5 Random Things Involved In My Day Today

• A pair of 1' x 1' red inflatable dice
• A picture of professional golfer Nancy Lopez
• A plastic pineapple
• Bird poop
• An eggroll
  

On Precocious Salad And Other Rants

There are very few television shows I can honestly say that I'm "into", and usually the ones that I am into I forget are on and miss anyway. (I guess I'm just not that into Amazing Race). But one show I have found myself enthralled with is Medium on NBC. If you haven't seen or heard, the basic premise is Allison DuBois (played by Patrica Arquette) is a Medium who has visions in her dreams that help solve crimes. Doesn't really seem like a story line I'd be that into, but I am. If you can get past the surreal story line, it's a pretty good show. One of my main beefs with the series is the oldest daughter Bridgette, (Played by Maria Lark) who is about as annoying as they come. She's one of those typical child actors who acts about 10 years older than they really are, and uses words and phrases and has the sensibility of that of a middle aged woman. I have yet to figure out if that's the actress herself, the way they want the girl to be portrayed or a mixture of the two. Either way, she's got to go. I actually just voted on a poll last night on whether or not the character should be killed off or removed. Apparently I'm not the only one with the opinion. Not only is the age inappropriate acting grating, but she comes off as arrogant or pretentious. Seems like she got an extra helping of Precocious Salad.

Check out last night's episode below, which is a two parter, to be continued next Monday. (Warning: Annoying commercial before show recap begins)

Happy Easter Y'all

I made it back to my place after the riveting family festivities. And as promised, the white chocolate cross made it's annual appearance. I would have a picture to share, but it seems my camera shit the bed this weekend. So I'll be in the market. Any suggestions?

Also included in my Easter holiday was my grandpa stating that "it seems 'Negroes' were born with a basketball in their hand", my great uncle from Italy showing his disgust for my Italian skills and an hour long video my grandpa made us watch on battleships of the NATO countries. I also discovered that Jen-nay's joke :"Jesus walked into a Hilton with three nails and asked 'Can you put me up for Easter?'" was not as big a hit at the dinner table as I first expected. Happy Easter.

Purmin Some Sugar On Me

I decided Thursday afternoon to take a personal day leave yesterday from work, since I couldn't bear the thought of waking up another morning this week. This extra day gave me the opportunity to head home a bit early yesterday to kick off the Easter weekend festivities.

In honor of Good Friday, it's tasteless offensive joke time!!!

Q: Why did Jesus die on the cross?
A: He forgot the safe word.

In the interest of taking the road of least offensiveness and knowing when to call it quits, I'll let the joke stand on it's own.

Not to be outdone by an early Good Friday, yesterday was also Purim. Happy Belated Purim. For yin'z Gentiles that might not know, check it. According to the article, "Gaily wrapped baskets of sweets, snacks and other foodstuffs given as mishloach manot on Purim day...to friends and teachers." My gay Purim baskets must still be in the mail.

Yesterday at the folk's house was all a buzz in preparation for the festivities. I had to prepare the plastic eggs for the Easter egg hunt today (not impressed) and today was also the day of coloring eggs. Easter egg coloring has never been something I really enjoy, but usually tolerate. My father totally digs coloring eggs, for reasons yet to be discovered, and my nieces get a kick out of it. My only excitement for the whole process is opening the coloring kit boxes first and removing all stickers, shrink wraps or any other traces of a cross or the word Jesus before anyone notices. Speaking of which, another Easter tradition is the white chocolate cross everyone receives from my mother in a basket. I'll post a pic, as I'm sure I'll get one.

In other Easter news, I consumed my first whole hard boiled egg yesterday. It was alright, but I'm not sure I'd do it again. I've eaten hard cooked eggs before, but never just sat down to munch a whole one. Check that off my list.

Note: I had taken several pictures to illustrate my excitement around the house this weekend, but my camera is being a bastard. Maybe next time.

