Midwestern casinos are better in imagination than reality. Imagination: Bellagio on a Friday night. Reality: heavy smell of Pinesol filled with morbidly obese people who don’t have two nickels to rub together wasting the money they don’t have, smoking heavily and wearing dirty winter coats that smell like wet dogs. When I want to be sad, this is where I go.
I didn’t know this about myself before because I rarely visit a store that limits its inventory to soaps and lotions, but I have a hard time saying “no” to more hand soap.
I went in with the intention of picking up 1 bottle then those salespeople put their witchcraft on me and before I knew it, I was at the cash register spending $36 on soaps and lotions. I almost took their advice and bought two more soaps before I snapped out of it and told her, “no, that’s ok, we rarely use soap in our house.”
Weird. I’m steering clear of Bed, Bath and Body Works from now on because evidently I can’t control myself. So that I get my money’s worth, I’d appreciate it if when you see me you tell me that I smell of delightful black cherry merlot and that my skin looks soft and supple (in a manly way, of course).
While straightening up the house this evening, I left the TV on and it happened to be one of those HGTV home design shows.
Nearly every 3 minutes, I could hear the female home owners crow “Oh…My….God!” (or “Oh…My…Gosh/Goodness!” if they’re church-goers) as they walked in to each room during “the big reveal” – for you who are uninitiated, that’s the part where the designer gets to show off and proudly beams when the homeowners are busy saying “Oh…My…God” (and yes, there are always ellipses between words there to symbolize a slow and even spacing between words as they are spoken).
You would think that the producers would tell these hens that the formulaic OMG is killing the ratings and encourage them to use a wider variety of phrases. Explore the space with their phraseology, if you will. Nope. EVERY episode contains an OMG said in the very same way by these young, female, urban hipsters. How about an occasional “Heavens to Murgatroid!”, “Great Coogly Moogly!”, “Holy Sheep Sh!t!”, “Great Scot!” or something that involves a little variety?
I have grown numb to the other stuff they say on every episode (open-concept, curb-appeal, price-point, pop-of-color, make-it-pop, this is a great space, room for entertaining, etc.). Even though it’s extremely annoying, I have developed a callousness there but the OMG said the same way multiple times a show has got to go. If anyone has any HGTV connections and wouldn’t mind passing along my comments, I’d be much obliged.
You know how when you meet someone for the first time then you realize you both have a mutual acquaintance then the guy tells you a fact or quick anecdote about your mutual acquaintance? One time that situation occurred when the guy’s lead in story about our mutual acquaintance was that he ‘watched him gain 40lbs over a 2 month period from eating pistachios.’
I want to be somebody’s mutual acquaintance where factoids about me like that (mundane, yet remarkable) easily flow in casual conversation because it is then that you know you’ve done something to really hit it out of the park.
After traipsing through the giant Minneapolis St. Paul airport, I arrived at my gate with a half hour to spare. I noticed that my phone charge was running low so I sought an empty seat near a charging station. I spotted an open seat and made a beeline for it.
As I sat down next to the young lady who was using the other side of it, I immediately noticed that she was breastfeeding her child and that the other people in the terminal area were giving her space with understood respect and a relative degree of privacy.
When I realized what I had done, I wanted to profusely apologize and issue a “Good for you!” or some other sort of congratulatory remark and to express my regret for invading her space, letting her know that I wasn’t a pervert trying to get a sneak peak – or maybe even worse, one of those weirdos who is disgusted by it because they think that breastfeeding in public is akin to taking a dump in front of everyone (or equating other bodily functions that we don’t necessarily do in public). I wanted to explain that my insistence on removing myself from the area was strictly based upon courtesy and maintaining her privacy. Instead, I issued an involuntary, indecipherable anxious noise, got up and scurried away, embarrassed and red-faced at the fact that I hadn’t noticed what was going on until I sat down.
I saw a couple of guys a few rows over notice my awkward and hasty departure. I’d bet they were probably thinking about the parallels of the breastfeeding scene from the movie Me, Myself and Irene as they nudged each other in the ribs and stifled their laughter. Exactly what I would have done had I been in their shoes.
The very kind older lady sitting next to me hasn’t quite picked up on the international signal I’m putting out by continuously trying to engage me in pleasant conversation despite the fact that I’m wearing noticeably large noise canceling headphones.
To her credit though, she is almost nice enough to make me take them off. Instead, I keep lifting one side off my ear and leaning her way to hear what she’s saying. As a side note, she smells as if you were to take a freshly peeled Florida orange and then saturate it with some sort of old lady talcum.
For some odd reason today, I harbor no ill will towards her about any of this. Maybe I’m becoming a better man?
(I’m not exactly sure what the picture represents but I’ll bet it smells like body and talcum. Add an underlying scent of Florida orange and you have what I smelled.)
I’m nervous because the guy sitting near me is dressed in a pilot uniform and has a horribly botched hair cut.
It looks like a Little House on the Prairie cut where he grabbed fistfuls of it and sawed it off with a hunting knife. This gives off the impression that he’s either had head surgery recently, he’s a mental patient on the verge of a major unraveling or he has a skewed sense of reality and thinks it’s a good look for him.
In any case, I hope he’s not a pilot on my flight, as I’m not comfortable riding with a guy who had either his head opened up recently, is mentally unstable and/or has such bad judgement.
I finally acted upon the thought I’ve had for months about changing the alarm clock music in my iPhone.
For months, I’ve been awakened by the sound of Counting Crows’ remake of The Ballad of El Goodo. While its a great song, it’s more road trippy vs alarm clock quality.
Last night I selected Young MC’s Bust a Move for alarm clock music and found it to be perfect when it went off at 5am. Before any note is played, the words “Bust It!” are said (sounding just like “Busted!”) – which immediately prompted me to sit up in bed thinking the police had arrived. Without delay after sitting up, the infectious groove begins and I found myself powerless except to immediately get up and dance to the shower. This all happened in a quick and fluid motion. Waking up with the quick shock right into fancy dancing seems to agree with me.
Bust a Move it is.
Not too long ago, I was in the cul-de-sac near my home playing NBA-like defense against my neighbor when somehow my getaway sticks tangled and I hit the ground like a meteor. I tore holes in my new flannel-lined jeans but did barely manage to avoid breaking both wrists as I used them to brace myself for the earth shaking impact.
Each time I play basketball, I realize why I never became a basketball player. This body was bred for hotdog eating contests instead of games that require skill and grace.
If any of you ever see me out trying to act like I can play basketball again, I’d like to ask that you empty the contents of a can of mace directly into my face and sternly remind me that basketball is unhealthy for me. Don’t feel bad when you do this, it’s for my own good.
Travel Tip: if you’re sitting in the front of an airplane and you walk to the back of it to use the restroom and you decide to fart in there, make sure you shake that fart all the way out of your pants before you exit the restroom. Otherwise, you’re going to cropdust just about everyone on the plane as you walk back to your seat, just like the Hasidic man wearing Beats (by Dr. Dre) headphones did a few moments ago. (And no, I didn’t detect a meat tenderizer aroma for those of you who might follow my posts.)
Let Me Be Frank With You 