People are always bugging me to write a new blog. Apparently, you all can't get enough of pre-pubescent level sex jokes and rants about how dressing a bunch of midgets as various Super Mario Bros. characters, taking them to Gasoline Alley, making them ride the go-karts, then filming it and posting it on youtube would be both "awesome" and "not that offensive."

Well, you're in luck.

I've started a new blog. However, to honor the memory of Kristiane*, I am emulating (aka stealing) her idea and doing this new blog at Wordpress.com. And not just because blogging on the same site "Dateline NBC" uses to catch pedophiles feels sort of cheesy, but because nothing screams professional like a free website run by nerds and used by pretentious, coffee-shop hanging out-in, reefer smoking bloggers everywhere. LOOK AT ME! I'M EXPRESSING MYSELF WITH WORDS!

Right then. The new site is: Here There's nothing there yet except for a little introductory post. Hopefully I'll do more stuff soon.

Now quit bugging me.

*(Note: Kristiane isn't dead. But I just think honoring her memory is a good idea, anyway.)

On October 27, 2006, I wrote a blog entitled "There must be a way we can shoehorn Jesus into this somehow…," discussing my frustration with people who were so determined to fit into a certain group they would embrace certain contradictions into their life.  It included all the elements that would become a staple of my later blogs: incoherent rambling, pathetic over the top attempts at humor, bad punctuation, and a cameo appearance by Samuel L. Jackson.

My motivation for writing this blog flowed less from my passion about the actual subject and more from my need to write something.  About this time, I found myself in a crisis with my relationship to the whole writing thing.  I had myself an English degree, and was telling people I was an aspiring writer, but there was a problem.  I had a sudden epiphany one day while trying to work on some short stories I could turn into a novel.  The epiphany went a little something like this:

 

I hate writing fiction.

 

And I realized…I did.  This is a scary realization for someone who, basically, had built his entire college education on the foundation of writing fiction.  But it was true.  I didn't like it anymore.  So what's a semi-educated wannabe writer who hates writing to do?

 

I decided, just as a task to keep myself writing something, to challenge myself to write a short blog and post it on MySpace once a week for a year.  The idea was simple: by freeing myself to write something pointless, simple, and unimportant, I could turn off my inner critic and actually get some writing done, as opposed to constantly crushing my own motivation with the intimidation that comes with trying to write something, you know, good.  I posted them just so I could see that my work was going somewhere…I never really imagined anyone would actually read the things.

 

I was very wrong.

 

A bunch of you decided this nonsense was funny and/or interesting and/or entertaining and/or ridiculous enough to read and comment on every week.  I was flattered, but it also made my task much more difficult.  The whole idea behind this experiment was to free myself to write without worrying about an audience.  And then…I had an audience.

 

But it turned out to be a very good thing, I think.  Knowing there were some people out there who actually cared if I posted a new blog or not forced me to drag myself to my laptop and write some weeks when I probably would have just as soon skipped it.  And I thank all of you for that.

 

Now, it is exactly a year later, and I'm feeling like this whole blog thing is done.  Or at least this incarnation of it, anyway.  So…now what?  Well, it is the end of an experiment…so we could look at some pointless numbers.  Here are my blog's stats, according to the main page:

 

POSTS: 39

COMMENTS: 181

VIEWS: 3620

KUDOS: 100

 

Fascinating.  And by fascination I mean…boring.  I did 39 posts in one year.  I wanted to do one every week.  Which means I missed 13 weeks.  That is over three months.  Bad, bad writer.  I am giving myself a C+ for that part of the experiement.

 

3,620 views seems like a lot, and that is pretty awesome.  That means 3,620 people saw my writing.  Or, that the same crazy person clicked my blogs link 3,620 times by themselves.  I almost like the idea of that second one better.

 

I also racked up 100 kudos.  I have no idea what that means, but that seems like a fair amount of kudos.  Is MySpace planning on setting up some sort of rewards system, where I can cash those in for, like, a new car or a trip or something?  Probably not.

 

But the best part…is the comments.  Oh, blog comments, how I love thee.  I am quite certain my absolute favorite part of firing up MySpace, or for that matter, one of the favorite parts of my whole day…was seeing "New Blog Comment" in wonderful, happy yellow letters in my mailbox.  Your comments to my nonsense were usually much more interesting, funny, and well thought out than my actual writing.  In fact, I would like to take this space right here to count down my ten favorite comments made by you, the reader, on my blog.  There are in the order, counting down, which they made me laugh, smile, think, or squint my eyes in a "what the fuck" expression.

 

10)

        "…it does suck buying condoms, so just stop using them and chance it."

 

--Nikki W. (in response to "Stuff about things…")

 

9)

        "I miss Surge.  And that's okay."

 

--Nick R. (in response to "thepilver.com…")

 

8)

        "Nikki Wakal says she is OVER IT! That is all."

 

--Andrew N. (in response to "My advice to you…")

 

7)

"My problem is YOUR nephew.  He has been up all night and all day....and not just awake, but crying.  THE WHOLE TIME.  Screaming even.  And why you ask?  Because of gas.  Seriously kid....just fart and get on with your life!"

 

--Amber N. (in response to"The problem with problems…")

 

6)

        "Calling Paula Abdul Skeletor is terrible. Skeletor, while quite disturbing to look at, at least had a semblence of a personality."

 

--Andrew N. (in response to "American Idol…")

 

5)

        "Fuck Carrot Top.  I hate that rat bastard!"

 

--Amber N. (in response to "If a tree falls in the forest…")

 

4)

        "I don't expect you boys to know everything, but I do expect you to know better…"

 

--Nikki W. (in response to "Ich Weiß nicht…")

 

3)

        "I want to have your boney, Charlie Brown looking, bad haircut having, WAY too young looking scrubby babies. Yeah, I said it."

 

--Meggan M. (in response to "A brief moment of self-image realignment…")

 

2)

        "Tim, you think too much."

 

--Jackie B. (in response to "Cruise Control…")

 

And finally, my all time favorite response.  In one of my blogs, I asked the readers to leave as their comment what they thought I would be doing ten years from now, prompting the greatest blog comment ever…

 

1)

"There's two things I imagine you doing. One is being the guy that tests how an Oreo holds up in different temperatures of milk. You will work in a lab. A very clean, white lab with very few employees... but you guys know how important your job is. You use tongs to get the Oreo out of the bag (and you open a new bag of Oreos every time you test a glass of milk. Some fat guy named Rick is sitting in the alley behind the lab waiting for the one-Oreo-less bags of cookies that you will inevitably throw out) and look sternly at your sterile watch, waiting for the seconds to pass to the next minute for an accurate reading. You're sweating. The staff is sweating. Most importantly, Rick is sweating. So many people depending on one man.

The second thing I see you doing is being that dude at the Renaissance festival that sticks his face out of the hole and says dickhead things to people while they throw tomatoes at him. You will be great at this because you're such a asshole. It's a perfect match."

 

--Kelly P. (in response to "All that I know…")

 

 

So there it is, folks.  I'm probably done with the whole blog writing thing, at least for awhile.  I hope to use the time to work on some other writing projects.  But I'll probably just use it to play more poker and download more internet porn.  Either way, it'll be pretty fantastic.

 

I don't really know how to end this, so since my blogs were always about random nonsense anyway, I will end this final blog with an idea for a movie I have.  Recently Hollywood has been going to the old TV show well fairly often, with movies such as "Transformers", "Charlie's Angels", and a rumored upcoming "Magnum PI" movie.  But I think they are missing out on the best old TV show that could become a great movie.  Imagine going to the theater and seeing the following preview…

 

THE FOLLOWING MOTION PICTURE HAS BEEN RATED "B" FOR BIG EXPLOSIONS, BIG BOOBS, AND BLOWING YOUR BALLS OFF

 

Exterior shot…the streets of New York.  Children are everywhere.

 

VOICE OVER GUY: In a city with no rules, no authority, no hope…

 

Children, ranging from ages 5 to late teens, are causing havoc in the streets!  They smoke, and swear, and mingle about as teenagers are liable to do.  The adults cower in fear.

 

RANDOM COP: We need to do something about these children!

 

MORGAN FREEMAN: There's only one man that can save us…but he's out of the game…

 

Cut to: a shadowy figure, slowly smoking a cigarette.

 

SHADOWY FIGURE: You know I don't do that anymore.  I'm out.

 

A football flies through the window, knocking over the shadowy figures priceless John Elway collector plates!

 

SHADOWY FIGURE: Now its personal.

 

Cut to:  exterior shot.  The children are rampaging.  But a shadow looms over them.  They gasp in horror.

 

CHILD: You!  But you're…

 

The identity of the shadowy figure is seen.  It is…SCOTT BAIO!

 

SCOTT BAIO:  I'm back…bitches.

 

On the screen, we see an explosion and a magnificent title splash:

 

CHARLES IN CHARGE: THE MOVIE!

 

Cut to next card:

 

I WANT CHARLES IN CHARGE OF ME….SUMMER OF 2008

 

Awesome.

Sunday morning, I sprung out of bed at the crack of 11:30 a.m.  I had a full day of things to accomplish, and decided to get a head start by depriving myself of my usual 1:30 sleep-in time.  Motivation!  I had a chore list, which included the following:

 Tim's To-Do List

 

1) Buy new car battery and brake pads

2) Clean apartment

3) Find monologue for audition

4) Write a blog

5) Work on play for ten-minute play festival

6) Look for a new job

I vowed to get at least five of these six accomplished today.  Well…four.  Three.  No, damn it…I was going to do four!  My work cut out for me and my belly full of determination and Frosted Mini-Spooners, I rolled up my sleeves and immediately…

…signed up to play a noon poker tournament on Pokerstars.com.  Uh, okay.  I have motivation.  But it's early.  And I also have a strong desire to sit in my pajamas and play poker.  For a little while.

"Wow, way to get on top of that "To-Do List."  You're a regular fireball of productivity," Bob commented.  Bob and I have been friends for longer than I can remember.  Literally.  I don't recall him ever not being a part of my life.  I think we all have a friend like Bob.  You know, the friend you don't really like and, in fact, sort of hate.  But you've been friends so long you don't really know how to tell this person to go away.  Also, though you may hate them, you're used to them…and sometimes friendship is more about comfort than the actual enjoyment of each others company.

So I'm playing poker, and Bob is watching me and chiming in with the occasional annoying comment.  The tournament is a $5 entry fee freeze-out which 2,770 people register for.  First prize, according to the tournament lobby, is a cute little $2,100 chunk of change.  And I only have to beat the other 2,669 players to get it.

During the first two hours of the tournament I manage to get all my money in after the flop in horrible shape, then proceed to catch lucky river cards to keep myself alive.  Bob snorts and giggles over my shoulder.

"Jesus, you pretty much suck at this.  Seriously.  You've been playing this game for how long?  Four years?  Good lord almighty.  And you've read how many poker books?  I would hope after four years of practice and study you'd be at least passably good, but I mean, look at you.  You should just go to the casino and play craps for all the good you're putting that $5 to.  Or better yet, just give it to a homeless guy.  At least he would have the decency to buy some good booze with it."

I ignore Bob, grit my teeth, and actually manage to play a couple hours of good poker and squeeze my way into the last 100 players.  For the next half hour I catch a sick rush, and with thirty players left in the tournament, I find myself the overall chip leader with over 600,000.

"Holy crap!  I could win this thing," I tell Bob.  I double check the tournament payout chart.  Yes, it's still $2,100 for 1^st place.  Even 2^nd place is a respectable $1,200.  Visions of paying off my car and taking my family out for a nice celebratory meal are doing the conga, California Raisin-like, through my skull.  Bum-bum bum-bum bum-BAH.  Bum-bum bum-bum bum-BAH…

"You're not going to win," Bob tells me, matter-of-factly.  He leans back in his chair, an annoying half smirk on his face.  "You're getting lucky.  You still have to outlast twenty-nine other people, and you haven't taken one bad beat this whole tournament.  You think that's going to last?"

