Life ain't pretty for a dog-faced boy

A friend from Vegas came up to visit me this weekend. In part so she could escape the heat, and in part to try and cheer me up about things not working out with The Model. We went to breakfast the first morning she was here, and had the following conversation:


Her: I feel like you're a lot more subdued than when you lived in Vegas.

Me: Really? Why do you say that?

Her: I don't know. I just feel like you're an old dog and I'm this annoying little puppy that you just have to kind of tolerate, but at some point you're going to snap and bite me.

Me: Ha ha. Well, if it helps you feel better, I'm in a much better mood than I would be if you hadn't come to visit. Also, I promise I won't bite you.


So there you have it. My blog sucks because I'm a subdued old dog.

I am the boy your mother wanted you to meet, but I am broken and torn with heels at my feet

I'm going to a Deer Tick concert tonight. I usually don't get very excited for shows anymore, but I'm excited to go to this one. I probably won't get home until one or two in the morning, but it'll be worth it. I just hope there are more people in attendance than the last concert I saw at this venue (last time there was a huge snow storm, and only five people showed - I felt bad for the band, but they played anyway).

The other day I told a girl in my lab about it and she asked who I would be going with.

Me: I don't know. I might be going alone, but even if that's the case, I'm still excited.

Her: You never know, you could meet someone there.

Me: That will never ever happen.

Her: That never happens because you never try!

Me: Exactly.

Take it back say it's not what you thought

Last night I stayed at a friend's house. This morning we went to breakfast. When the server brought the bill we each handed her a card and asked her to split the bill down the middle.

Me: I think mine was a little bit more than yours so I probably owe you a dollar or two.

Friend: How about you just don't jizz all over the sheets on my guest bed and we'll call it even.

Me: Uh. It might be too late for that. You should've told me last night if that's what you wanted.

So I grabbed baby girl by the rear end

A couple of Fridays ago I had to call a friend from Vegas to ask him about some things. When I called him, a female friend of ours answered the phone. I recognized her voice right away, and talked to her for a few minutes before she handed the phone to him. He walked outside so he could hear me better, we talked about the things I needed to ask him for several minutes, but eventually he started feeling like he was being rude by talking to me and ignoring her.

Him: I'd better go. [Friend] is sitting at the table all by herself.

Me: Okay. Grab her ass for me when you go back inside. Make sure you tell her it's from me.

Him: Alright. Will do.

Less than a minute later, I got a text.

Her: Why are you grabbing my butt?

Me: It looks so nice I can't help it. Especially in those jeans. It's good to see that he's okay with following orders.

Her: I'm sure he didn't need a lot of convincing.

I can attest to that.

Half a canyon

Yesterday I had the following conversation with a friend:

Friend: It's free to go to national parks this weekend.

Me: Why is that?

Friend: They waived the entrance fees for Martin Luther King Day.

Me: But, that wasn't part of his dream.

Friend: No, it was. They just shot him before he could say it.


That conversation reminded me that I meant to blog about my last trip to a national park, which only lasted for about thirty minutes.

I left my parents' house the day before New Year's Eve to take my kids home after having them for Christmas. We decided on the way up that, weather permitting, we'd take the slightly longer way back to Arizona and stop at the Grand Canyon. I'll let you be the judge if the weather was really cooperating with us. Here are a few pictures of the roads we drove on for the first five hours or so of the trip:









They got slightly better after that, but only for a short time until we got caught in the second wave of the storm system for another hour or so.

We did make it to the Grand Canyon though. When we got there it was freeeeeeeeeeezing (yes, that many Es). It was seventeen degrees, with a heavy wind blowing. The park ranger at the gate acted like we were crazy for trying to visit the park on such a crappy day. I told him we just wanted to go to an overlook real quick, see the canyon, then continue on our way. He said that was good, and to go to the first overlook, because that was the only one we'd be able to see anything from anyway.

He was right. I took this picture a couple hundred yards from the overlook. You can't even see the canyon yet.



