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Here's an example of setting yourself up for failure. At 1:52am last night, one day into what will be a busy and important week at work, I decided to set up a Blogger account, in anticipation of one day getting a Mac and abandoning this lame Microsoft web publishing program and the entire world it represents. It's the same sort of fantasy-living that people do when they play the lottery, I guess. Picking out cars and houses and whatnot. Anyway, should my Macintosh dream ever come true, I want to continue to host my own site, but I would like to use some free web-based software that allows me to publish from anywhere at any time on any platform. So my idea was that I would use the Blogger software for those future posts, and then link from my new Blogger-spawned home page to all of these dead old pages that I built with Frontpage. But figuring stuff like that out takes some time and ingenuity. I had neither last night. But at least I have registered www.verbungle.blogspot.com (turns out I actually registered a year ago!). I will say this: that Blogger software is easy as shit to use! Holy smokes! I dunno if it's as good as movable type or any of the other ones, maybe it's too restrictive in terms of layout. I theoretically care about aesthetics and design and all that shit, but as you can see from this bad boy** it's not my strong suit. To me the blog itself, including any and all tricked-out design features, is primarily a canvas for you to deliver your powerful artistic vision, your content, your message to the world, your hack-ass trivia games. Whatever the case, I've been living in the dark ages here, manually and badly doing what any of these other programs will do automatically and well. I may make the transition prior to my Mac purchase in 2009. The only drawback might be that having such ease of postage could one day tempt me to post from work, something I'm proud to say I've never done. At the same moment as I started my blog investigation, I decided to open up my dead laptop and remove the hard drive. I don't know why I did this. Was it morbid curiosity, some sort of computer autopsy? Or was I actually looking to problem-solve? I suppose I could replace the hard drive fairly cheaply (around $100) and then the old beast might possibly start up again, I don't know. Do I even want that? That computer's been nothing but trouble for me. I'd rather not spend one more red cent* on it, especially if its return to life means I never get the Mac that I crave. Maybe I wanted to pull out the hard drive with the hopes that I could recover the data on it. Maybe I wanted to smash it all with a heavy-bottomed skillet. I don't know. But 1:52 am on a school night is not the time to start projects of any kind, let alone two at once. I didn't get far on either and I managed to tire my ass out as well. But I have still been trying extra hard at work. That's two days and counting of the new commitment. *** Big Jim could not find the original "Crack, Whisky, Whore" -- it's ether dust at this point. But he was able to locate a later, shorter, and admittedly less inspired pass at the same project. It starts at the bottom and goes up, but it doesn't really matter. You might not like it but it won't cost you any money to read it. Also funny to note how the time stamps are all screwy.
>>> Big Jim Lang 10/05/98 04:46pm >>> *** So I have a new and totally annoying challenge all set to go. I will post the lyrics to a song, ONE WORD per day, until someone can name the song. It's sort of a combination of lyric stumpah and name that tune. No googling please. For ten points, here is the first example (note that this particular song actually starts with the chorus, but that would make it too obvious so I am starting with the first verse): Well That's it. I predict somebody gets it tomorrow with the introduction of word 2.
* Is the term "red cent" racist? Does it refer to a time when pennies had
Indians on them? Or is it just a reference to the color of the copper? Did they
used to be more red? 11/28/05: A nineteen year-old girl who acts twenty-five, a matchbook, a deeply gratifying lapse in judgment
Today was a good Sunday, not too much working man's Monday angst. Nice temperature outside. Ate some delicious food, read the paper. I'll be honest: I don't read the paper every day. But I used to read it every Sunday, and I think I will begin doing so again. Coffee, Donut, New York Times. BJL and I once had like a three-week email going back and forth, with each response just listing three items like that. The idea was to find three things (usually physical objects but often states of being) that together gently or not-so-gently hinted at a night of debauchery, or at least an afternoon of noble desperation. Then the reader could put the three things together and create the scene in their own head. At least I think that was the idea. The starting point was, of course, Crack, Whisky, Whore. I wish we still had that email somewhere. Oh BJL, righteous God of the Internets, please find it and forward it to me. Don't post the whole thing in the comments, please. I imagine it needs some editing before it can be made public. Nestle Crunch, $5 porno tape, creaky twin bed. Play along! It's fun! They say that if you are ever able to clearly photograph a Stuytown squirrel, the squirrel will eat your soul. If I had more energy and creativity tonight, I might compose a list of facts about Stuytown squirrels, a la the Chuck Norris, Vin Diesel, and Mr. T fact generators. But I will leave that to you instead. Five points for every Stuytown Squirrel Fact that you create and submit. Maximum two submissions per person. Played hoops this Saturday. It was good. I actually made what felt like a nice move* on the fast break (the old "fake the pass and go in for the layup") for the first time in maybe 9 years. The guy totally bought my lame fake. Basketball gives me great joy. D. Lee was going on for about five years about how the Knicks needed to dump some salaries and rebuild through the draft, as painful as it might be at the start. I kind of thought, nah, rebuilding's a pain in the ass, and there are no guarantees. Teams can go decades rebuilding. He was like, No, I would gladly watch a bunch of young guys with energy win 20 games than watch a bunch of overpaid guys win 35-40 games every year with no hope of improving. I think this year's Knick team is as close as we'll get for a while to fulfilling D. Lee's wishes. 3 good rookies full of youthful vigor, complete with fuckups, tantrums and occasional brilliance. To be honest I haven't watched much of this year's edition, but if Saturday's game is any indication I will start tuning in. From the highlights that looked like a thriller. Say you hail a cab for you, your wife, and your baby at 60th and 2nd. You ask him to go to 20th between 1st and C. He looks at you with confusion and asks you to repeat the destination, which you do, even saying "Two-Zero" to clarify that you don't want 28th. He nods, and begins speeding down 2nd avenue with attitude, snaking his way through narrow gaps in traffic. Fine. Then he cranks his Bob Marley CD up about four volume notches in the back seat. You ask him to lower it becasue your baby is sleeping, and he complies. A few moments later, he seems to turn the volume back up again, but you're not entirely sure. When you get to 27th street, he suddenly makes an erroneous right turn. You shout to him that he's making a mistake, and he slams on the brakes, but it's too late, he can't get back onto 2nd avenue. He keeps heading West, and you reiterate the address about three times, expecting him to make a right on 3rd and circle back. Instead, he goes straight through to Lex, again making this decision over your protests. 20th street...between 1st Avenue and Avenue C, you repeat at least two more times, even adding that he will now need to go East again. At Lexington, he makes a left and starts heading downtown, so you assume he's gotten the point, will hang a left at some point, and you'll be on your way. Knowing that Gramercy Park marks the end of Lexington Avenue at 21st street, you implore him to turn left on 22nd street and head East, but he's going too fast and he misses the turn. Now you'll be forced to wrap around Gramercy Park, son of a bitch. He makes a right and starts heading West on 21st street, again going too fast. As you approach the West side of the park, you shout, "Turn left!" but unbelievably he blows through this left hand turn and goes over to Park Avenue South. At this point, you lean up past the partition and shout to him, over the music, "YOU NEED TO MAKE A LEFT HERE AND THEN GO BACK EAST ACROSS 20th STREET!!!" He makes the left on Park and is almost ready to zoom past 20th when you shout, again, that he needs to make a left on 20th. He makes the left and you start what should be a straight shot home. But at each avenue you pass, he puts on his turn signal. GO STRAIGHT HERE, you say each time. He does as you say, but clearly has no idea what's going on. As you get to 20th between 2nd and 1st, you inform him that there are speed bumps on this block**, so please be careful. He then drives that entire block at around 4mph, no exaggeration. You finally get to 1st avenue and remind him that he needs to KEEP GOING STRAIGHT, which he does. After two more attempts to turn prematurely, he gets you home. At no time is there open hostility in the cab -- he seems to have made an honest, if intergalactically incompetent, attempt to get you where you need to go. Language barrier or not, you're pretty sure he is on drugs. As you finally pull over, the meter reads $9.30. How much do you give him? Just wondering. No more Whiteydat challenges. cW gets one point for locating Mr. T***, nobody got either of the previous two questions right and only two people responded at all, so we're moving on. For the record, #55 stole my sneaks and #38 stole my tape. Both as pranks, I think. The next four to six weeks are going to be a major grind. If I come out on the other end without messing things up too badly, my life could improve. If I screw up, it could get measurably worse. For my part I plan on bringing my game up as high as I can at work. No more wiseass remarks. Higher levels of concentration and commitment. Nicer outfits. Three shaves a week. Less checking of my favorite websites during biz hours. Basically, no more fucking around. Time to grow up a bit. How long do you think this newfound sense of energy and dedication, most likely triggered by four days of rest, will last? For five genius points, what temperature should all beer be served at?
