hell yea i pick my nose

i pick my nose.

who doesn't?

if you don't, you don't know what you're missing. sometimes tissue and blowing hard just don't cut it. you gotta get some nail and skin up in there and start picking away. it's very effective when done properly.

people do a lot grosser things with their fingers throughout their day. boogers are the least of your worries. and if it's the spread of germs you're worried about, i wouldn't waste too much worry on that.... those germs are gonna find a way to travel one way or another.

don't get me wrong, i do think if you're gonna pick your nose, you should do your best to wash your hands and keep them as clean as possible. don't be a total dirt bag about it. and i don't think anyone should eat their boogers. i know it's a quick solution to disposing of said boogers, but there's gotta be a tissue/napkin/paper towel around you somewhere.

but let's all stop pretending that any of us are above picking our nose and let's stop scoffing at those who are brave enough to do it in public. picking your nose in public only means you know the following:

-when there's a problem.
-how to take care of a problem as quickly and effectively as possible.

don't be a prude! nose pickers of the world unite!

oh, and think twice before you partake in your next high five.

andy rooney

andy rooney is retiring. but his impact on society will be forever felt.

rooney was doing what people on the internet do all the time way before there was an internet. you can't find a corner of the internet that is free from complaints, most over things that are trivial and probably not worth the effort or energy to complain about.

most blogs are just some sorta telling of things mundane. blogs rarely break new ground or push envelopes. most blogs are observations on things other people wouldn't care about all by themselves. thanks to your blog though, they now might care about it... for 20 seconds or so.

this is andy rooney. this is all he's ever done on 60 minutes. for those last few minutes of every episode, he sat at his cluttered desk in his cluttered office and chose a brand new topic to bitch about.

if andy rooney were 23 years old or so at this moment in time, he'd probably never leave his mom's basement. he'd be too preoccupied with trolling the internet and letting anyone who'll read know what isn't cool in his eyes.

there's a little bit of andy rooney in all of us. the internet has given us all an open forum to bitch about stuff. every time we bitch about anything on the internet, we're only doing it so others can read. you wouldn't post on facebook/twitter/google+/wherever if there was no one else on it to read it. and every time you do that, you're walking down a very beat up and abused path that was at some point trail blazed by the likes of rooney.

but there's a difference between any of us and andy rooney. rooney made a career out of it. rooney gets paid to be a troll. people on the internet not only complain for free, but most of the time anyone who reads whatever it is they're complaining about are saying to themselves, "i wish this crybaby would shut the fuck up."

i've read blogs that complain about rooney recently. and the authors of these posts don't see the hypocrisy. i've read stuff like:

thank god he's gone. we don't have to hear him bitch anymore.

nobody cares what he talks about.

he's out of touch. what gives him the right to complain all the time?

i read stuff like this on the internet!! imagine that!! bitch about rooney all you want. in fact the more you bitch about him, the more you're just ripping off his routine and as they say, 'imitation is the highest form of flattery.'

thanx for the bitching andy rooney. don't worry, there's a world full of people willing to carry on the tradition. it won't die with you. you lit the match that resulted in a fire that billy joel would write a song about.

the poop chronicles cont'd

okay, so my last post was about pooping but i have two more random thoughts to get out there on this topic.

thought 1-

i think to help alleviate some of the tension of pooping in public bathrooms, they should all blast heavy metal music 24/7. no one will be able to hear anyone else doing their business if slayer is blaring at full blast. even if you don't like heavy metal, you have to confess that it's the perfect music to play over speakers to help camouflage what's going down.

thought 2-

if that doesn't suit you, then bring your headphones to the bathroom. i do this most of the time. i usually blare some kinda heavy rock in my ears so i don't have to hear what's going on around me. i know that doesn't help anyone else in the bathroom, but screw 'em! they should've brought their own headphones or gotten behind my original idea to blast heavy metal music.

everybody poops

pooping. everyone does it. most people don't like to talk about it. and there seems to be a slight social phobia to do it in front of other people in public bathrooms.

we need to get over this shared social fear and learn that pooping is natural and nothing we should try and hide from others. i think grown adults in a sense need to be potty trained all over again.

we're all dragged away from the comfort of the bathrooms in our homes by work, school, and what have you. fortunately, everywhere we go, public bathrooms have been provided to do our business.

