today's rant: shutdown

fuck, it has been a long time.  um, moved to a new nice, big house.  just in time for a new kid on the way.

government shutdown.  i personally don't give a fuck.  what i hate is having to hear about it.  it could have been avoided.  all the republicans had to do is shut the fuck up.  but they are politicians.  they don't know how to shut the fuck up.  it doesn't matter if they have no formed opinion or working knowledge of a given topic.  they will talk their tits off for 21 hours straight just because they are getting paid.

but in the end, i am not worried about long-term effects.  there will not be any.  my retirement accounts have not been affected in any way, and that is all i care about.  besides, since the 70s, no government shutdown has lasted more than three weeks.  i can ride that out.  jesus christ, i wish there were other interesting things going on in the country.

the only reason i keep hearing about it is because people get paid to talk about and fill in their word count writing about it.  the only outlet i pay attention to with regards to the shutdown is comedy central from 11:00 pm to 11:59 pm.  i am also forced to read some stupid shit that one of my so-called facebook "friends" posts along with some dumb picture accompanied by blatant politically-biased text.  i thought the internet was supposed to be an outlet for original thinking, not a re-hashing of some retard's political savvy.

oops, sorry, wife.  i meant to say "some mentally-challenged person's political savvy."  actually, NO I DIDN'T!  to all my readers, please understand that i do not use the word "retard" to describe someone who has a mental handicap.  i use the word "retard" to describe someone who should do their job intelligently enough given their credentials, but utterly and epically fails, you know, like most people use the word.  i use the word usually to describe the one person who is pissing me off at the moment.  while my wife was pregnant the first time, the word "retard" was generally directed at the hospital administration and billing department.  as proof of this, i received a letter from my health insurance company last february saying that the hospital never billed the health insurance company for the delivery after a whole year, and the window expired.  that is one baby delivery that the hospital is never getting paid for now.  i'm sure as shit not paying for it.  we gave them the insurance info.  it's their fault for not claiming it.  hence, they are retards.

today's rant: still a new yorker

leave it to the mets to sweep the yanks in 4, then get swept by the worst team in their division.  fuck.

just because i've moved to south carolina does not mean i have stopped considering myself a new yorker.  i still plan on watching web streams of the mets and giants whenever i have the opportunity.  i still long for umberto's sicilian pizza and a&s bagels.  i miss doing the st. mark's bar run ending up at the comedy cellar (i remember doing this for my 24th birthday with my brother and my college roommate.  it is the most drunk i have ever been without throwing up.  the night was literally "beer, beer, beer, beerbeerbeer, sake, sake, sake, sake, beer, beer, burger, beer".  i got to see greg geraldo that night before he OD'ed a few years back)  when i am asked about college football down here, i have to catch myself from saying "oh, no.  i'm from new york, where they play real sports."  i instead go with the true-but-placating response "oh, no.  i'm from new york.  our college teams suck."  i will give the south this:  their peaches are awesome.  when i bite into a ripe peach in the summer, it is orgasmic.

oddly enough, when i mentioned at work that i will be taking a few days off to finalize the sale of my house back in new york, i have had repeated requests to bring pizza back from new york.  it makes me wonder what sort of poison out of which they make their pizza down here.  makes me feel better that i haven't tried it yet.

i know the perfect way for chick-fil-a to increase their revenue 17% immediately:  OPEN ON SUNDAYS, YOU FUCKING MORONS!

it seems that with every life-changing moment we have as a family, my wife must find a channel devoted to the topic and watch it 24/7.  she did it when we were getting married, she did it when she was pregnant, and she's doing it right the moment since we're getting a house built.  you cannot blame me for torturing myself by watching the mets.  in my opinion, my self-induced pain is much more dull than listening to what my wife has on TV.

