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With the 2005 Academy Awards less than a week away, it's a great time to weigh in with our Oscar Preview Edition. I'm not making any promises, but I feel pretty good about my picks this year. Let's get right to it, then. Here are Hans Bungle's Predictions for the 2005 Academy Awards: Best Picture: Million Dollar Baby - I think it's gonna be
Clint's year. Best Supporting Actress: Cate Blanchett - This is a toss-up,
but I think Blanchett gets it over Virginia Madsen. Best Makeup: Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
- Valli O'Reilly, Bill Corso - always go with the monster movie in the makeup
category. There you have it, my picks for this year's Oscars. The envelope please! *** We bought groceries today for the first time in about a month. Spent around 200 clams. Having a kitchen full of fresh food is right up there with a closet full of clean laundry. It just makes you feel like a real person. I can't wait to open the fridge in the morning. On a less positive note, I have thus far failed in my first household task, which is pretty sad considering all I had to do was hang a curtain rod. I just don't have the skills. We bought a new drill and everything, but it turned out that there was a thick metal plate in the area where we wanted to hang the rod. I kept trying to drill through it but the drill (or, more likely, I) couldn't hack it. I have been told to lubricate the drill bit, and that's what I'll try tomorrow unless someone has a better suggestion. It reminds me how many things there are to do in a house or apartment, and how many of us just make it up as we go along. And a lot of these things are potentially lethal, too. For instance, I'm drilling with this flimsy drill bit into a steel plate, and it's a foot away from my head, and I'm not wearing any kind of eyewear. What a schmuck. A house can kill you pretty easily. Dishwashers in particular are bad news. They'll burn your whole place down. *** Wheredat above right? Today's challenge: in my local supermarket (and probably in yours, too), the vast majority of the beer is kept at room temperature on shelves. There is a small refrigerated beer section, mostly occupied by every 40 imaginable. In this refrigerated section, there are also a few varieties of 6 six-packs available. Four varieties, to be exact. For 25 points each, name all four varieties (hint: 2 of them are made by the same label). *** As I was waiting for the cable guy to come over to test my signal today, I noticed that Ghost was playing on one of the pay channels. I never saw this movie when it came out, which makes me one of maybe 17 people in this category. It looked like a corny-ass piece of crap. But today I was feeling a sense of Swayze Regret* so I figured I'd give it a try. And this movie was maybe ten times worse than I could have ever imagined. An incredible clunker of a script, complete with a quasi-religious message and some of the most sappy dialogue in movie history. Terrible, primitive special effects. And through it all, the remarkable, wonderful Patrick Swayze stands tall. I know the Swayz has had a little comeback in the last couple
of years, with his role in Donnie Darko and his appearance in the Ja Rule
video. But I have to think that one or both of those gigs were offered to him in
a spirit of "Remember this dickweed?"** rather than out of actual respect
for his acting skills. Because, let's face it, Patrick Swayze is and always was a terrible, terrible actor. Which is not to say I don't enjoy watching him. His reaction shots in Ghost were so cheesy that I had to stop the TV*** and rewind to see every one twice. Someone should compile them all into a short film. He's not just a bad actor; he's a bad actor who strides across the screen with complete confidence. He's not tentative in his badness. He embraces it and lets it rip. And that's why I love him. There was a guy I knew in college, a friend of a friend who became part of our social circle for awhile. He was a strange dude, pretty nice but prone to the occasional angry outburst. One day in maybe 1992 a bunch of us were sitting around my apartment watching the tube, and all of a sudden this guy, we'll call him James, says: "What are you guys doing next Saturday night?" "Ummm...I dunno, nothing I guess," I said. "Why, what's going on?" "Whattaya say we get a bunch of beers and rent Point Break?" he said. Stunned silence, then suppressed giggles all around. It wasn't just the question itself. It was the way he said it. Like drinking beer and watching Point Break is in any way an acceptable way to spend a Saturday night. Like it was a fad sweeping college campuses. It was insane. For about two years after that, every time there was a lull in a conversation I was a part of, I would just say, "Next Saturday night, whattaya say we get a bunch of beers and rent Point Break?" Because, I reasoned, movies don't get any stupider than Point Break. It's not just stupid, it's passionately stupid, like the dumbest guy in the room with the loudest voice. Not content to be a big dumb action movie, it has pretensions of meaningfulness. It references Buddhism. It equates extreme sports with a higher plane of consciousness. It's all spiritual and shit. And the one who's the most spiritual of all is Swayze himself. Or, to be more accurate, his character "Bodhi". That's his name, just "Bodhi." He's mystical like that. Now, ten years down the road, I find myself missing Swayze and missing Point Break. The thing about Point Break was, it was actually quite exciting. It had some of the more original action sequences I can remember****. It had Swayze and Reeves facing off in a duel of vacant stares. Keanu's character was supposed to be a former Ohio State star QB named Johnny Utah. That's a strong indicator of a quality film. I'm not even going to address the delightful presence of Gary "Get" Busey. It's a fine film. James, I'm sorry if I laughed at your suggestion. Looking back, if I had spent that Saturday night with you, and the beers, and the Break, I'm sure my life would be much richer today. We all make choices, and I made a bad one. What's everybody doing next Saturday night? * Swayze Regret: a desire to go back to a simpler time when
anything was possible, before the sense of responsibility and the need to make
serious life choices took over. Evidence that this magical era of
opportunity actually existed can be found in the late 1980's through the
mid-1990's, when Patrick Swayze was a huge movie star. 2/25/05: It's Literally Ironic Thanks for the contributions, all. And sorry about the whinin'. As a token of my appreciation, help yourself to the very difficult wheredat at right. *** Like many members of my annoying generation, I like to sprinkle my speech with plenty of improperly and properly-used "literallys" and "ironics". Actually, I'm not so bad with the "literallys", but I am literally jam-packed with "ironics". For instance, today at work I experienced some soreness in my verbungle. How ironic, I thought. But was it really? Yeah, I guess it was. Borderline, though. Ah, work. Another long day spent with sack in hand and the
clock never far from my line of sight. Today I caught up on a lot of paperwork
and stuff. Still a ton more to do. My desk is a disaster even by my
own shameful standards. But I've been too damn bazy* lately to go through
everything and sort it out. It's an all day job. Maybe next week. This week, some of my co-workers and I had to appear on one of our shows. It was kinda painful, but whatever. Then some jokers decided to take a clip of us from the show and doctor it so it sounds like I'm letting out a huge fart when I stand up from a table. It was kind of a sloppy job but hilarious nonetheless. They emailed it around (I can email it to you if you like) and everyone had a good time. Then some tight-ass muckety-muck got wind of it, decided it was inappropriate, and minor wrist-slapping ensued. Who are these stiffs who go out of their way to deny us shit-sackers the few moments of joy we might hope to experience in the workplace? Mystifying. There is one dude at work, a Human Resources toady, probably only like 28 years old, who had the nerve to put the kibosh on (one of) the office NCAA pool(s) a couple of years back. This despite the fact that the SVP of legal affairs was entered in the pool. And despite the fact that the right to hold an office NCAA pool is clearly outlined in the constitution. But this young buck thought he was gonna play office Eliot Ness. What a dick. You know that little ding you get in Outlook when a new email comes in? Well, today at work somebody's volume was cranked and that ding was going off about every 12 minutes. It was so irritating that we created a mini task force to find out who it was. We started sending emails to everyone in our immediate area, but no dings. It was bizarre. Then, finally, we realized it was only going off on mass emails. The computers were all chirping together like a bunch of crickets. I guess it was the combination of so many machines making a noise at the exact same moment that made it noticeable. It probably happens in your workplace every day. But it never happened before in ours, and I don't know why it suddenly started happening today. I still think some dickus had his volume cranked. Dickuses, man. With so much dickplay in the