Straight up trippin’ Part 1

Hot Texas Weiners!

Ok fine, you may be wondering where i’ve been. I have a good answer to that, but first let me quote a Johnny Cash song, “I’ve been everywhere man”. And i’m sorry if you’re not a man and i just called you one, but i think he wrote the song to a manly trucker, or at least sang it to one. 

Anyways, right now i just showed up about 3 hours early for a shift at my work. Why? you ask? Well, I was the second resort for a shift that someone was already going to be showing up for,  and i got the impression they weren’t coming. Which is why i’m here writing, i got the time, and am slightly disgruntled. They say that pain writes the best love songs, but i believe that disgruntled people write the best blogs.  Perhaps i’ll let you be the judge.

Back to the road trip though, c’mon lets stay focused here. It started off in the depressingly wet and cloudy city of Rochester New York, a generally unpleasant city, but home to a delicious barbeque capable of turning this disgruntled blogger’s frown upside down. Sticky Lips was its name, and it was the only sunshine i saw in that city, where we embarked from. Late one night, we picked  up my brother’s father in law from the airport and then much later that night we arrived in New Jersey. I agree with your assumption that New Jersey isn’t the best direction from Rochester, especially when your final destination is Phoenix Arizona. But family comes first. So we went out there.

Now some people call it dirty Jersey, which is unjustified,  just like saying Virginia is for lovers. At least the sun was shining and we didn’t have to worry about dying when we went outside without a jacket. We also visited a place, no lie, called Hot Texas Weiners. Then from Jersey we trekked down to Virginia, they say it’s for lovers, i say it’s for losers. Sorry if you’re from Virginia, the mountains are nice, same with all the history and civil war stuff, but aside from that i found it very uninteresting. It wasn’t horrendous or offensive, just boring. Especially compared to the city we went to next.

Nashville is wonderful place. I have never, and probably will never be a fan of country music, i hate it, it’s so whiney it puts emo kids to shame, and it has twangs in it that my ears find offensive. But somehow i still loved Nashville.  In spite of there being country music and cowboy stores, I loved the attitude of the people. The live music coming from every door(even if it was country music). The fact that everyone you see, and talk to is in a band. The lights on Broadway(yes there is a Broadway in Nashville) matching with the smells of barbeque, beer, and smokes. That, along with the symphony of live music flowing from every door, made Nashville a very friendly place for the senses. Also there was the friendliness of strangers. One of the biggest things to me in a city is the friendliness of the people there, and Nashville came through. And to top it off, it was surprisingly warm too.

Well, thats the end of this episode, and i know this is sounding like one of those old-time tv dramas, and i have only one response to that, “More Doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCMzjJjuxQI  Camels, the long-lasting, satisfying cigarette that your children will love you for.

Nice Boots!!!

 

not sure if those boots were made for anything, let alone walking.

I’ve learned another valuable lesson in the proverbial “school-of-life”, proper enunciation can save your life. The other night there was a girl at my work, and i noticed that she was wearing cowboy boots, a compliment was in order. So I, in my endearingly sarcastic way decided to say “Nice boots”. The response wasn’t exactly what i was expecting, her and the girl i was working with both looked at me as if i had drowned a small animal. This only confused me further, so i walked into the back room. Then, just as i disappeared from their sight, i realised what my compliment may have been heard as a statement regarding the niceties of her mammaries.

I abruptly turned around to clear up the miscommunication, and emerged to see them now laughing. Just to be safe, i made double sure she knew that what i said, was indeed, “boots”.

Lesson? Guys, be sure to enunciate those “t’s”, especially when complimenting a lady’s footwear.

Oh and on a side note, that show i wrote about getting interviewed for, is premiering October 9th on TVtropolis. Since it has the 2 key ingredients for comedy(Jonathan Torrens and Me), i’m assuming it is going to be awesome. So if you like to smile and laugh, even have a good time, you should probably check it out. (http://www.facebook.com/pages/TV-with-TVs-Jonathan-Torrens/144494107854?ref=ts)

Oh and you know what they say about assuming, “It gives you the right answer before anyone else”.

P-hones?

Quick!! Whats the number for 911!!!???

Have you ever looked at what the cell phone providers in Canada have to offer? 

I say in “Canada”, because they are an interesting bunch. Special if you will, all in a league all of their own.  Like if all the kids from every school that always got picked last formed a group of teams that competed, there would be the team Canada cellphone plans vs the lazy-eyed asthmatics. And the lazy-eyed asthmatics would win every time.

