Conspiracy Theories

Okay, I know I sound like I'm wearing a tinfoil hat when I say this, but I think someone broke into my apartment yesterday and rearraged my refridgerator.

God! That sounds so crazy. I'm crazy. You're leaving, aren't you? Wait, just hear me out.

So I got home from work yesterday at 6:00, like normal. I haven't gone shopping this week yet, so I didn't have a lot of choice in the dinner department. I decided on some buttered tortillas and Dr Pepper, since those were the only two things that I definitely had in the kitchen.

I toss the tortillas in the oven and then start looking for the butter. I totally can't find it. Now, I do not have a large refridgerator and it is pretty much completely empty. I am mystified beause I have a damn huge tub of butter, and it cannot be hiding anywhere. I look all over the kitchen with no luck.

But you know what I do find? My half gallon of milk wedged up on top of the fridge, next to the cabinets. Which is very, very weird because why is the milk out of the refridgerator, and why is it way back up against the wall? Creepy, but I figure I must have just left it out yesterday and it got pushed back randomly. I throw out the milk. Still no butter.

Feeling completely insane, I check: the trash room, the bathroom, the living room, and my bedroom. No butter. This is so weird.

I decide to take a loss on the whole thing and just eat the tortillas sans butter. I put them on a plate and go to sit at the dining room table. I pull out the chair, and my tub of butter is sitting right there on the chair.

[Right here is where the ominous music would swell on the soundtrack of my life.]

What the Hell is going on?!

There is no way I would have ever put my butter 1) in the dining room, 2) on a chair under the dining room table and 3) completely forgotten this fact. Couple that with the milk on top of the refridgerator and I'm getting a huge "the calls are coming from inside the house" sort of vibe. Y'know, with butter.

So I ran around and checked; there is nothing else amiss in the house. I don't really have any valuables per se (except my TV of the gods) so I wasn't too worried. Although for a moment there I thought I was robbed, until I remembered I had let Frank borrow my 3rd season Will & Grace and it wasn't actually stolen from me by some insane butter-mover.

I feel like this should go somewhere, but really that's all I got. I have no proof, but I totally think someone snuck into my house and moved the perishables in my refridgerator around.

What more is there to say?

Hey, where are you goin'?

Cable Guy

Wherein Jason learns the importance of not being a complete moron.

[Scene: Jason's office]

Jason's Boss: Hey Jason. The cable has been out since yesterday.
Jason: Oh dang.
Jason's Boss: Will you see if anyone else is having problems?
Jason: Sure.

[Jason wanders around to all the different offices like a vagrant, and ascertains that no one else is having any problems. He returns.]

Jason: No one else is having problems, I'll call the cable company.

[Forshadowing: Key scene not found here -- Jason actually checking the cable himself.]

[Jason calls the cable company, they will send someone out as soon as possible, since they have no reported problems in the area.]

------

[Next Day]

Secretary: The cable people are here.
Jason: Come on back. I haven't actually checked the cable today, so I don't know if it's working or not... [Jason turns on the TV. Static abounds.] Yeah, it's been like this for over a day.
Cable Guy: Hmm, [looks behind the TV] well everything looks fine here. [grabs the remote. Changes the channel. Perfect picture. Changes the channel again. Also, perfect picture.]
Jason: [realizes that the problem with the cable was not so much that the cable was out and more that no one in the office thought of checking to see if the TV was set to channel 92, which we do not get. Embarrassment is not really the word.] Uhhhh...
Cable Guy [conflicting emotions across his face - some pretty extreme annoyance right up against some serious humor, since he knows that he'll get some big laughs when he gets back to the office. He settles on a big smile]: Well, yeah, I think we're done here. If you could sign this...
Jason: [Dies.]

[/Scene]


Am I not the sexiest person you know right now?

Hi, I'm Jason and I am officially the stupidest cable customer on the planet. My trophy should arrive any day now.

Damage Report

BWEoD Final Tallies:
Days of Drinking: 5 of 6
Days of Drunk: 4 of 6
Days of Awesomness: 6 of 6

For all future reference, everyone should always have a birthday week. None of that one day garbage. I may officially be old, but I got there in style, by damn.

It was a very dramatic weekend, filled with musical numbers, old people, astonishing football victories, inappropriate dances, and lots and lots of drinking. So you'd think there would be a thousand stories. Oddly enough, all I seem to be able to pull from my mind:

• Frat guys dress even worse now than when I went to school, which seems like a long time ago but was actually less than 6 months. How did things go so wrong so fast? Blazer over a polo shirt, with the polo collar flipped up? No no no no no. At least 200 guys at the football game were incredibly lucky that I didn't have some sort of blunt object with me 'cause I was in a hitting-people-with-bad-fashion-choices mood.
• Man, SMU never does things the easy way, do they? Got to ratchet up the tension as much as humanly possible. Ahead by a few points? Let's go for 2! Rich people do love the dramatic reversals, right? Oy.
• For all my bravado, I still couldn't convince myself to get drunk in front of both my parents and a table full of old people on my birthday. The old people were very irreverent, but some sort of repressive character trait from the past reared its ugly head. In other news from that night, Kim Greene rules the world.
• Surprising fact I learned this weekend: if you get continually drunk over a week, you are less likely to realize when you become drunk as the week progresses. When you can slam through three drinks and still think you are sober, you are totally deluding yourself and should probably check your speech for inappropriateness. Ah, hindsight.

Other news: I got a rug for my birthday, to add color and life to my living room. It is awesome. Sadly I'm already over it. I wonder if there is a return policy on things you lay on the floor and walk across.

I swear I remember when I used to write amusing things. Maybe once the alcoholic haze clears I'll be in better form. I apologize.

Hot Damn

BWEoD is rolling right along in grand fashion. Today I am old. But what a way to go. Friday is here and the culmination of Birthday Week is ready to commence.

NaNoWriMo is not going anywhere, mostly due to BWEoD. Word total is just around 2,000, pretty much 6,000 behind schedule. Maybe I'll catch up next week.

I hate to bring down the awesomeness that is this week, but y'all, I feel soooo sick right now. Is it possible to contract dysentery from bacon-covered cheese fries? I wouldn't think so, especially when I only ate the bacon, and yet I feel two steps from death's door. This could definitely crimp tonight's plans.

I had no idea exactly how much higher a degree of difficulty my morning routine is when I'm not feeling great. I already don't have that great of a morning routine. Anyone who knew me in college knows that I do not do mornings. At all. I would estimate my wake up time for the last two years of college to be somewhere around 12:30 pm. On a good day. And that's factoring in some wicked 8:00am labs and ethics classes that popped up every once in a while. I cherish my sleep above all else, you can be sure.

So in order to make sure I'm not late for work, I have a very complicated morning procedure:

• First Line of Defense: Cell phone alarm clock. This goes off at 6:45 am. It is scheduled to then keep going off every 15 minutes until I clear it off of snooze. This is a weak line, because it is insanely fickle and only goes off about 3/4ths of the time. Also, the snooze gets tired easily and usually only goes off once before going on break like the Teamster it is.
• Second Line: The alarm clock. This is the clock I have used since high school and it is uniquely able to rouse me from sleep, no matter what. Its shriek pierces my brain and I must silence it as soon as possible. So it is excellent. However, it does have an easy to hit snooze button as well. Thus we institute:
• Third Line: The alarm clock is situated in the next room over on the bookshelf. At first this was just convenience; I had only one clock and I needed it in the living room where I could see it during the day. Now though, placing the clock in the next room ensures that I must physically get up and turn it off. Yeah sure, I usually get up, stumble over to the door, run into it, open it, swing my arm wildly until the snooze is hit and then collapse back into the bed or onto the floor, but the extra effort does get me up earlier than usual.

But this morning, trying to work all that sick? Was like concentrated Hell. My dizziness made me fall over even more than usual getting to the alarm clock, the chills that I had gotten during the night ensured that my blanket was firmly wrapped around my legs so completely that I fell off the bed, and...well...everything else just made the morning quite the Olympic event. I eventually forewent shaving 'cause the dizziness was just asking for more trouble than I cared for. Happy Birthday to Me, Indeed.

I am however rocking work despite it all, so maybe I'll make it through today. Can't let the BWEoD down now, after all we've worked for.

Oh Man

Nothing saps my will to badly write a novel like a failed coup of the White House.

That being said, yesterday was interesting. I used my mad driving skilz to get home through the rain before 6:00 so I could pay my rent and hit the polls. Sadly the complex office closed early for voting, so I imagine it's only a matter of time before I get evicted and all my beautiful possessions are strewn across downtown Dallas.

I did make it to the polls, though. This may not have been the best thing, since I totally broke the scantron machine of magic voting elves that counts the ballots. Apparently I lack the ability to feed paper into a machine without disasterous results. I am a pox on Democracy. But they got it up and running within 10 minutes or so, so there was no lasting harm that I could see.

BWEoD continued unabated. I hit the grocery store for daiquiri mixers around 8:00 and found a whole crowd of people debating the age old question "What drink best washes away the pain of an election?" Me and this tall girl with spiky hair decided that strawberry margarita mix was definitely the sophisticated choice, because nothing says "informed voter" better than being drunk with really red lips. Unless you count drinking wine straight from a box, which ran a close second in our estimation.

I also picked up what I do believe was the worst Chinese food I have ever eaten in my entire life. Which I then proceeded to spill all over my kitchen floor. Egg drop soup does not clean well, believe you me. I think my apartment will forever smell like Calcutta now.

Anyways.

