TALES TO ASTONISH!

Update Update

2006-03-29T10:05:00.000-05:00

I've included a link on the Blogspot main page with instructions on updating the RSS feeds, so that people can see when I've updated my new feed. Click through to the site for the link!

RSS and So Forth

2006-03-22T09:11:00.000-05:00

For further MyYahoo convenience, this link should do most of the work for you so you can update your feed: CLICKY!

The new valid RSS URL is: http://nineteenthirtynine.net/?feed=rss2

There ya go. This is just a precaution, as I don't know how long the Blogspot address will remain.

For MyYahoo readers

2006-03-16T15:17:00.000-05:00

To get my new feed through MyYahoo, click on 'Add Content,' and then search for "nineteenthirtynine.net". And then it'll be just like the old days, only prettier.

URGENT MESSAGE FROM THE CHIEF!

2006-03-13T06:05:00.000-05:00

It's been fun blogging here at Blogspot -- but now I'm at http://nineteenthirtynine.net.

Go there!

Farewells

2006-03-12T20:46:00.000-05:00

Adios, Blogspot...it's been fun.

Friday Quickie

2006-03-10T11:57:00.000-05:00

Not much time to post this afternoon, but here's a vaguely mysterious tip:

This blog might not be around on Monday.

BWAHAHAHAAHAA!

I am now a cheap bastard

2006-03-09T08:15:00.000-05:00

I drink a lot of coffee.

Unfortunately, I work in a place that doesn't provide me with free coffee, so all that caffeine I suck down costs me a lot of money -- something to the tune of sixty bucks a month. I never really thought too much about it -- I figured that it's not exactly a negotiable expense, considering that I DESPERATELY NEED all the caffeine I can legally get short of sponsoring Colombian children to grow personal fields of beans for me. Three or four bucks a day isn't too bad, since I went for the cheap junk anyway. If I'd been going to Starbuck's for my coffee needs, I'd be in massive drug debt like Robert Downey Jr. in Less Than Zero, and I'd probably have a caffeine-induced heart attack and die with my head on Andrew McCarthy's shoulder.

When I say I'm in for the cheap junk, I mean it -- at home, I drink instant coffee rather than having a percolator of any kind. My parents drank instant, I learned to drink it, and nowadays I actually prefer it to most brewed coffee; some of the flavored kinds they're selling these days taste just pretty much indistinguishable from brewed beans. The Vanilla Taster's Choice in particular is great. Plus: I can make it in an instant, and get right back to my intense internet search for a complete set of Battle Beasts.

I'm approaching my point now: at work, coffee is three or four bucks a day. Hot water with a splash of Half-and-Half is free. A jar of instant coffee that makes me about 120 cups is eight dollars. Doing some quick math in my head, that offers me a discount per cup of about 96%. That's about $52 less spent on coffee per month -- that's almost my whole Time Warner bill! This revelation is why I now carry around a jar of Taster's Choice with me wherever I go, like it's one of the Beastmaster's ferrets and its special mission is to perk me up.

My instant coffee is about four times better-tasting than the crap I usually buy, and to top it off it doesn't give me that "scalding acid in my esophagus" feeling that the dark roast from the cafeteria does. I suspect that "dark" isn't referring so much to the strength or color of the roast, but rather acts as a loose synonym for "demonic evil." That would explain a lot of things about the place I work.

I'm also a bit proud of my money-saving scheme, since this is the first time I've been able to cut my expenses in a meaningful way since the coma. I'm only a tad worried that I'll eventually grow up to be one of those people that you see getting kicked out of restaurants for bringing their own food, who are inevitably either homeless, or very, very rich.

The Great White Skype

2006-03-08T09:51:00.000-05:00

Has anyone tried using that Skype internet phone thingamajig? It seems kind fascinating to me, since I'd like to be able to talk to the Lady Retropolitan when we're apart without using the phrase "What's that? I missed that whole last part. Say it again. One more time. Okay, now just the second half'. Okay, could you just email that part to me if it was important? Hello?" I guess I should use a bigger can on my end, but it's harder to attach the string and then I have all these diced tomatoes piled up on the counter.

I'm really wondering what the quality of the Skype audio is like, because if it's not better than the abominable set-up I've got now, it's probably not worth the free download. On the other hand, if it's halfway decent I might go pick up a cheap USB mic. And you know what that might lead to?

Open mic night in Retropolis!

What I mean by that, I don't know.

Scientific Breakthrough

2006-03-08T08:04:00.000-05:00

Scientists have recently discovered a startling new breed of sea life:

THE HAIRY LOBSTER

The new species was found deep below the ocean's surface in the South Pacific, next to a stack of Maxim issues and a copy of Cindy Crawford's Shape Your Body Workout.

A face only a cop could love

2006-03-08T07:48:00.000-05:00

Who has a face that says:

pleasedon'tcheckmybagpleasedon'tcheckmybagfuck

It's me, The Retropolitan!

This post brought to you by the MTA and the NYPD.

A humble thought for the day

2006-03-07T10:38:00.000-05:00

You know what the best part about having both a cat and a sweater is?

You get to go to work dressed like a Wookiee.

Yes, one of these days I'll get back to writing substantial posts.

X3

2006-03-07T06:09:00.000-05:00

If the terrible buzz for the movie hasn't killed your interest already, you can check out the new trailer for X3: The Last Stand right here.

Wait, I meant to say, "terrible buzz AND the posters that are so bad they border on parody." You know, the ones with the actors in the action movie standing around and looking bored and forlorn? And the Arial font? Those ones.

My disinterest in the project aside, I think this trailer looks pretty nifty.

Hypothetically Speaking

2006-03-06T15:03:00.000-05:00

If I had to be chased through one of the Friday the 13th flicks, I'd pick Jason Takes Manhattan. At least I could go home and die, since I hate the whole camping thing.

There are just too many bugs out by the lake, and I'd hate to be already annoyed when the lumbering unkillable hockey player chopped my head in two with a baseball bat.

I'd like to thank the Academy

2006-03-06T07:42:00.000-05:00

I'm still semi-boycotting the annual telecast of the Academy Awards, ever since they wrongfully denied giving ANY awards to my precious Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, despite the amazing effects, cinematography, and score. That means I'll still glance at the TV every once in a while while the Lady watches them, but they're all "angry" glances filled with venom and vitriol, and sometimes with sad, sweet longing.

Last night during the 78th Annual presentation, I did watch for a while, if "The Soup" or "Futurama" were on commercial break, and then if the commercials weren't too interesting. (Although I think Proctor & Gamble are really pushing back the boundaries of what cleaning-fluid commercials can really be.) Was I surprised by any of the winners? I don't know. I didn't see any of the nominated films other than Walk the Line, and I was still pretty "meh" about that one -- you can read my full review here, which, incidentally, is a lot fuller than the actual movie.

More importantly, I think I'm going to start boycotting the Oscars just on account of boring me to tears. I liked the film noir clip segment (being a student of noir and all), but that and some of the other clip bits left me scratching my head -- I couldn't tell why they were there, what purpose they served, or even what they were about thematically. It just seemed like they had an anxious apprentice editor with his test reel lying about, dying to show someone. To make matters worse, Lauren Bacall -- still looking absolutely amazing for being 82, by the way -- struggled her way through the speech like the guy in Scanners before his head a-sploded. I feel that Cronenberg is somehow behind it all.

Next year, I hope the Academy veers away from the standard format, and maybe once just does something other than over-dramatic film montages and the Apollo 13 music. Like, for instance, have the Ringling Bros. produce the show. There's nothing classier than lion-tamers and clowns with big pants. Everybody loves the big pants!

And maybe, just maybe -- if we're all really good -- the big-panted clown will spray someone with water! Guffaws for ever'body!

EDIT: Remember a few years back when Cirque du Soleil had that inexplicable stunt show in the middle of the Oscars? That was the best part of the show.

Elvira is looking good

2006-03-04T19:34:00.000-05:00

Having watched both Elvira, Mistress of the Dark and then Elvira's Haunted Hills today in lieu of actually having Halloweekend, I must say:

Cassandra Peterson mysteriously did not age in the thirteen-year gap between movies.

Her jokes didn't get any better, either, but if I wanted sophisticated boobie jokes I'd've watched an Aaron Sorkin show.

The Mundane

2006-03-03T08:09:00.000-05:00

It's a beautiful sunshine-filled day here in New York, NY, if you can ignore the icy freezing coldness and wind and grey slush on the sidewalks and that woman outside of Grand Central's 7 train exit that yells "GOooooooooooooood morning!" as she tries to slap you with free newspapers. If you have the ability to ignore that woman, you're probably living the most laid-back, happy existence ever experienced by mankind. Good for you!

Well, since my work schedule is a little changed today, I'll leave you all with a short post from me, and a whole list of entertaining posts by other people -- because today is CARNIVAL OF THE MUNDANE day! This installment is hosted over by Neil over at Citizen of the Month, and yours truly submitted a recent mundane piece for inclusion.

I hope you all have a nice weekend! Perhaps I'll be back later today.

My Brother, the Hero

2006-03-02T09:25:00.000-05:00

I had a heartwarming memory pop up in my head this morning, and for once it didn't involve puppies playing in fields of marigolds or "ALF" being cancelled.

My brother's a bit older than I am, so I was still a youngin' when he up and went to college to get that "book learnin'" junk that I used to (and occasionally still) beat kids up for having. He didn't go very far, since he went to a local university that was a whopping fifteen minute walk from my front door, but it was still a change in my life when he moved into the dorms with his friends. He came home pretty frequently anyway, so it wasn't as if he wasn't around anymore, but once or twice I went to visit him anyway. The first time I visited my brother was probably the first time I'd ever been let loose on college grounds before, and it was probably also the first time that this idea came to mind:

There is, somewhere, a life without parental supervision.

There just weren't any adults around on campus -- just college kids, roaming free and unchained. My parents had kept us on a pretty short leash at home, so the idea that I could be independent and escape their control without resorting to dubious Machiavellian schemes was a true revelation. I mean -- you could live as you wished in college! No one was watching! My brother and I walked around the quad and chatted while I silently contemplated possible reasons why total anarchy hadn't broken out around us.

We were cornering a giant stone pillar when I saw it:

An Evil Dead 2 poster.

Actually, it wasn't really a poster, but a xeroxed flier for one of those campus movie nights that happen all the time, and it wasn't even a xerox of the movie poster; it was just the title of the film, and some snarky gag like "Q: How do you reload a shotgun when you've only got one hand? A: You don't need to. It's a movie." It may have also had a photo of a chainsaw or a skull, but I'd have to go deeeeeep into the Wayback Machine of my head to remember.

It's not that the poster was especially neat or anything, it was that I was practically obsessed with horror films, and the Evil Dead movies in particular. I collected all kinds of ads and posters and articles about them, and I'm glad that I grew out of that phase before the internet exploded with horror websites and I died from toner fumes as I printed them all out. My brother saw my awe -- there were people that were gonna show EVIL DEAD 2 for fun! In public! -- and went over to the bulletin board, and carefully started prying off the staples so as not to tear the sheet.

I was aghast! He was... committing some kind of misdemeanor! He was stealing! He was defiling someone else's property, or something like that! The poster was not his for the taking, but there he was, bending back the staples! For me!

That's when I realized that my brother had become some kind of rockstar. I kept waiting for police sirens, or perhaps my mother's angry voice to careen through the air over town, smacking my brother's hand away from the board, because that was something that she wouldn't allow. But with an amazing show of reckless abandon, my brother took it off the wall and handed it to me.

It was a true coming-of-age moment in my life. It helped mark the end of one stage of my life in a way that hadn't happened since Faye Grant was captured by the Visitors.

Hmmm

2006-03-02T08:23:00.000-05:00

Hm.

I think you can tell by the sideburns.

The Power of ARM

2006-03-01T07:29:00.000-05:00

I have a general idea of the picture of myself that you all probably have: tall, thin, skinny, getting sand kicked in my face by jocks at the beach who want to chastely walk arm-in-arm with the Lady Retropolitan in her 1950s swimsuit. Usually, that's frighteningly dead-on. But it all changed last night, when something mysterious and startling happened to me.

Here, I even got a picture of it all:

That was me last night, except instead of a Spider-Man costume, I was wearing Spider-Man Underoos and a ski mask. And instead of water and a large piece of industrial machinery, I was trapped perilously underneath an avalanche of shelving and art supplies in my dressing room.

I had been putting away some laundry in the closet when suddenly a cracking sound stabbed from the top shelf, where I was storing all of my toxic materials and lead bricks! The room shuddered as the wooden plank gave way, splintering in the middle to release its load onto the shelves below it, which in turn cracked and buckled, changing into makeshift slides that guided the debris onto my Underooed body!

Much like in the image, I was pinned down by the sheer weight of art supplies and back-up rolls of toilet paper and the other things you might find in a man's studio apartment. I could barely move for fear of being crushed! But...I had to! I couldn't just give up, call it quits! I had to summon my inner will, if not for myself then for the Lady Retropolitan, who will probably need me to feed her cat tomorrow! Using what little space I had, I pivoted to brace my knees against the wood floor, and PUSHED backwards with all my might!

The assortment of mystery novels, Halloween decorations, and antique radios shook, as gravity started forcing them down the slope of my now-upturned back. Even though debris was still assaulting me from the remnants of the closet, I called upon my untapped superhuman strength and rose through the heap, triumphant!

