Left Foot. Right Foot.
Sunday, August 29, 2004
I've noticed that most of my problems stem from one thing - I don't follow procedures. I listen to CDs on random. I take wrong turns on purpose to mix up my drive home. I do not have a schedule of TV shows that I have to see. The dish washer can be started empty. Sometimes the vital soap is forgotten in the washing machine. It is not uncommon for milk to be added to the instant mashed potatoes way before it's supposed to be.
When I moved in I bought a new desk. While putting it together I decided that I was above the directions and summarily cast them aside. When I got to something around step 15 of 20, I realized that on step 2 I was supposed to have inserted screws into a now unreachable place. It took a lot of gerrymandering to get them home again.
I don't shop for groceries by a list. I keep a list in my head and each item is somehow strung together in a way that I won't remember to get item F until I have found item E which was sparked to memory by item D and so on. Sometimes this leads to making 3 or 4 laps around the store, but it beats writing things down.
I ran out of checks last week. Curiously I looked at the last time I had written anything down in the book. The date was 1999. I was pretty sure I had written a check since then so it didn't seem right. I turned the book upside down and it said 1666. I shuffled through my disorganized file box to find my birth certificate. It was then that I knew I was not alive in that year unless it was in another life but if I were a cow or a weasel in another life I probably did not have a checking account.
When I'm at the gym I walk around like a chicken with it's head cut off (except with a lot less blood). My mind races as to which exercise I should do next. Oh that looks good and I haven't worked that muscle yet! Oh but I've never tried this machine. But people can see me there and I might do it wrong. Maybe free weights! Oh, that guy with one arms is in there and that might make me uncomfortable. There's a hot girl on that machine. Maybe if I go to the one near it, she might like to watch me exercise.
By the time I've decided on what to do, it would have been better to just jump on the track or running machines and go jog with all of the leg movement I have done. When I get on that machine I realized that it was not a good idea since the sugar from the very half-a-bag of gummy worms that sparked the idea to go running are beginning to well up in the form of a ball of sugar in my mouth. Had I followed the correct procedure, I would have been able to breathe through my mouth and nose instead of just one of the above. It's too bad that this is the only way to have gummy worms before and after working out. They weren't even my worms anyway.
I was working on a 6-pack but I've decided to forgo that and go for the more economical 24-pack where I can be a hit at all the post-college parties that don't exist. I don't know how to make a 24-pack though so that means I'll probably have to follow a stricter procedure and I don't know how I feel about that. I have to fill out those stupid clipboard sheets if I want to make my company pay for a quarter of my membership. If the company knows the secret of making your belly into a case of beer, then why would their first gift to me be a 'drug and alcohol abuse prevention' book?
I guess the not following procedure thing doesn't really cause me very many problems, per se. I like the chaos. It really only causes distress in other people who think they know what's best for me and it's fun to watch them pull out their hair.
posted by Ghengis @ 6:07 PM,
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OCD Induced Rage
Friday, August 13, 2004
This year I began carrying dog biscuits with me. I keep one in my right pocket so it will be warm because dogs probably do not get a hot meal very often. I believe in letting people make their own choices and the same thing goes for man's best friend. I still carry the dog spray just in case but I offer the dogs a choice if they start screaming at me. Ok Rover, what's it going to be? The left pocket or the right?
They always answer by yelling "RIGHT RIGHT RIGHT!" I keep my keys in my right pocket too, so one of these times I'm going to accidentally throw the keys at the dog and make it mad by poking it in the nose and tricking it into thinking that sharp pieces of metal are good to eat. Once I get the dog mad it is hard to regain its trust with soothing words or promises of extra Christmas presents so I'll finally have to squirt him in the eyes so he can't see when I steal my keys out of his mouth. I just hope he does not dodge the spray and sprint around me and steal my truck because that would be a really awkward conversation to have with the police and my boss.
posted by Ghengis @ 5:39 PM,
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Citizens of Two Apartments
Monday, August 09, 2004
Since I work all day and my roommates... do nothing; half of the time I have the apartment to myself. It's times like this when I can open the washing machine lid and stare at my clothes getting dragged to the bottom of the bowl by the agitator. I start to day dream about getting sucked into the agitator and coming out on the other side, running through a plush green field with clean white clothes on, worrying about slipping and getting a grass stain. Then the spin cycle starts and my day dream is lost due to the sounds of my screams.
I listen to talk radio too much. Sometimes I lose myself, spending the better part of an hour listening to someone argue with people about something someone might or might not have done over 30 years ago. I do not care if Kerry burned down a village, stabbed holes in the tires of his own cargo planes, and tried to see how high he could jump when he shot his gun straight at the ground NOR do I care if he got an award for getting hurt when he was trying these fun stunts. I equally do not care if Bush was actually hiding from the boogie man in a cave during Vietnam or if he was actually trying to fly one of those fighters over there because he did not know how far away it was.
This kind of irrelevant, slow-news-day banter distracts from real issues and causes someone like me to want commit civil disobedience. (If you add civil before a word it makes it ok. Civil regicide and civil grand theft auto are some of the best kinds.) Civil disobedience that will create voter awareness is the best kind you can do. I want to target the issues that are the most important to people .
Tonight I went to the Honda Civic Hybrid dealer. I had a stack of Bush/Cheney bumper stickers. I began putting them on each of the bulky bumper of each automobile. I was about half way though the stack when some lights started coming after me. It was a police man. He told me that I should let the customers decide what bumper sticker they want to use and that some may not even want them! I told the officer that he was crazy because I knew that everyone was going to put that sticker on there anyway and that the Honda dealer would probably be calling me tomorrow for the increase in business sales. Since the police man watched the news he had no idea what to think anymore so he readily agreed. He even had a great idea to put a free gun on every driver's seat!