Our three person extravaganza got started in earnest with some light Daily Show which was wonderfully lovely (Al Sharpton is too awesome for words. And Samantha Bee actually made me laugh consistently throughout all of her bits. Will wonders never cease?) but surprisingly poignant ("This is just like a dream I had. Where I woke up crying." You and me both, Jon.).

I then spent the rest of the night watching Gilmore Girls, Mean Girls, and Center Stage -- otherwise known as the thoughtful homosexual's rebuttal to the easy passage of eleven anti-gay-marriage ballot initiatives. Sigh. And Damn.

Oh, and watching Sean compulsively refresh all the news websites for 2 consecutive hours with increasing horror.

"I think that county just got pinker."
"No, it's still white."
"No, it's totally pink. I see pink. How is it pink? It's surrounded on 4 sides by blue."
"I don't know."
"There's still hope though. He's only behind by 23,000. No wait, 27,000.
How did that even happen? Who do these New Mexicans think they are?"
"I dunno. I didn't even know there were 27,000 people in New Mexico."

I seriously need a nap.

Finally, the one important thing we learned from last night: Dance What You Feel!

Time's a Wastin'

Okay so maybe Off the Face of the Earth was a bit of an overstatement yesterday. Because I totally still have tons of time to write here.

Running Word Total: 773 (Only 1227 words behind. On Day Two. Shit.)

Running Birthday Week Extravaganza of Drunkeness (BWEoD) Total: 1 for 1 (At least I'm excelling where it counts.)

I knew empirically that there are not enough hours in the day, but up until yesterday I hadn't really experienced it in a while. Because, like I said, I ain't been doing crap for the last month or so. I stopped going to the gym and started watching a lot of TV and eating cake. Thus my time after work seemed limitless, there was always room for a little relaxation and messing around. If there was something important that needed to be done, I could knock it out no problem.

Now with the advent of needing to write 2,000 words a day and the need to go out and get drunk every night for a week, I have lost all ability to get things done in an efficient manner. (Although I did get sloshed quickly. Again, I succeed where it counts!) After work yesterday I needed to:

• Go buy a belt to replace the old one, sigh. This was accomplished but took over an hour, as I had to also wander around the store, buy some oil for the Truck of Malfunction, and dig through the clearanced Halloween candy. (Important aside, I think I function entirely on sugar nowadays. I've eschewed protein and carbs for straight refined sugar. And I love it. Remaindered candy rocks my world.)
• Clean up the house since I refrained from doing so after the Half-Party of Scary Movies on Halloween. This did not happen at all and when I got home from BWEoD I managed to step on three glasses, knock over two cans of Dr Pepper, and ran headlong into a wall. That last one did not have anything to do with cleaning, but I felt it should be included, for accuracy's sake.
• Cook dinner. Also did not happen, unless you count unwrapping fun-sized candy bars as cooking. Like I said, vive la sugar.
• Write my 2000 words. Actually did start, but yeah only got to 773 before BWE0D was scheduled to start, and really if you don't set priorities it sets a horrible example for the children. Won't someone please think of the children?
• BWEoD. The only truly accomplished thing of the night, although it did run a bit longer than I had scheduled. Kudos to Devon's mad drink making skilz and to VH1 for ensuring that I needed something alcoholic to cleanse my mind, in the form of the 100 Biggest Red Carpet Moments. (Although to be fair, that Madonna/Courtney Love moment was so frickin awesome. I had totally forgotten about that. "Access to a lot of drugs." Madonna was such a bad-ass.)
• Iron all my clothes. To cover this one: Right now it's a toss up as to whether I look like I slept in my clothes on a park bench and then showed up for work (which is not necessarily ruled out, I was in a right state yesterday), or had been storing my clothes in Pringles cans before getting dressed.

But today I'm totally set up for proper time management. I already have my voter registration card and the map to the poll location so I can go straight from work. And BWEoD is at my place tonight, so there's a good chance I'll clean up the apartment, and I'll have to provide food so dinner will definitely be served. That whole writing thing might be an issue though, a good host never runs off to work on a novel during an event.

So huzzah. Go vote. Everyone who votes gets a free daquiri at the BWEoD tonight. If alcohol won't convince you to vote, I don't know what will.

Off the Face of the Earth

Man. So in preparation for the month ahead, (wherein I'm supposed to write 2,000 words a day, everyday and oh dear God what have I gotten myself into) I took this weekend off to catch up on all my reading, finishing off the 3 books I currently had going.

And because I already had the momentum going, I knocked off a 4th on Sunday, slamming all the way through A Home at the End of the World in about 6 hours. It takes a pretty good book for that to happen. But man, talk about depressing. Like someone took a knife and stuck in in my chest and started rooting around. "Does that hurt? How about now?"

Other than that, I watched a steady stream of football and movies all weekend long, pretty much as background noise. Had a slew of people over for ice cream sundaes on Friday and scary movies on Halloween. Luckily no small children came a'knocking at the door, so I got to give away all the fruit roll ups to my guests, rather than whiny children. We also learned: John Carpenter's Vampires is incredibly-over-the-top-trashy bad, but what did we really expect with James Woods and Daniel Baldwin as the headliners. Plus: The Ring still freaks me out far more than it has any right too.

Other things of interest:

• The voting plan is all worked out, I researched all the candidates and have my ballot ready for tomorrow. I even have a map to the voting place. I am totally ready for this thing tomorrow. Let us hope I can make it home before 7:00 to actually get to Rock the Vote properly.
• This week is Birthday Week for me, so in addition to all the writing all the time, I plan to be more drunk than usual, and have outings planned for much of the week. 23, people! I only hope the two bottles I have in my house will be enough. And I totally apologize in advance for anything I do or say on Friday, the apex of birthday celebration.

So that's that. If you hear from me much less this month, trust that I'm slaving away on a long, crazy, poorly-written-and-plotted story and pray for my safe return.

Oh So Scary

What do you do when you can't think of something to do on a Thursday night?

Well if you're us, you run off to a late night showing of The Grudge at the movie theatre across the street from my apartment after finding that video games can't properly fill the void in our lives. We are nothing if not capricious. And not just a little masochistic.

Because I do not do horror movies well. And after last night, I can say with authority that I've grown even worse at them than I used to be. When you're already curled up into a ball due to the previews, generally you ain't gonna have the best experience with the movie itself. (To be fair, they were previews for a scary movie involving a clown (*shudder*) and one for The Ring 2 - This Time You Only Get Six Days, Bitches, which I think I should really get a pass on, because damn, The Ring was one scary mofo of a movie. And clowns, well...)

(Oh, and as an awesome aside, there was the most hilarious trying-to-be-scary trailer for The Boogeyman, which stars a member of the 7th Heaven cast and looks to be the worst scary movie made since They. I mean, they couldn't even get Dakota Fanning like the movie with the clown. They had to hire the poor man's Dakota Fanning to be the Creepy Kid of Foreshadowed Doom and Scariness. That's just weak, yo.)

(And one trailer for a movie that I would totally go see, about dead people who communicate through the electromagnetic spectrum, like photos and audio recordings. Which looks like it will end up formulaic, but has a genuinely scary looking premise.)

In any case, yeah, I totally spent the majority of the movie curled up in my chair with my hands, knees to my chest, covering either half of my eyes or all of my ears, whichever seemed to be the most in danger at the moment. And I would gasp loudly all the damn time and took to muttering things under my breath, mostly along the lines of "don't go in there, are you crazy!", pretty much nonstop once the credits started rolling. I'm not sure when I became completely unselfconscious at movies, but it definitely isn't a sign of good things to come.

The only completely positive thing about the whole experience was that Devon never screamed once, and only left the theatre for a couple of seconds. There was no repeat of the standing up and reaching for the screen in horror that we saw with The Panic Room. Bravo. And as per usual, Sean was quite stoic and didn't complain that the two people he saw the movie with were freaking out like junkies on a bad acid trip.

As for the movie itself, it didn't do that much for me, actually. It wasn't bad, but I judge scary movies by how scared I am after I get home, and damn if I didn't just go about my normal routine and slept just fine. Although when the ceiling creaked when I was digging in the closet for my pajamas, I will confess to yelping and looking around frantically for just a bit.

The only real comment I have about the movie itself, (besides the fact that Sarah Michelle Gellar and Jason Behr were both totally hot and rocked some fantastically horrible dialogue), is (WARNING SPOILER) that the scene with the sister was actually really, really scary to me. Because if I was ever in a horror movie that would totally be me, running to the bed, wrapping myself in the covers and cowering in the corner. For all the good it did her. I felt bad because throughout her whole scene I was whispering that exact advice and then she did it, and...well damn.

The rest of the movie, kinda scary, but kinda pointless.

Sort of like this entry. If you got rid of the scary.

Shift Happens

I have a very unsavory air about me. For the longest time I never understood it, but people inherently do not trust me. Up through my, what, second semster in college, I had never made it into a club without getting pulled over to the side by some police officer checking to see if I was drunk or on drugs. I have been pulled over int the TOM a grand total of three times in my life and each occassion was marked with a long conversation on whether or not I was carrying concealed weapons in the car, as well as a discussion of how drunk I was. I have been mistaken as a drug dealer time and time again.

Finally, we've pretty much nailed down all the elements that make up the untrustworthly-looking aspects of my character. Sadly, they constitute pretty much everything about myself, but what can you do?

The primary stumbling block seems to be my face. Apparently, being gaunt, pale, wild haired, and containing a pair of incredibly deep set eyes (the overhang of my brow could provide shelter for a family of Russian refugees) is a bad combination for a visage. To be precise, I look by turns, angry/brooding (which = dangerous, most likely criminal), and hungry/homeless/crazy (which = dangerous enough to cut you for a sandwich).