workplace, it's no wonder that many of us choose to do the bare minimum. The bare minimum is a fascinating concept. Even the hardest-working employees have off days, when they show up, punch in, and coast through the day trying to do as little as possible without raising alarm. And with so much busy work to do, minimum effort is always a very tempting option. After all, if there's something that needs only a small percentage of your brainpower to get done, why give it more? For instance, at work we are responsible for producing shows. When the shows are done, we have to turn them in to the people who put them on the air. When we deliver them, we are supposed to enclose a one page document in the tape box. This document is called a program log, and it contains any pertinent information about the show that might be of use to future generations. Length of segments, names of guests, stuff like that. It's pretty tedious filling 'em out. There is one box on the sheet that says, "Episode Description (3-4 sentences)." I usually have to fill out this box. Lately I have been giving it the bare minimum. It's a great opportunity to exercise minimum effort. In fact, I'm usually only doing 2 sentences, which is technically sub-minimum. So a typical episode description as filled out by me might go like this: "What are you supposed to do for a midnight snack on those winter nights when it's too cold to set foot outside the house? Don't worry, because Chef Tinkler has three easy ideas for late-night nibbles that'll send you to bed satisfied!" Really, really bad. I know. Today I filled out about eight of these damn things in a five minute span. When I went to the printer to retrieve them, I noticed that someone from the adjoining pod** had been printing their program logs at the same time. There were about ten of theirs sitting there, so I decided to take a look to see how much better their episode descriptions were. To my surprise, it turns out that theirs were measurably worse than ours! For instance, if they were doing the midnight snack show from above, their episode description would say: "Chef Tinkler makes midnight snacks." As much as I was proud that even my lowest level of effort produced something better than that, I was also in awe: these people were taking minimum effort to a whole new place, a place that I imagined could get very dangerous if you stayed too long. They were pioneers, exploring the depths of incompetence in a truly courageous way. On my most shameful days at work, when I really don't get the job done on any but the most basic of levels, I am consistently shocked by people who can do even less. The scary thing is that we don't even know for sure that they're giving minimum effort. Maybe they're giving it all they've got. Which means maybe, with a little less effort, they can take things lower. Anyway, it got me thinking. Who the hell is ever gonna these program logs, anyway? Nobody, that's who. The hacks next door have the right idea. But instead of giving it the one sentence treatment, I think I may start filling them out with a little panache. "Chef Tinkler gets up at midnight with a powerful urge. He'll flip through the television channels, pause briefly during a softcore sex romp on his pirated Cinemax, and then he'll shut down the TV. In the peace of his dark studio apartment, he'll tilt his head back and let out a long, overly dramatic sigh. He doesn't know how he ended up here -- sharing his crumb-filled twin bed with a different transvestite hooker every night, stealing tens and twenties from his blind old neighbor lady to pay for it. Why? That's the word that he'll hear bouncing off the corners of his brain, which is, strangely enough, square. Why does he hear a knock at the door every night at 4am? Why is happiness so elusive? Why did his parents name him 'Chef' anyway? 'Best not to spend too much time on the why,' he'll figure. 'Maybe I'll head out to the kitchen and get something to eat.'" Is that really any worse? I wonder how long it would take for someone to catch on. I may try this. *** In response to cW, who was kind enough to ask, "If the young Hans and the current Hans were to meet on that park bench, how might that conversation go?" I don't really know. I think maybe I'll make a list of ten things 35 year-old me would tell 15 year-old me. Maybe tomorrow, when I continue my teenage saga. For now, though, I would definitely tell that young screwup to always throw the first punch. *** Taking a page from Pete and other bloggers, I will now post my entry from a year ago today. Sad that I was talking about Fast Times and Dazed and Confused and my personal teen angst even then. In fact, my state of mind was remarkably similar to where it is now.
* A new term inspired by N. Sita's legitimate and understandable excuse for his lack of "West Coast, East Side" entries: "Sorry I haven't submitted another WCES, just been lazy or busy or both." ** Pod = A Cluster of Cubicles I'm burned out. The last two weeks have just knocked me on my mental ass. What's left of my mind is drifting off in a hundred different directions, rendering me basically useless. At work, I've been doing the best I can, but that ain't much. And the verbungle.com website has been suffering as well. For instance, here are a list of topics I have posted about recently: -Chunkies That's pretty bad. The squirrels in particular are troubling. Once you start talking about squirrels, you've got nowhere left to go. Actually, that list is probably pretty representative of any two week period over the last few months. But I can't help feeling like I've hit one of those unmistakable lulls that come along every six weeks or so and make me want to get out of the web business and return to my career as a speedboat racer. You'll also notice we've been remiss on our empeetreys, wheredats, GISG, and the Name That Solo game. Nothing's working. We're in a slump, friends. I'm feeling sad and confused and it shows. All the bad medical stuff and my house being completely unsettled has left me miserable. In the last couple of weeks, I haven't really had a chance to see my friends (except for one enjoyable night of bowling*) or play hoops or sit around thinking of guitar solos. In fact, I was feeling like packing up shop and taking a wise hiatus, and then I read Pete's post today and it somehow soothed me into keeping the boat sailing for awhile. It just reminded me that every one of our lives is filled with the same petty struggles, like nagging knee injuries and broken TV's. And somehow that made me feel like I'm not going through it alone. But this would still be a good time to submit something. I think maybe I should tell a little story about a bad period in my life. Even if usually nobody seems to care for the confessional/introspective stuff so much. But you know, you don't have to read it. Maybe I'll do it over the course of the next three of four posts. Or maybe I'll back out. The reason I feel like talking about this bad period is because Stuytown figures fairly prominently in there. The basics of the story are this (and if you knew me at the time, I'm sure you remember this as well): starting in the second semester of my sophomore year in high school, I pretty much stopped going to class for about a year. Well, that's not completely true. I would show up at school, go to homeroom, attend a couple of classes that I was doing OK in, and then I would leave school for about three hours, skipping all the classes that I was tanking. During this three hour period, I would go out, buy a Daily News, some Wrigley's Spearmint gum, and some gummi bears. I would sit on a bench and read the paper, and then I would eventually wander into Stuytown, carrying my slightly undersized Larry Bird basketball. I'd go play ball against whatever local scumbags were available, and then maybe I'd return to school for 8th period. After school, I'd go play ball again, this time with my friends. I'm sure they were thinking, Um, Hans, why weren't you in Chemistry today or for the last two months? But I think everybody was too scared to ask me, because they knew it would be devastating to me to have to admit that I had lost control of my life. When I tell this story these days, I romanticize it a little. I make it sound like I was some latter-day Holden Caulfield, rejecting high school and all the phonies it housed. Rebelling against something or other. I wish that were true. The truth is that I just flamed out for a while. I simply couldn't deal. It was a suffocating loneliness that filled my afternoons. Every conversation was spiked with the fear that I would be confronted about my collapse. My stomach just hurt all day long. And sometimes, like right now, I get that feeling again. And it's not fun or exciting or romantic. It's ass. I will try to keep posting about this in some detail if I have the time. There is at least one story with a payoff. In the meantime, I open the floor to questions about that period. For at least ten years after it happened, I was too embarrassed to discuss it. But I think now I'm OK with it. So ask a question if you like.*** cW, please report on the Paul Westerberg show. If only I had known about Paul Westerberg back in 1985, I would have been OK. * High game that night: 181, including a turkey. Taste that.
I think you can tell a lot about a man by how seriously he takes his bowling.