there's no need to hold on to it or try not to go in front of other people. what's the shame about? everyone does it. any person who giggles at the sounds of farting and poop hitting water in a public bathroom poops, farts, and wipes just like the rest of us.

i've been semi guilty of some of this shame. however things changed when my job sent me to our nyc office temporarily for a few months. it was an office crammed with people with only one location to go to the bathroom. and it was always busy in there! it was like the grand central station of bathrooms. at any given time, you had to prepare yourself for people in the stall to the left and the right of you. that's just the way it was.

at first i was like, "FUCK! this sucks! i don't wanna poop in front of all these people!" but eventually i got to realizing that everyone was in there for the same reason. it's all just how nature made us. food goes in, food comes out. we all eat together... might as well poop together.

we start this life with no shame. we poop wherever we want and someone cleans it up for us... sometimes in front of other people. and a lot of people end life in pretty similar fashion. shameless and proud pooping are the bookends of our lives. let's not be such prudes about it during that middle part.

my mustache

my brother phil turned 30 yesterday. to celebrate, he organized a mustache themed bar crawl in the west village area of NYC. we hit 7 bars in 7 hours. everyone had a mustache... if you couldn't grow one, you were given a fake one.

what was really rad about that was walking the streets of nyc as a gang of mustached mofo's and then walking up into new bars as a mustached gang. good times! we were definitely the raddest thing on the streets of nyc.

i've never rocked the stache before. i don't really dig them to tell you the truth. but for my brother's 30th bday, hell yea i'm gonna take part in the shenanigans. so i grew out a beard for about a month and the night before the event i shaved everything but the stache off my face.

when i first looked at my face with the stache, i was ready to rock it. i was even thinking of rocking it for a week after the party just so i could say i had a mustache phase at some point in my life. and at the beginning of the day it was all good. i was mustached with other mustached brethren.

and the feeling of mustache pride was reinforced every time we walked into a new bar and people inside the bar were hooting and hollering or pointing and taking pictures of us.

however, by the time i got to the end of the crawl, i started to get honest with myself. i've never liked mustaches. in fact, i think they look stupid (for the most part, i give a pass to the cast of the movie 'tombstone'). anytime i see a dude with a mustache, i think to myself, ok good for you... but i think it's dumb and i'd never rock that.

so i vowed right there and then to shave it off the moment i got home. this would be it. for 1 day of my entire life, i'd rock the stache. but that was it. i would only do it for this one day, for the high honor to be part of the awesome time that was phil's 30th b-day bar crawl.

i'm hella glad i rocked it for the day. and mustaches are awesome if you're part of a gang of other people also rocking mustaches. but as soon as that gang disappears, so goes any rational reason i'd want to have a mustache.

as soon as i got home, i grabbed a razor and slayed the stache. so long mustache phase. you were awesome for 1 day but outside of a bar crawl, i just can't think of any good reason to have a mustache at all.

troy davis and my anti death penalty diatribe

i came home from work today totally bummed out. i had been pretty much thinking about the troy davis case for most of the day... but it got more serious and heavy to me as the day wore on. his execution was scheduled for 7pm. i came home from work, got in about 7:15pm and before i checked the news i did a quick workout and after i completed that work out i found myself hitting my bed and knocking out for what turned out to be a cat nap.

so now it's 10:15pm. i woke up and the first thing i thought was.. shit, troy davis is probably dead now. so i went to the computer only to find out that stuff has been delayed and their waiting on the supreme court to say something... not exactly sure what they'll say or how optimistic anyone should be about this... but it was semi relieving to hear.

i have no emotional connection with troy davis. i signed a petition to try and stop his execution and that was about it. i wasn't willing to go outside and protest out loud about it. and anyways, apparently a ton of people are already doing that. the grassroots movement on the street to try and keep troy davis alive is strong, healthy, and hard to ignore.

i'm not willing to say troy davis is an innocent man. but what i am willing to say is how this is turning into a loud example of what is flawed about the concept of capital punishment in this country. i don't even like to call it capital punishment. that gives it dignity. let's call it U.S. sanctioned revenge killin'.

for all i know troy davis is guilty and did kill someone and if that is so, then he probably does deserve to die. i wouldn't wanna stick the needle in him, but there's people out there who'd probably do it for free... victim's family, friends, etc, etc.

