed.

“What?! What’s wrong?!”

“I’ve got something in my foot!”

“Like what? A needle? A pin? A pebble? A complex series of ligaments and bones?” Alright, that last one was a bit cheeky.

“No, dammit, come here and check it out.”

On my way over, somehow, the bottom of my t-shirt got caught on the corner post of the decorative foot of the bed. Not noticing, I continued a few quick steps forward to aid my wife and was then flung stumbling backwards (”Urk!”), sort of slung-shot by the elasticity of my shirt-hem. I remained on my feet, though. My wife looked up at me from examining her foot, having missed this rather cartoon-ish event.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” she said impatiently.

“You didn’t just see that or hear me go ‘Urk!’?”

“No, but I’m in pain here!”

I shrugged and walked over, without incident this time. I bent down to look at her foot. Nothing. I rubbed my hand over the bottom of her foot and she squeaked from the tickle. Nothing. I looked up at her, disbelieving.

“Don’t you look at me like that. There was something in there. It’s probably still in the carpet. Look in the carpet.” she says.

I felt around through the carpet on hands and knees for a few minutes while she hopped around on one foot.

“Nothing. Apparently you’re imagining the pain in your foot.” I stated.

“I’m going to imagine my hand smacking you upside the head in moment.”

“It’s that sort of remark that will encourage a jury to find you guilty of my murder years from now.”

She raised an eyebrow. “What makes you think it’ll be years from now?”

“Oh, I’m so scared. What are you going to do? Limp over here and smother me with a poorly-folded blanket?”

She picks a pillow off the bed and throws it at me and I deftly block it with my face. I pick one up and throw it at her, which misses horribly. We stand there for a minute glaring at each other.

“I’m finished fighting.” my wife says, dropping her scowl.

“I never was fighting, really.” I replied, as we left the somewhat straightened-up bedroom to go back to the kitchen.

Such is love.

Tags: cheeky, funny story, housework, Humor, love, marriage, wife, witty
Posted in Featured, Humor | No Comments »

Distractions, distractions.

Friday, March 13th, 2009

“While I don’t exactly have any real stage combat training, I have hadda smack a bitch up in my day, so I knew that would come in handy.” This is the sentence that came from the television that made me swivel around in my chair while I was trying to work on a graphics design project today.

“What on earth are you watching?” I asked my wife.

“It’s called ‘Scream Queens’. It’s a reality show where a bunch of actresses are all trying to win a role in the new Saw movie. They have to act out various scenes and they’re all whores and it’s really pretty aweful.”

“So why are you watching it?”

“Well, it’s kind of fun to watch these girls try to act. Oh, here, look! That one on the screen now, she’s a super-whore. She’s, like, the whorey-est of whores.”

I stopped working for a few minutes and watch the show with her, during the course of which, a woman wearing a bikini in a bathtub has a rubber snake thrown on her and proceeds to scream/moan-seductively and manhandle the snake in a suggestive way.

“Wow.” I say.

“It’s so difficult, not being a ho-bag myself and trying to follow these ho-bag shows on television. I don’t understand these things.” My wife says thoughtfully.

“Me neither. Does she moan like that with everything?”

“Pretty much. This one time there was a chainsaw murderer chasing her and I could swear she was having an orgasm.”

“So, it’s a delicate interplay between the feelings of sex and fear, a sort of primal link and she’s attempting to bridge the gap for us? With her boobs?”

“That’s pretty much it.”

“Sweet.” I said.

“Yeah, I think you’re enjoying this show more than me now.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

Tags: television, scream queens, boobs, distractions

Tags: boobs, distractions, scream queens, television
Posted in Life | No Comments »

The Tao of Work

Tuesday, March 10th, 2009

My wife has, arguably, one of the worst jobs on the planet. She works at a craft store which means it is her job to be abused by middle-aged women with disposable income, most of whom I am surprised can tie their own shoelaces. And if the stupidity brought in by customers isn’t enough to give you a headache, then you’ve also got a nice hefty dose from the employees.

“What the hell is up with customers asking where we keep the ‘reefs’?” My wife asked me shortly after last Thanksgiving. ”It’s a WREATH, goddamnit, A WREATH! It’s not a large grouping of coral, it’s a fucking circle of twigs and evergreen branchs and holly and some stupid ribbon.”

I bring this up because I’ve been ruminating quietly the last hour on the nature of ‘work’. My wife truly hates that job and wants to find something else, but I’m not in that position at all. I get paid to do what I would still do if I weren’t being paid.

There’s a thing that happens when something that you enjoy doing becomes something you are paid to do. Technically you’re going through the same motions but there is an added aspect or shadow that, for some, can destroy the beauty of the act or rob the activity of meaning. The trick is, I think, to remind yourself occasionally why you loved it in the first place, which is what this blog is all about for me. It’s a place where, after spending hours during the day writing website pitches and ad copy or basslines to songs, I can come to write for my enjoyment.

For example: Bananas. Kerfuffle. Slathered with jam.