I hope everyone has a rockin' Resurrection Eve!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

It Rocked...a little too hard

I made it back from Cleveland this morning to the tune of an incredible hangover and complete exhaustion. Which alludes to the fact that I did in fact have quite a good time in the city last night. I was a bit disappointed in the bar scene though, at least the ones we went to. Not too many people out, no real good music and no one really celebrating St. Patrick's Day. The occasional green shirt or shamrock pin made an appearance, but green beer was nowhere to be found. A real bummer. Apparently all the St. Patrick's Day festivities take place tomorrow. We did stay in an awesome hotel, which was a bit luxurious for a place to crash, but I decided to splurge. Some of the highlights of the evening include playing flip cup with a group of kids from Ohio State in a bar, ordering shots of Jamison and getting served rocks glasses filled with whiskey by mistake, and consoling a drunk woman outside because of her baby daddy drama. The museum also was quite cool and something I'm glad I saw. I think the highlights from that portion of the trip would have to be Kurt Cobain's guitar and a hand written version of "Psycho Killer" by the Talking Heads. A jam to end all jams. I hope everyone had a great time with all the goings on this weekend, and remember to wear green tomorrow (if you're horny).

	Talking Heads - Psycho Killer
	Found at skreemr.com

Cleveland Rocks! (sort of)

I'm headed across the border this weekend to the luxurious destination of Cleveland Ohio (or Ohi-a) to visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I'm kind of excited to go, since I've never been there before, and have heard many good things about it. It's the final part of a class on Rock and Roll and protest music I took this semester with a colleague. When we signed up for the class, we joked that we would stay and rock out afterwards in Cleveland for the weekend, but never really gave it a second thought. This week, however, another work friend of mine said he felt like road tripping with us if we were serious about staying. Since he did his undergrad in Cleveland he'd be a pretty handy travel buddy. And with that, we booked a room and set our plans to go crazy for St. Patty's Day in Cleveland, Ohi-a. I am a little bummed though since it is St. Patrick's Day weekend, and won't be able to celebrate in Pittsbugh with everyone, (even though last year I swore I would never go back to the parade).

Although I did have fun and probably will be back again next year, reasons why I didn't love the experience:

• It was snowing like a bastard.
• I found myself crammed in a port-a-potty with 4 men, all trying to urinate at the same time.
• I was D.D. and had to sober up too early.
• I man with a Mohawk and green pedal pushers on said "Yinz queer?" in all seriousness. (Oh wait, that was what made the day)
• Because I was sobering up I got in a rare but brutal pissy mood.

But yes, I'd do it all over again. There's always next year.

As I was planning the final details of my weekend escape to the great state to our west this afternoon, I received two phone calls from some friends. The first was my former college roommate who wanted to chat before he left tomorrow for two weeks in Jamaica. And the other from a friend who is, as we speak, in flight to spend two weeks in France. I feel bad for them. Neither one will get to experience the exoticness that is Cleveland. And, since I have no spring break, for now it will have to do. Since I'll be out, chances are there will be no blogging this weekend (sorry NaBloPoMo), but I will make up the posts with exciting stories from the weekend to come!

Durty Nellies et al

Eat your heart out Jen-nay, I made my own Guamalee yesterday. (Please note the intentional placement of durty nellies just for you). As I was browsing the produce section of the grocery store yesterday (which is my favorite part of grocery shopping) I decided to make guacamole on a complete whim. And I must say, it turned out flawless.

In other food news, my flour tortilla package recommends that if you have children who are partiularly picky eaters, you should try this delicious recipie: "Hot Corned Beef Roll-Ups with lettuce and spicy dressing". What planet did the marketing staff and kitchen gurus at Azteca flour tortilla company come from? That, to me, sounds like the most ridiculous item to make for a picky eater. No thanks Azteca.

I'm also waiting with baited breath for the season premier of Top Chef on Bravo. As the countdown on the right hand corner of my screen winds down, Bravo is re-airing the season finale of Project Runway, which is a show I mistakenly got sucked into. Mainly because they show re-runs of it constantly and I always stop when there is nothing else on. I guess you could call it one of my guilty pleasures. I secretly love it when Heidi Klum says "Auf Wiedersehen". I did, however, find the winner Christian incredibly annoying. Just a little too flamboyant and over the top for me (can you believe it?).

For Some Reason This Commercial Really Creeps Me Out

The Best Dilvery Of News Ever

I'll give you the conversation first, and let you guess the news.
I agree to meet a friend from work at a bar this afternoon. He approaches the bar:

Me: "Where the hell have you been? I'm half drunk already."
Friend: "Ok, you wanna kick me in the nuts?"
Me: "No fucking shit! Congratulations!"

