Can ya spare a crawlspace, friend?

I'm on a world wide hunt for friends. Every corner of the world. I won't stop looking til I have a friend in every country, continent, county, time zone and attic crawl space. And I won't stop looking til I've done just that!

Easiest way...Facebook.


Facebook and the addiction that comes with it when you sign up. It's worse than heroine withdrawls. I've seen babies crawl upside down on the ceiling!

There are, of course, other social networking sites but Facebook is my choice.

I have a MySpace account although it's not active. I've stopped using it for several reasons but the biggest reason is that my ex-girlfriend set it up, designed it, and poisoned it with all her 'little touches'. Seeing this site doesn't make me miss her. It makes me want to key her car and have a 'worm' slither into her computer.

Twitter...well, I refuse to 'tweet'.



So I'll just stick with good old Facebook to find me some friends.

Facebook starts innocentlu enough, and actually it might be good for the soul, if only moderation were the reality, but it's not.

Facebook began as a tool to communicate with friends that I've been close with, with or without URL skills. Soon, though, I reacquainted myself with some friends from grade school, which led to a sixth grade kickball class reunion that never materialized. From there, I met up with high school buddies, girlfriends, and even some from my junior high days, two years spent in Mountain Home, Idaho.

RA...RA...RA, GOOOOO PATRIOTS!!!

Then, my girlfriend, and I'm not talking about Medusa, and myself started playing a game. It lasted only three or four nights, but none the less, it was on. Each night we 'chose' a complete stranger in another part of the world to 'friend'. She always picked a man, me a woman. Only rule was that if 'friended', a conversation would have to take place between that 'friend' and ones self.

Something like this.

"Hey, Dave, how the heck are ya?"

"Uh...do I know you?"

"LMAO!!! WTF man, how the eff could you forget? Don't tell me you've forgot that night we finished off that fifth of Bacardi, stole the neighbors three legged cat and that bottle rocket blew up in your Bermudas!?"

Neither of us won, and no one lost, because are 'picks' never responded. And we decided to quit because it felt somewhere between harassment and stalking.

By the way, I'm not friends with the Greek belly dancer anymore. Promise, sweety!






But then I got to thinking, hey, maybe there's a need to 'friend' others within other geographic regions of the world. A need in case I needed a place to stay.

Came to me in the middle of the night. I was awoken by a creepy dream that I'd had, which in turn led me to the kitchen with a killer craving for a peanut butter and Frito sandwich. Please, do not ask about the correlation between Skippys and my inner most subconscience. I promise you don't want to hear about it. Anyway, the dream nor the delectable treat was where the idea came from, but it was the time chowing down, sitting at my laptop with Facebook up and trolling at 3:16 AM. that drew me to the idea. I couldn't believe that not only were my normal 'riding the Insomnia Bus friends' online, but there were others from the other side of the world, during my night time hours that were, during their day time hours, online as well. Who woulda thought?

Then, that revelation led me to start wondering, hypothetically of course, what if I really needed a place to stay. Not because I wanted to vacation in Mozambique or snorkel through the Great Barrier Reef, but because Johnny Law wanted to put me away, pretending they had a case against me, that they might think they had a legitimate case to lock me up, for a crime I didn't commit?

I wondered, what if I needed a tropical get away, under an assumed name? Under these preposterous conditions, and having real 'friends' in Brazil, Berlin, Belize or even Bozeman, could I not find a home elsewhere?

Would my 'friends' give me a hand?

I'm easy to live with, friends, really I am. Hardly any trouble at all. Promise!

SUCK!

My son Ethan and myself like to play a game called SUCK!. The game consists of, out of the blue, for no reason what so ever, he'll say something like "Hey dad," and I'll say "Ya?" and he'll say "Suck!".



Good times!

This is a game that started with, I'm guessing him and his friends and soon caught on with myself. Every chance I get, I'll play.

Standing at the counter at the grocery store, the guy ringing us up.

