I'm big in Japan

Don't ask me how we got on this topic, because I surely don't remember, but a little while ago my friend and I were talking about license plate frames we could make specifically for Japanese Americans.

- I'd rather be watching anime

- I'd rather be eating sushi

- I'd rather be catching Pokemon

- I'd rather be practicing Kenpo

- I'd rather be with my geisha

Three words that became hard to say: I and love and you

You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow, this opportunity comes once in a lifetime, yo

I woke up this morning and went to eat a bowl of cereal. As you know, I'm basically a child when it comes to my diet, so I reached for my box of Reese's Puffs and noticed that my roommate had taken it upon himself to complete a fill-in-the-blank rap on the back of the box.



In case you can't see it on the picture, I've transcribed the text below. The underlined bits are where Roommate filled in the blanks with his lyrics. (Mad-Libs: They're not just for kids anymore!)

My Reese's Puffs Rap

That peanut butter chocolate Mother Fucker
Is the shit that I fuck that makes me cream
Reese's Puffs, Reese's Puffs, in your bowl, in your bowl

Recognize the taste that I shit on your plate
Reese's Puffs, Reese's Puffs,
Wow peanut butter chocolate motherfucker

So crucial to my pussy ass vernacular
That peanut butter jizz is oh so spectacular!
Reese's Puffs, Reese's Puffs

My Reese's Puffs are up in your rectum
Each peanut butter orb is fucking balls deep
Reese's Puffs, Reese's Puffs, in your bowl
In your bowl. Watch me creep . . . Mother Fucker!



I don't know about you, but I think this baby is going platinum.

Now the beaver once slept for seven days and gave us all an awful fright, so I tickled his chin and gave him a pinch and the bastard tried to bite

On my way to Vegas last weekend I stopped for gas and saw a bumper sticker that I couldn't NOT buy right then and there. It said: I ♥ BEAVER.

I called my sister afterward and told her what I'd found. She requested that I go back right then and buy ten more. I was already getting back on the freeway, so I told her I'd stop again and buy her some on my way home. I did. But I only gave her five. The other five I sent to friends who would display it proudly.

One of my friends received it today at work. He texted me and said he'd buy me something if I displayed it on my car right next to my parking sticker. Presumably so the ultra-conservative university parking enforcement would see it every time they checked.

I texted him back and said they don't even issue parking permits anymore. They just scan license plates now, so I put it on my refrigerator instead.



Our text conversation continued:

Him: So you like your beaver on the fridge?

Me: I like it anywhere I can get it.

Him: So you're easy.

Me: And cheap. Spread the word. Particularly to any hot chicks.

Him: Being easy rarely works for hot chicks.

Him: Get ready for ugly chicks!


Damn! He's right. Lower standards, here I come.

I'd rather dance than talk with you

This morning I forgot about two things:

1) The tunnel I drive through on the way to my office is under more construction than usual.

2) Classes start today.

The combination of these two facts meant that traffic was a bajillion times heavier than it's been all summer. Yes, a bajillion.

As I sat inching my car along, I had more time to notice some things. Like the license plate frame on the car in front of me that read "I'd rather be swimming." I can understand wanting to be just about anywhere other than driving in heavy traffic, but I was a little surprised that people still put those frames around their license plates. I was also a little surprised that no matter what, this person would rather be swimming. Driving to the airport for a tropical vacation? No thanks, I'd rather be swimming. Making out in the back seat of the car? No thanks, I'd rather be swimming. Then, as I pulled into the parking lot on campus, I noticed a friend's truck had one that read, "I'd rather be playing baseball."

So I learned two things on my way to campus: Some complete stranger likes swimming. A friend of mine likes baseball.

The problem with those license plate frames, though, is that there are some people who can't be completely honest with what they'd rather be doing because of social stigmas. I came up with a few, for those people. Hey, I'm here to help.

I'd rather be . . .

. . . watching porn.

. . . skinning squirrels.

. . . cooking methamphetamine.

. . . sacrificing virgins.

. . . punching retards.

. . . date raping your sister.

. . . burning a cross in your yard.

. . . choking a hooker.

Feel free to put your favorite one around your license plate.

Emma, get me a lemon

A contradictory statement if I ever saw one:



Also, this lemonade may or may not contain strawberry.

I see a red door and I want to paint it black

Here is the painting that captures my "essence" as envisioned by my friend:



Here is the painting that captures my friend's "essence" as envisioned by her husband:



And here is the painting that captures my friend's husband's "essence" as envisioned by me:



Did I mention that we painted these in the children's area of the art museum in L.A.?

Buenos Tardes, Amigo

Question: Would you pick up this hitchhiker?



I didn't either. I called Border Patrol.