It's a perfectly inverse relationship. Anyone who curses unironically
after a just-missed spare pickup, or refuses to drink because they need to stay
focused on their bowling, is probably a douche and not worth your time.**
Bowling is meant to be fun and silly. Although it does feel good to knock
down all them pins. 2/22/5: Chocolate, Raisins, Peanuts...It's Just That Simple Here is a brief follow-up to the Chunky discussion on monkeyweb.com from a few weeks back. I had kind of assumed that Chunkies were one of those products that somehow still managed to exist on the fringe, but nobody really bought them. Like Tussy or Necco Wafers or bags of pork rinds. But thankfully I was wrong. In the days leading up to my departure from the UWS, I spent an insane amount of time in the local Duane Reade, even by my own standards. Garbage bags, packing tape, paper towels. All that stuff you need when you're moving out or disposing of a body. On the night before we finally moved, as I approached the checkout line, there was a guy ahead of me searching frantically for something at the front candy counter. "Over there, to your right, sir," the cashier said. "Where?" he asked. "Oh, I see. There they are. Thanks." To my delight, he grabbed a Chunky and set it down on the counter. "It's got to be a Chunky," he said, smiling. "Chunkies are the best," I chimed in from behind. "Of course, of course. Chunkies are the best. They really are," he said. And all three of us smiled great big Chunky smiles. *** After further review, we now second Joe Monkeyweb's opinion that the Stuytown squirrels are tremendously creepy. Every time I walk by, they stare me down as if to say, "Are you kidding me? You don't even have one fucking nut for me? It's 25 degrees out here. I've got a family to feed. You think it's fun foraging out here in this cold? I see you have that big shopping bag. You mean to tell me there's not one measly nut in there for me? One nut? Damn. Alright, then. That's cool. You do what you gotta do. But we'll remember you. And there's a lot of us. Keep that in mind the next time you're walking home alone at 2am. Cuz we don't forget. Count on that. See you later, friend." They even put their little hands out to let you know they are indeed accepting donations. They also gather in big groups when they really want to shake somebody down. They are terrifying little monsters. The only upside is that, if we could properly train and arm them, they might serve as our last defense against the giant squids and the martian martians, whenever they choose to launch their joint attack on mankind. 2/21/05: The Lament of the Unkicked Ass Thanks to all of you who sent out the good vibes in my pop's direction. He's home from the hospital after an exclusive three night engagement. It must feel great to be released from a place like that. Like you have another chance to live. I have to say, I am deeply disappointed by the staff and the system at NYU Hospital, and I suspect things are much the same at many other hospitals across the land. Doctor sightings were rare, and when they did stop by, they doled out information in such small bits that we were left to sit around and assemble it at the end of the day to see if it meant anything. Two of the main doctors gave us conflicting dosages for one of my pop's new medications, then the second of these docs refused to go check with the first doc to make sure they were on the same page, even when we asked him to. "It's my call," he said. There was a disheartening amount of time spent waiting around, which is to be expected, but in this case there wasn't even anyone there to let us know what it was we were waiting around for. Even his diagnosis was vague, and I got the distinct sense that the doctor was holding back some hard truths because he didn't have the guts to share them. He was going on vacation that day, and he didn't want anything to bring him down. What a mess. Just a cold place severely lacking in compassion; I naively thought that hospitals were supposed to provide spiritual support as well as medical care. The only people there who seemed genuinely interested in my pop's well-being were two terrific nurses who get the verbungle.com gold seal of approval and can expect a small token of appreciation in the coming days. It was a harrowing and exhausting few days, and then he was released without a real game plan for his future. I feel like some crucial step has been missed, and I am having trouble moving on with regular life until I know more. Where are all the good, caring doctors, the Little Scottie Frenches of the world? ***
But there is one particular day in my life, actually two, when I wish I had sensed the needs of the moment and used bloody violence as my friend. I was born in August of 1969. Here in the formerly united states of America, August is the 8th month of the year, and I think it is perhaps the 10th month when it comes to figuring out when to start your kids in school. Meaning, if you were born in November of 1969, you might have started your kids in nursery school in September of 1974, whereas I would have started in September of 1973 along with all the kids born from November of 1968 through October of 1969. What I'm getting at, in my usual clumsy way, is that I was always one of the youngest kids in my class. This was mildly annoying for various reasons, but it never really presented a practical problem until 1990. In 1990, you see, my friends and classmates all started turning 21. And I still had months to go. I guess if I were smart I would have secured a really good fake ID at some point between 1983 and 1990, but to be honest I never really needed one. There were house parties all the time; $2 bought you a cup and an entire evening's worth of beer, fun, and stories. On any given Thursday, Friday or Saturday between 1987 and 1990, my friend Brady would have at least three addresses written down on a piece of paper in his jacket pocket. 22 N. Bassett. 534 West Mifflin. 528 W. Dayton. 20 Breese Terrace. 520 West Wash. He had a secret line on every party in town, and to this day I'm not sure exactly how he did it. He was automatic with that shit. And in 1990, as a still-twenty year-old, I saw no reason to start going to expensive bars and ruin the good thing we had going with the house parties. Unfortunately, all my newly-minted legal drinker friends didn't see it that way. Bars were a chance to explore their government-sanctioned adulthood for the first time. So I did my best to steer things towards a house party when I could, and if I knew they were going to a bar that didn't card (very rare in Madison) maybe I'd tag along. When I went home to New York for Spring Break that year, I decided I needed to take some action on the fake ID front* My friend Alexi, himself a June birthday, hooked me up with the system he'd been using. He and his friends were making fake Canadian Driver's Licenses, which he assured me were very faithful to the real deal, right down to one amazing feature: they did not include photographs. It was pretty simple. About an hour of cutting and laminating, and I was now a resident of the Ontario Province. I used my real name -- that way, if someone wanted a second form of ID, I could use my student ID or what have ya. Of course, the license was so ridiculous that I was terrified to use it. Just a blue piece of paper with a pre-printed template and my name and address typed into the appropriate blank spaces. I ended up trying it out in two bars, each time after about fifteen minutes of nervous deliberation. Once at Bullwinkle's in Minneapolis and once at the lame dance bar on University Avenue in Madison, the one that underwent around three name changes while I was there. To my disbelief, both times I tried it, I succeeded. I think the license was so cheap looking that the bouncers figured nobody would be stupid enough to use it if it was fake. Anyway, I muddled through those last months leading up to my 21st birthday, and then one night, maybe in late July, I went for a couple of beers with some friends at the student union terrace. The union terrace was a great place to hang out on a summer evening. It was right off of beautiful Lake Mendota, and they served 46 ounce beers in paper cups for a very reasonable $3.30. The place was staffed almost exclusively by students, and occasionally you'd know somebody working behind the bar and they'd give you a break on the price. I remember when a guy from my dorm named Tim Teeter was working there, and I bought four of those 46 ouncers. I gave him a twenty, and he gave me back twenty dollars in change. What a winner. Of course, that was all later, after I turned 21. Before