This fact was further worsened by my old habit of wearing very large sweaters on my very small frame. I have now been warned that all drug dealers and young homeless people look exactly like I do, and they also wear the same kind of clothes.

So that's great.

In addition to my look and dress, apparently I act shifty too. This is a more nebulous concept, but I think it can be boiled down to: A) I don't look people in the face too often, or when I do, I usually look away immediately afterwards (neuroses are awesome) B) Sometimes I talk to myself, or have a nervous tic, or continue moving my lips after I speak, whatever it takes to make people uneasy. C) I act guilty. Of this, I have no clue what people mean, but they say that I always look like I'm hiding some sort of dark secret. As someone most memorably said the first time they met me: "Did we walk in on you shooting up? Don't look so guilty, everyone does it."

I have made many great strides in overcoming these issues (a handy guide to getting a job even though people think you're shifty) but still people give me a wide berth in general social situations. This can be good (see: grocery shopping is much easier when people fear you) but often it is very bad (see: yesterday when I said hi to another guy at the mailbox and he gave me a weird look and ran off).

And thus I explained why if you see me in real life, you'd probably run away. Or mace me, depending on whether you're a policeman or not.

Good times.

Me Vs. The Birds

So all the birds have apparently flown south for the winter. And by "south", I mean "to Dallas." And by "Dallas", I mean "the trees directly outside my window."

By my estimate, there are approximately 80 bajillion birds who now live around my apartment complex. And in the morning, they are the loudest thing in the world. And in that hyperbole, I'm including the guys with the backhoe and jackhammer who were working on the lot next to the hippie commune church next door. The birds will not be denied. The caw-caw-cawing, all the flapping, the occassional pecking out of the eyes of my neighbors who are out walking their many dogs. How is a man supposed to sleep, I ask you? Nothing cuts into a restful morning's sleep like the screams of the innocent.

Not only that, but the poor Truck of Malfunction is covered in a layer of bird crap so powerful that the entire weekend's worth of thunderstorms did nothing but chemically bond it to the TOM's frame forever (I think it was some sort of mutant-acid rain. This is Dallas, after all.).

When I drive home from work, I drive down this tree-lined street next to a shopping center. There are so many birds flying overhead, that everyone has to turn their headlights on for the length of the road. The birds have eclipsed the sun, that's how far we have fallen.

Yesterday, I was taking out the trash and the nice little girl from upstairs was throwing a ball up the landing to her mom. This is the part of the conversation I overheard:

Cute Little Girl: "Mom, why are there so many birds here?"
Mom (sounds v. tired): "I don't know, honey. Maybe they like it here."
CLG: "Well I hate them."
Mom: "I hate them too, baby."
CLG: "Can't somebody just shoot them all?"
Mom: "Maybe someone will."
CLG: "Can I shoot some?"
Mom: "Maybe tomorrow, honey."

I have the most awesome neighbors.

Complaints of the Elderly

Today's Rather Obvious Realization: I am old.

Yes, we go over this pretty much on a daily basis. But today my younger brother is 14.

14!

I swear, this growing up thing sucks like nothing else. These 6 straight weeks are like an obstacle course of aging reminders. Bam! Your younger sister gets married! Bam! Your even younger brother turns 14! Bam! You vote in your second presidential election! And of course...BAM!!! You turn 23!

Is that even possible? 23? I mean I know I drank a lot in sophomore year, but I don't think it was enough to erase as many years as I seem to be missing.

There has to be some sort of clerical error. I mean, look at my day yesterday:

• Come home from work. Immediately sit down at the computer and compulsively IM my friends. Use the word "totally" three times in a period of less than 45 seconds.
• Have a snack. And by snack, I mean grabbing a cake from the kitchen, a Dr Pepper, and a bag of Pixi Sticks and heading into a delicious sugar coma.
• Watch TV for three hours straight.
• Refuse to clean my room or do the dishes.
• Play video games until it's time for bed.
• Stay up re-reading Harry Potter until it's way past my bedtime.

There should be some rule that if you act like you're still in high school, you don't actually have to age.

And to prove my point even more, I give you a conversation from this weekend:

Mom (whispering): Jason, do you know that your hair is sticking up all over the place?

Jason (as the sullen teenager that he is): Uh....Yeah, mom. It's the style. Geez.

Jason's Brain: Dammit, I knew I should have killed that stylist.

------------------

Oh yeah. Happy Birthday Aaron! May your high school years be less painful than mine.

A Sharp Blow to the Self-Esteem

First off, let me say that I know that I'm not fat. As I've said before, I thank God every day for my metabolism and the fact that I can eat an entire cake in a day and not gain a pound.

That being said, Dear GOD, you would not believe what happened to me last week. Okay, I'm at work, doing work related things, filing and calling and staring off into space and whatnot. I get a call from the front desk that there is a delivery for my office. So I head up there to get it.

[Scene: Front Desk at Jason's Office. Jason walks up.]

Jason: Hi [Cool Secretary Who Runs The Joint]. You said you had a package for me?

CSWRTJ: Oh yeah. Here you go. (she easily picks up a box and places it on her desk)

[It should be noted here that CSWRTJ is about 75 and is a tiny woman.]

Jason: Thanks (Goes to pick up the box.) OOooff. (The box is rather heavy, by Jason standards.)

CSWRTJ: You okay there?

Jason (straining): Oh...yeah...no...problem...

[Jason takes one step backwards. *SNAP* The buckle on his belt literally pops off from the rest of the belt, somehow managing to disengage from the little hole it was in, flys 2 feet forward and lands with an excellent THUNK at the feet of CSWRTJ.]

CSWRTJ: (hiding some laughter) Uhhhh...

Jason's Brain: Dude, your belt just popped off. You've gained so much weight your clothes can no longer hold you. What is going on here? This secretary is trying sooo hard not to laugh at you right now. You must find some way to gracefully exit the situation. Perhaps a joke to ease the pain.

Jason: Uhhhh...could you hand me that? Heh heh. Guess I shouldn't have had that extra donut this morning, huh?

CSWRTJ (Goes from hiding laughter to a stone cold expression the moment the joke is finished): Ha. ha. (completely faked). Sure.

Jason's Brain: Yeah, not so much, chief. Abort! Abort!

Jason (completely embarrassed, as per usual): Thanks! (runs off into the sunset. And by runs off, I mean slowly struggles out of the main office with the huge weight that is the box. And into the sunset, I mean into the hallway out of sight so that he can drop the box and attempt to, in some way, fix his belt. He is unsuccessful.)

And did I mention that this happened at 10:00 in the morning, so I had to go through the entire day like this? Eventually I just abandoned the belt in favor of the oh-so-glamourous dress pants hanging off the hips look. Because I've become a damn high school punk, what with the low hanging pants, even in an office setting.

I still don't understand why the belt exploded as such. I'd like to imagine I have some The Incredible Hulk like powers of growth and strength, but really it's best not to delude oneself too much in a single day.

Boredom is a Dangerous Thing

For the past couple of years, I've been insanely tempted to try the NaNoWriMo thing. But both Novembers I had some excuse, usually class related, as to why I didn't. Now that I do damn near nothing every day, I have lost my excuses.

So even with my mad rationalization skilz, I can't come up with a reason not to get off my ass and start writing. So I'm gonna do it. Do you see what happens when I get bored? Bad things, yo. Because lately, I have sucked at writing. I mean, damn. But heck, it's only 50,000 words, right? How hideously painful could it be?

It is sort of exciting (because I am a dork), to actually get down to the business of it all, even though it will be crap personified. Because I am horrible at starting and/or finishing anything without very strict guidelines, this is ideal; exactly 30 days? That's only 1,667 words per day. No problem, right?

Right now it's sort of like seeing two trains hurtling towards each other on the same track - you know it's gonna be so horrible very soon, but you're secretly really excited to get to see it unfold. There is no better metaphor for Jason writing a book than that.

The only problem now is picking what to write. I have two mostly outlined stories to pick from. One is less focused, more funny and anecdotal and pretty much completely ridiculous. Sort of what I usually write, only (theoretically) structured in book-form. The other is all mapped out, sort of weird and disturbing kind of funny, but was originally supposed to be a short story, so I don't know if I can wring a full novel out of it.

So, comments? Imagine for a moment that you would actually read a book I wrote. Would you prefer something ridiculous called Dead End Books or something weird called Traverses? And would you want to read it? I was thinking about setting up a second blog for it, since I doubt I'll get to do much posting around here when I've got to write so much elsewhere. But that is pretty pretentious, not to (again) mention that it will suck and who wants to read something that sucks? Then again, if you read this...heh.

Anyway, hit that comment button, let me know what you think. And woot, just like that I will try to be a writer. Delusions of grandeur are the best kind of delusions.

Kitchen Ninja

I had an awesome post about foodage, but Blogger ate it, in the theme of pissing me off today.

So we'll just shorthand it:

• I can cook only three things: egg sandwiches, french toast, and cake.
• Eating cake all the time is blasphemous to me, because I am a Pie Whore, but I do it out of convenience. Because dag yo, baking a pie is hard.
• I tried to cook something new last night and ended up with an oven-full of melted doom and a saucepan fused with something that was probably supposed to be turkey dressing.

Thus the moral of the story is that the kitchen-gods hate it when you deviate from the norm. Or that I'm just a bad cook. Perhaps we'll never know which.

