rosemontBrent's Xanga

Friday, March 17, 2006

Fri, 17 Mar 2006 00:39:16 GMT

To My Cell Phone

(This is a log I wrote to my old cell phone, back when it was being held together with a rubber band and my clenched fist.)

You are a stupid piece of crap. You’ve let me down so many times, on so many levels. You are the most annoying, unreliable, cowardly jerk ass little bitch I’ve ever known. Pick up your shit and get out.

I doubt the people of Ericsson would be very proud of what you’ve become, how you’ve chosen to live your life. If they could see you now. One fucking bar. Oh wait, now there’s two, but just for a moment. Now there’s one again. How the hell do you do that, go in and out of reception while you’re just sitting there? It makes me so pissed to think about it, I give up.

I am the only person who has ever believed in you, ever. Who else do you have, huh? Who else hasn’t given up on you like I should have a long time ago? How many second chances have I given you? And you’ve squandered them away. You and your little tart battery.

I stick up for you, man. I put my ass on the line in front of everybody, time and again. I tell them, “No, my cell phone’s just fine for me. Works alright most the time. Yep, just something to get the job done.” All lies.

Look, I don’t need any fancy flip thing with a camera and three pivoting blades. I just need something to tell me who’s calling and a mute button to reject them. But good-God if you don’t make that difficult. My voicemail gets everything because you roam more than the Goddam’ buffalo.

I knew you were a cheap phone when I got you free with the service plan, so I wasn’t expecting miracles. But they failed to mention that you were a two-bit dirty old harlot with free nights and weekends. Actually, you’re free anytime. If I can’t call or receive calls, then I’m saving a ton of minutes that I already goddamned paid for! You’re a badly painted whore.

You do have character, though. I’ll give you that. You have what they call personality- little quirks that make you unique. Like when you continue to notify me that I have a new message in my voicemail long after I have listened to it and erased it. Or how, sometimes, when I have a message waiting you will unlock yourself and I will accidentally call my voicemail and leave a 2 minute long recording of whatever is going on in my pants pocket. Yeah, you’re a real fucking character.

One more thing. Being black and white does not make you nostalgic, or artsy. It makes you look like an ass, and it makes me look cheap. Not like my car isn’t doing a good job at that already. I’ll get to that in a second; right now I’m talking about you.

I guess you might be wondering why I haven’t just gotten a new phone. Well I’m not going to stop loving you, not that easy. I still think we can make it last, girl.

I remember the first day we met, at the AT&T Wireless store. You remember that? Before Cingular took over? It was AT&T back then, and it was you&me forever after that.

What happened to us? We thought we could take on the world. But I guess time has a way of changing network reliability.

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

Wed, 06 Jul 2005 21:45:44 GMT

I've really been a busy Little B these days, so I don't have an article to post, but I do have a webshots community page of pictures I took on my new digital camera.

Enjoy responsibly.

http://community.webshots.com/user/rosemontbrent

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Wed, 23 Mar 2005 21:30:37 GMT

Which Brent Are You Talking To?

Here is a song I made up called "Which Brent Are You Taking To?" My dream is for Big Brent and I to make beautiful music of this- just the two of us with acustic guitars, like Tenacious D or something. We will play it at Open Mic Nights or at parties upon female request. I have no musical accompaniment as of yet, but here is how it will go:

(Some sweet, catchy guitar lick…)

(Spoken) The other night I was making love to a woman. She’s a freshman. I’ll point her out if I see her. Anyways, um, everything was going pretty good, naturally. I’m Lil B, you know. But then all of a sudden she screamed out my name. Right in the middle of it. I had to stop. It totally killed the mood. I was like, “Who did you mean, right then?” She didn’t understand. I was like, “Well, were you referring to me, or him?” and I looked over her shoulder at Big B. “Oh,” she said. “I totally forgot he was even back there! But keep going, anyways, both of you.”

Chorus:

I’ve got a joke that will never get old

A never-ending fountain of comedy gold.

I live with a guy with the same name as me

My name is Brent, and this is Brent, my roomie.