I ignore my friend of little faith and sit down at my laptop, trying my best to channel Allen Cunningham, determined not to blow this opportunity.  I relax, concentrate, and…

…proceed to figuratively get repeatedly punched in the balls by my uncooperative opponents, who clearly have their own selfish ideas about who should win that two grand.  My downward spiral starts, as Bob predicated, with my first bad beat of the tournament, as I lose half my chips after flopping top pair, putting my opponent with a flush draw all-in, only to see him make his flush on the turn.  This is followed by me going completely card dead and unable to steal because every time I even dare to put in a pre-flop raise to steal the blinds, someone raises me the rest of my chips.  Don't these jackasses know I have a car to pay off?  How rude!

The blinds, antes, and foiled steal attempts combine to whittle away my once dominant chip stack, and forty-five minutes after I saw my name atop the leader board, I am busted from the tournament after my King-high fails to improve against my opponents Ace-high.  I am out in 20^th place.  20^th place out of 2,770.  It feels like 20^th out of 20.  A window pops up to congratulate me and inform me that I have won…$30.

Bob is literally rolling on my bedroom floor, laughing.  "Oh my god, that was so beautiful.  You didn't even make the final table.  You didn't even make the final TWO tables.  You were the chip leader for Christ's sake!"  I point out to him that I did finish 20^th out of over 2,500 people.  "Yeah, did you win?  No?  You suck.  The end."

I'm devastated, and to make matters work, I look at my computer clock and…6 O'CLOCK!  It's 6 pm.  Not only did I not win…it took me 6 hours of my precious Sunday to fail at this task.

"Fuck me!"  I spit.  I go for a walk, to try and work off some of the frustration.  Bob goes with me, not because I really want him to, but because he basically never leaves me alone.  It's just as well.  Left alone in my apartment, I'd be worried he'd try to steal something or pee in my food.

Walking around my apartment complex, I try to think how to salvage my day.  I decide going to buy a car battery and brakes, which should be a priority, is out.  I'm just not in the mood to deal with that crap now.  To be honest, I am probably just using this as an excuse to put off something I really don't want to do.  I've never changed a car battery before, and I figure there is a minimum 15% chance I will electrocute myself during the task.

"Holy shit, you call yourself a man?  You can't even change a lousy car battery?  Here, I'll give you a hint: the red plug goes into the red socket, and the black one goes into the black socket.  The end."  Bob is shaking his head.  "Your grandfather owned an auto shop.  Jesus!"

Having walked myself into exhaustion, I go back into my apartment and see if I can find something to eat.  I open my freezer to find water spilling out of it onto my floor and a compartment full of half de-thawed food.  "What the hell?"  I ask Bob, who shrugs.  A quick investigation shows that some ice build up has been preventing my freezer door from closing all the way.  It has been hanging open for God only knows how long.

Bob is cracking up.  "Hilarious," he says, wiping tears from his eyes.

I wheel around to him, angry.  "Dude, how is this hilarious?  I have a freezer full of food that isn't frozen.  I have Lake Michigan on my kitchen floor.  I have nothing to eat.  What part of all that fits your definition of 'hilarious'?"

"Oh, well...," Bob composes himself.  "Well, you're right, that's not funny. That's all kind of sucky, man.  Very tragic.  But, you know…it's happening to you, so…that's pretty funny."

I decide to start doing dishes, determined to get one thing on my list done and figuring cleaning is about the only thing I have the emotional energy for at this point.  A disturbing stack of empty Smirnoff bottles sitting next to my sink provides an uncomfortable reminder of my burgeoning alcoholism.

"Oh, please!" Bob rolls his eyes.  "Don't flatter yourself, sweetheart!  We're talking about the guy that has two stiff drinks and ten minutes later is rolling on the floor with a stomache ache.  'Oh, oh, it hurts.  Its hurts.  Wah-wah-wah!'"  Bob proceeds to cry and writhe around on the floor in an unflattering but admittedly accurate impersonation of me.  "You have about as much of a chance of being an alcoholic as you do of screwing Jessica Alba," he tells me after his performance is finished.

"You know," I say to him as I wipe down a cup, "standing in this apartment, doing dishes on a Sunday evening, getting mocked and harassed by someone who doesn't even exist…"  I rinse and put away the cup.  "I think I might be cracking up."

Bob removes himself from my kitchen floor and looks at me seriously.  "Dude, you're not cracking up.  I am merely an invention of your conscious mind, which has been conditioned by your upbringing and environment to process everything around you with a bitter, insult filled back-and-forth dialogue, rather than the more traditional stream of conscious monologue most people maintain.  I exist, essentially, so that you always have someone with whom you can debate the events of your life."

I squeeze the water from the dish rag and look at Bob suspiciously.

He breaks into a grin.  "Nah, I'm just messing with you, dude.  You're totally cracking up."

I continue scrubbing dirty dishes, thinking what else I might be able to accomplish from my list today.  Find a monologue?

"No one will ever cast you in a play, kid.  You look like a drug-addicted Tobey Maguire, without the talent," Bob informs me.

Write a play?

"About what?  You spend your weekends alone in your apartment scrubbing dishes and losing poker tournaments.  That's a Greek tragedy…but it's not a play."

Look for a new job?

"What the hell new job are you going to get?  You don't have any skills."

Write a blog?

"You don't have anything to write about.  Though a quick perusal of your previous blogs shows that hasn't stopped you recently."

I decide to stick one of my half-thawed frozen pizzas into the oven for dinner, figuring it would either fill my stomach or kill me, and I wasn't sure if I was terribly interested which.

"Do you know why you never get anything done?"  Bob asks me.  I ignore him, but of course he continues anyway, as I knew he would.  "It's because you spend all your time thinking about doing things, rather than actually…physically…doing them.  Let me ask you something, seriously…do you ever stop thinking?"

I think about it.

"Right," Bob chortles.  "I win."

As my pizza heats in the over, I plop myself down on my overstuffed blue chair, and think about turning on the TV.  I don't do it…but I think about it for a good long time.

 

Monday (Wives and Girlfriends and Everything In-Between)

 

My desk at work is in a high traffic area.  I produce industrial netting samples in a small corner area out on the production floor, but in a space right by the door leading to the offices and bathrooms.  And I don't have a cubicle.  What I do have, however, are two little comfortable looking chairs and a small coffee table sitting in front of my desk, an eccentric addition to my workspace courtesy of my boss, who thought it was cute to dress up the sample area in the fake décor of a small office.  I also have a couple of cracked paintings of wine glasses hanging above my desk.  Sometimes I look at those paintings and think…

 

God I could use a couple of glasses of you.

 

Thanks to my faux office set-up, my area is a popular hang-out for my co-workers looking to kill a minute or thirty while waiting for their shift to end.  Or for their lunch break to begin.  Or right after their lunch break.  Or while walking to the bathroom.  Or while walking to the snack machine.  Or when it's 4:43 pm on a Monday afternoon, and for absolutely no reason Paul is sitting in one of my "office" chairs and talking to me about…things.

 

It's Paul's birthday today.  It is also my mom's birthday today, and we manage a two minute conversation marveling over that coincidence.  Paul has a shaved head and a face that looks suspiciously like the face on He-Man's home, Castle Grayskull.  Despite his outward appearances, Paul is actually a very nice guy.  Or maybe he just seems like a nice guy compared to his outward appearances, because his outward appearance is that of someone that would cheerfully slice off your limbs and use your torso as a hood ornament.

 

Nah, he's a nice guy.

 

Paul has just finished entertaining me with a story about his previous year's birthday, during which he apparently got his wife drunk to the point of unconsciousness and then engaged in sexual intercourse with her.  Those aren't the words he uses, of course; I'm paraphrasing.  But it was something along those lines.  I always thought getting married meant you didn't have to get girls drunk to have sex with them anymore, but then again, what would I know?  I'm a child of divorce.

 

At some point our conversation moves to the area of love in general.  Paul tells me about the one time he was heartbroken.  After dating a certain woman for two years, she left him, telling him she was going back to her husband.  An expression of genuine loss crosses Paul's face.

 

I am unexpectedly touched.  "Wow, that's really too bad.  You were with her for two years, and she never told you she had a husband?"

 

"Oh no, I knew," Paul tells me.  "Hell, I was with my wife at the time."

 

Um…

 

Ahhhhh…

 

Okay.

 

And just like that, a beautiful story of unrequited love turns into a wildly uncomfortable tale of infidelity, booze, and sexual position I was not previously familiar with, but apparently requires a non-slick horizontal surface and a whole lot of stretching.

 

As I said before, my area is in a corner of the production area.  Meaning, I am up against a wall.  Meaning, when someone wants to talk to me…

 

…and God help me, everyone seems to want to talk to me…

 

…I have no where to go.  No escape.  No reason or cause to get up, leave, or do anything else.  At my work desk, I am, for all intents and purposes, a sitting duck.  An innocent bystander, helpless to defend myself from having conversations with co-workers I don't want to talk to, about things I'd rather not hear.

 

"Now let me tell you about my son and his girlfriend," Paul continues.  "This girl's pregnant, right?  With some other guys kid, and, you know, I'll let my son see her, but she's got to get rid of the kid, you know what I'm saying?..."

 

Sitting duck.

 

Tuesday (Tiger Woods and the Mexican Prison Gang)

 

"I can't go to jail.  All the jails are run by Mexican gangs."

 

This is the matter-of-fact declaration made to me by Jerry, who as usual has me cornered at my desk.  I continue gluing netting samples to cardboard backers, trying to stay uninterested, thinking that will make him leave.  It doesn't.

 

Jerry is one of those guys.  You know the guys I am talking about.  One of those guys who…um…he's not retarded…but he's not not retarded, either.  Jerry is, by my best guess pieced together from information gathered from other coworkers, in his late to mid forties.  He still lives with is mother, a fact which he bitches about daily, and he has worked for the company for the past twenty years.  From what I have been told, Jerry always has worked on the same machine, because it is too difficult to teach him to do anything else.  He has a round face that, despite his being nearly twice my age, is closer to resembling that of a twelve year old.  It is a face of someone who has had few worries in his life, because he either isn't smart enough to worry, or the people around him have shielded him from worry because they believed he wasn't smart enough to take care of himself.  Either way, I sort of envy him.

 

But not really.

 

So, the Mexican gangs have taken over all the prisons?  "Yeah.  People think it's the Blacks, or even the Whites, but it's not.  It's the Mexicans that run all the prisons."

 

And how do you know this, Jerry?

 

"It was on the…the news people…with the cameras…they went out and interviewed.  People.  All the people.  They say it's the Mexicans."

 

I'm feeling cheeky.  "Well, I guess if you ever go to prison, Jerry, you better get in good with the Mexicans, huh?"

 

"Oh no.  You have to join the gang of your race," Jerry patiently explains to me.  "So, if you are white, you join the white gang.  And black, the black gang.  And Mexican…"

 

The Mexican gang?

 

Jerry nods solemnly.

 

I'm a smart-ass, I can't help it.  So I say, "What if Tiger Woods went to jail?  What gang would he join?"

 

I'm joking, obviously, because Tiger Woods is a big sports star and therefore could never be convicted of a crime in our country.  But Jerry has an immediate and dead serious answer for me:

 

"Oh, he'd be screwed."

 

Wednesday (Rodney King is Weeping)

 

George is a guy I don't talk to very often.  He's short, and is always wearing baseball caps that relate to either NASCAR or hunting.  He has a mustache, and unless you are Tom Selleck, mustaches just don't work.  And he constantly walks like he just finished a six hour horse ride.

 

I've never seen him on a horse.

 

  George is spending these last couple minutes to give us a little sermon, which opens with the following line:

 

"I won't work with the black guys."