"Ethan?"

He has his headphones on, Satan Kills the Dali Lama screaming in his ear, assuring me I'll have a astronomical medical bill for his hearing loss. I pull a audio-plug from his ear.

"What, dad?!"



"Suck!" Ha, ha, ha!

Ethan rolls his eye, plugs his ear once again and walks away to stare at the Lotto scratch ticket machine. I'm sure he's thinking how good he has it with me as his dad.

Truth be told, though, he doesn't like playing it much anymore. Not with me anyway. I think it ran it's course with me and isn't all that much fun with his old man. A game that was meant to be played with teenage, pimple poppin' punks and, by throwing me into the mix, it's lost some of it's 'cool'.

I don't care. The fact is I am cool, he just doesn't know it right now. It may take him years, he may sixty-three, but I know a tsunami of realization will wash over him and it'll click at how damn'd cool I really was while raising him.

At least I don't make him listen to 'country' music in the car as my dad did. Wouldn't let us kids change the channel, even when The Knacks 'My Sharona' was all the rave.

"That crap will rot your brains!"



My dad wouldn't let us watch the 'After School Special' because there was chickens to be fed, the lawn to be mowed or his car needed a washing. He liked to call them 'After School Chores'. That was my dad's sense of humor.

My dad certainly would never have played Grand Theft Auto with me, or as I like to call it, Find A Super Fast Motorcycle, Run Over as Many Innocents and Then Hit a Wall at Seventy-Nine MPH Hour Crushing Every Virtual Bone in My Body.



See kid, I am cool! HA!

Of course, when I play GTA, this is the only time Ethan likes to play SUCK!, but I have my suspicions he's saying it less like a proper noun and more like an adjective describing my game play.

Deadly HALLOWEEN Deadline?!

This feels like school all over again. The mere mention of a 'subject', something quits working and my mind starts grinding to halt like a body in a wood chipper. Actually, not even like that, as proven by the Coen brother's in FARGO.

Full blown brain freeze is what it is though. Writer's block!

The writer's worst nightmare, even worse than waking up in a nightmare on Elm...oh forget it.

So, when the call went out by my fellow humorbloggers.com folk, to blog specifically about HALLOWEEN, making sure to use the word HALLOWEEN then I had big plans, even larger ideas and full blown optimism. Sounded like good fun.

After all, it is HALLOWEEN.

I was going to ramble on about Tuscaloosa, an old dummy that some friends and myself constructed. Built with Levi's 501's and Eddie Veddar flannel, old pair of Air Jordans and an elastic hydrocarbon polymer recreation of an old man's face. Completely stuffed with 219 days worth of newspaper, and designed to be no less than six feet two inches tall, weighing no less than Oprah on the top end of the yearly weight fluctuation.

HALLOWEEN tradition was to string Tuscaloosa from the roof of the house, and when unsuspecting teenage punks who had no business trick or treating in the first place stepped up to the door, Tuscaloosa was tossed violently from said roof, left hanging by the noosed rope. Screams of horror, burn out marks left in the grass and on occasion, puddles of pee! HA HA HA!!!

That HALLOWEEN fun ended the year we decided to go out cruisin' and lost our dummy to some large men in an even larger 4x4, and what appeared to be a five or six point buck tied down to the hood of their truck. The size of Bambi is debated to this day by my buddies. Regardless, they were rather pissed off when we threw Tuscaloosa out the window of the car, into oncoming traffic, directly in front of their monster truck. After these redneck sonzabitches ran it over, stopped, and backed back over Tuscaloosa, they began ominously gunning the engine and flashing their brights. It was at this point where we unanimously voted to sacrifice Tuscaloosa to the HALLOWEEN demons!

At the time, my buddies and me, in our early twenties, felt like this was the mature way of celebrating the scariest night of the year, HALLOWEEN. Of course, our thought process was always a little cloudy due to Smirnoff injected Florida oranges, painted with Jack-o-lantern faces.

