When I put myself in the picture of success

As promised, here are a few pics from my long holiday weekend.

Beach in Malibu



La Brea Tar Pits

Wall of Dire Wolf skulls:


A very dramatic scene:

(Trumpet all you want Little Mastodon, but your mother is screwed.)

LA County Museum of Art

Ancient sculptures from Mexico:


Mobiles:



Lamp posts out front:



Venice Beach

My friend's favorite part about Muscle Beach:



My favorite part about Muscle Beach:



A suicidal cat:



And of course, FIREWORKS:







Mission San Gabriel

We've got California in our eyes come on and catch us if you can

Has it really been a week since I last posted? Don't worry, I didn't drop off the face of the earth. Almost, but not quite. I went to California for the long holiday weekend.

Here's a little bit of what I've been up to since I last posted:

Thursday 7/1
Drove to California from Vegas - Saw Sloan perform at House of Blues in Los Angeles.

Friday 7/2
Hit the beach in Malibu - saw my first dolphins in the wild. Perhaps more importantly, saw many babes in bikinis. Spent the evening walking around a shopping area near my friend's apartment, bought some cool fish mugs, and tried some of the best Indian food I've had in quite some time.

Saturday 7/3
Visited the La Brea tar pits and the L.A. County Museum of Art. While there, my friend painted a picture of my "essence", and I did the same for her husband. I'll scan those later. I'm not going to lie, they're pretty amazing pieces of art. Also saw an Andy Warhol exhibit, and a lot of other cool things. Had dinner at an amazing Italian restaurant (apparently ranked top 10 for L.A., but we didn't know that until we were already seated), and even proposed to a piece of chocolate cake with a diamond ring and all. The cake said no. Still we had an amazing night together, but in the morning she was gone. Later we walked back down to the beach at Santa Monica, and saw a pretty cool fireworks display that was going on near Malibu. I'm now convinced that nothing beats sitting alone on a beach watching fireworks. It turned out to be much more enjoyable than the fireworks display we "saw" on Independence Day.

Sunday 7/4
Walked along Venice Beach and saw all of the associated madness. I wanted to get my picture taken with the "Kush Doctor" but didn't want to have to explain that I didn't actually want a prescription for medical marijuana. There was a muscleman competition going on at muscle beach, which I found hilarious for some reason. (Probably just jealousy.) Later we went back to the beach near my friend's apartment, then tried to go south to see a fireworks show at Marina Del Ray. It was a madhouse, and by the time we found a spot to sit, we quickly realized that we couldn't see any fireworks, so we just left before it was done. Luckily we'd seen a better fireworks display the night before so didn't feel too sorry for ourselves.

Monday 7/5
Toured Mission San Gabriel. It was pretty cool to see a little about the history of colonization of Southern California. I also saw a little bit of the UCLA campus and then drove home to Vegas.

In other words, it was not a bad way to spend a few days. I'll post pictures later. (I got some pretty cool ones.)

Black chick, white guy

Last night at pub trivia:

Question: In the book Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, what was the name of the runaway slave who teams up with Huck on his voyage down the Mississippi River?

Friend 1: It's Nigger Jim*.

Me: I'm just going to put Jim.

Friend 1: I think you have to put down the whole name.

Friend 2: But I don't like that word.

Me: I don't either.

Friend 1: Just put it down so we don't lose a point.

Me: Fine.

Friend 3 (who is African American): I can't believe you wrote that. Racist.

Me: If I have sex with you later will that make up for it?

Friend 3: Sure.



Later she passed me a note: You ready to pop the cork on this bitch?








*Apparently this is the name used by many critics and has been perpetuated ever since, but never appears in the book itself. Thank you Wikipedia!

Time to sit back and unwind

One of my friends who recently moved away came back to town this weekend. Of course you know what that means: Pool party!

We all met up at one friend's house, then went to the grocery store to pick up a few things. While there, they decided they needed to make rum drinks, so we ventured into the liquor section.

My friends were discussing what they wanted to make when a guy came into the aisle and asked us, "Where's the cheap shit?"