Except for the mess, which was mighty.

Now that I've discovered my super-strength, my first stop is going to be a tattoo parlor, where I'm going to get the Chinese character for the Superman logo inked on my bicep.

New Internet Rule

2006-02-28T13:29:00.000-05:00

I am hereby declaring a moratorium on all uses of the word/phrase/question "mmmmKAY?" and any variations thereof anywhere on the internet, including emails to me.

Do not resist.

Science Fiction Thing That I Want

2006-02-28T08:22:00.000-05:00

Even though this is a few years old, I still absolutely have to have cannot live without:

THE WRISTWATCH PHONE

This time, it's not the mamby-pamby officially-licensed "Dick Tracy" watch that came out for MSN Direct, which did everything EXCEPT allow for two-way communication -- this one's a real phone. If I had this, I could live out all of the crime-fighting adventures of everyone's favorite yellow-coated police detective. Sure, it'd be helpful if I actually went to police academy or had some form of law-enforcement training, but that's for the birds. If what comic books have been telling me for years is correct -- and they're almost always correct -- all I really need to defeat sinister gangsters like Littleface and The Nose is a little derring-do and a good wrist to talk to.

Comic books also tell me that all women have giant breasts, and all mansions have cave systems beneath them. Both of these have been proven true!

BY SCIENCE!

That's catchy!

2006-02-28T06:02:00.000-05:00

You know, it's hard to see "news aggregator" too many times without laying it over the tune "Smooth Operator."

Still trying to mash-up "RSS feed" and "Sweetest Taboo."

Dead Celebrity Catch Phrases

2006-02-27T07:51:00.000-05:00

I'm not famous.

Not yet, anyway, but in preparation for both fame and my eventual demise, it's become apparent that I need to develop some sort of catchphrase that people can use to title my obituaries. All the big dead celebrities are doing it!

Last year happened to be a very big year for celebrity deaths, so the public at large was treated to many a loving article about our Hollywood royalty that had passed. The downside was that pretty much every article or obituary that I read in the blogosphere last year included some kind of catchy headline that focused the person's career into one soundbyte based on a famous line that they had once uttered on film (or had uttered about them).

For instance, Bob "Gilligan" Denver passed away in 2005 -- I don't think I saw a mention of his death that didn't include the title "So Long, Little Buddy" or some variation thereof. Similarly, Noriyuki "Pat" Morita (of Karate Kid fame) died, and what happened:

"Wax on... (...Wax off this mortal coil)"

Frank Gorshin? "Riddle Me Dead, Batman!"

And how could I forget James Doohan's death-phrase, "Beam Him Up Lord"?

It doesn't take a genius to see that when Donald Trump kicks it, the headlines will be ablaze with variations of "Life, You're Fired!" And, my personal favorite of all hypothetical death catchphrases is Arnold Schwarzeneggar's "I... Won't Be Back."

This is why I think it prudent to get a good death-phrase associated with me now, so when I really hit it the big time all the large newspapers can get a headstart on typing out my obit. I'm thinking something ironic -- I get a little tired when the death-phrase is a stretched pun, or something -- so I want it to be about death. Or life. Something not too twisty, like:

Death, for me? Yes please! -- The Retropolitan dies at 106

NEW YORK, New York (AP) - The revered and mysterious celebrity writer known only as "The Retropolitan" died yesterday of natural causes at the age of 106. Supposedly born sometime in the late 1970s, The Retropolitan struggled along in a series of odd creative jobs until riding the internet humorist boom to fame in the first decade of this century. (The internet was a vast computer network linking informational "sites" on millions of different computers all across the world; many of the sites were devoted to pornography and horrible jokes.) As he ascended in popularity, he began writing a long series of unsuccessful novels that were critically panned, although achieved incredible sales records after being featured in the fifteenth season of the television series "Lost" (Episode 15.06, "Building a Coconut Boat," had a character with a full shelf of Retropolitan's works in the background.) Despite critical drubbings, The Retropolitan rode his sudden popularity to Hollywood, becoming a regular fixture on game shows such as "The New New New Hollywood Squares" and "Beat the Banzai Devil Today!" His most memorable contribution to popular culture is his unique catchphrase "Death, for me? No thanks!" which he bizarrely included in all of his works since 2006. The reason for the constant utterance of the phrase is unknown, which likely added to its incredible popularity.

The Retropolitan is probably not survived by anyone.

Know what kinda sucks? IE.

2006-02-26T22:44:00.000-05:00

I swear.

Some of the stupid workarounds I have to come up with to get my new blog to work in IE are so complex and labyrinthine, David Bowie actually showed up with a bunch of muppets, and said "Bloody 'ell" before dancing on an upside-down staircase.

Sadly, no Jennifer Connelly.

Shiny

2006-02-26T17:06:00.000-05:00

I found this online:

Kal-El's Spaceship!

Unfortunately, the cost of caring for a lost Kryptonian baby is not included in the asking price.

Spider-Man Part Tres

2006-02-24T14:50:00.000-05:00

Your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man is back, with a new pin-up photo courtesy of Sam Raimi and the people that are making the third movie. I'll repeat the tagline that everyone else on the internet is using: "This is not a black-and-white image." No, no it's not:

It appears Raimi and Co. have finally given fans what they've been asking for all along, a showdown with Ol' Webhead's greatest nemesis:

The dreaded Higgins Corporation.

The Whore of Microsoft

2006-02-24T11:27:00.000-05:00

Small blog update:

I vanquished the IE bug like Dr. Doom would crush the Fantastic Four if there were any justice in the world. It whimpered as I struck the killing blow, disintigrating it with my devastating repulsor-beam CSS mastery.

Back to Latveria!

It's almost Halloweekend!

2006-02-24T07:37:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to have a special Halloween-themed spring/summer party since March of 2004, and for various reasons it's still an unrealized dream. I mean, what could possibly be better than having Halloween come twice a year? Even Christmas in July cannot hold a candle to my horrific dream! (Although for what it's worth, the "Yom Kippur in the Spring" party went swimmingly.) Happily, though, I think the time has finally arrived to celebrate all the wonderful, scary, and...tacky things that I love about Halloween.

As much as I love a genuine scare, the Halloween that I really love is the Halloween that I had as a kid -- the one filled with cheesy scares and doofy novelties. I love all things horror, but it's really seeing the monster-themed yogurt in the supermarket that gets me going every October. The Halloween that I treasure is the one that's ruled over by Elvira and her giant... puns, the special pumpkin graphics on the USA network, and the weird commercials with mad scientists selling slime-green fruit juice. (Or Duracula.) Anybody remember the BeerWolf? I could seriously give X-Entertainment's Matt a run for his Halloween-loving money.

I happened to be thinking this morning about my mother's bizarre Christmas-decoration fetish, with her tiny porcelain army of snowmen, the 'fake snow' covering the kitchen table, and OF COURSE the animatronic Santa doll that moves his arms in a mechanized routine while (thank God optional) carols play -- I hate that stuff. It just strikes me as irritating, tacky, and gaudy, and I've never enjoyed seeing it clutter up the house.

And then I thought... "BUT if it were an animatronic FRANKENSTEIN moving his arms in a mock-performance of a VOODOO ritual..." I'd probably have a dozen of them lined up in my apartment next to the shiny purple bat garland and the life-size witch's cauldron with the Elvira Coors Light cardboard standee inside a haze of dry ice. It occurs to me that I should probably re-think my stance on tacky holiday decorations. I try not to be too gaudy with my decorating schemes, but Halloween brings out the macabre fanboy in me, and I just HAVE to show people my sculpted shrunken heads. A personal flaw, if you will.

Anyway, I think Halloweekend may be coming in a week or two. I have a fever that can only be cured by hackings, slashings, and gratuitous nudity.

IE Sucks

2006-02-23T07:55:00.000-05:00

Far back in the dark recesses of the Fortress of Retropolitude, behind creaky steel doors and clouds of mist, I've been toiling away on a brand-spanking new website to replace this one. Since I had no prior experience with HTML or CSS other than this blog right here, it's been kind of an uphill battle that I've fought for the past year, creating blog after blog and then deleting them because they looked kind of like a fourteen-year-old girl's manga fan page. (The only standard I've held myself to is not having an animated workman image saying "Under Construction!")

First and foremost among my desires was that the new site be compliant with more browsers than Firefox and Netscape, since I've seen how this one looks in Internet Explorer, and it ain't pretty (but I'm not about to spend time fixing it.) With that in mind, I've checked every single step I've made in not only Firefox and Netscape, but also Safari and IE, on Macs and PCs, laptops and towers, high resolutions and low resolutions, drunk and sober, Batman and Robin, just to make absolutely sure that it looked relatively correct. And then about three weeks ago, I just forgot to check it in other browsers, which coincidentally coincided with the time I started to do more weirdly complicated things.

Last night I remembered to check the site in IE.

I looked at it in Firefox first -- beautiful. Glorious. A fine piece of art.

Netscape -- very pretty. Linear, graphic, interesting.

IE -- ???

It went completely Picasso on me. The left margins were in the center, the icons were rotated, my posts were in foreign languages, both eyes were on the bottom of the face, and there was an "Under Construction" gif in the middle. IE did not recognize half of my work. I might as well have written the HTML in Lincoln Logs and displayed it on a Speak-N-Spell.

Although almost sixty percent of the people that come to this site use IE, I implore you: get something better. IE is the bane of astonishing tales.

Migraine

2006-02-22T20:56:00.000-05:00

For the first time in my life, I know what it is to have a migraine headache:

It feels like Jesus himself is pissing flaming lightning bolts onto your brain THROUGH YOUR EYES.

It almost makes me want stop blogging so I don't have to look at the computer screen.

Almost.

Yum

2006-02-22T14:00:00.000-05:00

You know what I bet would taste great?

Unicorn.

EDIT: Know what the best part about eating unicorn is? If you can stretch them enough, instant uni-kabob.

Get Off Of My Train

2006-02-22T07:50:00.000-05:00

Dear woman who decided that 7:05 in the morning on the subway was a great time to play ALL of her phone's ringtones at the highest volume:

I really like that "Bad to the Bone" song, even as a ringtone! It's been a long time since I've listened to it in its entirety, which was probably back during the opening credits of John Carpenter's cult classic Christine. (You know, the one about the demonic car?) It's also a really good motivational tune to listen to when you're doing tough work, like exercising vigorously, or kicking someone's ass really early in the morning, as I just did. To you.

You see, I don't mind that song (or even the theme from John Carpenter's Halloween, which I also have on my phone -- heck, maybe you're a big JC fan, too!). I don't even mind people checking out their ringtones, since everyone has to at some point. What I do object to is your choice of location and time, which -- if you allow me to remind you -- was this morning at 7:05 on the otherwise-quiet 7 train from Queens. You may remember me from your ride as the tall gentleman with the burning red eyes and the hobo coat. Even though I purposely tried to orient all the holes and tears in my coat towards you, in an attempt to make you think that I might be a crazy homeless man out to destroy you for disturbing my slumber, you were too busy scrolling back and forth between "Techno Ring 13" and "Techno Ring 10" at 100% volume to notice.

You see, there's an unspoken pact of courtesy that everyone else on the train was keeping to. That pact is pretty simple: don't bug other people, and the other people shall not bug you. You were bugging everyone, which is why we surrounded you like villagers outside Frankenstein's castle. You may have noticed a distinct decrease in personal space as our fists crowded the area around your head; that suspicious sensation on your upper lip was probably the blood running from where your personal boom-box had been rammed into your nose like Arnold's nose probe in Total Recall. If I remember correctly, it played the "comedy" ringtone of some comedian I'm sure you really love saying "Answer the phone, you *EXPLETIVE*" in creative ways for forty seconds as we rocked your Motorola back and forth until we got to Grand Central and had to go to work.

I just want you to know that it wasn't anything personal. It's just that you broke the pact, so we had to tear you apart like in a Filipino cannibal movie. If you survived, please remember to at least turn the volume down before you test out your ringtones. On my train. At 7:05 in the morning.

Yours,

The Retropolitan

Hobo Status

2006-02-21T11:12:00.000-05:00

COAT STATUS: Frayed
LOOKS LIKE: Homeless for thirty, forty days
NEW HOLES: Inner left pocket
ACCOUNTED HOLES: Many, widening
SMELLS LIKE: Fresh gardenias, Febreze

Yeah, I'm gonna order myself a new coat today. Big and Tall store, here I come!

(Why don't normal stores have size 38L?)

Fatherly Duties

2006-02-21T07:57:00.000-05:00

In a gallant show of fatherly affection, I spent the night camped out on the living room floor with the cat, to make sure that she didn't freak out if she woke up in the middle of the night and realized that she couldn't make her way to the Lady or I. She got back from a successful spaying surgery last night, and walked around much like her daddy does on a typical Saturday evening: completely wasted and incapable of standing. She tried, the poor dear, but she couldn't hold herself steady enough to get more than a step or two before falling sideways and thumping back down on the carpet, eliciting GASPS from the Lady Retropolitan every single time. The poor baby just sat on the floor, her head swaying perfectly side to side like that animatronic brontasaurus that I saw when I was in the fourth grade.