 

We have several "black guys" working at the company, but I've never seen any of them breaking their necks trying to work with George, so I'm not really sure why he feels he needs to verbalize this rule.  But he does.  He then explains his rationale for this stance:

 

"I don't have anything in common with them.  I told Dan that, flat out.  I said, 'I don't have anything to talk about with those guys.  We have nothing in common.  What would we talk about?"

 

There is an uncomfortable silence in the room.  None of the infamous "black guys" are currently here, obviously, but…

 

Do I say something?

 

Is there a point?

 

And most importantly, why doesn't anyone in this damn place just want to talk about the TV show "Scrubs."  Now, that's a conversation I can get excited about.  I fucking love that show.  It's hilarious.  And I love reliving funny lines and scenes with other "Scrubs" fans.  I do NOT like talking about black people and how this piece of white trash in front of me has nothing in common with them.

 

What really kills me about this guys statement isn't so much the fact that he just assumes he knows what his African-American coworkers would be interested, because they're black, but that he assumes that he WILL have stuff in common with someone like me, because I'm white.  Here's the deal: I am not interested in NASCAR, professional wrestling, shooting animals, beer, or smacking my wife…so what exactly does George think him and I will be talking about if we work together.  I have a JD from "Scrubs"-like fantasy, imagining that scene…

 

Tim and George Working Together Fantasy

 

George: So…I see you're white.

Me: Yes.  Yes I am.

George: I, too, have a white skin color.  We have a lot in common.  Let's talk about it.  Tell me, what would you say is your favorite thing about being white?

Me: Gee, I don't know.  I guess I would probably say the whole, "Not having our ancestors brought over to this country by force and having to work as slaves causing hundreds of years of deep-seated imbedded oppression against me" thing.

George: Yeah.  My favorite thing is the chicks.  Chicks love white guys.

 

Thursday (Hot Coffee)

 

When I take my lunch break at work, I usually go very late, so that no one else is in the break room.  This may sound stuck up, but I really just like to relax, read a book, and be alone on my break.  And I know if anyone else is in there, they will attempt to engage me in conversation.

 

On this Thursday, I have the break room to myself.  For a while.  Until Glen comes in.  Glen is the company maintenance man, and I have estimated his age at roughly 4,638 years old.  Roughly.  That would mean he's been around since before Jesus, folks.  And if you're wondering when Jesus is coming back…my guess is it won't be until after this guy leaves, because he is annoying as fuck.

 

Glen's distinctive physical feature is that he has no ass.  Where his ass should be, it is concave, like a spoon.  Now, you may be saying to yourself, "Why would you be looking at a 4,638 year old man's ass?"  And you would be correct to ask…that is a little strange.  But people, it is hard not to notice.  HE HAS NO ASS!  How do his pants stay up?  He wears a belt, but it is cinched so tight around his waste it looks like a garbage bag twist tie.  And his pants sort of just hang loose where his ass is supposed to be, and then all of the sudden, there are legs!  Where do the legs come from?  How are they connected to his torso?  It's like an optical illusion.

 

So Glen and his mysterious non-ass are in the break room with me.  I am facing the wall at this point, with my face buried in a book.  Glen is screwing around with the coffee machine, which is situated on the counter on the opposite wall.  And he's talking to the coffee machine.  At first I can't really understand what he is saying, something about beans and dark roast and Tony Danza…I don't catch it all.  But soon it is apparent that the coffee machine isn't working, and he begins to question it:

 

"Why aren't you working?"

 

"What is going on here?"

 

"Who broke this thing?"

 

Is he talking to me?  That would be odd, since I am literally on the opposite side of the room as him, and facing in the complete opposite direction.  Also, I hate coffee and have never in my life been within ten feet of that coffee machine.  However, I am the only other person in the room, so if he isn't talking to me, that leaves as the only other possibility that he is having a conversation with the coffee machine.  And that is scary.

 

For the first, and probably last, time in my life…I feel bad for a coffee machine.

 

Friday (As in, "TGI…")

 

First thing in the morning, every morning, we have a meeting.  As I am waiting for the meeting to start, I am eating a sleeve of donuts I bought on the way to work this morning, because I missed breakfast.  Jared, a chubby guy about my age, is sitting at the next table.  He looks at me.  And at that instant, I know what is coming.  I don't want it, but it is inevitable.  He is going to try and have a conversation with me.  About the donuts.

 

"So," he says to me, "donuts, huh?"

 

If I were The Human Torch, this place would be cinders by now.

 

After the meeting, I go back to my desk for another eight hours of gluing and assembling plastic samples together.  As I sit down, Paul is walking by.  He veers off his course, starts towards my desk, and opens that draw bridge mouth of his, and…

 

…I'm a sitting duck.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've decided I'm sick of entertaining all you jackasses.

Every week, I pour my blood, heart, sweat, and various other bodily fluids best left unnamed into my blog, and all you selfish rascals do is cry for more. "Write us more blogs, Tim! Write us more blogs, Tim! When are you going to write more blogs, Tim! More, more, MORE!" I'm sick of it. I'M ONLY ONE MAN!

I'm joking, obviously. I don't pour anything into my blogs except a half hour worth of rambling, poorly punctuated middle-school humor that I bang out while waiting for the alcohol buzz to kick in. And I love the fact that a few of you actually seem to read, enjoy, and care about what I write.

But some weeks I don't feel like writing a blog. This week, for example. Next week's not looking too good, either…but let's just focus on this week for now. I've got nothing to say. What I do have, however, is someone else's blog, that I would like to take this opportunity to advertise.

"The Pilver" is a blog written by Kristiane Bell. She focuses primarily on pop culture with occasional commentaries on her somewhat bizarre personal life. But mostly, she's just damn funny. Imagine my blogs, only slightly more girly and with slightly fewer midget jokes.

Here are a couple of samples of Kristiane's writing:

OK Soda

Thursday, July 19th, 2007

In the mid nineties, Coca-Cola decided to try out a new soda. They wanted to tap
into the generation x market and create something that screamed
anti-image. What their efforts produced was OK Soda. The soda that
told you it was just fine to be OK. This brand was not trying to be exuberant or jolly.
OK was not going to go to war with any other flavor. It was just there, and blah. The
flavor was never described or even mentioned in marketing. The flavor was beside the
point. It may be the first and only Soda to have had a manifesto. I took this off
Wikipedia:

1. What's the point of OK? Well, what's the point of anything?


2. OK Soda emphatically rejects anything that is not OK, and fully supports
   anything that is.


3. The better you understand something, the more OK it turns out to
   be.


4. OK Soda says, "Don't be fooled into thinking there has to be a reason for
   everything."


5. OK Soda reveals the surprising truth about people and situations.


6. OK Soda does not subscribe to any religion, or endorse any political party, or
   do anything other than feel OK.


7. There is no real secret to feeling OK.


8. OK Soda may be the preferred drink of other people such as
   yourself.


9. Never overestimate the remarkable abilities of "OK" brand
   soda.


10. Please wake up every morning knowing that things are going to be
    OK.

One day after school a friends and I went to the soda machine to get something to keep us
hyper on the bus ride home. The new button on the machine's display intrigued us.

We bought a couple cans. Both cans were noticeably different from one another and very
peculiar compared to any other can designs we'd seen before. We bought as many we could,
which was about three more. Fifteen year olds don't have much cash. For whatever reason
from that point on we claimed the drink as our own. We were too naive too see the
ridiculousness of the way OK was pushed in an un-pushy manner. There was even an 800
phone number that you could call and listen to messages of other OK fans and why they felt
OK about the product.

A year or so later the soda stopped showing up on shelves and I heard rumors that it was
being discontinued. So bummed were we. This was near the time I discovered the internet
and would spend time searching on infoseek every pop culture word I could find. One day I
came across a "Save OK Soda" site. The site suggested writing Coca-Cola and
telling them what you thought about not being able to drink the beverage choice of the
over bored youth of America. So I did. A few weeks passed and I received a letter from
Jennifer telling me that I was outta luck. Thanks Jennifer. Last week my mother sent me
a box, as she does every month. These boxes contain among other things letters and photos
from when I lived at home. The OK Soda reject letter was in this box.





I decided to point out the key parts of my letter proving I had too much time on my
hands.:

1.She thanked me, because Jennifer cares.

2. The awful news. The The end of the road. I had Kurt Cobain lying on the floor wearing
maroon converse flashbacks.

3. Yes, Jennifer I was. Please rub my face in that.

4. You did not work hard enough. There has not since been OK soda at my table. Surge and
diet/lemon/vanilla/coke do not count.

5. Jennifer signed her name. I would lick my finger to see if the ink is real, but the
letter is from 1997 and that's really old ink.

Moral: Distance make the heart grow fonder vs. Out of sight, out of reasonable judgment
to spend your teenage years doing productive things and instead writing emails to
corporate giants with zero chance of getting results.

Top 7 Greatest Things About Target.

Sunday, July 22nd, 2007

Target was established in, well many many years ago. The answer would be quicker to
find than typing this sentence, but I am still not going to look it up. It was founded
right here in my state, Minnesota. Growing up the choices for budget stores that sold it
all were limited to K-Mart and Target. I recall our family going to both places. The
majority of the time we were at Target. This was because they sold popcorn. My mom had a
thing for those long skinny bags of popcorn.

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Target's Original Logo

I just moved and I had to find the nearest Target. In my search I was directed to THE
Target. The nearest location is the First Target Ever. In recent years I feel that
Target has moved up a whole lot of notches above K-Mart and Wal-Mart. Target seems like
the store who you want at your lunch table while K-Mart is the kid you use to know and
like, then he started talking to himself and wearing cowboy boots with jean shorts to
school.
In my most recent visit to THE Target you may think I imagined it but I sensed a sort of
camaraderie between me and the other shoppers. As though our heads were held higher than
those in other stores. We knew we were in the greatest retail store and in the first one
of it's kind. Call me crazy, but you weren't there.

Here are the 7 greatest things about the greatest retail chain in the world.

7. Early Sales of Trashy Magazines
Stay with me here, our definitions of trashy are probably very different. I am a sucker
for US Weekly and People, in that order. Martha Stewart is also high on the list. Stores
typically bring out the current week's magazines between Friday and Tuesday. Not Target.
They put them out Thursday. Which means that one day sooner I get to know who dressed
the worst that week, who is getting divorced from their ex-best friend's baby daddy, and
how I can make salt and pepper shakers out of a gourd one day earlier than Wal-Mart
shoppers.

6. Jone's Holiday Soda's
It started with a single flavor of Turkey with gravy. Later they managed to make a six-pack dedicated to the whole holiday feast in soda form.
Now Jones is getting us excited for other special occasions as well. I think when they
join with Just Born and make some Easter Peep's Soda we should make Jone's their own
special holiday for their reign in awesomeness.

5. The Girls Department
HUH?! Well if you are female and darn scrawny like I am you would be stoked for finding
skirts on the sales rack for $3.74 as well. Also, you can go there and get the same hair
stuff and jewelry items (I need my plastic beads) for about half the price as the mature
section.

4. Dollar Bins
I have a five year old. He is loud. I bribe him at times to get him to lower his volume.
One easy way to do this is to point to those colorful bins and say, "If you are good
the whole time we are shopping we will get you whatever you want out of that whole
section!" It won't be long until he realizes mom is putting a scam on him. Until
then, he is building his collection of seasonally themed plastic crap quite nicely.

3. Starbucks
I use to be a barista. I scorned Starbucks, I even owned my own shop for a few years.
But my deepest secret is that after a money blowing fest at Target I'll always stop at the
Starbucks near the door and buy something. My obsessions have gone in phases. From
Pumpkin Spice Lattes to Caramel Apple Cider to Green Tea Frappaccinos. I don't have to
lie about it any more. When in Target, I go to Starbucks. And when I get home with my
beverage of choice and celebrity rag in hand, I am at peace like no other time during my
day. Pure zen.