It’s all about balance, really. The Way of doing what you love without mucking it up for yourself. It’s tricky. When you do any job long enough, it’s easy to complain no matter how trivial the complaint. I guess I have to remind myself that even male porn stars complain about chafing.

Tags: about blogging, craft store, tao, work
Posted in Life | No Comments »

Why DON'T I Blog About It?

Saturday, March 7th, 2009

“Why don’t you blog about it?” my wife asks me, in a tone that makes it sound more like she’s saying: “Why don’t you cry about it?”

We bicker playfully, without malice, jibing each other the way that newly married couples do. (3 years and counting. Take that, growing divorce rate!)

“And go ahead and tell everyone that I told you to blog about it, too.” She adds.

We’re sparring verbally in the car on the way to one of my local gigs, a casino gig that the band has played so many times in the past that it feels like coming home. In fact, since it’s been over 5 months since our last gig there, it feels exactly like coming home, complete with security staff telling me “We’ve missed you SO much!” and “We’re SO glad you’re back!” several times before I’ve even made it to the check-in station. It’s good to be loved.

“I think I will blog about it. And, maybe, if I’m up for it, I’ll even blog about blogging about it.”

My blog has been the subject of playful ribbing by my wife and friends and, truth be told, I’ve even made fun of it myself.

“This cheeseburger is great.” I remarked recently, “I can’t wait to go home and blog about it. See? It’s got a fried egg on it, and hashbrowns. If you were signed onto my RSS feed, you’d know exactly when I blogged about my egg-burger.”

My wife enjoys ribbing me about how I’m going to write something embarrassing on my blog about her. She’s worried that I’ll tell the world all about, oh-I-don’t-know, the fact that for several months when I was driving her to work she would wonder aloud to me about the dogs at a kennel that we passed twice a day, 5 days a week. I’m concentrating on the road, so I never look. Even when she tells me to look ahead of time, I always seem to find something else to watch around that particular bend. Like the potholes in the road that are tearing up my damn suspension.

“They all look like the same breed of dog to me.” she’d say, “They’re, like, a sort of short breed, with really strange looking coats. And such odd looking little legs! Maybe they’re a special breed? We should slow down one day and look.”

So one day, we slow down and take a look. And within a few seconds of looking it becomes pretty clear to me that they are not dogs, and, in fact, it’s not a kennel we’re stopped at. They are, unequivocably, goats. Aluminum-can-eating, hoof-having, horned, billy goats gruff.

“I could have sworn those were dogs.” she says as the reality sets in. I look at her like she’s clearly gone off the deep end, but I don’t say anything, I just smile (sheepishly?).

“Oh, just shut up and drive.” She tells me.

Yeah, that’s exactly the kind of thing she’d hate for me to blog about. So I won’t.

Tags: wife, blogging, dogs, goats, driving

Tags: blogging, dogs, driving, goats, wife
Posted in Humor, Life | No Comments »

A Dish Best Served Cold (And During The Season Finale)

Friday, March 6th, 2009

I’ve got a bad habit, or so my wife tells me, of talking through the last 5 minutes of hour-long television shows and movies. Now, this is especially annoying, she tells me, when I talk through the last 5 minutes of CSI or Law and Order or some other crime drama. You know, when they’re trying to wrap everything up in a neat little package.

CSI Detective on TV: “Well, if it’s not the gay business partner who did it, then it’s got to be, without a shadow of a doubt, the…”

Me: “Hey! I just installed the new stats plugin on my blog and it seems to be running fine. It did this funny thing though when I tried to check my stats right after I installed it…”

The Wife: “OH-MY-GOD, WILL YOU PLEASE SHUT UP FOR LIKE 3 FREAKING MINUTES?!?!”

Television: “…and I guess that wraps everything up! Case closed! Goodnight!”

This has, I guess, been going on for the last few years, and tonight my wife decided to exact some revenge on me. I’d been waiting all week for the season finale of “Burn Notice” because, you know, spies are awesome, and we’re sitting there on the couch, I’m eating my favorite popcorn (buttery cinnamon) and they’re finally about to reveal who ‘burned’ our main character when the wife turns to me and says…

“BLAH BLAH BLAH Blogging is hard! BLAH BLAH BLAH Bass guitars are neat! BLAH BLAH BLAH Insert Random Pithy Joke or Star Wars Quote Here BLAH BLAH FREAKING BLAH!”

I manage to turn back to the television just in time to see the Dad from Frasier (wtf?) in a helicopter and then the main character dives from the chopper after saying something sassy and then that’s it.

Thanks, babe. I owe you one.

Tags: tv, burn notice, blog stats, plugin, frasier, interruption

Tags: burn notice, frasier, interruption, plugin, stats, tv
Posted in Featured, Humor, Life | No Comments »

It's Playful Banter, Really.

Thursday, March 5th, 2009

Starting a blog, like beginning anything worthwhile, is never easy. It takes resolve, it takes planning, it takes patience. It takes a few drinks, preferrably right after lunch and yet before your wife gets home from the store.

“What on earth are you doing?!” my wife asks me. She’s just walked into the living room and found me sitting at my computer, having just made myself comfortable in my nice black leather chair that I think I stole, if memory serves. But from who? Or is it ‘whom’? I should know this.