It almost makes me wonder if I have a ticking biological clock, and if there is still time to destroy it.

So I saw the first episode of "Firefly"

2006-02-20T12:59:00.000-05:00

...and it wasn't half-bad. I'm still not infected with the Browncoat virus that makes people want to special-order coats and write fanfic and go to conventions, but I liked it enough to watch another episode. 'Course I haven't had a bug that bad since the outbreak of Brisco County Fever back in 1994.

Damn near killed me, that one.

Another Best Thing Ever

2006-02-20T08:51:00.000-05:00

I'm going through this hypothetical list of "Things that are perfect for me that I never knew about until NOW" so quickly in the past couple of weeks, I better slow down. I don't want to run out of perfection too early in my life, or else I'll end up as one of those guys that wears his high school letter jacket and hits on seventeen-year-olds the rest of his life.

Anyway -- and I don't even remember how I found this, which makes it even more mysterious -- I got linked to Max Allan Collins' book, "The War of the Worlds Murder," which as you may have guessed is the perfect book for me. It's probably even more perfect for me than "The Retropolitan Reader, or 50 Reasons Why I Love The Retropolitan" by Elisha Cuthbert, which I tell myself is due in stores any day now. "The War of the Worlds Murder" is a fictional tale of Walter B. Gibson (creator and writer of the Shadow pulp novels) taking a trip to visit Orson Welles to discuss the production of a Shadow movie -- on the same Halloween night when Welles broadcast the infamous War of the Worlds episode of his radio program. Then there are murders, and presumably mysteries.

It's got:
-Walter B. Gibson
-The Shadow
-Orson Welles
-War of the Worlds
-Old time radio
-1938 New York City
-Halloween
-Murder mysteries

The one thing that could arguably make it better is if it were real, and I were there.

Well, here's hoping that the book doesn't completely suck, although it's been getting favorable reviews. And the author also wrote "Road to Perdition," which I liked a lot.

Damn, I think that my soul will be destroyed if the book is awful. I'm kind of afraid to read it now.

I Dream About Murder

2006-02-20T05:59:00.000-05:00

I was going to complain about nights when you go to bed early like a good little boy but can't fall asleep until after the time you wanted to stay up until, but then I remembered that I had the longest, most involved dream in a long time. It was about a murder committed by Adrienne Shelley and some fat guy in a dumpy motel, and I was the cop that tracked them down. I won't get into specifics, but my version of tracking them down was doing absolutely nothing until I materialized in front of the motel with a SWAT team. For some reason, I also looked like Kyle Chandler.

There was a reservoir, or some kind of dam, and I shot the fat guy and saved the day. And Adrienne Shelley acted a lot like Paris Hilton, so I kind of wonder why I didn't shoot her too. It was a dream, after all.

A Very Special Day

2006-02-19T10:13:00.000-05:00

It's a very special day here in sunny Retropolis, because it's the very last day that the cat has before she goes to visit the vet, and gets -- you got it -- spayed. It's our very last chance to celebrate our cat's ovaries, which makes it:

OVARY DAY!

We'll be starting off this celebratory day in style, by decorating the apartment with streamers and decorations of all kinds, including a one-of-a-kind pinata in a shape which I'll leave to your imagination. While I'm hanging the papier mache cat uterus on the wall, the Lady will be in the kitchen making eggs ovary-z, and prepping the coffee for a day filled with full-bodied fun! The cat, of course will be tipping over wastebaskets and batting her dry food around like she's Babe Ruth. She's not really into parties.

As we wind the day down, we'll have a nice quiet dinner (maybe some candles), and we'll all tell stories about how the cat will have a friendlier personality, less risk for cancer and infections, and will live longer. Baby will sit paws-crossed on the table, and we will toast to her not going into noisy, noisy heat ever, ever, ever.

Then we'll all nap, and maybe have some drinks afterwards. It's okay for a cat to be hungover the day of surgery, right?

I can't sleep in

2006-02-18T10:47:00.000-05:00

Maybe it is the light, but I woke up this morning to a room filled with sun, and I thought to myself, "geez, it must be eleven o'clock already." I stayed in bed for perhaps ten or more minutes before I couldn't stand it anymore, and then got up and went to watch cartoons.

Nothing was on, because it was... 7:03 in the morning. The Lady, as of this writing, is still asleep.

At least the cat and I had some good father/daughter bonding time. She sat on my lap and purred, and I watched "The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny."

The Thought That Kept Me Up Last Night

2006-02-17T07:41:00.000-05:00

Anyone that knows me well enough to have been around while I slept is aware of the fact that I sleep with my eyes open. Not fully, Marty Feldman-open, but like Josh Hartnett-style slits. It's not really a big deal, unless you're sleeping with me and I spend the night staring at you and not responding to your questions or blinking. Then it's a creepy big deal, and especially great around Halloween. (Right, honey?)

It doesn't hurt, and my eyes don't seem to dry out because of it, but sometimes light is a problem. Even when I'm trying to fall asleep, my eyes will creep slowly open, and it's hard to get a stable impression of darkness; that's why I bought one of those sleep masks that you frequently see in movies. Actually, I see them all the time in movies, but I've never known anyone to have one in real life except me. I always wanted to be a pioneer on the sleep mask frontier, so it makes me happy. I'm also thinking that I could cut some eyeholes and fight crime, but that's a thought for later.

Last night as I was tucking myself into an impregnable fortress of red blankets, I pulled the mask over my eyes, slid all the way down under the covers, and then with my free arm reached up and clicked the lights off. As I was pulling my arm back under the covers, a thought occurred to me:

What if the light didn't go off?

I had an opaque black blinder on, so I didn't notice any difference in light level when I flipped the switch off -- it was black before, and black after. What if I didn't flick the switch hard enough and it just sprung back to the "on" position again? BECAUSE I WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO TELL IF I WAS SLEEPING WITH THE LIGHT ON.

I thought that I was being paranoid, so I didn't want to give my neuroses the satisfaction of actually checking. I just laid there, staring at the black wall in front of my eyes, trying to think happy thoughts about the Lady and the weekend and how Netflix should get me Clash of the Titans by SaturIS THAT HUMMING SOUND COMING FROM THE LIGHT BULBS?

Does the current flowing through the filament make a slight buzzing sound? Is that warmth I feel on my forehead the heat making its way down from the 60-watters?

I tried not to think about it. I clicked that switch every night from the same position, and every night in the last two years it's turned off. It had never once stayed on, I had never not used enough force.

I still didn't move, because I didn't want to launch myself down the slippery slope of OCD or become one of those people that can never leave their house because if they get ten feet outside the door they have to go check to make sure that they didn't leave their oven on. Believe me, those people are no fun at parties. It's always like "Hey, baby, how YOU doin'?" and they're all like "I think I left the iron plugged in. I have to go." Or maybe they're just not into me.

I cracked. I unwound my sheets from around my elbows, and twisted my head down just far enough so that I could nudge the mask to the side -- just enough to know if there was light in the room. My arm flipped up, and I nudged. It was still dark. I put my arm down, and rested my head on my pillow.

And: what if I didn't nudge enough, and it still covered my eyes enough to block out the light?

Ten minutes later: yeah, I turned it off.

Robots

2006-02-16T12:30:00.000-05:00

Robots are clearly better than horses with souls that talk about feelings.

So says the talking dinosaur.

Personally, I am in agreement: I generally prefer science fiction to fantasy fiction. I happen to be of the opinion that ray-guns and towering malevolent machines of steel and glass are more entertaining than magic rings and old men with walking sticks.

Also: shinier.

Sometimes Words Are Not Enough

2006-02-16T11:04:00.000-05:00

EDIT: Sometime while I was writing this post, the entire article I was basing it on appears to have been re-edited with the entire focus changed, making the law an already-established part of the penal code. My opinions hold, although I'm confused.

Move along now.

Say, isn't "MacGyver" a great show?

The Software of the Year

2006-02-16T08:57:00.000-05:00

It's the greatest bit of software that I've always had to have and never knew existed: Visual Typewriter.

It's one of those little things in the world that you come across randomly, and it seems so perfectly made for you that you can't even believe it's real. In that way it's very similar the Lady Retropolitan, and those assless pants I found in that alleyway.

I can't wait to get home and try out the demo for this, and maybe soon the weather will be nice enough to get to work on my Retro Keyboard X-1 Project, which I still have to chrome-enamel. Perhaps this weekend!

My Spidey Sense is Tingling

2006-02-15T19:51:00.000-05:00

I sense that in the near future... there will be... big changes at this blog.

Soon, so very soon.

BWA-HAHAHAHAH!

(Or is it MUAH-hahahaha?)

I always get my evil laughs mixed up.

EDIT: There's nothing like cheap red wine and some smooth pipe-smoking to finish off your Wednesday night. I may seem old, but one day you'll all understand.

MMM

2006-02-15T13:21:00.000-05:00

You know what I could really go for right about now?

Even better: frozen. That makes the chewy vanilla centers all crispy and cookie-like, until the heat from your mouth softens them and they suddenly go all chewy again. It's awesome.

I was thoughtful enough to grab two or three bags of those Halloween-sized Charleston Chews on November 1st when they were selling at about a 75% discount, and they've been sitting in my freezer ever since. The only thing that could possibly make a frozen Charleston Chew any better than it is already is if it had a layer of pure, unconditional love inside.

You know, like Twix, the candy bar that fills all the voids in my heart and makes the sadness go away.

The A Team

2006-02-15T06:21:00.000-05:00

"In 1972 a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire the A-Team."

Every morning, I watch the first half of "The A-Team" on the Sleuth Channel before I start off on my walk to the subway, and every morning I wonder exactly how they get so much business. They're wanted by the law, living underground and completely off the grid, and they still get freelance mercenary work each and every week. There must've been an awful lot of evil, land-stealing ranchers running protection rackets in the mid-1980s.

Speaking of which, does anyone know what the crime was that the crack commando unit didn't commit? Initially I was thinking it some kind of murder, but I also have a hunch it could be related to Mr. T's heinous offenses against fashion and haircare. Hey, that bling had to come from someplace.

Happy Valentine's Day!

2006-02-14T11:46:00.000-05:00

Six hundred years ago over in a chilly England, the very first Valentine was given when the near-impoverished St. Valentine offered a slip of paper bearing an oath of love to his dearest never-to-be, a sweet peasant girl that lived the rest of her life knowing that her love would never be truly requited.

At least, that's how Valentine's Day started in my head. Sometimes I also put in dragons, and sometimes the never-to-be is played by Jessica Simpson, which means that sometimes chilly England is warm enough for bikinis, and usually the love is requited until I get sleepy. I actually have no idea at all how Valentine's day really began, but that doesn't matter now that Hallmark and Godiva have stretched whatever kind of holiday it was into the marketing love-stravaganza that it currently is. And you know what? I like Valentine's Day just how it is: overmarketed romance.

What's wrong with a little bit of fabrication when it comes to romance? Yeah, you should always be telling your significant other that you love them, frequently be getting them little gifts anyway blah blah blah. No one at my financial level can afford the kind of love that it will take to defeat the empire of commercial holidays. That's why I really like Valentine's Day: it's one of only a few days of the year where I'm expected to do something sweet, which means I can coast by on sweet nothings the rest of the time. This leads me to think that men invented it, likely just to save themselves from having to look up where the flower shop is more than once a year.

Not that I would ever rely solely on sweet nothings -- I'm just sayin'. I'm a romantic, and I genuinely like doing lots of sweet little things for the Lady Retropolitan as frequently as I can. For instance, yesterday morning before I left for work, I heated the porridge before I slipped it under her iron-chained door. I find that it's the little things like that that keep the flame of love burning brightly, and also keep her from getting scurvy.

Tonight, the two of us are going to celebrate by having a fine, romantic meal -- lit by candles, of course -- followed by a nice, rich, chocolatey dessert. After that, we'll retire with our twinkling glasses of wine, gaze deeply into each other's eyes, and I'll do what comes naturally: apologize until morning.

Operation New Coat: Failure!

2006-02-13T22:38:00.000-05:00

Well, my goal of hurrying to the mall after work to buy a new coat to replace my now-completely unbuttonable overcoat didn't quite pan out. I went through a bunch of stores, but apparently I've got some kind of mutant body type that involves too-narrow shoulders and too-long arms. After much looking, I dejectedly got back on the train, where Paris Hilton's boyfriend offered me a hundred bucks to let him pour Coca-Cola on me. Then some guy with a video camera told me I'd get a full bottle of Jack if I'd start beating the crap out of other homeless men and let him film it and sell the tapes online. Then someone asked me if I was Nick Nolte.

Queens sure is a weird place.

Blogger Eats Posts

2006-02-13T14:01:00.000-05:00

It's official:

As of this morning, since all the useful buttons have popped off of my coat and the holes in the elbows have widened, I am now wearing full-on hobo-wear. You can see me at my next public appearance, walking down the aisle of the 6 train all this week. I'll be the man waving the tattered dixie cup in people's faces as they try to hide behind the New York Post.

You can catch me weekends on the 7 train.

I made up a joke about the snow

2006-02-13T09:19:00.000-05:00

The set-up:
I hear the snow's pretty bad this morning in New York!