We looked at each other, then shrugged.

Fortunately for him, he didn't need our help. He found a large, plastic bottle of vodka that cost $9.

He grabbed it, looked at me, and said, "There ya' go. Throw some cranberry in that bitch and you straight all day."

I would not want to be his head this morning.

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?

All the kids are staying fat

The problem with me spending time with my kids is that the only posts you're going to see in the near future are going to be about them. Like this little tidbit from Mr M while we were driving to my sister's wedding.

Mr M: Dad, if a fat girl was lost in the forest, what would a tree say?

Me: I don't know, what?

Mr M: How about lose some weight, fatty.

I probably should have explained to him that it's not nice to make fun of people. Instead I just laughed.

If you dare

What's worse than returning to the office to 130 unanswered emails?

Returning to the office to find this propped up in your office chair:





Does anyone want a sucker shaped like a penis? It's still wrapped.

Shakin' like a dog shittin' razor blades

This morning I baked a cake. For those of you keeping track, that's three cakes in the past ten days. In other words, not enough cake. (Is there ever enough cake?) As I poured the cake batter into the pan, I wanted to find out if any of my kids wanted to eat the rest of it that wouldn't come out of the bowl.

Me: Alright, who wants to lick the . . .

Tortellini: Me!

Mr M: I do. I do. I get the bowl. I get the bowl.

Me: Neither of you let me finish my sentence. As I was saying, who wants to lick the dog's butt? You both do. Ha ha!

I know you tried, I know you're cursed, I know your best was still your worst

The day before my sister's wedding I administered an exam in the night class I'm teaching. I didn't grade them until I got back. When I did get them graded, I saw something that depresses me greatly. It involves the following question (which I'd gone over three different times in class):

During aerobic respiration, which of the following molecules directly donates electrons to the electron transport chain at the lowest energy level, and thus only generates two ATP molecules?
A) NADH
B) FADH2


Two students chose D.

I wish I was joking.

Do you wanna dance? Will you wear my ring?

My youngest sister got married last weekend. I couldn't leave until Friday morning because I had to administer an exam on Thursday night, so it was a shorter trip than I would've liked, but you do what you can. It was nice to see all the family members that made it, even if I didn't get to visit with many of them as much as I would have liked. My kids and I spent a lot of time in the car (as usual - they're going to have such rotten memories of all the road trips with their dad).

Unfortunately for my sister, it rained all afternoon and evening. Luckily, her reception was indoors, and the place still looked nice.



The roses probably looked even better with the raindrops on them anyway.



My sister was such a beautiful bride. And my nieces made such cute little flower girls. The youngest one started running around and picking up the rose petals that the older one had scattered around and putting them back in her bucket. It was so cute.





Here's a picture of my sister holding the youngest flower girl later. Probably the only really good photo I took all night.



From a more selfish perspective, all her bridesmaids were either married already, or had boyfriends, so I asked her, "Would it be bad if I ditched your wedding reception and went to the one next door to see if there are any hot bridesmaids over there?" She encouraged me to go ahead, but alas, I couldn't bring myself to channel my inner wedding crasher, so I just stayed at my sister's reception.

Don't worry, I made up for it afterward when I took my children for a nice post-wedding family dinner at Hooter's.

Hola, my good friend

A few weeks ago, my friends and I got some free sombreros while we were out on a Friday night. Mine has been in my car ever since.

Even this weekend, with the trunk full of bags for our weekend trip to my sister's wedding, the sombrero has stayed in the car. Togers was going to wear it to the wedding reception, but forgot.

Yesterday, on our way to my parents' house, Tortellini put it on.



She joked, "If I wore this in Arizona, we'd get pulled over."

Not only that, she'd probably also be deported since she has no form of identification yet.

The greatest love is always ruined by the bickering

I have my kids for a couple of weeks. It's a constant source of entertainment for me, and therefore, for you too. The other night we went to In-N-Out for dinner, and while we were there, Mr M said something you wouldn't expect a kid his age to understand (I don't remember what it was - but earlier he proved to be the only one of my kids that knew it was a meteor that caused the mass extinction of the dinosaurs).