Next, the police man and I went to a Nascar event. We started driving around the track with a 16 year old SUV. It had a 13' x 13' square piece of metal welded to the front since Nascar people like welding. We bent the edges forward so it was concave and provided as much wind resistance as possible. I also put a sail on the top and out the side windows along with parachutes hanging out the back. There were gas powered fans excessively glued all around the exterior and set to high speed all the time, oscillating into oblivion. Oh yeah, I also stabbed a hole in the fuel and oil hoses so it needed a crew to constantly fill it while it was driving. We hired Ralph Nader to sit atop the vehicle to hold up a "Save the Environment" sign for extra wind resistance. On the big screens of the Nascar place was a monitor of the back seat of the car displaying gay people doing gay things to each other. Below was a ticker advertising for free abortions and a health food bar after the race.
I think it was a big hit and now everyone should know who to vote for since I have touched on all of the important issues of the day. It is a lucky thing that the world is so black and white because otherwise this might not have worked.
posted by Ghengis @ 10:57 PM,
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Puffy White Lies
Wednesday, August 04, 2004
There is a new drink out there! It is called waterfornow. It is fat free, cholesterol free, low in carbs, but best of all, it is free! Waterfornow is a drink that you only order at a restaurant or bar. When the waitress comes over to your table, waterfornow is something you can order when you are really nervous or can't make a decision. It makes you happy because you get something to drink but it also makes the waitress happy because she will think that at some point you are going to order a different drink. The best thing about waterfornow is that when the bill comes you can go to the bathroom for an undisclosed amount of time. When you come back you can say, "Oh it looks like you guys have already taken care of the tip so I'll just be going now." Except you don't say that out loud for fear of opening your wallet. If you have to you can hide under a table or leave out the emergency exit. Somehow, waterfornow gives you license to not share in the tip or food paying portion of a meal.
The waitress can only fall for the waterfornow trick so many times before she realizes that the "fornow" part is really a lie. At least one person has to order something with alcohol in it to keep her from abandoning the table forever. My back hurts pretty bad from "carrying the team" sometimes.
When I got home last night I took some pain reliever medicine. I forgot that you should not consume them with alcohol but the back pain would not yield to just 2 beers and I needed the boost... or so I thought. I also forgot that medicine before bed makes the neurons in my brain start on fire and melt down rational thought. I had the thing where I kept waking up thinking that I could not breath anymore and my heart was trying to beat a hole through my chest in some kind of muntinous escape effort.
I tried counting sheep again. This is the worst idea of the night! I'm sure the idea stems from some kind of psychology where puffy white things bounding over a fence in the night sky makes you think of sleep. It probably has something to do with the fact that the difference between Sheep and Sleep is the upside down u connected to the h. Is the trick to get your sheep to jump upside down? Scientists will never know.
Well when my sheep start jumping it works great for awhile. I am concentrated until around sheep #23. He is wearing Jordan's Bulls jersey. Subsequent sheep appear on the scene with different outfits and hats on. One of the sheep has a spoiler attached to his rear end to keep his back end down when he's street racing. When we get to the upper 70's, one sheep has osteoporosis and when he tries to jump his back legs crack and he goes crashing through the fence, falling down on the other side. His followers are staring me in the eye, per usual, so they don't see him when they try to jump. They all end up making a pile of tangled wool next to the fence's splinters of wood. Sheep #100 is particularly fat because he has to wear an extra long sash with his corresponding number on it. He comes crashing into the scene and sends the wounded sheep flying like bowling pins, scattering everywhere in my head. With a deep breath, I wake up and have to start over.
My sheep jump from left to right. I bet if I make my sheep jump from right to left it has the same effect as amphetamines.
posted by Ghengis @ 10:49 PM,
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Time for the Chore List
Monday, August 02, 2004
Every time I have moved in with new roommates I've always had to adjust to the differing idiosyncrasies accompanying each person. They always drag a part of home with them as they drag in their beds and kitchen supplies. It is interesting to notice how different some people are raised in the ways that they do things that you had never thought of. Sometimes it is very educational and you can learn a lot from your roommates. Here are some things I have learned from roommates, present and past:
- Trash can be piled to almost twice the height of the trash can before it is taken out
- Bananas are supposed to be refrigerated
- You can put half of a sandwich into the NON garbage disposal side of the sink and it will magically disappear after a few days of soaking
- If the TV is off for once it must be broken
- Slices of cheese should not be wrapped up in the refrigerator because it might suffocate and it's reprehensible to suffocate something and then eat it
- Milk can be kept out on the counter overnight with the cap off without a second thought
- Q-tips emit a screeching sound so no matter how hidden they are, the roommate can find them
- Toilet paper buying is a fun game of willpower
- No matter how nice it is to hear the surround sound that I set up, the crappy TV speakers will always be turned all the way up
- Frozen pizzas will only cook if you dirty a pizza pan and if you don't use a pizza pan the pizza is going to fall into the bottom of the oven and you'll never get it out!!
- Towels that I hang from the oven handle dry much fast when they are wadded up and thrown next to the sink
- Sauerkraut is really good and smells really good and it should be cooked all the time
- The sink can think better when it has more dishes in it
- Silverware has to be in those STUPID DIVIDERS because it is too easy to just dump everything into the drawer
- The proper response to my getting home from work is to rub your eyes and say, "What time is it?"
If it were not for roommate I would never have learned these valuable life skill lessons. High schools should not have home economics courses. They should just make high school kids live together and if they can get through it without killing eachother they get an A or a gold star or Burger Kings coupons or whatever politically correct markings they give out now
posted by Ghengis @ 11:46 PM,
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