So, back to the subject of HALLOWEEN and my assignment. Honestly, I'm at a loss. Do not know what to write about. I've been pitching ideas around in my skull for several days and can't dig up anything. This is a problem.

I tossed around the idea of reviewing a movie, say the midnight showing of the Exorcist, but this idea was debunked because I am not, and know I will not be in the mood anytime soon to have the holy living, HALLOWEEN, bejeezer shit scared out of me! Did that once, not again!

Alright then. What to write about?

HALLOWEEN candy?

Funny HALLOWEEN costumes?

Demonic and haunted HALLOWEEN heads that spin a full 360 degrees and starts stuttering "REDRUM, REDRUM!" when seriously pissed off?

Got nothing, really. Writers block is all I got and whatever it is that I could come up with would only be obnoxious drivel, attempting to say something that no one really wants to hear. It would no better than a C grade assignment, a piece of work that fails for the sake of writing a preassigned idea, with a preassigned word, that being HALLOWEEN.

And you all know I have higher standards than that, right?

Right!?!

By the way, if anyone sees Tuscaloosa this HALLOWEEN, tell him I say 'hi'.

Richard Heene Must Die!!!

DISCLAIMER - IF YOU OPT TO KILL THESE PEOPLE, IT LIES IN YOUR LAP SOLELY!

I have a growing list of 'people who must die!'

Not in a literal sense and not at my hands. I have a rough enough time staying out of trouble without killing idiots. But where I'm going with this is that there are just some people out there, walking free, taking up precious space that I don't believe truly are deserving.

Now I understand that we all have rights. The Constitution makes sure of that. I get it. I do. The right to bear arms, the freedom of speech and religion, the right to due process, a speedy trial. It was once amended that we had the right to not drink liquor, before we again had the right to drink liquor. We have many rights that are protected by the Constitution but let me make it real clear. No where in the Constitution, not since our Founding Father or any time since, has an amendment being written making it a right to be a complete and utter idiot if wanted.

People push the envelope and must DIE!

There has to be a limit to the level of dumbdom that one man can, shall I say, achieve!

But, the fact is, I appreciate these people. They make me feel good about myself, that the little things that I get down on myself about aren't that bad after all. Life could be worse.

And they give me reason to spew obscenities at the t.v., making my girlfriend wonder if I need medication. This humors me a great deal.

And most importantly, they give me much material to write about.

For example, Richard Heene.

It's fresh in our minds, and appears won't go away anytime soon.

This guy must die!

Top of the list, at least at this time. Sure, he has a family...a wife, kids, maybe a dog, but this guy doesn't deserve to keep on sucking up refreshing, high altitude, Colorado oxygen any more than Lindsey Lohan is deserving of a drivers license.

All the guy wants is publicity, a reality show and cash to go with it. Well guess what doughhead?! You got the publicity, you 'created' your own show, and there will be plenty o' cash flow, but in the wrong direction. Two out of three ain't bad, bitch!

There are lots of examples though, mostly criminal.

Take for instance the two burglars in North Carolina who broke into a school, found a camera and began taking pics of their crimes. All is good so far, right? But, not being able to get the 'film' out of the camera, they figured that it was empty of film and decided to leave the camera behind.

What? They've never heard of digital?

When they were arrested they told the police officer that "we thought it was one of them new fandangled Polarwhatchacallits. Didn't know why the dern'd picture didn't print out the front of the camera".

Okay, so I made up that last part, but I have to believe that's what the three shared brain cells between the two men were thinking at the time.

DIE!!!

Nother one. Man in Daytona Beach, Florida, walked into a shop, pointed his index finger, cocked his thumb (yes, cocked it) and proceeded to 'rob' the store. When the clerk realized he wasn't going to be seriously harmed if shot, he proceeded to chase him off. The suspect was later arrested and charged with 'armed' robbery!

Fingerprinting proved that it was indeed the weapon. HA!!!

DIE, you goofy bastard!