* However, if I ever actually saw this move on tape, it would be so slow and
clumsy that I might just cry. You don't have to tell me -- I know the e-logging's been lighter than Jm J. Bullock's Ballys lately. A lot of days, no posts. There have been ample chances to type up some bullshit and publish it, but here at verbungle.com we feel the same way about our content as Orson Welles feels about Paul Masson wine. But now it feels right, so let's go. We will give you a brief recap of the last four days, in reverse order. It'll be just as if we shared these days together! Friday: The day after Thanksgiving may be the most underrated day of the year. In fact, I am going to go ahead and call it my favorite holiday. It doesn't get nearly the respect it deserves, maybe because it doesn't have a cool name. Forget "Black Friday" and any other consumerism-based nicknames. That's not what this day is really about. The Friday after Thanksgiving is one of the only truly free days of the year. There's no pressure to hang with relatives. There's no driving through ice storms or spending all day in the kitchen. No obligation to buy anyone a gift. There's no work the day before, and there's no work for TWO DAYS afterward. It's a rare chance to spend a day completely lost in yourself, doing whatever the hell you want without a thought or care for anything or anyone else. Me Day. That's what I'm gonna call it from now on. Or maybe Free Day. So the wife and I spent our Me Day walking around with the baby. It was nice. No anxiety whatsoever, just fun and smiles and a nice long lunch. Since we are Americans by birth, we did manage to squeeze in a little shopping. After weeks of subtle cajoling and desperate whining, I actually got the wife to enter the Apple Store with me. It was a geek frenzy. Total chaos. I bet there were 500 people in the place. I wanted to look at the 15" PowerBook. I thought that maybe after the wife ran her fingers across its sleek abdominal muscles, she'd fall in love with this slender thoroughbred the same way I have. After waiting for about five minutes while douches right and left used the floor models for all sorts of annoying personal business -- booking trips, checking sports scores, emailing old friends -- a computer opened up and I dragged the wife over as quickly as we could get there. She looked at it for a couple of minutes and didn't really seem to form an opinion one way or the other. I had a few questions, so I hauled over the first available Genius I could find. Unfortunately, this Genius had even less knowledge than I did, pretty much across the board. Software? I knew more. Deals and discounts? I knew more. Compatibility? Maybe he knew more, but he answered my questions with such profound uncertainty that I mentally dismissed everything he said. The one question he did answer was: If I want to upgrade from the 80GB, 5400 rpm factory standard hard drive to the 100 GB, 7200 rpm dealie, can you do that here in the store? The answer was no. For that you had to buy online. In the store, they could install extra memory, but even that would take a couple of hours, and on a day as busy as today I took that to mean three weeks. He suggested that instead we could buy it online, right then and there on their internet connection. It seemed like a lame idea, but the wife was so dizzy from the masses of bodies banging into one another that she almost agreed. In the end, we decided to think about it, and if we wanted to we could order it online at home. When we thought about it, however, we came to realize that we are in no position to be dropping $3000 -- and that's how much it would cost after all was said and done, $3000! -- on a toy. So I quickly shifted my sights to the 14" iBook, which was marked down $100 today, but even with the discount it'll run a couple of grand after a few simple upgrades. Still way too much for us to be spending right now. We got a mouth to feed. So no computer for me. We will continue to share this one. Married readers out there, how many of you share a computer with your wife or husband? I should have listened to BJL and bought the HP Laptop that Walmart was offering for $398. Whatever. It was also a day of sightings: PBdotC, either I saw you Friday around 4pm on Houston and Broadway or you have a NYC twin. I hollered out to you like three times but I didn't really scream as loud as I could because I wasn't sure it was you. Do you have New Balance sneakers with some maroon on 'em? And do you have a soul patch?!?! If so, I saw your ass, baby. Happy Me Day. I also stopped at Lombardi's for a disappointing pizza pie. They didn't give it their usual love and care. The place was mobbed, and on the way in I could have sworn I saw Hardy Fischer, a high school classmate and a true original. Here's a verbungle.com flashback to refresh your memory on Hardy:
If you were a kid who cut class all the time, you managed to locate other
kids who did the same thing. If you were cool, you went to the park and smoked
pot. If you were me, you either a) went into Stuytown to play basketball with
the 35 year-old still-live-at-home dudes, or b) decided for some reason to hang
out in the school library. They had some magazines in there -- I remember
reading the Ebony magazine where they went to Magic Johnson's house and he had
an "Isiah Room." Lord knows they probably had some fun in that room. There were
also a lot of responsible kids who would go to the library to study for exams
and work on papers and stuff during a free period, kids who had plans for
productive lives. I remember sitting in there with another screw-up, a towering
delinquent named Hardy Fischer, and we'd play a game which consisted of
whispering a chosen word back and forth across the table at increasing levels of
volume until we were shushed by the librarian. The two words I distinctly
remember using were "zany" and "smegma" (this was when the term "smegma" was
brand-new to us). Once we were reprimanded, we would return to our Sports
Illustrated or Ebony and give the librarian a gesture of contrition, like
"Pardon us, what were we thinking?" Within a minute, we were at it again. And it
got pretty damn loud. Inevitably, the game would end with me shouting the word
"zany" or whatever the specified word was, and the librarian kicking us the hell
out. I think Hardy always respected me for really committing to the game. When
we received the boot, we never argued at all, just packed up our things and
shook our heads as we walked out amidst the stares. Two men ahead of their time. Or eating delicious pizza. Thursday: Had a great Thanksgiving, hope you did too. Got to see my mom, pop, sis and bro-in-law, along with the bro-in-law's family and their kids. Lots of kids, running around and screaming. Ate good food. Mashed potatoes, yams with marshmallows, creamed onions, collard greens, pumpkin pie, etc. Good stuff. No turkey, though. Too many turkeys have to die each year. I won't be a part of it anymore. Didn't spend enough time thinking of things to be thankful for. I guess I will just have to reiterate my thankses from the last two years, and add one major thank for the arrival, good health, and easygoing demeanor of our beautiful baby Bungle. She's been an absolute treat and I can't get enough of her. She's even better than that 15" PowerBook. The one I won't get tomorrow. Wednesday: Wednesday started off with a painful root canal (or, actually, the first half of one, more to come) and it didn't get much better after that. Kids, take care of your teeth when you're young or you'll end up a crusty old yuckmouth like me. As shitty as Wednesday was, it was way better than... Tuesday: ...when I made a real ass out of myself in front of the higher-ups again. It's official. I need to keep my mouth shut at all times. The things I say are incredibly stupid and inappropriate. Here's an example: On Tuesday, we went to Philly so we could do some focus group testing. The way it works is, they bring in about 60 women and they play them a tape of the show we're trying out. We watch the women through a one way mirror, or two way mirror if you prefer, whatever the thing is where you can see them but they can't see you. The women all get little electronic dials (sort of like Atari 2600 paddles), and as they watch the tape, they turn the dial to the right when they like what they're seeing and to the left if they don't like it. In our room, we have a monitor that displays each woman's response as the show plays. After the show is over, the women fill out some questionnaires to be reviewed later. While they are filling them out, we take a few minutes to make a cursory analysis of the paddle results (Band Name!). Simple enough. We had one group of women at 11am, and another at 1pm. After both groups were done, the computer dude graphed their results against each other. They were strikingly similar -- at the same points in the show where the first group had dialed right to indicate a favorable response, the second group had done the same thing. The same for the negative responses -- they were almost exactly in sync between the two groups. It was pretty neat, and it constituted helpful feedback. There was just one point in the show, like 19 minutes in, where the 11am group had a favorable response and the 1pm group had a negative response. Here we are, in this room, me, a few co-workers, some higher-ups, and some representatives from the focus group tech crew. Everyone's trying to figure out why the 11am group liked this one part of the show and the 1pm didn't. I started thinking perhaps it was an external factor. "Maybe somebody in the 1pm group broke wind at the 19 minute mark," I offered. Out of the ten people in the room who heard this crack, three laughed. The higher-ups were silent. My boss glared at me in a way that indicated he'd most definitely be kicking my ass if we were alone on the street at that moment. I wanted to kill myself. Kids, another message from Uncle Hans: as much as you may enjoy fart jokes, you need to slowly wean yourself from them. If you wait too long, you'll end up like me, a prisoner of your own immaturity. Although inside I still think it's sorta funny: a bunch of Philly housewives, staring intently at the screen, all dialing left at the same moment, without even realizing what it is that's giving them a negative response. The answer: somebody farted! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! *** Okee dokee, BC MI brilliantly answered the last Whiteydat challenge, with his answer of Rick from Illinois (#46). Ten points total at the discounted Withey Alumnus Rate. Quick Rick Notes: Decent guy, although he could get pretty emotional when he was drunk. Like he would all of a sudden start yelling and acting like he was the protector of all that was righteous. That got boring pretty quick. Rick was another bodybuilder type. By not lifting weights, I was definitely in the minority in my dorm. We had some serious lumber. I do remember that when junior year rolled around Rick arrived on campus in a fairly new 280 or 300 ZX. He thought he was the man for a few weeks there, until he fell asleep on the interstate and totaled it. He escaped unhurt. He did a cool crazy neck vein lizard man imitation. He was a lefty. Enough about Rick, on to the next Whiteydat question. I was thinking maybe these challenges are lame for the folks who weren't a part of the Whiteness of Withey, but Kissel assures me they're fun for one and all. Incidentally, I am in the picture (#24) sporting a ridiculously skinny head. I wish I had that metabolism today. There is also a bust of Mr. T. in the picture, if you can tell me where it is you get 1 point (Withey alumni and Kissel not eligible). Here's today's question: For ten points each, give me the number of the person who stole my Xavier McDaniel Spot-bilt sneakers, and the number of the person who stole my Brucecomp (TM) Bruce Springsteen compilation tape. Both items were eventually returned. One guess to a person, and onetime Withey residents may weigh in immediately on this one. 11/22/05: Treacherous Sledding Yeah, nobody got yesterday's Oggdat Challenge. The fashion victim we were looking for was #34, whose first name was Mark and whose last name I will not say. All you need to know is that he went by the name "Rocky." That's right, if you saw him in the elevator on your way to class on a Tuesday afternoon, you'd be all, "What's up, Rocky?" No irony, either. A couple quick notes on Rocky. He was a pretty nice guy, actually. Good student, built like a tank. He was from the same hometown, Marshfield, WI, as my roommate Oly (#23). They were both sophomores when I was a freshman, so they could have just stuck to themselves and their crew and been too cool for school, but instead they made a real effort to take me under their wings and introduce me to people. Especially Oly. If there was a party, he invited me. I will always appreciate that. There's an episode of Taxi where Jim flashes back to his college days. He's at Harvard in the late 60's, a real straight arrow, varsity sweater, the works -- he's completely opposed to the counterculture and the abundance of drugs on campus. His girlfriend tries to get him to loosen up and sample a pot brownie, and he refuses. Finally he gives in and takes one bite, and after initially showing no reaction at all, suddenly his expression contorts permanently into the "Iggy Face". I had my Iggy Face Moment on my first day in college at Wisconsin. I hadn't been much of a drinker in high school, maybe actually got incoherent three or four times and beyond that I would occasionally have a beer or three and it made me feel like a big man. But on that first day at college, my world changed. I got to my dorm in the late afternoon and my roommate wasn't home. I started to unpack and after an hour or so he returned (he had been out playing basketball). We made some small talk and after he took a shower, changed, and slathered himself in Brut aftershave, he walked me down the hall to Rocky's room, where there was a mini-party (maybe 14 people) in progress. Mostly sophomores, some really cute, if big-haired, girls. Oly introduced me around the room, and Rocky reached into the fridge and handed me an Old Milwaukee. That simple gesture of goodwill -- our beer is your beer, we are all in this together, let's have some fun, kid -- went a long way. My eyes lit up. In a rookie move, I believe I offered him some money, which he refused with a wave of his hand. Beers just kept coming my way all night and they didn't stop coming my way until about a year ago. I thank Rocky and Oly for igniting the first real sparks in my long and dysfunctional relationship with booze. Field trip to Philly for work on Tuesday. As far as I can recall, I've never once left New York City for work since I joined this company. That must mean I'm a real player. So let's get going on another Oggdat Challenge. One of my most memorable nights in college came during a snowstorm freshman year. There was a nice hill over by the Liz Waters dormitory across campus, and as the snow built up it created a perfect if potentially unsafe slope for sledding. About twenty of us grabbed cafeteria trays and headed over as the snow continued to fall. It was a tradition. However, we knew it was going to be a little dangerous, especially because kids from all over campus were heading over at the same time we were, which was going to make for intense tray traffic on the hill. There was one Withey resident who was perhaps a little too into the whole danger element -- in fact, all he wanted to do was get to the hill so he could smash into people and hopefully injure them. As we walked towards the hill, he began to sing. It was a song originally performed by a band that helped define 70's soft rock, but this young man turned it into an something ominous. Where it was once a simple song warning us all of the dangers of love, he twisted it into a paean to violence. For ten points. what number resident was this psycho? And for another ten, what song was he singing? Withey alums may answer at 5pm HST and will receive half point values for both questions. This was a pretty awesome post, I thought, except for the stupid ending that I don't get. 11/21/05: He's a Super Party Animal, his name is... I read crappy magazines so you don't have to. In the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly, there is an awesome interview with Mr. Billy Joel. I was surprised to discover that Billy Joel the human being is almost as annoying as Billy Joel the recording artist. My favorite quote: "I've always admired guys who walked away at the top of their game. DiMaggio did it. I've had my time in the sun." Wow. Where to start. Firstly and most obviously, there are a lot of people who come to mind as Billy Joel's athletic equivalent before JOE DIMAGGIO. I was thinking maybe World B. Free, because each man compiled a lifetime of big numbers without ever contributing anything meaningful to society. But then I realized that at least World B. Free had style. Billy Joel has no style. Billy Joel = Dave Kingman Another thing that bothers me about the quote is BJ's assertion that DiMaggio, and by extension BJ himself, "walked away at the top of their game."
Joe DiMaggio's average season for his first twelve years: .329, 29 HR, 122 RBI Maybe John Elway or Pete Sampras or Barry Sanders would have been a better example of a guy who walked away on top. When it comes to BJ himself, I guess he figures he went out at the top of his game because his final "pop" album*, released in 1993, did contain a couple of top 40 singles in "River of Dreams" and "All About Soul". But can you honestly say you've ever listened to either of those songs without getting a powerful urge to stab yourself in the throat? No. Those songs do not represent anyone at the top of his game, not even someone whose game was as consistently mediocre as Billy Joel's. In fact, those songs aren't even .262 12 HR, 71 RBI.
Billy Joel's average for all his albums prior to the final one: crap Billy also wants to clear something up: "I've seen references to my drinking Jack Daniels," he says indignantly. "I only drank scotch. Dewar's White Label." One more quote: "(As a kid) I didn't like rich people. And now I am one." Thanks Billy! *** Not all that memorable a weekend. Went to the dentist. Did 6 loads of laundry. Squeezed in a little basketball and felt old. Went to a one-year old's birthday party in Brooklyn. Baby birthday parties aren't really my scene, I reckon. Finished my book. Ran into EJ as she jogged through Stuytown. God bless her and everybody else who has the energy and discipline to run. That is way beyond me. As I was meticulously scrubbing down the old balls in the shower today, I calculated that I have now lived for 13,272 days. The average 13,272 day-old male American honky has 14,965 days left, so if I cut down on the Chunky Chews and avoid getting trampled by a herd of bison, I'm probably a little less than halfway home. In terms of quality, though, I've probably used up about 62% of my enjoyable moments in life. I'm assuming that once I hit 70, every waking minute will be consumed with nagging joint pain and thoughts of death's rapid approach. So those days almost shouldn't count. Kinda depressing. Of my 13,272 days, I've probably only used 230 or so of them wisely. But I've had a good time on about 10,500, so I can't worry too much about the mistakes and the missed opportunities. Fun comes first. That said, I would like to use my next 300 days in some kind of a strategic manner, because if I live them right they could make the ensuing 14,665 days much more pleasurable. And if I fuck 'em up, grey skies will be rolling in. We'll just have to see. I'd like to live a long life. Even when it's not all blowjobs and mashed potatoes, this earth is a good place to be. For the bevdat competition, we have no winner. I was drinking Coke! Out of a Pepsi cup! Can you imagine? That's because the mondo gas station across the way from my office has a huge soda machine that offers both Coke and Pepsi. Unheard of. I drank that whole cup down and then I started to tremble. I had so much fun looking back at "Whitey House '87" the other day that I have decided to create a numbered version from which I will draw the next few trivia challenge questions. The rules are gonna work like this:
1. I will ask a question or describe an event relating to somebody in the
picture, and you chime in with the number of the person who you think I'm
talking about. Here's today's scenario. About two weeks into my first semester in college, my roommate and another guy from our dorm floor and I took the bus out to West Towne Mall to do a little shopping. The guy who was not my roommate gave me a long speech about how important "fashion" was to him, how much he loved clothes and the art of looking good. He gave me this speech as he was trying on and then purchasing a White Spuds McKenzie sweatshirt at JC Penney. Tell me the number of this joker. Withey alums, you may answer at 11pm HST Monday 11/21/2005, assuming the right answer has not been given by then. Weird. I just checked my post from two years ago, and I was also pondering death and old age on that day:
11/21/3: * Before he "retired" to compose classical music (!) Wisconsinites love listening to their iPods. "It's like my own personal soundtrack," said Devin Roy, 19, of Fond du Lac. "It takes me away from all my worries, and puts me in a world where it's just me and my music," said Oscar Schmehling, 24, of DePere.