that, I would rely on my of-age friends to head up to the bar and get the beers. Boy this is getting long. But I am determined to finish. On this particular evening in July of 1990, I was with two of my 21 year-old friends, sitting on the terrace, talking shit and sharing 46 ounce beers. They had each bought a round (I think maybe we were buying two cups at a time and distributing it between the three of us), and now it was my turn. Had I been sober or smart, i would have handed one of them the money and asked them to go up and buy the beer, as was the standard operating procedure. But my belly was full of beer and my head was empty of rational thought, so I decided I would head up there with my Toronto license and take care of business myself. The lady behind the bar asked to see my ID, and I somewhat confidently handed it over. She took it back behind the counter for a second, and then returned with my 46 ouncers and gave me the ID back. I headed back to our table in triumph. We drank for about ten more minutes, and then a tall, kinda hairy dude with glasses came by and asked if we were all 21. We said yeah, and then he was like, "Hans Boongle, come with me. You're busted." This dick was some kind of student by day, narc by night. He took me down into some dimly lit interrogation room, where he angrily chided me about how they kept a huge book behind the bar at the union with every student's DOB in it, and how could I be so stupid as to try this shit? Between his sanctimonious speeches, he found the time to insult me personally several times. He looked to be about my age, and he just kept going on and on about underage drinking being wrong and this and that, and how lucky I was that I wasn't getting fined. He was over-the-top obnoxious. He was getting way too much joy out of the lecture he was delivering, and I wanted to punch his power-tripping mouth in. After about an hour, he let me go, but promised that he'd be sending a letter home to my parents. I tried to appeal to his sense of decency, but he was in full fascist mode and there was no reasoning with him. Sure enough, my dad got a letter about a week later informing him that his son had been engaging in underage drinking and warning him about its inherent dangers and telling him that I risked expulsion if it happened again. He called me the day he got it. "Are you in some kind of trouble out there?" he asked. "I just got this letter about underage drinking and the dangers of alcohol." I assured him that everything was fine, that it had just been this one dickhead guy with an axe to grind. It blew over, but I never forgave myself for not at least mouthing off to that douche. My resentment would carry on for the rest of my days, it seemed. Then one day a few years later I told the story to a woman I worked with who had also gone to Wisconsin. She was like, "Holy Shit! That had to be my friend Josh who busted you. That was his job, and he totally fits the physical description. He loved being a dick to people when he busted them." I was in shock. He had friends? And this woman was no teetotaler, which led to my next question. "Did 'Josh' abstain from alcohol while underage?" I asked. "Oh, hell no -- he was a raging drunk and a major druggie. He just loved being a cock and busting people." How I hated him, this fucking Josh. One night about six months later, a bunch of us went out drinking in the East Village. The woman was there, and who should come out to meet us but good ol' Josh, five years older but looking almost exactly the same as he did that fateful night in 1990. The group we were in was large enough so that I didn't have to talk to the girl or Josh through most of the evening. Instead I hung out with my friends and tried to figure out the perfect way to get revenge. I was like Mike, Adam Goldberg's character in Dazed and Confused. I knew there was a strong chance the guy would kick my ass, but if I got a few punches in and drew a little blood perhaps the cosmic scales would be tipped enough so that I could sleep better at night. But the night just went on and on, and I didn't do anything. Finally at 2A around 2 am, I went up to him and confronted him with the story, which apparently my co-worker had already briefed him on. But I did it in a "We were all young then, perhaps that's why you were such a dick" jokey manner. I didn't show him the fierce nature of my loathing for him, and he didn't apologize. He's probably still a dick to this day. And I still feel powerful regret for letting two chances to put him in his place slip by. So Josh, if you're out there, and nobody's kicked that ass of yours up to now, I hereby offer to do it. You may be bigger than me and you might just win. But I think I will smell revenge in the air and my psychotic fury will take over. And at the end of the day, yours is the ass that will be kicked. Of course, you could make it all better with a note of apology and a simple admission of your dickheaditude. But I know that's not your style. *** Speaking of Dazed and Confused (which I often do), I watched it again this weekend while trying to evaluate my new TV (the replacement came, it still blows). Verdict: Dazed and Confused still rocks the house. I did get a note from MGBC down in Texas, who has long been a Valley Girl proponent and is once again lobbying for its inclusion in the Big Three. I love Valley Girl, but I still have to place it one notch below Fast Times and Dazed and Confused. Perhaps it's because I'm a guy and VG is a girl's movie. Dunno. It's definitely great, though, so we hereby give it a special verbungle.com recognition of excellence. Have you seen what 1980's uberbabe Deborah Foreman is up to lately? It's good to see that Hollywood folks can move on with their lives when the roles dry up. It's so much more dignified than scraping around in a series of crapfest movies while pitifully awaiting your return to glory. *** I was thinking back and wondering how in the world Kerry lost to GWB, and it occurred to me that the Dems have completely failed to stay in step with the nastiness of politics in the 21st century. As evidence, I look back to this election and I recall how the Dems were going on about the young person cellphone vote, all those people who have forsaken their landlines and are thus unpollable, and how these people might swing the election for Kerry. In the meantime, the Republicans were slinging Vietnam-era mud and building voting machines. The fuckers. Either their approach needs to be exposed, or it needs to be copied. * An earlier attempt, in maybe 1988, had gone awry when some friends and I were brutally scammed in a Times Square Burger King. Before I say anything else, I want to send out positive thoughts to my father, Rolf Bungle, who is in the hospital right now undergoing some tests. And I hope that you will send your best wishes as well. Hospitals, even the very very good ones, are scary places filled with confusion and suffering and miscommunication and sorrow, and it always seems that a lethal screwup is just one tired nurse's keystroke away. I have a lot more thoughts about this matter but I guess it's best to keep it somewhat private. The stuff with my pop capped off what was already shaping up to be one of the busiest, toughest weeks I can remember. Part of it is being in the middle of a production run at work, but mostly it was because of The Move. Yeah, it was a real bad move. But my ass is now planted in my new apartment and that makes me very happy. Looking back, the way we scheduled The Move was probably too ambitious. Lots of things all happening in a very short time, some of them contingent on the successful completion of others. It was as if Rube Goldberg, or perhaps the Grucci brothers, had coordinated the whole thing. If we had pulled it off, it would have been spectacular. But like most intricately orchestrated missions, shit didn't quite turn out the way we planned it to. Here's what The Move looked like on paper: -Finish getting ready Monday night, in bed by a decent hour. 1. Getting ready for the move: this was the worst, most painful packing job I can remember. It just kept piling up and piling up, and we were barely making a dent in the mountains of crap that we apparently own. It was weird, too, because we pruned the hell out of everything we've got, giving a lot away. But it still kept us up until 5am on Monday night, and there were several moments where we looked at each other and thought, "Maybe we just aren't gonna be ready by 7am." Well, we were ready, but we were also dog-tired and stressed from the 1 hour of sleep, and we still feel angry at the world. 