Then, in Hawaii, a man was questioned, suspected of robbing four banks. He proudly and arrogantly said, "I didn't rob no four banks, copper! Only three!"

DIE, gravy sucking pig!

This example of brilliant stupidity hits close to home.

I had a nearly-ex-but-never-happened-thank-GOD-brother-in-law. We'll call him Tony. He was once pulled over...for what...well, not sure, don't care, won't move the story along any quicker. What matters is that Tony knew he had a warrant out for his arrest, and really didn't want to spend the night in county lock-up. So in his quick thinking way that Tony is known for, he exquisitely said he didn't have his ID, and instead of fessing up his true identity, he gave the officer the name of his brother, my other nearly-ex-never-happened-thank-GOD-brother-in-law. We'll call him Nick. Turns out that not only did Tony have a warrant out for his arrest, but so did Nick.

Tony ended up getting a three consecutive sentences...serving his, Nicks and the court decided to throw in an extra one, just because...well, just because of dumbdom, I'm guessing.

DIE!!!!

So you see, there a lot of extremely dim witted and shall we say, idiotic people in this world that need to be taken off the streets before more innocent people are harmed! Be on my side, help me out, and let me know of any of these morons so I can add them to my growing list.

Speaking of dumb, I gotta run, people. Been thinking of a $5 Starbucks!

DIE, DIE, DIE!!!

CONAN THE ANNIHILATOR

I'm not working right now, so I basically have a lot of time on my hands. That is after I wake up, ranging anywhere from 7:30 in the morning all the way up til the time Conan O'Brien ends sometime after midnight.

Speaking of which, I'm diggin' Conan O'Brien these days.

Funny guy.

But it's the hair that gets me more than anything. I could watch that hair anytime, anywhere. Funniest living thing ever, and when I say living, I mean living!

Take a look, but be warned. I took his face out of the pic because the hair is what I want to concentrate on here.




AWESOME!

How can you not think that isn't the coolest thing since the creature crawled from the black lagoon. Actually, kinda looks like it might have crawled out of a swamp, but with a sense of humor.

Be honest. Have you ever seen it up close? Really looked at it?

At time it seems to laughs along with Conan. In even rarer times, and I do mean rare, for obvious reasons, it appears to snicker at an Andy Richter comment.

It lives!

And dang if it isn't a protective device as well. This was proven after his near death experience after falling on his head while racing Teri Hatcher. Since then Honda is looking into the engineering of his hair to see if there is something there that could improve their airbag deployment technology. Riddell, maker of football helmets, have already pushed a prototype to the front of their research department so to have them in mass production and rolling off the assembly line by next years fall college football season.

They're calling it the Annihilator!





That is a helmet I can't wait to see the Detroit Lions wearing. It isn't like they could possibly get beat up any worse than they do every Sunday.

Alright, the whole Conan thing does run deeper than just the comedians hair with me though. I really do think he's funny, in a 'red headed stepchild way' but funny none the less. Goofy, funny faces, his quick wit, the way he can play with the camera and do lousy imitations that are recognizable regardless of how terrible they are.

Hysterical!

I've been a fan for many years, long before the late night talk shows. Dating back to the Simpsons, where he was a writer in the early years. Oh, and a little known fact. During his stint with Matt Groening and pals, Conan's hair had it's first shot at stardom, and the first time anyone can find in the archive that they were used as a prop for a skit. It came on the Treehouse of Horrors IV. The episode didn't actually make the cut but recently the unused, illustrated storyboard have surfaced on the internet. The story goes that his red rug mutates, grows spider like legs and goes about tormenting, slaughtering and sucking the blood from the residents of Springfield!

He was also pegged to be an ongoing cameo character, but the creators didn't see that working either.

TAKE MINE A LITTLE PINK, PLEASE!

I am enthralled with tasers! You might all have noticed I've referenced this wonderful weapon of mass electric destruction more than once before. So I don't know why but ain't they cool?! And I live in just the place where I can enjoy my insatiable thirst for 'em!






