Wooly Sid

Before I get started on a very important post about my personal grooming, if you came here for Lovehammer concert and CD reviews then just scroll down. Then come back and learn all about my beard. Then swing by the message board - it's the link over on the right that says "Leper House" - I got rid of the pop up ads and you don't have to register, either. Good times.

I'm not a hairy guy. On the Saffir-Simpson scale, I'd probably be a Category 2. I know Saffir-Simpson is for hurricanes, but I don't think Saffir would mind if I applied it to body hair. Saffir is the one that invented the scale and Simpson just added some crap about storm surge so that he could put his name on it, so I don't care what he thinks.
But I digress. I'm not nearly as manic or hairy as Robin Williams (a Cat 5), but when it comes to facial hair I can compete with the best. I tend to keep the face clean-shaven with a mere two blades instead of the five that Gillette would lead you to believe are necessary. However, every 8 years, I feel the need to grow a beard. My recent trip to the mountains both inspired and provided this opportunity, and I haven't used a razor in 30 days. At least not for shaving. And that's a very important point.

I usually go for the full beard, not one of those silly boy band or Johnny Depp beards where you make a little design or maze on your face. Besides being silly, that would also be entirely too much work - the point of growing a beard is to enjoy freedom from the daily chore of shaving. I considered life as a professional cyclist or female impersonator, but the leg shaving seemed like entirely too much work so I chose accounting. Regular bikini waxes are a good career move, but the leg shaving is optional. But I digress. All I'm really just trying to say is that I look more like Wooly Willy rather than K-Fed. With one exception..

This is the first beard where I have detected gray. In fact it would be hard to miss since it covers about 50% of my chinny chin chin and is an ever present reminder that I will be dead soon. Of course, there are products out there that I could use to "get the gray out," but even though one is called Just for Men I still think it's just still gay. So I'm considering going with the Chester Arthur look. For all you chicks out there that spent history class doodling your name as the Mrs. of your little high school crush, Chester Arthur was our 21st president (1881-1885) after Jimmy Garfield done got shot up. For many, I'm sure his name brings to mind important legislation such as the Pendleton Act or the Tariff Act of 1883, but I remember him as a key transitional executive in facial hair styling. You see, for the first eighty years or so, our chief executives were for the most part clean-shaven. Sure, Marty Van Buren and JQ (Adams) sported some heavy-duty sideburns, but never ventured beyond that. Then Ulysses Grant, being the Civil War badass that he was, reminded his fellow Republicans that he just kicked the South's ass and they could kiss his lily white ass if they thought he was going to shave just for a damn election, thus becoming our first fully bearded prez. Rutherford Hayes and Jimmy Garfield continued this dozen-year run of bearded leadership. However, while serving as VP for Jimmy Garfield, Chester Arthur came home rather lit from an evening out drinking mead and eating pot pies and passed out on the White House lawn. To teach him a lesson, Garfield had the secret service shave a patch of whiskers from his chin, but Arthur pretended nothing was amiss and sported his new style with pride through the remainder of his term and during his own presidency. Four years later, Grover Cleveland took office with merely a moustache in an attempt to reverse the trend. Benjamin Harrison brought the beard back to office in 1889, but when a sickly speechwriter named Hack coughed on him during a meeting, poor Ben went to bed with TB all over his beard and infected his innocent wife Caroline who died from the affliction while he was still in office. The American people freaked and re-elected Grover Cleveland in a landslide. Harrison went on to marry his wife's niece, which creeped a lot of people out, and we haven't had a bearded president since. But I digress.

Before anyone freaks out, Mrs. F'er's TB vaccination is current and she doesn't have any nieces, but I'm still in a quandary about this beard. So I asked myself, what would Jim Morrison do? Some people ask "What would Jesus do?" but in the words of Andy Prieboy, "God got his ass kicked the first time He came down here slumming." Now, normally I don't turn to Jim Morrison for direction in my life because it didn't turn out that great for him, but I just read an extremely cool interview with Jim's old bodyguard (the author is a Lovehammer and Leper Pop fan, so check it out). I'm not a big Doors fan, mainly because there was a Doors CD on the jukebox at the bar I used to hang out at and somebody always used to play The End which usually made me want to break my beer bottle on the bar and use its jagged edges to slice my veins open. I showed restraint as a courtesy to our dedicated barkeeps, but it left me with an undeserved distaste for the Doors. But in reading the interview I grew intrigued with insights it offered into Morrison trying to live as a regular guy while having to deal with all the crap around him. Way more insightful than that Val Kilmer movie. For example, the interview confirmed that Morrison alternately grew a beard and shaved it and quite possibly required the assistance of a professional barber in its removal, but since he died at the age of 27 I didn't get any insights on how to handle the gray.

Honestly, I get kind of bored with it after about a month. I'll spontaneously shave it off one day after deciding I look too much like Al Borland on Home Improvement. Or maybe I'll keep it this time and take a shot at hosting Family Feud. Between the Richard Dawson haircut and the Al Borland beard, I think I have what it takes.





Let's play the Feud!

Marty Casey & Lovehammers - CD Review by Moist Rub

Many of the reviews for the Marty Casey and Lovehammers cd were published shortly after the cd was released. I question the validity and the effort behind those reviews. It seems to me one must listen to a cd over and over and over and over, reflecting upon it in various moods, pretending it is the soundtrack to one’s life movie and imagining how it would change the plot, and inventing unique dance moves to the songs to get a true sense of the episode the band has provided to music history. Unlike those other hacks, I took my sweet time experiencing this cd, so I could provide a review that is engrained in my soul, rather than offering a translucent first impression overview of the material.

I don’t find first impressions, in general, very reliable. I usually make an indistinct first impression on people – horrible impressions at times. I find that this technique weeds out the contemptible folk that aren’t worth knowing me, and it also explains why I have only two friends. Accordingly, I don’t judge people or art or news or zoo animals or restaurants or hardcore facts based on fleeting first impressions. I’ll give them four or five subsequent impressions to prove their quality (about a hundred if they’re hot and/or rich). If I had reviewed the cd on the day it was released, when I had just eaten a rhubarb pie, I would have given it a horrible review since rhubarb makes my ears wilt, and I may have attributed that to the quality of this cd. As it turns out, wilted ears actually makes boy bands sound like zither orchestras. That knowledge may be useful to you someday.

Because most of the songs on this cd were available in prior recordings by the band, my first impression of was, “What the hell is this crap, I already know all these songs!” In fact, that is the review I submitted to Spin magazine. They sent it back to me smeared with used kitty litter (and I think it was used by something bigger than a house cat). Honestly, it did take me about a week of listening to the cd just to accept the changes they made to the old versions of the songs. I rejected them at first, just like my body rejected the butt cheek transplant I tried performing on myself, except this was not as painful or as bloody, nor did it affect my ability to sit on a toilet. Contrarily, listening to this cd makes sitting on the toilet very enjoyable. The acoustics are magnificent in there. I’ve never been so regular my whole life. Once I was able to overcome my preconceptions of these songs that were programmed into my brain, which involved some self-inflicted amnesia techniques, I was able to listen to them with a clear and bruised head.

Marty Casey and Lovehammers serves us, the gentle rockers, a sampler platter of what they’ve been about all these years while most of the country mistakenly ignored them, thanks to the weasel record companies not knowing what the public likes because they are too worried about selling acetonic apparitions rather than good music. Listening to this cd is like sampling a banquet hall’s entrees and appetizers when deciding where to have a wedding reception. I find this sampling exquisitely acceptable, garcon. I, Moist Rub, take thee, Lovehammers, to be my unlawfully amplified rock band, in sobriety and in drunk, for head banger, for ballad, for main set and for encore, in a club or in a concert hall, to rock and to roll until death do us part, at which time we will rock with Jimi and Janis and Duane and Bon and Randy and Bonzo and Elvis and Kurt and the rest.

Others have tried to categorize the Lovehammers as Neo-Grunge or some vapid term like that. That may be true, since I have no idea what Neo-Grunge means. Well, I understand that “neo” means “new” which would indicate that those people believe that the Lovehammers music is a new kind of Grunge, along with Nickelback and Puddle of Mud and others (from what I’ve read). But what does THAT mean? I don’t think they know, otherwise they would have coined a new term or applied an existing one instead of modifying an old one. The big difference I can tell is that, where Grunge was serious, despondent, reactionary and pessimistic, the Lovehammers remind us that rock and roll can be fun, while encompassing a larger range of emotions than Grunge did not do. Although, I enjoyed Grunge (and still do), it pissed me off that I was pissed off all the time. And that pissed me off. I thought I was pissed off during the nineties because my kids were babies, and I had no idea how to handle them. I still don’t know how to handle them, but I don’t let it bother me anymore, because I’ve grown emotionally, thanks, in part, to the Lovehammers. As it turns out, it was Grunge all along telling me to be pissed off. Angst can be a great diversion sometimes, especially when life is all rainbows and lollypops (and who wants that - certainly not Eddie Vedder). Eventually, you have to hop off the drudgery train and lick some roses. The Lovehammers use angst as a sauce, instead of a meat like Grunge did. Given this information, I guess Neo-Grunge means Grunge on Prozac, or maybe Rock Con Grunge Sauce. I think it was Dave Groehl who told Grunge to lighten up.

If any song on the cd is neo-grungish, it would be Casualty, the only new song. Initially, I thought it was a Nickelback cover, and I didn’t like it. After listening to it fifty-six times or so, I began to feel the Lovehammer vibe resonate to the surface. It may have been influenced by Nickelback, but Marty’s voice brings it to a different plane. This song has inspired me to make a difference in this world. From now on, I vow not to cut down any more rain forests, unless, of course, they hinder my real estate development projects.