Which Brent are you talking to?

Which Brent, is it me or you?

Which Brent re you talking too-oo-woo?.

(Guitar kicks in harder, then slows down for spoken part.)

(Spoken) Hello? Yes, this is he. …Wait, who is this? My grandma? … That’s funny, because both of my grandmas are dead. …Oh, don’t get upset. …I know! You must mean Brent Hanson, we are both named Brent. Gosh, sorry. Hold on a sec, I’ll go get him.

Chorus:

I’ve got a joke that will never get old

A never-ending fountain of comedy gold.

I live with a guy with the same name as me

My name is Brent, and this is Brent, my roomie.

Which Brent are you talking to?

Which Brent, is it me or you?

Which Brent re you talking too-oo-woo?.

(Spoken) Humm. Well, I’ve never been to Spain, Rachel, but I’ll give it a shot. I think if I had been there I would have gotten around the city on the Metro. It’s a public transportation system in Madrid that everybody uses, I’m guessing. You know, Big B was actually there all last semester- OH! You must have been directing your question at him. Sorry. You just said Brent. I should have known by the context of the question…

Which Brent are you talking to?

Which Brent, is it me or you?

Which Brent are you talking to-oo-woo!

I play a super tight solo.

(Spoken)

Lil B: Did you hear what he said right before he went under?

Big B: Yeah. “Help. Help me, Brent. My God, Help.” Then he kinda made some gurgling sounds.

Lil B: Yeah, that’s what I heard too.

Big B: So… was he looking at you… or, me.

Lil B: I dunno. He was splashing a lot. Couldn’t really tell.

Big B: Yeah.

Lil B: Well. He probably was referring to you, because you’ve been friends longer.

Big B: Yeah, but you’re a way better swimmer.

Lil B: True.

Big B: Ummm. We can flip for it.

Lil B: Sure. I have a nickel.

Big B: No, hold up. I think I have a quarter…. Nope. It’s a nickel too.

Lil B: Heh. Nice.

Big B: Okay, so call it in the air.

Lil B: Heads.

Big B: No. It’s tails.

Lil B: So, does that mean you go save him, or me?

Big B: Haha. I don’t know. Okay, heads you save him, tails I do.

Lil B: Sounds good.

Big B: …. Okay… tails.

Lil B: Yes!

Big B: So… we aren’t doing two out of three?

Lil B: Fine. Whatever.

Big B: Let’s use my nickel.

(Repeat 3 X)

Which Brent are you talking to?

Which Brent, is it me or you?

Which Brent are you talking to-oo-woo?

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Wed, 23 Mar 2005 21:01:49 GMT

Vegas Episode III:

“Tell us again, Pa.

Tell us about the time you won your fortune in Vegas.”

So there I was… Just cashed out from a long night of roulette, a wad of hundreds in my pocket, ready to call it a morning, just take my loot and walk away a big winner. When all of a sudden, Bryan gets a hankering for the craps tables. Now I’m not one to argue with intuition. When the craps tables call, there’s no use avoiding ‘em, you’d better answer the call. It’s the same sort of feeling you get when you realize you’re about the throw up and you’ve been given a short window of opportunity to make it someplace more bleachable, so you’d better get there quick, and put it “all in!”

So we head over to shoot some craps. Neither of us have any idea how to play, and I’m just aware of things enough to realize I’m too drunk to be smart and walk away while I’m ahead.

Bryan and I started watching the pretty chips dance about the pit. The dice shimmered and flashed like red fireflies embracing and chasing each other on their way to the gala masquerade. It was all so magical in the craps pit. We knew we had to be a part of the wonder, no matter our innocence of this fanciful place. The craps shooters guarded their secrets from us because we were outsiders, mischievous boys who had stumbled upon a thicket-spring hidden somewhere deep in the casino forest. We did not belong, so we hid behind the wall of the field of play and watched the daydream unfold in front of us.