Tortellini: [Mr M] is really smart. He's probably the smartest of all us kids.

Me: Maybe. What do you think? Who's the smartest kid?

Mr M: Dad is.

Me: I'm not a kid. Who do you think is the smartest of you three?

Mr M: Hmmm. [Tortellini].

Tortellini: I knew it! I knew he'd say me because he hates [Togers].

Mr M: I hate [Tortellini] too, but I hate [Togers] more.

The next day we all went to get haircuts. While Tortellini was in the chair, Togers said something that made Mr M laugh.

Me: Is your brother funny?

Mr M: Yeah.

Me: But I thought you hated him.

Mr M: I do! But he's still funny.

Celebrate good times, come on!

Yesterday was Togers' birthday. My ex-wife said she asked Mr M in the morning if he'd wished Togers a happy birthday. Mr M said that he hadn't, because he "wasn't celebrating [Togers'] birthday."

Later, when it was time for cake and ice cream, Mr M insisted that he didn't want any cake, just ice cream. I asked him about it this morning. He didn't want any cake, because that would've been celebrating Togers birthday.

So if you were ever wondering where to draw the line between celebrating something and not celebrating, it's this:

Cake and ice cream = celebrating

Just ice cream = not celebrating

You're welcome!

Someday back when we were young I guess something just went wrong

Last night while teaching:

Student 1: Have you heard the sound of your voice? I have it recorded. Do you want to listen to it?

Me: Yes, I've heard the sound of my voice. I don't like it, so no, I don't want to listen.

Student 1: You don't like the way your voice sounds?

Me: No, because it sounds different to me than it does to you. When I hear it played back it sounds a lot lower than the way I hear it. I think it sounds like I'm dumber than I am.

Student 2: It just sounds like you smoked a lot of weed when you were younger. That's all.


Lovely. Student 2 confirmed that my voice makes me sound dumb. He might as well have said, "Your voice just sounds like you killed a LOT of brain cells in your youth."

Can I take points off for brutal honesty?

For the record, I've never smoked weed. My stupid voice comes naturally.

You're coming off kind of contrived and pretentious, you're not saying anything we haven't heard before

Once again, it's time to share the highlights from my TA evaluations from last semester. As always, these are taken verbatim from the evaluations themselves.

Laboratory Activities
What was your favorite lab exercise? Why?
- The video, because it doesn't stink.
- Disection*, because it is dirty and exciting.
- Leaving, because it was always late.
- Ugh, none! Labs were just very boring.

Which lab experience was most informative and educational for you?
- Disection because I can do it and touching

What was your least favorite lab exercise? Why?
- Disections, because the stink.
- Anything w/ plants -- hella boring!
- Earthworm dissection and looking at live flat worms because both creep me out.

What is the major weakness of the [biology] lab?
- The only thing I didn't like was the detailedness of the quizzes.
- It's too hard (that's what she said?)

What is the major strength of the [biology] lab?
- Actual action take and tangible to all senses.
- [Minnow] is just a big bucket of win


Laboratory Instructor
In general, how would you rate your lab instructor as a teacher?
- A for awesome
- Damn, he's good (maybe because he's young?)
- Nothing special either way
- Kept me awake

How would you assess your lab instructor's ability in making things understandable and their willingness to help?
- A for always helping
- Godly

Assess your lab instructor's knowledge about the topics covered.
- A for abundance of knowledge
- He's a smartie-pants.
- Knew pretty much everything - I mean he is a doctor!!
- Again, he is a plethora of knowledge, or maybe even a cornacopia.
- Knew more than I knew, answered things

Assess your lab instructor's examination policy, fairness, and grading.
- B for Boy some of those quizzes are hard

What were his/her strong points?
- He got an attitude (in a nice way)