Waiting for Superman

If you've ever wondered how my kids and I entertain ourselves while waiting for overpriced pizza to come to our table (and you know you have), it's by pondering the important questions of life, such as these:

Who would win in a fistfight, The Incredible Hulk, or The Thing?

Who has a firmer handshake, Ice Man or the Human Torch (from Fantastic Four)?

Who would win in a staring contest, Cyclops or Magneto?

Who would make the best ice cream sundae, Ice Man or Wonder Woman?

Who would win in a Derek Zoolander style walk-off, Wonder Woman or Spider Man?

Who would be the bigger alcoholic, Batman or the Incredible Hulk?

Who would be most likely to cry after being dumped, Spiderman or Aquaman?

Who has hooked up with more guys, Lois Lane or Mary Jane Watson?

Who will be the first to come out of the closet, Robin or the Wonder Twins?

Here comes Peter Cottontail

A few minutes ago I was talking to Mr M about the Easter Bunny coming tomorrow.

"Dad, there's no such thing. The Easter Bunny isn't real. It's just a guy dressed in a bunny suit that comes and leaves candy in your house."

Yeah, dude, 'cause that's less creepy.

So how you wanna kick it? Gonna kick it root down.

Are you as surprised as I am that not one student this week made an inappropriate comment about this root tip model?



Root tip indeed.

Now that I'm saved I wish I was damned

The other day one of my friends came into my office to get my take on an idea she's thinking about incorporating into her dissertation. It's funny that she would do that, considering that I'm retarded, and she knows that.

After I told her I thought her idea was interesting, and doable, and that her adviser would probably like it, she started playing around with some of the figures I have on my desk. In doing so, she knocked Pencil Top Jesus down on His face. Then she turned around to walk out of the room.

"Wait. You're just going to knock Jesus over and leave Him lying there like that?"

"I'm a Jew. It's what we do."

You'll be happy to know that Pencil Top Jesus has risen* again, and now presides over my office.



But He needs to look over His shoulder, because the devil has taken the form of a duck, and seems to be gaining power.







*Not THAT way.

Take the ride as far as anyone can go

It's official. My car is hella evil:

Little ghost little ghost the one I'm scared of the most

Do you have stuff to hand out to trick-or-treaters this year? I always pick out some of my favorites, just in case nobody comes by and I have to polish it off myself. Here's a sampling of what the kids will get to choose from when they come to my place.

For the young 'uns
- bananas
- old gum
- ramen
- Cheerios
- 8 track tapes
- Chia pet

For the older kids
- porn
- nuclear warheads
- swine flu
- crack cocaine
- the clap
- severed heads

Oh my sweet rapture I hear Jesus and the angels singing hallelujah calling me to enter the promised the land

I saw* a Nissan Altima with a vanity plate that read: JEHOVAH.

I thought His return would be a little more triumphant, and that He'd be in something a little more regal.

You know, like a chariot of fire.









*Of course this happens the one time I'm not carrying my phone to take a picture.

While their tasks are aligning their minds are deciding

Do you like to doodle? Do you bore easily? If so, I've got the perfect activity* for you to try.

First you take a piece of paper (or in this case, a bar napkin), fold it in half, and draw something on the bottom half of it. Be careful not to let anyone else see what you're drawing.

Once you're finished with your half of the picture, keep it folded but mark the locations where parts of your drawing end so the person who draws the top half will know where to begin.

Then, hand the paper/napkin to one of your friends, and have them complete the picture without knowing what you drew on the bottom.

Here are the results from when I recently played this game with some of my friends:

Sumo Ballerina


Hard Luck Alien Duck


Charlie Brown Cheerleader Chick


Alien EggShell Halibut Man


Fortune Telling Mer-Bird


I don't even know what this is








*It's the perfect thing to do whether you're chilling out with friends at the bar, sitting with your family in church, or trying to avoid falling asleep in class.

Before I learn I gotta grow up, but I'm not willing I guess I'm fucked

Having a bad day? Are you the sort of person who feels better after reading about the misery of others? If so, you're in luck. May I direct your attention to fmylife.com? Read it. Love it.

A few good ones:

- Today, I was flirting via text with a coworker. Things started getting heated, and I wanted to send her a sexy picture. I asked if she had any suggestions. She said, "Your nuts!" She meant, "YOU'RE nuts." I sent her a photo of my junk. I offended a co-worker with incriminating evidence. FML

- Today, I got back my math test. Instead of taking the time to mark the mistakes, my professor just circled the bottom half of the page and wrote "OMG." FML

- Today, I was delivering packages to patients in the hospital for my job. My boss gave me a room to deliver to, and I drop it off as usual. But my boss gave me the wrong room number. I had to walk in, apologize, and take back balloons and a stuffed animal from a crying 6year old patient. FML

- Today, I tasted the rainbow. By that, I mean a homeless man hit me in the face with a bag of Skittles for not giving him money. FML