today's rant: car sticker

a few days ago, i read the most ignorant car sticker i have ever seen. it reads as follows:

god said it
i believe it
that ends it

where do i start? the beginning? good idea. "god said it." um, god did not write the bible. no. he didn't. it was written by people. i will allow the possibility that the old testament was transcribed by people from god's words, and that's stretching it a lot. as for the new testament, absolutely not. the book of john was written by john's followers. the book of mark was written by mark's followers. actually, even those books were transcribed and translated century after century by people of the cloth from language to language. quality control being as sticky as was in those days with a serious lacking of journalistic ethical standards, the bible as it is today is in no way, shape, or form an exact transcript of god's words dating back a few millenia. therefore, we can flush that first line down the toilet.

next up, "i believe it." good for you. i'm happy that you think you believe it. i'm sure you've come to terms about not being able to eat shellfish, not being able to trim your sideburns, not being able to eat pork, and plucking your lustful eye out whenever you watch porn. then again, if you actually did that, you wouldn't be driving a car in the first place because of your lack of depth perception, and you wouldn't have the stupid fucking car sticker at all.

finally, "that ends it." this is the line i have the biggest problem with. this tells the reader that the owner of the car refuses to be open to intellectual discourse or any possible rebuttal. they openly announce that they choose to be in a logical vacuum in which they live in ignorant bliss for all to point and snicker. the person's iq automatically goes down about 40 points with this proclamation of self-righteous disdain of the beliefs of others. i challenge this person to stand by their convictions and take the car to fallujah. let's see how long they last.

to me, living by this creedo completely eliminates all original, creative, free, or logical thinking. this goes against human nature and it inhibits any sort of social progress.

i've said it.
if you don't like it,
argue with me.

my wife 1 minute ago:  "there is dirt and blood in my bra tonight."

today's rant: bra-wnie

last night, my wife was adjusting her bra while in bed.  the lights were off and our eyes had gotten used to the dark for a little while already.  when she finished adjusting her bra, she noticed that something about the size of a peanut m&m had fallen out.  she seemed very timid and asked me what it was, perhaps thinking that an insect (possibly one of those rolly-polly ones?) had fallen out of her bra.  i proceeded to poke the item with the remote control twice.  i then swallowed my nerve and ventured tactile contact.  i picked it up and proudly proclaimed, "it's a brownie."  apparently, a piece of a brownie she ate earlier yesterday had fallen into her bra.  now i know where our daughter picked up the habit of having cheerios fall into her diaper. to top it off, tonight, my wife experienced another food/bra anomaly. just 5 minutes ago, she discovered part of our daughter's granola bar in her bra. she exulted the profound words "i knew my bra was itchy but... look, there's chocolate and everything!" i love you too, sweetie.

it is starting to piss me off that my wife is watching hgtv at all hours of the day.  i understand the reason why she wants to watch the shows since we're getting a new house built, but the shows themselves are figuratively fucking me in the ear.  most shows follow the same exact format.  i don't mind shows and movies following the same format, as long as it is entertaining.  this shit ain't fucking entertaining.  every single fucking time, realtors take prospective property owners around and say "this first property has absolutely nothing that you want and falls well within your budget, so screw you.  this property has everything that you want and you cannot ever hope to afford it, you cocksuckers!  this third property has some of what you want and you'd have to put the rest in yourself, perfectly matching your budget.  by the way, these are the only three properties you can choose from, which is nothing like real life, but you're under contract with us, so tough tuchass.  since you're gonna pick this third property anyway, let's spend the other 17 minutes of this show just fucking around and telling the folks at home your pathetic story of how you met when you're getting married."  every... fucking... time.

today's rant: bad person burial

right now, i have a really bad stomach virus.  i really shouldn't go further than that.  why would you want to know that?  i don't want to gross you out.  there is no point in telling you good people how my asshole is bubbling green twice an hour.

i read that they buried the dead boston bomber brother in an undisclosed location.  i do not think that is fair.  i think that if someone commits mass murder in a country for PURELY RELIGIOUS OR POLITICAL REASONS (i had to highlight that just to be clear), then we should shame them in death.  i believe that the 28th amendment of the united states constitution should state that the burial site of a person, natural-born citizen or not, who has committed mass murder against americans for purely religious or political reasons should have a monument on their burial state of the statue of liberty wearing a strapon sodomizing the mass murderer with uncle sam holding his head and fucking his mouth.

