Ever notice how it's the little things in life that amuse us so much? More to the point, ever notice how it's the silly little idiocies in life that amuse us more than anything else? Well, this is not as much ''the little blog that could'' as it is ''the blog that enjoys going up the down escalator in your local mall.'' Will it have anything of real importance? No, probably not. But enjoy the ride never the less!

 

November is National Novel Writing Month, where aspiring writers try to crank out 50,000 words over the course of the month. With all of my current attempts to siphon my ongoing writing projects down to a meager one or two, combined with the usual frenetic activity that comes with pretending like I know how to run a retail kiosk, I sadly doubt I'll be participating. But that doesn't mean I can't recommend this project to anyone else reading this little bit of nowhere.

If you like to write, or want a challenge for the artistic side of your brain, check out the Link of the Day: http://www.nanowrimo.org/

But if I learn you've been using this as an excuse to write that epic Cthulhu/Harry Potter/Indiana Jones crossover (complete with lurid sex scenes involving a Deep One, Snape and a bunch of Nazis), I'm afraid I'm going to have to bludgeon you with a rabid weasel.


posted by Phillip at 9:05 PM

 

November is National Novel Writing Month, where aspiring writers try to crank out 50,000 words over the course of the month. With all of my current attempts to siphon my ongoing writing projects down to a meager one or two, combined with the usual frenetic activity that comes with pretending like I know how to run a retail kiosk, I sadly doubt I'll be participating. But that doesn't mean I can't recommend this project to anyone else reading this little bit of nowhere.

If you like to write, or want a challenge for the artistic side of your brain, check out the Link of the Day: http://www.nanowrimo.org/

But if I learn you've been using this as an excuse to write that epic Cthulhu/Harry Potter/Indiana Jones crossover (complete with lurid sex scenes involving a Deep One, Snape and a bunch of Nazis), I'm afraid I'm going to have to bludgeon you with a rabid weasel.


posted by Phillip at 8:37 PM

 

As few days ago, I watched a most amusing commercial for some kind of large super-sized truck complete with all the fancy schmancy extra features: fold-back rear seats, cup holders, A/C, and those small TV you can watch porn on while you're driving. Now what happened in this commercial was that in the faraway distance, a volcano erupted. Seconds later, debris starts raining down in the foreground. Amidst that debris sudden drops said truck, which is now covered in ash. After giving the ol' shocks a good what-for, the truck casually starts up and drives off, leaving the happy volcano behind to fire hot molten lava all over the local towns.

Now I know what you're thinking: if the term "putting on the Ritz" was interpreted literally, does that mean for a night on the town, some guys take Ritz crackers and wear them like a tuxedo? For that matter, would those Cheese Ritz-Bits be the best kind, since the cheese filling will make for a good adhesive to the skin? And once they've covered themselves in the Ritz, would problems arise once they went outside and the pigeons came after them?

The world may never know.

If you're not thinking that, then you're probably asking, "What's so amusing about that commercial thing?" Well, the commercial unto itself didn't amuse me. But the disclaimer appearing in it did; you need the volcanic context first. I cannot help but wonder just what kind of idiot it took for them to insert Warning: dropping trucks is safe only in commercials.

Are they fearful that after seeing this commercial, some soon-to-be Darwin Award nominee would sit up and say, "Hey! That looked so cool! Let's take Grandpa's truck, drive it into an active volcano and see how far it spits us out when it finally erupts! And on the way, we'll smear ourselves with Ritz-bits!"

Are we doomed to soon see a new disclaimer being added into "The Wizard of Oz" movie that reads Warning: dropping houses on witches is safe only in movies? And if this continues, we might yet see a disclaimer being plastered all over the Lupin III series telling us Warning: not obeying the laws of physics is safe only in Anime. It might reach newfound heights as they scream at us on CDs Warning: letting the piano drink is safe only in Tom Waits songs! And what about the Swedish chainsaws that already have the label Warning: do not attempt to stop chainsaw with hand or genitals?

In the end, I don't think it's the disclaimers themselves that worry me. It's the idiots who inspire them.

Today's Warning: ranting about silly, nonsensical things is safe only in blogs.


posted by Phillip at 6:50 AM

 

Baby Gabriel now has eyebrows. Or at least the beginning of eyebrows, which is an improvement on his inherent and total lack of eyebrows when Mel & I last saw him.