Spokane! The taser capital of the world. This part of the country used to be known for the Aryans but no longer. What we really like in the Pacific Northwest is to see a helpless thug, bankrobber, disabled person or Red Angus frying from the inside out!

Which leads to my favorite story. I'm going to dissect this one porter steak at a time so as to illustrate what down for you all.

Seems a poor cow wandered out on to I-90 and instead of listening the cops to "Get down on, get down on the ground NOW!!!"

This just confused the bovine, so he continued chomping on his cud and swatting flies off his ass.

"Don't make me say it again! GET DOWN, NOW!!!"

When the cow resisted, the police officers pulled out their tasers, aimed, and with the training they received over a six or seven week course, proceed to jolt the unassuming cow. Not once, not twice, not even three times, but 'again and again' til the animal died.

Yowza!!! Good fun, baby!

This is just the first time I can remember, this tasering epidemic, but I'll be damn'd if I want it to go away anytime soon.

Don't get me wrong. This would be extremely scary, that is if anyone...man, woman or child were runnin' around with 50,000 Volts of packaged electricity in their back pocket. But, this isn't the case. Truth is, it's the faithful, protectors of the peace, the men and women in blue, the coppers, fuzz and our very own Spokompton Police Department.





Love those guys!

Now we don't have a trademark on tasers here. We don't, but at the last city council meeting there was a vote and the chance to put a sign entering Spokane proclaiming:

Spokane
Heck Ya, We'll Tase You if You'll Just Sit Still Long 'Nough!

The vote missed passing by one vote because Council Member Al French was on a ride along with the SPD, casing out Doug Clark's home. He was doing so in hopes that he'd get the chance to use his newly learned 'taser skills' on the Spokesman-Reviews columnist and most boisterous proponent of the cops and the council.

Got to love Al's desire to learn a new craft and hand down the long arm of the law himself.

Now, don't be thinkin' that Spokane is only known for the taser. We have other notable attributes. We have Bloomsday, John Stockton and a rusty old metal, garbage eating goat.





Oh, and the world's largest Radio Flyer!!!

But we do love the taser. And yes, maybe it's used elsewhere to keep the peace like the crotchety old grandma in Texas that got herself zapped because she wouldn't sign her speeding ticket. But you know what? We aren't gonna take a 72 year old grandma's in Texas trying to take the attention away from our great city up here, away from her sweltering heat. We have all the heat we can handled, supplied by our faithful men in badges!

KC-135 and the Sunshine Balloon Band

I wasn't going to do this, but I have to. Pisses me off!

Everyone, myself included, is consumed with this 'balloon boy', the one that supposedly floated 7000 feet in the sky, over Colorado, while the cameras rolled and the whole country followed in horror. The boy 'lands' in the cellar, narrowly misses puking up on Barbara Walters, and announces it was 'for the show'.

Hmmm...



So, now there is a question of whether or not the boys father has narcissistic personality disorder. If this guy wants the publicity, if this guy wants to fly, then let's give it to him. And we won't call it punishment. Remember, he's just chasing a dream, this is America after all. That being said, I say one end of a long rope should be tied to his testicles and the other end to a KC-135. WHOO HOO! We have take off!!!





But that isn't what angers me.

Where my ire bubbles over is that we, as a society, built this. This guy thinks he can run around acting like an orangutans ass. He knows that while I'm trying to watch Judge Judy, I'll be interrupted by his stupid, silver UFO, and my afternoon will be ruined.

Let me reiterate, he knows this!

For this, he should be punished!



So, in closing I say we stand him up in front of the Honorable Judge herself and see how long he lasts with her. He'll be praying for the a long rope and a cargo tanker.

Siskel Turns Over in His Grave...From Hell!

I have always wanted to be a film critic. Not any kind of film critic though. I'm talking the film critic that reviews Dick Tracy with Warren Beatty and Madonna and has the nuts to express in bold print and proudly proclaim, "That was a fine piece of cinematography!"