i am not trying to be ignorant or closed minded.  i'm sure that the united kingdom wouldn't mind a monument of queen elizabeth forcing a dildo-shaped scepter down the throat of the london bus bombers with winston churchill drinking brandy and giving a golden shower at the same time.  it would also be interesting to see a monument of a bull stabbing and bludgeoning the madrid bombers with their horns while members of the spanish inquisition paddle them on the ass with bibles.  hey, if american journalists get beheaded on videotape, i don't think this shaming of actually bad people is asking too much.  fuck 'em.

today's rant: food

i'm disappointed that every time i say "like a good neighbor, state farm is there", nothing happens.  why the hell do i even bother paying my premiums?

someone from stony brook just emailed me about some career fair back at my old college.  i've responded by taking his email address and signing him up for a bunch of internet newsletters.  i'm signing him up for recipes, government recalls, and religious content.  hope he enjoyed having his school email.  i wish spamming spammers was always this easy.

my biggest restaurant pet peeve is undercooked chicken.  there is no excuse for that.  it is akin to the cook telling you "go fuck yourself."  it makes me wish that most restaurants would adopt taco bell's quality policy of "like it or we'll eat it."  i would freakin love to see that.  i may even pay to see some guy choke down 130 degree pink chicken meat because of his neglect.

coming in at a close second is undercooked eggs.  to be fair, i sort of ask for it when i order eggs over easy.  but then again, that means that the eggs are supposed to have a runny yolk.  that does not mean that the egg whites are running clear.  that is not breakfast.  that is food poisoning and two days of puking and shitting my pants because of food-borne pathogens.

cooking for a baby is a way different food experience that just cooking for my wife, or even cooking for myself.  the only way i can gauge if my daughter likes my food or not is whether or not she takes the food out of her mouth and drops it off the side of her high chair.  the best part of that is that it makes more food for me.

watching her eat something new is amazing.  she has such an inquisitive look on her face.  at first, she doesn't know how to handle it.  if i feed her something on a spoon or fork, she'll stare at it for 4 seconds, then attempt to take it off with her fingers, especially yogurt.  then she'll put halfway through her mouth.  this is the point where she is first tasting it.  the weird thing that she doesn't follow through.  she'll take the food back out of her mouth and stare at it again.  either her attention span is still developing or she is thinking "my dad made it taste like this?!" which can either be a good thing or a bad thing.  then, she'll put it back in her mouth completely and take two bites.  then she stares off into nothingness as if contemplating the meaning of life.  in those two bites, fates are decided.  either this food is going to be something to keep in our baby-feeding repertoire or this food will justify my wife buying a tablecloth that doubles as a drop cloth underneath the highchair when my daughter takes the food back out of her mouth and discards it off the side of her highchair. 

today's rant: driving through atlanta

lately for my job, i have to drive from my new home in south carolina to my job in alabama until the south carolina facility opens.  my drive takes me from columbia through augusta through atlanta to montgomery.  depending on traffic and stops for gas and food, it takes me anywhere between 5 hours 15 minutes to 6 and a half hours when going 70 mph.  now, i have not had the opportunity to spend a good amount of time in atlanta.  i would like to at some point.  i might even be adventurous or drunk enough to go a braves game when the mets play there.

unfortunately for me, my route only takes me south of the main part of atlanta, so i do not get to see much of the city.  the interstate i ride takes me though the airport.  notice that i did not say "passed the airport."  i said "through the airport" and i mean "through the airport."   the interstate goes through the airport.  look on a map.  one miscalculation, a plane is landing on your ass or you are driving through the nathan's hot dogs booth.

you know what would be awesome?  strawberry m&m's.  by the way, i don't want to hear any grammar nazis coming at me.  "oh, there isn't supposed to be an apostrophe there since it's plural and not possessive!"  fuck you!  i'm staring at the bag right now.  there's an apostrophe.