The punchline:
Yeah, it's actually more inconvenient than the recent transit strike, which completely shut down the subway and bus service. At least then, I was carpooling to work, traveling in warmth and comfort with only three other people, and I could reasonably call out of going to work if I wanted to. Now, the snow is making driving impossible, and the trains are running -- but so slowly and with so many delays that it took me twice as long to get to work as it usually does, and I was crushed against the side of the car by the four hundred other commuters trying to fit onto the train.

It's still not really all that bad, though, and hardly deserving of the title "The Blizzard of '06" that the news channels have given it. Two days of heavy snowfall hasn't exactly crippled the city, and having lived in two much snowier places, I know that it could've been a lot worse. At least most of the roads were plowed by the time most people walk to the train in the morning!

The follow-up:
Man, I thought you said you had a joke about the snow. That wasn't funny.

The hysterical retort:
That is the joke: that there's no joke. It's meta.

The straight man leaves the scene:
I think I get it: you were going to make up a joke when you started, but couldn't think of one. So you just kept talking as if one might occur to you, but it never did. You misled the audience into thinking that there would be a guffaw in the making, but the real joke is on us.

An aside to the audience:
That guy sucks the mystery and joy out of life. What's the deal with that?

The Case For Not Letting Me Talk To Celebrities

2006-02-10T08:17:00.000-05:00

TALKING TO CELEBRITIES V. RETROPOLITAN, THE

DEFENSE OPENING STATEMENT: I like celebrities. I have several autographed items!

PROSECUTION OPENING STATEMENT: The defendant has repeatedly shown near-obsessive levels of fascination with mostly -- forgive the descriptive term -- "B-Level" celebrities, and on occasion a slumming A-lister or two. These actors and writers exhibit quirky behavior and talent that has failed to earn them wide recognition, but the defendant's nigh-absolute compulsion to watch and read their work combined with his debilitating social awkwardness makes them fearful of his very presence. I will show today that the defendant [points through monitor at The Retropolitan] should not be allowed to speak to any marginally famous person, ever again. Or anyone at all, but that may be outside the scope of this trial.

Due to being on sets across the world (and frequently in Danny's house), most of the celebrities mentioned in this trial will not stand as witnesses. Instead, we will focus on available physical evidence ("signed collectibles") as well as witness accounts and the defendant's own testimony.

-----

The court calls The Retropolitan to the stand.

EXHIBIT A: Autographed 8.5"x11" glossy color photograph of Adam West, in full Batman garb, standing in the Bat Cave in front of the Batmobile. In the middle-right, it is signed "To L'il Retro, BLAM! Batman (Adam West)" in black Sharpie.

TtC: How old were you when you became a Batman fan?
R: Oh, I've been a fan as long as I can remember. Since I was real little.
TtC: Ah, and how old were you when your loving, devoted parents took you to see Mr. Adam West and the classic TV Batmobile at a signing?
R: Oh, jeez, about seven? I don't really remember. Real young.
TtC: But do you remember...THE TEARS???
[court gasps]
R (sullenly): Yes. So I cried, all right? I was a kid! I was nervous! He was my hero!
TtC: It's been my experience that when your hero asks you what your name is, you tell him -- not burst into shrieking tears of fear, embarassing your family like the weeping, spoiled, pansy you were!
R: His very outfit was designed to strike fear into the hearts of men!
TtC: Your poor father, having to tell Adam West what his own pansy son's name was...
R: Hey now.

TtC (on a roll): NEXT EXHIBIT! I present Exhibit B: an autographed copy of Bruce Campbell's autobiography, "If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B-Movie Actor."

EXHIBIT B: "If Chins Could Kill," by Bruce Campbell. Inside cover, in black Sharpie, it reads: "Hey Retro, Come get some. Bruce."

TtC: Now, as big a Batman fan as you are, you're also a big horror movie fan, right?
R: This is correct.
TtC: And the Evil Dead series was important in influencing your decision to go to film school, correct? Not to mention your passion for Mr. Campbell's television series... [checks notes]... "The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr."?
R: Spot-on. Very perceptive.
TtC: So you just couldn't pass up an opportunity to meet the star of those films, could you?
R: Absolutely not. I remember being very excited.
TtC: And how old were you when Mr. Campbell rolled through town on a signing tour?
R: I think... I don't recall... maybe nineteen? Twenty? Kinda fuzzy.
TtC (shouting): WHICH IS IT??
R (recoiling): Uhh... twenty. Ish.
TtC: But you didn't behave like a twenty-year-old, did you?
R: I don't really know what you're talking about. Could you be more specific in a way that doesn't outright embarass me?
TtC: No. We have a statement from a witness that was there in line next to you, which I will now read for the court:

Mr. Retropolitan was two people ahead of me in line for the signing, I think, and we'd been there a long time -- probably around four hours. Bruce Campbell is very popular! Lots of people. Anyway, we were waiting and waiting, and the closer we got to Bruce, the more and more purple Mr. Retropolitan's ears got. I swear, they started to look like eggplants. Then -- get this! -- when he finally got to sit down next to the King of B-Movies, he says "Hey, how ya doin'?" -- and then his face goes white. Ears were still red, though. Everyone else there actually chatted with Bruce for a minute, but that was all Mr. Retropolitan said. Awkward silence in the whole room, like what he wasn't saying was affecting everyone. Weird guy. Smelled like water.

R: So my ears get red. Happens to a lot of people.
TtC: But most people can still speak, regardless of the colors of their ears.
R: Hey, I'd been in line four hours, and I had every question I could think of --
TtC (interrupting): SILENCE! Moving on.

EXHIBIT C: A copy of "Profoundly Erotic," by the world's foremost living drive-in movie critic Joe Bob Briggs. In the inside cover, it reads: "To Retropolitan -- Pick out the most depraved act in this book, do it, and report back to me. Joe Bob."

TtC: You thought you were ready to talk to someone famous, didn't you?
R: Yes.
TtC: But you weren't, were you?
R (welling up): No.
TtC: Why don't you tell us about the conversation you had with him at the signing?
R: Well, after the discussion, we all lined up with our books, and then when we got to the table, he said 'hi' and whatnot, then asked where you were from.
TtC: And what happened after you told him where you were from?
R (tearing up): He started to talk about how he was recently in the area for an article he was writing about a boxer.
TtC: And you said...?
R: I... I said that I wasn't really familiar with boxing.
TtC: And then he tried to remember the name of the town that he had visited, to keep the conversation going, is that correct?
R: Yes. But, while I knew the region, my mind went completely blank on town names.
TtC: How about you fill us in on the rest of the conversation?
R: There...there wasn't anymore.
TtC: Do you know what the sound of horrifying awkward silence sounds like?
[R remains awkwardly silent]
TtC: Correct! I see you're VERY familiar with it! And what color were your ears?
R (crying and screaming): THEY WERE RED, OKAY? RED! REDREDRED!

TtC: I rest my case -- unless, of course, you want me to bring up the "Alec Baldwin" debacle? Or how about Martha Plimpton? Phylicia Rashad? Sam Waterston?
R (eyes red, face wet): Please, please... no.

CLOSING STATEMENT BY THE PROSECUTION: I think I've shown very clearly that the defendant has proven himself to be absolutely incapable of interacting with celebrities in any way that doesn't freak them out. Mr. Retropolitan, while doing nothing physically harmful, still manages to meet perfectly nice famous people and create awkward silences every single time. You'd think that, by his age, he'd have learned to talk to people, but no. He's nothing but the most awkward of fanboys, the kind of fan that celebrities become wary of, the kind that do nothing but smile at them uneasily. OR BURST INTO TEARS!

CLOSING STATEMENT BY THE DEFENSE: I was seven. Seven. It was Batman... [face turns red, bursts into tears] ...SEVEN!

-----

Court has decided in favor of the prosecution. The defendant shall hereforth no longer be allowed to talk to any celebrity, marginally famous person, anyone he admires greatly, or even anyone that's really pretty, just in case.

Once he stops crying, he is free to return home, so long as he does not come within ten yards of any of the aforementioned types of humans.

Profoundly Awesome

2006-02-09T22:09:00.000-05:00

Let pictures speak louder than words:

"To Retropolitan -
Pick out the most depraved act in this book, do it, and report back to me.

Joe Bob
2/9/06"

Pure. Awesome.

Y'hear that, Lady Retropolitan? We've received orders.

Extra special thanks to my pals Doug and Mary, who got me the book for Christmas.

Ripped

2006-02-09T15:24:00.000-05:00

I got my black overcoat two or so years ago, back when I first moved to New York City, and it's the only coat I own. That's why I was so dismayed last week to notice that not only were the buttons on the front loosening, they were actually tearing off whole chunks of the coat that they were sewn to. That was the second problem I had with the coat, coming months after the lining decided to strip itself and hang helplessly off the hem at the bottom like Lee Majors on "The Fall Guy." But, I still thought I could sew that up and stretch out the coat's life for a few more months.

Today, I noticed that I've worn holes in both elbows.

That's right, boys and girls: your host, The Retropolitan, looks like a hobo. The only thing missing from my wardrobe is a stick with a polka-dotted sheet full of clothes tied to the end of it. Next thing you know, I'll be asking Britney to give back my Porsche.

The Rapture of the Blog

2006-02-09T10:51:00.000-05:00

One day, everything will end.

Out of nowhere, the skies will open up, and the light of Heaven will shine down as Jesus sweeps up the faithful to their eternal reward in a moment that will stand remembered for all eternity. The true believers of the world will be carried away from their mortality in an instant, leaving behind an earth full suddenly-ended lives. Their kettles will scream unabated, the coffee in their mugs will go cold; also, their blogs will stop being updated. I have a feeling that the rapture has already come to the blogosphere, because I've been trolling through a lot of lapsed blogs.

Last Post from Harsh Reality:

November 23, 2004, "A Rock and a Hard Place"

Drinking wine...way too much wine...listening to tunes...knowing I'm about to go where I shouldn't...where I said I wouldn't...into unchartered territory that is so dangerous, yet so intoxicating and irresistable.

It's been so long...but not at all.

It's been so strange, but also comfortable.

Anxiety, curiosity, dread, hope, confidence, fear...so many things words can't describe.

Ohhhh, what to do. Caught between a rock and a hard place...

This one sounds like he's actually watching Jesus come down. He's even drinking Jesus' own blood, although it sounds like he's had too much of the magic plasma. So, it's really a toss-up: taken home by divine will, or had too much to drink and hit his head on the table, to have his body found weeks later after the rent went unpaid for the standard 45 days of unresponsiveness? Or, for the long shot, stolen by Satan for abusing the ellipsis?

Last post from Confessions of a Coffeeholic:
September 5, 2004, Untitled

It's been awhile, but I'm back and ready to post. With the elections, Hurricane Frances, NYC protests, and such, there's much to write about....

Poor woman never knew what hit her. She was so, so excited to get back to blogging, to fill her online journal with amusing stories about recent life changes -- but all she saw was a flash of lightning, and the roar of God's hand tearing open the sky to pull her towards His ever-loving embrace. Also possible: actually was a coffeeholic, and was the center of an intervention that led her into a rehab clinic. Unfortunately, the rehab clinic offered free coffee and she never fully recovered. It could really go either way.

Last post from Amethyst Muse:

September 5, 2005, "Test"

Test of the blogger for word capabilities.

Sometimes, the Lord takes them way, waaaay before their prime. Maybe He was getting a little jumpy. At any rate, Amethyst Muse knew one thing before she was whisked off to her new kingdom: yes, Blogger for Word did, in fact, work. It's good to go out on a high note.

Last post from the Atheist Historian:

From August 5, 2004, "Get smart: boost your brain through machines"

AI is Artificial Intelligence. Or, as in this case, Amplified Intelligence. Sign in to see full entry.

This one's kind of a shocker, because of the out-and-out rejection of God and all, but it just goes to show you that you never can tell what Jesus is up to. Who says the Christ doesn't like to mix it up a little bit? Perhaps they just needed a pool boy. I happened to sign in to read the full post, and it went something like this:

OMG so I totally put on the brain-probe's suction cups, and suddenly liek I can do all this math. I'm tearing through algebra now guyz!!!!!!!!! Although, on the other hand, it's starting to tingle... as if the cosmos were creating a swirling vortex of unimaginable, nigh-unperceivable rifts floating along the edges of my synaptic pathways. There seems to be something beyond this world; this device has given me a sight beyond vision, beyond what any mortal has ever experienced! My pulse is racing! I have become

---

Hey, look, the Pope.

Weird, huh? Well, mysterious ways and all that. Maybe there IS something to all this "god chatter" I keep hearing. For the time being, though, it looks like I'm stuck here on earth with you guys.

At least I have my blog to keep me occup

Wang Chung

2006-02-09T09:04:00.000-05:00

A brief post to think about this morning before I finish my other post:

Wang Chung used to be called "Huang Chung," until they signed with Geffen Records in 1982.

A little later on, they released "Everybody Have Fun Tonight" and "Let's Go," earning them a permanent place in my heart. Also: the guy from Wang Chung looks a lot like a pissed-off Sting.

This post was sponsored by the Creative Labs Jukebox Zen Xtra MP3 player's "Shuffle" button.