Overpriced jokes, thats what they are. You’ll never hear about anything more over-priced that delivers less satisfaction than a Canadian cellphone plan, well except for the Toronto Maple Leafs. Even better is their total lack of coverage(wait cell phones or the leafs?(or is coverage football(wait brackets inside of brackets, this is the equivalent of punctuational heresy))). Which i suppose is a combination of 2 factors, my cellular provider and the fact that Canada probably has the biggest land to person ratio in the world. Then you just compare the US and Canada commercials and you know something is up…

American commercial: “look at how good our coverage is, biggest 3G network, everything plan for next to nothing, most hi-tech up to date phones out there, most powerful military force on your side.”

Canadian commercial: animals jumping around.

When animals are your major selling point, maybe you shouldn’t even be advertising. Yes Telus, i am talking about you. My cell phone provider for the past 4 years. I don’t know what is more stupid, their coverage, or my continued patronage of their lack of service. Interesting how sometimes i get signal from US towers, even though my home is about 80km away from the US.

Interestingly, as i was researching the distance from my house to the US border i just found something out, that if you type in USA as your destination, and follow the directions, you’ll end up just north of the small town of Dearing Kansas, just east of a triangular lake of some sort. I suppose north of Dearing is the geographic, and possibly cultural center of the USA. Knowing US cellphone providers,  they probably get better cell phone coverage too. God bless America.

No seriously, there is pooh on your shirt!

Deep in the hundred Acre Wood

You ever wonder what would happen if they were to cut down the hundred acre wood?

Probably not a lot, they wouldn’t even get a lot of  money for it, considering most of those trees are probably dead on account of those stuffed animals living in them. The ones without animals living in them are probably filled with dead bees, that died every winter, due to a gluttonous stuffed bear call Pooh.

What a cracked out story about animals in a woods. A baby pig with a speech impediment, that seems to be afraid of everything except for catching a flu, a hyperactive tiger with a tendency to jump everywhere. Then the depressed, homeless donkey that keeps trying to build himself a home, that everyone keeps destroying. Then there’s a little boy who shepherds these animals as they go on all sorts of adventures that can be experienced within the confines of 100 acres. I guess you can’t get very far from cracked out when your main character was named after a city like Winnipeg. Fair enough the books were written for some guy’s kid sometime in the 1920’s, or at least thats what the Our Heritage Commercial tells us. What the commercial didn’t tell us is that through those stories the boy became fascinated with bears, and the idea of living with them and going on various not so interesting adventures with them in the woods. This fascination soon turned into obsession which birthed the mad scheme that consumed his mind, that little boy, innocent little Christopher Robin, grew up to become, Grizzly Man.

Yes it’s sad when a little boy grows up into a crazy bear loving man. Even more sad when him and his girlfriend get eaten by real bears and not the imaginary one his dad wrote about. Oh well,  the moral of the story, destroy your childs imagination before it destroys them. I think thats the motto for the American Education System.

Twighlight 7: Step up to the Streets

Breakdancing Vampires!

I think I’ve found the secret to the meaning of life. But if I told you, I’d have to kill you.

But here’s a few secrets, if you guess a girls age to be 24, she will most likely not be offended. Also it’s not a good idea to ask a woman if she is into younger guys, which is pretty much an indirect way of telling her that she looks old.

Now that you’ve learned your life lessons for the day, it’s time for business. How awesome would it be to have a song out there in the top 10 that was written about you? Or even better, how awesome would it be to have a one hit wonder song written about you?

Well I suppose it would only be awesome if it was a love song, or something that makes you out to be amazing. If it’s one of those heartbreak/breakup songs written about you, you’re done for.

Cause even if the band tanks, after, the writer would have the supreme satisfaction of getting that song out about how you are the most terrible person ever to live. You’ll have to endure it on the radio, and after you turn it off, you’ll hear it in the preview to the next hit teen movie, Twilight 7: Step up to the streets.

Which is one of the final Twilight installments in which the misfit teen vampires join a dance crew, and must prove themselves worthy through the use of their superhuman vampire  strength in order to fit in and win the respect of their human peers….ON THE STREETS!!!!

And even after the movie fades into obscurity and the song leaves the top 10, then top 40, and off the airwaves. You’ll be watching re-runs of Seinfeld in your 60’s and a commercial will come on, and in it will be that song. Haunting you, forever that you forgot their birthday, lost their dog, broke their truck, or if it’s a country song, all 3.

