my life in cinemascope

when i inevitably make the movie of my life, i definitely want it to be a musical.

what else could properly capture the grandeur and absurdity that is my life?

this past weekend, i went with a bunch of my people to go see the greatest movie musical of all time, seven brides for seven brothers.

it is my third favorite movie ever (superseded only by the princess bride and young frankenstein).

of course, when i found out a month ago that it would be playing at a local theatre, i was psyched beyond belief.

i called all my friends and told them to tell all their friends to come enjoy the cinematic majesty of one of stanley donen's finest films (not bad considering the fact that he also did the singin' in the rain and charade)

my buddy's wife, autumn, had never seen it but he had told her that she would love it.

on saturday morning, she was trying to convince her friend, brittany, to join us.

"what's it about?" she inquired.

i answered her truthfully.

"it's a retelling of plutarch's historical account of the rape and kidnapping of the sabine women by the army of the roman republic set in the frontier days of oregon territory."

i waited for it to sink in and added, "it's a comedy/musical."

she decided not to come.

but big shout outs to everyone who did: joe & jerronda, mel and the kids, mom & dad, felicia, jairus, andre & amanda, cinnamon & the boys and cheryl & the twins.

thanks for being my friends, i hope you had a good time.

oh... and jenna, you were with us in spirit. 143.

enjoy the youtube clip below

the burger king wants your soul

even as a simpsons cartoon, the burger king is creepy.

bluetooth... putting the "B" in "B-hole"

it occurred to me at lunch why i have the urge to punch individuals in the face when i see them walking around wearing their tres chic bluetooth ear pieces.

it boils down to a simple philosophy that the wearer projects.

it's as if they're saying...

you may be standing in front of me, but you are not important enough to merit my attention. right now, i would rather be talking to anyone one else but you.

that's right, i said it. every bluetoothing pedestrian is a jerk.

except for lieutenant uhura from the original star trek.

she makes ear pieces look dead sexy.

simultaneous best/worst nickname ever

my boss walked in this morning wearing a pretty headband.

being in a goofy mood, i pointed out the obvious.

"what's up, headband?" i greeted her. "can i call you that today?"

she laughed and replied, "how about 'h.b' instead?"

"no good." i responded. "i'm working on a program for honeybaked ham and that's all i can think of when i hear those initials."

i then started giggling hysterically, "what if your significant other actually used that as a term of endearment?

i mean, it has the word 'honey' in it, but it also contains the word 'ham'.

how would you respond to that one?"

i thought deeply on this throughout the morning.

what kind of person merits the nickname "honeybaked"?

blues guitarist?

linebacker?

harlem globetrotter?

weekend funnies

i went out to dinner with a group of friends after our religious convention this past weekend.

one girl in our group was complaining about having to park out in the furthest, gravel-paved lot, or "out in frickin' egypt," as she described it.

having been involved in shuttle pickup and dropoff during previous conventions, i was well aware of the lot that she was referring to.

i interjected during her rant, "it's called 'lot eight.'"

another girl from our group piped up with a question to the former, "did you come on time?"

"of course, i did!" she replied excitedly.

"that's just it!" responded girl #2. "I discovered a secret this weekend... if you come in late, you get to park in the empty spaces that they hold up front."

"that's true," i jokingly replied. "in fact, the parking attendants have a phrase, 'if they come in later, they're not a lot eighter.'"

girl #1 look at me doubtfully, "do they really, or did you just make that up?"

i conceded my guiltiness with a smile and a nod.

"you are so lame." she replied and then began to laugh.

i think i'm in love.

adventures in manscaping

last year i passed a major milestone that most men hope they never have to address.

i bought a nose hair trimmer.

the very act of nose hair grooming is a ritual that i am convinced only the most depraved sadist could enjoy.

but i also don't want to look like a human catfish, so i've invested in a battery powered trimmer which i discreetly use every few months.

well, it had come to be that time last thursday.

i was preparing to go to a religious convention and i wanted to look my best so broke out "busby" (as i've affectionately named it) and went to work on my right nostril.

five seconds in, the battery decided that it had had enough of this demeaning task and completely died.

now i had one captain picard nostril and one don king nostril.

this would have been quickly remedied if i had AA batteries on hand, but nooooooo! life is never that simple for yours truly.

i went into my bedroom and pulled one from my tv remote.

busby whirred to life with renewed vigor until i again inserted the trimmer in my sniffer.

i tried the other battery in the remote... same story.

new battery... same nostril... dead stop.

i moved on to my dvd remote batteries.

battery... nostril... stop...

battery... nostril... stop...

then my battery powered clocks.

battery... nostril... stop...

battery... nostril... stop...

at one point i began to think that my nose hairs might have adapted to become impervious to man-made steel blades.

i then pictured the scene from superman 4 where one of superman's hairs is holding up a 2-ton weight in a museum.

one hour and eight batteries later, i finally found one with enough juice to do the job.

and out of respect to my trimmer i have renamed it.

BUSBY THE NOSE HAIR SLAYER!!!

the soundtrack of my life

i got this in an email from my friend, casey.

The Soundtrack of Your Life:

Here's how it works: Open your computer music files, ipod etc and set to 'shuffle'. Whatever song plays first goes in the first slot (no cheating!).

When you go to a new question, hit the 'next' button' and continue doing so until all blanks are filled.

and this is what my work machine thinks of me. I don't know whether my movie is a comedy or tragedy.