Bad Mood

Man, did you ever just have one of those mornings? Everything that could possibly go wrong goes wrong, and then you sit down and take your first sip of coffee and you look down to realize that somehow you managed to put on your olive shirt with your dark olive pants and that you look like a bruised avocado (with really bad hair) and will continue to do so for the rest of the day?

Perhaps it is not a scenario you are accustomed to, but trust me, it suuuuuuucks.

Additionally, I just can't get over stupid things today. In general, I'm a very laid back sort of guy, in that I don't let most things bother me for very long. Bad stuff happens, you deal and move on. But today, damn if I can't get over a stupid grudge I thought I gave up a long time ago.

I know empirically that there's nothing to be done now and dwelling on it will do nothing but piss me off, yet my brain stays fixed on it. Mostly because of a conversation last night, wherein I realized something that I knew about myself, but it makes me feel bad nonetheless:

I am a shallow person.

Heh. Well, obviously, you say. We've covered this before. But now I'm specifically shallow.

More to the point, while I can almost always get over anything, the things I find hardest are situations in which I get burned over money. I get over fights and insults and relationship stuff, but God help you if you cost me $2,415.75. I'll do the whole forgive and move on thing, and then I think I'm over it, until something happens like last night and I'm all "If I had that big wad of money, this would not be a problem," and I'm right back in it.

I guess I'm just too analytical and budget-minded with money. There are plenty of what-ifs in relationships and whatnot, but things with number values are way too easy to calculate. Damn my math skills.

So yeah, neurotic much?

Resolved: Today I will get over myself. Or cut that guy who screwed me over. Whatever works.

Ooh, and later on I have an exciting cooking misadventure to recount. I'm all over the place today.

Spendy McSpendalot

So yesterday was National If You're a Woman Don't Spend Any Money Day. I know this because the radio told me, and the radio never lies. Thus, apparently in honor of this fact, I went out and spent a crap-load of money on pretty things to make my life more enjoyable.

First, I rocked Best Buy for the first season of Arrested Development (which made me inadvertently laugh so loud that Crazy Neighbor from across the breezeway was all "what the hell was going on last night?" when I saw him leaving for work today. (Quiet, Crazy Neighbor, how's about you stop creeping me out with your blacked out windows and pitch black apartment interior and excessive computer equipment? (I seem to have fallen off track. Exeunt Parentheses.)))

However, my love for Best Buy continues to wane. First, they run out of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on the day it comes out, then they totally lie to me when I call to ask if they had the AV cable I needed for work. Then yesterday I had to dig through the DVD box sets to find the AD because they can't be bothered to put it with the rest of the new releases.

Bad form, y'all. Keep this up and I'm totally gonna start going to that craptacular Circuit City (even though the salespeople there are so dumb that I have to resist the urge to clap my hand to my forehead and gasp everytime they say anything. Swear to God: "I don't know if this computer has RAM. I think it only plays DVDs") a mile down the road. But AD was on sale, so the tenuous love affair continues.

Next, I hit the mall (have I mentioned I hate malls? Because I do. With the fiery passion of a thousand suns. Full of all those damn punk kids with the damn loud music and their long hippie hair. Hi, I'm bitter and old. And only slightly kidding.) because Jason for serious needs some new work clothes. Exactly five business outfits is no way to go through life. (And it means you have to do laundry every Sunday, no matter what.)

So I get three awesome new shirts that cost roughly what I pay for my entire months worth of groceries, after my personal shopper (not really my personal shopper, but this too-cool Iranian saleslady who has been working at the store everytime I've bought something and has consulted on it all, thus seeming to know me intimately) declares me "flawlessly accented." Which I'm pretty sure is complete gibberish, but sounded like a great thing at the time.

I rounded off my spending extravaganza with some new socks, a full tank of premium gasoline, and a night of daiquiris with Devon.

Meet Jason, single-handedly keeping capitalism alive, one Tuesday at a time.

ADD - Journal Style

Because I can't muster enough energy to compose something lengthy and workable about any one subject, I'm gonna throw out everything I have to write about all in one deliciously excessive post. And then I shall complain for the rest of the week that I have nothing to write about. Sexy how that works out, no?

So, this weekend:

• Friday: Made it to 7:30pm before passing out on the couch like a 70 year-old. A boring 70 year-old. In my defense, I had been up until 3:00 the previous night and ended up getting a total of 2 hours of sleep after the Sprinkler Malfunction of Death occurred outside my window, which was immediately followed by the Summoning of the Authorities to My Neighbor's Apartment. Still, the loss of a weekend night makes me very bitter.
• Saturday: The Truck of Malfunction engaged in a surprising plot twist when it decided to, *gasp*, malfunction as I was heading off to see SMU in yet another glorious loss. Missed game and instead became covered in grease, oil and other painfully smelly things to triumphantly fix the TOM. Am truly a manly grease-monkey. Although afterwards, had to wash with mango-scented body wash, neutralizing most of the manliness.
• Continuing Saturday: Tried to recapture my youth by getting drunk and attending a college party. Had forgotten how much I missed drinking games. Very easy to pick back up, was just like riding a bicycle. . .only drunkenly. Seem to have bruised my knuckles playing WTF (note to self: Wooden tables are out for that sort of game). Felt v. old, but was heartened when freshmen would not believe I was alumnae. This may have something to do with the fact that most alumni who show up seem to be about 30, but I take my victories where ever I find them.
• Sunday: Worked yet another Texas Stadium Job From Beyond Hell. This time I was in charge of scads of money and a tiny tiny booth out on the south endzone. Made more money that ever before, but somehow that translated into less tips than I would have made had I just decided to dance to the music in my head with an empty hat in front of me (or so I'd like to imagine). I blame the very old man who was my second in command and his complete deafness, along with my lovely assistant who was unable to do simple math (6 X 6 = 52? The hell you say?). I most certainly would not blame it on my inefficiency at getting change in any sort of timely manner, or my surly attitude about working after a night of heavy drinking, or my inability to open a bottle of beer without wincing due to my bruised knuckles. It must have been them, I say.
• Continuing Sunday: Went directly from the game to out with freshman brother Randy on his weekend trip to Dallas. Good times all around, even if I was coated in a fine sheen of beer and defeat and dressed as the lost Peruna handler. Realized that one should always be wearing something tighter than a XXXL polo shirt when jaunting down to Oak Lawn. Called it a night early, due to fact that I almost fell over in exhaustion within the first half hour at the bar.

So there. My weekend's worth of stories spent in one huge blast. I feel better now, don't you?

Bookish

I read a lot. Like a lot, alot. I had slowed down somewhat over the course of college but I've sincerely picked up the pace since summer started. Especially in the last 2 weeks. And since this is my blog I get to write whatever boring things I want, I'm compiling a list of the books I've read since the first of this month and a few comments on them.

I'm very willfull, making you read about books that I've read. It could be worse though, I could be doing more movie reviews. And I'm the worst movie reviewer in the history of the world (see: each of my previous attempts, all of which seem to contain the phrase "I liked it a lot."). So as it turns out, you should be thanking me for this. Rationalization is an awesome power, in my hands.

Song of Susannah (Dark Tower Book 6) by Stephen King
I am completely addicted to pulpy Steven King books and this series is the best example by far. I read all 5 before this one slowly and leasuirely over the course of 8 months, just loving how immersed I felt in the whole thing. I tore through this book in literally 3 days, reading over 350 pages in one Sunday. I'm not sure I agree with the whole meta let-me-insert-myself-into-my-work thing, but it worked pretty well. I just finally rationalized it enough to buy the seventh book, but it's on hold until I get through my current read. It's taking all of my will power, believe me.

The Lost World by Michael Crichton
I've read this many times, but I saw part of the movie on TV about a month ago and had to get the bad taste out of my mouth by reading the book again. Just like the one above, nothing satisfies like good old fashion trashy popular fiction. And I love all the evolutionary/extinction discussions in it. They're so delightfully dumbed down, I feel very superior to all the fictional characters.

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
In terms of direct enjoyment, I may love this book more than any other. Yes, it is far too long, and yes some of the main characters are boring as all hell, and yes there are parts that I really feel compelled to just skim through, but seriously, there are sections that I love beyond all reason. How to eat Cap'n Crunch cereal? Sexual frustration as a linear equation? Inheritance items strewn across a parking lot as a function of value vs sentiment? Okay, maybe I'm just a math geek, but yeah, LOVE. I pretty much am continually reading this at all times.

The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett
Had never read any of these books (it's a sci fi series about Discworld, which is exactly what it sounds like) but I got a copy for 50 cents back home and had heard good things. It was surprisingly excellent, just the right kind of funny for me. I haven't gone on to make the plunge into the rest of the series just because there are something like 37 more books. But I'll eventually get around to them.

Boy Culture by Matthew Rettenmund
We've already covered that I'm a whore for popular trashy fiction, but sadly it doesn't end there. I'm truly a whore for trashy gay-themed fiction. I read this book in under 24 hours (from Tuesday afternoon to Wednesday). It's not a great read by any stretch but it sated my apetite for a couple of days. I mean, I understand autobiographic style rarely should go well, but in the end it's hopeful that you might like even one of the characters. Not so much in this book. Definitely not one for characterization junkies. Oh well.