When it was my turn to throw the dice I gave myself away to the regulars. I threw overhand and leaned into it so that the dice ricochet off the table and flew out of the pit and everyone was embarrassed for me or annoyed by me except Bryan, who could appreciate such a thing.

About that time Bryan thought he had discovered a pattern to the movement of chips and dice. He advised me to put a hundred dollar bill on the Do Not Pass Bar section of the table and I did as I was told because I was drunk, and that means I do whatever I'm told by my peers regardless of the consequences. A few moments later the money was taken away. Craps? More like… Shits. We were out of our league, and a long way from home.

Things were different back at the roulette table, that’s for sure. Roulette is such a great name- so much better than craps, just by the sound of it, I guess. I think when I grow up I’ll name one of my many daughters Roulette, or maybe nickname her Black Two, or Double Zero. If I have a really ugly daughter I’ll name her Paigow, because hey, that’s paigow.*

Looking back, those few hours of playing roulette in Vegas were probably the best I’m ever going to have in my life, especially considering the fact that in a matter of months I won’t ever be able to say, “At least I don’t have an English degree.”

Ahh, but life at the roulette table was sweet. Drinks were free and served from a tray just inches away from the bosom of a hot waitress. There was a beautiful girl at the table named Aphrodite who looked like she really could have been in the Adventures of Hurcules starring Kevin Sorbo, and although Ash and Lins** were from Texas, they were actually attractive and unarmed.

I was a rich man then. Rich with money, rich with booze, rich with friends and also booze. God, that free booze was great. If I could only go back there, just think! It breaks my heart every time I realize that I’m sitting in class, not in Vegas, and the drink girl wont be around for a long, long time, if ever at all.

But we were at the craps table now, and something had to be done to win my money back. I watched the action on the table a little while longer, and once I got the feeling I put another hundred on Do Not Pass. This was the type of feeling you get after you’ve thrown up and you think, what an awful taste in my mouth, I better wash this down with some more booze! And what do you know, the dice came up snake eyes, which pays out double, so I grabbed the money and fled before the game could seduce me again.

Before I knew it I was back in the hotel room performing the first ever Lil B Money Dance, which I will try to recreate some time at an XC dance party, or maybe if I win the lottery or make it with “Lins” Lohan.

* Paigow is the term used when you have no face cards in your hand and you will likely lose.

** We called them Ash and Lins instead of the more formal Ashley and Lindsay because that’s just how things were at the roulette table, intimate, yet casual and …sensuous.

Tuesday, March 01, 2005

Tue, 01 Mar 2005 06:37:12 GMT

Vegas Part II: The House Strikes Back

“To the Luxor, Please.”

After David and Bryan left for the hotel room, the rest of us went back to the paigow poker table with Buzz, the dealer, whose wife was of ill repute, and could often be aptly compared to some of our poker hands; “Put the gentlemen on top, sir, that’s what she’d do-- Exact-a-mundo!”

David called my cell not too long after another round of drinks and said he required assistance with Bryan, who had been wheelchaired at the Excalibur and was making a mess of himself again. I cashed out and went outside for a cab. I got in the back of the car and said, and I quote, “To the Luxor, please!” Our room was at the Excalibur, of course, but it sounded like a good idea at the time. I was up.

I’m not sure how I got to the third floor of the Luxor, because usually there’s a security guard that checks to see if you have a room key to keep people like myself out, but possibly my drunken flighty eyes were so convincing that he let me up for the pure love of misadventure. I remember at one point I walked into the back of a kitchen and went down some hallways that looked like a hospital and ended up in a large banquet room with a bunch of very surprised maids. These must be the ones cleaning up after Bryan, I thought.

I wandered about the halls and thought it was odd that there were no hotel rooms to be found. Then David called again, and I asked him if our room was on the third floor. It was, so I knew I was on the right track. I walked in and out of rooms, closets, and stairwells, and went by those maids half a dozen times but found nothing but suspicious faces, incredulous looks, and a good discrete pee corner.

Then some synapse in my brain sobered up enough to put it all together: the absence of hotel rooms, the Egyptian art, the directions I had given to the cab driver… I realized that I was at the Luxor and David was at the Excalibur, and that I had had a good night.