My kids are geniuses and only had sweatshirts on, so they were freezing, but I still made them "pose" for this picture:



Obviously not the best picture I've ever taken of them, but it really was too cold for me to feel good about asking them to stand there long enough for me to take a second one. (You know, one without my shadow obscuring their faces, and without wind blowing Tortellini's hair every which way.) Immediately after I snapped that shot they ran to warm up in the gift shop that was nearby, at the base of a watchtower:



I stayed out for a few minutes longer to see if I could take some better pictures.

(I couldn't really.)





(What's so "grand" about it anyway?)

I'm glad we went, even if it was the shortest trip I've ever had to a national park. Next time though, I'm definitely going when it's warmer.

Words can mean nothing to some in this world

Yesterday I met up with some friends at a park to play frisbee golf. Since the park was only a half mile or so from my sister's apartment, I called to see if she was home after we were done. She said she was, and told me to come over. I told her I'd be there shortly.

Meanwhile, my friends were trying to decide if they wanted to go for a bite to eat. As I hung up, one of them said, "Well, it sounds like [Minnow] is setting up a booty call, so I'm guessing he's out. Is that what you were doing? It was, wasn't it?"

I answered, "I hope not. That was my youngest sister."

"Full? Or half?"*

"You're disgusting."









*And you thought I left all my perverted friends behind in Vegas.

This is the mountain, this is the lightning, this is the man pulling on his iron chain

Me: The manager was cute.

Friend: Yeah she was.

Me: She also had a big old wedding ring on her finger.

Friend: She did? I didn't notice that. Too bad for her. She's missing out on all of this. [Motions to self with hands]

Me: Not necessarily. Rings come off.

Friend: She can leave it on for all I care. She didn't get it from me.

He jumped out right after seeing the very sight of me

Me: Hey man, what's new? It's been forever since I last saw you.

Friend: I know. It's been nice.

Me: Tell me about it. Asshole.

This charming man, why pamper life's complexity?

Friend: Why did you buy so many boxes of Girl Scout cookies?

Me: They're not all for me. Some are for [Friend], and some are for [Hot Waitress] since she asked me to get a box for her.

Friend: You actually bought her some?

Me: Of course. How else am I going to get her to love me?

Friend: You could try being witty and charming.

Me: Pfffffft.

Friend: You're right. Better stick with the cookies.

Free like a bird, yet I don't fly much

Friend: Come on, [Husband] and I are ready. Let's go.

Me: I'm not ready to go yet.

Friend: Alright, I see you checking out that girl's cleavage, Dr. Douche.

Me: I'm Dr. Do Whatever I Want.

Friend: So why don't you go over there and talk to her?

Me: Yeah, that's not happening.

Friend: Well, until you do that, you're Dr. Douche.

Go ahead put your red dress on

I'm preparing another manuscript to submit for publication. My Ph D adviser thinks it's close to being ready, but the more I look at it the more problems I seem to find. I tried to address one of those problems yesterday, but the way I did it didn't quite seem to fit right, so I thought I'd ask a friend what he thought about how I should address the issue.

Me: I need your opinion on something.

Him: I'd suggest you try wearing women's clothes for at least a few days before you get yourself snipped.

Hey shorty

Me: At least I think it was her that texted me, I didn't save her number in my phone when she gave it to me.

Friend: Well, do you want me to look it up in my phone? Here, look, is that the number?

Me: Oh no, not her, the other [Girl's Name]. The short blonde girl that's in your class.

Friend: She's not short. She's tall.

Me: Well, she's short compared to me.

Friend: What the fuck? That's it. You are no longer allowed to comment on girls' height. The only thing you can say is that she's tall if she's taller than you.

There's a fat man standing by the soda machine and he knows, he knows, he knows that life can be funny

Friend: Look at that line to go see Santa Claus.

Me: I should go wait to sit on his lap, and when he asks what I want for Christmas, say, "a naughty girl."

Friend: That'd be pretty funny.

Me: Yeah, and you know Santa would laugh. Then, when he's all, "Ho, ho ho." I'd say, "Exactly!"

Grandma take me home

I have a friend who is renovating his house. He's had a contractor doing most of the work(painting, putting in new carpet, new hardwood floor in the living room, etc.), but wanted to do some of the easier things himself. He's replacing all the light switches, outlet boxes, phone and cable jacks, which is all pretty easy to do, just time consuming, so one of my other friends and I went out to help him for a few hours.

