Perspective

Take a look at what's happening in the world around you. Go on, take a look at it. Pretty bleak, huh? No wonder all those Japanese kids are killing themselves. In troubled times, it's easy to just throw your hands up in disgust and say, "Well, I give up," and let yourself be sucked into the downward spiral in which the world is seemingly headed.

But before getting caught up in all that gloom and doom stuff, it's important to take things into perspective. Are we really headed in the wrong direction? Are things really getting worse? I used to think so, right up until this morning.

The elevators at the Prudential Tower have little video screens that flash news updates, weather forecasts, stock reports, sports scores and other information so you have something to do in there other than trying not to make eye contact with the weird guy that got on with you. The current time is displayed at the bottom of the screen, next to the message "You Are Watching Captivate Network." Captivate. See, it's funny because you're literally captive while you're watching it.

I was in the elevator this morning, and after the Channel 7 four-day weather forecast, there was a trivia screen informing me that on this day twenty years ago, the number one movie in the country was Police Academy 3: Back in Training. I don't know about you, but suddenly, I felt much better about times we're living in.

Read more »

The Legend of Johnny Bingo

When the Bossman rations out the weekly wages, sometimes I wonder if he truly knows the dedication to the craft that emanates from the very souls of his ever-diligent employees. (The number printed on the rightmost corner of the check would suggest a resounding "No.") Yet so dedicated are we, so devoted to keeping our minds limber, that we spend what lesser men would consider an obscene amount of time playing online Scrabble. What better way to keep your mind fresh and wary of common misspellings--a veritable career-ender in the fast-paced world of typesetting--then to partake in a friendly four-player intra-office game of Scrabble? But the benefits don't end there. No, there's also the healthy spirit of competition and valuable life lessons associated with the game. One of those lessons I'd like to share with you today.

First of all, the practice of playing Scrabble as a work enhancement tool started back at the old office with an actual flesh-and-blood Scrabble board. Okay, not flesh and blood, but it was a tangible enitity, bound to this Earth the way our current virtual game is not. In those days, John T (beloved internet wordsmith Mr. Schprock) ruled the Scrabble world with an iron fist, and he notched a hefty number of wins with little opposition. He'd drop Bingos (that's a word that uses all seven tiles and nets you an extra 50 points if you didn't know) at a clip of at least one a game, earining him the name "Johnny Bingo." Second place, a very distant second place, belonged to Joe, who took it upon himself to say, "John-nay...John-nay Bingo!" several times a day as only he can.

As for us stragglers, were lucky to win a game or two here and there, as if by some miracle.

But those days are gone. With online Scrabble, the nagging guilt one felt while hovering over the board to take a turn, knowing full well that the boss could walk by at any minute, has been replaced by the almost cocky sensation caused by slyly hiding the game window when the boss comes around. Granted, these games are useful exercises for those in our profession, but employers don't always see it that way. So with the newfound freedom of taking as long as I want to take my turn, rather than the hurried frantic pace of the old games, I've found myself winning more.

In fact, just last week, I was tied with John T for number of wins, seven, until he mounted a comeback of sorts and won several games in a row. I hadn't won again until Friday, which brought my record to eight versus his eleven. Last week I was poised to supplant John T and here I find myself needing a string of wins to even tie him again. We started a new game, and as the winner of the previous game, I went first. I immediately went on the offensive (or as much so as you can while playing Scrabble) and played "BERTH," placing the "H" on the double-letter score. 28 points. Do your worst, T.

BERTHING. Triple-word score. 36 points.

Dammit.

That was as close to me as he came, though. Fortune shined on me this morning, lining my rack with high-scoring, easily-playable letters. But it takes more than good letters. It takes skill, my friend. During the next few turns I walked away with the lead, playing "AX" and "NIX" for 51 points one round, and "HALTS" and "SOCKS" for 46 the next. When the virtual tile bag ran empty, I held onto an impressive lead with 202 points. John T was in second place, 61 points behind me with all the high-scoring letters already boarded. What's more, I had a Bingo in my rack in the form of "HEADMEN." There was no open spaces on the board large enough to accommodate such a word, but at this point it was all a formality. A walk-off Bingo would have been nice, but it was just as well to get another 19 points and go out on my next turn. The extra 19 put me at 221 to T's 141.

Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright. The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light. And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout. But there is no joy in Mudville-- John T played "VAPOURS" and "SCUD" for a total of 93 points. That's right, he got a walk-off Bingo, playing all of his letters and collecting the remaining ones in our sorry little racks. 113 points for that turn in all, skyrocketing his final score to 254 and dropping mine to 213. Both words were subsequently checked in the official Scrabble dictionary and found to be perfectly acceptable, and my surefire win was rendered a meaningless also-ran. I'm not sure how long I sat here, dumbfounded look on my face, as John T smugly announced that he was adding another win to his column. Johnny Bingo rides again.

And so, the life lesson that I hope you take away from this cautionary tale, is that John T stinks.

Read more »

Ask A Stupid Question...