2. Target Sunday Ads
I don't always "do" the Sunday paper. But growing up we did. Sundays now when
we head over to my family's for after church dinner there's always a newspaper strewn on
the living room furniture. Whoever grabs the paper first has dibs on the Target ad. By
the time that person is done leafing through it, the rest of the droolers have decided in
which order we are going to pass around the ad. There's no other ad in the paper that
receives this treatment. None even come close.

1. Holidays
Target celebrates holidays the way retail establishments are meant to celebrate holidays.
People are supposed to celebrate whatever they celebrate within their
hearts and family. Target, you have my permission to go daisy crazy whenever you feel
like it for the upcoming seasons. I don't know how it is everywhere. It seems a good
chunk of the back corner of Targets around here are solely dedicated to whatever
celebration is approaching. Right now, they are phasing out the summer barbecue and
outdoor things to make way for Back to School, or as the hip kids say, Back 2 Cool.
I really do love going in there come mid September when I just cannot stand one more humid
day with tornado sirens to see the fall decor and Halloween costumes. Then, you know it's
coming. It being the three month long relationship Target and I share every year in
preparations for the day the old man poofs through the wall of my chimney free apartment.
You don't ever need to buy anything. Just to go and smells the smells and stick your head
up to the Christmas trees and squint so that the lights look as they did on the Family
Affair TV show intro.

Ah, jeez. I am getting too happy about the whole thing already. I love holidays,
especially those that take place in cold weather. And I love Target.





Kristiane Bell's blog can be found at www.thepilver.com. And when you get sick of me (or just impatient for my next blog to come out), you should go over to her site and check it out.

Because I just can't be funny, brilliant, and overpoweringly attractive every week, folks.

I recently had the brilliant idea that I would like to see a movie about my life made.  Not because I'm so egotistical as to believe my life is particularly interesting; in fact, I'm all too aware that my life is quite boring, and would not have enough material in it to fill a three-minute preview, much less a movie.  But that is where the magic of embellishment comes in.  With embellishment, a mild car accident becomes a ten car pile-up.  With embellishment, a simple date becomes a torrid love affair.  With embellishment, an argument with a stranger becomes a life-or-death struggle for the fate of the world.

 

Did I mention that by "embellishment" I mean "lying?"

 

At any rate, I see this movie being exciting, dramatic, hilarious, tragic, sexy, and riveting.  Basically, everything my life isn't.  So while sitting at work one day, extremely bored, I decided to cast this movie.  Why would I waste valuable brain energy casting this non-existent movie?  For fun.  Just play along.

 

So here's the rules:  Basically, I tried to cast relatively well known actors close to the age of people in my life.  Also, I have a lot of actor friends, but (with one exception) no one gets to play themselves.

 

Without further ado, here are the stars of the Untitled Tim Gage Biopic, and who they will be playing:

 

 

 

 

Topher Grace (Tim Gage)

 

 

Oh, Lordy, how I long to put Heath Ledger's name here, or Colin Farrell.  But alas, as I think to do so, reality sets in.  I mean, I'm hot and all, but…

 

Since the creation of a little TV show called "That 70s Show," every time I meet someone new, I almost inevitably have to hear, "Oh my God, do you know who you remind me of?  That guy from 'That 70s Show.'  The dorky, funny one.  What's his name?  Eric!  Yeah, you're exactly like him.  Funny, skinny, and attractive in a nerdy way that isn't really attractive, I'm just being nice."

 

I guess it's better than reminding people of Ashton Kutcher.

 

Nicollette Sheridan (Deena Davis)

 

 

As Nikki W. has enthusiastically informed me on several occasions, my mom is, apparently, something she calls a "MILF."  Now, I'm just a nice, innocent, Midwest boy, so I have absolutely no idea what a MILF is…probably some sort of euphemism for someone that likes to cook, or someone who enjoys tea.  At any rate, when I Googled the term "MILF," the first name that popped up was that of "Desperate Housewives" star Nicollette Sheridan.  So…that is who's playing my mom.

 

(Note: I didn't actually Google "MILF"…and I wouldn't recommend you do, either.)

 

Tom Selleck (Ross Gage)

 

 

Okay, so my dad isn't quite as cool as Tom Selleck.  But, in his defense…NO ONE is as cool as Tom Selleck.  Tom Selleck is so cool, the Vatican actually refers to his birthday as a "Holy Day."  Tom Selleck is so cool, when he masturbates, he fantasizes about himself.  Tom Selleck has no one to envy.  In fact, Tom Selleck envies YOU for having HIM to envy.  Plus, with Tom Selleck in my movie, there will be a mandatory car chase scene, a mandatory explosion that Tom Selleck will jump away from in the nick of time, and a mandatory shot of Tom Selleck slam dunking a basketball.

 

(A quick, unrelated side note: I recently read an article saying that some producers were planning a movie version of "Magnum P.I…starring Nicholas Cage.  Uh…hello?  Excuse me?  Folks, Tom Selleck isn't dead!  Why wouldn't he star?  Plus, there's no way Nicholas Cage can grow a sweet mustache…)

 

Hilary Duff (April Gage)

 

 

Hilary Duff is not a good actress.  But that's okay, because it's a well know movie fact that if you fill your cast with too much talent, it makes the movie too unbearable.  Like wine with a fine meal, you need some crappy actors in your movie to bring out the flavor of the other great actors.  Therefore, Hilary Duff will play my youngest sister.

 

Okay, I'm busted…I just don't know any other famous 18 year old actresses.

 

Jodie Sweetin (Amber Nordling)

 

 

Amber is the biggest "Full House" fan on the planet (except for maybe John Stamos), so I like the idea of the girl who played Stephanie Tanner playing her, especially since they are about the same age.  Also, Jodie needs some more acting work now that she's off meth.

Seth Rogen (Jeremy Nordling)

 

 

You know that guy who's just laid back, cool, funny, and just generally fun to be around?  That is my brother-in-law to a tee.  "Knocked Up" and "The 40 Year Old Virgin" star Seth Rogen has already made a nice career for himself playing the guy you just want to get a beer with.

 

James Davis Nordling (Himself)

 

 

I know I said no one got to play themselves…but seriously, look at this kid.  He needs to be in movies…or at least a Huggies commercial.  Besides, there are no famous acting babies that I am aware of.  Unless you count Jamie Foxx.

 

Anne Hathaway (Nikki Wakal)

 

 

I don't think it's fair when girls are both super-smart and also hot.  You should only get to be one or the other.  Smartness and hotness combined make me feel insecure, causing me to eat more Cool Ranch Doritos, which makes me feel even more insecure, and sends me into a shame-spiral.  Do you really want that Anne Hathaway and Nikki Wakal?  A shame spiral?

 

Also, this casting choice will satisfy Nikki's love of all things British.  Hold on…my secretary is telling me Anne Hathaway isn't British.  Well…she should be.

 

Zooey Deschanel (Generic Fictionalized Love-Interest)

 

 

In every movie, the main character has to have a love interest, and in my movie it's "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" star Zooey Deschanel.  There's just…something…about…Zooey.  She is what I would term, "strangely attractive."

 

But the movie needs a love interest, because the audience wants to see romance.  The audience wants to see passion.  The audience wants to see…me get it on with Zooey Deschanel.  And I aim to please.  (The audience, not Zooey Deschanel.)

 

(Well, okay…her, too.)

 

Christopher Walken (Generic Fictionalized Villian)

 

 

Every movie also need a villain.  An antagonist who can match wits against the main character, pushing him to the limits of his endurance and abilities.  Why Christopher Walken?  Look at that God-damn picture…I haven't even seen the movie yet and I'm already scared.

 

 

Now, after the stars, I also see a strong cast of supporting players in this movie.  Here are some of the other people I see making an appearance in my life movie, and who they will be playing…in alphabetical order…

 

 

 

Zach Braff (John Stevens)

 

This star of "Scrubs" is a comic genius and loveable nerd, much like the person he is playing.  Also, John gave me a part in his Fringe show…so I have to make him a character in my movie, right?

 

Drew Carey (Dean Skogman)

 

 

My boss at work looks exactly like stand-up comedian Drew Carey…only without the business suit and with a mustache.  They even make the same facial expressions.  It's eerie.

 

Shannon Elizabeth (Lisa Ziebert)

 

 

Shannon is hot…Lisa is hot.  Shannon likes poker…Lisa likes poker.  Shannon won't let me have sex with her…Lisa likes poker.

 

I'm joking.  I've never had sex with Lisa Ziebert.  Or Shannon Elizabeth.  Those are the only two people in the world I can think of that I haven't had sex with off the top of my head…

 

Jake Gyllenhaal (Andrew Nawrocki)

Have you ever heard the term "boyish good looks."  Andrew Nawrocki invented it…and Jake Gyllenhaal stole it.

 

Scarlett Johansson (Meggan Massie)

 

 

Intelligent?  Check.  Beautiful?  Check.  Enormous pain in the ass?  Check.  That's what we in the business call "perfect casting."

 

Debra Messing/Eric McCormack (Lindsay Maus/Mike Adank)

 

 

Okay, so the two stars of "Will & Grace" are way too old to being playing Fountain City theater stars Lindsay Maus and Mike Adank…but I mean, C'MON!  It's too perfect.

 

Bijou Phillips (Amanda M. Tyson)

 

 

Let me talk to the guys for a second…you know how sometimes there's a girl, and you're pretty sure she can kick your ass, and it's pretty scary…but it's also pretty hot.  Pow.

 

(Amanda is actually very nice.  But she COULD kick my ass, if she wanted.)

 

Sara Silverman (Siri Hellerman)

 

 

Another case where the actress is about a decade and a half too old for her part, but this is too good.  The funniest Jewish girl in Hollywood playing the funniest Jewish girl in Hawaii.  Actually, probably the only Jewish girl in Hawaii.

 

 

Now, with the perfect cast, I just need to write a great screenplay and get a director.  Does anyone know if Christopher Nolan is busy?

 A quick note:  I don't know what my blogs look like on everyone else's computer now, but for some reason on mine they look all fucked up.  A couple of days ago, for no apparent reason, the font size became too small, and for some damn reason the little emoticons at the top representing my mood are in the form of little kitty cats  (I mean, I'm comfortable with my sexuality and all, but that's a little much), and for the life of me I can't figure out how to fix these problems.  If anyone knows how to make blogs look pretty on this wonky site, I'd appreciate the technical help (especially with getting rid of the damn cats).  Otherwise, if it looks jacked up on your computer as well, please bear with me…

"What's my motivation?"

 

These three words have become the ultimate acting cliché, used to epitomize the over-serious performer trying to generate a forced gravitas into roles where it is unnecessary…an "Oscar Meyer Weiner" commercial, for example.  In every movie or TV show about actors, you can be sure some pampered starlet will be asking a frazzled director, "What's my motivation in this scene?"

 

There's a reason why this has become such a cliché.  It's because, though they may not ask it out loud in that same pampered, bored voice as they do in television, actors are always constantly wondering and asking about the motivation of their characters.  Most actors realize that, basically, motivation is not only the key, but quite possibly the only essential element of understanding a character.  Everything you really need to know about someone can be pretty well extrapolated just by knowing why the hell they bother to do anything.

 

Why is motivation so key for actors to understand their characters?  I think it's because motivation is the key to understanding people in life.  Right now, billions of people around the world are waking up, dragging themselves to work, painting portraits, building houses, having sex with their partners, playing golf, etc etc…for some reason.  There might be billions of different reasons, unique to each person, but the fact remains each and every person is doing whatever it is they're doing because they believe it will accomplish something in their lives.  They have goals, dreams, and plans, and their actions are direct steps designed to take them to their goal.

 

When analyzing a role, actors often like to talk about their character's super-objective.  A super-objective is a primary goal a character has throughout a play, and every action that character takes during the course of the script is supposed to somehow relate to his or her super-objective.  So if a character's super-objective was, say, "To eat the world's biggest falafel," and there was a scene in the play where that character was, say, thumb-wrestling her roommate, as an actor you would somehow have to relate the thumb-wrestling with the ultimate goal of falafel eating.