How could he/she improve?,
- Not allow and/or engage in so many loud and disruptive conversations that do not pertain to lab.
- He is at his MAX!
- Somehow make preservatives (for disections) smell like flowers or something.
- "insert mean statement"
- Not to blast the A/C when driving [on the field trip].
- Nothing that I can think of, even my best friend who joined our lab commented on your greatness ;)
- SMILE MORE!
- Maybe go the the gym a little
- talks too much, which wastes lab time
- Be more cool
- psst . . . make the quizzes easier









*Apparently I need to do a better job of teaching these students how to spell 'dissection'

When the last king of Hollywood shatters his glass on the floor

Last week while administering an exam, I got a phone call from one of my friends. Obviously I didn't answer. A few minutes later I got another call. Then a text. I figured it must be important, so I took my phone out of my pocket to see what was going on. Turned out that they had a suite at Planet Hollywood for the weekend, but weren't going to be able to use it that night. They wanted to know if I wanted it. Of course I did, because, hey, free suite.

It turned out to be the Sharon Stone suite, with a bunch of memorabilia from various movies starring her. There were a bunch of pictures of her on the walls, outfits she'd worn in various movies displayed in huge cases around the suite, and coffee tables/end tables with glass tops and props from her movies, including her cigarette case, the ice pick, the lie detector machine, etc. from Basic Instinct. It was kind of cool.

I took a bunch of pictures, but something was wrong with the lighting in the room, my camera, or both, so none of them turned out and you're going to have to take my word for it since the pics below don't do it justice. Which is a shame, because as I texted my friend upon my arrival, there were so many nice surfaces, I wouldn't even begin to know which one to first snort my coke off of.

Anyway, here are the few that actually look decent:
The bed:


The nightstand (aka, coke snorting surface number three):


The view the next morning (because the really cool night shots were all blurry):


Memorabilia table (aka, coke snorting surface number one)


Also unfortunately, I spent the night alone. I told a friend the next morning that if there was ever a room for housekeeping to enter only to find my dead body slumped over a pile of cocaine, or naked in the closet with a belt around my neck, that would've been the room.

Ah, missed opportunities.

And the wise man said I don't wanna hear your voice

Friend: I just got a text that said "are you a guy?"

Me: From who? And are you?

Friend: From an unknown number. I said, "yes, who is this?" and they said, "a girl - how old are you?" How does someone get my number?

Me: I don't know. I mean, I spray painted it on the wall in the locker room at like three local high schools, but I don't know.

And I believe there's a way to describe the silence as a sound

I've compiled another music mix for my your listening pleasure. Check it out. These only show up here once every six months or so.

Just One In A Billion(click to download)
1. Bad Sun - The Bravery
2. Lover's Waltz - A.A. Bondy
3. Keep It Clean - Camera Obscura
4. Long Time - Deer Tick
5. Pavement Tune - The Frames
6. Flashing Red Light Means Go - The Boxer Rebellion
7. So Lonely - The Whigs
8. Sirens - The Whip
9. Poised And Ready - Brendan Benson
10. Apple Trees - Eels
11. Sabali (Paul Epworth Remix) - Amadou and Mariam

Enjoy!

Kinda hard to blame somebody for goin' to a better place

Most of my friends are out of town this weekend. That makes for a boring Friday night. So, I did what I usually do when I'm alone and bored - I went for a drive. I drove across Hoover Dam to Arizona so I could go down by the banks of the Colorado River. It's been a while since I've been near flowing water. It relaxes me. I should do it more often.

On the way back I had to stop at a police checkpoint. They stop everyone to inspect their vehicles to make sure nothing's suspicious looking before allowing people to cross the dam. As I pulled up to the officer, he told me to roll down my window so he could see inside my car. Just then the song Paradise Blues by Eels came on the stereo.

Scary little suicide bomber
On her way to paradise
Gonna take yourself and be with her
Killin' once and killin' twice

Not exactly the best timing.

But still it's been written, a history of lovers, given and taken in ink

My ex-wife called the other day to let me know that Togers was the recipient of the "loverboy" award at his end of year band concert.

She told me that his teacher said he probably would've gone out with more girls, but there weren't any he hadn't already dated.

This is what I want to do to him* for not sharing his secrets with his old man.