Okay, suppose you're walking down the street, minding your own business, when a guy comes up to you and says, "See that guy over there? He likes to shove fish down his pants." Your immediate reaction would be that the guy that stopped you on the street wasn't right in the head.

But then you start thinking, "What if that guy really does shove fish down his pants? Nah, he can't. That's too ridiculous. But still..." And you just can't stop thinking about it. Does the guy standing on the other side of the street really stick haddock down his pants for reasons known only to him? He looks like a normal enough guy, but you'd never even seen him until about twenty seconds ago, so who knows? And if he doesn't, why would someone make something like that up? Maybe the first guy is crazy. How credible is he? Maybe they're both crazy. Maybe thinking about it for any extended period of time is making you crazy.

Your day was going so well, and now all you can think about is fishpants over there. Do you walk over there and ask the guy if he puts fish down his pants? No. How would you even go about doing that?

"I'm sorry sir, but are you in the habit of filling your trousers with fish?"

Assuming the guy doesn't punch you in the face, he might just shrug it off and go about the rest of his life thinking you were some loon that accosted him on the street. And I don't know about you, but I hate it when people I don't know think I'm a loon. You have to get to know me before you can think that.

And what if, throwing logic and common sense to the wind, this guy actually does stick fish down his pants? How awkward would that be?

"Excuse me, I know this is going to sound completely insane, but...um...do you...put fish down your pants?"

"Live fish or dead fish?"

"You tell me."

"Why, do you have a problem with people who stick dead fish down there pants?"

"Oh, no...I...I was just...this guy said..."

"You don't know what it's like, okay? You don't know. And screw you for judging me!"

"I'm not judging, I'm not judging. It's cool. Hey, whatever. I'm cool with that. You can't spell fetish without fish, right? But, why dead fish?"

"What's it to you?"

"I mean, you know, did they really deserve to die just so you could shove them in your pants?"

"Yes they deserved to die, and I hope they burn in hell!"

Man, there's just no good way to work this out. You'd probably end up with an aneurysm. Good thing it's just hypothetical.

Read more »

One Lump Or Two?

Until I met Michele I never drank much tea. I liked the little cups they give you at the fancier Chinese food restaraunts, but that was about it. I wasn't really aware that tea came in all kinds of ridiculous flavors, and now I've been drinking it more and more. Which is a good thing, because I like coffee, but I can't drink it very often or I end up spending all night rushing in and out of the bathroom. I swear, it's like the Friday the 13th movies; the first one is genuinely scary, followed by a seemingly endless line of progressively sloppy sequels.

Tuesday night I put the water on to make a cup. I asked if anybody else wanted anything, but no one did, so I got out a mug, put the teabag in, and poured the hot water into it. I can tell right now that you're absolutely enthralled by my exposition of the tea-making process. The final touch was three giant spoonfulls of sugar. after I'd dumped the sugar in, I put the spoon in my mouth to taste the sugary goodness. But it didn't taste like sugary goodness. It tasted like what I'd imagine used kitty litter would taste like.

I'd like to take a moment now, if I could, to point out that, although we may all have our differences, there is one constant that exsists throughout all the peoples of the world. And that constant is, whenever someone puts something God-awful in their mouth, they immediately track down someone else and make them try it. "Oh, this is gross! Here, have some."

I grabbed the sugar bowl and brought it over to my mom for her to try it. I got pretty much the result I expected. Michele refused to try it at first, but I got her to break down and taste it. It was salty, but it still tasted a bit like sugar.

For some time now there's been at least one mouse running around the house vertually undetected, pooping all over the place and leaving nibble marks on doorframes and any article of clothing unfortunate enough to be left on the ground. In the back of my mind, I was thinking that I had just consumed sugar laced with mouse pee.

Fortunately, it was nothing that dramatic. No, when my dad came home, my mom asked him if he had filled the sugar bowl. He said that he had, and she then asked him where he got the sugar to fill it.

"From the tupperware container with the blue top in the cabinet."

That container was salt. He poured salt in with the sugar, which I then poured into my tea. It tasted like the ocean.

And the best part? He used it in his drink that morning right after he'd filled the bowl and didn't even notice! I guess that's not really the best part, but I was sort of building up to this big climax and that's all that happened. The best part was probably my initial gagging and going around trying to get everybody to taste the potentially mouse-tainted sugar.

I've got a new update up in the Drawings section. You'll check it out if you know what's good for you.

Read more »

Pantsless: A Story of Courage and Survival

Twenty-eight years ago, under a shady mango tree in Guatemala, a man sold a mystic green "fertility" rock to a gullible tourist. Elsewhere, newborn Jose Julian Sarti Gil lay in his crib, swaddled in a Dallas Cowboys t-shirt. Today, Jose is an important, if not overly enthusiastic, cog in the well-tuned machine that is the Borders bookstore empire. And the tourist? He was probably attacked by a gang of armed robbers in Tikal.

In celebration of Jose's birth, I offer the following story, as told by the man of the hour himself.