Seventh Son / Ender's Game / First Meetings by Orson Scott Card
If there is such a thing as my favorite author, Card wins, hands down. (That sounds like a pun, but I don't think it is.) For some completely unknown reason, if I start reading an Orson Scott Card book, I cannot stop until I finish, often forgoing sleeping, eating, and watching TV to get through it. I've seriously read Ender's Game at least 10 times and that's an incredibly conservative estimate. I love how well Card can create characters you absolutely must root for and love in just a few short sentences. And by the time you've invested an entire book in them, you feel sad to see them go. He's not so great on plot, but perfect on writing characters and perfect dialogue. I read Ender's Game over 2 lunches last week when I forgot my current book at home (for some reason I have a copy in the truck of malfunction), I knocked out First Meetings during commercials of football games on Saturday, and read all of Seventh Son while waiting for my beer serving adventure at Texas Stadium to begin and end (there was a lot of waiting around going on). I do enjoy Seventh Son but the entire Alvin Maker series is my least favorite of Card's. Alternate histories are awesome (see the next entry) but some of the completely impractical elements sort of slow down the story for me. Not that it isn't completely awesome.

Okay, I've wasted a lot of time here and there's still more books to go, so I'll forgo them all except the one I'm currently on.

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel by Susanna Clarke
An alternate history of England, wherein there was a dedicated practice of English Magic. It's a strange premise, but if there's something I can't pass up it is a fully realized world, in any form. I love the Harry Potter books and can read through them all in a week and be ready to read them all again in a day, not necessarily for the prose or the story, but for the complete sense of atmosphere they create. I have the same thing with the Lord of The Rings series, only I draw out the experience as long as possible. I usually take at least a month to get through all six books, just because they're so comfortable and easy to pick up and read and set down and go on.

All that blathering just to say that I've been reading JS&MN for almost a month already and am barely halfway through. I really like it and it's possibly the first book that I've not felt the need to get through quickly. It's an excellent mix of history, funny, and interesting. Something everyone should read. I'm sure I'll have more to say once I actually get around to finishing it. Ath this rate, it'll be sometime next year.

Wow. Let's just look back and realize that I am a huge dork. And that wasn't even all the books. Crap. In contrast to the last post, we'll try and pick up the excitement factor next time.

That's Dr Pepper To You

I know I said the next entry would be about books, but man, I must tell this story.

Because I know from bizarre, and damn.

So for work today I had to run down to Mockingbird Station for some random errand (for those of you who do not live in Dallas, Mockingbird Station is an upscale-ish shopping center, housing the local independent movie theatre, Urban Outfitters, etc.)

I park over in the side lot and start the trek over to the place of erranding, when I notice something odd. There is this girl standing over on the corner. She's wearing this really, really tight, white, sleeveless, midriff-baring t-shirt and a super short maroon miniskirt.

This is not in and of itself odd, that exact ensemble being the required wardrobe of most SMU girls, but the thing that sets it off is the white paper hat that she is wearing. The same kind that you would see in old ice cream parlors and the like. It has a Dr Pepper logo on it.

While I am pondering this, I look around and suddenly realize that they're everywhere. Swarms of girls wearing the exact same outfit have completely covered Mockingbird Station. Every corner, blocking store entrances. Just standing and smiling. I silently wonder if the revolution has indeed taken place and I just missed the memo. And it was a Dr Pepper Revolution.

I decide not to worry about this and head off on my errand. As I am walking, I finally get an idea of what is going on, as I hear some guy ask one of the drones: "So what's up with all of you?"

Oh, foolish man. You should not engage them, no matter how pretty they are.

The spiel begins: "Did you know that next week a new flavor of Dr Pepper comes out?!?!" She says in a manner than I would generally reserve for announcing the return of Jesus, or perhaps the arrival of Christina Aguilera.

She follows this up with a death stare at the guy to answer her, whilst a crowd of the Dr Pepper Whores (DPWs) begin to circle around him, blocking all chances of escape.

"Um, No?" (He realizes he is so doomed.)

"Cherry-Vanilla Dr Pepper!" she shouts, triumphantly, her eyes blazing.

[At this point I completely believe this is some sort of joke. Cherry Dr Pepper? Maybe. Vanilla Dr Pepper? Sure. Cherry-Vanilla Dr Pepper? Hellllllll no. And yet...behold.]

The staring begins again. The guy, obviously missing the imaginary question they're waiting on, starts to panic, but recovers.

"Ah! Oh... That's nice. Yeah! So, are you giving out samples?"

The crowd of DPWs are momentarily stunned.

"Uhh, no," the head DPW snots out. "We're not giving anything out. We're here to raise awareness of the great new flavor of Dr Pepper --- Cherry-Vanilla Dr Pepper!"* Again with the fierce, fiery eyes.

(*I swear that was the exact line: "To raise awareness of Dr Pepper." Jesus-tapdancing-Christ.)

At this point I finally gave in and accepted the fact that this must be real and the candid camera people were not gonna be busting out of the store for a great laugh. Sadly, I went on my errand.

As I was headed back to my Truck of Malfunction, the largest tour bus I have ever seen pulled up along side my truck. It was covered with a huge Dr Pepper logo and more Dr Pepper regalia than I imagined existed in the entire world. All of the DPWs lined up and began filing in. There were literally at least 40 of them. The bus took off just as I was starting my truck of malfunction, no doubt to send the DPWs to another part of Dallas to spread awareness of Dr Pepper.

They will be sorely missed.

Work It

Man, I am falling behind. Damn all the shiny and colorful things that distract me so easily. I'll try to make up for it by posting as many boring stories as rapidly as I can.

Speaking of boring stories, for my big three day weekend (thank you bankers, and your complete love of declaring holidays for pretty much anything) I was looking forward to a full schedule of staring blankly at televised football games and eating junk food until I became one with the couch. You know, like ya do.

So of course, I instead took a job working as a beer server at a large professional sports arena. Which is close to the original plan, except that I didn't get to eat anything (let alone junk food) for 12 hours, I didn't get to sit down for 12 hours (let alone on a couch), and I didn't get to watch any football, although I could hear the roar of the crowd who was watching it.

I must say, as jobs go, serving beer at professional sporting events is sort of horrible, and sort of incredibly awesome. Because while it does suck jamming your arm into a bucket of ice water continually for half a day while constantly standing so that you can help people drink through a football loss, there is something to be said for the careful anthropological study of these same football fans.

Seriously, it takes a very interesting and dedicated kind of person to begin drinking at 10:00 in the morning. Especially when it's freakin cold outside and the price of a single drink is more than I generally pay for a six pack. A nice six pack. I had a very real Jane-Goodall-Gorillas-in-the-Texas-Stadium-Mist vibe going on for most of the day.

Plus, for some completely unknown reason, I was very good at getting tips from people. Like, really good. So much so that my stand mates pretty much started pimping me out directly to make a couple of bucks ("Get over there and flex." "Flex, what?" "Nevermind, just get over there and smile at her."). Which I didn't necessarily mind, I do love me some cash, but it really threw a wrench into the whole scientific-observer thing I had going on. It's hard to pretend to be Mr. Impartial Science Guy when you're flirting with 35 year old women in a thinly veiled pretense to part them with an extra 50 cents.

In any case, while I was completely wiped out from all the work (flirting is hard, yo) I did make some excellent cash so I could actually do things this week, and it only took up roughly 1/6 of my weekend. Which left a good 5/6 for Couch Fusion and Football, which will totally be the name of my second album.

Next up: Jason writes an entry about all the books he read last week, because there was way too much action in this entry. Gotta slow it down a bit.

"Horace is a Carrot" - A Short Story

Once upon a time, there was a carrot named Horace. All that Horace wanted to do in his life was grow up to be the main dish at a fancy restaurant. But everyone always told him, 'Carrots are not main courses. Carrots are side dishes.' Even his mom. But she was eaten by an industrious rabbit, so he didn't put much stock in what she said. So every day he did his best to become the perfect carrot, so one day he would be picked and sent to a gourmet restaurant, which would complete the first stage of his plan.

And indeed, he became one of the best carrots in the world. He was picked and as luck would have it, he was sent in a shipment to the opening of a new gourmet restaurant in New York. But still, he had no plan on how to become a main course. Everyone was right, there was no place for a carrot in a main course. People want starches or protein as a main course. Roots are always pushed aside.

But he refused to give up!

He tried many bold and daring plans to become part of the main dish. On the first day, he inched his way out of the vegetable bin and creeped towards the stove where the main course was made, in the hope that someone might see him and put him in. But alas, someone saw him and threw him back into the bin.

And he was very sad.

The next day he tried to disguise himself as part of the ingredients in the filet mignon dish, but when the chef saw him he said “Bah, vhat iz this karrot duuing in my ingredientz?" and threw him back in the bin.

And Horace was sad again.

The third day was Horace's last chance, because the restaurant always threw away old vegetables three days after they came in. 'It's hopeless!' Horace thought. 'Mom was right, I'll never be a main course.' And Horace contemplated suicide.

'Anything is better than becoming part of a salad.'

So he decided to become part of a main course in his spectacular suicide. He would throw himself into the pasta maker, killing himself, while at the same time making him part of the pasta which was part of the main course that night.

'It's better than nothing.' Horace decided.

But still, he was sad, never actually realizing his dream of becoming a main course. So the night went on, and he slowly carried out his plan. he inched his way out of the salad bin and across the counter to the pasta maker. It was with a heavy heart that he began to toss himself into the mix, when suddenly the doors to the kitchen burst open!

'Nobody move! This is a surprise health inspection,' the health inspector said.

Horace froze, afraid to give away his position when everyone was so quiet. Slowly, the health inspector went around checking all the stations for any health code violations. All went well until he reached the pasta maker.

'What is this carrot doing out here on the counter? This is most unsanitary. He's in the main course preparation area. What if someone were allergic to carrots? There could be a lawsuit. I'm afraid I'm going to have to write you up and shut you down.'