In other news, the new seasonal kiosk in the mall has finally arrived. Instead of us selling debatably kitch/filler presents, we are now presenting onlookers with a wide variey of scarves, mittens and hats that resemble a bunch of skinned Muppets. Well...in all honesty, we only have half a kiosk selling Muppet-skin winterwear. We're still waiting for the rest our merchandise to arrive, so the other half of the kiosk is pleasantly void of anything.

And what, might you ask, would make my pleasure in this new kiosk complete? My answer is simple: the curtain and its track, a jerry can of gasoline, a match, five minutes and an alibi. Now I don't want to gripe. Far be it from me to sound like I'm whining, but I always thought that when they put together these kiosks, they would...you know....actually assemble it correctly. But it appears we have that special "not allowed to play with edged paper" sort of kiosk. In short, there are parts of the track not connected to the kiosk frame, the curtain won't line up with the border of the kiosk, there's a screwhead in the track preventing any part of the curtain from moving past it, and there are gaps in the track large enough for the curtain rollers to actually fall through.

I suppose I should be thankful, though: from the sounds of it, the same guy who put our kiosk together also tried to assemble another one in a different mall. And that kiosk was not only put in crooked, but also put in the completely wrong place.


Today's Lesson: prioritize. Put together a kiosk, and then get drunk. While doing it in the reverse order will make things interesting, it will also make employees homocidal.



posted by Phillip at 9:22 PM

 

For some reason, when I woke up this morning, the entire right side of my ass was uncomfortably sore. While I can attribute it to having endured somewhat cramped sleeping quarters last night (thank you Shady for taking up more of the bed than I'd think possible for a small dog), I am still bemused at how it's only the right side that's suffering. No full ass, no left-and-right. My pain is only half-assed.

As a result, I feel asymmetrical somehow. My ass has become lopsided. Whenever I clench my buttocks (ah, revel in the visuals! Or reel, whatever works for you.), the one side feels as if it's been tenderized the way a punching bag must feel after a boxer's had a go at it for ten minutes. It will probably take a day or two for the right side of my ass to heal.

In the meantime, though, I say to the masses born of the Age of Enlightenment and Reason: why can't science have it's useless avenues like everything else? I want to know about the effects of country music on suicide, and whether the 5-second rule is truly sanitary, and that herrings apparently communicate by farting!

And you can too, now: http://www.improb.com/ig/ig-top.html

Today's Lesson: pigeons will be instinctively attracted to any statue--except for a bronze statue located in Kanazawa, Japan.




posted by Phillip at 8:23 AM

 

A few nights ago, the gaggle of us poor sots spending our working hours trapped in a store filled with heavier-than-thou luggage, recently messed-up (again) winterwear and "oh dear god who thought that shade of regurgitated lima bean green looked good?!" purses, decided to commiserate by going out for a night of bowling. In light of that night, Today's lesson might as well be: 5-pin bowling is harder than it looks. I could be technical and say that the 5-pin bowling balls are overall lighter, and so they gain more of a side-spin when you launch them. Or I could be honest and saw my piffly arms have no real muscle mass on them, and by the second 10-frame game, my poor biceps had all the power of soggy ravioli.

Speaking of playing with balls, courtesy of Pesti-chan, the Word of the Day is: Innuendo! (That, or else "double entendre", deliberate or otherwise.)

http://rainbow.arch.scriptmania.com/rainbow_tv_episode.html

Anyhoo, back to the bowling, it was a truly a time of comraderie. Unless you count the first game, where I decisively beat the pants off of everyone else. And unless you also count the second game, where everyone else decisively beat the pants off me in what became known as the "I don't care who wins, someone just beat the pants off Phil!" game, where I got the worst score of the gaggle. Again, refer two paragraphs up to my soggy ravioli-biceps. (Mel won game 2, incidentally.)

You know, in light of the Rainbow TV link and the word of the day, perhaps I should rephrase the whole "beating their pants off" thing. Naaaaah....

And remember: just like Rainbow TV says, it's fun to bang away all night with your friends, just so long as you don't break their plucking instruments.


posted by Phillip at 7:06 AM

 

Some days you don't have a lot to write about. Some days you're just too tired to write. Some days you're just too tired to even care. And some days, you're not exactly sure whether or not people want to hear about how little baby Gabriel seems to have this uncontrollable urge to fart incessantly whenever he's in my arms. Sure, one time be balanced it out by sneezing all over me, but it's a little disturbing to see him burbling away in either Mel or Donna's arms, and then the second he gets handed to me, he makes a noise that I can only hope is flatulence. And it's constant at that, a nigh-incessant barrage of rude noises I could never get away with making in public. Then again, I'm not small, wrinkly and in need of a diaper changing every few hours.