but U.S. sanctioned revenge killin' is all wrong. we have to realize our justice system isn't 100% fool proof. and we're starting to hear more and more about cases where people were put to death in the past that could've been turned around now thanks to new technology and whatnot.

just the idea that we could possibly be wrong... how are we to know all 12 jurors ever get it right? isn't that enough to end this whole charade?

this isn't just about troy davis. this is about the whole damn system. but the troy davis situation is a bit of an opportunity for the anti-capital punishment movement. there's doubt. and it's on our tv's and computers. there's witnesses who are stepping up giving conflicting info and jurors saying they think they might've been wrong.

if troy davis is an innocent man, then what? how do we let ourselves sleep with that idea floating around in our head that maybe, by some slight possibility, he's not the killer?

i know it's awful that people kill other people. it's an atrocious act that shouldn't go unpunished. i guess my suggestion for an alternative is life in jail. isn't it enough to spend a whole lifetime stuck in a sucky place to think about what you did? prison blows. no one wants to be there. but at least some people get to think about leaving one day. not murderers. there's no going home, they are home.

i just don't think we as people have the right to take someone else's life... even if it's cuz they took someone else's life. murder is murder. it doesn't matter what court or set of state laws supports it. you can't make the act of taking a life anything but the act of taking a life.

it's times like this that i wish i could believe in a place called hell. sometimes i wanna believe in a hell more than a heaven only so i could know for sure that bad people get their punishment, that there's a place that all the evildoers can never escape from.

and for all the killers who end up in jail, end up executed, or end up never being caught... they'd all end up in the same place... a fiery pit of eternal damnation.

and then i would know there's a place for all the people who are responsible for the killing of the innocent through capital punishment... if there was a hell, i'm sure these people would end up there as well, standing shoulder to shoulder with all the other killers.

cuz in hell, murder is murder.

breast slapping, i've found my calling

an informational video on the fine art of breast slapping:



looks like i've finally found my calling in life. i'm gonna become a breast slapper.

apparently there is a specific way of slapping breasts that will make them grow. so if i go pro with this, i will be able to slap boobs all day. what could possibly be more awesome than waking up everyday and saying to myself, "time to get up and slap some titties!" it's like my dreams have come true! i feel like i've won the lottery! seriously, what could be more awesome than this gig??

and i don't even need to feel bad about it cuz i'll be doing a good deed. women want bigger boobs and i will offer them an alternative to surgery. i'll be the cheaper, easier, quicker option.

and y'know what they say... if you're gonna do a job, might as well enjoy your job. so ladies, if you're looking for a professional who takes boob slapping seriously and enjoys their job, look no further... i'm your guy!

vampires are stupid

vampires don't exist. so talking about what you would do if you were a vampire is stupid. it's a wasted convo on an impossible scenario and you'd be better suited to waste your breath speaking of the improbable chances of winning a multimillion dollar lottery prize.

but if there was any possibility that you could be a vampire and you actually desired to become one, then you're stupid. and here's why...

vampires live forever. sounds sweet don't it? except you'll outlive everyone you EVER love. after a while you'll have no one to relate to. no one to talk to about that one crazy time at that party when shit got crazy. cuz anyone who was at that party is DEAD. you outlive everyone except other vampires i suppose... but vampires don't make good company...

since vampires get to keep on aging, it also means they keep on becoming more jaded and grumpy... that's the baggage that comes along with spending more time on this planet. the longer you're around, the more you realize stuff sucks and it makes you a little bit sadder. think of the grumpiest senior citizen you've ever known, and multiply that by 5, 6, 7...who knows how many times... the grumpiness, the jadedness... it would grow beyond your mortal comprehension.

if that don't suck enough you have to feed on blood to keep living. the longer you feed on human beings, the better your chances of getting caught become. vampires can potentially live forever, so on a long enough timeline you'd get caught killing someone somewhere and you'd end up in jail. jail would suck and you'd probably die there unless you found someway to escape or someway to constantly feed. even if you somehow got some source of blood to keep on living, you'd only keep on living in jail. what a life.

the idea of shit like vampires is so cool until a vampire fucks up your day. if vampires were real, you'd hate them all. we'd be at war with them live the gov't is at war with mutants in x-men comics. a vampire would've harmed or killed someone you know by now and you'd think all vampires suck for existing because of it.