Give up? That's how he told me he and his wife are having a baby. I love how normally when that news is broken it's exciting and emotional, but somehow most things with me seem to lack a certain class and social standard. I also wish there were no background to that story, and that was the typical way to tell friends you're expecting. But, as the story goes, when he told me a while back that he and his wife were thinking about having a kid, I blankly said the day he tells me he is having a child I will inflict said pain onto him because that means it would be the beginning of the end. In all actuality, I'm quite happy for him, and I didn't kick him, but it got me to thinking today, "Why am I so anti-baby?"

I don't hate children, I don't even hate babies. I do, however, get annoyed when they're whining, crying or running around their upstairs apartment like a maniac while their neighbor below is attempting to relax and do some blogging while trying his absolute hardest not to flip shit and start screaming through the ceiling, but I wouldn't say I hate them. I also know that at the end of the day, kids are going home to their families, and I'm going home to my quiet and relaxing place, devoid of all Pack and Plays and Hannah Montana dvds.

I've never really wanted children, and the older I get the stronger my convictions become about raising a child. As I've said before, I spend my entire day with other people's kids, why would I want to come home to my own. "But you'll feel differently once you have one" seems to be a popular rebuttal. Excuse me, did you just hear what I said? I said I'm not having one. I don't doubt that you do feel differently about a child once you have one, because you have one. I don't necessarily feel like I needed the Reese's peanut butter egg I just ate, but I felt differently because I had one sitting on my counter.

I don't mean to sound cynical against people who want to have children. In fact, I have had several fleeting thoughts of fatherhood. Some that have downright freaked me out. But they have been just that, fleeting. Perhaps it's my age and the fact that I'm not close to settling down just yet, but I've always felt that I want to live my life as my own, and not be responsible for anyone else. I'm a bit too selfish at this stage in the game to be worried about anyone else. And I swear to God if they don't quit running upstairs I'm going to loose my shit.

I Balanced My Checkbook To Sinead O'Connor Tonight

Sounds like a punchline, but it's true.
I apologize (mostly to myself) for not keeping to the NaBloPoMo contract and skipping out this weekend. My weekend was a bit of a blur, and didn't have much time for NaBloPoMo-ing. So, is it possible to make-up the posts just by having 31 posts in 31 days? I think so. Not that my posts are really all that worth-while, but I'd like to say I completed something.

So I had made plans to visit my family up north again this weekend, since my last weekend's plans to do so were botched because of the weather. Come about 3pm Friday and I'm ready to roll. Except my mother called and said the entire family was sick and the weather was bad, so don't come. Ok, thanks Mom. Operation Visit Fam. Attempt #2: Mission aborted. Then, around noon Saturday, right in the middle of my hang-over ritual of tepid coffee and The Food Network, she calls again telling me that miraculously everyone is better and the roads are clear, and I should try to come home. So I ran around like a mad man and made the trip home. In the midst of packing I forgot to pack my computer, thus no blogging this weekend. My trip was rather uneventful, but relaxing. I wish I would have had more time to visit some people, but alas, I had to return to the grind today. FYI, this is a picture I caught of my 5 year old niece trying to meditate. I absolutely love it, and will serve as my Manic Monday post this week.

In other mundane news, I picked up my taxes which I had prepared last week. Thanks Uncle Sam, $800 to blow! I actually think the majority of it is going towards my credit card debt, which is a totally lame and uncool way to spend it, but it needs to be done.

Things That Pissed Me Off Today

It seems that I use this blog more to bitch than anything else. Some people may argue that bitching is one thing I have perfected. However, I try not to consider myself a negative person. That being said, here's my bitching for the day.