you know what the hardest thing about being on weight watchers is?  post-holiday clearance candy.  $1 for a five pound bag of pastel m&m's simply because it isn't easter anymore?  god bless america.

i am still reveling in the fact that being a father gives me a legitimate excuse to watch cartoons.  lately, i was elated to hear that there will be a sequel to finding nemo called finding dory.  now i can play finding nemo for my daughter in two years and we can go see finding dory immediately after in the theaters.  fuckin' a! (singing in my head "just keep swimming, just keep swimming...")

i might as well say this now while it is early in the season and i still feel happy:  let's go mets!

today's rant: how many squares?

when did "can you name a city in <state name> without the letter <vowel>?  bet you can't" get so popular?  i bet that if you have seen any of these on your facebook newsfeed, you have immediately thought of five cities off the top of your head if you live in that state, and if you gave it another minute, you could list fifteen others.  this is just as dumb as the "how many squares are in this picture?  bet you can't find them all" bullshit pictures or the dumb math questions that end with "84% of people get this wrong".  it seems that americans are in no short abundance of stupid things to share on their facebook wall.  yes, i'm referring to YOU!  you too, angry musthachioed person the mirror!

you know that "hide" button on the newsfeed next to each item?  i think it would be nice if when you hid something on your feed, an anonymous notification should be sent to the person who you blocked with the following statement:
"one of your facebook friends has permanently hid your posts on their facebook newsfeed.  the following reason was given:"
and for the reason, you'd have a choice of 1) misleading, 2) offensive, 3) illegal, 4) degrading to women, 5) libelous, 6) stupid, 7) homoerotic, 8) swedish, 9) prophesied by Nostradamus, or 10) all of the above.

this is my theory on economics and politics: the stock market's performance in inversely proportional to the level of confidence americans have in their government.  for example:

Bill Clinton gets a hummer in the White House = Dow Jones hits 11,000
Relief that we're getting a new President = dot-com bubble burst
The comedy riot that was GW Bush's two terms = Dow Jones hits 14,000
Relief that we're getting a new President = housing bubble burst
Credit downgrade, Obamacare, and sequesters = Dow Jones breaks another record

am I detecting a pattern?

this is not a "Democrat vs. Republican" thing. this is a "government" thing.  putting a donkey sticker or an elephant sticker on it does not change how it works.  all I'm say is let's stop the bickering and ride this stock market wave for all it is worth.  i know i am.

in response to the news of elisabeth hasselbeck leaving the view, scientists have predicted a 548% higher occurrence of the phrases "cunt on the loose!  there's a cunt on the loose!  hide the children!"

i think the vatican should invest in a space program.  i'm surprised they haven't done it yet with all the money they have.  think about it.  they want to be closer to god.  what better way then to strap the next pope into a rocket with a monkey and have them go meet god?  i'm sure god will pick them up once they get out of the atmosphere.  wouldn't that be awesome if that was in the new pope's job description?

today's rant: purgatory

let me tell you how my day has been.  i should be at work right now in montgomery, alabama.  funny as it sounds, i actually long to be there right now.  think about how that sounds.  what possible scenario could lead me to this situation?  what level of self-loathing do i have to reach?  well, i am three states away and there is no way i am getting there tonight.  i am stuck in charlotte-douglas international airport, or as i have nicknamed it, purgatory.  i am currently waiting for my wife's aunt to pick me up from the airport because she lives in charlotte.  while i am waiting, let me tell you about purgatory.

first of all, i woke up at 4:45am to get to my flight, which was delayed taking off from laguardia airport and delayed again landing in charlotte.  therefore, i missed my connecting flight.  instead, they put me on the following flight.  want to know where that flight originated?  laguardia airport.  remind me to ask the person who booked my flight and ask them why in god's name they didn't want me to get a good night's sleep and put me on the later flight from laguardia.  why would you want me to be tired going to work?  cannot really pay attention to FAA regulations while i am half asleep, now can i?