and for the hopeless romantics... the chances are nearly impossible that you'll get to spend forever with your "soul mate." even if you meet your "soul mate" and you both become vampires, eventually you'll spend so much time with each other that you'll know everything there is to hate in one another. this will lead to cheating and other shenanigans that will eventually put an end to your "eternal" romance.

and if she dies and becomes reincarnated (the chances keep getting slimmer cuz for this to be possible we now not only need vampires to exist, but the process of reincarnation also) as a human all over again, you'll have to:

a-wait for her to grow to a certain age. you're not gonna get your grind on with a new born baby.

b- find her every single time she reincarnates.

c-convince her all over again that you're meant to be and get her to fuck over keanu reeves's character... (the concept in Bram Stoker's Dracula drives me soooooo fucking crazy! keanu gets such a raw deal in that movie! he did nothing to deserve that! NOTHING!!! that's undeserved aggression and if you were keanu's character, you'd be in 110% agreement with me).

final point and then i'm done:

if everything worked out ideally... TOTALLY FUCKING IDEALLY, NOTHING AT ALL COULD FUCK IT UP, IT'S EVERYTHING YOU WANT IT TO BE!!!

what will you do when the sun dies? what will you do if the earth is eaten by a black hole? what if you do travel to another planet and then the sun for that planet suddenly dies? sooner or later, fate's gonna get you. and by the time it does, i'm sure you'll be bored and sad and eager to put an end to it all. you'll think about how awesome those first 84.5 years were and if you could've just ended it before it got old...

i think eternal life is an overrated concept... especially if it's on the terms of being a vampire. we're here for a short time for a reason... or maybe there is no reason.. i don't know.. but what i do know is wanting to be a vampire is lame.

a no huddle offense, punk rock kinda life

the no huddle offense is a strategy that is employed in the game of football. it's usually used when time is running low and a team needs to try and score quickly to keep themselves in a game. by sacrificing the huddle, teams save valuable seconds that can be used to run plays to get them closer to scoring.

but my favorite advantage to a no huddle offense is what it does to a defense. it throws defenses out of their comfort zone. it leaves them less time to get set and be ready for whatever the offense is about to throw at them. defenses are usually unable to substitute players in between plays and defenses start to get exhausted quicker when going up against a no huddle offense.

some teams like to exercise a no huddle offense just for the fuck of it... not just when they're down or in a hurry. sure, this gives them less time to plan plays but when a team's offense is in the zone running their offense without huddles, it's very hard to stop. suddenly the offense is a lot less thought and a lot more action. nothing too fancy, just relying on what works... whether it's a bruising running game that is gashing a defense open or a swift passing attack that leaves defensive secondaries in a daze, to me there's nothing more beautiful than when an offense is taking it to the defense on some blitzkrieg type shit.

most of the time, this is how i wanna live my life. i just wanna keep attacking life. i wanna keep attacking life at a speed that life can't handle. that whatever life throws at me, it's not ready to combat what i'm throwing at it. look out motherfuckers. i came here to score touchdowns and if you make any attempt to stop me, i promise you i will come at you with a pace that will leave you exhausted and wondering if and how you will ever find the energy to put my attack to rest.

i wanna attack life. and fuck the huddle. yea, i might wear myself out too, but it'll all be worth it when i'm putting points on the board and adding wins to my record. the trophies i seek in life will be worth every drop of sweat, every ounce of effort i leave on the field.

if i don't want it that hard, than i don't even wanna step on the field. if i'm not gonna put everything i got into a fast paced, all out, full volume attack, than why bother? that's how i want to live my life. and even if i lose, even if i got no victory to celebrate at the end, i'll still be able to look back on my life, on my efforts and say i gave it all i had and at the least that which got in my way got exhausted trying to stop me.

it's on some punk rock type shit to me. it's all very similar. i'm gonna simplify the playbook. i'm gonna break the songs down to 3 chords. but those 3 chords will be loud and fast and you may not enjoy the song being played but if you listen you'll know the message i'm trying to deliver. and those that do enjoy it will jump around and mosh and scream the lyrics along with the melody.

and when the no huddle offense is working, and when punk rock songs are working, that shit is fun! it's fast, fun, and leaves you with no time to slow down and be boring.

no huddle, punk rock kinda life... that's the life for me. fast, loud, relentless, and fun!