 

It's not always easy.

 

As an actor, I've always sort of struggled wit the super-objective thing, and I think I'm starting to realize why.  It's for a similar reason that I'm struggling right now, in my real life, to find motivation to do anything.  And the reason is this: there are no super-objectives.  Ultimate goals, by their very definition, cannot exist.  Every goal, though it may seem like a final destination, is actually just another step to something else.  And though these steps may vary from person to person, everyone's steps all lead to the same place: nowhere.  This is a due to a little conundrum I've named "The Endless Whys."

 

For demonstration purposes, I present Bob.  Bob is a young man, about my age.  He graduated from a good college with a business degree and has been working for some giant, faceless, computer company for three years.  Bob has a goal: to become VP of Marketing in said giant, faceless, computer company.

 

Bob doesn't really exist, by the way.  Just pretend.

 

Let's explore Bob's goal, and see if we can see where his motivation is leading him.

 

So, Bob, you have a goal.  What is it?

 

"To become Vice President of Marketing at Blah-Blah Inc."

 

Why?

 

"So I can make more money and secure a better future for my family."

 

Why?

 

"So I can save up enough money, and…open my own business someday."

 

Why?

 

"So my kids can inherit the business, and make lots of money for their families."

 

Why?

 

"So…I don't know…maybe their kids can go to medical school."

 

Why?

 

"Maybe one of my grandkids will discover a cure for cancer, saving millions of lives."

 

Why?

 

"So that all those millions of people…that don't exist yet…can live.  For a while, I guess.  I mean, I suppose they're still going to die.  You know…eventually."

 

It's at this point I imagine Bob punching me in the gut and running over my foot with his car, because I've pissed him off with my annoying "why's."  That's why I made Bob imaginary.  It saves wear and tear on my precious body.

 

What Bob isn't taking into account is that in 4-5 billion years, our sun will enter into a red giant phase, possibly destroying the Earth, or at the very least making it inhabitable for life as we know it.  Also, many scientists have theorized that, although the universe is currently expanding, soon it will stop and actually begin retracting, probably back into the pinprick of nothingness that they believe existed before the Big Bang, rending everything you've ever done, or the records of everything you have ever done, or the results of every action you've ever taken, or basically everything that you have ever had any sort of influence or effect on, ever, gone and meaningless.

 

(By the way…it's not a good idea to break out this sort of existential nonsense at parties.  You may think it will make you sound deep and interesting...but instead it will result in you never being invited to a party again.)

 

This sort of frustratingly easy but pointless thinking makes getting really intense about anything in life, ah, mildly difficult.  So why do I keep getting up each day, dragging myself to my job, keeping my car filled with gas, clipping my toenails, eating, reading the newspaper, walking around my apartment, getting drunk, and writing pointless, long, pretensious, overly philosophical blogs?

 

Because there is an opposite principal to "The Endless Whys."  And it's called "The Endless Why Nots."

 

I could just lay in my bed, or my ridiculously comfortable giant blue chair, and wait patiently for death, since what's the point of doing anything.  But then…why not watch some TV?  I mean, I'm right in front of it, I might as well turn it on while I'm here.  And why not go outside for awhile, take a walk?  I'm not doing anything else.  Why not stop at the gas station, buy a Mountain Dew, talk to the pretty cashier girl, go get a haircut, phone a friend, go drinking, get a job, audition for a play, write a haiku (thanks, Madison!), get married, have kids, get promoted…and pretty soon I'm right back into daily whirlwind of pointless, frustrating, fun, crazy living, with everyone else.

 

I'm not really sure why I do the things I do anymore, or even what I'm trying to accomplish.  I do know that right now I'm going to go to my freezer, take out some ice cream, and eat it.

 

Why?

 

Why not?

…Michael Vick

Yeah, okay…so I'm not very topical on this one.  The Michael Vick case is weeks old now, and mostly out of the spotlight.  But I've had stuff I've wanted to say about this for awhile now, but my hectic life (read: laziness) stopped me.

 

In case you are someone who completely avoids the news…first off, why the fuck are you reading this?  Go read a newspaper, for God's sake!  Second off, Michael Vick is (was) an NFL star quarterback who recently plead guilty to running a…uh…dog fighting ring?  That still EXISTS?  Okay…running a dog fighting ring.  You can read about it here, if you know nothing and feel like you need to in order to understand my ranting…

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/17/AR2007071701393.html

 

So, I have three strong opinions about this whole issue:

 

OPINION 1- This is the most ridiculous crime any celebrity/athlete has ever been convicted for, and whatever amount of jail time he gets sentenced to, I don't feel sorry for him in the least.  What makes this even more mind-boggling to me is the fact that this is a guy who basically had the world at his feet.  I mean, he was on the cover of Madden Football just a couple of years ago!  As odd as this may seem, I could almost understand this if it were some poor ghetto kid with nothing going on in his life, and dog fighting was his passion.  I mean, it would still be sick and wrong and everything, but even poor people need hobbies.  But Michael Vick?  "Yeah, I know I'm the face of the NFL…rich beyond all measure…worshipped by countless fans…a God in what is quickly becoming American's real national pastime…

 

…but my real passion is training dogs to rip each others faces off."

 

Huh?

 

Anyway…stick him in jail, I guess.  However, having said all that…

 

OPINION 2- All you animal lovers out there need to get off your high ass horses and stop acting like Vick is Adolph-fucking-Hitler.  In letters to the newspaper and on TV I have heard people react to this story with statements like, "He should burn in hell" or "They should fry his ass" or other such venomous declarations usually reserved for child molesters.  I mean, stories of professional athletes beating up their wives pop up all the time, and though people might be upset, I've never seen anyone this outraged.  Here's the news, folks: what Vick did is sick, disgusting, and unnecessary, but guess what?  Vick still isn't one one-HUNDREDTH as bad or sick as anyone who has taken a single human life, ever.  Yes, all you card carrying PETA members, what I am saying to you now is…

 

People are more important than animals.

 

I'm sorry.  I know you love your fluffy little doggy.  He's very cute.  But they're just dogs.  They're not humans.  And if you disagree with me, then answer me two questions:  How much money did you buy your fluffy, cute little dog for?  And how much money would you need to buy a human?

 

Oh, wait…we don't sell humans in stores.  Point: me.

 

OPINION 3- This is the one I'm most passionate about.  Since this Vick case came to light, I have not once, not twice, but on three separate occasions accidentally run into disgusting pictures of mangled dogs on the internet, before I realized what I was going to be seeing.  They are horrific.

 

Of course, all you animal lover are now saying to me, "That's the point, Tim.  They are supposed to be horrific to make you realize the horrible thing Vick has done."  Uh…no.  This is the same fucked-up logic that anti-abortionists use when they go to college campuses and thrust horrible pictures of aborted fetuses in your face before you even realize who they are or what you are looking at. (Sound like I've been there?  Yeah.)  Listen folks…first off, this sort of pathos-driven, shock tactic doesn't prove that your view is correct, just like me exposing unwilling people to pictures of dead and mangled soldiers wouldn't make me correct about the war in Iraq or pictures of a bullet-ridden body of a two-year old wouldn't make me correct about gun control.  It just makes you an asshole.  Also, it doesn't make me feel sympathy for your side.  Instead, it makes me hate you, and want something horrible to happen to you.  A dog mangling your face, for instance.

 

…glasses

 

So, my eyes suck.  Without corrective lenses of some sort, I am basically Velma from "Scooby-Doo"…blind.  That being the case, I've always been a fan of contact lenses.  They're more comfortable, I can see better, etc.  But I recently ran out of my disposable contacts, and due to a prescription mix-up, I haven't been able to get more.  So I'm stuck with glasses.

 

Fucking glasses.  Seriously, these things are retarded.  And yes, I know I could just get laser eyes surgery, and I plan to, but I can't afford it…yet.  But glasses?  I mean, this is 2007, for Christ's sake!  We don't have anything better than this invented yet?  I'm pissed off enough that I don't have a hover car and rolling treadmills that go everywhere and hot green aliens with huge boobs that we were promised to have by now…but then to top it all off I still have to wear glasses to correct my fucked up eye-sight?  People, it's two pieces of glass suspended in front of my eyes via a system of wires hooked to my ears and balancing on the bridge of my nose.  I might as well be bashing rocks together to wash my clothes and peddling my stone car with my own bare feet while I'm wearing these things.  What a fucking joke.

 

…President Bush

 

Ugh…do I really have to do more bitching about this tool?  Isn't his almost unfathomable second-term over yet?  I do, and it isn't.  My dislike for the man who almost certainly will go down in history as not only the worst president, but possibly one of the worst world leaders in history is well known, but recently he said something in an article which, I think more than any other one thing, demonstrates why I despise this man.

 

Last week, Bush's press secretary (that's the guy that talks to the press…duh) Tony Snow announced his resignation.  Read about it here, if it pleases you:

 

http://www.wcsh6.com/news/national/article.aspx?storyid=69978

 

The Bush statements I'd like to draw your attention to in this article are as follows.  First of, when talking about why he felt Snow did such a good job as press secretary, Bush says, among other things, that Snow is, "…able to talk about issues in a way that the American people can understand."

 

Hmm…

 

Later, when discussing Snow's replacement, Dana Perino, Bush comments that Perino is someone, "…who is able to spell out the issues of the day in a way that people listening on TV can understand."

 

These two statements were in the same article.  Not two paragraphs from each other.  Is the message your President giving you clear enough, dear rear?

 

You're stupid.

 

You, you, and you, too.  You're all very dumb.  And President Bush is kind enough to get smart, capable press secretarys who can talk…very…slowly…and use very small words…so that those of us living in our stick and mud huts and blowing "Dixie" on our XXX wine jugs to pass the time can understand all the big, hard, complicated issues he has to deal with every day!  (Every day expect the days in August, that is.  He's on vacation that month every year.)

 

Hey!  President Bush!  News flash!  We're not dumb.  We understand things, believe it or not.  It's not the issues we don't understand.  It's you and your administration that defies our comprehension.

 

Is it 2009 yet?

The wildest understatement I've ever made in one of my blogs:

High school sucked.

 

If I had to choose between going back to high school and doing prison time, it would be a no-brainer.  Lock my ass up.  If I had to choose between going back to high school and having one of my legs amputated, I'd be upset…but fire up the saw.  If I had to choose between going back to high school and spending a year living in Iowa…hmm.  That's a tough one.  Is suicide an option?  No?  Do they have the internet yet in Iowa?  No?  Fuck.  Okay, Iowa, you win this time…

 

My ten year reunion was this past Saturday.  Needless to say, I wasn't there.  For me to go back to my high school reunion, I think, would be not terribly far off from a Holocaust survivor going to an Auschwitz concentration camp reunion.  Not really a place I want to go back to. Mostly I'm just amazed it's been ten years already.

 

For this blog, I thought it would be fun (read: easy) to make a list of ten things I've learned in the ten years since high school.  I brainstormed at work, could only come up with three things:

 

1) Every theatre in the world is haunted by a ghost.  And not just any ghost, but the ghost of an actor that threw themselves from the catwalk onto the stage.  And they all did this about 30-50 years ago.  Apparently around this time there was a rash of actor/theatre suicides, and the spirits all decided to stick around.  Go figure.

 

2) My self-esteem has made an almost unfathomable parabolic arc in the past ten years, and,

 

3) Making a list is hard.

 

We'll ignore the moderately interesting yet mostly useless facts 1 and 3, and instead focus on my favorite topic…ME!  Me, me, me, me, me…

 

People that know me now would probably not even recognize me in high school.  I hated myself.  I daresay I hated myself more than anyone else hated me, and in fact I probably hated myself more than anyone hated ANYONE else.  Why did I hate myself?  Maybe because I'm the type of person to write "daresay" in a blog…I don't know.  Why is irrelevant, the point is I left high school in shambles, and spent the next several years consciously and carefully rebuilding my own self-esteem.