In other news, provided we're allowed to and my co-workers finance the venture, I'm going to be dressing up at work on Halloween as 70's Elton John, complete with the large shades and extreme suits.

And I think that should I ever start a production company, I'm going to name it OMGWTFBBQ Productions. If anything it would be amusing to be interviewed and have someone ask me what that means...especially if it's for television. Get out the censor, it's time for a bleeping!

Today's Lesson: a hiatus can sometimes be a good thing, so long as you're still energetic about going back to whatever it was you were doing beforehand.


posted by Phillip at 5:38 PM

 

If that's even a word, and if it's not, it'll do. This is the English language after all, and people are getting away with creating new and hybrid words that creep their way into the common vocabulary with each passing day. But yes, to summarize: one more step of Mel's immigration process is done. The processing centre in Buffalo finally sent us a form stating that yes, they received her file and will be going through it sooner or later (alas, the odds favour later). In essence, the last step will really be them telling us that, yes, Mel's immigration has been completed and she gets her landed status. In the meantime, we can check on their website to see how the progress is coming along with her snazzy (see, that's a new word to have infiltrated our vocabulary, even though it sounds like someone trying to describe Prince while sneezing) new file number.

In other news, Shady seems to still be protesting about last night's bath (even though she earned it by rolling in a large dirt pile during her evening walk), and Mel thoroughly trounced me in Monopoly. Again. It wouldn't have been so bad if she didn't always land on Free Parking and get ridiculously large amounts of cash on top of her already large pile of money.

Today's Lesson: wet dogs in the bathtub can move surprisingly faster than you think. (And when they escape they leave a lot of water on the floor to be mopped up.)


posted by Phillip at 7:34 AM

 

It has just come to my attention that next week's episode of CSI: New York will involve nyotaimori. Is this a case of art imitating fanservice imitating life? Perhaps, perhaps not. All I do know is that chances are very good if any girl is shown with her otherwise naked body adorned with elegant displays of sushi, she's probably going to be wearing a lot of sushi...or else there's going to be a lot of strategically-placed ohashi.

Though this does annoy me somewhat; I've been fighting for a year now to have the producers pick up my concepts of CSI: Nerima District or CSI: Crystal Tokyo, but for some reason I've been denied. True genius is never appreciated in it's own time.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go preen my ego.

Today's Lesson: nothing can mangle an otherwise perfectly good 8-hour sleep like a Shih-tzu taking up as much of the bed as she can (that being at least half of it).


posted by Phillip at 7:56 AM

 

Last night, I was going back through some random writing notes I've been making and then stashing away like a chipmunk, and I stumbled across some remarks meant for this little bit of nowhere. They actually date back to the time Mel & I recently spent in Connecticut, enjoying a wedding of one of her cousins, and then really enjoying the open bar they had all night during the receiption.

Oddly enough, what struck me the most wasn't the stretched white Hummer limo the wedding party had (or the inherent lack of anything to eat or drink the Hummer limo had), or the not-so-sublte biblical references to how the wife must submit to her husband (presented in a fashion that sounded almost as if suffrage had yet to exist), or even how the incredibly long candles at our table were the only candles to melt and leave large bits of broken wax all over our tablecloth (which unto itself was an impressive feat considering they were supposed to be dripless candles). No, in the end it the was the name of the church that struck me as vastly amusing. As we pulled up to the church a short time before the wedding ceremony was to begin, there was a large sign boldly proclaiming an "Evangelical Free Church".

This suddenly had me wondering just what "Free" meant. Was this church "free", like how a building might be "termite free" or "accident free for 10 days"? Did they finally manage to contract a denominational exterminator and get rid of those pesky Evangelicals skittering around the pews?

Or perhaps Evangelicals are free here, like that toy you find in a Happy Meal. Does this subsequently mean that you get 1 free Evangelical to take home with you after every sermon? For that matter, do you get to choose the Evangelical, or do they get randomly stuffed in bags and handed to you, so you get surprised after you've pulled out of the church parking lot?

Or perhaps this is the church that broke off from its mother church: the "Evangelical Pay Church."

So what is the meaning behind the "free"? The world may never know....