The only other song that may fit into this nebulous neo-grunge category would be Clinic. Here is an example where mood comes into my review. Sometimes, I don’t want to listen to this song, because I may be feeling melancholy and vulnerable, like after a trip to the gynecologist. It hurts my feelings when they kick me out of there. On those days, this song scares me, especially Marty’s disturbed voicing of “coma”. Oooooh, somebody hold me. Other days, like when I just finished mowing the lawn and have inadvertently decapitated six bunnies with the mower, I want to crank up this song. Had I limited my review to my experience on gynecology day, I would not have given Clinic a second chance.

Call of Distress may have fit into the Neo-Grunge category if they had not modified it from its original recording. They “popped” it up, and I like it better that way. The song is about a suicide, which is a bad vibe. But the arrangement implies hope, or at least acceptance and contentment. Why does suicide have to be such a sad event? The Lovehammers tell us it doesn’t. This dichotomy works. If you’re going to bring everybody down by killing yourself, you may as well accompany it with some upbeat music. I especially like the emulation of sirens at the bridge. Everybody likes sirens.

The rest of the cd departs from this fascist neo-grunge label. It is chock full of variety, all within the rock realm, touching different parts of my brain. Songs like Hold On and The Riddle and Trees are up beat with important messages about love and life and loving life and living love and living to love and loving to live. Speaking of Trees, this song was inspired by Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit, when he climbed the trees in Mirkwood to give the dwarves a sense of where they were in the forest. He was then molested by butterflies. If that’s not an allegory for finding one’s soul mate and fighting for him/her, I don’t know what is. The Tunnel and Eyes Can’t See crank it up a little to remind us that sometimes you need to knock down some walls with a driving guitar and pounding rhythm section to figure out what the hell is going on in life. Then they tender it up with Rain on the Brain and Clouds to give us a break to reflect on the important things in life, like irritating precipitation inside the skull and metaphorical free falling. What makes Lovehammers’ mellow songs stand up is that they are not pussified. They have substance and are not merely wishy-washy, empty lamentations of passion in an insipid attempt to get flood gates flowing. They have guts, and I respect that. I’m sure the record company encouraged them to pussify those songs. That is what happened to REO Speedwagon and Journey. They used to rock in the seventies until they discovered eunuch love songs sell, and they gave us crap like Can’t Fight This Feeling and Open Arms (sorry, Karen). That’s when their careers peaked and the record companies rejoiced. That’s also when I left their work at the record store.

And then there's Maude, I mean, Straight as an Arrow - the best song on the cd. Simply put, this song is an ass kicker. The phallic implications of this song are obvious. You can read about them in entirety in my next book, Oedipus Lovehammer. My favorite line is “kiss is like a handshake”, which is a blatant reference to the human male’s attitude that sex means nothing. Add to that the line “What about me, so what, so what” and we learn how the Lovehammers feel about the women they’ve known who questioned their own lack of orgasms with the Lovehammers responding accordingly, “so what”. Not all of us men feel that way, ladies. Some of us would love to help you out with your orgasms, but I really don’t know what I’m doing when it comes to that, and frankly, I’m a little tired.

The cd successfully conveys how versatile the Lovehammers are. Sure, there are songs missing I had hoped they would include. But, like the tortuous water slide that is one of their shows, the cd provides the same emotional and rockin’ contortions. Having said that, there is one point of contention I must bring up. I understand that Epic tried to get LH to dumb down some songs to make them more pop friendly. I don’t mind that. Even with Epic’s influence, the Lovehammers were able to rock through unscathed. I’ve come to accept both versions of each duplicated song, and enjoy them both. But, the producers went over the line in one particular manipulation on Hold On, which didn’t destroy the song, luckily. They employed a pitch corrector to modify Marty’s voice in the first verse, when repeating “in one year”. For those of you not familiar with the pitch corrector, it is that effect Cher used in Life after Love, or whatever that horrible song was called, where it makes the voice sound computerized if employed to a maximum level. This effect was quite popular a few years ago. Cher’s producers were pretty liberal with the use of the pitch corrector, probably since they were already using it to fix her voice, in general. It is a cheap, boneheaded, parlor trick used by Epic to attract the lowest common denominators who wallow in pop fizz. I doubt that one instance of it is enough to attract the attention of pop radio lemmings, so why use it at all?

Marty Casey and Lovehammers cd cranks, consoles, inspires, caresses, harasses, cajoles, pokes, provokes, soothes and, most importantly, rocks. It is this flexibility that should allow the Lovehammers to remain in the public ear for years to come, while successfully overcoming the delusive Neo-Grunge label that has been impaled upon them. I don’t know if they’ll be able to achieve a unique term for their music, but what is wrong with plain old rock ‘n roll? I do know that in my own life’s movie, this cd has changed the plot dramatically. OK, not dramatically. OK, not at all, but it has given it a fabulous new soundtrack to aggrandize my major life events, like when I turn over my couch cushions to redecorate my living room. Look for that in a theater near you.

Lovehammers at Joe's, Feb 2, 2006. Recap by Moist Rub

I spent most of my workday the other Thursday checking my personal email box for a message from StivOO with the hopes of reading something like, “We’re blowing off Improv class tonight, I got us tickets to the show.” These were pretty high hopes, as StivOO has never been known to blow off his responsibilities. In college, he had the ability to attend class, actually do AND hand in his homework and study on his way to straight A’s, all the while being shitfaced with the best of them. The “best of them” being me, Sid and Captain Break-it, among others. I, on the other hand, had a reputation of being somewhat of a slacker. Classes, for me, were just somewhere to go to find some peace and quiet to work off a hangover. I wasn’t able to achieve the academic/drunken Karma that StivOO was able to do. The chances of him actually sending me a “blow off” email were slim, but since I was busy blowing off work, I had nothing better to do than check my email frequently.

The email never came, so I loaded up my shrunken Bill Murray head and made my way to class. Class proceeded as usual, but I could tell by the way StivOO spent the first half of it trying to figure out how to use his wife’s cell phone that he was a bit distracted. Eventually, after he had asked everybody in class what they thought his wife’s favorite color is and what bra size she wears (nobody in the class knows her), he figured out her voice mail password. There was a message from his brother that he had dropped off some Lovehammers tickets for us at the Second City front desk. Reminiscent of Dewey Finn at the end of his first day of substitute teaching in School of Rock, StivOO bolted out of Improv class as if the bell had just rung, telling us all he’d see us on the flip flop. I grabbed his coat and mine and politely excused myself to our instructor. She told me to get the hell out of there.

Joe’s is a mere two-minute cab ride down the street from The Second City, so we were able to get there in time to miss the first four songs.

The Lovehammers are notorious for starting out slow and boring, so we didn’t miss much. That is a lie, of course. I’m just trying to make myself feel better about it. Luckily, we got there in time to see the Lovehammers do their 90-minute xylophonic Peter, Paul and Mary medley. I fear that with their newfound fame, they may never perform it again. At the same time, I feel lucky to have seen it one last time.

Not surprisingly, the Lovehammers rocked the snot out of that place. StivOO and I had to stand in the back, because the place was packed to the rafters. And because every time we tried moving up, the mean Hammerheads pushed us down and kicked us in the head. As a favor to me, Marty talked the band into playing I'm Only Happy When It Rains by Garbage. Either that or he saw me standing in the back sweating my bag off and, from the looks of me, he thought it was raining outside which reminded him that they knew that song. (It was a little hot

inside Joe’s, and I’m an old lard ass.) For me, that was the highlight of the show, since that is my favorite cover they perform. They also played Here Comes the Rain Again, Rain (by Dragon), The Rain Song, Fool in the Rain, Purple Rain, A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall, Fire and Rain, Have You Ever Seen the Rain, Rainy Days and Mondays, Love Reign O’er Me, Rain Rain Go Away, Singing in the Rain, Rain It Black and Big Booty Hoes by Notorious B.I.G. It was a fabulous “rain” set.

They also played their standard songs off the new album, but let loose a little bit, since they were at Joe’s instead of warming up OBINXS fans and JDidiots. As expected, Marty took a tour of the ceiling to get a better view of the crowd. He baptized a few of us with his sweat as he hung by his legs from the rafters. Those people who received the sacrament were granted a continuous loop of the song Trees playing in their head until the day they die. And those standing next to those people received a voucher for a free crotch rub from one of the roadies.

As the main set diminished, StivOO suggested we try to get into the VIP section for the encore. The bouncer had other ideas. For some reason, he did not believe StivOO was the brother of the lead singer, so he pushed StivOO down the stairs. Even with the confirmation from Brandon, Jessica Robinson’s (from RockStar:INXS) husband, who was exiting when we were attempting to enter, he could not get in. So the bouncer pushed him down the stairs, again. He suggested StivOO check at the front counter to see if he was on “the list”. The bouncer looked at me and said, “Good evening, Mr. Rub,” and he let me in after I agreed to have dinner with him and his family next Sunday. We’re having a rib roast.

StivOO made his way to the front counter only to find that his name was nowhere near “the list”. Note to my brothers: if you ever become rock stars, put my damn name on any list for any show you do anywhere, just in case I show up. With Brandon’s help, and after spending about thirty minutes in Joe’s special pillow room with the bar manager, StivOO was given access to the VIP section. His hair was a little messed up and his glasses were crooked.