"It's amazing," said Hans Bungle, 36, of Sturgeon Bay. "When I've g I was walking down West 15th Street on my way to work today, a half hour late because the guy had come to put in the bathroom tile. A half hour late, blasting my iPod on shuffle, listening to "The Modern Age" by The Strokes and thinking that I had been right to defend that first Strokes album against the inevitable backlash and the dismissive cries of "derivative" and "phony" and all that. Those songs are just good. Nothing to take too seriously, just good tunes. Almost every one of 'em. If you don't like 'em, fine. But it seemed like a lot of people were looking for reasons not to like 'em. If you have to do that, then it must be pretty good. So I'm walking along, bopping my head, and suddenly someone comes up behind me and kicks me in the ass! I turned around, and it was my boss! He was angry at me because there was a work situation brewing and he'd been unable to reach me on my crappy cell phone that I never seem to feel when it vibrates*. Then he sees me, twenty steps ahead of him, blissfully lost in the musical madness of 2001, still not picking up the cell, not responding as he repeatedly calls out my name -- well, it was enough to make him kick me in the ass. All in good fun, right? I hope so. So the workday got off to a bad start and I hadn't even made it to work yet. It's been like that for about two weeks now. Lots of stuff to do, slow periods of progress interrupted by long meetings where nothing all that important gets discussed. At one of those meetings this afternoon, our department head was discussing something and I kind of got lost in a daydream. It's not that I wasn't paying attention -- but something he said got me thinking, and as I let my imagination slowly wind its way towards wherever it was going, I guess I tuned him out. Then, sure enough, like John Houseman in The Paper Chase, he just called on me out of the blue. "Hans...what do you think?" he asked. To be honest, I hadn't listened to a word out of his mouth for like five minutes before that, so I didn't really even know what he was asking. But rather than choosing:
Option A: come clean, admit that you had drifted off into goofytown and and that you had no
idea what he was asking, or: I instead chose: Option C: give a long-winded, meandering answer that touches not only on what you think he might be talking about but also on whatever is on your mind at that moment. I just started talking about like ten things at once, certain that one of them would strike a chord. I was looking around the room for one head to begin nodding, if not in actual agreement with me then at least recognizing that what I was saying made sense. But the nods didn't come, so I just kept talking. It was terrifying. I answered at least three questions, none of which had apparently been asked, because all I got was stupefied looks. Finally I decided to cut my losses by saying, "If you're asking me what I think about the meetings, I definitely think small groups works best." Everyone just kept staring at me like I had doodoo on my chin. Does it still somehow surprise people that I'm a moron? How is that possible? Dan K. sends in this excellent link from his hometown paper (quick registration req'd), and asks the question, Did the locals in Madison ever call ol' Hans Bungle a "Coastie"? Short answer: not to my face. I'll give a longer answer in a minute, but first let me say what I think that article is dancing around but is afraid to actually come out and ask: "Do Wisconsin residents dislike Jewish people?" I say this because the off-campus dorms the article refers to such as The Statesider have heavy Jewish representation. The state of Wisconsin has approximately 28,000 Jews, compared to a million in "Coastie" California, half a million in "Coastie" New Jersey and a million and a half in "Coastie" New York. Out of Wisconsin's 28,000 Jews, 4000 are undergrads at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Many of them are the "Coasties" whose personal style and cultural background clash so strongly with the Wisconsinites' sense of what's right. So for the article to write it off to some kind of "Coastal" bias is a little bit dishonest, IMO. I guess asking the question above would make for a much more serious article and a pricklier debate. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think there's a little (possibly subconscious) overtone of anti-Semitism in dressing up as a "Coastie" for Halloween. It's a nice little Petri dish to see how stereotypes develop. One guy grows up in Wisconsin, perhaps he's never met a "Coastie" before, and then he meets one who's an absolute douchebag. His immediate hypothesis: Coasties are douchebags. Too bad he didn't meet Hans Bungle first, we could have shared some laughs over an Old Style or two and I could have sent him down the path of righteousness and love of your fellow man. Because I must say my experience at Wisconsin was far from any of the stuff mentioned in that article. From the moment I arrived on campus in 1987 until I left town six years later, I was treated with nothing but love and kindness by nearly everyone I met. Sure, there was BC MI's truck driver roommate who often said things to me like, "Of course you don't want to go get ice cream -- you're from NEW YORK!" But he was just an idiot. I will give myself some credit; I definitely did not come to Madison thinking I was better than anyone because of where I came from. I was excited to meet new people from a different background than me. Truly I was. And from what I saw people felt the same way towards me. In many ways I was much more innocent than most of my new Wisconsin friends. They seemed like real men to me. They'd been drinking since they were 12, they could all drive stick shifts, and most of them had fucked multiple women in their young lives. Some of them could dunk basketballs on ten foot rims. They were like a race of supermen. I was fascinated by them and they taught me most of what I know today. I wouldn't have wanted to go anywhere else. I don't know what they saw in me. I guess I had a few New York stories to tell. None of them had ever seen a guy get shot dead on the sidewalk in broad daylight. None of them had nearly as much fisting experience as I did. But I think what they liked about me was that I was a Midwesterner at heart: I dressed like them, I talked like them, and within a few weeks I was drinking like them. Maybe my positive experience stems from the dorm I lived in. Remember, this was in 1987, so there were no internets, and no real way to find information without going to a library or making a bunch of phone calls or something. Forget that. So when I got my campus housing application, and it asked me to rank my top three dorm choices, I started with Ogg Hall and moved on down the list of Southeast dorms from there. My reasoning: Ogg and the rest of the Southeast dorms were right across the street from the SERF, the spanking, then four year-old rec center where I assumed, correctly, I could play some good basketball. I didn't know that the Southeast dorms were the less desirable place to be. The Lakeshore dorms were older, quainter, quieter, and had infinitely more character. The Southeast dorms were cold, modern, and devoid of charm. But the Lakeshore dorms were for angsty guys who listened to the Smiths and wore all black before that look even had a name. The Southeast dorms were for alcoholic hell-raisers who unironically wore University of Wisconsin sweat pants and weren't afraid to throw in the Steve Miller Band or The Kinks when the situation called for it. In Lakeshore you might hear an earnest freshman gently strumming an acoustic guitar on a Friday afternoon. In Ogg, we had 20 year-old father Tim K., singing Whitesnake songs at the top of his lungs in the stairwell until 3am while emptying pack after pack of cigarettes. In my soul, even if I wanted to, I could never have been anything but an Ogg man. And between those ugly concrete walls I met about a dozen fine men who I still consider friends today. Looking back, I could not have found a more welcoming, unbiased, unpretentious, fun-loving, good-hearted, open-minded bunch of dudes if I'd tried. So here's to finding common ground: Sweet Mother Alcohol's nurturing breast. And a mutual love of Ugg boots. Upon review of cW's appeal, the board of bungle has decided to award him 11 points for his correct answer of "Planet Claire," and will award Deion one point for at least naming the band correctly. Deion may appeal the appeal, but it won't get far. For nine genius points, tell me what hit song I am reminded of every time I look at my Lowepro camera case? For another four points, what beverage am I drinking in the picture above? As someone who cut class one day in high school so I could see Code of Silence (best line: "If I want your opinion, I'll beat it out of you.") this (via Metafilter) cracked my ass up several times. * I keep it on vibrate because I work in a field where a cell phone ringing at the wrong time can fuck everything up pretty good. But after the ass-kicking incident, I turned on the ringer again. And promptly got burned when the intro to "Immigrant Song" came blasting through during an afternoon meeting. It happened again today. I found myself resisting the powerful urge to talk out of my ass, instead shutting the fuck up several times. We had like a four hour meeting and I spoke up quite a bit over the course of the four hours. But as it wound down, I caught myself about to say something and then holding back like five times, for no particular reason other than instinct. After each of the five near-misses, I reviewed in my head the thing I'd been about to say to figure out its potential impact and each time, I was thankful as hell that I didn't say it. Had I gone ahead with the five comments, the results would have been negative every single time, with damage ranging from mild to catastrophic. I could probably take this information in a number of ways. If I were an optimist, I might say, "Wow, Hansie, you really have a great sense of timing -- that rare understanding of what to say and when to say it, and more importantly, when to say nothing at all." However, that is simply not true: earlier in the meeting, we had been joking around, and one guy who I don't know all that well was talking about his 73 year-old mom and he mentioned how cute she is. I chimed in with "Cute? She's a piece of ass." That's real bright. When coupled with that gem, the five-for-five mercifully-unsaid bonehead comments point to a more obvious conclusion: NEARLY EVERYTHING I SAY IS STUPID. STUPIDER STILL IS THE STUFF I ALMOST SAY, BUT DON'T. If that's the case, I guess the smartest thing I can do from here on out is place myself on permanent STFU status. Every time I am about to say something, I am going to put that potential statement through a rigorous set of cross-checks to gauge its level of appropriateness. If it doesn't come through clean on all sectors, it gets buried permanently in the STFU file. If, by the time I figure out that the potential statement is OK, the moment to say it has slipped by, I'll STFU then, too, knowing that it wasn't meant to be. This should take me down to like 92 words a day, mostly pleases and thank yous. If I had to start a business, I think it would be a smoothie shop. Sure, a sandwich shop is my true fantasy, but that's a little complicated. Smoothies are a sure thing. Think about it, the Smoothie probably celebrated its "It" moment in like 1992. But unlike flannel shirts and goatees, it didn't fade into embarrassment and obscurity when it was no longer in vogue. No, the smoothie just kept doing its thing and earning big money. And you know why? Because smoothies are delicious. Everybody likes 'em. Even a bad smoothie is pretty good. And if I had my own smoothie place and I needed to come up with a menu quickly, I could do it. Give me an afternoon, maybe $400 worth of various fruits, juices, and sorbets, and I'd have that shit figured out no problem. Just keep mixing shit up till it tastes good. To prove my point, I had a friend from high school who knew nothing more about fruit, juice, sorbet, or smoothies than you or me. I-n the early 90's, he opened a smoothie shop on Houston off West Broadway, and he made a killing. He sold it about eight years later, and I am pretty sure he made enough in that deal to retire. Retiring at 30. That's smooth. I went to Tekserve the other day and checked out some Mac laptops. My conclusions were as follows:
-I want the 15" Powerbook (with extra memory and a 100GB HD) in the worst way. I
want it so much I feel unclean. I think I will get a new computer in February. So keep the tips comin' in. For twelve points, name the song that contains these lyrics (no googling).
Some say she's from mars That's all we got today. 11/14/05: I'll slap his bald head Before we get to today's official post, we have a couple of announcements. The first one you've already guessed. Big Jim Lang has scraped every dark corner of the web and he has finally come up with gold. The photo of Xavier McDaniel choking Wes Matthews, the Holy Grail of Google Image Searches, has been unearthed! I am awarding Big Jim 10 points out of gratitude and respect. He is the Unquestioned Master of the Internets.
A couple notes on the picture.
1) I owned those Spot-Bilts that the X-Man is wearing. A kid in my dorm stole
them from me for like a week, then returned them. They need to be reissued. Go Wes! Next announcement: I was pleased to see that Ahmad Rashad won his 5th consecutive "Least Threatening Muslim" award last week. Well done, Ahmad. More weird news from this weekend: a young girl with the last name Borden may be at least partially responsible for the deaths of both her parents. Murders aside, it was a pretty good weekend. Went to a nice elegant wedding on Saturday night, although unfortunately it caused me to miss any festivities surrounding Joe Monkeyweb's birthday. Happy Kareem Adbul-Jabirthday, Joe. I drank two beers and a glass of wine at the wedding and I woke up Sunday feeling like I'd been through twelve rounds with Bald Bull. I ain't what I once was, which wasn't much. I've really been dreading this coming week at work, so Sunday afternoon could have been a day of intense anxiety and depression. But instead I hung out with the baby and watched some meaningless NFL football. 2 great games, Giants-Vikes (congrats JPW) and Bucs-'Skins (sorry PBdotC). I watched them with interest but I had no emotional commitment to any team. I was a football whore and it felt great. Maybe that's the secret to watching sports. Don't root too hard for anybody. Last pre-post question: do you think Penny Hardaway even gets free shoes these days? Official Post begins in 3...2...1... You know, there are lots of times every week where someone around me takes note of something that they think is especially dumb. Like all of a sudden someone from the next cube will say, "Man, our vacation policy is dumb." Or I'll be talking with a friend and they'll say, "The Real World? How can you watch that shit? It's so dumb." Or "Boy, the plot of The Eiger Sanction is so far-fetched and dumb." And inevitably I'm all, It is? I tend not to notice how dumb things are. But if I really think about it, there are plenty of things that I think are dumb, too. I think maybe I need to write them down. They're not necessarily things I hate, in fact some of them are things I like quite a bit. But they're all dumb as hell. Alias is real dumb. So is Lost. Not sure which is dumber. Having two Dunkin' Donuts within four blocks of each other in a city that doesn't give a shit about Dunkin' Donuts is dumb. Going to a scuzzy bar full scuzzoids and asking the bartender for "a bottle of your finest cognac" because you're trying to impress a girl...well, that's just dumb. Fashion is stupid. Hunting is kinda dumb. Sorry hunters. Please don't shoot me. Palm Pilots are now dumb. Tattoos are usually dumb. Unprotected anal sex with multiple partners after a night drinking way too much Zima is dumb. Especially the Zima part. The word "blog" is dumb. So is the concept, but less so. The People Magazine crossword puzzle is unbelievably dumb. Dogs and babies are dumb, don't let anybody tell you different. I'm dumb. In fact I'm so dumb that every day when I wake up I've forgotten I'm dumb. It takes me until like 3pm to re-learn that I'm dumb. Then I'm sad. Chain emails are dumb as hell, as are the legions of dumbasses who perpetuate them. I can't believe this concept has made the leap into the digital age. Lotteries are dumb. Unless we won.* Did we win, Vic? Cults are dumb. Even the big ones that have been around for thousands of years. Kansas is pretty dumb. Male tank tops are dumb. Fraternities and sororities = dumb. Spectravision with insertion restriction is dumb. Bad liars are dumb. Diamonds are dumb. Bobby Murcer, God love him, is pretty dumb. This post was dumb. You're dumb for wasting your time reading this far. To make you feel better, I will award ten Genius Points to the person who can tell me whodat? * We definitely didn't win the big loot. But maybe $250 grand? The next time you hear from me, you will be hearing from a multi-millionaire, courtesy of the Illinois State Lottery. The Friday jackpot is 262 million dollars. My share of the winnings will be one third of that, or roughly 87.3 million. I will choose the "lump sum" option, leaving me maybe $30 million after taxes (?). That's a lot of Monet*. You're probably wondering why I only get a third of the pot, how I got involved with the Illinois State Lottery, and how I could possibly be so certain I'm going to win. In order: -I am splitting the winnings three ways, with my buddies Vic and "Special." We call Special "Special" because in a moment of turbo-charged drunken bravado at Around the Clock back in 1999, he ordered the "2 Egg Special, with 10 additional eggs, please." Not only did he eat every last one of those dozen delicious eggs, but he enjoyed a nice calamari appetizer as well. Anyway, the three of us are going in on this thing together, 20 bucks a man, split everything down three ways. -Vic lives in Chicago, so he is buying the tickets. It was also his idea to enter. Thank you Vic! -The reason I know we are going to win is because for the last year and a half, Vic has been haunted by the number 11, and more specifically 11:11. Everywhere he looks, that number is right there. I wish I could remember all the weird 11:11's that have come his way, but I don't. What I do know is that 11:11 must signify something, and I feel confident that Vic has figured it out. It's the date of the lottery he is destined to win. So I am honored that he asked me to participate. I would send him the Monet to cover my $20 immediately, but I figure he can just subtract it from my $87.3 million. If (somehow) we don't win, I will send him $14 in the mail.** Vic called and left me a message yesterday, encouraging me to spend the next 48 hours fantasizing about what I'll do with all the cash. I like that advice. Obviously, I'll save a lot of the Monet in some kind of secure account. I am not going to end up no Curtis Sharp. I will also give a whole bunch to charity, but you don't care about that. And I will certainly make some outrageous, immensely stupid purchases for myself, my friends and my family, because that's The Bungle Way. But all that big-picture crap is boring, and we'll get to it in due time. What I want to address right now are the small-scale changes in my life that will come from my newfound wealth. Here are a few: -The winner of this round of Geniusmaker will receive $1200 in cash. So step up if you know some answers. Get in the game, people. -I will continue going to work every day, but I will do so dressed up as that scary mascot guy from the Burger King ads. If anyone has a problem, they can let me know. -I will buy this computer, and I'll load it up with cool shit. I will use a new web publishing program to publish this website. -I will buy the negative and all the rights to the Xavier McDaniel-choking-Wes Matthews photo.*** I will have it reproduced 50' x 70' on the side of a building downtown. A building which I will buy if necessary. The word "Sonics" on Xavier McDaniel's jersey will be replaced by the word "Verbungle," and the "Lakers" on Wes Matthews' jersey will be replaced by "Suckers". In the lower right hand corner the words "Stop the Violence" will be tastefully added. -I will buy roughly $37,000 worth of cool gadgets. No Rokr phone though. -I will have John Paciorek jerseys made up for everyone I know. -I will hire a personal trainer. -I will buy fifty bags of cheese puffs. -I will no longer do my own laundry. -Like Jerry Lewis, I will never wear the same pair of socks twice. -I will fly to Chicago for a weekend of intense celebration. While there, I will high-five dozens of people, some of them ironically, most of them not. I will also use the "Johnson, party of One" joke approximately 30 times. I will laugh each time. -I will hire a full-time assistant/columnist. $72,000 a year plus bennies. Sign up now and send résumés. -I will buy a fully restored 1973 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme. White. I will park it on the street. Vanity plate suggestions are welcome. -I will buy a home, and in this home I will have five fridges dedicated to Gatorade. -I will play basketball three times a week. I will develop a sweeping hook shot. -I will hire an elite fighting team and with them I will sneak into the hills of Alqaedastan and come out with Osama in cuffs, whining like a witty bitty bitch. Or maybe I'll let them go without me. As I think of more things, I will list them. In the meantime, know that I will continue providing high-quality content right here on the old bungle. For twelve points in the suddenly-meaningful round of Geniusmaker, tell me: whodat?