2. The Movers: They showed up 45 minutes late and then, after they packed up our stuff, they got stuck in traffic and took an hour and a half to get from W. 72nd to East 20th. And still the whole thing took only 4 hours. One thing about movers: they really know how to move stuff. They don't f around, they just come in and get their move on. I If you've ever enlisted your buddies to help you move, and then you make the transition to professionals, you will notice a tremendous difference in skill level and attitude. And barring tremendous poverty, what are you still doing calling up your buddies to help you move? 3. The new TV: I knew we couldn't afford a spanking new 34" HDTV like Joe Monkeyweb got a few weeks back. So we settled on a regular old Sony non-HD 27 incher. When we got it hooked up we noticed that there is a pink bar on the left hand side of the screen, and the top of the screen buzzes whenever something reddish comes on. WTF? Circuit City is coming back on Saturday to replace it. Frustrating. 4. The sofa was too big to fit in the elevator, so we had to send it back. This despite the fact that we gave Crate and Barrel our elevator's dimensions and they assured us it would be no problem. Gas face for them on that one. 5. The Verizon guy couldn't get our phone working. In fact, the minute he came in he pretty much said exactly that. "No way are you gonna have service after this. I can install the jacks if you like, but you won't have service for a while yet." He didn't really sound like he wanted to install the jacks at all. But we asked him to please do so, and he obliged. And he was right, still no service as of two nights later. This is going to take a long time to sort out, I think, because Verizon screwed up our initial order and the wife had to call them back about eight times to (she thought) make things right. This problem is made more annoying because cell phone service within the complex is spotty at best. 6. The Cable Service itself is all sucky. The cable installer guy was a real gentleman and I have nothing against him as a man. He mentioned that he had gone to culinary school with Bobby Flay but found that life in professional kitchens was too hostile for him, so now he installs cable TV. I gave him my copy of Kitchen Confidential because he said he'd been interested in reading it. All that said, the cable service is grainy and the image quality looks like what you might have come across on an episode of Interludes After Midnight on Channel J back in 1982. And yet neither the installer guy nor my wife would acknowledge this. After the new TV comes in on Saturday and the graininess remains, TWC is getting a call for a return visit. I think our signal needs boosting or some shit. Some other stuff went wrong, too, but I don't remember exactly what. Those problems will all be dealt with in time, so let me move on to the positive. 1. Stuytown is beautiful and quiet. The smell of dog shit has been replaced by the smell of trees. The sound of garbage trucks has been replaced by the squeals of children playing.* The sight of marauding teens has been replaced by the adorable dark brown squirrels that opoulate the complex.** I feel so happy and at home here. And I have barely had time to check out the complex or the surrounding neighborhood. I feel 100% regret-free about the decision to move here. Have I mentioned the plexiglass backboards? 2. Joe M. and Big Jim Lang have been extremely polite and welcoming, which makes this tough move a little easier to take. It's nice to be surrounded by friends. 3. 1-800-F-U-C-K-I-N-G-M-A-T-T-R-E-S-S, baby. Sing it loud, sing it proud. These guys are efficient as hell. They were in and out in about 9 minutes and we now have an insanely comfortable bed. And cheap, too. I give them like a 29.2 on the VRS. 4. Our apartment is cozy and new and clean. I am especially impressed by the immaculate bathroom. The tub is so clean we may be able to take baths someday. 5. Assorted other stuff. I am happy as hell about our new location. I just want things to slow down and improve so I can enjoy it. * Although as I watched some eight year-olds playing tackle football in the complex, I was disturbed by what I heard: Kid who just tackled other kid: "Shut the fuck up, bitch!" And I am not kidding. These kids were like eight. I guess you grow up hard around here. ** What's up with all the dark brown squirrels? I love 'em, but why are they so prevalent here and so rare in the rest of the city? Internet masters, begin your googling. Between work and packing for our big move, the next few days are going to be incredibly busy ones for the verbungle.com staff, so don't be surprised if you don't hear from us until maybe next Thursday. I hope readership doesn't dwindle back into the single digits during this hiatus, but we have no choice and so we're gonna shut this bitch down. During this quiet period, we will still happily accept contributions and we will post them in the usual timely manner. In fact, if someone wants to be guest blogger for the week, consider this your invitation. Just send me some text and I'll put it up. Before I say another word I want to mention that I neglected a key contributor when I was doling out credit yesterday. Big ups/thanks/props/shoutout to D. Lee, who checks in today with another edition of his stylish cartoon Big Fat Yatch. Thanks to D. Lee for spicing things up. Well, I have approximately 103 hours left as a resident of Manhattan's shit-lined Upper West Side. This is the second time in my life I've found myself living here, and I can say with confidence that it will be the last as well. Not that I hate it -- it's actually a perfectly decent place to live. It's just not for me and it never was. Here then is my parting evaluation of my soon-to-be former neighborhood: Things I'll miss about the UWS -The 2/3 train from 72nd to 12th street: a model of speed and convenience -The one-block walk to said 2/3 train and all the possibilities that opens up -The 24-hour Duane Reade in our building -Cafe Luxembourg -Le Pain Quotidien -The Sony Lincoln Square theater (grudgingly) -Having a Doorman (1st time evah!) -Central and Riverside Parks -Tons of essential stores nearby -My commute -The smoothie place -Nick and Toni's -My nice photographer neighbor guy Things I won't miss -Dog Shit everywhere -My fellow Duane Reade shoppers -The amount of people who live here that think that not only is it the best place in the world to live, but that you should get out of the way on the sidewalk when they walk by, because they've been here longer than you have. -The evil woman in my building with the soulless black shark eyes. -The Fairway Experience. "Fairway" is the most inapt title this side of Us Magazine. -Dougie's BBQ; in particular the crowds of kids who are always standing outside blocking the entire sidewalk and who once yelled something racist at my wife. -What seems like an inordinately high asshole to mensch ratio among the locals -The unpleasant guy at the deli who tried to shortchange me that one time way back when *** One of my assigned tasks for the Big Move was to uninstall our two air
conditioners in time for the Salvation Army to pick them up on Saturday.*
I'm not so great with the air conditioners. I've successfully installed
them in the past, although it should be mentioned that: Anyway, I had to remove the units tonight and it was a bitch. Actually, the Friedrich was fine. I just slid the heavy unit out of the sleeve before I detached the sleeve itself. That's how it should work. But with the Frigidaire, I couldn't find a way to separate the unit from the sleeve in order to safely pull the unit into the apartment before detaching the sleeve. I decided I would have to just unscrew all the screws and then kind of open the window and grab the unit before it plummeted 11 stories, all in the same quick motion. I knew it was stupid and I wished crsmal was here to either help me or suggest an appropriate solution. But instead I just went for it. And it was close. The minute I pulled the window up a hair, that A/C got a strong desire to leap to its death. Gravity is pretty impressive. But I just grabbed it before it fell and I pulled that shit back in. I have said it before and it remains true: with the incredible concentration of nitwits like me in this city who incorrectly install/uninstall air conditioners, it is nothing less than a miracle that twenty people a day aren't flattened by falling units. I hope I never have to do it again. If I do, I am emailing crsmal ahead of time so he can send me some damn instructions. * One nice thing about Stuytown is that the apartments all have air conditioners built in and the electricity is free. So we won't be needing our old A/C's.