"blogging is graffiti with punctuation."

i saw the movie contagion the other day. and eliot gould's character, dr. sussman at one point in the movie says to a dude who has an online blog,

"you're not a journalist. you're a blogger. blogs are just graffiti with punctuation."

as a semi avid blogger who rarely gets too serious, i got such a kick out of this! i know the intent of the phrase was to insult the dude he was talking to. but if that statement were redirected to me, i'd take a lot of joy and even pride out of it.

i don't consider myself a journalist. i don't think my blog is some important source of information. i just write shit that i hope people will be entertained to read. that's it. that's the only reason i keep posting stuff. whenever someone says, 'i enjoyed your last post,' to me, that makes my fucking day cuz that's all i do this for.

and i have such a love for graffiti as an art form. and when i think about it, i start to see some similarities. both are just putting your stuff out there. it's your message, uncensored, unfiltered, and untouched by big corporate machines that control almost all other forms of entertainment and information. this blog is just as available to the world to see as someone's tag posted large on a billboard that thousands of commuters pass every day.

and much like graffiti, there's good blogs and there's bad blogs. bad graffiti pisses me off just as much as a bad blog. when it's bad, it's wasting space. but when it's good, it's doing so much. it's adding aesthetic value to the drudgery that surrounds it.

and with graffiti and blogging, for the most part it's all about passion. not a lot of people are getting paid to do this stuff. okay, i know there's some exceptions to this rule... but the majority aren't seeing a single dollar. but we all keep on doing it cuz we enjoy to get it out there in the world.

this world can be a boring place to look at and live in at times. i'm glad there's people out there who out of passion alone wanna add stuff for us to look at in this world to spice things up and make it somewhat more enjoyable, if just for a few moments.

fuck blogging. i do graffiti with punctuation. that sounds way more awesome.

i just wanna be a postive dude

"i just wanna be a positive dude."

most days i wake up and this is what i say to myself. all i wanna do today is be a positive dude. if i can make it through the whole day just simply being a positive dude, then it's a good day and a good day is good enough for me.

and every night before i go to sleep, i think to myself, ok... tomorrow i'm gonna be a positive dude. tomorrow's gonna be a good one. i'm gonna take the fuck ups and mishaps of today, reflect on them, and then turn all that shit around tomorrow.

i know this doesn't sound very ambitious... but honestly, when i think about life and what i'm doing with it... i just think that if i get through the whole ride of life being a positive dude, then it'll be a good ride. i don't wanna spoil the ride with a negative attitude or a shitty outlook on life. and i don't wanna treat others shitty cuz then all of the sudden i've got no one to share the experience of the ride with. the ride's only gonna be more fun if i'm getting along with the people who happen to be on the ride with me.

it sounds simple, but that's where its simplicity ends. this world is a motherfucker. and there's a lot of assholes in it and i find myself constantly allowing others to drag my mood down. and yes, that's all my fault, i own that. i can't think life's gonna be a peach with no resistance to my 'positive dude plan.'

cuz the way i see it, you kinda gotta be tough to be a positive dude. you gotta be able to take the crap that life hands you sometimes and deal with it and somehow not let it turn you into a negative prick.

and the potential to be a negative prick is there and it's screaming and it gets louder every time something we encounter pisses us off. reacting to shit negatively is easy... so easy that you gotta be smart and tough to overcome that easy option, to take the high road and remain a positive dude.

i give it up to all the positive dudes out there. that's a hard routine to stick to. but ya'll also happen to be the most awesome of people. who doesn't love a positive dude? (rhetorical question, anyone who doesn't like a positive dude is drowning in negativity). they're the best to be around!

and when i think about that, it starts to feel infectious. like hell yea i wanna be a positive dude too. i also wanna be awesome to be around. cuz if you're awesome to be around, maybe that'll inspire someone else to be positive.

i think we're mostly products of our environment. but i think you get a say in how much positive energy exists in your immediate environment. if you're not happy with the level of positive energy around you, do something to increase it.

and if you start to become a positive dude, and those around you start to become positive dudes as well... soon the world is populated with positive dudes and that could possibly have some awesome results.



ps- i know i typed dude a lot in this post. when i say dude, i mean dudes AND chicks. this isn't some kinda sexist nonsense... everyone can get in on this.