- Today, I was texting two people at once. Trying to respond to my friend's text, I accidentally clicked on this guy's name instead, who I've never met. He just told me about his grandma's funeral he went to that was an open casket. I responded with, "Haha wow you slut, I'm sure you were aroused." FML

- Today I texted my girlfriend, telling her how I hated my job and felt like I was trapped be wasting my time. A couple of minutes later she texted back, saying "That's how I feel about our relationship." FML

- Today, I was the only one in an elevator when an attractive girl came in, talking on her phone. She told her friend, "I have to go, there's a cute guy on this elevator." Before I could even react, she turned to me and said, "Sorry for lying, I really wanted to get off the phone with her." FML

- Today I stopped riding my bike to help an elderly lady across the street. While we were crossing, the light changed, and in the rush to get her to the curb I dropped my phone. It was run over. Then I looked across the street just in time to see my bike get stolen. FML

Now throats'll be slashed and flags'll unfurl

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. I was going through some old notes from a conservation biology class, and found a couple of examples that demonstrate the saying perfectly. Well, almost perfectly.


Example 1: The Cichlids
One day in class we had a prolonged discussion on the high levels of diversity of cichlid fishes in the Rift Lakes that have formed in eastern Africa. These fish represent a textbook example of an explosive radiation. There are estimates of nearly 1000 species of cichlids in these rift lakes, even though the rift lakes are relatively young in geologic time. The lakes formed as a result of plate tectonics because the plate that eastern Africa sits on is slowly pulling away from the rest of the continent. This has resulted in the formation of a deep valley that has filled up with water in some parts. Hence, any organisms living within these lakes had to get there within a relatively recent time frame, and the sheer number of species found there suggest that they must have evolved at an accelerated rate.

While the fish community represents a large amount of genetic diversity, the professor made the comment about how all the diversity might eventually be wiped out if the two plates separated completely. This would be because the rift valley would eventually fill up with sea water, which would obviously kill off any freshwater species. So it's a conundrum. While this system represents a classic example of rapid evolution (side note: there are fish so specialized in these lakes that they only eat the eyeballs or scales of other cichlids), it may also only be a blip on the screen of evolutionary time. That's if all these species eventually become extinct.

I'm not doing the conversation justice here, but I remember it as clearly as the day I sat in the classroom. However, here are the only notes I took during that conversation:





The second picture is the national flag for the country that will be sitting on the shoreline of the newly developed seaway: Dead Cichlid Nation*.



Example 2: Bees
We had another discussion about how we need to be mindful of changing environmental conditions when thinking about conservation and how it pertains to plant and animal distributions. Just because an organism occurs somewhere does not mean that it was always there, just like absence of an organism from a certain area doesn't guarantee that it's never occurred there. Anyone familiar with the fossil record knows that. This could be important when planning reserves. If possible, you want to conserve enough of an area that things can shift around if they need to. That usually isn't possible because of the financial obligations and politics, but it would be ideal.

The example our professor gave us when trying to illustrate this point was the continent of Antarctica. Today it is obviously covered with ice, but that hasn't always been the case. He mentioned a fairly recent study that talked about how Antarctica was once a much warmer place, and showed that bees migrated from Africa to South America across Antarctica (more recently than when all three continents were joined together to make up Gondwana).

Here are my notes from that discussion:



That would be the flag** for Frozen Bumblebee Nation.








*Incidentally, Dead Cichlid Nation would be one of George W. Bush's favorite countries because of the mass extinction rate associated with its formation - so glad that guy's not our president anymore.

**One of my lab mates looked at my notes while I was drawing these flags, and she interrupted the class by laughing too loud. The professor was not as amused. That may have been the reason why he started disliking me. I'm not sure about this.

Together we'll be runnin' somewhere new

In honor of the inauguration today, I'll direct your attention to this site where you can make an Obamicon of yourself.

Go on. All the cool kids are doing it.

Here are a few that I made while trying to take my mind off the fact that the Eagles were getting their asses handed to them in the NFC Championship game.









Here are some others that I didn't make, but I think are hilarious so I stole them to post here anyway:

The ghost of my dance instructor pushed me down into an open grave

We're all going to die someday. It's good to let people know what your wishes are for your funeral, burial, etc. So, depending on what the circumstances of my death are, here are some potential things for my family to put on my headstone.

- What are you staring at?

- The badger won.

- I will haunt every last one of you.

- He died like he lived - on fire.

- The ground needed to be fed.

- It's getting hard to breathe down here.

- Attention graverobbers: No treasure buried in this coffin.

- His heart exploded from doing too much coke.

- Lived a life worthy of The Jerry Springer Show.

- I shaved my balls for this?

- I'm just sayin'. I'm dead.