 

Within half a dozen years I was able, through the collusion of happy accidental events and pure willpower, to transform myself from a self-loathing sad sack of soggy sod (alliteration is fun), into a cocky, egotistical, Prima Donna, jackass.

 

Awesome.

 

I think my self-esteem peaked approximately somewhere during my second year at Winona State.  I remember I was jumping my rocket-cycle over a pair of sharks with laser eyes while screwing the blonde out of these two hot twin sisters I'd met at the library and eating a hamburger, and I said to myself, "Yeah…this is pretty cool."  Also, I was firing a machine gun into the air for no particular reason.

 

That might not have happened exactly the way I remember it…but you get the point.

 

Since that shark-jumping, twin-screwing, machine-gun-firing instant, I have been on a slow and inevitable decline.  The problem is, my self-esteem has always been based on three things…I call them "The Three Pillars of Tim's Awesomeness." (And yes, I am so cocky I actually refer to myself in the third person in my head.  And at job interviews.)

 

THE THREE PILLARS OF TIM'S AWESOMENESS

(I've put them in bold to reinforce their "pillar-ness")

 

1-   TIM IS NICE

2-   TIM IS FUNNY

3-   TIM IS RIDICULOUSLY ATTRACTIVE

 

But now, I'm just not sure that's enough anymore.  Looks fade.  I can't be funny all the time…some might argue I can't be funny ever.  And being nice is WAY overrated.  Nice is boring.  Nice is the person you want to talk to after the beach bully kicked sand in your eye.  Nice isn't who you want planning your bachelor party…with the strippers and the booze and the oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah…

 

Also, I'm having doubts about what I'm trying to accomplish with my life, and blah blah whatnot.  I'd like to be a writer/actor, but the problem is, I TOTALLY just want to do those things because I enjoy them.  I don't really think I have anything to add to the world with my writing or acting.  And let's be honest here, folks…the world needs more writers or actors like it needs another hole in the ozone layer.  So I'm not trying to improve the world with my writing or acting…I want the world to improve ME because I write and act.  Me, me, me, me, me…

 

I'm basically, for all intents and purposes, useless.

 

Useless is a harsh word, and it's pretty brutal on your self-esteem.  Just about as bad for it, I'd say, as shark jumping is good.  So here I am, spiraling downward back to where I was when I left high school.  Wondering who I am, what's wrong with me, and what I'm supposed to be doing.  Meet 2007 Tim…same as 1997 Tim.

 

That's my high school reunion.

 

On an entirely unrelated note…

 

According to my sources…and by "sources" I mean Nikki W…some fundamentalist Christian preachers/media whores have been going on TV to claim that the I35 bridge collapse was a punishment from God because Minnesota doesn't have sodomy laws.  Much like Jerry Falwell did following September 11^th, these men of God are using a horrible tragedy to advance there argument against a lifestyle choice they disagree with.

 

And frankly, I have to admit they might have a point.  I mean, if I were an all-powerful being, and I wanted to stop people from being gay, I'm pretty sure I would do it by having bridges fall down on people or crashing planes into buildings.  I mean, I certainly wouldn't do it by causing gay people's genitals to explode when they had sex, or having an asteroid fall on a gay bar, or even just coming down from the fucking clouds and saying, "Yo, y'all stop being gay now, ya hear.  I'm God, bitch."

 

Because that would be too obvious.

 

But though this argument seems logically sound, Nikki cleverly came up with another theory.  Maybe God made the I35 bridge fall because he's punishing Minnesota for hosting the Republican National Convention next year.  This theory seems much more likely to me, because everyone knows that Republicans love bridges.  I mean, that's one of the tenets of their ideology.  Those crazy conservative bastards are all about traveling from one place to a different place that isn't connected by land.  They love it.

 

So I would like to open up this space for discussion on the Fundamentalist Christian/collapsing bridges/gay people/Republican National Convention issue.  Leave your theories as to why God made the I35 bridge fall (because he clearly did), and perhaps ideas about other structures God can collapse to punish gay people for their horrible, dirty, sinfully arousing ways.

 

We need to get to the bottom of this.

"Fuck" is like, the best word ever…when someone finally says, "Hey, fuck you," there's nothing better.  I just look at them and go, "Yeah, that's right.  Fuck me.  Good use of fuck right there"…once somebody hits you with "fuck you" that's it.  There's nothing better, there's nothing above.  You can't come back with, "Oh, fuck me?  Yeah?  Gaylord!"

 

---Dane Cook, Harmful If Swallowed

 

Those that know me know that when I argue, I prefer to keep things on a rational, logical level.  I generally try not to let emotions guide my argument, or let my disagreement in what the other person is saying cause me to get personally vindictive.  However, sometimes people say things that are so dumb, so annoying, and so wrong, that I have no choice but just look them straight in the eye and deliver a solid…

 

Fuck you.

 

I'd like to take this opportunity and hand out a few "Fuck you's" today to some people who have recently said stupid things.  So without further ado…

 

My first "Fuck you" goes out to an entire group of people.  This is addressed mostly to waiters and waitresses, but it could potentially be expanded to anyone who has a job which traditionally is dependent on tips for income (delivery drivers, etc.).  I have heard a lot of bitching from waitresses (for the rest of this rant I will use the word waitresses, because, sexist or not, females make up the vast majority of restaurant workers…but I mean men and women) about customers who stiff them on tips.  This bitching comes in the form of friends in person, or a recent ridiculous Myspace spam bulletin circling around.  Part of this bitching includes waitresses assertion that 20% is now the "standard" tip for adequate service, rather that 15% (WTF!?!?  Who decided this?  I wasn't on that committee!). 

 

Now, I'm not going to tear into the ridiculousness of the tipping system, and how it basically is perpetuated by restaurant owners to screw customers.  Instead, I will just focus on one absolutely retarded phrase that has become a sort of a war chant for tip-bitching waitresses.  It goes something like this:

 

"If you can't afford to tip, you can't afford to eat out." (Or order delivery, or whatever.)

 

Well, waiters and waitresses of the word, excuse me, but…

 

FUCK YOU!

 

Now, I understand that you are all low-income single mothers, or struggling actors or actresses, or what not.  And I sympathize, I do.  But I am also a struggling artist living on a meager salary, and occasionally I'd like to enjoy a nice meal at a restaurant.  And guess what?  I can afford to do so, regardless of whether or not I have enough money to tip.  How can that be?  Allow me to give you a brief diagram about how capitalism, which is the economic system used in our country, works.

 

• BUSINESS OFFERS CUSTOMER GOODS/SERVICES AT STATED COST
• CUSTOMER, DECIDING GOODS/SERVICES ARE WORTH COST, PAYS BUSINESS MONEY
• BUSINESS USES MONEY TO COVER EXPENSES (INCLUDING PAYING EMPLOYEES), THEN TAKES EXCESS MONEY AS PROFIT

That's it, folks.  Nowhere in that model is there anything about the CUSTOMER being responsible for paying EMPLOYEES of the business directly.  That means if I go to the "Oliver Garden" and my spaghetti dinner is priced at $10.99 in the menu, it's going to cost me…$10.99.  NOT $10.99 plus a 20% tip.  Tipping…is…optional.  As a waitress, you are an employee of the restaurant, and if you feel you aren't making enough money, that is an issue to be resolved between YOU AND YOUR EMPLOYEER.  It is NOT an issue to take up with poor bedraggled customers (like me) who just want to get an occasional meal.  And if you don't like having a significant chunk of your salary be an optional expense that people don't have to give you…FIND ANOTHER JOB!

 

Now having said all this, those of you who have eaten out with me know that I always tip, and usually quite well.  Why do I do that, if I feel this way about tipping?  Simple.  I feel guilty.  That's all.  I think that's why everyone tips, to be honest.  Plain and simple guilt.  So waiters and waitresses of the world, your tips are basically just a charity case, oftentimes from other poor people.  And by bitching about the tips you DON'T get, you are basically becoming a glorified street beggar.  Congratulations.  And fuck you.

 

My next "Fuck you" goes out to syndicated newspaper columnist Dear Abby.  I usually don't read Dear Abby's column, because unlike Dan Savage's column, which is almost always honest, accurate, and funny, Dear Abby's column is usually pretentious, inaccurate, and stodgy.  But a week or so ago I was scanning her column, killing some time before leaving work, and she wrote something interesting.  She had received a letter from a woman asking for advice on how to deal with her 6-year old daughter, who was asking about her father, who wasn't around.  The girl's father, evidently, skipped town as soon as he found out his girlfriend was pregnant, and the woman hadn't heard from him since.

 

Surprisingly, Abby's advice to the woman was pretty straight forward and honest, which was fine.  However, the bitch just had to throw in this little gem of a line, near the end of her response:

 

"I'm often sad that men can reproduce when they are as young as 11 years old, since they often don't become adults until they are in their 30's."

 

Hmm…well put, Dear Abby.  Allow me to rebuttal by saying…

 

FUCK YOU!

 

I am so fucking sick and tired of this anti-male bullshit that is now running rampant through the media, particularly when it comes to the area of sex and reproduction.  Okay, so this asshole, loser, dirt bag, piece of shit meat got his girlfriend pregnant and then took off.  He sucks.  And yes, there is no shortage of other men who would do the same cowardly thing.  They're out there, they exist, and they suck.  But there are plenty of men…dare I say the vast, vast, vast majority of them, that take care of their shit.  But acknowledging that doesn't allow you to write your snarky, pretentious little broad stroke slap at the male gender, does it, Dear Abby?  Fuck you.

 

And furthermore, let's talk about mommy here.  Yes, there are men who will knock you up and then skip town.  But guess what?  99.999% of these types of men are clearly recognizable within about, oh, I'd say 45 minutes of meeting them.  Does he have a job?  No?  He's leaving.  Does he ask to borrow a twenty on your second date?  Yes?  He's leaving.  Does he list drinking beer as one of his favorite hobbies?  Yes?  He's leaving!  Clear as day.  Which means that the mommy in this story either A) Fucked this guy within the first 45 minutes of meeting him or B) Knew him for longer for 45 minutes, and fucked him anyway.  Either way, she's an idiot, and the only victim I see in this story is the poor 6 year old girl who, pray to God, will grow up to realize she has sprung from the loins of morons and will do everything is her power NOT to be like her parents.

 

Finally, I just want to say something quickly to the guy I cut off while trying to find a parking spot in Minneapolis during the Fringe Festival.  I looked out my car window, and I clearly saw this gentleman mouth the words "Fuck you" at me as he squealed away.  To him I would just like to respond, "Oh yeah?  Well…"

 

"Gaylord!"

I know this may seem like I'm coming on a little strong.  I realize that we've never even once seen each other before this moment, our paths crossing as you are walking your two dogs and I'm walking…nowhere in particular.  Our eyes meet.  I step aside to avoid your charges, who are sniffing and barking at everything in sight.  We smile at each other.  And though neither of us says anything, I think it's pretty clear what needs to happen here: Full-on, hardcore, bed-shaking sexual intercourse.

 

You're shocked.  Right now you are saying to yourself, "I'm not that type of girl."  You're saying, "I don't sleep with guys I have just met, particularly ones wandering outside of his apartment building with no dog or apparent walking agenda."  You're saying, "Who are you, to even think that I would talk to you, much less have sex with you, when I don't even know your name?"

 

I understand your hesitation.  I do.  And normally, I would agree with you 100%.  You shouldn't just have sex with a guy you just happened to pass by on the sidewalk.  But what you are clearly failing to take into consideration is this: 9/11 changed everything.  We live in a different world now.  On September 11, 2001, terrorists attacked our country and murdered over 3,000 Americans, and now we live in a time where we must constantly be vigilant, a world where it is us and them, and we CANNOT lose this battle.  Basically, what I am saying to you is:

 

If you don't have sex with me, the terrorists win.