I waited for StivOO with the bouncer. He wanted to hear all about the magic of blogging. When we got upstairs, StivOO bee-lined to Jessica, who seemed genuinely happy to see him. And why wouldn’t she, he’s a great guy. It’s not his fault his rock star brother doesn’t want him at his shows. After standing there like a dumbshit watching StivOO and Jessica talk for about ten minutes, without StivOO introducing me (I think he thought the pillow room was my fault), I introduced myself to Jessica. She was very gracious and friendly. And she is much cuter in person than she is on that nasty television. She touched my left boob. We talked for a good twenty minutes. StivOO and I gave Jessica and Brandon parenting advice, although Jessica is not quite ready for a family. Brandon is, or maybe he’s just horny. Or both. Jessica made me promise that I’ll come out to one of her band’s shows (Covergurl). She agreed to send a limo for me. I agreed to pretend like we never met and to bring some young people with me, because potential record companies don’t like seeing codgers at their shows unless they’re dads of the real fans. That seems fair.

The Lovehammers finally finished up and made their way to their special room in the VIP section. Bobby tweaked my nipple. Yes, my left nipple, on the same boob Jessica touched. It was quite a night for my left breast. I haven’t washed it since (or prior to then, for that matter). StivOO scolded Bob for starting on time and causing us to miss the first four songs. In the past, the Lovehammers always started late. Bob claimed that they are no longer in charge and have to do what they’re told. So, I told him to get me a beer. I’m still waiting for it.

Marty turned invisible and slipped by us into the magic room. He never came out. Fearing that he was dead, and it probably was our fault, we returned to the main floor and tormented ourselves with the braying, heinous rap music that was playing loudly throughout Joe’s, while we talked to our friends Karen and Lisa. They eventually got bored with us and started doing that, “Okayyyyyy, it was nice to see you….” stuff, but I hadn’t yet finished my story of my recent pancreatic discomfort, and StivOO had just started spinning things on his elbow. They went to buy us beers and never came back.

Upon leaving, we met up with StivOO’s eldest brother, John, who was outside parking cars. He instructed us to go around the back to the tour bus and talk with Marty. Since he’s the oldest brother, we had to do what he said, even though we really wanted to go grab some soup.

As we approached the bus, we saw Marty surrounded by a few well wishers. Before we could interfere with his fans, StivOO’s aunt and cousin intercepted us. I stood there and watched them talk for a while. And then it happened. Out of the blue, who do you think grabbed my attention? That’s right, Heather Locklear, Pamela Anderson and Brooke Burke. They smothered me with kisses and hugs and apologies (just from Brooke for the way she had her bodyguards mutilate me out in LA). As it turns out, they can actually read and are big fans of Leper Pop. As they were rubbing parts of themselves on me, I could hear the faint sound of somebody say, “I’m one of the Snark girls” to StivOO’s aunt. I heard sounds of angelic horns as a white light blinded me. I threw the three hussies to the ground and slicked back my hair with some of their spit I scraped from my face. I approached the young woman that made the remark. I said, “Pleased to meet me, I am Moist Rub,” as I extended my hand. Then the girl screamed, “BLASPHEMER!” and jabbed me in the gut with her crutch and cracked me on the head with her elbow. After I showed her my ID, fingerprints and credit card, she believed me. So, we restarted the introduction, which was accompanied by screams of joy and hugs abound. That young lady was none other than Fabiansparkle. She now holds my Moist Rub introductory cherry, as I had never introduced myself as Moist Rub to anybody before. It was strange referring to myself by that name. But she hugged me and made me feel safe.

Fabiansparkle had a few Snark friends with her, and we had a very nice conversation as she showed me some pictures of her with INXS back in the eighties. I never realized Tim Farriss had such hair issues back then. Maybe it was because I was preoccupied measuring my own mullet at the time. Don’t worry, Fabian, I won’t bring up those huge eighties glasses and that chromatic threatening long sweater you were wearing in that one picture.

I learned something very important in my brief encounter with the Snark Girls. Something that will help remind me that, no matter how crazy and horrible the world can be at times, life is all good. And that is because Snark Girls like to rock and are cool, fun chicks. It’s one of those experiences I wish I could share with everybody I know, and I hope my loved ones can have the same opportunity someday.

Like I said, we had a nice, heart-felt chat, albeit shorter than expected. As we shared our thoughts, hopes and dreams, StivOO and I were accosted by a brazen hand on each of our shoulders, as we heard a rock star voice singing, “Alan, what has happened to Alan…”. It was Marty, of course. This is how StivOO and I had instructed Marty to approach us in public – singing our hit single, Alan. One time, at Cannes, he failed to do so while we were swapping gravy recipes with Roger Ebert. Marty is still ruing that day. He is a smart boy and has learned from that mistake.

I let Marty catch up with StivOO while I went back to being dazzled by the Snark girls. Before too long, Marty demanded, “Let’s go on the bus”. So, StivOO and I went on the bus. Although, I wouldn’t jump off a cliff if Marty told me to, or play chicken with him, I will accept his invitation to go on a tour bus. I excused myself from the lovely and boobalicious Snark girls, dreaming of the day we can meet again, and I got on the bus.

The tour bus was more than I imagined it ever could be. As I walked up the stairs, I could hear the sweet sounds of Christopher Cross playing at a conservative level in the background. I was met by a group of rock and roll enthusiasts, including Jessica and her husband, who were sitting around on the bus having a civilized discussion about education fiscal issues. They welcomed StivOO and me into their conversation. Marty disappeared into the back of the bus. While we waited for his return, we enjoyed some lemonade and fresh baked cookies made by one of the roadies. Before too long, Marty returned shouting, “It’s Parcheesi time!” After our third game, of which I won one, and took second in another, I was pretty wiped out. I can’t imagine how those boys can manage this kind of partying every night. Marty pleaded with me to stay for the rest of the Parcheesi tournament. I declined. The entire group understood and sang For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow to me. I bowed to them all and exited the bus.

What a night. I chose to walk back to The Second City to pick up my car, instead of taking a cab. It was more like drifting in a dream than walking, as I reflected on the events of that night. As if brought about by the Lovehammers’ “rain” set, it began to drizzle, and I felt reborn as I floated to my car nestled safely in the parking garage. Those Lovehammers. What a show. What a group of Snark girls. What a bus. What a challenging Parcheesi match. What a crock of shit, fourteen dollars for parking!?!?! Reverie time is over, back to life in the real world.

Winter Wonder-Sid, Part II

From the title of the post you will see that this is Part II. If you missed Part I, just scroll down and read that first. Or don't. But don't come crying to me when you get all confused half way through this post when I pull the duck-billed platypus out of my pants...

I didn’t find any fried cheese sticks at the breakfast buffet, so I settled for some oatmeal and an elk McMuffin. I suited up for the day, buttoned the flap on my longjohns and followed Mrs. F’er to the foot of the bunny slope where we waited for our instructor, who was easy to spot in his required blue jacket and soul patch. I thought it might be just a private lesson for the F’ers but we were joined by Young Nick. Many travelers enjoy the opportunity to meet interesting people from all over the world while on vacation, so I decided to put aside my anti-social side and see what Nick’s story was. Turns out that he was from a faraway place called Fort Worth, Texas and was even on the same flight as us the day before. Little did he know how close he was to being eaten in the tragic plane crash that never happened.

So we started the lesson and did drills with mystical far eastern names like “The Falling Leaf,” which might imply some sort of meditative state that allows one to be one with the board. However, it was more a method for me to demonstrate my young grasshopper ability to alternatively fall violently on my face and my ass and learn firsthand why helmets are recommended for snowboarding. All while Young Nick applied his skateboard skills and gracefully “falling leafed” down the slope, picking up young lasses along the way. Mrs. F’er, who was a natural on skis, struggled with the new concepts only to be saved by Soul Patch Scott the instructor, who patiently took her by the hands and gracefully led her in a fluid ice dance down the slope which was freshly groomed by my chin.

We eventually achieved a level of competence for which Soul Patch Scott determined would allow us to take the chair lift to the green runs with a minimal risk of required medical attention. Anyone that has learned to ski or ride will know that one of the more intimidating exercises as a beginner is getting off the chair lift. It’s not exactly like a cab that stops at your destination and you step off onto the curb. It’s more as if the cab were just to slow down a bit and have you jump out while trying to simultaneously get your wallet back in your pocket or purse. With a piece of plywood stapled to one of your shoes. It’s not too bad – when starting out you just try to keep your balance long enough to clear the ramp down from the lift and then roll out of the way when you fall down. If you make it farther than your wife, she will blame you for pushing her or cutting her off. If she makes it farther, then it’s because she pushed you or cut you off. Fortunately, it wasn’t crowded and there were no lift lines, so we were able to get our own chairs and avoid divorce court until we better mastered those skills. But I digress.

This part of the lesson involved more falling leaf stuff, except on a steeper slope as 4 year-olds blow by on skis while laughing at you. All while Young Nick stopped to build his own terrain park to practice on while we caught up.

I was soaked in sweat and breathing like an obscene caller after spending three hours lifting my entire body weight off the ground and chasing down Young Nick, when Soul Patch Scott mercifully announced it was time for lunch. I dragged my ass to the cafeteria and sat in quiet reflection wondering if golf was really as bad as I made it out to be. Mrs. F’er, recognizing the importance of food and drink, forced us to eat despite the feeling that my body might reject anything other than euthanasia. As soon as I finished my last bite and was starting to feel a little better, it was time for Part Deux of our session.