karma is a bitch

if you say or think this, you've sorta missed the point of karma. karma's not your own personal weapon that you can aim at other people spitefully. even if someone's done you wrong, saying 'karma is a bitch' in reference to something bad happening to them is you wishing ill upon another person. and that in turn is a negative thing and bad for the whole karma thing.

if you're gonna believe in karma, you gotta realize it's about becoming a better person and through being a better person, better things start to happen to you. and if someone else is negative, negative things should happen to them but you shouldn't wish it to happen.

if you really have faith in karma, anytime someone does you wrong, you should not only be willing to forgive said person... you should be willing to forget, move on, and not waste a frown upon it.

cuz here's the kicker... if someone did do something wrong to or towards you, then obviously you had it coming. karma delivered. that karma you just called a bitch... yeah that same karma just bitch slapped you. so take it on the chin and think about how you deserved that.

cuz that's karma for you... if you really believe what goes around comes around, then anytime something bad happens to you only means you did something to deserve it. all the bad shit that EVER happens to you is earned by you and you alone.

if that idea makes you uncomfortable, maybe you don't really believe in karma. maybe you're just a fair weathered fan of karma... wanting her to play her role only when it's convenient for you.

the punk rock parent paradox

there comes a time in the life of many punk rockers, after they meet another punk rocker of the opposite sex that they wanna spend the rest of their lives with, that they decide they wanna bring a brand new little baby punk rocker into this world and increase the punk rock population.

it's an adorable thought.... what punk rock parent wouldn't wanna raise their little ones in a totally punk rock environment? raise them on punk rock music. dress them up in punk rock clothes. bring them to shows at 5 years old and teach them to do punk rock things like give authority figures the middle finger.

and just like that, your little punk rock tribe is complete and your family tree now officially has a punk rock branch.

the only problem is you can't force your child to grow up to be a punk rock person. sure, you can dress them up as a child, but eventually they'll reach an age where they wanna make their own decisions and who knows what the fuck they'll choose at that point.

but if they're anything like you with your punk rock ways, they'll probably choose to rebel against the most obvious authority figures of them all... their parents. the only reason you became punk rock was because you were rebelling against something. and kudos to you for that!

but if the apple really doesn't fall far from the tree, your kids will probably rebel against everything you stand for. they'll wear polo shirts and listen to josh groban albums. you'll shove guitars in their face but they'll say, "fuck you mom and dad, i'm playing the flute. i'm a flautist!" they'll go to church and join the military and vote republican.

and that's just what you should want them to do if you want them to be like you. this is the punk rock parent paradox. the essence of punk rock is rebellion. nothing's more rebellious than ending up being nothing like your parents. but because they'll rebel so hard against the ways of punk rock, they'll truly be punk rock deep down inside, making them just like you.

sick day

so i took today off of work cuz i was waiting on an exterminator to come to my house cuz i live in a really old building that has bugs in it. at first i was hoping that i'd be able to slide with 1/2 a day out of work and make it in for the 2nd half, but here i am at 4:47pm... i have just officially given up on this dude showing up at all today (i say dude cuz are there really any female exterminators out there? i'm all for equality for all but that's some equality i've never seen in person).

i've kept myself confined to my apartment all day. i feel like when i was a kid and i used to stay home from school and my parents would tell me if i was gonna stay home, that meant no going out. so i wasted the day away watching tv mostly... i went back and forth from espn's to my dvr backlog. i napped a lot too. then i wasted some time on the internet and now here i am blogging.

i have yet to shower. i didn't wanna be in the shower and miss the exterminator. all i've eaten is 2 granola bars cuz that's kinda all i have laying around my house. i was really ill prepared for this. i mishandled this like i mishandle a ton of things in my life... i woke up thinking it was all gonna work out the way i wanted it to. i assumed i'd wake up, dude would get here early, and i could either try to make it for the 2nd half of work or do something cool with my added time off like maybe get a tattoo or something.

so shit didn't work out like that. and now i've wasted the whole damn day boring myself to tears. i'm done with this noise! i'm gonna finish this blog post, hit the park for a jog, shower, and then go out and eat like a goddamn pig!

the biggest bummer of all, i didn't watch the price is right today. my fault, i know. i was busy with nap #1 and totally missed it. but when it comes to the whole 'staying home from school' nostalgic trip... nothing tops that experience off like a viewing of price is right. i bet they even had planko and the hiking yodeling dude.