*Not really, but kinda

We haven't met and that's okay

On the first day of my summer class, I was going down the roster to see who was in attendance to find out if I had extra room for a few people who were trying to add. When I got to the 'M's, one student's last name was Montana.

Me (after calling out their name): Any relation to Hannah?

Student: No, but Joe is my uncle.

Me: Really?

Student: No.

The most disturbing thing about this exchange was this: Why wasn't Joe Montana the first celebrity to pop into my mind?

Box full of letters - 7

Dear Smart Car Drivers,

I admire what you're doing for the planet by driving cars that get a godzillion miles to the gallon. That said, I'd like to offer you a word of advice: You should refrain from getting a vanity plate* that makes it seem as though you're trying to look tough.



You're driving a smart car. You're not tough. It's okay that you're not tough, but you're not. Your vanity plate should read something like TRE HGR or something instead.

Much love,

Native Minnow







*If, however, this plate isn't about looking tough, but is referring to your favorite activity**, then please disregard this.

**But that's pretty gay if that's the case.

Every breath you take

Tonight I went with a friend to get dinner and watch basketball. He dropped me off at my car when we were finished. As we pulled up I noticed a piece of paper under the windshield wiper.

I said, "That had better not be a flier from somebody. If it is I'm going to be pissed. I hate those things."

My friend asked, "What else would it be?"

"It had better be a note from my stalker."

It was.

There's an eventual release from every scale of crime

Yesterday afternoon I got a text from my ex-wife. It said, "Just told [Mr M] to go sit on his bed until he does what he was told. He replied, 'I am gonna be sitting there forever 'cause I am not going to do it.'"

Almost immediately after that I got a second text from her saying, "Well, it took less than five minutes for him to get sick of his room so he did it. So now you know, forever equals five minutes to [Mr M]."

Shock the monkey

Contender for worst children's book ever:



Even worse is that it was in a college book store.

Tell me it's not just me that thinks so, but at least it wasn't 'Choke the Chicken.'

So you can take this cookie, and stick it up your . . . yeah

Yesterday, while at the grocery store with a friend, I found some cookies that looked pretty good. My friend said that she probably shouldn't eat one because she's trying to lose weight, but then read the label and said that she'd have to try at least one because they were "enrobed in chocolate."

When we got to the check out line, a man brought a few items to hand to the woman in front of us. He held up a package of cookies and she said no. He said, "please?" but she still said no. Dejectedly, he handed her whatever she'd sent him to get, and walked back to the cookie aisle to put them back.

The cashier finished up with them, and then grabbed my things to scan.

My friend said, "No cookies. No." Basically to make fun of the woman in front of us.

The cashier looked at her and laughed.

My friend said, "I'm just kidding. I don't own him like that."

I said, "I'm probably not going to share my cookies with you anyway."

"That's okay. Maybe I don't want them. Your cookies are 'enrobed' in sin."

I turned to the cashier and said, "That's the best way to be enrobed."

She blushed. Understandable, since she had no idea what the 'enrobed' joke was about anyway.

When I came here today, all I wanted to say was how much I miss you

Just wanted to take a second to let the people of the internets know that I have the most awesome mother in the entire world.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

This could be your lucky day in Hell

Last night I had plans with Girl Who Won't Be My Girlfriend. She had a final exam in the evening, and said she'd call me when she finished.

I got an email from her in the middle of the day stating that she didn't have her phone, so she'd just come over to my house after she was done. I emailed her back to say that would be perfect (since I wanted to watch the NBA playoffs anyway).

Later in the evening, I logged in to facebook and saw that she'd changed her status to "I think I may get lucky tonight."

Imagine my disappointment when I realized that I forgot to give her the new gate code to my neighborhood, and couldn't call to let her know.

I'll never look down again, again

Earlier this week:

Ex-wife: Hi. I need you to talk to your son. He got in trouble on the playground today.

Me: Okay. Put him on.

Mr M: Hi Dad.

Me: Hi dude. Your mom said you got in trouble at school today.

Mr M: Yeah. I did.