My vision was to create a website. And specifically I wanted to create an outlet for fun people to post interesting stuff. I wanted to host a site that would be a grab-bag of ideas and stories and any other contributions people might be kind enough to send in. I guess some small egotistical part of me figured that some of the content would be my own, but I really just wanted to create a forum for people to say stuff. About a year later, I started the site, and for the first year or so after that, it was mostly my own shit. Which is only gonna go so far. I know my stuff is a little weak and insubstantial. Pulitzer prize winner Frank McCourt told me so almost twenty years ago. And (presumable non-Pulitzer prize winners) Daniel and Corey told me so again today, as did ace cohort Pete B. (playfully, we hope). Incidentally, they're right -- those band names are lame. But slowly, the contributions started coming in: a list here, a review here, and then full scale blog-style entries from the N. Florida Blogger and the Smal family. And this makes me so happy, because it's closer and closer to what I wanted it to be all along. A showcase for the mad genius that I believe is present in so many of us. And it is in the spirit of mad genius and pride that I introduce verbungle.com's latest feature, a recurring blog from decidedly Un-Californian Californian N. Sita. If you don't know Nick, you should know (and you will soon know) that he's one of the smarter cats you'll ever come across. Smart enough that he actually makes me nervous sometimes. Smart enough that he came up with the term "rumpilingus" way back in like 1996.* That's the kind of mind we're dealing with here. Here then is the highly entertaining first entry of his column, "West Coast, East Side." Thank you Nick and keep 'em coming. The life out in L.A. actually sounds quite good. I thought it might have been a little too tough for you all, but Sport came through on the latest round of "Name that solo" by correctly guessing Fountains of Wayne. He didn't name the song but he's getting full props anyway. That wasn't easy. I also just noticed Sport's Blog, which is real nice and immediately gets a spot on the verbungle.com permalist at right. We're gonna slide him right into Dan Kois's old spot, now that Dan has inexplicably hung up his blog in order to take a real job that pays him actual money to do cool stuff. Sellout. Back to Sport. I met Sport when I was in Chicago this summer. He and my friend Brady were doing the anti-Bush T-shirt business together, and we spent an afternoon at a street fest hanging with Sport, drinking free beer and telling stories. You'll never meet a nicer guy than Sport. And the motherfucker can draw, too. He's also one of those guys that I hate because he's subtly cool and clever and doesn't need to be the loudest guy in the room, whereas I am constantly cracking bad jokes in a desperate attempt to make people like me. But the world needs all of us. Anyway, Sport gets our seal of approval, even if we can't remember his real first name or how he got the nickname "Sport." Here is the full empeetrey if you're interested. From a band full of a bunch of wimpy indie type fellas, almost every Fountains of Wayne song I've heard contains a pretty decent and rocking guitar solo. Weird. While we're tossing props around, I want to send some in the direction of Houston, Texas, home of friend and former colleague L. Grace BC. I remember my first day on the job; I was a pimple-faced 24 year-old kid eager to get started on an exciting career in shitsacking. My boss was introducing me to people and she said, "This is Larry Grace. She's young (she was just 22) but I can tell you already that she's going places." And sure enough, the minute you met Larry Grace you knew it was true. Just a winner in every sense of the word. She's a Texan through and through, and she eventually left NYC to head back down South and start a family. Perhaps she can send up a dispatch from Bushland when she gets a moment. We miss her up North. I want to thank Larry Grace for kindly sending me the Texas Monthly with the article on "Dazed and Confused."** It was a nice read and it took me back. I remember seeing that movie at the theater on 12th and 2nd back in 1993, and realizing about halfway through that "Fast Times" now had a 1a to go along with its universally accepted ranking as the number one film of all time. The list goes like this: 1. Fast Times I truly feel that way. "Fast Times" and "Dazed and Confused" are the only two movies I can return to again and again with measurable positive results. And the most interesting thing in the "Texas Monthly" article was learning that the same guy, Don Phillips, cast both movies. And that he had retired after "Fast Times" and didn't do a thing until they lured him out of retirement to do "Dazed and Confused" a decade later. About 60% of the actors I enjoy watching today owe their success to this one guy. Amazing. It's like he came up to the big leagues, hit a 600 foot homer off Sandy Koufax, retired, came back for one at bat ten years later and hit a 700 foot homer off Nolan Ryan. One of the all-time great "less is more" careers. It was also interesting that he met McConaughey in a bar, they proceeded to get wasted together, and then Phillips offered him what was originally a tiny part as Wooderson. Then they got one look at him in the pink jeans and knew they were dealing with forces beyond their control. That Wooderson had actually come to life and had to be a big part of the movie. Also interesting were the names of some actors who didn't make the cut: Vince Vaughn (who I think could have taken the movie in either direction), Ashley Judd (who hit on Jason London), and Claire Danes, among others. If you can pick up a copy, I suggest you do so. If for nothing else than to get a better look at this picture of Wooderson at left -- taken in 2003! Every once in awhile I come across a link on Metafilter that I feel inclined to pass on to you. Here's one from today. I don't know what to make of it, and I'm sure you won't either. But I think it might cause you to feel some things that make you uncomfortable. And that's always worth a link. * And you want to talk about an original idea? Rumpilingus
STILL turns up zero google hits, nine years later. Although I just sent in a
definition to urban dictionary.com (using the name Nick) so the wisdom can be
spread. 2/9/5: I remember my first beer I always loved that Steve Martin heckler shout-down. *** Let's face it. Barring a major comeback from Sita (or maybe a miracle run by Kois or Kissel or Monkeyweb), cW is going to win the first round of the lyric stumpah. It was a well-played game, and we are going to bring it right back as soon as it's over for "Lyric Stumpah II: Electric Boogaloo." Next time we'll be a little more organized from the get go. And you can bet your sweet ass we'll be offering a prize of some sort. *** So on the surface today was a lot like yesterday. In at 10, out at 10. Shit got sacked. The Man took his cut. But I went home feeling a little better about myself than I did yesterday, because I did a damn good job. I worked hard and I got results. And, as crsmal points out in his entry from a couple days back, sometimes there is some genuine personal fulfillment in a job well done. My grandfather worked for the phone company, up on poles in the hot sun and the winter chill, bringing service to remote corners of the USA. And at the end of a long workday back in 1933, I bet he looked up at that day's poles and wires and went: Hells yeah. So even if the work itself is mundane and thankless, you can feel good about doing shit right. When the day is over, if your pole is standing tall and strong, you can pound your evening Bud with pride.* Still, this changes nothing about my uncertain future at the plant and what I aim to do with the next five years of my professional life. *** Look, we're not going to lie. We know the "Name That Solo" game has its flaws, not the least of which is that I am still recording the clips in a crude and barely usable manner. But you'll play on, because you're bored at work and you will be again tomorrow. Here is the latest edition of "Name That Solo." So, if you can Name That Solo, go ahead and Name That Solo. Hint: the band has been around for maybe ten years and still exists today. And they've had at least one Top 40 hit in their career. Answers at noon please. *** I think it's time we addressed the "New Name" solicitation that I've had posted on the right-hand side of the main page for the last three months. First I want to thank everyone for their suggestions. And I want to mention that many of them, not just some of them, were creative and completely viable. But the general feeling is that maybe verbungle.com isn't so bad after all, so we've re-upped for a couple more years under that name. I still don't love it, but it's there and it's not going anywhere, like a big hairy wart on the tip of our nose. The funny thing is, I truly enjoy the continual suggestions that come in from you fine folks, so I think I'm gonna leave the solicitation up there for the foreseeable future. Maybe we'll get one that's so damn good we'll have no choice but to make the switch. So thanks again and keep 'em coming if you feel like it. *** God I can't wait to move. Six days. It's gonna be all that, the shit, and the bomb, not to mention the cat's pajamas. Spring is coming, friends are near, and generally speaking I don't think I've ever been happier in my adult life. At least not for this long a stretch. Sure, there have been some pretty spectacular moments, like the time I threw a tennis ball out of a car moving approximately 25 miles an hour and caught it on the bounce. Or the Starks dunk. Or an out-of-character three point shot I hit in the rain to win a game in a 3 on 3 tournament in Chicago. Or when selling Loverboy on the L train. Or when I became an overnight billionaire during the verbungle.com IPO. And let's face it, there were also some totally outstanding moments that I just can't mention in this space. Randy, you remember. I know you do. But I don't recall being this happy for this long before. I've never had such a continued sense that everything's going to be alright** as I do today. And don't worry, I know it really won't be alright. But I'm gonna ride this shit out until I go through my whole prescription. I think part of the newfound happiness is not clinging to regret and failed opportunities the way I used to, and instead looking at all the great opportunities that still may be. At least that's what my Kabbalah instructor tells me. * This sentence is unintentionally suggestive. Today was a really rough day. It started out with an hour and a half in the dentist's chair. My dental philosophy doesn't seem to be paying off. It goes something like this: 1) Avoid the dentist for approximately three years at a time. 3) Upon your return, discover that you have approximately a dozen cavities, some of which are in such advanced stages that they need either root canals or crowns or jaw removal or some other complex procedure. 