so, i got put on the next flight.  in the meantime, there was the issue of nutrition that had taken over.  the closest eatery to my gate was the fox sports sky box grill.  do not let the name of the dining area fool you.  the food has absolutely nothing to do with fox, sports, the sky, a box, or any other combination or permutation of the preceding words.  i ordered a bacon cheeseburger with seasoned fries and a pickle spear.  the fries were not seasoned, i got no pickle spear, and the bacon was pre-cooked.  i did not leave a good tip and i wrote on the receipt why.  i encourage you all to do the same for when management reads each receipt at the end of the day.  i should have eaten at the papa john's at the food court and saved some money.

i emailed everyone at work who this affected.  that's a great feeling.  having to explain to your boss and lead people why, even though you PROMISED to be there, that you'll be late.  then even later.  then not even showing up because the flight was cancelled completely.  the reason is astounding.  the flight attendant i was supposed to have was stuck in louisville, kentucky.  i sat at the gate thinking to myself, "self, you've sat through this plenty of times in the past three months.  you've seen tommy boy enough times to remember what david spade says in the airplane scene.  you can do this!"  despite my attempts to volunteer my services so we could get to montgomery, my pleas fell on deaf ears. 

i sincerely hope that the people at work do not think i'm just trying to get out of a day of work and have fun.  i do not consider listening to toddler's wail away because mommy will not buy them a can of pringles as "fun".  i DO consider watching strung-out convention participants missing out on their harley davidson convention bare-knuckle box each other for control of the only power outlet at the gate as "fun".  if only i can sell that on pay-per-view.

so here i am, typing away, finishing up my TCBY parfait.  i actually consider that to be quite an accomplishment because i have not seen another TCBY outside of Sunrise Mall massapequa in YEARS!  they disappeared from long island and i am severely dissapointed in that.  instead, all these fuckin fro-yo shops popped up with self-serve machines and toppings.  they just popped up overnight.  it's as if long islanders forgot that frozen yogurt existed and then were smacked in the face with five different shops to eat at.  we're like alzheimer's patients, as if we've never been to a frozen yogurt shop before.

as i am writing this part, it is now 23 hours after i missed my original connecting flight.  luckily enough for me, i am sitting at the appropriate gate staring at the plane right out the window.  the only way i am missing this flight is if i have a stroke sometime in the next hour within the 100ft walking distance from my seat at the gate to the plane.  i'm even checking the flight status online at regular intervals just to make sure that the plane that i am staring at is actually "on time" and in this plane of existence.

today's rant: ape-shit superbowl

if the superbowl has proven anything not related to sports, it is that people have way too much free time on their hands worrying about shit that has nothing to do with them, especially in the fifteen minutes before the coin was flipped.

before halftime, my wife called me and asked me what i thought about having the sandy hook elementary kids and jennifer hudson, all of whom knew someone shot to death, and the message it was sending.  i had to take a moment to catch my breath.  i asked her if she actually thought there was a liberal gun-control conspiracy during "america the beautiful."  OK, let's get one fucking thing straight, because everyone, EVERYONE, no, you don't understand, E!V!E!R!Y!O!N!E!, democrats & republicans, has been retarded for the past two months.  dems, it's not a gun control issue, it's a mental health issue.  reps, having the audacity to assume how MLK Jr. would side with you over the issue on his holiday is mind-fucking.  to my wife's defense, she was watching the superbowl with her family.  just to give you an idea about their political standpoint, i had to block everything they have rehashed after masturbating to fox news from appearing on my facebook newsfeed.  i had to block it, and I'M registered republican.  aside from that, they have enough issues to keep sigmund freud on retainer for quite a long time.  that, plus the friends that her family brought over, leads me to think that she didn't come up with it by herself.  she probably got it from someone at the superbowl party.

next, the national anthem.  i understood the chatter after x-tina aguilera fucked up the lyrics a few years ago, but the fact that i have to read that alicia keys is getting slack for singing a version that may have been pitchy at times but otherwise OK means that too many people have sticks shoved up their asses.  monday morning, i thought the major issue was gonna be the power going out 2 minutes into the 3rd quarter.  it is amazing what sets people off.