a new season / a new beginning

tonight is officially the first game of the nfl season which means my fantasy football season officially starts tonight as well.

i love the start of a new season. i get to draft a whole new team of nfl athletes to fill my roster and fill me with hope that this is the year.

forget the past. forget all the crummy seasons of the past. forget all the times i've found myself in the bottom 3 places 3 weeks before the season ends and i'm trying to work out the miraculous mathematics it would take to get my underwhelming team into at least the 6th seed of the playoffs.

this is the year! this is the team! my bad news bombsquad will dominate! they will dominate all season long, beginning to end and into the playoffs. it will be my avatar that proudly lifts up the yahoo fantasy championship trophy at the end of this season.

i've got years of bad seasons in my rear view. i've had seasons so bad that it would be completely logical for me to just give up (like i did with baseball fantasy leagues, seriously fuck that shit, i'm truly done with fantasy baseball). but not this season. this is the season that i look forward and burn the past. all that losing, it's like it never happened. this is a new team, a new season, and a new me.

the sky's the limit! this year i dominate!

more pencils, more books, more teacher's dirty looks

i like when the school year starts again cuz it gets the kids off the street and out of the collective hair of all people.

i get it kids... you're young, you're hip, you're loud and full of energy and hope! you're our future and will be the ones who decide which senior citizen programs will still be around for me to benefit from when i'm in my golden age.

but you're annoying, so so annoying. kids, if you were me, you'd probably hate you. you'd tell you to shut up or if you're the kids who happen to be my neighbors, you'd use the term, "shut up you stupid faggot!"

the kids next door to me are my very own sample of the kids of the world. they play basketball till all hours of the night constantly referring to one another as faggots and talking about how much pussy they're getting in their imaginary existences.

kids need something to do. if we don't send the kids somewhere, they'll never leave the comforts of their existence, things like an xbox 360 or a basketball hoop in the backyard.

and they need to be learned. we know most parents don't wanna learn 'em. why not send them to a processing plant for education? say what you want about the education system... but at least we got one... at least we got some place where kids go for most of the year to sit and learn and use their brains. that's good for them. that's good for anybody.

and kids, don't be mad! you have it so good! before schools, you were sent to work farms and coal mines. before these modern times, a lot more of you died before you ever got a chance to grow pubes. you're the luckiest generation of kids to have ever graced the planet with your tech toys and such.

besides, absence makes the heart grow fonder. your parents can learn to love you even more than they already do cuz they get to miss you all those hours while you're away making new friends, cheating on tests, and eating schoolhouse cardboard pizza.

c'mon kids, lighten up. don't be a brat and just make the best of your situation. and don't think you going to school makes all adults of the world happy. after all, teachers are adults too.

it was the worst of times, so it couldn't be the best of times

i went to a renaissance fair today (get your "josh is such a dork jokes out now before continuing... feel better? awesome... read on).

and it was pretty awesome in the sense that it celebrates all the stuff we think is awesome about the renaissance age and medieval times. and sure, there's a ton of awesomeness to behold. there's knights and jousting, mead and battle axes you get to throw at a wall.

there's ice cream and funnel cake which i'm sure were big hits back then. there's tons of opportunities to spend your money on stuff... clothes, weapons, jewelery and whatnot. there's rides for the kids and paddle boats. there's porta-potties which i'm sure are not such a big upgrade in bathroom technology from those times of old.

there's even stocks that you can put your head and hands in while your friends take a pic of you. tons of kids were doing it. lots of laughing. hahahaha, stocks, so much fun! but think about the stocks back in medieval times. think about all the people who were probably kept in those stocks while villagers threw fruit and rocks at them. there was nothing fun about the stocks unless you were one of the douches throwing shit.

sure, the renaissance fair is a lot of fun and no one should take it so serious. but i did leave with a deeper appreciation of the day in age we live in now.

whenever i think of the possibility of time travel or the ability to live in whatever age i want, i think to myself that i wouldn't go back in time. i think the farther back you go, the suckier it would be to adjust.

i'll think about things like the plague or lack of clean drinking water. or how the majority of people were peasants who lived in filth from the cradle to the grave. medicine back then was a joke at best. and i don't even wanna imagine what a trip to the dentist was like. if you disagreed with the wrong person, you were burned at the stake...no questions, no trial, just you burning. if i did somehow travel back in time, i'd cash my ticket back to the present the second i'd have to use the bathroom or clean myself.