Horace was mortified. He had ruined the restaurant all because of his irrational wish. 'Vait. Vait, Eww doo not undeerstand.' The chef said to the health inspector, thinking quickly. 'Zee karrot, he is part ov a new main deeesh I am creating. Called Carrot....um....Carrot Vesuvius! It will be my finest creation!' 'Yeah right.' Said the health inspector. 'Everyone knows carrots are only side dishes.'

But the chef grabbed Horace up and began to spotaneously create a carrot main course. He specially peeled him an set him in a bed of pasta, pointing upward, and added decorative garnishes and finished it off with a healthy does of pasta sauce, like hot lava running down the side of a mountain. 'See? Is the perfect creation. C'est magnifique!'

'Well I suppose it's not a violation then,' admitted the health inspector. 'It's very interesting. Good luck then.' And the health inspector left.

'Whew, that vas a close von. Ah well, at least I have a nice new main dish for tonight.' said the chef.

Thus Horace fufilled his lifetime wish to become a main course, and he was the happiest carrot who ever lived.

While Carrot Vesuvius became all the rage in the avant garde scene in New York. And everyone lived happily ever after.

The End.

-------------------------------

And y'all can just be quiet, because I love my story. I don't care what anyone says.

Another Sign That I Need to Get Out More

TV News Anchor Last Night: Really need that first cup of coffee in the morning to get going? You might need it more than you realize. Surprising new news on addiction, tonight at 9:00.

Jason: Hey! Shut up, you don't KNOW ME!

sigh.

(Resolved: I will try to talk to the television less. And when I do talk to it, I will not expect a response.)

I am Soo Not an Adult

I make a pretty good run at pretending to be all adult and whatnot.

I gots me a good paying job, an apartment to myself, and a slew of bills that I always cover on time. I spent 45 minutes a few days ago just staring a coffee tables trying to find one that would complement my living room well. And as much as it pains me to say it, I do enjoy spending the occasional (read: most every) Friday night staying home and watching the TV.

Now all that said, I am the anti-adult in most all other aspects. Key points:

• When I go out for lunch, I either come home and have lunch meat sandwiches and chips, exactly like I used to when I was in elementary school or I go to McDonalds. Like, seriously, every day. I was a McDs fiend back as a child and now that I get to pick where I eat on my own, hells yes I'm gonna go eat there every day. Whateva, you're not the boss of me!
  
• I shop like a 5 year old. I went to the store today, you know what I got? Let's go down the list:

1. 2 boxes Fruit Roll-ups
2. 2 bags Pixi Sticks
3. 2 boxes Cake Mix (chocolate and strawberry)
4. 5 frozen pizzas
5. 24 pack Dr Pepper
6. 1 jar of pickles
7. 1 loaf of bread
8. 1 box instant hot chocolate
9. 1 box toaster strudel
10. 4 candy bars (assorted)

I mean, look at that. I apparently live like a 1st grader would if he went all Freaky Friday with his older, just-got-out-of-college brother.

Top it all off with my stuffed beaver collection and the amount of video games I play, it's a wonder I'm able to survive on my own.

When Good Heads Go Bad

In case you thought my luck with haircuts had changed, think again.

Bad Omens before 9:00 am

How to tell that today will be a bad day, in under 2 hours.

7:15 am: Wake up, shamble about, shower, shave, and dress yourself completely without thought.

7:55 am: Leave house, head out to car. Return to house to retrieve cell phone. Return to car. Return to house to retrieve signed papers. Return to car. Return to house to turn off iron. Return to car. Return to house to lock the door for the 5th time today.

8:15 am: Woman at the bakery is giving you really odd looks. What, she got a thing against muffins?

8:20 am: Enter mirrored elevator to go up to your office. Realize that you forgot to brush your hair before you left. Suddenly understand odd looks from before.

8:30 am: Head to bathroom to fix hair. Also realize that you 1) forgot your belt, 2) forgot your glasses, 3) misbuttoned your shirt, and 4) are wearing one black sock and one blue sock.

8:31 am: Start your 9 hour workday.

Hells yes, let us bring it on.

Theory

Through careful study and evaluation, I have come up with a detailed decision-making model that should benefit all mankind.

The important issue it covers? How To Decide If You Should Date Someone.

How To Decide If You Should Date Someone

Step 1: First you must realize that all people can be ranked somewhere on a Scale of Attractiveness To You. This scale is set up 1 - 10, (you can use decimal places if you're that much of a nerd). It is primarily physically based, (scales of attraction are inherently shallow) but you should also consider other intangibles such as fame, and other tangibles, such as money and/or the car he drives, to come up with a complete attractiveness rating.

For example, while Bill Gates may look like a reject from the Statewide 5th Graders Science Fair, the sheer amount of money he has bumps him up to an 8 on my scale. (And if you're one of those people to whom money is not attractive...what are you doing reading this?)

The scale is something like this:

10 - Incredibly attractive, your ideal person
.
.
5 - Moderately attractive, whatever your "pretty cute" classification is.
.
.
1 - Just barely passes the test for attractiveness, in that you wouldn't kick them out of bed, necessarily, as long as you can keeps the lights off.

Obviously this leaves no room for people you find unattractive. Why would you consider dating someone you weren't attracted to? (Remember, we've already factored in the money to the attractiveness.)

Step 2: The Insanity Scale. Every person in the world has some measure of inherent craziness to them. Trust me, even if they seem like the most well-adjusted person in the world, there is something hiding, just waiting to come out. Thus, when considering a potential SO, you must also rate them on the 1 -10 craziness scale.

1 - Seemingly completely normal, the insanity is quite dormant.
.
.
5 - Pretty crazy, holds several irrational beliefs, or has a nervous tic, or likes Carrot Top, things like that.
.
.
10 - Batshit crazy, believes the gamma people have his house staked out, or bears an eerie resemblance to Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction.

You can consider general personality traits here (he's boring, or tells jokes that aren't funny) but this should be primarily an insanity meter, not a personality test. This isn't a formula for compatibility, it's one for date-ability.
----
Note: For this test to be completely accurate, you must understand that scoring a 10 on the Attractiveness scale is incredibly hard. All ideals must be met, otherwise the system will fail. Conversely, it does not take much to get high up on the Insanity Scale, because people are all kinds of wacked out. Plus insanity is a lot more objective, so there's less room for fudging on insanity.

Step 3: Take the attractiveness score and divide it by the insanity score. As long as the resulting number is 1 or greater, congratulations, you've picked a winner! Date in good health. Anything less than 1, you're just wasting your time. Too much cost, not enough benefit.

For example: Say you've got this guy. A solid 7.6 on the Attractiveness (very cute, plus drives a BMW), and a 5.3 on Insanity (it seems like he has too close a relationship with his mother, and he's a little too into birdwatching). 7.6 / 5.3 = 1.43. His attractiveness outweighs his quirks, go ahead, date away.

Example #2: Angelina Jolie. A 9.7 on the Hottness scale (girl is smokin', rich, and famous), but a full on 10.00 in Craziness (Adopted Cambodian baby, vial of Billy Bob Thorton blood around her neck, makes out with her brother at award ceremonies). 9.7/10.0 = .97. Sorry, Angelina, it's just not gonna work out. Don't care how hot you are, pure craziness trumps all.

-----------
And that is that.

Actually, there is one other factor.

Step 4: Give yourself the test. If your score is below the 1.0 mark, you have three options. 1) Go see a therapist and get that Insanity score down. 2) Go to a plastic surgeon (or a car dealership), and get that Attractiveness score up. 3) Lower your cutoff to match your own score. That way two 0.459's can find love together.

Huzzah! Now that is that.

----------

The only difficulties with this theory lie in making sure you can spot all the insanity clues early enough to get a correct reading. I advise asking early in the relationship "Are you crazy?" Any answer that is remotely affirmative immediately adds 5 points to whatever you already have as an Insanity score. Also, check their room for any shrines to celebrities or yourself, and make sure they don't talk to themselves too much. Watch out for odd collections and hobbies, as these are often outward indicators of interior madness.

Anyway, use the theory in good health and let me know if there are any tweaks I need to include in future revisions.

Happy Relationship Hunting!

Dorkage: The Dorkening

Watch out, this is one of those internet staple entries that I'm almost too ashamed to put up, but am too lazy to waste, now that it's come down to it.

As it is dictated by my DNA, I went out and purchased the Star Wars Trilogy on DVD the day after it came out.

(I truly believe that the second I was handed that Computer Science degree my DNA was forever and irrevocably altered so that I will always be pale, bedecked in glasses, will sneeze at natural light, be unable to catch a ball, and will immediately buy all things Star Wars immediately on their release. People who know me may contend that had all these traits before I actually received the degree. These people are lying. I was a natural athlete, strong and bronzed, and only engaged in all things cool, until that day I picked up that degree. Anyways.)

It has come to my attention that there are several issues I have with the first movie that I've never really delved into. I think right now would be an excellent time to get into it.

• Luke has got to be the whiniest character in the history of the world that people were actually supposed to eventually like. "Buuuut, I was going into Toche Station to pick uuuppp some power con-vert-teerrrrs!" Shut it, Luke! Dear Lord, I would have bitch slapped that boy 20 minutes in.
• Princess Leia is incredibly resourceful. Somehow she manages to maintain that incredibly difficult Headphone/Bear Claw hairdo throughout the entire movie, enduring hostile takeover of her ship, stunning in the back, torture at the hands of Darth Vader, and escape through a garbage disposal. That is some dedication to your style.
  