This time we took the high speed quad lift a little further up the mountain, which would provide the opportunity for more face plants per run on the way down. Actually, we started to get the hang of it and spent the afternoon transitioning from the falling leaf pattern to linking our turns and not looking like winter wonderland stunt doubles. However, the longer runs were taking their toll and I found myself purposefully crashing into snow banks at various points just to rest my fatigued muscles. I eventually slid into the base area, landing at Soul Patch Scott’s feet, ready to beg for mercy when he announced the end of our lesson. I hugged his leg and felt a tear run down my cheek…

We walked the quarter mile back to the inn and I used my remaining energy to extract my feet from the snowboard boots which was on par with trying to get the plastic off a new CD. I donned my swimsuit, not for the swimwear competition, but for the hot tub. Luckily we had the hot tub to ourselves that day since I was surely making pornographic noises as the jets hit each seized muscle. I eventually withdrew from the hot tub and ventured back to the room where Mrs. F’er led a stretching session that proved me limber as tree trunk. But I played along and after a shower, I felt ready to attempt a trip to dinner.

I shuffled to the town shuttle and ended up at Donita’s for some Mexican food. The cheddar jalapeno soup was stellar, the burrito was filling, and I highly recommend the spinach enchiladas in which Mrs. F’er partook. Shortly thereafter, I overdosed on Advil and fell unconscious.

Next morning I woke up paralyzed with pain. I felt like I had been run over my a Sherman tank and then hogtied and placed on some train tracks by Snidely Whiplash. The bastard. The Advil had worn off and I demanded a morphine drip. Mrs. F’er denied my request and brought me more Advil and insisted I stretch again. I began my ascent to the floor and approximately 30 minutes later I was ready to begin. It wasn’t stretching as much as it was learning to regain a semblance of motor skills. She doubted my ability to continue, but after a shower I was ready to give it a shot. We got a late start and took a leisurely lunch, but we spent most of the day on the slopes and actually made some progress. I wasn’t exactly ready for the Olympic snowboard team, but the crashes were less severe and not as painful. Except for the last run of the day when I landed so hard I swear at least four inches of my large intestine shot out my ass and would need to be repacked. But it did reinforce that whole downhill edge lesson pretty well.

After more obscenely gratifying non-sexual hot tub action, some stretching and a shower it was pizza time. We made our way to the Secret Stash and found one of the coolest restaurants I’ve been to in a long time. Lots couches, loveseats, and cushions for floor seating which looked cool but from which I might not have been able to get up from after the meal. Fortunately we were seated at a standard table that night and met our server Melanie when she sat down with us, asked us excitedly how we’ve been, wanted to know what we did that day, and instantly became our best friend forever. Even though she seemed like she was developing a character for SNL, we loved her and she gave us some killer recommendations, including the stuffed mushrooms which are served out of the oven in a dish so hot it will burn you and give you a scar. Which we know because she showed us hers. Nonetheless, I burned my finger, too. Great pizza – Melanie and the F’ers both recommend “Me n’ My Uncle’s Pie” with chipotle sauce, cheddar, chicken, black beans, corn and red peppers. Be forewarned – the pizzas are all hand-tossed and made to order so they can take a while, but in another stroke of good fortune, a couple and their child were seated next to us shortly after we ordered. Now Sid doesn’t like kids too much, but their child wasn’t a kid as much as he was a pirate. Wearing his Buzz Lightyear pajamas, a black bandana on his head, and an eye patch, he was an entertaining, yet well-behaved little pirate, and was rewarded with some pirate dipping sauce from Melanie for his cheese bread. Soon after finishing dinner, I overdosed on Advil again and lost consciousness.

Wednesday, I woke up just as sore and was encouraged by Mrs. F’er to take a day off. A day off? On vacation? What is she, nuts? There was a mountain out there waiting to be conquered. You think Admiral Byrd took a day off as he marched to the South Pole? Hell, no, and neither would I. She reminded me that I really wasn’t Admiral Byrd, so we compromised and spent the morning doing a few runs to stay loose and practice some more turns. Besides, a storm was brewing and I wanted to be well-rested for the fresh powder on Thursday. That afternoon we went to town for lunch at Pitas in Paradise (“big on taste, little on seating”) so Mrs. F’er could get her coveted falafel and while I munched on a gyro. We stopped by the youth hostel to do a load of laundry then mosied back for our hot tub ritual. Dinner that night at the Last Steep was enjoyable despite the group of generic businessmen at the adjacent table who were so important that they spent most of the meal on their cell phones and checking email on their Blackberries. If the town could only jam the signals for all that stuff, it would be the perfect destination.

We awoke Thursday to mounds of fresh powder – “Have you any idea of what the street value of this mountain is?” This was a good thing as it greatly softened the impact of my crashes. It was like going from that fine grit they call toilet paper at work to a fresh roll of Angel Soft. This did wonders for my confidence and I was soon carving turns like someone that carves turns really good, chasing Mrs. F’er down the steepest of green runs. It was a good day. Except for that hour when the winds kicked up and created some near whiteout conditions at the top of the Painter Boy lift.
Mrs. F’er cursed me for suggesting that one last run before lunch prior to quickly disappearing down the slope. I decided to ride out the storm, and befriended a Siberian girl who showed me how to build a shelter from the worsening conditions. We sat safely in our makeshift camp and I shared the slice of pumpkin bread I had stashed in my pocket at breakfast. We spoke the international language of love before the skies cleared and we went our separate ways. Or that might have been a delusion resulting from a crash caused by the snowblindness.

We finished off dinner that night at a nice Italian joint called Marchitelli's, but Mrs. F’er cringed when I suggested the bread pudding for dessert. I developed a liking for bread pudding during my stints in New Orleans and had tried to re-create the experience back home. It wasn’t pretty. I appealed to her sense of adventure and assured her that they could do a much better job than I. She agreed, they delivered, and there was much rejoicing.

By Friday we were exhausted but spent more than half the day showing off our newfound skills to the batch of newbies that had arrived in town that day. We watched knowingly as the new students went down hard, and then crashed ourselves since we weren’t paying attention. Reluctantly we turned in our equipment and were off to Pitas in Paradise for a late lunch. In town we noticed that the main street was shut down – apparently the townfolk build a giant ski jump in the middle of the street downtown each year for the Winter Carnival. They seem to have a lot of wacky ideas there, but instead of laughing them off they actually implement them. Sadly, we didn’t get to stick around to see the exhibition the next day, but we did get back to the Secret Stash that night to celebrate the greatness of that little town.

Winter Wonder-Sid

I know I said I would review Skating with Celebrities in my next post, but I lied. Apparently I’m not the only one that got sucked into that show and I was reassured it’s nothing to be ashamed of. I still feel shame, but at least I realize I don’t have to complete my penance. At least as long as I stop having dirty thoughts about Jillian Barberie. Let's all keep dear Jillian in our prayers as she struggles with those bruised ribs.

If you’ve been visiting the Leper House Message Board (and you really should), you might have noticed that the F’ers recently took a well-deserved vacation. After I spent a week last year tumbling awkwardly down the snow strewn slopes of Taos with skis twisting and levering my limbs into positions normally reserved for experienced contortionists, Mrs F’er decided that it wasn’t sufficiently challenging and rather than build upon the limited skill set I managed last year she decided that snowboarding would be a bitchin’ idea.

Why did she decide this? I have a theory. First, her best friend used to be a snowboarder. Right… used to be. As far as I can discern she now spends free time remodeling her home, scrapbooking, knitting and reproducing. Second, the guys she works with at the bike shop apparently spend all their free time in the half pipe throwing down triple lindys and inverted aerials on their bicycles or snowboards, depending on the season and the amount of leftover money after stocking up on beer, Red Bull, and nachos. She forgets that these motherfuckers were still in diapers when I was already off at college learning to appreciate the subtle nuances of quarter beer night.

On the other hand, I’d rather repeatedly slam my fingers in the car door rather than spend a week chasing a golf ball across an overpriced resort with a bunch of generic businessmen, so I got out the ski pants and made sure they still fit. They were a little snug, but it wouldn’t be a problem if I just cut back on deep fried cheese sticks at breakfast for a couple weeks.

Taos is a cool, unpretentious place but is still old school when it comes to their mountain and bans those punk-ass snowboarders. So I booked a trip to Crested Butte, one of the more remote resorts in Colorado. Since I’m anti-social and base my life around not being seen and minimizing contact with the outside world, it has hence earned my business. Vail, Aspen and Tahoe can kiss my snowy white ass.

As our flight progressed, the dusty, dry terrain of Texas yielded to the mountainous Rockies and I began eyeing other passengers, trying to determine who I would eat first in the event of a crash while waiting for rescuers. That would prove to be a needless exercise as we soon landed safely in Gunnison, Colorado, whose airport is about one quarter the size of my local Wal-Mart SuperCenter. A heavily bearded guy named Woody in a flannel shirt and down vest unloads the baggage, arranges ground transportation, de-ices the departing aircraft, cleans the toilets, makes the coffee, runs security, and still has time for several games of solitaire on the airport computer.

I carefully avoided eye contact with the other two couples as we boarded our shuttle and began the 45 minute ride to Mt. Crested Butte. By the time we arrived, the snow was coming down pretty good and I perused the landscape for the location of the nearest emergency clinic. Meanwhile, I had to catch up to Mrs. F’er who was already half way to the rental shop to get our equipment so we could get an early start the next day.

At the rental shop, I filled out a rental form which included a waiver that released them from liability in the likely event that I seriously injure myself trying to get back down to the bottom of a snowy mountain while tightly bound to one of their sleek, waxed boards. I also had to certify my age, which they politely overlooked seeing that I exceeded the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s recommended age by approximately 47 years. To prevent a concussion from prematurely, yet mercifully, ending our activities, Mrs. F’er added a couple helmets to the tab. This added to my anxiety as she didn’t require us to wear the brain buckets last year.