I think you have to take a tram to get from the Luxor to the Excalibur, so I must have gone on that. One thing I do remember is the moving sidewalks. It was somewhere near 5 in the morning and nobody was running around from hotel to hotel like I was, so the moving sidewalks were completely devoid of traffic to slow me down. Running across those moving sidewalks all liquored up and on a mission, the world flying by me as I effortlessly ran the fastest sixty yards of my life must have been the closest I will ever come to PCP or time travel. It is one of the hidden treasures of Las Vegas.

Once I got to the Excalibur, the struggle wasn’t over. Our room was in Tower II, the tower you can’t find if you’re distracted by flashing or spinning things, or running at full speed concentrating on not spilling your “brownsies” ($1 chips). The only way I ever found David and Tower II was by asking some hotel workers and maids if they had seen “a guy, looks kinda like me, really drunk, in a wheelchair…”

“Si, Si. Ive seen your fren,’” they would say, and in broken Spanish try to explain which direction the wheelchair had gone and the sympathy (“lastima”) they felt for the poor “joven.”

Finally I found David outside the elevators. He told me the room number, but the hell if I’m going to remember that, not this close to solving this puzzle. Once on the third floor I walked around looking for the right room. I decided I would just pick the room that felt right and try it. I picked the one where the door was slightly ajar, pushed it open and went in. The room was completely dark but there was water running in the bathroom. I knocked on the bathroom door and asked if Bryan was in there. There was a muffled response that I took as an affirmative. Great, he must be perfectly fine. He’s with the water now, at least.

It was time for our little detective to get some shut eye, the case of the runaway wheelchair wrapped up nicely. The four girls occupied all the beds, so I went over to the corner near the air conditioner, curled up and went to sleep on the floor. The next thing I remember is waking up face to face with Big Brent.

…

The girls were up and at ‘em at 10:00 that morning, turning on what must have been ever single light in that whole hotel room, and oh, did they ever talk! I really don’t like being awake during the phase when my drunk turns into my hangover. I get ornery.

I went back to sleep eventually, and then when we all woke up I made vodka and Red Bulls for everyone, which we called “stiffies.” Then I would say something like, “Hey, David, did I give you a stiffy?” Or, “I woke up with a huge stiffy in my hand!” It was hilarious, trust me.

Next we got ready to go out, spilt booze all over some girls luggage, threw BBQ cheddar cheese-its all over the room, and listened to the Vonage commercial, which became our battle cry that night: “Whoo woo! Woo woo Woo!”

We got lunch at the food court and went on Dennis’ long, sobering march to the Venetian. The low point of the whole trip came when Bryan and I were walking behind some mom pulling a suitcase up the strip with her teenage daughter. Bryan commented that it was a large bag she was pulling, and the lady turned around, gave him a dirty look and pulled her daughter close.

Things looked grim, but the night was far from over. Stay tuned for the final installment in the series…

Wednesday, February 09, 2005

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 05:49:51 GMT

Hey, we all went to Vegas this last weekend!

This is the story of how two separate casinos restrained Bryan to a wheelchair Friday night.

If horseracing is the sport of kings, then paigow poker is the sport of someone who intends to get hammered. The thing about paigow that’s so appealing to drunks is that you can have a designated card player. You can ask the dealer what he would do with your hand, or you can ask someone else at the table you trust, or any pit boss with a seventeen year old daughter, Dennis.

Us guys, we asked Bryan, who had played before. That is, until Bryan started playing illegal hands and cursing out the dealer. That’s when I started asking the drink waitress what she would do with my hand, and about the time she started demanding eighty dollar tips. Hay-yo!

So we had all been playing paigow and soaking up complementary drinks until it got to be about five or so in the morning. I’m a little sketchy about the next sequence of events due to how “up” I was. But I remember coming back from the bathroom and a few of us were gone from the table. We all cashed out and then went outside to the driveway where the taxis are. Bryan was sitting on a bench hunched over with about five garbage bags in his hand, unresponsive, abusive.