Today's Lesson: it is counter-productive to try and write comfortably while sitting on a broken swivel chair. (First the rice steamer, now this...)




posted by Phillip at 7:48 AM

 

The apartment is suddenly a lot larger and a lot quieter than it had been not so long ago. This past Sunday marked the last day my Dad was not only crashing in the apartment (as he really had no other place to go while he was trying to work things out with my mother), but also the last day he'd be living around here at all. After many attempts that all subsequently failed, he's decided to turn and walk away from it all. He's going to be staying with his brother for a few days, and then they're going to move his stuff out to Nova Scotia, where he'll stay with my grandparents.

I personally can't call what he's doing 'running away.' When you're left with virtually no other options left and nowhere else to go, courtesy of the other party involved, you're not running. In all honesty, I think my mother didn't actually believe he would leave, and thusly she kept jerking him around with the wild hope that they might actually be able to resolve their problems--all so she could keep him on a proverbial short leash and get him to do whatever odd jobs she wanted him to do. Resolutions can't be made when someone isn't listening yo a word being said, or holding the search for a resolution as a high priority on her list.

All in all, I feel strangely relieved that this has happened. I deplore the circumstances that have led to this, and I doubt that all will be forgiven as time goes on. I can only hope for the best for my Dad, wish him the best of luck in Nova Scotia as he tries to create a new life for himself, and keep in contact with him through calls and letters as much as I can. At least now he's not being trapped in a limbo state, no sure if he should stay or go, uncertain if things will work out. The distance will be unpleasant, to say the least, but it's a distance that's needed between the two of them right now. Maybe it'll help dislodge my mother's head out of her ass. I wish I could remain optimistic as I make such a caustic remark as that, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

Life still goes on despite all of this. My Dad's picking up the pieces of his life, with the support of pretty much everyone else he knows, including my sister and I. Mel & I suddenly are alone in our apartment again, and while if he ever needed the crash space my Dad could stay without qualms or concerns, it's good to have the freedom and quiet again.

Today's Lesson: when a loud "bzzzt!" suddenly is heard from your rice steamer, it probably means in all likelihood that your steamer has committed ritual suicide. (As what happened with ours.)


posted by Phillip at 7:27 AM

 

About two nights ago, Alice Cooper performed in Kitchener. Yesterday, he was roaming around the mall I worked at...and I missed him, dammit! At the very least, misery likes/revels in company, and there was good company to be had. All three of us working at the store yesterday were Alice Cooper fans--my manager grew up to his songs, I was raised on them courtesy of my Dad, and my co-worker's a rabid Cooper fan to begin with. And a good friend of mine, also a Cooper fan, happened to stop by.

Our mission was simple: find Alice Cooper. I'm not entirely sure what we'd have done with him when we found him, but we were determined to track him down nevertheless. I'd have probably gotten a CD autographed for my Dad. John would have managed to have a very long and engaging conversation with him, I hold little doubt. Chances are I'd also have had to give Alice a warning that he had a roughly 5-second headstart before my manager and co-worker both jumped on him. Yet despite the crusading search parties to find him, alas, there was no Alice Cooper to be found. I guess he'd either just left the mall, or else was in a store whenever we walked down that particular corridor.

In the end, my brush with stardom only turned out to being slightly downwind of it. Oh well, at least I didn't get arrested for not having encountered Alice Cooper. There are distinct possibilities that something along those lines might have arisen had I located him. This is Alice Cooper, after all.

Though I should add that this excitement led to some of the most amusing conversations with my co-worker that I've ever had. Being the rabid Cooper fan, she still has this image of Alice being the scary-looking, badboy shock-rocker belting out how he's eighteen and school's out forever, and how the man behind the mask is back. The idea of Alice Cooper just casually hanging around a shopping mall (especially one as dysfunctional as ours) boggled her to no end. Especially when I made the remark about how Alice Cooper was apparently in Hallmark, buying 'thank-you' cards for staff at the auditorium where he'd performed.

"Alice Cooper writes 'Thank-You' Cards?!" she exclaimed. "He can't do that! He's the Coop! He's not supposed to be so nice. He's not allowed to write 'Thank-You' cards...is he?"

Ah, truly a priceless moment. Then again, this is also the woman who then remarked about two hours later, "You know what? John Cleese has really big teeth."

Today's Lesson: sometimes when the work isn't great, it's the workers trapped there with you who make it enjoyable.


posted by Phillip at 5:42 AM