So the moral of the story is, don’t hurt someone who isn’t talented enough to write at least 2 hit songs on separate albums. Because one thing we all don’t want is a one hit wonder following us around to tell everyone how terrible we are.

What’s a hero to do?

KEEP FIT AND HAVE FUN!!!!

Maybe it’s a good idea to stop basing my entire life off of Facebook.

Oh wait, I have.

Apparently leather sucks, don’t ask me how I know, I just know. In fact there’s a lot of things I know. Like don’t drop a Macintosh computer, or else you will lose something you sometimes hold dear. Like a dear someone from a past time.

And like watching Land before time 1 through to 347, I think I’ve found a new brilliant past time. Since summer has finally decided to come to Southern Ontario, the patio at my Starbucks is now habitable without the aid of a sweater. What is this past time you ask? People watching of course. It’s very intriguing to see the ways that people interact with each other and try to present themselves to the world. I feel like I should be narrating with excerpts from the nature channel.

“See how the male displays his desire for a mate, as they pass, with his immediate increase in the volume of his laughter and broadness of his gestures”

“As the male pilots his BMW, note the splay of his plumage with all the windows down and loud rap music playing.”

It’s interesting the music some of the cars play as they enter and exit the parking lot. I wonder if some people plan what they’re going to be listening to when they drive in. Some it seems like it, I know sometimes I do, and with some people it’s obvious they didn’t. Some things you probably don’t want to blare as you drive into a parking lot would probably include, The Jonas Brothers, Air Supply, and the themes to cartoons. Also rap music coming out of a mini-van doesn’t offset the uncoolness of driving a mini-van. In fact it just makes it worse, nothing says lame better than you and your friends in your moms mini-van playing 50  cent at a distortingly high volume.

You also get to meet and talk to some pretty cool cats. Some ask if they can be mentioned in my ultra famous, high profile, celebrity blog. I tell them no. My blog is all about observations, I’m not a name dropper. Some people think that if they ask, I’ll just put them in. Like those gay guys, the one referred to by the other has “his Asian”. Apparently he bought him on eBay, for a good price too. $2. But as I was saying, I’m not going to put people in unless it actually flows with the story…

SAM DOAN!!

…line. Like if i drop one person in it, next thing you know, I’ll be advertising soft drink brands, and athletic shoes. Even though I don’t really do sports. Then I’ll be making a ton of money, and my blog will be officially selling out. So to the 30-40 regular readers I have, I know you appreciate the integrity. The obscene truths that are revealed, and the amusement of me abusing the English language in an intriguing manner.

So much love, keep fit and have fun.

How I armwrestled Chris Martin and won!

Shoot that wasn't reverse!

Have you ever parked your train on the second floor of a building, started it up, only to find out it was in gear and you drove straight through the wall and out the window?

That happened to me once, well maybe not. But somethings only have to happen once to be memorable. Like old ladies swearing.

There is something hilarious about old ladies swearing. I don’t know what it is, maybe it’s how unexpected it is when they open their mouths and those four letter words come flying out. I think I’d be less surprised if they opened their mouth and a turtle crawled out. But anyhow, this one day there was a lady that came up to pay with her debit card, that didn’t seem to work. No problem, just try again right?

Wrong!

I’m not sure if it’s because old people have it out for technology, or whether  something snapped, but a sweet pleasant lady opened her mouth and proceeded to gently pummel the unco-operative debit machine with merciless F-bomb after F-bomb. Much to my shock and the customers behind hers amusement. I’m not sure if I have ever had a harder time of maintaining my composure, the temptation to burst out laughing was extreme. But thankfully the fear of sharing the poor debit machine’s fate won out over the temptation to laugh. A close call no doubt.

Speaking of close calls, imagine for a moment if you have a small child. At first I almost wrote, “own a small child”. Although owning a child, perhaps isn’t the best outlook on parenthood. Good thing I don’t have any kids. It seems that it’s not a good idea, if you have kids, to have a bunch of partially full buckets hanging around. Apparently children can drown in them if there is liquid in the bottom. Actually I heard that small children can drown in 1 inch of water, which is kinda weird. Granted I’ve never had children, but I’m pretty sure they’re bigger than 1 inch when they are born. I’m also sure that when they are 1 inch or smaller these children are surrounded by water, or at least some sort of liquid. Which is probably not the most pleasant thought my blog has put in your head. Still, small children are just really curious I guess, especially when it comes to what is at the bottom of partially full buckets. What happens when you stick things into plugs(done that!), whether having no clothes on actually allows you to run faster(done that!). Whether Coldplay is awesome in concert or not(done that twice!). In fact just this past Thursday.