“Writing?”

“I can see that, but where are your pants?”

I gesture to the couch without needing to look. “There.” And now back to writing…

“Well put them on. My friend Max will be here any moment and I don’t want you doing the mad scramble to get into your pants while I answer the door. Then she’ll walk in and you’ll be zipping up your fly and she’ll be thinking we were fooling around…”

“Well, if she’s going to think it anyway…” I implore. She looks at me like I just asked her if she might be willing to consider exotic dancing as a night job. “I mean, I’ve already got my pants off…”

She rolls her eyes so hard I swear it makes a sound and then she gestures impatiently toward my pants, which, quite frankly, my pants don’t deserve. I spontaneously decide, on my own, to put them on.

They’re a nice pair of gray slacks that I’ve ‘hemmed’ with a pair of scissors. It wouldn’t be so bad except that the only scissors I could find that day were left-handed safety-scissors for kids that have a decorative wavy edge better suited to cutting brightly colored construction paper. I tried to counter the waviness by cutting in a counter-active wavy manner, sort of like one sine wave cancelling out the other to create a straight line, but…

“Chris! Would you stop admiring your pants and put them on?” my wife says.

“Oh. I didn’t realize you were still in the room. My bad.” I put them on, one leg at a time, just to show how bourgeois I am. Sure, a guy like me has a way of putting them on both legs at once, but it involves model rocketry and some on-the-fly (Ha!) calculations and some advanced theories about quantum chromodynamics and Strong Force that I’d rather not fool around with right now. Especially while the wife’s watching.

She walks out of the room to do who-knows-what. Grout the tub maybe.

Honestly, the amount of work she goes through when a guest is coming over to our house is astonishing. New potpourri appeared in our bathroom when that girl from Craigslist came over to look at the recumbant exercise bicycle, just in case, I’m guessing, she decided to use the bathroom. A new throw-pillow spontaneously came into being when my drummer came to pick me up for a gig. A decorative basket of fruit teleported onto our kitchen counter last week, when that guy came around looking for his black leather office chair. It amazes me. Really.

“When is she going to be here?” I call out towards the other room.

“I don’t know! She said she’d be here when she got off of work!”

“Well, when’s that?”

“Anytime between now and nine!”

I take a look at my watch. Jesus, it’s 4:39PM. Cable repairmen give you a smaller window than that.

“Tonight, I trust? I mean, she’ll be here technically today, right?”

My wife walks back in the living room while putting on some earrings and I start putting on my shoes. “Well, duh. We’re not waiting all night for her.”

“Why the bloody hell not…” I grumble. “we’re already waiting all damn day…”

“Oh, stop your grumbling and just be ready when she comes because we’re leaving right when she gets here. Besides, this was your idea. We’re going to go see that movie you wanted to see.” she tells me.

“What movie?”

“That one. You KNOW. That one we saw the trailer for online when we were at my parents and you said ‘Oh, that looks funny’. And I was all like, no, that looks stupid. And then you said ‘But it’s got that guy from Shaun of the Dead in it’, and then I said, oh yes, that IS him and so now we’re going to go and see it. With Max.”

“Why on earth do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Every time you imitate me, like you just did, why do you always make me sound like I’m mentally handicapped?”

“I don’t know. I guess it just comes out that way.”

“I don’t actually sound like that do I?” I ask seriously.

“Oh, baby, of course not,” she says and comes over to where I’m now sitting and puts her arm around my shoulder. “No, you sound more like a cross between Fozzy Bear from the Muppets and Billy Bob Thorton from Sling Blade.”

“Now you’re just being cruel,” I tell her as she leaves the room again. I worry that it might be true. I’ve actually heard my own voice on tape before and it’s something I never want to ever hear again. It lacks depth. Let’s just leave it at that. Perhaps someday I’ll do a podcast and you’ll all hear it. Whoo! Movin’ on up into the year 2002!

Alright, now that I’m dressed I can get back to writing.

Starting a blog is never easy… But then again, what the hell do I know? I mean, this is only my second blog ever and I started my last one with a story about being mistaken for having masochistic sex with my decidedly male drummer in Mississippi.

Starting a new blog, though, reminds me of another first in my life: Sex. With a woman. Specifically, my first time. Let me explain.

There was some trouble with getting it started (not on my end, I assure you), but I knew it would mostly be a worthwhile venture that might change my life for the better. I knew the motions I needed to go through, but I wasn’t quite sure how I was going to get from point A to point B. (I hadn’t even thought about points C through M, and my wife would gently, yet firmly, introduce me to points N through W on our honeymoon. I think she’s saving the rest of the Latin-based alphabet for our wool/copper anniversary. Then, who knows? Perhaps Cyrillic?) Then there was that boring part where I forced myself to think about tennis. And then, in the end, I felt that, had I not offended all parties involved and left them wanting more, I wouldn’t feel like I’ve done my job properly. As a blogger, I mean.

And so that’s my first real post here. Kinda proud really.

Peace out!

Tags: sex, metaphor, blogging, writing, marriage, funny, bickering

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