Me: What did you do?

Mr M: I called a girl a midget.

Me: Why did you do that?

Mr M: Because she is.

At least he's penitent. Oh, wait.

Forget about feelings, that's not what pays

Student (about to turn in his lab final): How can we find out our grades?

Me: I'll have them posted outside the lab sometime tomorrow.

Student: Is there any chance for extra credit?

Me: No.

Student: You need your car washed or anything?

Me: No.

Student: Need a tall blonde girl? I could see about sending a hottie your way.

Me: No, I think I'm good.

Another student approached me and said that the one who made the "offer" shoots porno films.

Which means he probably could've delivered the goods.

Which means . . .

WHAT WAS I THINKING???

As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I take a look at my life and realize there's not much left

Has it really been a whole week since I last posted? Sorry. I've been busy. With your mom.

(Just kidding. That's not your mom. That's a huge 'statue' that was at Rhyolite, a ghost town that used to be the largest boom town in Nevada [even bigger than Vegas from 1905-1911]).

I went to Death Valley again. One of my friends had never been, and we heard that wildflowers were blooming everywhere, so we figured now was as good a time as any. But before we got to there we stopped at Rhyolite. There was one house that was built out of bottles in 1906 - ironically it was one of the only buildings left standing:


A monument to the miners that used to live there:


And what's a ghost town without some ghosts?


One of them was about to steal a bike.


There was also a couch that looked like it could have been one of Anonymous Boxer's projects:


Entering Death Valley:


There were a fair number of flowers




And cacti:


One of the craziest things in Death Valley is this place called Scotty's Castle. Who builds a castle in the middle of the desert? Scotty. That's who.








And of course, Badwater. The lowest elevation in the western hemisphere:


Sea level is marked way up on these rocks (but you may have to click on the picture to be able to see it).



The trip was made even better by the bags of candy we bought at this huge candy store out in the middle of nowhere. I hope your weekend was as good as mine.

I used to love her, but I had to kill her, I knew I'd miss her, so I had to keep her, she's buried right in my back yard

Tonight I went to pub trivia with some friends. One of the questions asked which artist went on tour in 2004, played in 96 U. S. cities and became the highest grossing male artist. We had no idea. We just started naming artists that we thought might fit the bill, even if we didn't know they were on tour that year. I guessed Sting.

My friend said, "That's it! You got it."

I said, "I don't know. I was just throwing that out there. I don't really think it's him."

She replied, "I do. I'm 100% sure. If I'm wrong, you can murder me."

"How about if you're wrong you just give me a bj instead?"

"How about you can murder me, then have sex with my still warm corpse?"

"Deal!"

The answer was Prince.

When the guy announced that, I acted like I was going to choke her.

She said, "I'd like to recant and just blow you instead. I don't want to die."

I don't know. It seems to me that if you're willing to put the stakes that high, then you ought to be willing to pay the price if you are, in fact, wrong.

These snakes is slitherin' with dollar signs in they eyes

My office is just around the corner from a classroom. Herpetology is currently being taught there now. The other day my friend and I were talking in my office, and the herpetology TA was out in the hall making noise while she was doing something.

Me: What is she doing out there?

Friend: It looks like she's playing around with a bunch of snakes in the hallway.

Me (doing my best Samuel L. Jackson impersonation): I HAVE HAD IT WITH THESE MOTHER FUCKING SNAKES IN THIS MOTHER FUCKING HALLWAY!!!

Unbeknownst to me, class was in session.

And they were taking a test.

Yes, they all heard.

And I get lonely, but I ain't that lonely yet

A little over a month ago I got a text from a friend as I was getting ready for bed. Apparently there was something extremely funny written on a mutual friend's facebook page, and she said I needed to go check it out.

I did.

It was a comment left by a gay friend of theirs. He asked her what she thought my reaction would be if he offered me a "no-strings attached" blow job.

At the time I joked that I didn't know if I should be repulsed, flattered, or both.

I told the story to another of my friends and she thought it was hilarious. She did a little cyberstalking and came to the conclusion that this guy would make a pretty hot chick. Her take: "I think you should just put him in a dress and go for it."