 

Surely you can see the connection.  They hate us because they hate our freedom.  Our freedom to do what we choose.  For instance, the choice to have sex with a gangly, semi-creepy looking white guy you just met walking your dogs outside your apartment building.  Terrorists HATE when we do that shit.  So, to fight against the terrorists and their horrible, Tim-Not-Getting-Laid ideals, you MUST have sex with me.  For the good of the country, we need to go up to my bedroom right now, or possibly shower, and engage in a good ninety seconds of elbowy, pale, nerd sex, followed by another thirty seconds of awkward, insincere cuddling.

 

Unless, of course, you hate America.

 

And speaking of hating American, what the hell is your problem, Student Loan Collection Man?  Yes, I realize I borrowed thousands of dollars from your company in order to complete my college education.  And yes, I realize I signed a note promising I would pay said thousands of dollars back to you.  But if you look closely at those documents, I think you will clearly see that I signed them BEFORE 9/11.  That's right, the obligation to pay these loans back to you was made at an entirely different time.  We live in a completely different era now, one of religious fanatics who band together in order to destroy our way of life.  And these evil-doers just LOVE seeing us go after each other, destroying our own society from the inside by squabbling with each other over petty little concerns like student loan payments.

 

Do you think the brave men and women fighting for our freedoms in Iraq worry about student loan payments?  When they're dodging bullets as they run from sand dune to sand dune, courageously carrying the American flag through a storm of shrapnel, do you think they say to themselves, "I wonder how much interest has accumulated on my student loan?"  No.  Because they know it is us and them.  You're either for us…or you're for the repayment of legally binding educational loans.

 

And don't think the terrorists don't know that you are sending letters to my home everyday, demanding payment on this loan.  They know, and they love it.  They feed on our infighting.  You, Mr. Student Loan Collection Man, are giving aid and comfort to our enemies with your constant threats of "litigation" and "judgment."

 

For shame.

 

And shame on you, too, dirty dishes.  Right now I'm staring at an ever increasing pile of you accumulating in my sink, and it's downright unpatriotic.  Don't you know that right this moment, there are terrible fanatics plotting ways to strike at the heart of American society and tear us apart, while you sit there with your thin layer of gross slim and fruit flies buzzing about you.

 

I understand that before 9/11, I would be required to actually take a wet sponge and also possibly some soapy water and wipe you down to clean you…but this is a new era we live in.  An era of Good-guys and bad-guys, freedom lovers and terrorists, the brave and the cowardly.  Not an era of wash-rinse-repeat.  Damn you to hell, dirty dishes, but your un-American stinking up of my apartment has left me with little choice but to send in Sergeant Nikki W. to straighten out your liberal, pansy-ass, food-encrusted ways.  And by "send it" Nikki W, I mean "wait until she gets sick of looking at you so she does the dishes instead of me."

 

And meanwhile, the terrorists laugh.

 

(Okay, it's tacky…but if George Bush can invade a country, destroy our civil liberties, and get re-elected using this stuff, I figure I should at least be able to get some ass, a free education, and some clean dishes with the same material.  Right?)

Ladies and gentlemen, we live in exciting times.

Right now is a veritable Golden Age for the world of literature.  If you like reading, being alive right now is the equivalent of liking theater and being alive in Shakespeare-era London, or liking rock and roll and being alive in the 60's, or liking to be mauled by prehistoric predators and being alive in the stone-age.  Why are we, right now, at the peak of our literary prowess as a civilization?  One name:

 

J.K. Rowling.

 

I haven't read any of the Harry Potter books myself, but if the general reaction to the release of one of these books is any indication, I don't think it's much of a stretch to say that these books are basically The Greatest Thing Ever Created in the History of Existence.  If you want to understand  how good these books are, imagine taking all the good parts of the Bible…you know, all the violence and sex and talking bushes and seven-headed monsters…and cutting out all the preachy Jesus stuff, then mixing that in a giant blender with all the other great works of literature in history: Shakespeare's plays, The Iliad, and every Archie comic book ever produced; and finally have Tom Selleck masturbate into the blender, soaking the entire mixture in his super-masculine-yet-still-sensative Magnum P.I. DNA…then you will have some concept of the greatness of the Harry Potter series.

 

In seriousness, I'm perfectly happy for the people enjoying the conclusion to HP right now, but I have to get something off my chest.  By far my biggest pet peeve regarding the Harry Potter books is that each time a new one is released, I have to be subject to an endless series of newspaper articles, news reports, and NPR interviews proclaiming how great it is that Harry Potter is introducing the "magic of reading" to children and getting them away from their silly "iPods, cellphones, and video games."   According to every one of these people, reading is the most important thing a person can do with their time; everything else is just a distraction.

 

I realize what I'm about to say now, seeing as I am an avid reader, aspiring writer, and English degree holder, will sound completely blasphemes—on the same level with a Catholic priest calling out for his congregation to start an orgy—but it's the truth so I'm going to say it anyway.  And I'm going to type it in bold, capital letters, so you all see it clearly:

 

READING IS EXTREMELY OVERRATED

 

Read that again.  Go ahead, I'll wait.  Now, I've noticed by talking to people that read my blog that some of you have a hard time telling when I'm joking and when I'm being serious.  So let me emphasis: I'm not kidding about this.  Reading is way, way, over-valued.  Let's look at all the reasons why reading is supposedly "The Shit"…and see why it's really "just shit."

 

Books are more intellectual than other forms of media (television, movie, games, etc…)

 

Bullshit.  There are good books…and there are trashy books.  Just like there is good TV…and there is trashy TV.  And in both cases, the trashy variety probably makes up about 90% of the material.  Why?  Because it sells.  "Harry Potter" might be the best selling individual book, but what do you think the best selling genre is?  Do you think it might be those ridiculous romance novels with Fabio and some heaving-bossomed white chick on every cover?  And maybe that's why several dozen new ones are being written every month?

 

The fact of the matter is any form of media can be intellectually stimulating if you choose the right stuff.  Or are you telling me that someone watching "The History of the Norman Race" on TV is being less intellectually stimulated that the person reading "The Naughty Pirates Cove"?

 

TV, video games, and computers encourage children to be anti-social

 

And books don't?  So I was the only geeky middle schooler running home each day to curl up with my latest "Star Trek" novel by myself with no friends?

 

Oh, wait…yeah, I was.

 

My early teen nerdy ways aside, however, reading isn't any more inherently social than any other activity.  Sure people can participate in book clubs, or discuss books they are reading with friends.  But people can play video games in groups, or discuss TV shows or movies, or chat via the internet.  And people can also stay home alone constantly reading, and carry a book with them everywhere they go so they don't have to risk talking to people they don't know.  The fact is, specific activities aren't social or anti-social…it's the person that makes them one way or the other.

 

Except for masturbating…that's probably inherently anti-social.  Also: fun.

 

Books help children (and adults) learn to use their imagination

 

This might be the only thing close to a legitimate advantage books have over anything else.  But, though I have nothing but anecdotal evidence to back this up, I've really come to believe that people either like using their imagination, or they don't.  People that do…well, they like reading, and probably for that very reason.  But people who don't…which is most sane people…aren't going to be so hot on reading and having to fill in all the details with their brain, when they can watch TV or a movie and have someone else do it for them.  And who can blame them?  Are we really going to start faulting people for NOT being unfocused, head-in-the-clouds, dreamers?

 

People are who they are…cramming the written word down their throats isn't going to change them.

 

Finally, I'd like to make the case that a lot of this pro-book rah-rah stems not so much from people being in favor of reading, but people being against technology.  In every one of these "reading is so great" articles, there is ALWAYS a mandatory thumbing of the nose at the evils of cellphones, ipods, computers, and video games.  People, for some reason, seem naturally inclined to assume that all new technology, instead of helping us, is eroding our ability to function as humans.

 

Here's a fun little story.  During the Greek philosopher Aristotle's time, there was a new, dangerous technology being developed.  Aristotle himself cried out again it, claiming it would corrupt society.  What was this technology?

 

The written word.

 

It's true.  Aristotle, and many other intellectuals of the time, hated this new fangled "reading and writing", claiming it would destroy people's ability to remember things.  And you know what: they were absolutely right.  People nowadays can't remember SHIT compared to people back then.  Why?  BECAUSE WE DON'T HAVE TO!  We just write that shit down.  And I don't think anyone's prepared to argue we're much worse off as a society because we can't remember long, long lists of things.  So are we really so arrogant as to believe our technology is perfect NOW?  That everything that comes after this is destroying our culture, but everything that came before was great?  Here's the deal: 1000 years from now, people will be bitching about those damn "Holodeck simulators" and how they keep kids from appreciating their old-fashioned "Mega iToys."

 

At any rate: I love reading, and if you do too, wonderful.  But it isn't the most important thing in existence.  That would be the internet.

 

And to all of you currently reading Harry Potter 7, I say: enjoy.  Also: Harry, Ron, and Hermione all die.  I read it on Wikipedia.

 

I'm just kidding.

 

Or am I?

Across the street from the house I lived in for the bulk of my life, there lives a man named Willie.  We call him Grandpa Willie, because he's very old.  Grandpa Willie's favorite hobby…in fact, the only hobby he seems to have…is to sit outside in front of his house in a porch chair and just…watch.  Everything.  He doesn't move, he doesn't say anything, he doesn't interfere.  He's just there.  Observing you.  Judging you.  Sort of like Jesus…only much older and with slightly more fishing equipment in his garage.

The funny thing about Grandpa Willie is, I remember him from when I was extremely young…under ten years old…and back then he was very old.  And now it is twenty years later, and he's still very old.  The lesson here is that you are old for much, much longer than you are young.  I'm not really sure where that dividing line between "old" and "young" is.  Maybe it's when you get your first checking account.  Or the first time you find something on TV offensive.  Wherever the line is, I'm pretty sure I have officially crossed it.  Here is, broken down by category, a list of reminders I've had in just the past twenty-four hours that I'm more Grandpa Willie than I'd care to admit.

 

Technology

 

Let's just get something straight right now: I love me my technology.  I'm typing this blog right now on a ridiculously high-end Dell laptop that I convinced my sister to finance for me, because God knows I can't be checking my Myspace page or surfing the internet for useless movie news on a slow machine.  Cellphones, PSP's, DVD players…love 'em all like children.  But sometimes technology can get a little ridiculous…

 

Take the ATM machine at my bank.  For reasons I can only begin to guess at, it talks.  It narrates everything you are doing at the machine, as you are doing it.  And even more baffling, it talks in the voice of a stern British woman.  Why?  Is the owner of the bank Julie Andrews?  Or did they just decide a stern British voice would help the customers operate the ATM better?  I have no idea.  But as I stopped at the local Rainbow to get some cash and pick up some groceries, my interaction with my ATM went something like this:

 

"WELCOME TO THE FASTCASH ATM MACHINE.  PLEASE SWIPE YOUR CARD TO BEGIN." (I also forgot to mention…the stern British woman's voice is very, very, very loud.  It yells at you, pretty much.  I'm certain the people picking up milk in the very back of the store can hear it quite clearly.)

 

I swipe my card.  "PLEASE ENTER YOUR SUPER-SECRET PIN NUMBER."

 

I do so.  "YOU HAVE ENTERED 8367.  IS 8367 YOUR SUPER-SECRET PIN NUMBER?" the ATM asks.

 

I quickly glance around at the other shoppers who are staring at me.  "Uh…hell no!  It sure isn't!" I declare as I casually hit the "Yes" button.

 

"PLEASE SELECT YOUR TRANSACTION," my ATM orders me, drill sergeant like.  I hit the "Withdraw" button and ask to receive $60.

 

"YOU HAVE SELECTED TO WITHDRAW $60 SO THAT YOU CAN BUY SOME LICEX BRAND HEAD LICE REMOVER.  IS THIS CORRECT?"