David and Casey were trying to negotiate with the taxi drivers get a cab to take Bryan back to the Excalibur. Apparently he had required a wheelchair to make it outside, so there was no way he could walk back to our room a few blocks away. For the taxi drivers, Bryan was not exactly house odds.

Eventually we got a driver to agree to sixty dollars for the trip that was probably not even a mile long. Bryan and David left in the cab. The rest of us went back to the tables because there was still some moonlight left.

But unbeknownst to us, Bryan was puking and getting wheelchaired at the Excalibur. David would need the help of a plucky little B to get Bryan up to the room, but would help come in time?.....

Stay tuned for more in the series! I gotta go.

Friday, January 14, 2005

Fri, 14 Jan 2005 02:44:38 GMT

Achem! achem. I think I got the lipoma, Pop.

Last week I went to the doctor to have them look at my bumps. I got bumps, you know. But don’t worry women of the greater Sacramento area. You needn’t rush off to the doctor yourself, because, as I will soon explain, my bumps are non contagious and highly boring.

The father bump is located on my tummy to the right of the proposed site of my abdominal muscles. It looks like there’s something below the skin kinda bulging out, like a little piece of chicken got lost on its way out and is stranded betwixt my intestines and my skin. It’s soft, and if you poke it, it doesn’t hurt. It isn’t ticklish so don’t you even dare, you. It just kinda hangs out on the side of my abdomen, kickin it.

There’s another one, the baby bump, on my left side. For a long time I thought that maybe these bumps were okay because I have them on both sides, except that the right one started getting bigger some time ago. This got me a little concerned because it could be a tumor or cancer or something, and also because there is always the small possibility that these were alien hatchlings waiting to burst through my stomach. In the latter case it would be imperative that I have a trusted friend kill me before they can incubate any further and perhaps take control of my nervous system or force me to breed with human females to further their race. I guess it has advantages and disadvantages.

I’ve always tried to do my own diagnosis and mistreatment for my injuries and illneses. I was once a Bio major, you know. Usually I prescribe letting nature take its course, as in the case of my broken pinky finger, which will be crooked for the rest of my life. When I was in 4^th grade I had a broken arm but hid it for two and a half weeks, thinking it would work itself out. Other times I do my own first aid, like for that poison oak I had a while ago. As a rule I like to underdo it or overdo my medicine so much that there is permanent damage.

For my bumps I had first gone about a passive wait-and-see, might-go-away-if-I-just-avoid-doing-sit-ups approach, but I later changed my treatment to an aggressive, kill-it-with-booze methodology. It is now, I believe, almost certain that alcohol has no known effect on the bumps. But I will continue the research, maybe up the dosage. I’m positive it’s the cure.

So I go to the doctor’s office, and first they have to take my temperature. They have this new thing now that takes your thermometer. The nurse has this instrument that’s pretty much just a small wheel at the end of a stick. She rolls it across your forehead and can tell your temperature in a matter of moments. My mom used to do the same thing to take my temperature, but, you know, with her hand.

So then I go wait on the tall bench with the paper on it, waiting to see the actual doc. I’m kinda surprised they didn’t ask me to drop trough, because it seems like they are always wanting me to do that, even when I come in for something like asthma.

So the doctor comes in, feels up my unnatural curves, steps back, takes off his glasses and looks me in the face. “You got lipoma, kid,” he said, “The most non-cancerous, non-tumorous, hip hopinest growth I’ve ever seen.”

“Sweet. So I’ll just need a few kilos of Medicinal Jane, and I’ll be on my way.”

But the doctor just shook his head no.

Well, as it turns out, lipoma is just “fatty tissue” that for no real reason builds up in some people. Doesn’t hurt, isn’t dangerous, just looks queer. Apparently you can get them removed with minor surgery, but I was like, nope, that’s all I needed to hear. See YA!