I would find out later that before we left for Colorado, her buddy Gabe at the bike shop gave her the following advice:
"Wear a helmet and don't die."






Next stop was the ski school where they promised that I’d be on my way to landing my own triple lindys, but had me sign a waiver similar to the rental shop’s just in case I had some sort of Nordic learning disability.

With those details handled, we reviewed the chow house selections and decided on some Thai food. We hopped the free shuttle to town 3 miles away and walked around town which was refreshingly devoid of Fortune 500 companies and strip malls. Before dinner, Mrs. F’er bought a pair of snow boots from a girl and her dog at a small shop. The girl was extremely helpful, but the dog appeared rather disinterested. She also gave a thumbs up to our Thai food decision and we made tracks to the Ginger Café.

We didn’t have reservations (and didn’t know we needed them), but were early enough to get one of the seven or eight tables in the joint. We both dig Thai food, but I’m allergic to peanuts and, though a mild allergy, it still freaks out Mrs. F’er to the point that she thinks I will swell up and die if I even get a glimpse of Mr. Peanut. Little does she know that in Leper House they used to do immunology research by attempting to sneak peanuts into my food just to watch me puke. But I digress. Our server didn’t seem to have a good working knowledge of the menu, but assured us she would try to have them keep any peanuts to a minimum. Despite the concern, it turned out to be some the best Thai food we’ve ever had and I didn’t puke, swell or die.

But that also meant I didn’t have an excuse to avoid a snowy demise the next day…

(to be continued)

Salon de la Moist Rub

I never had a Barbie Head when growing up. My sisters had a Barbie Head. They used to play with it. If you consider brushing its hair and putting make up on it “playing”, then they played with it. I didn’t consider that “playing”. It seemed more like work, which is why I never wanted one. Although, I did want a jackhammer, and some consider using one of those as work, which I guess it is if you’re using it to accomplish something. I wanted one so I could break stuff, like my sisters’ Barbie Head.

As it turns out, they weren’t really playing with the Barbie Head. They were in training. Training to be full fledged, self-grooming women. And, through this training, they became not only self-grooming. They are able to groom others, as well. I’ve further come to learn that most women have this amazing, community grooming ability. Ex-Mrs. Rub can do it, too. I, on the other hand, having spent my youth dreaming of jackhammer demolitions, do not have that ability. Or, I didn’t used to. That Barbie Head training would have come in handy nowadays, now that I’m a father of a daughter.

Recently, my daughter has adopted a rad new hairstyle called, “Knot-Ridden Get Dad In Trouble Mess”. She never used to have problems with knots. Or maybe she had, but I never paid attention. In the past, if she had a knot here and there, I would brush her hair in a way so that the outside strands covered the knots, and it looked smooth until she actually moved. Hence, the iron lung I bought and made her go to school in on the problem days. This strategy worked fine until, I guess, it got out of hand, as determined by ex-Mrs. Rub.

This is actually fun for them, until they expect a guy to do it.

Somehow, it became my fault that my daughter’s hair had become a knot farm. Although I swear she’s come to my house after a few days at ex-Mrs. Rub’s home with a rat’s nest on her head. After I took the rat’s nest off her head, I noticed thousands of knots in her hair. Not being able to prove it (and I didn’t even question why my daughter was wearing a rat’s nest), I chose not to even bring up the argument with ex-Mrs. Rub.

She had the gall to question my daughter-grooming ability. My retort was clear. I never had a Barbie Head, nor have I ever had long hair (relatively), nor have I ever, personally, had a knot in my hair. I did get gum stuck in my hair in seventh grade during a pep rally, once. I couldn’t get it out with my comb, so I chose to rip out the entire clump from my skull. The bleeding stopped by seventh period. I brought that up to confuse ex-Mrs. Rub, but it didn’t work. My diversionary tactics haven’t worked since the day after our honeymoon. Still, they make arguing more fun (for me, at least). My point was, how the hell would I know how to get a knot out of my hair, let alone, my daughter’s hair? She’s seen my daughter’s Barbie Head. It’s bald. It’s bald because one day my daughter was crying because she had trouble brushing the ratty fake hair on the Barbie Head, so I shaved it. That probably wasn’t the optimal solution to the problem, and it didn’t stop my daughter from crying, but it was a solution. That Barbie Head hasn’t had a knot since. It all worked out. She and I make fun of the bald Barbie Head sometimes, and it’s a wonderful father/daughter bonding experience.

My defense was stricken from the record and overruled by the emotional agony ex-Mrs. Rub endured while extricating the knots from my daughter’s head. She claimed that she was brought to tears with the sight of bales of my daughter’s hair being meshed in the comb, as if she was being plucked to death. I did some research on this. You can’t kill somebody by plucking them unless you do it all at once and pull at least 39.4 percent of the skin with it. Ex-Mrs. Rub did not use the global pluck technique, so I considered her testimony immaterial. That made no difference to ex-Mrs Rub.

I was losing the argument. It’s hard to beat an emotional opponent when all I have are bullets made out of logic and responsibility avoidance. I had one more bomb in my arsenal. I proposed that maybe, just maybe, our daughter was not mature enough to take care of such long hair by herself. Ex-Mrs. Rub agreed, and before she could get her “but” out there, I suggested we cut my daughter’s hair short until she learns to knot-proof it herself. Or, at least until the Barbie Head grows her fake hair back so my daughter can practice. Then, the “but” came out. Ex-Mrs. Rub said something about me being lazy and not willing to sacrifice some effort to keep my daughter’s hair the way she likes it. I’m not sure of her exact words. There was a game on. Then, I may have accused her of not being a good enough mom to teach our daughter how to self-groom. OK, I’m not an idiot, I didn’t actually say that, but the thought did cross my mind. Not the part of her being a bad mom - she’s a wonderful mom. It was just the part about her not having taught our daughter the self-grooming. It’s only fair since I have taught our son everything he has to know about being a guy, which is nothing since he’s a guy. I was going to say it, but I couldn’t think of a way to phrase it without getting a brush jammed in a part of my body that brushes usually don’t go.

Finally, I succumbed to the pressure and agreed to make more of an effort to the follicle fostering of our daughter. After giving my daughter a bath, (a bath that rendered her hair knotless, I’ll have you know) I asked her to get her pajamas on and report to me for some beauty parlor time. Somewhere between her bedroom and the family room and during the three minutes, twenty-six seconds it took her to don her pj’s, no less than forty-five hundred knots infiltrated her hair.

Immediately, I wondered how my daughter would look with a Dorothy Hamill haircut. No, not too good. Not even back in the seventies. So I armed myself with a brush, a fine-toothed comb and a fifty-five gallon drum of that Knot-Be-Gone fluid, which should be called, Knot-Be-Wet-But-Still-In-Your-Daughter’s-Hair. The stuff doesn’t work. I attacked the knots with the brush. The brush was able to smooth out the top layer of her hair, which almost tricked me, but I was now too wise in the ways of tuft teasing. I looked underneath the calm sea of hair to find the looming tumbleweed graveyard. So, I pumped some more knot-buster sauce and went after it with the comb. After I traumatized my daughter with whiplash from the massive comb stroke being thwarted by the knots, I considered that maybe going after all of the knots at once was not the best approach.

I began carefully taking each knot at a time. Some of them consisted of only two or three strands of hair. Before I knew it, I was half finished. Thinking that was better than I usually did, I almost sent her to bed to let her mother figure out the rest in a couple of days. But, I carried on, and finished the job. Sure, I ripped a few strands out of my daughter’s head, eliciting shrieks of pain. But, I didn’t let that bother me. I don’t know what ex-Mrs. Rub’s issue was with seeing the amputated hair in the comb. Those are tokens of learning. Me learning how to de-knot, and my daughter learning that she needs to figure this task out herself so that I don’t resort back to my clump yanking gum extracting technique of my youth on her.

I now consider myself pretty good at grooming my daughter’s hair. Pretty good in relation to other non-gay fathers, that is. I have long ago conquered the ponytail, braid, bun and beehive. I still can’t compete with the Barbie Head trained women of the world. That doesn’t bother me, since I have other mountains to eventually climb being the father of a daughter. Mountains such as puberty and the “monthly visitor” I can see coming over the horizon toward our house. I wonder if Mattel has a Barbie part to help me out with that.

24 Hours With Sid

They say that sometimes you can’t change a behavior until you’ve hit rock bottom. I hit rock bottom this week. We’re talking in the gutter, wearing your own puke rock bottom. That’s right… I caught myself watching Skating With Celebrities this week. I didn’t mean to watch it, and I’m blaming it on Mrs. F’er. I take that back, as I need to take responsibility for my own behavior. Here’s my story….

It all started with Super Bowl XXXIX – that’s 39 for all you that didn’t take Roman in high school or haven’t dated a big, strong gladiator like me. After the game last year, Fox decided to show the two-hour season premiere of XXIV (24). I didn’t see the first three seasons, but I finally decided to see what all the hype was about. Mrs. F’er looked on with disdain as I wiped the nacho cheese sauce from my chin and tuned in to my 12th consecutive hour of television that day. Desperate for some quality time with me, she reluctantly joined me on the couch and we introduced ourselves the men and women of CTU.