4) Suffer through 6 months to a year's worth of dental reconstruction, complete with tremendous pain and a bill for about 15 to 20 grand. 5) Spend the next two years paying down the bill and wondering if the dentist is being straight with you about how necessary all this work was, or if he's just buying himself a 5th car with your money. 6) Develop such an aversion to dentists and to the helpless feeling one gets when turning over your mouth to a stranger who can profit off of it that you fall out of the habit of going, which takes you back to Step 1. Right now I'm in the middle of Step 4. After the dentist I went to work and sacked the old shit with reasonable gusto for about 12 hours. But it was a bad day at the office. Lots of tension and anger and yelling and stuff. And I wasn't performing well. I was trying but coming up short, like Donovan McNabb. I think I am at a serious crossroads at work.* I sort of have to figure out if this is where I want to be and if so, I need to commit to it with a greater percentage of my emotional capacity and intellectual firepower. I've been told as much. They're like, "Hans, we like that you do x and y well and we think you're a nice guy. But until you learn how to do z, and I mean really do it, there's only so much pie here for you to consume." And I guess I want some more pie. We're all supposed to want more pie, right? And they're right, I need to improve my z. But learning to do z is going to be a pain in the ass, because in my heart I have no passion for z. And there are other places out there where maybe my knowledge of q could serve me well, could allow me to have a decent-sized slice of a different pie, a pie I'm more fond of. But in my heart I also know that I am lazy and I fear change and so I'll probably stay and learn a little z and get a little more pie. But I'd really like to go somewhere that appreciates my expertise in q. Although to be honest I don't think I really have a q. So I'll keep kicking along, eating as much pie as I can eat without pushing myself too hard. From the point of view of the government, I am an ideal consumer. Every bit I make goes right back into the economy, and then I'll take a big hit on something and I'll put it on a credit card. Then I'll pay off the credit card over the course of a couple year's time. I ain't saving squat outside of my pitiful retirement account. I am just a redistributor of money. There are lessons here for future generations. After my crap day sacking the shit and dealing with the communal unrest, I decide to take a cab home because it was 9:45 pm and I was hungry and tired. And wouldn't ya know I had a crazy ass cab driver who kept turning around 180 degrees in his seat to talk to me as we drove up the West SIde Hwy. Here is a sample of what he had to say (apply thick Russian accent): "May I ask you question? Say you have someone in your life, I don't know, man, woman, whatever. I try to keep open mind. And this person, she tells you she has only kissed her boyfriend, nobody else. And then you are still her friend, nothing sexual I promise you. And then one day she tells you she kissed many men, maybe 200 men or more. On the lips. I tell her fuck you, you know what I say? She is just a bartender, just like I am only a taxi driver. We both give service, you know? But now she make lots of money and she thinks she is a star, you know? I mean, she can kiss as many men as she like, have sex with 1000 men, that is not my business. But she told me one thing and then she say that she actually kissed like 200 men. And so I told her this is bullshit, you know? It is like if you tell me you will meet me on this corner at 5:30 pm to drop off typewriter, and then I come at 5:30 pm and you never come. And then I see you and you tell me some more bullshit. You know, it is very hard. I maybe have to terminate friendship. Like when I ask you what smells like food, and you tell me "burger" and then I see you next week and you tell me you have not eaten burger in years. You are lying. I don't understand this. Please tell me if I am wrong. I must see this woman tonight, and I do not know what to tell her." This went on for the entire ride and then even after I paid he kept jabbering for another two minutes while I tried to be supportive and polite. He was all nervous and sweaty and I hope he doesn't hurt his poor friend, lying, kissing tramp that she may be. Moving in one week, kids. * My 157th such crossroads since I've been working at this company. Somehow I have managed to avoid taking either path on the first 156 crossroads.
I went with the Sierra Nevada and I didn't regret it. I did eat too many Cheetos. That's one I'll be thinking about as I clutch my stomach at work late Monday afternoon. In the end, it's always the damn Cheetos. Just like in the movies. By the way, Joe Monkeyweb is looking good and healthy and he's once again able to consume high-quality foods like sandwiches, Doritos, and Ice Cold Coca-Cola. Good to see him on the way back. Paul McCartney needs a protein supplement or some HGH or something. He looks like somebody's spinster aunt. Creepy. The Eagles 4th quarter clock management was maddening. Perhaps sometime this spring, when he is doing some work around the house, Donovan McNabb will discover his sense of urgency. Of course, I am psychotic about this point. It drives me nuts to see teams dicking around when the clock is against them. In fact, once your team is down by 2 scores, you should start hurrying your ass to the line of scrimmage every play -- no matter how much time is left. I'm talking about even in the 2nd quarter. Yet the Eagles, down ten with three minutes to go, were milling around like they were at a barbecue. Andy Reid looked a little too calm on the sidelines, too. Get your team going. Whatever. Just a shame that the Patriots got to win again, without playing a great game. I hate Bush-lover Tom Brady. It was a lot of fun and I hope to someday host a small gathering at our own place for some sporting event. You're all invited. Yes, you too. Speaking of our own place, this is a good time to announce that effective February 15th, the verbungle.com offices are moving to Stuyvesant Town, located on Manhattan's rough and tumble East Side. In a related news item, the wife and I will be relocating there as well. I have no idea where I want to spend the rest of my life, but I will say that in the short run I am tickled pink to be moving away from the annoying Upper West Side and into a really nice place. Yes, I'll be living in the projects, people. I also have a definite history in this particular housing complex, one that I will describe at length in a later post. Here is what I am most excited about (to be amended as I discover more about the area): -new offices are nestled comfortably between the Monkeyweb
compound and Big Jim Lang's Eastside Aviary I am a happy man right now. Work and the move are going to suck for the next few weeks, but then life should be looking up. I don't know when exactly I became a Bud Man. I never sat down and said, "Damn, Budweiser tastes good." In fact, I'd describe it as a pretty unremarkable pissy domestic bladder-filler. Drinking good beer is a fine thing to do. But you need to have a reliable pissy domestic bladder-filler during thin times. For this purpose, I used to drink Rolling Rock back in high school. Then it was Old Milwaukee in college. Then Rolling Rock again after I moved back to New York. Especially when I was living on East 9th Street and the deli on the corner would cut 12 packs in half and sell the halves for $5.50. Rolling Rock is a pretty good bladder-filler. In bottles only. But it definitely tastes like piss. Pabst, as recently discussed on the PBdotC, has its merits. In cans only. Only problem I have with Pabst is the hipster factor -- it seems like about 48% of Pabst drinkers do it sarcastically. Not me. I drink it with a pure heart and good intentions. Never cared much for Miller, and Coors is out of the question. So somehow, somewhere along the line, I started drinking Bud Tall Boys. I definitely like the 16 oz. size. And I think maybe the red, white, and blue label makes me feel like I'm being a good American when I drink it. But it's not very good. I deserve better. Check out our happening Super Bowl predictions! 2/3/05: State of the Internet Address Popin' ain't easy. That was my headline for today's entry. In the grand NY