* New slang term for cash The thing about low-traffic e-loggin'* is, if you really stop and think about what you're doing, how hard you're working to accomplish it, and how many people end up reading it and/or caring about it...well, you'll lose your mind. So instead you pretend you're doing it just for yourself, and you soldier on for pride's sake. I am sure I'm not the only one to notice this, but on the new D. Wade sneaker commercial, the slogan is, "Fall seven times, stand up eight." Which I guess is some Japanese proverb, and it sounds kind of cool. But don't you really only need to stand up seven times if you fall seven times? I guess they are counting the first time you stand up, prior to the initial fall. But there's nothing heroic about standing up that first time. It's only the ensuing seven stand-ups that make you a tough guy. Plus, how do they know you were already standing prior to the first fall? Maybe the first time you fell was out of a chair or off a sofa or something. Or are they saying you should stand up twice after your seventh fall? I don't get it. That ad is dumb. Alexi S. was camped out in Fort Greene, Brooklyn waiting in vain for Deion during the marathon, and strangely, he took this shot. Here are a couple of ignorant Apple-related questions. 1) If the Apple mouse only has one button, what replaces the right-click (my most indispensable Windows maneuver)? How do you view your options prior to a full click? Is there like a hesitation click or something? Can you use a two-button mouse? 2) Now that Apple has introduced the video iPod, whey haven't they begun to offer movies for it? it seems like a natural fit. They could be sub-DVD quality and sell for like $3.99. There's your business model, Apple. Is the MPAA just too wary of piracy to involve itself with any kind of file-based business venture? Are they just working out the details? And think about this: iPorn. When it comes to technology, there are so many slick new things to buy that it seems almost impossible to list them all. Instead, maybe it's wise to begin a process of elimination -- listing all the potentially cool gadgets that hold zero interest for me. 1) The Rokr iTunes cell phone That's it so far. Why is it a big deal that Kate Moss got caught on video snorting coke? Who could possibly be surprised by the fact that she does coke? She's been pretty open about her addictions in the past. She's dating a guy whose relationship with drugs is not unlike Chester Cheetah's relationship with cheese. So if the fact that she does coke is no giant shock, what is her great crime? Being taped doing her thing? That ain't her fault. I guess some people are upset because, get this, they think Kate is a role model for young British girls. Not to go all Barkley on you here, but if Kate Moss is your daughter's role model you're already fucked. For nine points, whodat? * Brush-suggested alternative to the word "blogging" Here's to Deion, who not only finished the Marathon on Sunday, but also solidly whipped his DC doppelganger. The official results:
Deion Sandals 36M NY USA Average Mile: 8:38 Finish Time: 3:49:03 From what the experts are saying, it wasn't even that close. The wife and I tried to catch up with him at 101st street and 5th Avenue (mile 22). I think we missed him by about 7 minutes. Here are some free verbungle.com marathon-watching tips. If you're trying to cheer on a marathon runner, please observe as many of them as you can (we observed none):
So we screwed up all of that...but at least we got one thing right: 5) If a dude runs by dressed up as Wonder Woman, run and catch up to him so you can snap his picture. One thing I noticed: approximately 50% of marathon runners become marathon walkers by mile 22. That shit does not look fun at all. Except for drinking down all that free Gatorade. *** Did you happen to see Vince Carter's dunk on Alonzo Mourning? Oh my Grace Jones. That was nashty. That's right, it warrants the "h" in "nashty". Screw it. I'm going full-on naschty for this one. *** I know the genius challenges have been a little bit self-indulgent and random lately, so we're gonna mix it up in a minute. But first let's do a little housekeeping. 1) BA's Halloween spread -- Rolo, Reese's, Reese's white chocolate, Twix, Skittles, York Peppermint Patty, Snickers, M&Mazing, traditional Hershey's, Junior Mints, 3 Musketeers to name a few -- definitely trumps mine. Nice work. Next year see if you can fold in a few KitKats and you'll really be rolling with the big boys. 2) In Flexdat, Joe wins with his guess of $2000. Actual amount is $2500, meaning that together the wife and I have set aside over 8 grand for 2006 medical expenses. Seems like a lot, but you got the baby, and then you got various other standard medical costs, and I am also anticipating some serious dental work because my dentist seems to have f'd up a filling and now it may be root canal time. If we happen to have like 5 grand left over, maybe I'll get the Lasik surgery. In one eye. 3) Nobody got any of the answers for Magazinedat. The correct answers were:
a) Slam Magazine - a basketball magazine targeted at suburban white
youths who dream of being urban streetball legends. I read it almost every
month. I can't help myself. Before you get all, "I can't believe you read crap like Us Magazine," let me remind you of one thing: Celebrities are better than regular folk. Better than you, better than me. Way better. Don't forget this. Need an example? I'll give you two. Example #1: You're playing 4 on 4 touch football on a crisp Autumn afternoon. Your team is down, 6 scores to 1 in a game to 7. You are playing quarterback. You drop back to pass, scanning the field for an open receiver. The defense is just too tight, nobody can break free. The designated lineman gets to 7 Mississippis and starts rushing your ass. You make a couple of nifty evasive moves that buy you just enough time to spot your good pal Tommy break open down the right sideline. Just as the pass rusher lunges to tag you, you unleash a beautiful 40-yard spiral to Tommy for the score. Sure, you go on to lose, 7 scores to 2, but this is definitely a strong moment and it makes you feel all warm inside for a good two and a half minutes, and then for another four minutes when you remember it on the subway ride home. In terms of fun, probably a 76 on a scale of 1-100. Now let's imagine this scenario: You're playing 4 on 4 touch football on a crisp Autumn afternoon. Your team is down, 6 scores to 1 in a game to 7. You are playing quarterback. You drop back to pass, scanning the field for an open receiver. The defense is just too tight, nobody can break free. The designated lineman gets to 7 Mississippis and starts rushing your ass. You make a couple of nifty evasive moves that buy you just enough time to spot your good pal Brad Pitt break open down the right sideline. Just as the pass rusher lunges to tag you, you unleash a beautiful 40-yard spiral to Brad Pitt for the score. Sure, you go on to lose, 7 scores to 2, but this is definitely a strong moment. After the game, Brad Pitt asks you if you want to grab a beer at a trendy hotspot. You say yes. When you arrive (by limo) at the trendy hotspot, you meet up with three or four beautiful women who want to sleep with Brad Pitt but will settle for giving you their phone number. You are easily able to convince yourself that they really like you for you, and not just as a means to get close to Brad Pitt. You go to bed with a huge smile on your face. Fun Quotient: approximately 97.25. Example #2: You are throwing a party that gets a little out of control. You find yourself locked in a particularly heated game of Buzz with a few of your friends, and the night kind of slips away from you. Around 1 am, you realize you haven't seen your girlfriend in a couple of hours. You start stumbling around the apartment looking for her, but you can't find her and nobody seems to know where she is. You give up and trudge off to your room to go to sleep. When you open your bedroom door, you are shocked to discover your good buddy Tommy, giving it to your lady in a position that you never even thought of before and you feel certain she'd never have let you try even if you had thought of it. Recoiling, you close the door and slink back to the living room, where you eventually pass out on the couch and end up choking to death on your own vomit. Fun Quotient: 14 (because the game of Buzz was probably pretty fun). Celebrity Version: You are throwing a party that gets a little out of control. You find yourself locked in a particularly heated game of Buzz with a few of your friends (George Clooney, Al Michaels, R. Kelly), and the night kind of slips away from you. Around 1 am, you realize you haven't seen your girlfriend (the model you met after the football game) in a couple of hours. You start stumbling around the apartment looking for her, but you can't find her and nobody seems to know where she is. You give up and trudge off to your room to go to sleep. When you open your bedroom door, you are shocked to discover your good buddy Brad Pitt, giving it to your lady in a position that you never even thought of before and you feel certain she'd never have let you try even if you had thought of it. Recoiling, you close the door and slink back to the living room, where you grab a beer and collapse into the couch to sort things out. Before you even have time to begin wallowing, a revenge-minded Angelina Jolie plops herself down next to you and asks if you'd mind walking her home. Fun Quotient: 74. That's why I read Us Magazine. *** In order to decrease overall site lameness, , we're going back to that old favorite, the Google Image Search Game, for today's challenge. For seventeen points, which search brought up this image (within the first three pages of results)? Sorry we haven't updated any of the non-blog parts of the site in a while. Maybe soon we'll have a new Trayline. Twix. The answer was Twix. How could you miss that? And you really can't beat that trifecta: Twix, KitKat, Reese's. Lucky kids in my building. What? You think you can beat it? Put your cards on the table. Deion is running the marathon on