Fedora Tilt

2006-02-08T19:24:00.000-05:00

A special tip of the hat goes to the Vodkapundit, for vodkalanching the site by linking it in one of his posts. I normally get around a hundred or so unique hits a day, and today (as of this writing) I'm somewhere around six-hundred fifty unique visitors with no signs of slowing. In practical terms, this means that I'll probably have around... uh... one new regular reader from now on. They come for the Vodkapundit, but statistically speaking they don't stay for the doofy Doc Savage jokes. People are fickle. In fact, this is also an announcement that the tone of this blog is going to change in order to bring in a new audience.

Special preview of tomorrow's posts:

1. "Boobs, and Why They're Neat" (with pictures)
2. "Celebrity mistakes, and the breasts they make them with" (with pictures)
3. "Federline Nearly Kills Family With Song" (with gratuitous Popozao)

Tune in tomorrow for the hi-res celebrity candids, right here at Tales of Celebrity Gossip!

The Man of Bronze

2006-02-08T08:08:00.000-05:00

Adventurer. Crime-fighter. Scientific genius.

After last night's dinner, I realized that these were all accurate descriptions of my hair, because I have basically the same haircut as Doc Savage, Man of Bronze. Minus the widow's peak, though:

You heard it here first: TERROR WEARS NO SHOES!

I do resemble Doc Savage in at least five or six ways other than hairstyle, including having a tendency to wear holes in my shirts and frequently staring off into the distance while standing on a background of flames. And our enemies usually end up conveniently being killed off by curious twists of their own egomaniacal failings. In my case, some would say too conveniently. Those people usually end up being conveniently killed off too. One of life's mysteries, I suppose.

It's a handy haircut to have, as I learned this morning on the way to work when I defeated the Crimson Rogue and ended his plot to take the entire New York transit system hostage. I tell ya, that Crimson Rogue is always coming up with new ways to cause havoc, death rays and whatnot, but he never seems to get it that I always defeat his plots by punching one of his ratzi thugs and having him fall into the path of the sinister machine, thereby causing it to explode before it can do any real harm (and also absolving me of manslaughter charges). My point is: not a single hair out of place! I just stapled my shirt back together, and I was ready to get back to the office!

My only wish is that they'd stop making me tear my shirts to shreds so much. I'm like, "Dude -- it's February. Can't you wait until, like, July?" My chilly nipples are kind of embarassing when they're exposed in 38-degree weather, but luckily everyone that's ever said anything has happened to have curious egomaniacal failings. Painful ones.

No, Mine's Bigger

2006-02-07T09:21:00.000-05:00

You know, I always thought that the Middle East and the West would end up having some kind of pissing contest, but I always figured it would be about nuclear weapons, not cartoons.

Next up: anti-semitic rock/paper/scissors!

Hair

2006-02-07T08:25:00.000-05:00

I like having short hair, but I think Billy Zane has me beat.

THE PHANTOM

I'm always happy when I get a decent haircut, since going to the barber is one of those regular occurrences in my life that without fail gets me nervous each and every time. I just don't like going to get my hair cut. That's why I resist going until I've got my Billy Ray Cyrus-Farrah Fawcett look emerging, and the kids on the bus start to make fun of me, calling me cruel names like "Hillbilly Jerkwad" and "Backwater Person of Questionable Intent."

At first, I thought it was just the idea of a stranger playing with sharpened blades near my ears while I'm all but strapped into a chair, but I seem to be okay with that part. (Who wants to analyze that part of my psyche? Anyone?) The real problem, I think, is that the only haircut lingo I know is "shorter." You can't go longer once it's been done, so that option's out, and I have absolutely no idea how to describe anything else I might want done to my hair. Whenever the barber asks me what I want, my best guess is "well, whatever you think will be okay." I get the impression that my barber thinks I'm French.

I suppose that I could try naming actors that have hair that I like, but I don't think the elderly Russian guy holding the snippers watches the same flicks I do. (One might look at this as an opportunity to expand my film viewing to include popular Russian cinema, so when he asks what I want, I can just say "gimme that hip, Sergei Bodrov look" and then we can share a knowing glance.) Actually, I'm still not even sure if he speaks the same language I do, or is just going with phonetic pronunciations in order to trick me into thinking that he's listening to me. I find that happens a lot in New York, sometimes with my girlfriend.

Anyway, the Russian man gave me a good haircut last night. I just kept saying "shorter" until his expression changed. That's usually a good indicator that the haircut is coming to an end.

Happy Monday

2006-02-06T19:31:00.000-05:00

You know how to make a Monday night great?

1. The previous Saturday morning, clean your place from top to bottom.

2. Right after you clean, leave for your significant other's apartment until Monday night.

3. Forget that you've cleaned at all.

4. Come home and be pleasantly surprised.

Seriously, now.

I actually got a good haircut on the way home from work today, and when I opened my door I was extreeeeemely surprised to find my place spotless. I feel like new.

Terrors of the Night

2006-02-06T08:21:00.000-05:00

The moon's bright silver light fell from the sky, splashing into the heavy fog and creating a soft, blue-grey haze that settled just above the forest floor. The night was still, and the slight breeze that ran through the branches and stirred the leaves was only a brief visitor. The smallest animals and the tiniest insects were only making slight sounds, but together they formed a muted chorus in the glow of the moon.

A branch on the forest floor snapped.

The dried wood was broken cleanly in two by the heel of a woman's boot, and the pieces sent little puffs of mist off in either direction in small eddies and swirls. The boot didn't move, not forward, not at all; it froze as if the cool air of the night had turned it to ice. The hem of the woman's cloak dropped to the ground, and her knee touched lightly on the dirt. She pushed a stray lock of blonde hair behind her ear, and left her hand cupped behind it for a second. She heard:

Nothing.

Nothing at all; not a bird, nor cricket, nor breeze, as if the snap of the twig had scared the night into utter silence. Her nostrils flared, and she slowly took her weight off of her knee, sliding it to her other heel. She put her fingertips on the ground in front of her, and pushed against it to help her stand, her cloak sliding across the ground as it lifted back to her ankles. She waited. She listened.

Nothing but her heart, pounding furiously in her chest.

She knew it was near.

She drew the cloak tightly around her, for warmth as well as camoflage. She took one tentative step forward, carefully and slowly, trying to see if she could rest her weight on the bed of scattered sticks without causing too many sounds to escape into the forest. Her foot rolled slightly, crackling a twig, muting it by pushing it further into the damp soil. She drew her other foot forward, and began making slow, careful strides through the haze. She was moving swiftly for her care, pivoting carefully around larger fallings of leaves and twigs, gliding down a corridor of moonlit trees -- and then she stopped, abruptly, her cloak wrapping around her with the momentum.

A dark shape was in front of her, rising slowly from its perch behind a gathering of trees, taking form out of the fog. It howled.

The girl spun, her cloak swishing in the air. Her legs hit the ground with softened thuds, the beat of her steps picking up in tempo as a choir of four paws entered the chase. She ran the through forest, dodging trees as well as she could, some branches still slapping her like knives as she darted through them. The scent of her blood only caused the beast behind her to hurry faster. At last, she came to a small clearing, where she could fly through without worry for shadow-hidden rocks and obstacles. Still, as cautious as she was, her leg twisted and she fell ungracefully in the middle of the moonlit patch of woods.

The beast drew up in front of her, shifting its weight to its two hairy hind legs, extending the claws on its massive front paws -- paws with thumbs, she noted. Its face was that of a man, but embellished with the features of a wolf: snout, fangs, and covered in a fine, brown fur. It smiled.

The girl smiled also. She tossed the edge of her cloak to her side, and the beast followed a sudden glare of moonlight back to the revolver she was holding in her hand.

"Silver," she said, tugging the trigger backwards.

Thunder boomed, and the beast caught the bullet in the shoulder, quickly throwing a paw up to his wound before dropping to his knees.

"Silver? Seriously?" the beast cried out. "Jesus Christ, lady, what do you think I am, some kind of magical werewolf? Fucking ouch."

The girl gasped.

"Well, aren't you?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm a werewolf and my sister is the tooth fairy. Haven't you ever heard of a human-animal hybrid? The most dangerous scientific abomination that the world has ever known?"

"Well, no," she replied. "I just thought that..."

"Well, we used to be a nice, fun-loving gang of scientific experiments meant to help the human race understand and treat diseases, but now that we've been outlawed by executive order, everything's changed. It's real tough to get work these days, so we have to kill for food. I apologize in advance."

"Oh, that must explain the old saying: when human-animal hybrids are outlawed, only mad outlaws will create human-animal hybrids."

"Yeah, and then we added: 'and kill humans for food.' It's unfortunate but true," the Wolf-Man growled, raising his index finger as if to make a point.

He rolled onto his back, getting his garage-attendant's uniform slightly damp from a patch of moss. Still holding his wound tightly, he arched his neck and howled, the scream echoing slightly off the trees around them. A few seconds of silence were followed by a small crunching of leaves off to the side of a clearing. The girl pulled her cloak closer, wincing at the pain in her ankle from when she dropped to the ground. She kept her hand on the revolver.

Out of the darkened cluster of trees emerged a thin, spindly leg -- covered in scales. It was hard to see in the fog and darkness, but it almost looked green in color. The leg was covered in part by tattered denim pants, which were worn by what looked like a scaly man with a crocodile's head.

"Woah, woah woah, Alligator Dan -- I asked you to bring gauze. I don't see any gauze in your hands," the Wolf Man complained.

"Dude, let's get this straight for the last time: I am half alligator, half man. I do not understand wolf-speak. I don't even understand alligator-speak. My mad scientist was not big on the linguistics, so next time you want gauze, you yell for gauze IN ENGLISH," Alligator Dan shouted.

The girl discreetly aimed her gun towards the new visitor.

"Hey, you didn't tell me we were having a snack," Dan continued, noticing the girl. He traipsed out into the clearing and put his scaly palms on his hips. "Man, I wish we hadn't been outlawed. Human flesh is kind of gamey. At least at the lab we had KFC Fridays. And, you know, helped to discover major breakthroughs in preventing diseases." He let out a long, mournful sigh under his breath as he reminisced.

The wolf-man growled quietly, running his tongue across one of his chipped fangs. He looked at the girl, who was becoming more and more frightened of these horrible, horrible freaks of science gone awry. She fingered the trigger, and tried to play out an escape scenario in her head while the wolf-man eyed her warily. She noticed his eyes move past her to something behind her, but she was too afraid to turn and look. The girl began to tremble, and thanked her all-mighty and non-abomination-creating God that she had survived this long. Her silent prayer was interrupted by a new visitor:

ATOMO, clone-beast from Ventura, CA!

"Duuude, you look like hell," Alligator Dan announced.

It was true. Atomo did look like the scientific nightmare that he was: the cloning of human-rhinocerous hybrid, bred from a test tube and assaulted with radiation in order to understand its effects on the human body. He was a large, muscular man-ocerous, human in every way except for the deep grey shade of his tough hide and the large horn protruding from where a human's nose would be. He snorted as he stepped into the blue lake of moonlight, sending mist swirling about his face.

"What do you expect, Dan? I'm only a direct result of the slippery-slope result of basic biological testing," he grunted in a voice that could only come from a man-ocerous.

"Know who else looks like hell?" Dan asked. "Your eight-thousand perfect clones!" Dan slapped his scaly palm against his thigh, and laughed. Dan's laugh was more like a hiss, since he was only half-human.

"I swear, Alligator Dan," the Wolf-Man interjected, "your sense of humor got the short end of the nuclear hybridization process. I know man-rodents that make better jokes than you. And they were specifically bred without senses of humor."

The girl decided to make her move. She tried to puff out her cloak as far as possible to mask the slow, careful movements that were putting her back into a crouched position. It was hell on her ankle, but she needed to get away from these freaks -- and fast. There was no telling how many human-animal hybrids were lurking about in these forests.

Atomo walked slowly over to where Wolf-Man was sitting, and crouched next to him to see how bad the gunshot wound was. Alligator Dan, already losing interest in the conversation, stared off into the distance, perhaps thinking about KFC Fridays past. The girl knew this was her moment: the two sitting, and one lost in thought. If there was ever going to be a time to run, it was now.

She lept from her position, landing on her good ankle, and ran off amidst the trees. Her short strides let her swing her good ankle around faster and with less weight, and she was pleased by the quick ground she was taking. She could hear the trio behind her but sensed that with the manocerous' slow speed, the wolf-man's wound, and the alligator-man's ennui, she could easily outrun them. It was unfortunate that she never saw the half-monkey, half-manatee manakey swing its long-whiskered tail down from the treetop. Her last thought before she was devoured was:

"If only these terrible, terrible freaks could have been harnessed for the good of all mankind, perhaps for some non-humanity-threatening scientific purposes like cancer research, or learning more about the way that our genetic codes create common defects in our bodies. I wish we lived in a world in which the process of scientific investigation wasn't warped and abused by godless lunatics bent on ruling the world with sci-fi clone armies of half-men. And oh, the irony that I meet my most final fate at the hands of not a half-man/half-animal outlawed hybrid beast, but rather by a half-animal/half-animal creature only slightly more ethically dubious than the half-donkey/half-horse creation commonly called the mule."

The manakey was very small and had no sharp teeth to speak of, which was why she had so much thinking time before it killed and ate her.

Greatest Hits

2006-02-04T08:40:00.000-05:00

Twenty-five thousand hits must be some kind of landmark, right? Thanks for stopping by and for coming back.

Now stop loitering.