sure, we got some bad shit going on right now. there's a lot of sucky stuff going on in the world. but i think where we're at is as good as it's ever been so far in history. there's no form of nostalgia that makes me wanna say, "i wish i lived back in such-and-such times." i wouldn't even wanna go back to 20, 30, 40 years ago. i can't imagine living in a time before air conditioning and facebook that i would enjoy more than now. i just don't think that's possible.

so yea, let's have fun with the past and let's learn from history. but let's not kid ourselves. we are currently living in the best of times at this moment.

drop the guilt trip assholes!

i'm sick of guilt trips being used for people to get their way.

it's everywhere, especially on tv. it's in the sad commercials about starving kids in africa and homeless pets that are gonna be put to sleep if you don't do something (put to sleep, or to put it more bluntly, killed by those same people who so compassionately make the commercial).

we're forced to watch anti smoking commercials that try to make you think about all the bad shit that's gonna happen down the road if you don't quit smoking. as if there's 1 dumbass left in this world somewhere who doesn't understand the consequences of smoking.

vegetarians will tell you how awful the killing procedures are for animals. churches will tell you you're gonna burn in hell forever if you don't join them. anti-abortion protesters use pictures of dead fetuses. your boss tells only the good employees stay late and take extra shifts. teachers tell you F's will ruin your future.

people will use all types of guilt to try and get you to see things their way. but this is totally the wrong way to go about things. nothing should make you feel more guilty than laying guilt trips on people and watching it work... or sometimes it doesn't work and you don't get what you were looking for (a donation or a new follower or whatever) but still that person who refused to see things your way might walk away feeling a little crappier about themselves.

if what you're offering is so positive, why not use a more positive way to convince others? show us what's so great about what you're offering instead of showing us what's so negative about not accepting it. if it's really something so awesome, people should probably gravitate towards it naturally.

guilt trips are a form of manipulation. manipulation is a form of control. trying to control others in such a fashion is grade A douchebaggery. what you're really doing is sullying the image of whatever it is you're trying to represent. no one likes an asshole, and that's who uses guilt trips. all you're doing is convincing me that your movement is filled with assholes and it keeps me farther away.

show me the money!

seriously, show it to me.

give me money for something, for stuff, for whatever.

i don't wanna be a prostitute, but surely there's some skill i got that you'll pay me for? why not just give me your money to be awesome. i'm so good at it... you really should hop on a good deal when you see one.

i know from far away i look talentless. i can't build shit. i hate cleaning. gourmet cooking to me means pancakes for dinner. if your car breaks down, all i can do is help you stare at it awkwardly.

but c'mon! give a guy a chance here! there's gotta be a gap in your life that i can help fulfill.

i can hang out with you... you can pay me to be your friend... or tell people i'm your brother... i don't care as long as the cash is correct.

i give great advice! c'mon! have a seat, throw me a $20 bill and tell me your problems. i'll have your shit worked out in no time.

i can draw stick figures. need art? then you need me! take home your very own josh wells stick figure piece to add to your collection.

maybe you need a sidekick cuz you're a superhero or a henchman cuz you're a villain. fine, i can do that... but i suck at fighting... so really i'm just gonna be the wise cracking dude who every so often comes up with a good idea, "i think we should stick around to see batman get cut in half by the buzz saw instead of leaving the room and assuming it will be done while we're not around."

maybe you need a co-host cuz you host a tv or radio show. i can do that! i can be your announcer, your queue card holder, or just a dude who stands around and says, 'lookin good,' a lot.

in fact, i can be a yes man. i'll make a helluva yes man. yes yes yes... all your ideas are good and awesome. just keep that cash coming and you continue to shine with one brilliant idea after another.

shit, maybe you need a no man. maybe you need someone to constantly talk you out of bad ideas. i can do that shit too. just reference my batman example 3 paragraphs back.

c'mon people! it's obvious that the world is sleeping on josh wells. i don't understand why i don't have millions of dollars being thrown at me to do ordinary things. cuz what it all comes down to is josh wells makes ordinary look extraordinary. i make that shit shine! you need this world! make them checks payable to:

Joshua D. Wells

or just give me cash... i don't take credit but i'll gladly accept your atm card with the pin # written on the back.