Fast forward to today's departmental seminar. I was sitting next to the girl who initially alerted me to the comment, and she pointed out that the kid was also in the audience. Another friend that I was sitting by had heard the story and wanted to see what the guy looked like. We pointed him out.

"That's a GUY?"

"Yeah."

"You're sure?"

"Yeah. Why? Don't tell me you're going to be of the same mind as [Friend] when she saw his pictures."

"What did she say again?"

"She said I should just put him in a dress and go for it."

"I think she might be right."



I seriously need to figure out a way to stop these apparent gay vibes from emanating out from me.

So come along and play my game, you'll never be the same

This week I had to cover a friend's lab because she couldn't be there. It happens to be the week of a short field trip where we visit a place about thirty minutes away from campus. We shuttle students out there in twelve passenger vans. As I pulled out of the parking lot with a van full of students, I went over a speed bump too fast, and bounced the students in the back seat around a little.

Me: Sorry.

Student: What? You're not used to driving a big van like this?

Me: Not like this. The van I drive doesn't have any windows.

Student: Or passengers?

Me: Exactly. And I usually drive a lot slower as I'm patrolling neighborhoods looking for kids to offer free candy to.

Student: . . .

I won't let you bury it, won't let you smother it, won't let you murder it

Last Saturday I saw Muse play at Mandalay Bay. It was possibly the best concert experience of my life. And thanks to the internets, I can share some of it with you. Here are some pictures that some people posted of the show:







And here are some videos:

Muse 4/10/10 - Intro and Uprising


Time is Running Out


Starlight


Supermassive Black Hole


United States of Eurasia


Feeling Good


Stockholm Syndrome


New Born (Bad sound, but the lights were really cool for this song)


I can actually see myself in the crowd in he Starlight and Supermassive Black Hole videos.

Don't be jealous.

It ain't pretty when the pretty leaves you with no place to go

Friday night I was out with friends, and the place we were at was packed. One of my friends pointed out a girl at the table next to us because she wanted my opinion on whether the girl was attractive. She was. Later in the evening, that girl tried making her way to the bathroom, but there were people in her way. One of them accidentally bumped her and she got a disgusted look on her face and threw her hands up in the air.

I thought her reaction was a little over the top. After all, you're going to get bumped when you're trying to make your way through dancing people in a crowded place. Apparently my friend agreed with me because she leaned over and said, "She's not THAT hot. Someone should tell her."

Better late than never

I spent Easter in Arizona with my kids. The weekend started off fine, and even though it ended on a sour note, with me putting myself as a candidate for the worst father ever, it was still nice to see them. It'd been far too long.

We dyed eggs, and Tortellini and Togers hid them in the back yard so that Mr M could go on an Easter egg hunt.

I only had one contribution to the egg hiding, and that was trying to use camouflage to hide this one in the pool.


Tortellini thought it would be fun to draw various things on some of the eggs she colored. They turned out pretty cool. She's creative, that one.






But my favorite egg might have been the one my ex's boyfriend made.


Togers didn't draw on any of his because I told him not to draw a pentagram on an Easter egg.

Mr M got tired of searching for them rather quickly, but persevered and found them all anyway. What a good sport.

The sporting life

Reason # 3,128 why I love NBA quotes comes from ESPN's recap of last night's Jazz vs. Rockets game:

"We were touching a lot of balls, we were deflecting a lot of passes," said Scola, who had five rebounds, two steals and a block. "We pretty much controlled the whole game."

There you have it - All it takes to win in the NBA is to touch a lot of balls.

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.

We don't need no education

Last night I left my cell phone unattended for a few hours. When I checked it, I had four missed calls from my ex-wife, but no message. I called back to see what was going on, and Togers answered. He sounded very down.

Me: What's going on?

Him: Dad? Mom told me I had to call you about my grades. I got three Ds and two Fs.

Me: [About to launch into a profanity laced tirade]

Him: April Fool's!!!

I can't believe I fell for it.