The show kept my interest for a few weeks after that, but I have the attention span of a gnat when it comes to most things and I slowly lost interest and focused my attention on more important activities such as tie-dying my underwear. However, guess who kept watching? That’s right, Mrs. F’er. At first I was amused, but then the Kiefer Sutherland screen savers started showing up on the computer. Then the posters and calendars began covering the house. The fan club membership including the honorary CTU badge and Chloe decoder necklace arrived in the mail. I went out of town one week last summer for work, and I’m pretty sure she spent 72 straight hours watching Seasons 1 – 3 on DVD, stopping only to check the Kiefer fan sites for updated photo galleries at the top of each hour.

That brings us to 2006. I suffered the physical abuse of being placed into a suffocating headlock after talking during the previews of the upcoming season. Needless to say, both televisions in our home were tuned into the season premiere, just in case one experienced an untimely malfunction. Desperate for some quality time with Mrs. F’er, I reluctantly joined her on the couch and tried to keep my mouth shut. It didn’t matter since I lost interest after about 23 minutes into the 1,440 scheduled. I found other important activities such as converting Neil Diamond lyrics into Morse code to amuse myself and avoid subsequent suffocating headlocks.

That brings us to last week. The tables are turned and Mrs. F’er has business out of town and leaves me alone at the house for a week. I’m pretty sure I spent 72 straight hours eating cans of cake frosting, stopping only to pray for a Growing Pains reunion show featuring Kirk Cameron since a Growing Pains reunion that doesn’t include Kirk cannot in good conscience call itself a reunion show. But I digress. Mrs. F’er called to interrupt the frosting binge and ask a small favor. It seems that her return flight happened to be scheduled during this week’s broadcast of 24 and she needed somebody to tape it. Ouch, bad planning, babe. I recognized my superior bargaining position and asked what it was worth to her, hoping that she would agree to a threesome with the brunette girl at the sunglasses store that looks like a younger Charlize Theron. Unfortunately, it was actually worth her not expending the energy of putting me in another suffocating headlock. So I grabbed a videotape and tried to figure out how to program the VCR since I’m 78 years old and nobody born before 1950 knows how to work them. Not wanting to risk screwing it up, I decided the best course of action would be to just turn on the damn TV, put the tape in, and hit the button that said “RECORD” in large red letters. The only remaining challenge was that whole crazy time zone issue, which caused me to turn on the damn TV one hour early. There I was greeted not by my nemesis Kiefer Sutherland, but by an extremely gay Scott Hamilton and the cast of Skating With Celebrities. Somehow I was instantly transfixed. I could not turn it off. I waited to learn the premise of the show and waited to see what would happen next. And I’ll review what happened in my next post.

Just so you aren’t left totally hanging, I did successfully record the said episode of 24. I was rewarded for my completing my challenge, but I still can’t figure out why she kept calling me Jack…

Sid Sweet Home

Believe it or not, the firm I work for convinces people to employ my services at what I’m convinced is an unconscionable rate. I know hookers that charge less than I do. Sure, their spreadsheets aren’t as pretty as mine, but I never thought my work would demand higher rates than poontang. But I shamefully digress.

A client in Chicago wanted to have a meeting, but the guy in our Chicago office that should be handling it is busy attending a soybean festival or something in Decatur that day. Since I have had the unique experience of having dated a girl from Decatur, Illinois and a girl from Decatur, Texas I was chosen as most qualified to take his place. The client balks at paying my travel expenses, thinking that I travel in a private jet flown by Buzz Aldrin and eat at exclusive restaurants featuring unicorn steaks served by Oscar winners (not including Michael Moore), while subletting Oprah’s condo for accommodations. Finally, it’s agreed that he’ll cover my travel expenses if I go via covered wagon, don’t bill him for my travel time, only eat rice cakes, and share a sleeping bag with the dude in the alley who thinks he’s Leif Garrett. Who knows, maybe it really is Leif Garrett. As usual, I’m already beaten down before I even book my ticket, but then I’m told it’s a Friday afternoon meeting. Normally this would be a bad thing, but with family in Chicago I can stick around for the weekend and satisfy familial obligations with no added cost. I book my return trip for Sunday and ask my sainted mother if she can remove the meth addicts boarding in my old room for the weekend, and the plan is in place.

I roll out of bed around 4:30 a.m. Friday morning so I can catch the first flight of the day to Chicago 802 miles away, because soybean boy can’t walk down the street a few blocks. Then I hop the train at the airport for the quick trip downtown. Rather uneventful except for the babe that got on at the Jefferson Park stop. She appeared to be a cross between my favorite CNN Headline News anchor Robin Meade and a yet to be identified Latina porn star. I offered her $50 to read me the headlines in a sexy voice, but instead just got gouged in the eye for free. I behaved myself the rest of the trip, dutifully exited at Washington and walked the 4 blocks to our Chicago office. Soybean boy had failed to tell his staff that I was coming, so when I walked in with my duffel bag they assumed I was a homeless guy that got past security and gouged my other eye before I could introduce myself. Eventually, my eyes quit tearing, I got the files I needed and was ahead of schedule, so I called our client to see if he wanted to have lunch before the official meeting. He already had plans, but invited me along so I braved the cold winds and made my way to his office. I was standing on the corner across the street from his office waiting for the light to change when I noticed a sign that said “Sears Tower Parking.” I didn’t realize it, but I had been standing within 25 feet of the Sears Tower. That’s not as oblivious as it sounds. Pretend you’re standing on the corner and Marty Casey walks up next to you. You would obviously recognize the boy, tell him you’re a fan, maybe take a picture with your camera phone, and try not to fart. But suppose Marty was 1200 feet tall. You might walk right up to that giant shoe and not realize you’re standing next to him. You might even fart, and then he would step on you like a smoldering cigarette butt and you wouldn’t even get a photo of his instep. But I digress.

I finally met up with the client and we strolled back over the Sears Tower and had lunch at some Italian place, and I didn’t get either eye gouged although there was a close call with a rampant breadstick.

We returned to his office, where we managed to stretch the meeting out to about 90 minutes after which I was dismissed for the weekend. Glad I could help.

My next assignment was to meet Mom at the train station where we would ride together out to the wild west suburbs and on to my sister’s house for a family dinner. About 12 of my relatives gathered there, but I think they really just showed up for the pizza. Then we celebrated my birthday 9 months late (or 3 months early) because my 2-1/2 year old niece likes cake and birthday parties. I also got to meet my 6 month old nephew for the first time, which is always uncomfortable since I don’t have any kids and have never been around babies. Surprisingly, he didn’t answer when I said, “Hey, Joe, what’s up?” He just made a weird face and spit up on my shoulder. I thought that might relieve me of baby duty, but they forced us to continue bonding. I told him about my meeting and he appeared to question why we didn’t take advantage of modern telecommunications to work more efficiently. I briefly explained the benefits of face-to-face client contact and the nuances that can be lost if one relies too heavily on technology. He nodded in agreement and spit up on my other shoulder.

The next morning I hotwired my mom’s car and met my uncles for breakfast. Nobody spit up on each other, so I guess it was a success. Back at mom’s house, I spent the afternoon rewiring the cables behind her upstairs television. To make it more interesting I pretended I was defusing a bomb in some blockbuster TV show and if I made the wrong connection it would set off a string of deadly explosions and the terrorists would win. Eventually, I successfully accessed the Lifetime channel, wiped the sweat from my brow and was the new household hero. As a reward, I was fed a nice Italian beef sandwich from the hot dog joint down the street since you can’t get those in Dallas. I think you need some sort of special permit in Texas to open a restaurant that doesn’t serve exclusively BBQ and they only issue 2 of them in election years.

Since everybody thinks kids are cute, I was offered the opportunity to babysit that evening but I was running out of clean shirts. Fortunately my uncle and cousin took me out to shoot some pool. I warned them that I took a billiards class in college, but they didn’t seem to care. I even confessed that I got a B in the class, which is technically “above average” but it still didn’t shake their confidence. After we got kicked out of a couple bars since my cousin is still technically underage, we finally found a table in the lounge at the local bowling alley where they didn’t seem to care as long as you weren't vomiting in the ashtrays. As if it made a difference, we tried to find a cue stick that wasn’t as warped as your typical reality show star and racked them up. We must have appeared racist because the only ball we were pocketing seemed to be the white one. Eventually, some other players showed up to put us out of our misery and we retreated back to mothering bosom of their home for some poker.

I was never a big card player and have resisted the latest poker craze, instead waiting patiently for the Old Maid craze to begin. And waiting. And waiting. But I digress. We added another cousin and a couple friends and suddenly had a game. They briefed me on the house rules, which included no eye gouging, thankfully. Turns out that Lady Luck was in my pants that night and I won the first round and pocketed $20 in winnings. We played another round and I got my ass kicked, but was still up $15 big ones. Apparently Lady Luck had left me to go watch SNL in the other room or something.

Next morning, Mom bought me breakfast because I think she’s under the impression that I’m still making minimum wage and my wife is selling Chiclets downtown to help pay for food. We stopped by my sister’s again, where my niece presented me with a gift of colored sand in a small bottle. I asked her what the hell I was supposed to do with it, and she replied, “Screw you, Uncle Sid,” and wiped a glob of non-toxic paste in my hair. Actually, I graciously accepted her gift and carefully packed it in my carry-on, waiting for airport security to grill me about the unidentified chemical reagents in my bag. Then I remembered they would be easily distracted by my nail clippers and allow me to breeze through.

My bottles of sand and I made it safely home that day, and they’re proudly displayed on our mantel right next to my 5th grade bowling trophy. The End.