 

"What the fuck?  No, I don't have any--," I vigorously scratch my head as I scream at the gossiping-spreading machine.  "Damn it, just give me my money!"  I snatch up my three twenties and try to ignore customers who by this point are definitely staring.

 

"THANK YOU FOR USING THE CASH FAST ATM MACHINE TO WITHDRAW CASH THAT YOU WILL BE TAKING OUT TO YOUR CAR.  ALONE.  IN THE DARK.  YOU PROBABLY WON'T GET MUGGED, BUT IF YOU DID, THE MUGGER WOULD PROBABLY GET AWAY WITH IT.  HAVE A NICE DAY."

 

Stupid European machine.  Seriously, I really don't understand why I need a Howard Cosell like play-by-play of what I'm doing at the ATM.  Things didn't get better after I had picked up my groceries and went to pay.  I went to the new "Self-Service" register that they have at almost every grocery store now.  Since I spent six torturous months as a grocery store cashier, you would think I would want nothing to do with these devices.  You'd be mostly right, but I've found they're useful if you need to purchase items you'd rather not have a human being see you buying.  For instance, if a person needed to buy some Licex Brand Head Lice Remover, perhaps.  I mean, I didn't…but just as an example…if you did…the Self Service registers are the way to go.

 

So I'm happily scanning my items and placing them in the bag, when suddenly the machine starts beeping and flashing like it's a God damn metal detector and I'm an oversized penny.  "Unauthorized item in the bagging area," it tells me and everyone around me, though fortunately not in a British dialect.

 

Unauthorized item in the bagging area?  What the hell?  I just set my bag of Doritos down there.  What's unauthorized?  Did somebody sneak a brick of heroin or some illegal Mexicans into my cart?

 

I'm frantically pushing buttons, trying to make the register do something other than yell at me, when a middle aged woman with an impressive looking key ring comes over, puts in one of her many hundreds of keys, and enters a code.

 

"Okay, take that out of the bag," she tells me.  I pick up my delicious Doritos.  "Now put them back," she tells me.  I do.  The register throws another hissy fit.  "Now you confused it by grabbing the bag and putting it back again," the woman tells me.

 

"I'm sorry," I say, "I didn't mean to give your cash register an emotional crisis."  After a few minutes of soothing the register, stroking it's hair, telling it how pretty it is and how it's not getting fat at all, the woman managed to make it so it would accept my money, and I could finally leave with my groceries.

 

On a slightly positive note on the technology front, when I got into my car from the grocery store, I was pleasantly surprised to see that my CD player was working.  You see, my car CD player worked great for about two months when I first got it.  Then it stopped working for a while.  Then it worked for a while again.  Then it stopped again.  And it has basically repeated this cycle…working for a week, then not working for a day or so…for the past few months.  About a week ago it stopped working, and it was looking like it wasn't coming back.  But now it works again…I guess.  I don't know.  I'm glad it works…but I'm feeling a little abused by this constant cycle of working and not working.  Stop playing with my emotions, CD player!  Damn…if I want something in my life that works fine, then goes silent for a week for no reason, then is suddenly fine again as if nothing was wrong in the first place…I'll get a girlfriend.

 

The Age Gap

 

Earlier that day, I decided my belly needed to be full of Burger King.  I was in the mood for what I like to call "The Dane Cook Special"… Chicken sandwich, hot tasty hot French fries, and beverage.  As I pulled into the BK drive-thru, I saw a parked car with a half-dozen or so teenagers milling about it.  They weren't doing anything particularly wrong…they weren't doing anything particularly at all.  They were just there.  They were…Burger King Rats.  And all I could think to myself was:

 

"Get outta here and get a job, ya damn kids!"  Seriously.  And worst of all, in my brain it sounded exactly like my old eighth grade shop teacher.  Frightening.  Why would I care if kids are milling about?  What else are kids supposed to do?  Am I just jealous of their no job, no responsibilities, no worries, youthful face looking, frantic semi-regular nubile sex having, lives?

 

Yes.

 

Fucking punk kids, reminding me of my own rapidly accelerating age when I just want to enjoy a chicken sandwich.

 

Memories

 

As I was filling my car with gas even earlier in the day, and watching the $ meter edge it's way past $40, I thought to myself, "I remember back in the day I could put $5 in my car and not have to worry about gas for a week."

 

And yes, that is the exact expression I used in my thoughts.  Back…in…the…day.  And I wasn't even trying to be ironic or funny.  I literally meant…back in the day.

 

Sometimes Nikki W. and I will be talking about things…let's say theater things…and we will say, "Remember back in the day, when we were in so-and-so play…"  We used to say this to be funny.  But now, it's not even funny.  It's realistic.  Nikki and I have a back in the day…and it's getting farther back with each passing week.

 

I'm not supposed to be old enough to have a "back in the day."  I'm supposed to BE the God-damn day.  This is the day.  Not back then.  Now.

 

Wait…what am I talking about again?

 

See…senility.  Grandpa Timmy, here I come.

 

But all is not yet lost.  I'm still capable of great depths of immaturity when I it is called for.  When Nikki at rehearsal says the line "bamboo beads" too quickly and it sounds like "bam-boobies"…I laugh a little on the inside, each and every time.  I still kind of want to buy a "Dukes of Hazard" pedal car, even though I already own a real car.  And, I'm not going to lie, when I think about sex…I still giggle a little bit, way down deep inside.  Because it's kind of funny.

 

The bad news is, lately I've been noticing I have this urge.  Not often, but sometimes, I just really want to make myself a drink, and go sit out on my apartment porch.  Not to read, not to surf the internet, but just sit there, and drink, and watch…

I think you know your life isn't going exactly as planned when you find yourself wondering how much money you could get for selling one of your organs.

 

This was the idea I contemplated yesterday while examining my current state of almost embarrassing brokenness.  Just exactly how much could I get for one of my kidneys?  I have to tell you, if somebody offered me five grand for one right now, I'd take it in a shot.  I might even give a long hard thought about one or two thousand.  Less than a thousand, I might have to pass.  It seems to be a moot point, since I have absolutely no idea how much I could get for a kidney.  I mean, kidney buyers aren't exactly the type of thing you can just look up in the Yellow Pages.  And a cursory glance at craigslist.com found no one else in the market of buying or selling kidneys, leaving the exact value of said organ a mystery.

 

But, seriously, if I could get good value on a kidney…I'd give one up.  Kidneys are the things we have two of, right?  And you only need one?  Or is that your liver?  Damn, I probably should look that up.  You definitely don't want to sell an organ and find out afterwards that it was something you needed to…you know…live.

 

And actually, selling organs for money isn't really a habit you want to get into anyway, because really, how far can you get in life doing that?  How many organs can any one person have that they can do without?  I don't know the answer to this question, but I'm guessing the number has to be less than a dozen, making organ selling a short-term financial solution at best.

 

I suppose I would be remiss if I didn't mention at this point that I do have a long term option available to me that is similar to selling organs, and that would of course be going to a fertility clinic and selling my…uh……you know.  My "male seed."  My "baby batter."  My "boys."  My "egg whites."  My "happy juice."

 

In case you haven't figured it out yet, we're talking about masturbating into a cup here, foks.

 

(A quick editorial note: As I am typing this, Microsoft Word has just brought it to my attention that I DON'T know how to spell the word "masturbating"…which being that I am both a male and have a degree in English seems terribly wrong, somehow.)

 

Here's the deal: while on the surface this seems like the absolute perfect money making opportunity, I got to tell you, I don't think I could do it.  Not because I'm worried about someone else having kids with my DNA that I don't know about, because I could care less.  I'm sure as hell not using them for that purpose, so if it brings happiness to someone else, more power to them.  But just because…that's way too much pressure for me.  I've taken, on a couple of different occasions, drug tests for new jobs, and I have a hard time PEEING when I know there is a nurse outside the door, waiting for my urine.  How the hell am I supposed to get off knowing there's some poor, bored, 9 to 5 nurse waiting at the front desk for me to bring the results to her?  I can't even fathom what I'm supposed to fantasize about to get over that mental hurdle.

 

The point here, people, is I'm poor.  And being poor, I've discovered, is very, very boring.  Also: frustrating.  So it was with a great deal of relief that my persistent agonizing over my money problems was interrupted yesterday by a little good-bye hang out with Siri Hellerman.

 

I met Siri Hellerman when we were playing opposite of each other in a production of You Can't Take it With You earlier this year.  In a week, Siri is moving to Hawaii for a year and a half because she is the LUCKIEST BITCH IN THE WORLD.

 

I'm just kidding.  But not really.

 

The point is, Siri and I had a date with Bennigans, alcohol, and Futurama on DVD, because those are pretty much the three pillars of our relationship.  While we were waiting on our food at Bennigans, Siri asked me a standard question that lately is pretty much the bane of my existence.

 

"So, how's life?"

 

This is a very normal, polite, average thing for a friend to ask another friend when they are conversing.  And I fucking hate it.  Because I can't answer it honestly and positively at the same time.  So I can either answer it like this:

 

Well, Siri, I'm dead broke because I have a job that doesn't pay shit, I'm not making any progress on anything I would like to accomplish in my life, and I'm wildly unhappy, probably more because of my own mental state than any actual outside, controllable factors.  I'm a jaded, cynical, broken, bitter old man at the ripe age of 28.  Also, my toe hurts.  The middle one, on my right foot.

 

But I can't answer like that, because nobody wants to listen to me whine, least of all myself, and what the hell can she do about it?  So what's the point of bringing down the mood?  But the only other alternative is to answer like this:

 

Fine.

 

Which A) is not entirely accurate and B) makes for a very short conversation.

 

So I settle for a nice middle ground, with a little bit of whining…just enough so we have a little something to talk about.  Well, maybe there was more than a little whining…I don't really remember.  But there was some, causing Siri to finally bestow this declaration upon me:

 

"Tim, your problem is, you don't listen to anyone else's advice."

 

This is funny, because I honestly don't remember ever RECEIVING anyone else's advice recently.  But, to be fair, I guess that sort of proves Siri's point: if I'm not listening to people's advice, how would I remember it?  So Siri's advice: listen to advice.  That's good advice.

 

Now, back to my apartment for drinking and Bender.  Here is what I have realized about drinking: alcohol doesn't make you feel less depressed.  It just makes all the regular, simple aspects of life so difficult, you literally don't have enough power in your brain to dwell on being depressed.  For example, going to the bathroom.  When you have to walk to your bathroom, which by the way for me is a mere 10-yards from my living room, and you get up and the entire building is spinning, and you have to concentrate INSANELY hard just to walk in the straight line required to get from point A to point B…well…you don't really have time to think about your emotional woes.

 

Despite my extreme intoxication, I was able to accomplish one minor feat.  Here is a most excellent picture I took of Siri, who managed to pass out for about a half hour halfway through Futurama but before we concluded the night with Cheaters:

 

 

That's an empty bottle of Sprite on her head, in case you're wondering.  I would have balanced some more cool things on her, but that's all I could find at the time.

 

(Another quick side note: how big of a nerd am I?  Most girls would be nervous about passing out in a guy's apartment because they might be sexually molested.  Girls who pass out in my apartment get random objects placed on their skulls and then get laughed at.  Now, I'm not by any stretch saying it's a good thing to take advantage of a passed out female…but you have to admit it's a hell of a lot cooler.)

 

After Siri had sobered up, we said goodbye and she left.  I was still quite drunk, and I attempted to read some more of "The Know-It-All", a terrifically funny little memoir by A.J. Jacobs…but unfortunately Mr. Jacobs' writing was weaving and crawling across the pages too much for my eyes to follow properly, leading me to do something I don't normally like to do, which is go to bed drunk.  Supposedly going to sleep drunk is what gives you a hang-over, but I have yet to have even one hang-over, and so I have decided that I am hang-over proof.

 

I marveled at my imperviousness to alcohol's aftereffects as I drifted off to sleep, and wondered briefly if I could make any money off of that.  I decided I'd worry about it in the morning.