It's the weekend, for chrissake! Go out! See friends! Turn off the computer!

Don't you people read books?

.... ........ ............... ................ ....................... ..........................................

2006-02-03T14:44:00.000-05:00

4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
4 8 15 16 23 42
Tsk, tsk, tsk Ms. Rodriguez! Getting kicked off the show for unruly behavior! Now you'll never know what the hell these numbers mean.

Channeling

2006-02-03T11:04:00.000-05:00

I watched my brand-new DVD of Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle last night, and hoped to channel the energy, wit and style of Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley into today's post.

But that didn't really happen.

I've written three posts this morning, each one sucking slightly more than the one before it, causing a suck-vortex in Blogger that made a coworker ask what that sucking noise was. After I turned off my 'special machine' I explained:

The first post was called "Super-powers that I could gain, and ways that I could totally waste them." It sounded like a comedy goldmine! In the end it reverted to suckitude after I couldn't think of anything funny to do with being able to shoot lightning bolts from my fingertips that didn't involve charging electronic devices. Eventually I got hung up on whether Green Arrow actually had "Super-Aim" as a power, and whether or not being stuck with a lethal weapon AND a moral code that prevents you from using it lethally was funny. (It is, but only sometimes. Grenade-Man had it worse.)

Then, I took it another way, and tried to write about what the Justice League would do if they were real people. This one got off to a good start, because I had Superman doing a Tony Robbins bit and singing "Simply the Best" at Republican conventions for people with low self-esteem, talking about his childhood as an orphan on a farm and how he made it big on "strong moral values." Then I brought it around to Aquaman, but that totally derailed it because I didn't want to jump on the anti-Aquaman bandwagon, so half of the post became a non-amphibian shame piece about our treatment of Atlantis. Plus, he has a hook for a hand, and I don't like making fun of handicapable people.

Finally, I tried writing a post about how Jerry Orbach would have made a good Batman. I typed "You know who'd make a good Batman?" and then the sucking sound started again, so I just tapped delete until it stopped.

Oh well. They can't all be gems, right?

That's when I decided to not post anything at all today.

OMG YOU GUYS BRITNEY IS PREGNANT AGAIN

2006-02-02T14:36:00.000-05:00

According to Yahoo! News, Britney Spears and her pool boy Kevin Federline are once again prepared to spawn. Unfortunately, this came a day too late after President Bush's declared stand against human/animal hybrids.

That concludes today's "Maxwell House Easy Joke Hour." Please tune in again tomorrow on this station.

Not yet Friday

2006-02-02T10:19:00.000-05:00

After all the complaining I did to people about being exhausted yesterday, I crawled into bed at about nine o'clock, and then stared at the ceiling until about midnight, wide awake. The good news is: the ceiling looks very strong, and will probably continue to prevent the upstairs apartment from crashing down onto the Lady and I for some years to come. Beams, man.

Anyway, I'm again tired, and my weak little mind is too scattered to focus on writing a thrilling radio-gram adventure this morning. Instead, you should tell me a joke or something. In real conversation, I'm notoriously terrible at telling jokes, so I could use some guidance. The only joke I know involves poultry and a street, and that doesn't seem to encourage the whole "people liking me" thing at parties. (Not counting that one 'nitrous party' I went to, but I get the feeling that those guys would laugh at anything. With the exception of the awkward silence that came with the arrival of Carrot Top.)

So tell 'em if you got 'em.

If not, just silently celebrate the industrious craftsmen that build ceilings.

Someone Needs To Buy This For Me

2006-02-01T08:27:00.000-05:00

I know that I didn't get anything for most of you on your birthdays, but with mine coming up in so soon in November, I'd really appreciate it if you buy this ROCKETEER HELMET TELEPHONE for me. Sure, I realize that I don't even have a telephone line set up in my apartment, but that's primarily because I just couldn't find the correct helmet-shaped telephone until right now. The pith-phone just didn't work with my decor.

Just imagine! If I had this telephone, I could gossip about screen stars with all of my closest friends, AND have amazing aerial battles with Nazi zeppelins at the same time! I suppose I could do that with only my cell phone and jetpack, but I think you know as well as I do how dangerous that is without the proper fin on my ~~head~~ phone. I'd be liable to lose control and fly out of range of my Verizon service, and I'd never get to hear about the on-screen antics of Errol Flynn!

I'm pleading with you: buy me this phone. There are only FIFTEEN in existence, and I must have one of them.

Listening to our language crumble

2006-01-31T07:16:00.000-05:00

I've mentioned a bunch of times that I'm a big fan of the Rhapsody music service (and I'm still not getting money from them to say that), but back before I had Rhapsody I was using the similarly subscription-based Napster. Years before that, I was using the not-quite-totally-legal version of Napster, where the monthly subscription rate was "lots of hard drive space." Like most people, I loved Napster and those services for all the free music that they got me.

Looking back over my mp3 playlists, I now realize what Napster was really doing to us all.

It wasn't just making us media-needy, morally-challenged audio thieves, creating our ethical identities as artist-abusing lawbreakers; it was also destroying our language. Instant Messenger-speak can barely hold a candle to the atrocities committed in the name of mp3-labeling.

I was making a playlist this morning on the train ride to work, and scrolling through the bajillions of songs that I have looking for a particular Flaming Lips song that I hadn't heard in a long time. I've listened to it before on my mp3 player -- and I've had it in one form or another on my computer for years -- but I couldn't find the damned file. I checked under "F" for "Flaming." No dice. I checked "L" for "Lips," just in case, and then of course "T" for "The." Nothing. I checked under the song title, the album name, and then I went through the "Unknown Artist" category in case it was never labeled at all -- nope!

And then, I found it:

"The_Falamming_Lips_12_Tanjerines.mp3"

But that's not all! I also listened to Phill Colins, the Beesty Boys, and the Pixxies. And Kajagoogoo, which ironically was spelled correctly, but statistically speaking should not have been.

It almost makes me wish I could track down those users that labeled about 90% of the illegal mp3s in the world and levy fines against their spelling.

EDIT: Andy would understand.

Don't Stop

2006-01-30T16:00:00.000-05:00

Who else here has "Don't Stop Believing" by Journey stuck in their head? Anyone?

How about now that I've brought it up?

There we go.

Weeeeeekend

2006-01-30T07:58:00.000-05:00

On Saturday night, I made a quick shopping trip to the local pharmacy.

I bought:

And:

So how was your weekend?

UPDATE: It's funny to think that at one point I had intended to use this blog to elevate the discourse. Oh, well. As Mel Brooks might say, I try to "rise below vulgarity."

What luck!

2006-01-29T19:07:00.000-05:00

You know, somedays I just can't believe that I found a photograph of the Pope in a sombrero. Maybe there is a God.

Well, probably not. But that doesn't make it any less awesome. Perhaps, more awesome.

Now, back to my "pope AND toga" search.

I Am Wrong

2006-01-27T08:55:00.000-05:00

Every morning I go through my routine.

At 5:30 am (EST), my beautiful faux-antique digital alarm clock/radio starts beeping, and I quickly unfurl my red blanket sarcophogus and in my jammies march over to my desk. I say "march" instead of "stumble" (as I'm sure most people do at 5:30 in the morning), because I'm a morning person and I wake up more or less without difficulty. Once in a while I step on the cat, but I blame that more on the cat than on my being sleepy. Besides, it shuts her up.

(I'm just kidding about that. I would never intentionally step on my cat just because she's meowing. There are plenty of better ways to quiet the kitten than stepping on her. Marijuana, for instance.)

After turning off the alarm, I flick on the desk lamp, yawn, stretch, and then walk over to the bathroom to pee -- again, pretty much following the same exact path that most people do, with the exception that I drink so much coffee and booze that my urine is universal orange like roadsigns and traffic cones and emergency lights. I don't think it's a coincidence that there have been (to date) zero fatal accidents in my bathroom since I moved in. There was one incident where the Lady attempted to kill me in there, but then I explained that all men do it and ran away before she could hit me.

After that, I walk on over to the kitchen, turn on the stove under my neat-looking tea kettle, and boil myself some water for coffee. I drink instant coffee, since I inherited the capacity to withstand cutting bitterness and acidity from a childhood living outside of Buffalo. A lot of my friends try to convince me to get a coffee machine, but I usually only finish half a cup before I leave for work, so it probably wouldn't be worth it. I like that I can make the instant coffee as strong or as weak as I like, which is easier to control than with a Mr. Coffee. Also, I like a little formality in the morning, and while Mr. Coffee is nice, I read a lot of reviews on Amazon that mentioned that after a few mornings together he gets all "Oh, please -- call me Jeremy Coffee." I don't care for that.

See? So far my morning was pretty much like everyone else's, but with more red and probably more antiques. And I'm taller than about 95% of the world, so my jammies are a larger size. But basically a perfectly average morning.

Until I zoned out today. Something in my brain turned off (click!) right before I took the kettle off of the heat, probably due to seeing the mess that I'd left in the kitchen from the night before. (Living alone is great for leaving messes overnight. Hoo-boy, is it ever! If you have a messy kitchen counter fetish, I recommend living alone. Please.) Last night I'd made myself a bunch of hot dogs for dinner, and in my hungry zeal I left out the buns and the ketchup and the cutting board for the onion that I like to put on my hot dogs from time to time. So, as I looked over the countertop, it occurred to me like a self-evident truth: it's time to make hot dogs.

So I did. I opened the fridge, grabbed the hot dogs, and started to broil them in my toaster oven. Then I yawned, and wondered why I was tired. It was like I warped my brain back to six-thirty last night, when I was happy to be home from work and famished. Luckily, my tea kettle started screaming, which reminded me that I was actually supposed to be making my morning coffee, not dinner. But since the hot dogs were already achieving a nice crispy skin, I had a nice big breakfast. One with ketchup and mustard, one with ketchup and relish, and one with ketchup and onions. I suppose I could've packed them up and taken them for lunch, but my stomach hadn't snapped out of 'dinner' time, so I ate them.

I am wrong in many ways, but today's reason I am wrong is that I made hot dogs for breakfast.

Spidey, Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me?

2006-01-26T09:06:00.000-05:00

The new Spider-Man costume:

My response:

No.

EDIT: In hindsight, it is slightly better than the "new" costume that DC gave Superman a few years ago, before caving into the hysterical ravings of an upset fanbase and sending Supes back to his old tights:

Or, for that matter, better than the "New Pope" thing that was going around before:

I, for one, was a huge fan of "The Big Hat" like everyone else. The sombrero just made him look short, and quite frankly impeded his crime-fighting ways.

Most Recent Thing That Made Me Laugh Out Loud

2006-01-25T13:06:00.000-05:00

From over at Zombie Eat Brains, written by Zombie_Tom:

From the April 12th post, entitled "Brains":

Sometimes I think, maybe I think about brains too much.

But then I think: brains.

From the April 30th post, entitled "Brains":

I have a joke:

Knock knock.

Who's there?

Brains.

Brains who OH GOOD LORD PLEASE STOP EATING MY BRAINS AIIEEE BLARGLE GASP.

It's funnier in person.

From the November 8th post, entitled "Brains":

Today I got so mad at my boss, I wanted to eat his brains. So I did. Then I remembered I don't have a job. Man, they are never letting me back into that library again.

Mad genius, I tell you. Now I'm hungry.

Good thinking, Shadow!

2006-01-25T08:17:00.000-05:00

From a Shadow radio broadcast:

The Shadow:
I found that the most expensive cars have disappeared from the most unlikely places...

Margo Lane:
Where's that?

The Shadow:
...garages, in front of homes, in parking lots...

Is it any surprise we won WWII with that kind of brainpower on our side?

Later on in the episode, The Shadow deduces that money is being taken from the strangest places, like banks... safes... wallets...

New York City Cops

2006-01-25T07:48:00.000-05:00

Here's a helpful tip for all of my New Yorker brethren that commute to work via the subway:

If you accidentally make eye contact with one of the 'random search' cops, and then quickly look away as if he didn't exist and that awkward moment never happened, they will search your bag.

This has been a helpful New York City subway tip from your friend, The Retropolitan -- helping keep your knapsacks terror-free since 2006.

Prayer

2006-01-23T20:06:00.000-05:00

This is going to sound way off my normal vibe, but I'm actually posting to ask for... your prayers.

My friend Erica's mother is very ill in the ICU at the moment, with a collapsed lung and awaiting a transplant; the situation is quite dire, and the outlook is not very good from all I can gather. They are a staunch Catholic family, and have sent out a call for prayers for her survival and recovery. Despite what I (and many of the readers here) think about God and the efficacy of prayers, I know that some of you do hold that belief, and I know that it would be a great comfort to them to know that many people are thinking of them in this unfortunate and frightening time. If you do pray, if you do believe, please send some hope in their direction.

Art Project Diary 1: Retro Keyboard

2006-01-23T07:57:00.000-05:00

In the spirit of the greatest artists in the history of mankind, I'm embarking on a quest so deeply philosophical and groundbreaking that I probably won't survive it, and if I do I might be horribly disfigured or bored. I've had this idea skimming across the of synapses in my brain for quite some time now, and I'm happy to report that I've finally officially launched.

I am modifying my keyboard.

My computer keyboard, not the Casio that I learned to play the easier half of "Heart and Soul" on with my dad in one of those endearing Lifetime Channel moments when I was nine.