Once we got to a good stopping point he suggested we go out to dinner and then he'd show us around the neighborhood. At dinner, my friend asked if there were any hot MILFs in the neighborhood. He said, well, there's a little bar just around the corner that I'm sure would be full of hot MILFs for you. We'll stop by there after dinner.

We walked in, and he said, "Welcome to the MILF bar."

My other friend and I looked around, and there wasn't a single patron under the age of fifty.

I said, "I'm not sure this is a MILF bar. It's more like a GILF bar, because they're all grandmas. But, the 'L' doesn't really apply, because I wouldn't like to."

He replied, "Well then, perhaps we should call it the GIRNF* bar instead."









*GIRNF - Granny I'd Rather Not Fuck

The flowers of naivete buried in a layer of frost

Friend: You're getting on my last nerve, [Minnow]!

Me: That's obvious.

Friend: What? You think just because you passed your dissertation defense that all of a sudden you can just be an asshole?

Me: I've been an asshole as long as you've known me.

Friend: That's not true. When I first met you, you were a naive little fucknut.

Me: And now I'm just a fucknut?

Friend: Exactly!

A date in Constantinople

Friend: We should go see a movie.

Me: Is there anything good playing? I haven't paid much attention lately. The last movie I saw was Inglorious Basterds.

Friend: That movie was awesome.

Me: Yeah, I liked it. I didn't call you when I went because it was a spur of the moment thing, so I went by myself.

Friend: I did the same thing.

Friend's Lab Mate: Last time I went to a movie by myself, some middle eastern guy kept trying to pick up on me.

Friend: Having a middle eastern man try to pick up on me would be a significant upswing in my love life. It would be a self esteem booster because I'd at least feel validated in some perverse sort of way.

It's okay to eat fish 'cause they don't have any feelings

I went out with a friend for all you can eat sushi the other night. Normally he orders everything, but this time he handed me the pencil and menu and told me to do it since I was "all grown up" now. I marked down the rolls that I knew we both like, but then started reading the descriptions for the chef's specials. I read a couple that sounded good to me, and my friend agreed.

Friend: Yeah, those sound good, order one of each of those.

Me: I don't see them on the list.

Friend: Oh, they're not on there. You have to write the specials down at the bottom of the sheet.

Me: Ah, I see. But I have to say, I feel a little dirty ordering a 'man whore' followed by a 'wet dream.'

Friend: Why? Because it's a Thursday night, and you typically only go for that stuff on Fridays?

Your racist friend

Driving in my car with my friend from Texas:

Him: That's a nice house.

Me: I know you just said, "That's a nice house", but with your accent, it sounded like you said, "That's a nice ass."

Him: So?

Me: So we just passed that 13 year old girl who was riding her bike on the other side of the street, pedophile.

Him: I'm no pedophile, racist!

Me: Racist? How does that make me racist?

Him: You're anti-Texan.

Me: Pretty sure Texan isn't a race, dude.

Him: Neither is New Zealander. But that didn't stop that guy from refusing to give Bret and Jemaine their fruit*.








*Even though they did get it in the end.

A bunch of large sized baggies with big white rocks inside

Friend 1: It's like my house.

Me: With invalids sitting around everywhere.

Friend 2: Moaning and wheezing.

Me: Popping prescriptions pills all day.

Friend 2: And doing crack. With an eight ball in both ears.

Me: And one in the butt crack.

Friends 1 and 2: . . .

Me: What? They call it the dirty eight ball.

Friend 1: I can't believe you'd say that.

Me: I can't believe you'd do that.

Black dog beside me

Friend: I drove by the park today and it was packed.

Me: Was there some big event there or something?

Friend: No. Just all kinds of people out enjoying the nice weather and walking their dogs and stuff. I guess I would be too.

Me: If you had a dog. But you don't.

Friend: Two words: Chick magnet.

Me: True. But only for chicks who love dogs. And do you really want one of those? I'm not sure I do.

Friend: But, you've got it all wrong. You don't have to take them home. You just wait for them to bend down to pet your dog, and that's when you put it in.


Maybe it's time to start borrowing my roommate's dog.