Sunday, and I don't think it would hurt at all to cheer his ass on from the side of the road. I'm gonna try to be there. He should be averaging between an eight and nine minute mile, and you can (probably) even check his progress online here. He's runner #14775. I don't want to put additional pressure on ol' Deion, but I noticed that there's another entrant with the same name (note: Deion's real name is not Deion Sandals). This imitator apparently came up from DC. Deion, you better represent. Whatever the case, I'm proud of ya. 26 plus miles is plenty. If, when we were sitting in my apartment playing Mr. Do on ColecoVision in 1983, you'da told me you'd be running the 2005 NYC Marathon, I would have laughed in your face. And followed it up with a robust neckie. You are an impressive specimen. I was scanning through the HD channels late Saturday night and I came across the Clips-Wolves game. I like that we get additional HD channels with NBA games on 'em. Do I have to thank Mark Cuban for that? I hope not. Anyway, the game went into OT, it was very entertaining. I would just like to say right now (for the 7th time at least) that Kevin Garnett is my favorite athlete in any sport and it will break my heart if they can't surround him with some real talent again before he retires. The Sprewell-Cassell team almost had enough firepower to win it all. But somebody always gets hurt. Wasn't Cassell hurt during the playoffs in their big year? I think so. Whatever. KG is my sports hero. Midway point in the weekend and the stats are shaping up like this:
Beers Consumed: 1 (ancient Stella out of the fridge) It's official (sorta): I am definitely getting a Mac. Fuck it. I've had bad luck with all my PC's, and I want a computer that makes my balls tingle. I want to become a Mac zealot. The only problem is we don't have a couple grand laying around to drop on a new computer right now, so I may have to wait about three months. Good. It'll give me (and my personal computer-buying consultant isired) time to come to the absolute right decision. Two pieces of advice from isired that I definitely intend to follow up on:
1) Go to the store and see how I like the 12" PowerBook. If the screen
doesn't bother me, this could be the winner. I've always wanted to have one of
those cute little laptops that you can wear in a hip holster. But it definitely
requires a test drive because that little screen might get annoying. I saw a guy on the street today who was deaf and blind. He was standing on the corner holding a sign that said, "I am deaf and blind. Please help me cross the street." The wife saw the sign and helped him, and he grunted a two-syllable "mmm-mmm" which must have meant "thank you." He would have kept waiting there until somebody helped him. Man, that takes some fucking guts, to walk out into the world alone without sight and hearing. Yet another reminder of how lucky we are. It was an absolutely beautiful day in NYC today. Let's hope that poor fellow was able to enjoy the breeze against his face as he marched through the dark and silent streets. I ate at B Bar with the wife for brunch today. For a no-longer-the-place-to-be-but-still-loaded-with-loud-and-pretentious-hipster-fuckwads kinda joint, it's actually very kid-friendly. Our waitress was all smiles, but in a way that made me almost certain she actually despised us. That's OK, though. My simple order of eggs, hash browns and english muffin was prepared perfectly. I almost had some bacon, too. Delicious food. Highest recommendations. How much did I elect to put into my flex spending account at work for 2006? Twelve points to whoever's closest, an exact answer will get you twenty points. Please note: at her office, my wife is maxing out her flex spending account, at $6000. So we already have that set aside. The maximum I can put in through my office is $4000. You can keep that figure in mind when guessing. 11/3/5: A handful of friends, one needs a match one needs some ice You know what I hate? When losers write letters to magazines complaining about who the magazine chose to put on last week's cover. You know, like: "Dear Time Magazine, Putting Judge Alito on your cover this week shows an incredible lack of judgment on the part of your editorial staff. Surely you realize that November 1st marks the 11th anniversary of George Lucas's decision to take a leave of absence from his production company, a leave that allowed him to begin work on the scripts for the three Star Wars prequels. This was a perfect opportunity for Time to honor a great American and his unique vision. Sincerely, Dick S. McNugget" Yeah, OK. We get it. You're a hopeless weenie. But as I acknowledge how much those letters annoy me, I must also point out the sin Sports Illustrated committed this week with their cover choice. It is two separate photos, one of Peyton Manning and the other of Tom Brady, and the "story" is a preview of their upcoming Monday Night Football matchup. An unbelievably lame choice to begin with: two superimposed, non-action shots of quarterbacks, promoting a stupid mid-season football game. What makes it unforgivable is that the WHITE SOX WON THE WORLD SERIES THIS WEEK! FOR THE FIRST TIME IN ALMOST 90 YEARS! And all they get is a little circle in the upper right hand corner. Unreal. It sorta makes me believe in the myth of the East Coast sports media bias. I was reading a little of the Rosa Parks memorial coverage and I was moved by this quote from Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm: "Her greatness lay in doing what everybody could do but doesn't," Granholm said. "She was unexpected. She was untitled. ... (She was) an improbable warrior that was leading an unlikely army of waitresses and street sweepers and shopkeepers and auto mechanics." Sometimes a good ol' corny line like that just gets me. It really choked me up. It made me think about all the times in life when we could do something, do the right thing...and we just don't, because it's not the easiest or most comfortable thing. The human being is conditioned to take the path of least resistance, and that's why it's so impressive when people grit their teeth and stand up for what they know to be right, in the face of tremendous resistance. When you think about the guts it took for people like Rosa Parks to do what they did, you think maybe you could do a little more. In my life, there is at least one clear example I can remember of someone stepping up and doing the right thing when it wasn't an easy thing to do. Obviously nothing compared to Rosa Parks, and I've probably mentioned it here before, but it was an event I'll never forget so let's talk about it again. One night in I guess 1990, my college friends and I gathered at the Mustard Palace (which was the nickname of an apartment on Orchard street where a bunch of the fellas lived) to watch the Pistons play in the Finals against the Blazers. Joining our small circle of friends that night were two rednecks from M. Dilly's hometown. In M. Dilly's defense, they were not his friends. They were just two dudes from his hometown who came to Madison for the weekend and called him up. Probably because he was a legend back in Dillyville (4.3 in the forty and could throw a football a quarter of a mile) and he was the only person they could think of to call in Madison. So there are like ten of us sitting in the apartment watching the game, and the halftime tape piece was about Dennis Rodman, who at that point was not the Dennis Rodman of the late 90's. He was just a young exuberant dude who went a little crazy on the court sometimes. Anyway, the piece featured him and his wife, who happened to be white, and as soon as they see her the redneck dudes start spouting all sorts of crazy racist bullshit -- terms I'd never even heard before. Like "Mud Shark." The terms were so far out there that you only knew they were racist from the hateful tone the guys used when they said them. And they kept going on, for like a good 90 seconds while the tape package was playing. It was incredibly offensive and deeply troubling. And to be honest, I didn't know what to do. Part of it was that the redneck guys were kind of big scary dudes and I didn't want them to beat me up. Part of me didn't want to create a hostile or awkward vibe by calling them out (even though they had already created a decidedly hostile vibe of their own with all their racist spew). So I sat there and wished the moment would just sort of disappear on its own. Which, I guess, is what a lot of people do at times like that. Wait it out. Hope for justice to prevail in the end. And take the easy way out. But suddenly my man BC MI, who's at heart a gentle and shy fellow and not the type of guy to pipe up in a big crowd without reason, goes: "Why don't you guys just shut the fuck up?" Stunned, the rednecks shut the fuck up. Brian continued: "Nobody here wants to listen to that shit. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about, and you really need to shut the fuck up." The rednecks, realizing they weren't among like-minded folks, continued shutting the fuck up for the remainder of their visit, which lasted about 6 minutes. They never put up a moment's argument. They didn't try to defend their indefensible position. They just packed up and left. We watched the rest of the game in peace. And I had a new hero. So today verbungle.com would like to salute large-scale heroes like Rosa Parks, who took on the flagrant, institutionalized wrongs of her society with a simple gesture of strength. And also the everyday heroes like BC MI, who through small but important good deeds manage to keep the human race moving in the right direction. Incredible to receive a HaloScan comment from my long-lost buddy Jeff C. yesterday. He marks the third or fourth friend I've reconnected with through this stupid website, which is enough to make its existence worthwhile. People, you should all get websites. But make them better than this one. Jeff C., expect an email soon. For three points each, tell me what the names of the three candy treats we handed out on Halloween. Only three guesses to a customer. Hint: none of the three is a Watchamacallit Bar.