Really?

Or how about the guy that put his stamp of approval on Brittany Spears' incurable disease that was Crossroads? Does this man still have a job?

I assume he does, and why? Because they get paid to review movies that are made of detergent and crap-pie.

That being said, why can't I?

So...I'm gonna give it a shot, and hope that because I'm so convincing that in these harsh economically trying times you'll go out and spend your hard earned cash on a complete waste of celluloid and the catered in deli trays.

Okay, so on my first attempt I don't want to spend to much money researching my endeavor so I'll go downstairs to cable t.v. where I know just the place to find a perfectly good load of intolerable cinematography puke.

LIFETIME!

There has to be a pooper with Meridith Baxter-Birney or Valerie Bertinelli-Van Halen. Always is. Oh...ya!!! Here we go, a real doozy! Let me watch this, take some notes, write this bad boy up and I'll be off and runnin', publishing my first ever movie review. Give me a few hours and I'll be right back at ya with a critique of a stimulating film.

Two minutes later...

Not even I could put a decent spin on that garbage!

Plan B.

Blockbuster!

I'll grab a newly released DVD, something not many have seen. Maybe a western, or zombie flick or a western/zombie flick. That will be a challenge in proving that I could falsify details enough that you want to not only run, but break laws in order to get this movie.

Back with something good, in a tobacco stained spittoon kind of way.

So this is older but a real suck-ass through a straw kind of film. A horror spectacle with pasty characters, unbearable plot, a stuttering lead and the worst dialogue ever keyed and wasted on perfectly good paper before recycling was popular.

Here goes!!!

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Little Nicky - Hell Hath No Fury and Not Nearly the Fun!

The first time I saw Little Nicky I hadn't planned to. A date and myself walked into the wrong theater. Twenty-seven minutes later, after upcoming movie previews, several ads for Diet Coke and Twizzlers, the credits began rolling. It was then that we realized we were in the wrong screening room. My date laid down an ultimatum. Leave this movie or leave her. Years later, I've found that the movie was better than the relationship and I should have taken her up on her offer.

The next time I took it in, I not only got past the credits, but through the entire thing. And what a hellacious treat.

Written by Adam Sandler, he also stars in it as the lead character, Little Nicky, the son of Beelzebub. He's sent back to the surface to 'flask' his even more evil brothers that are pissed that they aren't being handed the throne of Satan. He's supposed to bring them back to Hell. Hilarity ensues.

First, he meets Mr. Beefy, a talking bulldog that claims to be an old friend of the satanic daddy of all daddies. Mr. Beefy points, or paws, Little Nicky in all the right directions trying with all his puppy might to keep him out of trouble. Check out the marijuana cake scene...nothing is funnier than a possessed Adam Sandler and a chubby bulldog higher than Heaven itself.

Then, for the women out there that don't want to believe they've spent their evening wasted watching a horribly produced, over-acted Adam Sandler dud, there is the complimentary love story. Ingenious. Patricia Arquette plays Little Nicky's love interest. A bland, unattractive woman, which by the way, she excels at magnificently. She falls for him, he divulges his evil and heinous background to her and everyone lives happily ever after, blah, blah, blah....

The movie is full of great actors such as Rodney Dangerfield, Harvey Keitel, Kevin Nealon, Dana Carvey, Henry Winkler and Quentin Tarantino as the blind deacon, which we all know, if Tarantino is gonna act, he definitely needs a character prop such as Leber's congenital amaurosis as an excuse.

The only excruciatingly painful part in the movie is the sadistic Rob Schnieder cameo. "You can do it!" All I can say is I just hope some earthly being kills him and he lands an eternal sentence of burning at the stakes of the Dark Lord!

So going into this movie expecting the Exorcist, a person will be disappointed but all and all a great late night waste of time. Just don't bring a date!