I scavenged for a long time before finding some of the necessary parts and I managed to come home from my post-Christmas vacation with a bagful of 1930s/40s typewriter keys and assorted parts, which I need to make my Ultimate Retro Computer Typewriter Keyboard, codenamed: Keypad X1. It's codenamed that because it's a big secret that I don't want anyone to know about, except you guys. Let's just keep it between us, okay?

Here's the plan.

I'm crossing this:

With this:

And we'll see what happens. It will probably end up looking something like this:

Unfortunately, combining the two is much more difficult than simply strapping them to a table and slathering them with mutagenic goo, but there's not really a reason to rush the project. I'm trying to do this one correctly, because I plan on being able to use it and I need it to hold up to the daily wear and tear that comes with being The Retropolitan's keyboard. That's a lot of daily wear and tear, because I spend a lot of time bashing it with my fists in frustration when joke after joke falls flat. I've hit the keyboard two, three times in the last forty-five seconds alone.

I did some light reading on computer modding over the past few months, and I think I've got a fairly decent outline for what I'm going to do. It involves a lot of enamel, followed by serious spraying with silver and brass chrome. (In case you're curious, chrome enamel is a bad choice to "huff" if you're looking to get high, unless you really like Iron Man.) I've been slowly picking up the supplies for the past couple of months, and spent about three hours prying keys off of a giant-sized antique Royal typewriter that my father found at work.

I hated to break apart an antique in such a nice condition, but orders from above indicated that either I was taking it home with me, or it was destined for the dump the next day. Since the typewriter was an unwieldy fifty-pound beast (I had to have help to move it the twenty feet from the garage to the kitchen floor), I got out some tools and broke it down as best I could. That ended up involving several ninja death kicks to the carriage because even after three hours with help from both of my parents, we couldn't even find what was holding it on. (My best guess is "magical incantation".) I weep a little bit every time I think about it, since dearie me that thing was in exquisite condition for being seventy-odd years old. The Royal Typewriter Co. really knew what they were doing, but nothing can withstand the unbridled MIGHT of my ninja death kick.

(In fact, the Royal typewriter photo above is, as far as I can tell, close to the same model as the one I had. The only visible difference is that mine had a special carriage that was about two to three times longer that the one in the photograph. My typewriter was very well-endowed.)

I began the prep work last month when I took apart an old keyboard I had lying around from when I spilled an extra-large Dunkin Donuts Hazelnut coffee all over my computer, and needed to buy an emergency extra keyboard since my semaphore skills were rusty. Later on I got a new computer with a better (i.e. cleaner) keyboard, so I stuffed the replacement into a closet until I could come up with a suitable arts and crafts project for it. (I'll let you ponder what I mean by "cleaner".) To my surprise, the inside of a computer keyboard looks like a Tron background topped with eighty suction cups. Now you know what to say when someone casually muses, "I wonder what my keyboard looks like inside". Your friends will think you're a genius.

In conclusion: I broke apart my keyboard into its component bits last night, and hopefully I'll be able to work on it some more this week, or perhaps this coming weekend. We shall see what the future holds for the X1.

Friday, FRIDAY!

2006-01-20T12:29:00.000-05:00

It's almost the weekend! I don't really feel like a new post, since I already wrote a thousand-word review this morning, so I'm going to go back to the old blogger's standby post:

The list.

Here we go:

THINGS THAT WOULD HAVE MADE PUBERTY, LIKE, A TON BETTER:

1. Awkward sexual desires consolidated into handy step-by-step manual, with photos. Oh, so many photos. Laminated.

2. Emergence of super-powers.

3. No shirts versus skins day in gym class.

4. Free "The Smiths" albums for everyone!

5. Lock on bedroom door.

6. Lock on bathroom door.

7. Wardrobe made out of unstable molecular mesh that grew with me when I went from 4'10" to 6'4" in six months.

8. Mandatory audition for "Beauty and the Geek".

9. The iPod.

10. Whatever equipment Gary and Wyatt had in Weird Science.

Feel free to add your own.

New Review

2006-01-20T11:02:00.000-05:00

Because it's Friday and I can do whatever I want, I submit my review of Marvel's latest entry into the overhyped sci-fi action genre, the Fantastic Four. Find out what I thought riiiiight over HERE.

Plus, there are pretty pictures for those of you who can't or won't read. You won't be able to find out what I thought of the movie that way, but at least you can ogle Jessica Alba.

OBJECTIFIERS!

For the Weak

2006-01-19T09:32:00.000-05:00

Sweet Jeebus, I'm exhausted. I'm usually a little sleepy, but today I'm actually doing the sleep aerobic neck exercise of down, down, down, jerk head back up, down, down, down, up. I may not last through the next hour, but at least I'll pass out on my desk with a toned neck.

I had a passing dream a few minutes ago where I had gills like Kevin Costner in Waterworld, except mine were actually USB ports. Weird, huh? No word on whether they were 2.0 or lower.

Back to the struggle.

*thud*

Remember WENN

2006-01-19T08:36:00.000-05:00

I never saw this show, but it seems like it would have been right up my alley -- it was a series on AMC about a 1930s radio station in Pittsburgh.

Doug Thompson:

Wow, Betty, I don't know how often I'm likely to find you running down the hall after me! It's sort of, you know, The Dream!

Betty Roberts:

Oh, well, Doug, I need to ask you something. In private.

Doug Thompson:

Son of The Dream!

Dear Keira Knightley

2006-01-18T07:34:00.000-05:00

Dear Keira Knightley:

You are one of the most beautiful young women in the entire world, and are one of Hollywood's leading starlets. You're poised on the brink of breakthrough mainstream American success with your Golden Globe-nominated performance in Pride and Prejudice, and the two upcoming sequels to Pirates of the Caribbean. I understand that being young, rich, beautiful, and successful brings its fair share of hardships and annoyances (I know better than most), but I hope you'll take the time to honor one simple, little request from a fan:

Stop doing that thing with your lips.

Seriously. You have one of the most perfectly-evolved faces in the history of all of mankind, with each feature exquisitely-shaped and working together to create a harmonious ideal that would have made the Greek philosophers cry. I can barely express how stunning you are, right up until I see that you're still doing that thing with your lips.

I've seen many photos of you -- it's hard not to, these days -- and in nearly every photograph where you're aware of the camera, you look like you're trying to suck down an extra thick vanilla milkshake from Baskin-Robbins. You pucker your lips constantly, perhaps thinking that it adds some kind of model-like posed quality to your pictures. At first, I just thought that you were whistling.

It wasn't until much later, at the Globes the other night, that I realized you do it all the time. Constantly. I struggled to find a photo of you when you didn't look like you were searching for an inconspicuous place to spit out your tobacco, or maybe had taken a bite of too-hot food and were trying to quickly air-cool it enough to chew on it. It is not a fetching look, but maybe I just have a thing for incredibly beautiful women whose lips occasionally meet. We all have our fetishes, I guess.

For the sake of comparison, here's a photograph of Momma Fratelli from The Goonies:

Now there's a lady who knows how to hold her lips with class, poise, and elegance, if you can get past the guttural huskiness of her voice. You might do well to examine for a moment the amazing effect Ms. Ramsey is able to achieve just by not parting her lips like she's making a sympathetic "Oooooooh..." noise while watching someone else get hurt.

Your concerned fan,

The Retropolitan

I Have Seen The Light

2006-01-17T08:34:00.000-05:00

It has been a truly remarkable morning, for I have been confronted with CERTAIN evidence of the hereafter that shall change my life forever. I may not have been one of those people that saw Jesus or the Virgin Mary in the oil stain, or the clipboard, or the plank of wood... or the piece of toast... or the window smudge... or even a church for that matter, but all that has changed since I spilled my coffee moments ago, and looked downward:

COFFEE JESUS

I clearly felt a tingle shoot down my spine, and the longer I spent staring at Jesus the more hyper and awake I become. Also, my daily pre-coffee headache disappeared in what was surely a display of celestial healing powers. It's not everyday that a humble man runs head-on into signs from Heaven, especially not signs that smell this good. I'll have to thank the Yemeni guy that percolated God for me this morning.

BEHOLD!

What have I done to deserve such a calling? In this photo, He looks like he's weeping a little bit, although part of me suspects that the "tear" is saliva from my cussing outburst after I whacked my coffee cup with my elbow, so I don't think it counts. If you take away the teardrop, I think He looks generally happy. Possibly bemused. Hard to tell -- maybe he's doing some sort of math in his head, counting sinners or something. I'm not one to divine the thoughts of others.

THE NEW GRAIL

Okay, maybe "The New Grail" is giving it too much credit -- it's just a vessel for the Hand of God, although it's pretty sturdy for a disposable coffee cup and only costs $1.25 filled with regular coffee and two sugars and THE POWER OF THE LORD. In case you're curious, I don't normally drink coffee with a straw, but I needed one to ~~draw in the details~~ stir in the sugar.

I was going to get a medium cup this morning, because they had nice styrofoam cups with pretty designs on it, but at the last second I changed my order to a large. I chose... wisely.

SHROUD OF FOLGERS

As much as I would have liked to keep my token from God around all day, it was kind of in the way of the computer, and starting to make the countertop get kinda sticky. I made the sign of the cross, and laid a brown paper napkin across his visage. I thought at first that it might leave a perfect trace impression of his features -- because I've heard that's totally within God's power -- but it really spread out as it soaked in, and the napkin only looks kinda like Jesus. More like a West Texas Jesus. But I think He's still there in spirit.

I think that the message this is sending to me is pretty obvious, if you're in tune to the Lord like I am now: I must build a giant monument out of stone, or make some kind of stupidly garish display of the Ten Commandments. Normally I'd be totally against back-breaking labor for a God that I don't believe in, but hey -- I'm just a loyal soldier following orders, so I don't question too much.

Next stop:

I have to fund the monument somehow.

Anything Anything

2006-01-16T08:00:00.000-05:00

Remember that Nightmare on Elm Street music video special I mentioned? Well, it got me thinking back to part four of the series, which had the song "Anything, Anything" by Dramarama in it. So I downloaded the song, and I've listened to it somewhere in the ballpark of forty-thousand times since yesterday afternoon. It's so intense and angsty -- makes me want to go back home, fight with my parents, slam some doors, and then watch the Cindy Crawford workout video and not do my science homework.

And then probably the Cindy Crawford workout video again before I went to bed.

EDIT: BECAUSE NO ONE UNDERSTANDS!

I Find The Best Stuff

2006-01-15T16:50:00.000-05:00

For the last two days, I've been trying to adjust to the silence that comes with not having cable, and so I've been digging deeper and deeper into my video collection -- and that in itself is a weekend-long project. I've got so many VHS tapes that they'd probably make thick enough piles to protect me from nuclear fallout, and it's always fun to break down the stacks and see what treasures I've forgotten about. And man, did I find some stuff.

Such as: The Stuff, a Michael Moriarty movie about sentient ice cream that turns citizens into mindless killers. Seriously.

Flight of the Navigator, that crappy (in my opinion) Disney flick about the kid that gets drafted to help an alien computer get back home, losing eight years of his childhood in the process. I didn't like this one when I was a kid, and I don't like it now. Except that Paul Reubens is the alien voice.

Monster Squad, The Lost Boys, an MTV collection of Nightmare on Elm Street videos (?), a bit of "Headbanger's Ball", and then "V: The Final Battle Part 2" ALL ON ONE VHS TAPE. This is now the greatest VHS tape in all of the known universe. It's also mysteriously long. I hit play two days ago and it's still running.

The Midnight Hour, a great, silly Halloween TV-movie from 1986 with LeVar Burton, Shari Belafonte, and the cuter Pfeiffer, Dedee.

What's even better is that almost all of these movies were taped off of TV, so I get to see all the old commercials for Wendy's and whatnot.

File this entry under: Nostalgia.

UPDATE: Scratch that. File this one under: "Anything, Anything" by Dramarama.

Saturday Night Boredom Blogging

2006-01-14T19:24:00.000-05:00

Maybe it's just the bourbon talking, but Big Trouble in Little China is, like, the best movie ever.

Saturday Morning...

2006-01-14T14:07:00.000-05:00

...is not as much fun if you can't watch cartoons. Now that I've ditched the cable box and must rely on my DVD player and 'the internets' for entertainment, it gets awful quiet in here. Good thing I just got the complete soundtrack to "V".

Now I feel like bustin' some lizard-alien skulls! Who's with me?

Anyone?

Fine. Don't come crawling to me when the red dust runs out.

Curses

2006-01-13T20:45:00.000-05:00

Well, looks like my live-blogging plan is out the window for now. I don't have cable, and the DVD copy of Friday the 13th is...well, not where I thought I left it. With regret, I must postpone tonight's special presentation.

But I have beer!

Dear Art.com

2006-01-13T13:15:00.000-05:00

Dear Art.com:

"Two-Day Shipping" should not mean "We'll process it for more than two days, and then it'll prolly get to ya a coupla days later." I ordered my poster on Wednesday, and expected it Friday or more likely Saturday. Not Monday. I can only presume you think "Next-Day" means "Five or six days, or, you know, whenever."