• This afternoon one of my students approached me in the hall to ask me his score on a test they had taken first thing this morning. I have a good rapport with this kid, even though he can be kind of a pain sometimes. When I said I hadn't yet had a chance to look them over, he told me that I was lazy and should have them done. Albeit in a joking tone (I think) the comment pissed me off for two, or more, reasons. Firstly, I always try, and usually do, to get tests and assignments returned the next day. Nothing pissed me off more when I was in school than teachers that sat on tests and projects for months before grading. Second, and most importantly, I can not believe a teenager has the gall to speak to a teacher like that. I may sound old here, but I NEVER would have said something like that to one of my teachers, even in jest and I knew they could take a joke. I just blew the comment off today, since I know the kid's personality and his humor is quite a bit like mine; dry and sarcastic, but I still am a bit shocked.
• I picked up my car from the garage this afternoon, which is an entire day later than the day it was supposed to be ready. Today is the first I've had my car since Monday evening. I never realized how dependent I am on my vehicle. Bumming rides to work from colleagues was getting pretty old. As if being without a car for the week wasn't bad enough, my little trip to the garage cost me a little over $1500. Not something I had in my budget.
• The kid I tutor informed me he had the flu all week and felt like shit, but his mom was making him do tutoring tonight. Ok, thanks. After about 45 minutes of trying to get this kid into his work in vain, I gave up and called it an early night. I wanted to get out of there not totally because he was sick, but mostly because someone in his house was BLARING a CD of various renditions of "Oh Danny Boy". On the bright side it did get me into the St. Patty's mood a little early.
  
• I dropped and broke my favorite ash tray for about the 4th time tonight. This thing has been through a lot, and I've had it for years. I've broken it and super glued it so many times, but I refuse to throw it away. It's a white ceramic ashtray with a drawing of Jesus smoking a joint wearing aviator sunglasses and a T-shirt that reads "My Dad Created the Universe and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt". A timeless heirloom.
  

Incase You've Missed Them...

What I Found Out My Car Needs Before It Passes Inspection Today

• New front bearings.
• New rear brakes.
• New rear brake shoes.
• New emergency brake.
• New front axle.

Total cost before labor and taxes: approximately $1,400.

Have a nice day.

Manic Monday

A Quick Rundown Of The Weekend

• I watched the bartender breathe fire last night as I drank my "Flaming Dr. Pepper". Both were a sublime experience.
• A girl asked me for a condom at the bar last night. I bashfully told her I didn't have one on me, to which she replied, "You look like you'd use them all the time". Ok, thanks. ( I think) And to that I said "I don't use them period. It just feels better without."
• In order to not to have a complete claustrophobic panic attack at the tiny packed bar, Dee and I became the only bad asses bump and grind dancing in the entire place. Yeah, we looked like assholes, but at that point in the night, who cares?
  
• I was offered a challenge at Denny's at 3 a.m. that if I could order the "Lumberjack Slam" with a straight face it would be free. Offer extended, offer rejected.
• Dee found a piece of raw meat, about a half an inch big in her "Everything Omelette" this morning. Raw meat in breakfast = comped food and free muffins.
• A nice quiet hang-over breakfast directly next to a table of two families with a whopping total of 8, yes count them EIGHT, children all under the age of 4 is not as fun as it sounds. At the end of their meal, one youngster's diaper was leaking so badly he made a puddle on the chair. Nice.
• It took me well over an hour to pick up a few groceries this morning. Silly me, I forgot about the church rush at Wal-Mart.

How was Yinz's weekend?

Challenge Extended...

As per inspiration by Jen-nay's commitment to NaBloPoMo, I too will try to post 31 posts in 31 days. Since the theme of the month is lists, I will try to use that as the springboard. Mostly because I frequently lack blog post theme inspiration. To kick it off, the first post of the new month will be:...................................................

Why February 2008 Sucked and Rocked

• February always sucks. No offense to any February lovers or Aquariuses, but the shortest month always seems to be the suckiest. It also doesn't help that the most repulsive holiday falls directly in the middle. (And no, I'm not just bitter because I didn't have a Valentine this year. Other years when I've been in perfectly healthy dysfunctional relationships, I've also hated it.) My fondest Valentine's memory was when a friend from high school and I made black heart Valentines that said "Fuck You" on them, and hand delivered them to unsuspecting recipients.
• The snow and in climate weather allowed me to sleep past 5:30 a.m. a total of 6 times all month. As I've said before on here, my job is one of the few that allows me to be lazy on snowy and cold days, and I took full advantage this month. It also lulls me into being awkwardly adverse to doing anything that involves leaving my house.
  
• My neighbors above me have just gotten louder.
• My job seemed to get better last month. For some reason, although the month lasted about 28 days too long, I really felt on top of my game most of the month at work.
• It was leap year. I hate leap year. Don't ask me why, I just find it incredibly annoying.
• I started taking classes, finally. Both Italian and Rock and Roll history classes that both rock in their own quirky ways.

And that is all I have time for now, stay tuned for tomorrow's NaBloPoMo list!