And when I went to see Coldplay  it was pretty much epic. It was a fantastic show, it had everything from a butterfly storm to a cell phone wave to a Coldplay rendition of Billy Jean. It was pretty cool singing along with 40,ooo+ people to nearly all the songs, and the free cd was pretty cool too. I have some awesome pics up on my facebook, most of which are of a 50 foot screen cause we were too far for most pictures.

See you cats later!!

Oh and apparently I’m better than Hong Kong. A customer at my Starbucks indirectly said that.

Moustaches for All!!!!

Sign my stache.

Hmmm, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?  A lot has been happening lately, I had a moustache, my sister got married and in a few short days i shall be seeing Coldplay in Toronto. So let’s start with the most important things first…

Yes it is true, I had a moustache. I decided at long last to get one. It’s one of those things you have to do before you die. Like swimming with dolphins, or taming a Bengal tiger. Well, like them, but less wildlife related. In retrospect I see it more as a passage into manhood. Sort of like the killing of a wolf or a bar mitzvah, once you’ve done it or been through it, you can truly call yourself a man. If you’ve never had a stache, chances are you’ve never been a man, which works out fine, if you’re a girl.

But I had it, the stache was there, perched on my upper lip in it’s rightful place. I even named it. Weaver. After Dennis Weaver. I was contemplating Burt after Mr. Reynolds, or possibly Selleck after big Tom’s stache. Even at one point of moustache induced delirium nearly called it Burt Tom Selleck Reynolds, but weaver won out. Simply because his moustache looked most like mine, so it was only proper.

I found that people trusted what I said a lot more when I had a moustache. It’s like when you have a moustache, people automatically take what ever you say as fact, unless you’re my dad, who pioneered the moustache in our family. He was like the Johnny Appleseed of upper lip hair. My dad just laughed when he saw my moustache. Told me I’m too young to have one, but fails to take into account that he was 16 when he first got his. He has been likened many a time to Flanders from The Simpsons, which is funny because he actually looks like him. Also we go to church, so it’s like he is the real life version of Flanders, except he’s actually pretty cool. And exceptionally funny. In fact he is a preacher, which makes me a son of a preacher man. Apparently there is some stigma attached to that. I’m not completely sure if it’s true or not, so you’ll probably have to ask my brothers.

Nevertheless when my sister got married my dad had the honor and ability to legally marry them. They’re currently cruising around somewhere in Europe, hopefully having fun. I would’ve had the moustache for her wedding, but she said I couldn’t go if I had a moustache. This is kind of opposite of Adam and Lindsay’s wedding which was the major driving force behind me getting the stache in the first place. It wasn’t in vain either, since they both appreciated it, and it was a lovely addition to their already wonderful wedding. 

But the moustache is gone, for now, but not forever. And my blog is still alive too. Trust me, next time there will be something about old ladies swearing and the hazards faced by small children who are intrigued by large buckets with liquid in the bottom.

Brisk walks, through where trouble stalks.

Go Diego Go!

According to the picture above, people do jumping jacks when they get robbed.

Have you ever forgotten what the stars look like?

I got out of my car one night, after closing at Starbucks, and looked up at the stars. I don’t think I remember seeing that many, then again it’s been a while since I’ve really looked at them. I remember in my last year of college, I took an intro to Astronomy as an elective. Why? you ask…Wellfor 2 reasons. One I needed to pick up an elective to graduate, and secondly it was the only elective offered that had any potential in helping me pick up chicks. Granted it’s never worked, but then again I’ve never really tried it out, it’s too cliche anyways. Still a cliche subject like the stars helps you pick up more chicks than learning different computer languages. I’ve never known someone to Java script a girl off of her feet, or C+ their way into a woman’s heart. I suppose girl appeal ended up having not to much to do with it, since in the end it was an easy course and I was interested in learning more about my favourite planet, the sun. We watched a lunar eclipse one night during the course, and saw Saturn. This was moderately disappointing since Saturn was just a shining dot in the sky, much like every other star. No rings, no aliens, nothin!

I learned that there are some pretty big things out there in the universe. There are stars that are 600 times bigger than our sun, pretty big considering that our sun can hold about 1 million earths inside of it. Which really makes me realize that my muscles aren’t quite the biggest thing in the universe unlike Ryan’s advertisement….but are a close second. You may be wondering what it’s like having a supernova lurking between your shoulder and forearm, it’s pretty much like a normal day of walking around at a flea market. Except for when you go up to that creepy guy selling those vintage acrylic handbags, you have the power to make him give you whatever price you want.