Fuck you, Art.com, because now I have to watch out for that pink "Attempted Delivery" slip, and then wait until I have time on Saturday morning -- NEXT Saturday, that is -- at a post office that I haven't even located yet. "Two-Day Shipping" is now "Ten-Day Shipping." I hate you and I don't want to be your pal anymore.

Your friend in Christ,

The Retropolitan

Friday the 13th

2006-01-13T09:02:00.000-05:00

What a perfect morning for Friday the 13th! I stepped out of the Lady's apartment this morning into the cold darkness, the grounds shrouded by rolling fog drifts, with the bright full moon still looming over me. The "rolling fog drifts" isn't just embellished writing -- I could literally see distinct clouds of fog on the ground, not just the usual flat haziness. It wasn't just fog, it was The Fog, but less green and fewer ghost pirates. The atmosphere was great until about ten minutes into my uphill walk to the train, at which point I stopped caring about the atmosphere and just wanted to sit down.

Friday the 13th! A full moon! To me, if Halloween is like Christmas and my birthday combined, then this is like some of those lesser holidays like Memorial Day and Take Your Son to Work Day combined. Not the greatest day ever, but still more exciting than my average Friday. To celebrate, Tales to Astonish is hosting a special event tonight, starting at 10 pm EST:

I'll be live-blogging Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood.

BE THERE as I uselessly comment on every horrible stab wound, and every pair of unleashed boobies, all in real-time! It will be like sitting with me while I talk my way through an honored genre classic, only you won't be able to have me escorted out pantsless by the ushers. Again.

The flick is playing on Spike TV at 10pm, for those of you who were born without video stores.

Blogger Problems

2006-01-12T12:02:00.000-05:00

I'm having some problems with Blogger this morning -- don't know if it's just me -- so I'll be back later, perhaps.

WITH MARGARITAS FOR EVERYONE!

And a tiny fez.

National De-Lurking Week

2006-01-11T07:57:00.000-05:00

In the spirit of... of something, it has been announced that this week is National De-Lurking Week, the one time of the year that asks all anonymous blog readers to come out of the shadows and leave a comment. Here's the quote right from the founding fathers of NDLW over at Paper Napkin:

This is the week you've been waiting for! Or not! De-lurking week! Last year we just had a measly 24 hours, and if you were stuck in a meeting, or your server crashed, or you live on the other side of the world, you missed it (booo). Plus your fingers may have become numb from all the typing you tried to cram in 24 hours. So this year we're giving you a whole week to come out of the closet (so to speak).

Many of you made resolutions last week to lose weight, or quit smoking, or stop beating your children (oops, maybe that was just me), and I just read a Psychology Today article which notes a direct correlation between weight loss, and commenting on your favorite blogs, so leave a comment because it will make you skinny. Not that you're fat, because you're not!! So tell me how long you've been reading my blog, or your favorite book, or the first word that pops into your mind when you hear the word shish-kabob, and remember, if you don't leave a comment, you're letting the terrorists win.

See? It's kind of a moral imperative that you de-lurk and leave your cozy shield of mystery behind. Unfortunately, I only picked up on this halfway through the week, but there's still time to stop by and comment.

EDIT: Keep in mind, too, that this isn't a "please tell me that you like me, you really like me" thing. How about we steer it in a better direction for lurkers?

Tell me something about...I dunno. How about you all recommend some videos? I have a long weekend coming up. That's a pretty innocuous topic.

Stealth!

2006-01-10T10:33:00.000-05:00

Once again my employers forgot to tell me about a sudden day off for everyone, although I guess there are worse things in life than stealth holidays -- and paid ones, to boot. After my trek into the outer boroughs, it's back to unpacking and trying to figure out what stuff I'm missing.

Like shampoo. There's a whole list of stuff that I would never notice was missing until the exact second I need it. Ah, well -- time to turn on Big Trouble in Little China and make a to-do list.

Updates throughout the day!

UPDATE: "Just remember what ol' Jack Burton does when the earth quakes, the poison arrows fall from the sky, and the pillars of Heaven shake. Yeah, Jack Burton just looks that big old storm right in the eye and says, 'Give me your best shot. I can take it.'"

UPDATE: A very productive day. But back to more important subjects, fans of Big Trouble in Little China should go visit the Wing Kong Exchange.

UPDATE: Thanks to Dan T., I now have the Coupe de Villes' "Big Trouble in Little China" theme song stuck in my head. Biiiiiig trouble....in little CHIIIIIIIII-Na. Biiiiiiig trouble...

Spam Story

2006-01-09T08:51:00.000-05:00

I still find myself eating like a college freshman when I'm by myself; I'm twenty-six and my kitchen cabinet is still stocked with ramen noodles and powdered fruit drink mix. And not the good stuff, either -- we're talking the C-Town Special Brand stuff, sale-price broken noodles (down from $0.15) and powdered drinks that are probably cut with beach sand. I'm a bargain shopper when it comes to buying barely-nutritious crap food, which annoys the heck out of the Lady Retropolitan and her gourmet-cooking ways. I can see her point that I'm going to die of sodium poisoning if I keep eating the ramen, but the Creamy Chicken flavor is just so tasty.

The Lady isn't alone, either -- my old roommate and I used to constantly get into arguments about this. She'd invariably make "eeeeeeww!" noises whenever I reached for my Tang, although as I write that I realize that maybe she was just commenting on the innuendo. (I'm going back to calling it "powdered drink mix".) She was completely dismissive of my diet, which is fine, except that she had never actually had ramen but was just assuming it was terrible. (I do believe that she's had tang before, if you know what I mean and I think you do.) We're getting to the point of my post, which is not about sexual euphemisms:

I'd never in my life had Spam-brand canned spiced ham before.

In fact, I've never referred to Spam-brand canned spiced ham by it's full name until now. I wasn't exactly assuming that Spam would be awful, but I think we can all agree that it's got a bad reputation, at least outside of Hawaii. (I hear that it's considered a delicacy down there, but that's probably because they worship a giant tiki statue named "Hormel".) On Saturday, I decided to trek into uncharted personal territory.

I ate Spam.

I had to run to the grocery store for some small errand, and as I walked by the canned goods aisle a glimmer of light reflected off of a shiny square tin. If I were a believin' man, I'd think that God was urging me to buy Spam with holy beams of fluorescent light. Or Satan was trying to tempt me into buying Spam. Or if it wasn't Satan, it was the manager of the grocery store who positioned the overhead light just so. I ducked my head into aisle eight, and there they were: neatly-stacked tins of spiced ham. And one of turkey, but I thought I should at least go with ham Spam for my first try. I picked up the "35% Less Sodium" kind, since I'd had a package of ramen earlier and that put me around 900% of my daily recommended sodium allowance. I have to draw the line somewhere.

My first mistake was not buying hamburger buns to go with the Spam, since I'm guessing that Spamburger hamburgers are the suggested way to eat it, if the photo on the front of the tin is any indication. Since I didn't have any hamburger buns lying around the apartment, I grabbed two slices of rye bread, which is probably the exact wrong way to eat Spam. As per the mini-recipe on the tin, I cut a square-ish slice of the stuff from the 'loaf' and broiled it until it started to sizzle a little bit -- so far, it didn't look so bad. I chopped a tiny piece of the non-broiled bit, just for a preview:

Not too bad, although -- honestly -- it needed some salt.

It didn't make me recoil or anything, so I pushed forward in my experiment. After I got the Spam slice to the desired temperature in my toaster oven, I dropped on a slice of American cheese (also like in the photo) and slapped it between the bread. I also dabbed a bit of Hunt's-brand ketchup on the plate, just in case of emergencies, should something go horribly awry. I raised a glass of soda for a preliminary toast, and then took a bite.

Take my word for it: never make a Spamburger with rye bread.

Aside from that, it really didn't taste like much of anything. All I could taste was the bread and some of the cheese, and then there was a slight, almost subtle ham flavor lurking waaaay, way down underneath all the flavors, like someone lit a ham-scented candle in another room. I had expected to look like the Maxell guy when I bit into it, but it really didn't taste like much of anything. I dipped an edge into the ketchup (after breaking the glass over emergency condiment cage), and finished the sandwich that way, which was like eating a ketchup and cheese sandwich on rye bread. Also of note: never make a ketchup and cheese sandwich on rye bread. The flavors don't really meld.

I guess this wasn't much of a Spam adventure, because I cheated when I got the low-sodium kind, and the sodium must be where all the Spamtastic flavor lives. Who knew? I think I'll try regular-sodium Spam at some point, but I'm in no rush. Next time I'll do it right and get real burger buns, and maybe some Tang to wash it down with. Spam on Ritz, anyone?

Feel free to share your Spam recipes in the comments section.

Panexa

2006-01-09T07:49:00.000-05:00

Ask your doctor for a reason to take it.

All by myself

2006-01-08T21:47:00.000-05:00

Well, after months in the making, I'm all alone here in my apartment. That's MY apartment. No roommates, no pets, just me and...me. It's a heck of a change, and one that I really appreciate, despite missing the hell out of the Lady and Isis. I've never in my life not had roommates of some sort, so this is a whole new experience for me, and one that I think I need before I'm ready to move on with my life.

But I miss the Lady. And Isis.

I'm pathetic. Time for Wilco and whiskey.

UPDATE: Remember that burglary I mentioned back during the week before Christmas? Unless I'm mistaken and the Lady's parents still have it, the bastard took my VCR/DVD player. 'Cause I don't have it, which makes this rented copy of "Dracula: 1792 AD" useless to me. As if it were useful in the first place. But still.

God has odd wrath

2006-01-06T08:35:00.000-05:00

I was going to work this bit about Pat Robertson's latest hysterically awful comment on Ariel Sharon's stroke being a manifestation of the Lord's anger, but after a few moments of thought, I held back. If I make a post about a crazy thing Pat Robertson said recently, I'd have to write posts about every crazy thing that Pat Robertson says, and that would probably require at least two or three extra posts every couple minutes. This man never shuts up, and never shuts up about God. I've met crazy subway preachers that are more coherent than him, but at least they go away if you give them some change.

So I plead with you, America: give this man a dime. Send him off into obscurity. Help him get back on his feet and stop shaking that tin cup of batshit insanity.

He just wants something to keep warm.

***

Things Pat Robertson Says God Willed To Happen:

1. Ariel Sharon's stroke (divided God's land)
2. The destruction of New Orleans (city of sin)
3. The early expiration of his 2% milk (cow had multiple partners)
4. The continuing existence of Kansas (He hates science, prefers music and phys ed)

Things That God Was Too Busy Too Bother With:

1. The anti-Intelligent Design ruling in Dover (thought Kansas took care of it)
2. WWII (got caught up in Steinbeck novel, like, totally zoned out)
3. Bubonic Plague (he was making some sauce, and didn't notice when it boiled over)
4. Jesus' haircut (that boy'll never get a job lookin' like that)

That Damned Song

2006-01-05T07:42:00.000-05:00

Still in my head: MEXICAN HAT DANCE.

And the more I think about it, the faster the tempo starts going. Pretty soon it's going to make my head a-splode. It kinda reminds me of the Willy Wonka river scene, only without the terror of Gene Wilder or fat German children.

Also had the Mexican Hat Dance stuck in his head:

As a polite gesture for the faithful, I cropped out the Cuervo bottle in his other hand.

UPDATE: "Bless me father, for I have duh-nuh-NUH-nuhnuhnuh-nuhnuhnuh-Nuhhhhhh, nuh-nuh-nuhnuhnuh-nuhnuhunhun-uh!"

Fit to Print

2006-01-04T09:45:00.000-05:00

Every once in a while, I kick myself in the rear and use what few synapses that Pizza Hut and binge drinking haven't killed to come up with ideas for a redesign of Tales to Astonish! Since Pizza Hut and binge drinking have actually destroyed most of the useful cells in my brain, I don't do this very often, or for very long, so I try to get the most out of those four or five workers in my brain. Today, they had a great idea:

I'll have a news ticker! But not modern news -- too pedestrian -- it'll have retro news from 1939! News from the olden days! It could be like "this day in history" or something.

That sounded like a fun idea, and I was proud of the boys upstairs until I realized that last night's pepporoni-and-mushroom coupled with Caballero del Diablo Chardonnay melted the 'reviewer' cells in my head, because it occurred to me just now that almost all news from 1939 was bad news. Actually, it was worse than bad news. It was horrible news, and I figured it might come into conflict with the general light-hearted, laissez-faire-joie-de-vive-veni-vidi-vici tone of my writing.

This is why it would be bad:

February 21, 2004:

I wrote: a post about ghosts and Kristy Swanson, titled "Swayze was the best one".
Headline from 1939: "Murderous Bands of Ukrainian Terrorists Slay Polish Refugees".

September 27, 2005:

I wrote: a post about zombie rednecks called "The South Will Rise Again".
Headline from 1939: "Registry For Jews".

And so forth, the entire year, getting worse by the day.

I can't help but feel that having a constant crawl of horrifying news from the past would be something of a downer. Instead, I am going to have a looping MIDI of "Mexican Hat Dance," and animated GIFs of cats dangling from trees that just aren't giving up.

UPDATE: Mexican. Hat. Dance. Stuck. In. My. Head.

UPDATE 2:

UPDATE 3: Has there ever been a punk version of the Mexican Hat Dance? Someone tell the Sub-Par Brakers they have a request.

UPDATE 4: And a blonde joke to pass the time.