But before I ran out of there I started wondering. “It’s fat?! Doctor, there’s got to be some mistake. Maybe it’s some kind of forlorn muscle, or a random finger that’s trying to evolve there. I want a second opinion. Are you sure it couldn’t be an alien fetus? …Or maybe part of my liver just decided to get the hell out while it still has a chance?” But these suggestions were quelled with a slow, deliberate head shaking that lasted well after I turned my back and left.

So I guess the fat got together and decided it stood a better chance against my running by organizing itself and setting up camp below my ribs until the revolution comes and I start turning into my father. Time, I’m sad to say, is on lipoma’s side.

…Unless. No. …Well, I mean, with enough bourbon in me, and this trusty old pocket knife, I could maybe bungle my way through an operation. Then again, giving my ailment a good terminal sounding name like lipoma is bound to earn sympathy with human females. That, or I might get free drinks. I think I’ll keep my bumps around for now just in case. I must be off now, my lipoma’s acting up and I need the good syrup to sooth ails me.

Monday, December 27, 2004

Mon, 27 Dec 2004 19:26:09 GMT

This is an article I was going to write for the Vista, USD’s campus newspaper, but I never got around to finishing. Here it is uncensored and aware of the fact it isn’t really in the Vista. …A true facebooker would never have finished an article by the deadline, but somehow somebody else wrote one that touched on some of the stuff I talk about in the following:

Airplane Glue is my Anti-Facebook

It used to be that if you wanted a good, fun, win-win addiction you were limited to getting hooked on gambling or sex, maybe coke. Well pull your nose up from that glass cutting board, Doper, and stick it into a book. No, no. I know what you’re thinking and I’ve already tried. Although new textbook binding smells great it won’t get you high; turning each page and snorting up and down the crease will take forever to hyperventilate and pass you out, like, five hours give or take. Also, I’m not suggesting you start reading. You’ve got a lot going for ya, and, believe it or not, a lot of people care about you. I’m talking about doing thefacebook.com.

www.thefacebook.com is an inexpensive, disease free high that allows you to post a page about yourself and view the pages of other people in your school and many other schools around the country. Like alcohol it impairs your inhibitions and allows you to become “friends” with people you don’t remember ever meeting. You’ll find your eyes can get just as bloodshot on facebook all night as they can with weed, and ecstasy fiends out there will be happy to know there are plenty of “clubs” to go to. Like heroin, facebook is nearly 100% addictive, so if you don’t like needles or giving hand jobs in alleyways facebook is a good alternative. Playing organized sports or getting a hobby is also okay, but hell, so is making real friends.

The only drawback to facebook is that it has taken all the fun out of stalking. Time was, a guy had to sort through page after page of dead-end Google results or even hunker down behind some shrubs. People these days won’t learn the valuable, time tested skills that generations before them had to learn. They’ll never know stuff like peering, lurking, schedule memorizing, faking looking in both directions when the subject notices you’re staring, stuff like that. With facebook any lazy punker with five minuets and a free hand can get more precious obsession info than weeks of tedious old-school fieldwork could produce. Where’s the fun? Where is the skill, the art, the creepiness? Maybe I’m just a helpless romantic, but I believe the gentleman should have to steal the picture that makes up the centerpiece of his closet shrine.

By the way, you’re going to need to think long and hard about the picture you want on your facebook profile. Personally, I chose a full body shot of myself in a Robin Halloween costume, complete with yellow tights, booze sprayed all over my red shirt, holding a bottle of Andre champagne. This pic is a good one for many reasons, but most of all because it entitles me to join three clubs: “I Think I’m Drunk in my Facebook Pic, But I Don’t Remember,” “The I Love Andre Club,” and “I’d Take a Bullet for Bob Sagat.” Not because I would, but because it’s funny to think about. Not getting shot. Bob Sagat.

Now I’m sure people will tell you horror stories about a bad facebook trip they had one night, but let me tell you, there are advantages to getting messed up in facebook. For starters there’s this thing called “poking.” It feels really good when somebody pokes you on facebook. In real life it hurts your ribs and the morning light floods into your pupils and you’ve got to “move along” like the officer tells you. Brush yourself off and try to piece your life back together.