• Darth Vader is incredibly effective in all things. Whether crushing some guy's windpipe or smiting Obi Wan, you have to admire the guy's lack of wasted movement, as well as his general bad-ass-itude. Too bad he cocks it up in the end. Who ever told you that you were a great starfighter, huh?
• Tarkin never really did anything for me , as a character. Too much British bureaucracy, not enough ass kicking menace. I find it hard to believe Vader didn't wing him with a lightsaber during Death Star construction. He did manage to wipe out an entire planet, though. Pretty bold, that I'll give him.

I still totally love the movie, though. "I can't see 'im!" said with a heavy Texas accent may be my most often quoted throwaway movie line over my entire life (closely matched by "Do it! Do it now!" from The Matrix.) (Damn, I really am a dork.)

All this and I still have two more movies to go! And the bonus features. Rock on. Just can't wait for Yoda to show up again.

Bandanas and Bartending

So this Sunday I took a bartending job at one of those upscale Dallas Plantation Homes just outside Highland Park. Bartending jobs are usually excellent because A) they pay really well, B) if they're hiring from a temp agency they usually don't need to you to make anything more complicated than a glass of wine or maybe to run a margarita machine, C) tips of the rich are uniformly awesome, and D) serving alcohol to rich people is a source of unending hilarity. You have no idea.

Weirdly, this party was scheduled for mid-afternoon on a Sunday, outdoors. First off, no one in Dallas ever schedules events at the same time as a home Cowboys game unless said event is a Cowboys watching party. I mean it's just not done. Who do these people think they are? Secondly, why on earth would you hold an event at the peak heat time of the day,, at the end of summer? It was wicked hot, with absolutely no wind or clouds. This ended up making the event much more awesome for me, as you will soon see, but still mucho weird-o.

Since I am the low man on the bartending totem pole at this event, I get stuck on outside bartending detail. Which means that instead of being at the front entrance hooking people up with margaritas as they come in, or over at the patio rocking the mimosas, I'm out at the far end of the lawn in the middle of the blazing sun, next to the croquet field, handing out soft drinks and beer to the genteel masses.

(A side note: Rich people are insanely attractive. Maybe it was just that this event screened out all the ugly rich people, but damn, yo.)

So this is not my beautiful bartending gig, seeing as it is ridiculously hot and all I get to do is hand people ice cold beers, which they proceed to drain in front of me in a not-taunting-but-might-as-well-been display of thirst quenching. But at the same time, I've done much worse while temping, for way less money, in much hotter temperatures. This is pretty much par for the course, except as a bonus all these catty old women keep coming up to me and making incredibly bitchy comments about everyone else at the party, which tends to keep everything nice and lively. ("She's had so much work done in the past 3 months I'm surprised her lips still move when she talks.")

I guess, though, that rich people must not spend a lot of time in the heat, because they seemed absolutely sure that I was going to whither and die standing out there in the sun. Every two minutes someone would come up to me "Oh you must be dying!" "Do you need some water?" "Are you sure you're okay?" I think I must have had some big time frail-waif-boy vibes going on, 'cause it was kind of embarrassing. Especially since the rich people usually don't care about the help, so long as the drinks are flowing in the proper direction.

It could have had something to do with the fact that it was something of a charity dinner; it's chic to help the poor, especially when they're serving you stuff.

At first they insisted that I take a very pink cloth napkin, fill it with ice, and drape it around my neck like some sort of bandana gone horribly wrong. It gave me the appearance of an incredibly gay old-time bank robber, who suddenly decided to go straight and start serving alcohol.

Wonderful.

I tried to circumvent the whole hideousness by tucking it into my shirt collar (because these people were damned if they let me take it off, God knows why) but that just made things even worse. 'Cause now it looked like I had no neck, something of a hunchback, and you could still see the pink through the fabric of my shirt. From gay-bank-robber to gay-hunchback. You've come a long way, baby.

The other bartenders ribbed me about it to no end, but I was a strong, proud, independent, obviously-gay-failed-bankrobber/hunchback, dammit.

In the end though, the catty old women decided as a group that it would not do for me to stand out in the sun all day and insisted that I move my bar under the shade of a tree at the far side of the lawn. Which was great since no one wanted to walk that far to get a drink, so I was just me and my pretty, pretty pink bandana, alone together for the rest of the party.

All that, and I got paid too. Jealous, much?

Pop Secret

Before we start, let me begin by saying that for all four years of high school, I planned on becoming a chef once I grew up. It was a lofty goal, so those plans were eventually abandoned, for reasons which will become painfully obvious, momentarily.

It's Saturday night. I'm waiting for a friend of mine to pick me up so's we can go to Plano, for various reasons that we don't need to get into right now. While I'm waiting, I'm watching the Florida / Tennesse football game on TV and refreshing ESPN.com to read just how quickly SMU is getting hammered into the ground by OSU.

At that point I decide that the only thing that properly goes along with the destruction of my alma mater by Oklahomans is some popcorn. So at a commercial, I run into the kitchen, extract some microwave popcorn from way up on the top shelf, toss it into the microwave, slam the door, hit the POPCORN button and run back into the living room just as play begins again. I am the essence of conserved movement.

I hear my phone ring, so I run into the bedroom and have a 2 minute phone conversation. When I come out, I hear the microwave make the noise that indicates it is quite done, thank you, please remove this darn food from me. I run over to the kitchen and pull the popcorn bag from angry microwave.

Here, I notice there seems to be a lot of steam coming from the popcorn bag. Like a lot, a lot. But whatever, right? Popcorn = yum. I dig around, find a big bowl to put said popcorn in, when I realize that, hmm, you know what? that ain't steam. It's smoke. The popcorn inside the bag is on fire. And every time I shake the bag to cool it off, a little more oxygen gets in there to fuel the flames.

What anyone else would think: Oh no! Fire! Put it out!

What my brain thinks: Nooo! The popcorn is ruined! Maybe I can save part of it!

Luckily, my common sense kicked in at some point, so instead of trying to rescue the few remaining delicious kernels, I did what all rational people would do in this situation. Namely, I threw the bag into the sink and started smacking it with a spatula until it stopped smoking.

Huzzah, go me!

At this point, thinking all is fine, I turn on the little fan above the stove to suck the smoke away, spray a bunch of air freshener to mask the stench, and go back in my bedroom to check the score of the SMU game. Maybe 3 minutes later, I decide that one near-apartment-burning shouldn't really stop me from enjoying some high cholesterol goodness, so I go back into the kitchen to attempt the process one more time, this time vowing to watch the microwave the entire time for signs of improper popcorn management.

When I get to the kitchen, though, before I turn on the light, I realize that there is something glowing in there. Y'see, life lesson #1 that I should have taken from this experience: when something is on fire, it isn't enough to beat it into submission with a kitchen utensil, you should also douse it in water for several hours, lest it reignite and come after you again, only this time it's personal.

So, I whip out the spatula again and turn the water on in the sink this time and together we triumph over The Flaming Bag of Popcorn and Death. Once it is a large, soggy mess, I gather it all up, put it in a plastic bag and throw it out in the dumpster, figuring if it spontaneously combusts again, at least there all it will burn is trash and it will never get its revenge.

I then returned home and popped a second bag without incident, which I then devoured. Because nothing makes you work up an appetite like repeatedly hitting a flaming bag of popcorn with a spatula for 15 minutes.

And to think I totally could have been a chef.

You wish you were this cool

As we have covered previously, I have to work on the Truck of Malfunction at least once a week to repair the air conditioning, unless I feel like sweating off 18 pounds every time I get into the car. It's a pretty simple operation, but it does involve me opening the hood and attaching hoses and puncturing cans that could potentially explode in my face and kill me. This makes for a rather manly feeling that I don't get most of time, since I'm usually like a 12 year old girl who sings a lot of showtunes for the majority of my life.

But anyway.

So I'm working on the TOM this week. I hook up all the proper components, no one gets exploded, and then I have to do the waiting part, which is hanging around my car for 20 minutes while the coolant gets circulated. (Because it's a bad idea to leave a car idling by itself for half an hour, even if it is the TOM.) To pass the time this week, I've brought my latest book with me, a huge 700 page hardbound copy of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (which is completely awesome, by the way) to read in the increasingly cool TOM cab.

[Scene: The cab of the TOM. Jason is highly engrossed in his book.]

Jason: Ooh...

[He moves around to get more comfortable in the tiny car. He ends up with his leaning against the window, looking down at the book in his lap.]

Jason: Hmm

Guy Who Is Standing Right Outside Unbeknownst To Jason (GWISROUTJ): RAP-RAP-RAP [on the window] Hi!

Jason:AAHHH!

[At this point Jason freaks out, because he is easily startled, and throws the book into the air. He then realizes that if the book falls, it will probably bend and rip all the pages and they will get all dirty from the years of accumulated crap inside the TOM. Since he just bought this book 2 days ago and paid full market price, Jason decides he must catch this book. Thus, he starts flailing his arms around wildly, trying to grab the book in a non-vulnerable area, looking for all the world like he is fending off a swarm of bees, or perhaps engaging in a slap fight with a suddenly-animated book. Eventually he manages to get the book without any harm done. He carefully lays it on the seat next to him and then turns to the window. (By the by, it has totally been at least a full minute since GWISROUTJ did the knocking.]

Jason [rolls down window]: Uh...hey [Upstairs Neighbor Guy Jason Knows].

GWISROUTJ [looking somehow bemused and uncomfortable at the same time]: Hey. I was just going to do laundry, thought I'd say Hi. Sorry I scared you.

Jason [scoffs]: Oh no, that's okay you didn't scare me.

(What Jason intends for this to mean: Oh I totally meant to do that crazy dance with the book, that's how I always finish reading a passage and that is completely normal and obviously I'm not so easily scared by someone knocking at a window.)