For another eight points, tell me what the connection between the titles of the
last four posts is. No googling please. Here are the titles for your
convenience: 11/2/5: Take my place in back with the loudmouths Thanks again to the recently unmasked isired for all the mac-vice. And thanks to EJ for the kind software offer. You are good people and I am proud to share a housing complex witcha. It's kind of a sad statement about my website's popularity when I realize that roughly half of my readers are residents of Stuytown or Peter Cooper. I choose to interpret this data to mean that there is an extremely high concentration of smart people in this part of town. Just finishing up a tough stretch at work. That's always fun. For the next two or three days I hope to have some time to catch up on old emails and return egregiously unreturned phone calls. I didn't get any pictures of the baby in her watermelon costume. But I think you can imagine she was mighty cute. I brought Mama's home for dinner tonight. As a resident of the area directly north of the East Village, I can do that now. I hadn't been to Mama's in about four years, and I would like to report that it is still a tremendous bargain. For ten bucks they stuff about three pounds of food onto your plate. Good, hearty, satisfying food. My only complaint is that a lot of the veggies are served at room temp, but that's no problem when you're getting it to go and you can just chuck it in the toaster oven or the microwave when you get home. I walked past 7B on the way home just so I could look inside. It was about 7:45 pm and the place was still pretty empty. There was one small group of friends sitting at the bar together and slurping down some beers. They looked content, like they had no place else to be. Just settling in for a nice long night at the bar. It's been a while since I've been in that position, but I can still remember what it feels like. It feels good. But it usually ends badly. I watched the Suns-Mavs game on Tuesday night. Highly entertaining. One thing that struck me watching the game -- these guys are way better than me at basketball. Take Dirk Nowitski. That guy is just a much better all around player than me. I'd have a tough time stopping him. I think I'd have to block his shot a few times and get in his head. That would probably do it. Weddingdat ends in a tie between Joe and Dan K. with their answers of 13 and 23 weddings attended. I have actually attended 18 weddings by my count. Joe and Dan will each get five points. At only one of those 18 weddings did I split my face open diving on the floor in an attempt to pop a balloon*. At only one other one did I jump on stage with my idiot friends and belt out a horrendously off-key rendition of that wedding standard, "Hungry Heart." At only one wedding did I help chuck the groom in a lake. So at most I only ruined 3 out of 18. Pretty good. There is a city in Wisconsin whose name sounds like a quarter being dropped into a toilet. Name it for eight points. Googling encouraged. * Video of this incident exists. 11/1/05: I'm not ready as I'll ever be October of 2005 was officially the fastest month in human history. I know what you're thinking: June of 2397 B.C. was pretty fast, too. But let's be honest: June of 2397 B.C. only had 30 days and there was a stretch there in the middle when the days started to drag a little bit. So October 2005 wins. Get down on it, if you really want it. I am going to stop talking about my computer situation for now. Thanks to everyone for weighing in, especially isired for the extensive mac info. Right now I am definitely looking at a mac, and it's between three models. The wife thinks I'm nuts but I think I'm ready to make my move. None of the PC's I've seen are blowing me away. Last question -- will the mac I buy automatically connect to my Linksys wireless router or do I need to a) buy a new router that works on both PC's and macs b) buy a mac router and set that up in addition to my Linksys router or c) download some crap to make the Linksys work? Thanks again. Monday Night Football puts me to sleep, and I kind of like that. One thing that the FJM site has done to me -- it's kind of ruined sports watching. I mean, I've always been annoyed when really stupid announcers say really stupid things, but that site has just perked up my radar in a way that I'm not sure if I like. Like every time I hear a sports analyst say something, I'm all, "Wrong. Wrong. That's wrong also." The truth is that even the better announcers out there believe in a lot of crazy shit, and they say it with straight faces. This makes them look mighty stupid. But the guys at FJM may be worse -- they watch sports with such a methodical, clinical eye that they kind of suck the life right out of the whole deal. As a fan, I want to believe in magic. I want to say that A-Rod sucked this postseason because he choked, and that Derek Jeter always comes through because he's got some kind of superior psychological makeup. I want to feel confident in assuming that John Starks's 3-point attempt in Game 6 of the '94 Finals would have gone right in if Hakeem hadn't gotten a finger on it...because Starks had the hot hand. Sure, statistics tell us that he had only about a 30% chance of making that shot, given his position on the court and the defensive pressure being applied. But John Starks had the magic. For better or worse. I want to believe that sports is more than a bunch of probabilities colliding in generally predictable ways. Even if I know that's really what they are. In my head, I want to believe in the human factor. It makes for much better stories. I guess I don't want to know the real reason things happen on playing fields. I want to believe the best reason. OK, here's one of those things that makes me resistant to move to Apple. Bad enough they use the slogan "Think Different" when all their products look exactly the same. Bad enough that they sell digital music and slap all sorts of restrictions on it so you can only do with it what they want you to do with it. Now they are trying to sell us music videos. For $1.99 a pop. WTF? I know I'm not obligated to buy one, but shouldn't music videos be free? Isn't the general idea that they get us to watch the video in the hopes that we'll buy the song? Not anymore. Gas face, Apple. That goes for Fiona Apple as well. I guess with the NBA season about to start, I should make some quickie predictions. Division Winners:
East: NJ, Indiana, Miami Conference Finalists: Miami, Indiana, San Antonio, Dallas NBA Finals: San Antonio over Indiana I would have picked Miami to win the East if they hadn't shaken stuff up so much. I think getting 'Toine was a big mistake. MVP: LeBron That should do it. I am attending a wedding on November 12th. Tell me how many weddings (including that one but not including my own) I've attended in my life. Ten points to closest guess, 19 points if it's an exact match. One guess to a customer. |
The previous post was long and bunky. I could have skipped it, but then all that
bad brainial fluid would still be swishing around in my head. Sometimes you just
gotta get it out, ya know? It's like that with anything that's inside you and
wants to come out, be it physiological or intellectual. If you let it sit in
there too long, it starts to rot. So it's better to just get it out and move on.
ot my ears
(earphones) on, the rest of the universe can take a number. Yeah, baby. You know
what the fuck I'm talking about."