Also, having someone “request” your friendship gives you a nice little buzz. It works even when the person asking to be your friend is your roommate of two years, some dude you say hi to on campus, or some lonely sap you knew back in high school who has to ask for friends on facebook cause he probably has no friends at Cal Poly, fucking looser. Sure, I’ll confirm that. Ahhhahaha. This shit is great; I have so many friends!

I could tell that I had a problem when I once had an AIM away message explain that I was too busy facebooking to talk online. That’s internet rock bottom. Writing a weblog about how facebook disease- and it is a disease- has negatively affected my relationship with my instant messenger.

I realized that facebook didn’t make me feel good, but that I needed it to keep me from feeling bad. If I logged on and had no “friend requests” waiting, nobody signed my “wall,” and nobody “poked” me, my day was shot all to hell. If I got out of bed at all I thought about my next facebook session constantly and nervously scratched my arms. I desperately wanted to feel good again, to feel the release of the search engine finding someone whose interests happen to also include Chupacabras, the goat sucker.

I needed the escape from reality. Life is hard and full of suffering. The real world is an abandoned circus of dangers and illusions. I walk these lonely streets on the boulevard of broken dreams. I shuffle around campus with my head down and my hands in my pockets, find a seat in the back and wait for it all to be over.

But on facebook, oh, facebook I’m someone else for a brief time. I’m doused in champagne, smiling, confident, with a mask to cover my secret identity. I have a million friends and I’m defined by only the best little tidbits about me: my favorite this, my best that. I’m not a Mr. Hyde or a doppelganger, but a better lil B, if I weren’t so, so… me.

Luckily I have come to realize that facebook is getting in the way of my life, and I’ve started on a twelve step program to quit. This is step number three, the writing of weblogs, telling others my story. Step one was admitting I have a problem. Good thing step two involved airplane glue, otherwise I think I might relapse. Hey, I wonder if there’s an airplane glue club on facebook? I probably got some friend requests by now for sure…. This article can wait.

Tuesday, November 23, 2004

Tue, 23 Nov 2004 07:03:39 GMT

B to the E

I just lived a 48 hour commercial for Budweiser’s new alcoholic energy drink B^e. That’s pronounced B to the E, like B is being multiplied by itself E times, where E can be anything in the set of all real numbers and B represents awesome.

Described by one Bryan Bonelli to “make you really aggressive,” B^e picks up where regular Budweiser leaves off, specifically that typical down time between the hours of 2 and 4 in the morning where so many boozers prematurely cut it off and find a spot on David and Bryan’s floor to make camp for the night. At this point a careful dose of B^e, combined liberally with a “Dymie” (Dyehydrusomething) caffeine pill can give any party just the right slap in the back of the head. Just ask Dennis, who after helping himself to some instant party slapped an alleged “c—k sucker in the back of the head Saturday night. Thank God cooler heads prevailed in the ensuing showdown in the alley. The complete equation might have been B^e + D/F = comma; where D equals the amount of Dymies taken and F is the “base” of food that one has in his system to level out D’s effects. For now I’m not sure what the equation would be, or if there is even one, or if it is just an expression: B to the E plus D divided by F.

I think Ron Artest, Jermaine O’Neal and Steven Jackson probably didn’t have enough F Thursday night.

Tuesday, November 23, 2004

Tue, 23 Nov 2004 06:02:26 GMT

USD Cross Country Dance Party Psychoanalysis

The nature of our relationship to one another is defined almost exclusively by mutual physical exertion, not pain as such, but by the struggle, the sweat, by the body’s war against the mind. When there are no Balboa fruit loops to run, no lats to pull-down, or squats to… squat we crave something physical to occupy the void. Take, for example, moments where we are forced together for long periods of time with nothing to do, like the whirly pool. I often find myself begging somebody, anybody to dump more ice in the water. And why? Because when I have something external to fight, like keeping the ice water lapping up to my balls, I can stop thinking about the fact that we’re all taking a bath together, hiking up our shorts, and breathing on each other’s necks. Imagine the same scene without the river of ice water rushing between our virile legs. Dennis and I call that kind of thing “I got first shower (wink, wink).”