Sid, Neve & Gliz - Torino 2006

Crap. I’ve been alerted by Neve and Gliz that the Winter Olympics begin next month and I haven’t even started training yet. Neve and Gliz are the official mascots of the 2006 games. Neve is supposed to be a “soft, friendly and elegant snowball” but really appears to be a cross between Lemonhead and the Cingular Wireless logo. Gliz claims to be a “lively and playful ice cube” that is obviously a hybrid of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man and the AOL guy. Some Portuguese artist actually won the competition with those drawings, but I allege it was fixed and demand that the judging panel be drug tested. But I digress.

It’s not looking like I’ll be there for the opening ceremonies in 2006, but maybe it’s for the best. You see, I’m a dirty two-timing bastard. I’ll explain in a minute.

Way back in the old days when the athletes were still wearing fur togas and participating in primitive events like the icicle toss and the hardest nipple competion, Moist Rub and I were sitting around watching Olympic coverage. It was that or attempt some Theoretical and Applied Mechanics homework. Being the patriotic type, I donned my red, white and blue skin suit and dutifully tuned into the proceedings. Seeing as my career in engineering wasn’t working out as planned, I considered life as an Olympic athlete and began to peruse the events.

Skiing
Downhill: I have the feeling that these guys get all the chicks. While this aspect intrigued me, I realized that I really didn’t have a chance competing against an Austrian guy whose mother gave birth to him on a chairlift and who completed his first run before the umbilical cord was cut. So all alpine events are out. Alpine events include any events in which gravity will likely kill me while trying to chase down guys named Franz. I went skiing last year and my 62 year old instructor suggested I stick to snow angels while she worked with Mrs. F’er. Just as I had swept out a perfect angel, they both came skidding in and covered me and my angel in a pile of fresh powder, laughed, and then went to drink hot chocolate at the chateau with some charming studs with French accents.

Freestyle: The Winter Olympic Committee was having a breakfast meeting trying to figure out how to increase the ratings, when one of them glanced over at the Wheaties and noticed a gymnast on the box. “Those gymnasts always get all the attention!” he declared, and vowed to bring the acrobatic grace to the slopes. Unfortunately, the dope smoking slackers that signed up for the freestyle skiing competition weren’t nearly as endearing as the diminutive pixies of the mats. I think I could handle the dope smoking part, but I’m not sure I could land on my feet while altered. Better not take any chances.

Ski Jumping: Face planting into the side of a mountain is pretty low on my list of things to do before I die. Also pretty low on my list of ways to die. I need to update that list. Each year a few additional ways occur to me and they must be properly ranked. That way people can consult the list after my demise and decide how much to grieve. If someone tries to tell Mrs. F’er, “That’s the way he would have wanted to go,” she can just pull out the list to confirm and punch them in the nose as needed.

Cross Country: Eliminates the threat of gravity, but seems too much like jogging in really crappy weather. I don’t even like jogging in nice weather. I don’t even like jogging on a treadmill in a temperature controlled health club with a cold bottle of water by my side while watching Full House reruns on a color TV in the corner. I did a 10k once that was part of the Cowtown Marathon in Fort Worth. If you go slow enough, stop for all the water breaks, and take a couple cigarette breaks you can finish about the same time the first marathon runners are coming in and people will mistake you for one of them. At least they might if you aren’t wearing a velvet track suit and Princess Reeboks. I don’t care how bad my country needs me, I’m not signing up for this event.

Nordic Combined: A combination of ski jumping and cross country. Weren’t you listening when I said I’m not doing cross country? Or face planting into the Alps?

Biathlon: Combines cross country skiing with… I told you I’m not doing… wait, what did you say….? I get to shoot stuff? Like bad guys? Wild turkeys? Just targets? Nevermind. See above. Besides, it’s probably a real pain in the ass to get your rifle past security on the flight to Italy, then you have to try to jam that and your skis into the overhead bin. Besides, I don’t think I’d like to participate in any event where the competitors carry artillery. I’m sure there are rules against capping the competition, but I just don’t want to take that chance.

Snowboard
I’ll be going snowboarding at the end of this month. If anyone is short of cash, meet me there with a digicam and I’m sure I’ll provide you some footage that will lock up first place on America’s Funniest Home Videos of Cute Babies, Hilarious Pets, and Stupid People Being Severely Injured. I have a fear of being tethered to stuff. I think it started when Greg Brady got hit in the head with his own surfboard after mistaking the dangerous Tiki idol as a good luck charm in Hawaii. Then I hit myself in the head with a racquetball racquet and became the first person to draw his own blood in that sport. So I’m not holding out hope that the Olympic Committee is going to be recruiting me anytime soon for this event.
Besides, I’m an old man and don’t know what the hell Jim McKay is talking about when he starts throwing down terms like whoops, waves, banks, kickers and spines during the half pipe competition. I thought that’s what they had to smoke before starting their run.

Skating
Figure Skating: Any activity that requires wearing sequins is not a sport, and I’m not wearing sequins. However, some of those skater chicks develop quite the little cupcake asses, so I might be talked into the pairs competition if you can hook me up with one of them hotties. But then there’s always the chance that a jealous Mrs. F’er will club me in the shin with a lead pipe and then I’d forever have to watch a clip of myself on television crying in an ice rink in my poofy sequin shirt. I’ll never live that down with my buddies down at the steel mill.

I’m not sure why Ice Dancing is in the Olympics, but if they’re going to include it they need to raise the difficultly level so that there are more crashes. Or maybe set themselves on fire. I heard they were going to eliminate this silly event, but then they saw the ratings for Dancing with Desperate Out-of-Work Stars and Skating with Fringe Celebs and decided “what the hell - those dumbass Americans will watch.”

Speed Skating: I almost joined a speed skating club one winter, but hockey looked like more fun. Then I got hit in the ankle with a puck and the speed skaters laughed at me while I sobbed in a snow bank. Bastards.

Ice Hockey
I don’t want to play any sport in which it’s considered a miracle if the US wins.
They added women’s hockey at some point, but I don’t think anyone noticed.

Curling
You know those guys at the gym that just do curls all the time and have huge biceps so they can wear tiny shirts and impress chicks, but never work out the rest of their body and have those skinny disproportionate legs? It’s not that I’m checking them out, but they crack me up. But I digress and it’s not that kind of curling. Olympiad curling is just like hockey except you can’t hit the other team, and instead of firing high speed shots at the other team’s goal while on skates, you just kind of walk around the ice in your loafers and play shuffleboard with a broom. Kind of looks like a janitor’s convention at an ice-age bowling alley. I’ll pass.

Skeleton
What we used to call sledding when we were kids. I painted “Rosebud” on the deck of my bad-ass sled, but none of the other kids got the reference. Dumbasses. Other kids showed up with the round plastic disc sleds that were fast, but had no steering mechanism and usually ended with a fiery crash into the monkey bars at the bottom of the hill. OK, so they weren’t fiery, but it wasn’t pretty. It ain’t pretty after the pretty leaves you ass up in the snow. The third class consisted of the poor kids that would raid the garbage of the more debt ridden families for the discarded boxes of large Christmas purchases and use the flattened boxes as makeshift sleds. Worked pretty well unless it was a wet snow which would leave one sitting dejectedly in a pile of wet pulp, until one of the disc riders knocked himself out and allowed his disc to be commandeered.

The skeleton competition is all about speed, so you have skinny guys in aerodynamic skin suits lying head-first upon a light-weight carbon cookie sheet attached to razor sharp speed skating blades going about 130 km/hr. That’s about 80 mph for those of you that never adopted the metric system. Kind of makes the Olympics a pain in the ass. The course appears to be a juiced up water slide at Wet n’ Wild except the water is frozen and instead splashing into a refreshing pool at the end, you crash into a sheet of ice if you screw up. The rough ice and friction shred your skin suit, burn off your skin and other necessary body tissues, leaving just a pile of bones; hence, the name skeleton. High penalty for failure, so I’m out.

Luge
Looks about the same as skeleton, except these wusses go down feet-first because they’re scared. Instead of medals, they should just give them chests to pin them on. Huh?

Bobsleigh
This incorporates the same Roid Rage Water Park that skeleton and luge use, but with a little more protection offered by the sled. This could work. All I needed was a teammate. I recruited Moist Rub and the US Bobsled Dream Team was formed. We would start our training right after happy hour next Friday. Surprisingly that didn’t work out, but the dream lived on as we attempted to build our own sled out of the plethora of emptied aluminum Stroh’s cans scattered amidst the house using only a staple gun and a psychology textbook. We never got to try it out, but it was probably for the best. I’m also thinking that there might have been some sort of issues concerning commercial endorsement. Not from the Olympic Committee but from Stroh’s for denigrating their brand.

A few years later (probably four, to be exact), LA Ray and I were sitting around watching Olympic coverage at the local tavern. It was that or get off our stools and play darts at the local tavern. LA Ray began to extol the greatness of curling. I was skeptical at first, but after careful thought I realized he was onto something. It doesn’t require much physical training. Low risk of death. Canadian chicks dig you. And you can probably drink beer while competing as long as you keep it hidden in a brown paper bag. That night the US Curling Dream Team was formed. We would order our brooms after happy hour next Friday. Surprisingly that didn’t work out, but the dream lived on.

To date, approximately three Olympiads have come and gone. Neither Moist Rub nor LA Ray has called, so my double dealing has not been exposed. But now I’m just afraid they’ve gone behind my back and have plans to form their own 2 man luge team. Sure it’s a little gay looking, but I just don’t like being left out. I hope the wife didn’t throw out the skin suit.