Those bags are quite tricky. They give you the illusion of style and strength, but have you ever tried to run out of a bank with one filled with wrapped $100 bills? I did once, and it totally didn’t work out. For 2 reasons, number one it makes you very noticeable in a crowd when you have a brightly coloured psychedelic patterned bag, and B the aged acrylic is so brittle that it disintegrates once you toss the bundles of bills in, or rolls of pennies.

Rolls of coins can actually be convenient, if you want to use a bus as your getaway car. Although public transit is quite unreliable, unless your plan allows for 15 minutes error either way. Plus they’re not very fast or great handling vehicles. They are better than asking a friend who can’t drive a manual gearbox to drive the getaway car which just so happens to be manual…at least the police are laughing when they catch you.

On foot though allows for the greatest mobility. I find that going on a brisk walk before a bank robbery is the perfect warm up, gets the heart pumping and puts a smile on your face. Then you can jog off with your hip bag filled with bills, and not worry about cramping up when they release the dogs.

Oh and Micheal Jackson, secrets revealed, frozen yogurt is not an effective anti-aging or post plastic surgery healing ointment. Just thought i’d add that in there to get a few extra search hits on the blog.

Why not?

Top that!!

"Is that Journey?!?"

You ever find yourself bursting out into song randomly? For me this is a regular occurrence, the main problem with that is, I’m terrible at remembering words. Also, I don’t have the most brilliant vocal range. And I lack rhythm, which is quite evident if you’ve ever seen me dance. As Amy always says, “Jesse it’s a good thing you’re pretty.”. But apparently beauty is in the eye of the beholder, which makes you wonder who came up with the saying that love is blind. Probably Helen Keller.

This past Sunday I went to a wedding, where I almost passed out. And not from the abundance of wine they had there. Or from any sort of drink. Unless you consider laughter a drink, then I’m pretty sure you’re either crazy, or very weird.

It was Tim’s wedding, the lead singer of the band I toured with. At the wedding, during the speeches, in fact between the parent speeches, Luke the drummer went up and did a perfect rendition of the “Wolf Pack” speech from The Hangover. That is when I, along with our 2 tables, nearly vomited with laughter as the rest of the wedding was in a state of shock and wonder. (I’d say Shock and Awe, but George W. Bush has a copyright on that.) It was almost too perfect. That along with the helmet that Jenna Lane gave them as a part of her wedding present package possibly made the wedding.

The wine helped too, but then again that can almost go without saying. In fact the recent scare of the LCBO almost going on strike nearly plunged the province of Ontario into a state of terror. For my American and out of province friends, the LCBO is pretty much the only place in Ontario where you can buy hard liquor. They also provide beers and wines. So the other day we went in not knowing about this impending strike, the place looked like a store in one of those apocalypse movies, after like 4 weeks. Empty shelves,  people with carts overflowing with booze, and zombies, lots of radioactive zombies. It was ridiculous, all because they threatened that they “might” go on strike. The strike never happened and I heard of some stores clearing, you may want to sit down, $300 000 in one day. IN ONE DAY!!!!! When most places threaten to go on strike, they usually lose money, just look at any domestic car maker.

Out of a job yet, keep buying from financially irresponsible companies that make sub-par products….oh wait that would be Ford, Chrysler/Dodge, and GM. If any of you belong to CAW or have people that do and are haters of this message, feel free to forward any hate mail to

300 Renaissance Center
Detroit, MI United States
48265.

After that you can mail Santa, and then hope that you make a difference.

 Angry people amuse me. I find the best way to deal with them is through song. You can really reach a lot of people through music. Imagine someone comes up to the counter angry that they burned themselves with their hot coffee. As they’re about to throw it into my eyes, I switch seamlessly into an inner monologue….”How i react now is critical, because if I don’t act soon, I’ll have 3rd degree burns on my corneas. Plus if I remember anything that Randy, Paula, Simon and that other girl have taught me from American Idol, it’s all about song choice.”… So I look at this be-muscled, utterly enraged, neo-nazi-like man, take a deep breath and break into Truly, Madly, Deeply by Savage Garden. I can’t see him, because my eye’s are closed. This is partially to capture the emotion of the song, partially because I’m expecting hot coffee to hit my face any minute. As I hit the chorus his heart melts as my melodious voice soothes his tortured soul, and not only do i score a fat tip, but a date from his ultra-cute, hippie-pacifist daughter.

Thank you Savage Garden. Thank you.