Post tradition of r But before I went ahead with my post, I decided to test a theory of mine. The theory goes something like this: anytime you come up with an idea that you think is original and good, go ahead and look it up on google. And goddamit somebody else thought of it first. Sure enough, at least 3 other people across the cyberscape had come up with "popin' ain't easy" before me. In the past, semi-original ideas like mine passed as original and that was that. There was no looking stuff up. You said something, people chose whether or not to laugh, and you moved on. Now you can't just live with that teeny bit of satisfaction that comes with a good line. Same thing happened to me recently with poo-gina (don't click, these definitions are very unpleasant). This leads me to Conclusion #1: The internet is too big. We could cut this thing down by about 30% and it'd still be plenty big enough. I'd start by banning anybody who comes up with my good ideas before I do. Another thing that's really been bothering me lately is spam. I know, spam's not new, nor is complaining about it. But as verbungle.com has matured from a simple, one-room mom and pop operation with only about a dozen employees into the multinational conglomerate that it is today, we have seen a marked increase in the spam we receive. And so we feel compelled to address it. I think what I hate most about spam is that it takes advantage of the loneliness in all of us. Let's face it, the internet is a full of lonely people. One of the reasons we come to the internet is because we crave the acceptance of others. Each of us, in some way, is lonely. Teenagers with bad acne, married fathers of 12, NBA shooting guards. All lonely. Even Bill Clinton is lonely on some level. Because loneliness doesn't necessarily mean you're unloved, or that nobody will have sex with you. Sure, it can mean that, but it also might mean that there's some tiny part of you that nobody is touching, and maybe it's the one part you're most proud of. And a lot of people go to the internet to find a way to touch this part of themselves. So when our little email notification icon pops up, or we look in our mailbox and see new (6), there is small tingle of excitement, a sense that another human being has reached out to us. That someone is thinking of us. That someone thinks we have merit. And then you look a little closer and it's "BREAK WALLS APART WITH YOUR HUGE COCK" or some such. And you realize that not only is nobody telling you how great you are, or even saying "What's up?", but instead they are hitting you with the double affront of "I would like your money" and "Look, we know you have boner problems, dude." Fuck them. Therefore, Conclusion #2: People who send spam deserve nut punches. People who make pop-up ads that say "Your computer is unprotected against viruses, click 'yes' to protect your computer," preying on the technology-impaired, deserve vigorous kicks in their perineums. People who create and distribute viruses and spyware and worms and all that shit deserve to have their entire lower pubis removed completely.* The reason these punishments are so harsh is that these mofos** are destroying something that is quite nearly perfect. The internet should not be laced with land mines and unsolicited business propositions. It should be each surfer's course to chart for themselves, a golden journey to whatever holy or unholy place that person wants to go.. And I realize it's naive to think the internet would be any different than anything else, that it would somehow be purer or freer from commerce than say, cable TV. But it's still in the early stages, so I think we can afford to think in big and happy terms when discussing its future. Anyway, that's about it for what's wrong. Other than these two areas, the internet is strong. Very strong. And of course the bigness of the internet is what makes it so great, so you can actually scratch Conclusion #1. For the most part, internet, I'm liking what you're doing. You're looking good. And I see great things for the two of us in the future. Oh, one more thing: enough with the fancy flash intros. Just the goods, please. A couple of days ago I posted a "Name That Solo" which nobody has gotten so far. Before I forget, I will tell you what it is, in invisi-text if you don't want to read it. To read the artist and title, you will have to highlight the next sentence: "King Harvest (Has Surely Come)," by The Band. One thing that's interesting about this song, although not unique, is that it starts with the chorus rather than a verse, and also that it ends with a guitar solo, rather than returning for another verse or at least a chorus. Plus it's just a damn fine song. Here's the full empeetrey for those who want it. Name That Solo, the Google Image Search Game, the Wheredat? Game, the Lyric Stumpah. Sometimes several on the same day. I realize now maybe it's overkill. Form here on out, the stumpahs will be updated daily, but we'll only roll out each of the other games occasionally. For "NTS" and "Wheredat," that probably means once a week. So from now on, if there's a picture on here, you can just look at the picture and enjoy it. You don't have to tell me where it is unless you really want to. If it's a "Wheredat," we'll clearly mark it as such. Thanks. Tomorrow I may enlist you for some advice. * Some of these punishments were designed for men, and I
leave it to a woman to come up with similar punishments for female offenders. Dipak's running a little Super Bowl box pool at his office if anyone's interested. You can reach him at inxe at aol dot com. I don't recommend watching the Super Bowl without owning at least five boxes in at least three separate pools. It can turn into a very long day if you're not conscientious enough about your gambling. It's like going on an all-day hike and forgetting to pack a sandwich. Joe Monkeyweb likes to talk about how they need to bring back Bud Bowl, and I am in full agreement with him on this one. Bring it back, and let's wager the shit outta that thing. Why they all of a sudden thought we as a nation were sick of Bud Bowls is a complete mystery. People who don't like Bud Bowl are the same people who watch Leno. The Bud Bowls were almost always close, and there were plenty of memorable moments. Of course you remember The Freezer's performance in Bud Bowl I. It still sends chills down my spine. Let's bring it back. OK, I just saw this site, and maybe it's best to let our fond Bud Bowl memories live on, rather than tainting them by bringing it back. Wow was that bad. I think perhaps Bud Bowl had reached the end of the line. If they bring it back, we need some fresh blood in there. And no Marv. I don't have much else, so I am just going to announce another new exciting feature here at the website. I'm sure you're sick of my daily crap about life here in New York City. So I hope you are as pleased as I am to welcome the joint blog from Mr. & Mrs. Smal, residents of suburban New Jersey. Here is their debut.
Before we move on, we want to send out a hearty verbungle.com welcome to a New Discreet Reader (NDR), Dave C. from Detroit. One of the most rare and delightful of species, the NDR is defined as anybody who reads this site who I don't know personally. If you've ever hoisted an Old Style with me, you aren't an NDR. If you've thrown me a bounce pass only to watch in frustration as it rolled off my fingertips, you're not an NDR. If you've ever slipped me the creeper, not only aren't you an NDR but I'd appreciate you keeping it under your hat. Finally, if you've ever stabbed me in the face with a broken bottle while your buddy held me down on the floor of a Brooklyn nightclub, you aren't an NDR and I'd appreciate a long-overdue admission of guilt and/or apology. But as far as we know, Dave C. is an NDR, and he has also piped in with a nice contribution right off the bat, a review of Hans Bungle's childhood hero Steve Kemp. In my heart, I'd like to disagree with his assessment, but in my head I know he's right on target. Thanks for the input Dave, and welcome. Get comfortable, make yourself at home, and help yourself to a nice hot bowl of our complimentary HTML. One thing I've been proud of during this January-February transition week is the outstanding job I've done in avoiding Super Bowl hype. Although I guess I am vaguely aware of the usual fabricated plot-lines: Patriots going for the dynasty, T.O.'s uncertain playing status, Tom Brady's certain annoying status, the Eagles looking for their first Super Bowl win, McNabb trying to become the 2nd African-American QB to win it all, Belichick's "genius", etc. And that's all stuff I've heard despite the fact that I haven't watched ESPN all week and I've been making a conscious effort not to give a shit about this game until it's absolutely necessary to do so. That said, it'd be lovely if the Eagles win. But I really don't care. In fact, here is a mini-list for you (not to be confused with today's new actual list): Things I care about more than this year's Super Bowl:* -The Iraqi elections In fact, the only things I care less about than the Super Bowl are the Knicks and Yankees. Perhaps my passion as a sports fan is dwindling. On to the games, which are really the reason you come here. Guys like Sita can barely be bothered with the rest of this bullshit site, including the rules for the games, so frenzied is he for a victory in the stumpah game. He did make it clear that he wants no sympathy in the stumpah, blaming his struggles with the 12 noon rule on his own internal clock: "When left to my own devices, I crash at 3:30 or 4 and wake at 10 or so (if I'm lucky)." Friend, you and I must have bought our internal clocks at the same store. The Weber's on Broadway between 71st and 72nd, right? I thought so. Anyway, because I respect and share your odd sleeping patterns, I may work out a solution for the next round of shtumpage. But for the remainder of round 1, we will continue with the noon start time for accepting answers. Same for all the games. Today we've got: Enjoy; no answers before noon eastern, please. VH1 Classic-inspired trivia question of the day: How many drinks does George Thorogood drink in the "I drink alone" video? You can answer this one whenevah. * In addition to all the things I care most about, like my
family and all that crap What a crew! I'm thinking Sir Mix-a-lot is gonna handle the vocals for Alice in Chains in addition to his own set
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