Improv Rub

So StivOO and I were walking around the city, looking for unexploded fireworks left over from Thanksgiving, and all of a sudden, we were at Piper’s Alley, the home of Second City. There, some weird lady, wearing an ironing board as pants and wire hangers for curlers in her hair, lured us in with a sign that said “Free Sex and Money”. StivOO and I made a pact to go for the money only because we would be able to pay for sex with it, which is always more fulfilling than getting sex for free. When we walked in, to our astonishment, there was neither free sex nor free money. Immediately, we were swooped upon and placed before an improv training recruitment officer. After twenty minutes of berating, spitting, bull whipping and orifice violating, StivOO and I had enrolled in the beginner’s level of improv training offered by Second City. That’s right, they wouldn’t let us in unless we violated some of their orifices, including light sockets.

Our first class was Thursday, January 5. Upon arriving, we received our official Second City Training Center Student ID card (pictured). As you can see, this card tells us that Second City does not have a graphic designer on staff, as a lemur with a lisp could have designed a more professional card. I would have expected at least a caricature of Steve Carell on it. My card expires March 5th. This way, if I’m no good, they can keep me out of their hallways after putting up with me for a mere two months. That is assuming my talent doesn’t earn me another card for the following session. And by talent, I mean two hundred and sixty dollars.

StivOO and I entered a windowless training room, which, as we learned later, also serves as the staging area for the Second City skybox stage. I spent the first ten minutes sniffing the carpet and walls hoping to get a wiff of Tina Fey sweat from years gone by. All I could sense were gallons of Rachel Dratch residue, which, I’ll admit, is funnier, but not as sweet smelling as Tina’s. Our instructor, Jackie, eventually showed up and told me to get my nose off the wall and have a seat.

Jackie entertained us with about fifteen minutes of introductory yak yak. Then she demanded that we partake in our first exercise. I don’t know how much actual improv we’ll end up doing in this class. I think it’s more wax on, wax off type training. Before we know it, we’ll know how to inflict karate on unsuspecting whale watchers. The exercise consisted of the eighteen of us trainees meandering around the room, making eye contact with others and saying “hi”. I, being the overachiever when convenient and easy, chose to say “hello” and “howdy, pardner” to some of my fellow classmates. They seemed to enjoy it and I can tell they really, really like me a lot. StivOO and I avoided each other, as we have made eye contact plenty of other times and have even said hello to each other on occasion. Next, Jackie expanded on that motif and told us to continue doing the promenade, but this time, introduce ourselves and provide a one sentence statement about ourselves. This is where I was thrown off, a little. I stuck to the rules, stating things like, “I have shoes”, “I get itchy when bowling”, and “I’ve never been eaten by an alligator.” Consequently, I rifled through the entire class. Classmates I met tried conversing with me, but the rule was to say one thing, so I turned my back on them right quick after their first comment. Then I noticed everybody was paired up and talking. That wasn’t the direction. We were only supposed to say one thing! And, Jackie did nothing to prevent it. So, I went back to sniffing the carpet until the next exercise commenced.

Next, we circled our blossoming improv chuck wagons. Jackie instructed us to shout out our names while accompanying it with a unique physical movement. She demonstrated by shouting her name and doing a karate type kick. We were to all repeat what she did, using her name and movement. So we did. People decided to follow the rules this time, if you can believe it, which was good because sniffing the carpet was starting to make me gag. Then, we began doing our own with the group repeating the name and movement. I screwed mine up. I attempted to do the Brady Bunch “Keep On” single knee kneel-down with the flamboyant arm circle, but it came out more like an around the world bowling move. I have never been more embarrassed the entire month. StivOO chose to go with the classic 213 Thumper move. I won’t describe it, but he did it wrong, too. I corrected it when it came around to me. We were both failing miserably as improv-ers. Jackie turned that ordeal into a game where one person would start with her/his own name and move and then say another persons name and do their move. That person would pick it up and lay it down to pass it to another person, and she told two friends, and they told two friends and so on and so on. I presume the intent was to get us to learn each other’s names and loosen up in the process. I can only speak for myself, but I don’t think it worked so well since the only people's names I can remember are Crotch Grab, Nipple Tweak, Squat Kick and Take Your Leg Off (amputees are welcome at Second City, by the way).

Once that was over, we maintained our circle. It’s a symbol of unity and it promotes ensemble behavior, which is a cornerstone in improv communities. OK, I don't know what I'm talking about, but it may be correct. We did stay in the circle formation in order to play a game called Time to Start Sweating and Hurt Yourself. You may know this game by its other name, Kitty Wants a Corner. To play the game, one person starts in the middle of the circle. Jackie volunteered since the rest of us didn’t know how to play. The person in the middle of the circle, the Kitty, is supposed to go up to one of the people on the perimeter and say, “Kitty wants a corner.” The person spoken to was to instruct the Kitty to ask one of his/her next door neighbors and point to which one. Then the Kitty would go to the person next to the first person, as instructed, and ask the same question. The point here is to show how stupid cats are, since circles have no corners. Not in this dimension, anyway. While this was going on, the other people on the perimeter were supposed to be trying to make eye contact with each other. Once two people achieved that, they had to attempt to run across the circle and switch places. The Kitty’s goal was to usurp one of the switchers and commandeer an empty spot on the circle, causing a new Kitty. The people on the perimeter had no incentive to switch places, but that didn’t seem to matter. I guess the incentive was to try to screw over one of your fellow classmates by causing them to become Kitty. So much for the ensemble unity. This is where the sweating and injury came in. Cinderblock walls surrounded three quarters of the circle. In order to get to the opposite open space without crushing my skull, I had to accelerate and decelerate faster than a driver’s ed student on the first day. My metabolism didn’t like that very much, so I began to drip. My knee didn’t like that very much either, so I began to think, in between the intense pulses of pain surging underneath my knee cap, about having reconstructive surgery . My pain was eased when I later learned that StivOO twisted his ankle. What a dork. Old people shouldn’t play improv games. I never had to be Kitty, so I guess I won. It helps when you stop switching places halfway through the game because you’ve blacked out from trauma shock. Besides teaching us why cats are retarded, this game got our blood running and facilitated some incidental collisions and fondling, otherwise known as foreplay, further promoting the ensemble unity.

Finally, Jackie stopped the insanity with an endearing, “Game Over.” Before I could go take a shower, Jackie had us splitting up into pairs. I ended up with Ron, otherwise known as Belly Scratch with Tongue Out. He’s a fifty-year-old orchestra leader. Nice guy. StivOO, conveniently, ended up with one of the four women in the class. I’m sure it was coincidental and the fact that she has the body of a professional athlete (soccer player) had nothing to do with it. His partner was Erin, aka Put Your Leg Behind Your Head. This exercise was boring so I won’t get into it too much. It involved intensely examining your partner, turning around, closing your eyes, and turning back around to try to figure out why your partner’s zipper was undone and he was wearing a shoe on his head. I like to think I won that game, too, since I didn’t fall down and I stopped sweating. The fact that it wasn’t a game doesn’t matter. I won.

After a short break, we all took a seat around the room. Since we did such a fine job in the prior exercise, Jackie asked us to pair off again, where your partner was the person sitting next to you. As luck would have it, Erin was sitting next to StivOO. I was also sitting next to StivOO, but I was on the wrong side of him. Erin and StivOO were partners, again, amazingly. I turned to look to my left to find Richard, the ADD, attention-deprived, trust-funded, unemployed spaz sitting next to me. Also known as Point at Yourself. Our task was for one partner to listen while the other partner told her/his life story in five minutes. Then, the listening partner would summarize the life story to the class in one minute. After half the class’s stories were told, we switched and the listener in each pair got to tell his/her life story to the other. I finished recapping my life to Richard about a minute early. It’s not that there isn’t much to tell. I don’t pay attention all the time, so I’m not sure what happened in my life. Consequently, my story was pretty boring. Luckily, Richard lives in his own little world, and the class now thinks I co-starred with Mel Gibson in Braveheart, I’m a champion dart player and I make up two of the six children in my family. Richard was so all over the place with his story to me, it was hard to keep track. I ended up keying my portrayal of him on an incident in high school where he quit the wrestling team because a teammate was leering at his tallywacker in the shower. After living through that, I’m guessing anything else that happens to him is trivial. And then there was StivOO and Erin. Oh, they are both so cute and successful. They had a grand ole time relaying each other’s stories. It made me sick. Physically sick. I had to re-swallow some puke, I tell ya. Of course, StivOO brought up Marty, which brought about some interest from the class. However, there were only about three or four people in the class that were familiar with him. And it turns out Erin is the granddaughter of hall of fame baseball player, Red Schoendienst. Relatives of famous people, isn’t that cute? But the worst part was that StivOO had the numbskullity to tell Erin that he and I are friends and that I am the funniest person he knows. And, she remembered to tell this to the class. Thanks a lot, StivOO. Nothing like setting everybody’s expectations of me super high so they can scorn me when all I got is poo comments when we get to the improv stuff. I would have run right out of there if my knee hadn’t been swollen to the size of rutabega. Besides ruining my improv career, the point of that exercise, as far as I could tell, was to give a chance for people to brag about themselves through a proxy. I tried to brag, but my fireman coloring trophy in kindergarten didn’t seem to stand up to the Iron Man triathelete chemical engineer with an MBA, or the woman with five thousand college degrees writing a mystery novel, or the computer wizard dude who designed his own coding language when he was twelve and whose hobby is to use one hundred dollar bills as post it notes.

Jackie finally dismissed us. I put my head down and limped out. On the way back to my car, the spirit of John Candy appeared in front of me and said, “You should have gone with the One Handed Cartwheel instead of that weird bowling move.” It wasn’t a bowling move, John Candy, Mr. Dead Smarty Pants! This is going to be a long eight weeks.