1. Opening Credits: Say It Loud (I'm Black and I'm Proud), James Brown

Wow.

2. Birth: I Want A Girl That's Hip, Tim Carroll

I guess from my dad's point of view? The first of many times I'd disappoint.

3. First Day At School: Mustang Sally, Wilson Pickett

And 5-yr-old Noah learns his pimp-walk

4. Falling In Love: Keep Fishin', Weezer

Yep, I can see that.

5. Fight Song: Good, Better Than Ezra

Kinda rockin' but not too dangerous.

6. Breaking Up: Shop Around, Smokey Robinson

hahaha!

7. Prom: I Melt With You, Nouvelle Vague

Even more tragic... I never went. Oooh, pathos.

8. Life: You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling – Righteous Brothers

I don't know what this means.

9. Mental Breakdown: Play That Funky Music, Wild Cherry

YES!!!

10. Driving: Lullabye, Billy Joel

Driving and Billy Joel have never gone togther. (another zinger from 2004!)

11. Flashback: Third Degree, Eric Clapton

A little grungy blues to flashback to the ghettos of Pittsburgh.

12. Wedding: Soul Man, Sam & Dave

Oh, I'm totally performing this immediately after saying, "I do."

13. Birth of a Child: Somebody To Love, Queen

Aww. I never thought of this song that way.

14. Final Battle: Come Go With Me, Del Vikings

More comedy gold.

15. Death Scene: Immigrant Song, Led Zeppelin

"Valhalla, I'm coming!" LOL

16. Funeral: Your Mama Don’t Dance, Loggins & Messina

And everybody has inappropriate laughter...

17. Ending Credits: You’re Makin’ Me High, Toni Braxton

Or what the director, screenwriter and entire cast were saying during the production.

-

I thought it was a fun way to waste my lunch time today.

my stupidest reason for getting into trouble at work...

i really like my job.

and to lose it over something as stupid as a shower curtain would be just my luck.

allow me to explain...

business has been great for the company and they've been hiring like crazy.

the only down side to this is that we have quickly run out of room to put all of the employees.

so, a temporary solution was provided with recent reconstruction efforts.

this is all fine and dandy with me.

except for the really, really annoying habit that some of my coworkers have of bumping the back of my chair while trying to squeeze past me.

mind you, they are saving less than ten feet of travel by doing this.

after a week of these shortcuts constantly interrupting my workflow, i decided to take action.

i told my boss that i was going to put up a shower curtain to stem the pedestrian tides.

she laughed and thought that i was joking.

oh no, my friends, this was war.

the gauntlet had been thrown down. the die was cast. there would be no survivors.

the following thursday, i stayed after work for a few minutes and hung the now infamous curtain.

penguins with googly eyes was just the threatening message that i wanted to send.

to quote network, they seemed to scream, "i'm mad as hell and i'm not going to take it anymore!"

i got a lot of giggles from passers-by as i was hanging it up.

amanda, who sits caddy-corner from me even got some pictures (at right).

well... my angry penguin statement didn't last long.

the following morning the curtain was folded up in my chair with a note from one of the executives that i was not allowed to creatively define my workspace this way.

as i related this story to my dad, i remembered all of the times i got in trouble while i was in high school.

never was i censured for fighting or contraband substances, usually it was for goofball crap like this.

i guess some things will never change.

back to work... er.. if that's what you call it.

hi all.

it's been several weeks since my last post.

if you're a friend or family you know that this is mostly because of the recent death of my great-grandmother.

i spent the 4th of july scanning all of her photos at her house.

it was emotionally draining to say the least but fun to look at old pictures of my parents and the rest of my family.

i'll post a few here this weekend.

and now a funny story related to granny's memorial service.

because of my background in graphic design, i seem to get nominated for a lot of jobs that i may not necessarily want to be considered for.

case in point: granny's memorial service programs.

the funeral home wanted to charge a ridiculous amount for design, layout and printing so i was asked to step up to the plate on short notice.

i went to compusa and bought a new epson scanner/copier/print/bass-o-matic to serve the needs of this print job.

i stayed late at work a few days prior to the service and created a layout that i thought was suitably pretty and still respectable considering the somber occasion.

i was asked to include a picture with name and birth/death years on the cover, the obituary and program info inside and the lyrics to granny's favorite song for singing after the program.

i had a little space left inside for a personal thank you to all of the family's loved ones for their support during this time of grieving and i also wanted to highlight the Bible's hope of a resurrection for faithful Christians.

Rather than getting too preachy, I simply referenced the scriptures in italicized text - Revelation 21:3,4 and Matthew 5:28,29.

As I keyed in the scriptures, I thought to myself "Matthew 5:28,29??? That doesn't quite sound right. But I'm certain that it is. It's definitely 5:28,29."

Since I didn't have my Bible with me at work, I let it go. After all, I was fairly certain that I had it correct.

A day later at Bible Study group, it popped back into my head.

I thought that maybe I should double-check just to be 100% sure.

It turns out that I had the wrong Gospel entirely.

What I wanted was John 5:28,29.

Matthew 5:28,29 from the Sermon on the Mount says (paraphrasing) "Truly I say to you that whoever looks at a woman so as to have a passion for her has already committed fornication in his heart."

Thankfully, I hadn't printed them yet.

Though I giggled when I imagined the confusion that it would have caused at the memorial service.