It was January 15, 1998. I was returning home from a holiday trip to Guatemala. Since it was 75 degrees there and I'd be going through Miami, I was wearing shorts. When I boarded my plane in Miami, the captain told us we we'd be heading straight into a blizzard. Oh well, no worries. Nick and the guys were picking me up at Logan.

My flight made it in just before the storm. On the ride back, Nick wanted to stop by the South Shore Plaza for something. I don't remember how long we stayed, but when we got out there was maybe an inch of snow on the ground. As Wah Kee took the turn behind Pizzeria Uno, Nick said, "Careful, Kee. The roads might be a little..." Nick never finished the sentence. Before we knew it, the Audi was riding on two wheels while the others bounced off the curb. We slid about 200 feet or so. We got out of the car to survey the damage, and Wah Kee proudly proclaimed, "Ehh, we're fine guys. No proble whatsoever." About the same time Nick discovered the two front wheels were facing in. Now I'm no mechanic, but that can't be a good thing.

So there we were, stuck on a curb, no front wheels, me wearing shorts, Wah Kee in denial, John along for the ride, and no idea what do do next. Then a lucky break. It turned out I had my AAA card in my luggage. Why I would need that on a plane, I dunno. Nick was hungry so he suggested the two of us walk over to Pizzeria Uno so I could call AAA and he could get a pizza. By this point the snow was really coming down, and it took about 15 minutes for AAA to understand I wasn't driving my car. Once they had all the details they told me the good news: Due to the storm, It would be 2 1/2 -- 4 hours for the tow truck to show up. YAY.

Nick apologized, but there really was no reason to. To be honest, I was just happy to be on the ground. Back at the scene of the crime, Wah Kee and John were sitting on the curb watching another car do donuts in the snow. John got pissed because he thought people would see the donuts and assume we were the ones doing the donuts and then crashed. If only it had been that exciting. After about 2 hours, the tow truck showed up. I think a tear ran down Wah Kee's face as they raised the Audi into the truck. Then we realized there was no way we'd all fit in the truck, especially with all the luggage. Some car pulled over because the driver knew Wah-Kee and offered a ride. So we all piled into this little 2 door. Wah-Kee up front; the rest of us and the luggage in back. I seem to remember John sitting on Nick's lap, but I believe he was just sitting on my carry-on bags. Once we were all inside, and the tow truck was gone, Wah Kee realized, "Oh crap, my parents are gonna kill me!" Our new driver giggled and said, "Don't worry. My dad gets pissed every time I total my car." John's eyes bugged out, as he whimpered something about not wanting to be in another accident.

He got us home in one piece though, and I was in bed by 1 am. When I boarded the plane in Guatemala, I thought something would happen on the plane, not 8miles from home. But things could have been better if I had a jacket, and some pants.

Oh, and Nick never shared his pizza. Bum.

Once again, "Every time I total my car"?! This is who we get to drive us home in a freaking blizzard, a graduate of the Billy Joel School of Driving? One thing about Jose's story, though; I thought the car that picked us up was a station wagon, not a two door. I guess they make two door station wagons. I don't know. It's all a blur. All I really remember is Jose kept saying that he had a winter coat in his car, and it would have been nice if he had it on. I think we were supposed to pick him up in his car, but used Wah-Kee's instead. I forget why. Like he said, I was just along for the ride. But if I had to guess, I'd say it was because Jose didn't want Wah-Kee driving his car.

Anyway, Jose left out one tiny detail, which was that for some reason, the driver's side back door on the Audi couldn't be opened from the inside. This wasn't a result of the accident; it was always like that. You had to be let out, like a police car. I think there was a big suitcase or something in the middle seat separating me and Jose, so he could get out on his side, but I was stuck in the car until someone thought to open the door.

Oddly enough, last year's birthday story also involved a car accident and the same Pizzaria Uno. Weird.

Read more »

One More

My mom emailed me at work yesterday about my last post. She asked if my life was really that bad in high school. It wasn't, really. I can look back now and see it's just part of growing up. I liked a girl, she didn't like me. It happens. But aside from the silly repressed feelings and self-destructive unrequited love business, life was pretty good.

As for the poems, Memories and But I Do were the only "serious" ones I did. I intentionally mixed them in with the rest, which were infused with my own dark humor, (at least that was the idea) to sort of throw people off track of what was really going on in my head.

But just to ease my mom's mind, here's one more from that time frame that's not about love lost or death. Well, actually it is about death, but it's not all depressing and stuff. I can't remember if the accompanying doodle was the inspiration for the poem, or if it came afterwards.

Anyway, here it is. This is a, uh, Brazilian ass-shaker right here. Can I say that? Right on.

The River Styx
While going to the river Styx,
I got into a nasty fix.
For I was completely unaware
That I had to pay Charon's fare.
He patiently waited for a token;
Still and silent--not a word was spoken.
He then put out his bony hand
But I still did not understand.
It is now to my great lament
That he did not get his payment.
He had many more souls to deliver
So he left me there, by the river.
Then I got it through my head
That all this time I've been dead.
Now I'm in a nasty fix --
I'm stranded on the river Styx.

Read more »