(What Jason actually conveys: Hi, I've lost my damn mind, please walk away slowly, no sudden movements, and perhaps I'll let you live to see tomorrow.)

GWISROUTJ: Ah. Alright then. See you around. [runs away]

It is a beautiful day in my neighborhood, no?

Just Swell

Last Wednesday I woke up in my normal blind fog, rolled out of bed and onto the floor, reaching desperately to silence the alarm clock from hell that is not so much next to my bed as it is in the other room so I will actually have to get up. Damn my clever tricks on my morning self.

But anyway, it seems like a normal day, when I notice that my mouth feels weird. Like, umm, thick. Which is odd, y'know?

My tongue seems to have swelled during the night. Nothing too serious, just about 1.5 its normal size. I'm somewhat concerned, seeing as one's tongue does not change size on of its own accord without some reason, but I figure it will go away eventually. I continue on with my day.

By dinner, it has grown even more and it feels like my entire mouth is burned, like I just gulped down three cups of steaming hot coffee and rolled it around to retain the flavor. It freakin' hurts. But there's not really much I can do, besides wonder what on earth I could have possibly done to warrant such a reaction.

Thursday rolls around and now The Tongue (as I imagine it being called) is affecting my speech. For serious, it sounds like I'm talking around a mouthful of marbles. As the day progresses, in addition to talking like I recently received a sharp blow to the head, I keep biting The Tongue, as it is now too large to avoid my teeth, in their normal setting.

When I get home from work (which was hideous: "Goo-mooorr-niegh, hooo caa I hep yoou?" "Excuse me?" "Sigh.") to alleviate the pain from the burning sensation as well as all the bites I bust out some of that throat numbing medication on The Tongue, thinking any medicine is good medicine, right? Foolish Jason, if The Tongue goes numb, you won't know when you're biting it all the time. And your speech will be so slurred you'll sound drunk without even trying. By this point I am practically drooling and I feel as though my head has become incredibly large.

This is not my beautiful life.

By that night, though, the numbing had worn off and I made it through the night out without severe incident, unless you count Devon laughing at me every time I tried to speak. Which, you know, she does normally anyway, so yeah. And I managed to get some alcohol into my system, which numbed everything in a very nice way that didn't seem to increase the number of tongue bitings per minute. So rock. (And I got to see Sean do a perfect karaoke rendition of No Scrubs that will forever live on in my mind and in the hearts of the drunken cowgirls at the table next to us. Even the worst days have their high points.)

By Saturday the whole thing was over and the tongue was back to mere lowercase status. Why did such a weird thing happen to me? Allergic reaction? Dental issues? Voodoo curse from my arch-nemesis? I guess it'll just be a mystery for the ages.

Insane Insecurities Part 2

It's time again for Things in Popular Culture That Disturb Jason.

I've already gone over that Levi's commercial that freaks the bejesus out of me, (which, by the way, is on all the damn time nowadays) and how incredibly wrong and creepy it is. But it turns out that it's not just this commercial that disturbs me, but pretty much any commercial where inanimate things come to life to terrorize innocent consumers.

My cases on point are both Juicy Fruit commercials, probably both conceived by the same twisted, sadistic mind. The first is the one where the donkey pinata comes to life during some kid's birthday party and starts attacking some poor child because it wants the gum that she just beat out of it's body returned to it.

Seriously, that's all kinds of messed up. I mean, I'm a generally well-adjusted 22 year-old (okay, that's a lie, but follow along) and it truly disturbs me. I imagine any child who saw this would nurse a fear of pinatas well into adulthood. Not that I imagine it would be very debilitating (how many times does the subject of pinatas come up in everyday conversation?) but still - bad form, juicy Fruit, bad form.

Second, this other Gum Commercial From Hell, wherein these high school kids are learning CPR and the freakin' CPR dummy comes to life to get at this kid's gum, directly out of the guy's mouth! First of all, EWW! Second, What. The. Fuck? From his mouth? What kind of pervy CPR dummy is this?

(It completely cracks me up, though, that they put up a warning on the bottom of the screen: Never Do CPR While Chewing Gum. Well obviously, or the person/thing you're doing it on will try to mug you for it. Wasn't that the message you were trying to get across?)

Okay, granted I obviously have more issues with this than anyone else in the world, but how is this supposed to make you want to buy their gum? Our gum is so good, inanimate objects leap to sentience and will invade your mouth for a chance to make it their own! Hoo Boy! Sign me up!

What's next? A ventrioquist's dummy pulls a knife on his puppeteer to take the gum? Just go all the way and imply that objects are willing to kill you for the gum. That will definitely bring in the customers! (Aside: I am totally kidding, Juicy Fruit people. I will lose my mind if I see a commercial where a psychotic dummy comes to life. I'm already scarred forever by that episode of Buffy.)

At least at the end of this commercial, the CPR dummy crashes into a car and dies - we are sure that the menace has ended, so long as the children never eat gum again.

Jesus.

--------------------------------

The last thing I want to discuss that disturbs me is less emotional-scarring-for-life disturbing and more shocking-witness-to-a-train-wreck-can't-look-away disturbing. Namely, the Christina Aguilera cover of the 70's song Car Wash, which of late is on the radio all the damnable time. At first I was slightly pleased by the campy-throwback nature of the song. "La-la-la, Working at a Car Wash, Woo! We're having Fun!"

The more I hear it, the more I'm disturbed/fascinated by the sheer sincerity of Christina's devotion to this song. She believes in this car wash, and shows it by rocking out without a hint of sarcasm or irony. Missy Elliot could almost be forgiven, since everything she's ever done has this level of over-the-top-ness. But Christina, my dear, Lady Marmalade at least had the stripping, whorish aspect going for it. This whole Car Wash thing is just embarrassing. And cheesy in a not-at-all-good way.

Unless the music video is nothing more than a chance for Christina to stage a one-woman wet t-shirt contest. In that case, I say "Bravo Miss Aguilera, you never fail to find a way to appeal to your target demographic."

(PS - Dear Christina, I'm just giving you the business, you know that I love you. People say I dress trashy too. We have so much in common. We are beautiful, no matter what they say. We should totally do a duet sometime.

Love, Jason)

Sickly

Last night I got home from watching a movie around 12:00.

(Aside:
Dear Angelina Jolie,
You and your huge lips complete me. Your dedication to completely incongruous nudity in a serial killer movie is awesome. Call me.
Love,
Jason)

By 12:45 it became apparent that I was in the early stages of some sort of sickness. You know, when you can totally feel the onset of a virus settling down on your chest like a thick blanket of untimely death? You don't? Whatever. Focus people! So I felt sick and was not getting any sleep and I had to be up in under 6 hours. Thus I took some medicine, guaranteed to knock you into a coma.

As a result of scary serial killer movie and drugs, I had a dream that I was at the International Rooster convention (where people come to discuss their love of roosters, I suppose). I remember carrying a large ceramic rooster with me everywhere I went and this guy in a chicken suit was trying to kill me for it, because it had won a prize for Best Rooster. Somehow I escaped in my Truck of Malfunction, but it was raining and a bird crashed into my windshield (a rooster, naturally) and I ran off the road and the TOM flipped. At that point I woke up, as I fell off the bed.

Now it's 10:00 in the morning, I'm barely functioning at a semi-conscious level, and I can't get the image of that creepy chicken-suit-wearing killer from my dream out of my head.

This is going to be one of those days.

The Tricks of Shopping

It came to my attention late Monday night that I was completely without the essentials of food. Thus it was at 9:30 at night that I braved the wilderness of the West Village to forage for something to keep me alive for a few more days. Specifically, I needed: One (1) Gallon of Milk, One (1) Loaf of Bread, One (1) Jar of Pickles.

This would be the story of how I went out on a three item quest and ended up spending 30 dollars and returning with 9 lbs of ribs and no milk, but it is an intricate and complex story that I don't have the patience for.

Okay, nevermind, I've distilled the essence of it exactly: Jason has poor impulse control and buys everything in the store that looks tasty, but has no memory and forgets what he came for. The end.

As someone once said, it's very difficult to become a novelist when you're as good at getting to the point as I am.

I will, however, present a list of important things I learned on this adventure.
In no particular order:

• Don't mess with the Produce Lady, because she will totally cut you.
• If you get a cart with uneven wheels, exchange it immediately, or you may lose control of it at an inopportune time and crash into a huge display of tuna and make a whole bunch of noise and cause people to stare.
• When a girl gives you a look that one generally reserves for shockingly dressed whores, before you give her a piece of your mind check your clothing to see if she may have a point about the inappropriate nature of your clothes.
• And coming from above...Always check what you are wearing before you leave the house to make sure, a) there are no large holes in your shorts that reveal too much information about yourself and b) that the shirt you are wearing is not so small that when you reach for something on the top shelf you expose your entire torso.

(Jason's Painful Realization of the Night: "Dear God, I'm dressed like a
man-whore in Albertsons at 10:00 at night.")

(Jason's Second Thought: "Do they kick whores out of the store?" [girl walks by] "Oh, I guess not.")

• When you are in the checkout line (apparently dressed like a whore) and see someone from your badminton class last semester, hide behind the impulse items to avoid a very painful conversation that ends with the line "Well, it looks like you ended up doing okay for yourself."

(Jason's Internal Conversation: "Exactly how should I take that? As a
compliment, obviously. But I think he just assumed I was a prostitute. But a good one. Shut up.")

All these lessons brought to you as a Public Service Announcement. May you always have healthy, happy, and solicitation-free grocery runs.