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Convincing? You bet it was! So from now on, maybe once a week or until the hate filled e-mails start flowing in, insisting I stop, I'll keep 'em coming.

Rambling Man

Working off my most recent blog activity, only a day later, I will continue to the next, so as to keep my fingers moving, my brain churning and hopefully the ideas a flowing like the ice cream fountain at Old Country Buffet. Fast, fast, fast...that is what I want on this post. The sole purpose is to just quickly and at times, effectively, write whatever comes to mind before you all get cantankerous with me or it truly sounds like rubbish. Hopefully neither happens but I suspect it will be a photo finish.

It will be like a journal of jumbled thoughts, ideas, my where abouts during the day. Whatever comes to mind. No matter how small, uneventful, treacherous, ugly or boring to the follower, but a practice in conditioning my brain to keep moving, so as not to get lost in the fog of listlessness.

Let me start.

Talked to the remote control guy, on the phone, from Phillips today. Bought a universal remote a week ago but couldn't get it to work then, and still can't. Now, when I say that I talked to him, what I really mean is that I ended the conversation by yelling, screaming, pounding my head against the wall like a toddler and came damn near close to tossing myself off the the nine and half foot deck of the house. All because I don't fricken speak Istanbulese, Pakastanese, or Jibberishese. I may not always have proper pronunciation but I don't confuse and replace the word 'AND' with 'COW'!

Bernie Madoff is likely to be the biggest seller of the Halloween season. A mask that is. Two things. First, I bet the scum sucking pig wishes he'd had one of these at the time he ripped off the thousands of people of billions of dollars. He might have Made Off (get it?) with all the loot before being sent up the river for the next 150 years or so, before anyone realize he was the one actually under that piece of rubber. Don't worry Bernie, you should be out to see your great grandkids graduate. Not! Secondly, what kid is gonna know who the hell Bernie Madoff is anyway? Good riddance, Bernie, you little f@$k weasel.

Must have coffee! Be right back.

I'm back from Starbucks. Sorry! My plan was to write for a constant hour then send this off to the editor but my quad shot stood in the way.

I concluded three things on the way to get coffee though. Let me divulge. First, it's colder than the Swiss Alps and people are still wearing cargo shorts! Stop it, ok? I believe this is how, and I'm probably wrong, Swine flu is spread. Next, the lights on the South Hill here in good old Spokane are synch'd and actually stay green so it's easy to get from place to place without much delay. This leads me to my last observation. I'm thinking that this is the reason the crime rate is so low up here, and not because of the money associated or the altitude. Think about it. If you don't stop for a red light every four or five blocks as you have to in north Spokane then don't the chances of being carjacked go down. I'm onto something here. I just may run for County Commissioner. I've been meaning to square off with Al French anyway.

What else?

Music. Monsters of Folk, super cool! Can't get enough of Mr. Conar Oberst. Why the hell have I been missing out on My Morning Jacket and the Avett Brothers? And the Beatles! Ok, every media outlet is covering these guys, whether radio, re-mixed and re-mastered CD's or video games, but let's face it. The coolest!!! Been a fan forever and don't see that changing any time soon.

A joke. What would it take to reunite the Beatles? Well, used to be three more bullets but...well anyway, I'll stop.

I had my girlfriend recently tell me that because of her bad back that she hurt in a car accident years ago, she can forecast snow. Well, I have news for you sister. I have this big toe that I busted last year that twitches when the the Family Guy is ready to begin. Ya, I have no idea either, so please don't ask.

It's October and that can mean only one thing. Baseball. The big news about our American pastime is that both L.A. teams have moved on to the the Championship Series. Who gives a crap!