That’s why in my four years on USD cross country I’ve been a leader in the struggle to keep the two vans separate: a girls van and a van that can stick to a radio station all the way through a goddamned song. We have to avoid any situation that might be a catalyst for shaking it fast, watching one’s self, or showing to others what one is working with. Of course, the van comes complete with restraints and harnesses, but when we aren’t working out, the cross country team is a powder keg of potential dance that needs to be smothered by physical activity or buckets of cold water.

Don’t think I’m suggesting we not dance. On the contrary, repressing the dance, bottling it up inside, is probably unhealthy and can lead people to act out in negative ways. Do you think assistant coach Colson dances? Unlikely. Which explains his need to harvest man boobs on my person. Just sayin…

Dear Diary,

I’m Obsessed with Cardinal Cross Country

I’ll admit it: Stanford Cross Country fascinates me. Their homepage is on my favorites list on my browser right below the link to HyundaiOwners.com and above the Dick Grayson fan page.

The first thing I like about Stanford cross country has to be that sexy waif Sara Bei. Now before you say anything, I just want you to know that once she graduates Sara is going to start packing on the pounds just like I will. She will grow a butt, and I will grow a gut, and our spooning will be like fitting together two pieces of a puzzle- they are both thin cardboard, but lumpy and knobby in just the right places to make a perfect fit. Something beautiful can form when two lean bodies start to atrophy and slump, and I intend to reap the benefits until her scale finally reaches the century mark. Sara will get better and more desirable as I grow older, and there are only three other things in the world that will do that: cheese, wine, and high school girls.

The other name on the Stanford site’s roster that is in purple font, not virgin blue like all the rest is Jeane Goff, who, because Sara has apparently come up lame, probably makes it into Ryan Hall’s confessions every week. Unlike Sara Bei, Jeane has the advantage of having nice hips now while I’m young. According to her profile she’s a communications major, but you don’t have to be one of those to tell as much from her body language. Hey-oh!

Then there’s Ryan Hall, who I’ve been told is hot. As a heterosexual male I cannot acknowledge that any other man is hot, like Brad Pitt, or least of all cute, like Seth from the O.C., but I do reserve the right to say that men are ugly (see article on San Diego News anchors). Anyways, if Stanford cross country is anything like USD, the top seniors get all the chicks they want (“priority mating rights,” as I once put it). This would mean that Sara and Ryan make a natural alpha boning pair, except that Hall is ever so gay for Jesus, and pretty boy Garrett Heath probably hogs all the tail.

They are just so damned fast and smart and attractive and pious. And when they poop, which they never do, you find yourself actually trying to sniff it, and then you’re like, why am I breathing through my nose right now, smelling this Stanford poop? But you smell it again anyways, and oh, it hurts that you can’t help but love everything about them.

Just think about Stanford. I mean, they are called the Cardinal, but their mascot and logo is a tree. You would think that a name like Cardinal would naturally mean a bird or a priest, but that’s just Stanford’s style. USD’s mascot, the Torrero, is confusing but only because it is a Spanish word. Our logo gives a clear explanation for anyone wondering what a Torrero is. People look at it and say, oh, it’s a dandy. Not the same with Stanford. Cardinal… tree. Okay, B, I say to myself. You’re not really sure what just happened, but maybe you’re getting a little drunk, so don’t say anything and just pretend that it makes sense. Take a deep breath and slow down a bit; it’s still way early in the evening and you promised yourself Pukey McBarferson wasn’t coming to the party tonight.

But there is no joy in Muddville because yesterday at the NCAA Championships Stanford got rolled up and smoked... like a tree. Hall wasn’t even first on their team, “Nef” was, leading the Cardinal to a sixth place finish. SUCK! Hell, even my 10k P.R. would have been good enough for a spot on the Stanford traveling team, though I’m sure the course was probably harder. But still. Sara Bei doesn’t know that.