Help me figure this out. Two cars stop in the middle of a busy intersection in Spokane, all the men jump out of their cars and fisticuffs ensue. One man, I'll call him Mr. Dipshit because I don't see any other name that would be as fitting, is promptly run over by a passing car. First off I have to say to Mr. Dipshit, HA HA HA HA!!!! I still can't stop laughing since reading that on Sunday. But what really chaps my ass is that no charges, arrests, tickets or tasering took place. A cow roams onto the freeway and our finest, the Spokane County Sheriffs Department taser that sucker till it's medium rare, and nothing happens to these idiots. Hell, if they ALL got run over I can see that justice was served, but only the one? Come on coppers, you can do better than that!

Okay, I'm now pushing two hours and seventeen minutes and I wanted to finish up much quicker than that so I'm going to shove off, but if I offended anyone in the least bit, please submit comments, concerns, or complaints to my local HR and I'll be sure to get back to as soon as possible.

Lastly, before I go, just a heads up. My big toe is twitching.

WASTED DAYZZZZZZZ

I've lost my job. And in these economically tough times it sucks, sure, but it's certainly a better alternative to what I was doing, which was my job. My days and weeks consisted of going into a place of business where there wasn't much professionalism and sound ethics. I was managed by a woman, THE CHEST, that didn't know her ass from a missile silo sixty seven feet below ground. She was demanding of me when she didn't know what she was demanding of me. I have twenty years experience in the optical industry, while she has less than five. I have ground more pairs of eye glasses than she has worked minutes in the biz. I have faceted and drilled as many lens as she has sold. Hell, I've intentionally, hucked more CR-39 lens at my poster/target of a super-model for Luxottica eyewear that was pinned to the wall then she's changed out nasty, head cheese infested nose pads.

She is a big, fat dummy.

That being said, I'm the one that is still unemployed.

And truth be told, I was fired from this place, a place I won't divulge the name of, but, without uttering the name, I will say there isn't the words Eye and Glass and World on the front of the leased building at 6029 N. Division in Spokane, Washington. For some, being fired sounds like the worst thing ever, the end of the world. A stigma of sorts follows when you tell someone that you were 'fired' but for me it's different. It's not the end of the world but the beginning of a new chapter. A life experience to grow from. A challenge to move forward with and conquer. A mountain to climb in order to jump off and fly gravityless like the Birdmen of Oslo. An unwanted but needed vacation from a place I despise worse than any Lindsey Lohan movie ever produced.

And, for me it's a first. I had never been fired. Not in twenty-four years of working. Not when I was a kid with nary a responsibility. Never. Hadn't. And now have.

But, like I said, it's move on time. No worries, one day at time, and, now I'm beginning to find, sheer and utter days of long, cold boredom.

Ughh...

So, I find myself trying to stay busy. Filling out applications, pasting resumes, being placed on hold for thirty minutes by Joy, the unemployment lady to have a seventy-three second conversation to determine that I am indeed have the same phone number and e-mail address as what I put on my application.

That isn't all I do though. Afterall, there are something like four hours in a day, right? After the late morning and mid-afternoon naps, of course.

And then there is Facebook.

It would be a lie to say I don't Facebook, but it isn't like I spend the better part of the day on it. Okay, that is a lie. Maybe I do spend a little too much time on Facebook. As a matter of fact, I was recently told that I'm "seriously on this thing WAY too much." Facebook, that is. True, but dang Leahlyn, how do you suppose I'll be able to rule New York and Russia if I'm not? I mean, Mafia Wars won't be fought by themselves, now will they? Geesh! Anyway, I'm not on WAY too much. Really. The time spent FB'ing could be spent in worse ways like watching soap operas or God forbid, Ellen. I haven't got to that point in my life yet, so until I do I'll just keep telling myself that I'm going about my day at least somewhat productive.

It has other purposes other than Mafia Wars. It's a networking, socializing and creative waste of time but hardly ham fisted. No sir. Heck, I've met up with friends from grade school, reacquainted myself with high school buddies and most importantly made friends with dozens of others, including leggy, brunette, complete strangers from Moscow! Point is, there is a perfectly good reason that Facebook isn't a waste of time, and more of a productive time passer until my next nap.

Wow! Is it noon already? Gotta run all, but after my nap...