Yeah, the holidays.

Christmas was good to me this year. I received what I asked for, and the gifts I didn’t ask for were pretty good too. I didn’t have to pretend to like anything this year so yay for that. I would have to say my favorite gift was a shirt my brother gave to me that says “Super Jerk” on it. I’ve never seen the comic before, but just the concept of a super hero who’s a jerk really appeals to me. I’m also the real life version of super jerk because I didn’t get my wife anything. I mean, what do you do when she says she wants shoes? I’m not about to pick something out on my own, so I said hit the mall and buy your shoes. She’s happy with that. I have one more Christmas gathering to attend this Sunday. Fathers side of the family. That should be fun. Super cool because the complex where my grandma lives, and where the event will be, is only a few minutes drive away from my house. Not sure what’s happening with New Years yet. Maybe the traditional board games and junk food with the family, maybe just sitting home with the wife. I do have a few new video games to explore once she hits the hay so maybe that’s what I’ll do. Mister Machoman

Something to bitch about. Part 1

I expect this to be something I continue as I have many things that just bug me. And now I have a place to express it. Even if only a small number of folks read, or agree, I have the satisfaction of putting it down.

So, for my fist entry, I hate people who have to answer their own questions.

Friend 1: So, what are you doing tonight?

Friend 2: I don't know. Am I going to go out to the club? No. 

Friend 1: Don't answer your own questions, you sound like a fool.

I know that's sort of a lame example, but you get my drift. I heard it today while listening to the Slate Political Gabfest. I've always hated it, but this just reminded me of it and forced me to share. I've been having a stressful time at work this past week with the holiday right around the corner. Things seem to get to me quicker than usual. 

Lucy's Fucking Sky

Puppy cuts

My puppy got a haircut today. Sure she's three years old, but she will always forever be my puppy.

Daphne Before:

Much better Daphne after:

Rubber Doll

Is is wrong to beg at the Salvation Army?

I was with H shopping…wait a second…I was with H and she was shopping, I was there to keep her company. We were walking into the Salvation Army to grab some clothes for a future photo shoot. But I thought this was weird. There was a Salvation Army bell ringer standing outside the Salvation Army. Is this really a good location? I mean really, most people are going to the Salvation Army because they don’t have much money to start with. And dang it if I can’t remember what else I was going to say about this. It takes me about 45 minutes to draft these blog entries because I get interrupted so often and I tend to lose my train of thought. I just remembered…The Survivor season finale is tomorrow. Awesome. I’m sort of rooting for Bob, Ken or Sugar. All three have played really good games. But really, I like Bob for the win, with Sugar second. But I don't think it's going to go down that way. Sugar, Ken, Bob...win, place and show. Robot Love

The broken car...part two

The results are in. The car is totaled. Now we’ll be saving over $400 a month plus we’re getting an extra $1200 for the value of the car minus the loan. I hope I’m explaining that right. H’s father took care of all that stuff for us. Tonight we’re going down to the police station the get a copy of the accident report so we can collect on the unused warranty. Life is good. H still isn’t that fond of waking up at 5:20a to get me to work, but if it means saving that money and paying off some credit cards, she’ll happy to do it. But first, we’re going to do the responsible thing. We’re gearing up to get a few new tattoo’s! Dark Lover Rising

Nine Inch Nails and a broken car

Last Tuesday I went to the Nine Inch Nails show at the Target Center, way cool. Our seats (my brother was with me) were not so great, but we still had a great time. We were on the very last row of seats before the start blocking them off; otherwise you’d be looking behind the stage. That it’s self wasn’t so bad, but the was this big light rack right in our view. That mega sucked because it blocked our view of the drummer. If nothing else we want to watch him. Other than Trent jumping around like a madman, the drummer if the most active of the band. Of most bands really. We also couldn’t see the light show very well that I’ve heard so much about, but we got the gist of it. My wife on the other hand, was on the floor with her friend. I tried my darndest to trade with her, but she was having it. Good for her too. She meet up with a couple of friends there, one of which had some back stage passes. If you know my wife, and it would be odd if you did, she has wanted to meet Trent for a long time. He’s the one guy she would leave me for, or so she say. Ha, I kid, or do I? So get goes back stage and wait for over an hour. She meets the other band mates but Trent is a no show. Now, as is par for H (my wife), she hates him now and forever. That’s too bad, but she still loves his music. In other news, H got in a car accident Saturday evening on the way back from the Mall of America. She was with her brother and two of his friends. Everybody is o.k. so that’s a plus. What’s not a plus if that it took her car out of commission. Old guy in a big Ford F-200 or something like that. I know crap about cars, but it was one of those big pick-up trucks. Anyways, Old guy (with drunk plates) claimed he sneezed and took his foot off the brake while heading to a red light. That caused him to smash into the left rear door of her car (2004 Ford Taurus) and ricochet into another car. Tow truck guy and the cop said her car is totaled. So right now we’re waiting for the insurance people to look at it and let us know what our next step it. Nothing like some Monday morning anticipation! …and this just in…H hates driving my car. Shocker! (2002 Olds Alero) LSD=Truth

Great Sunday!

O.k….Work wasn’t that bad this weekend. Saturday was sort of busy, but nothing we couldn’t handle. Sunday though, Sunday was a good day. Work was really slow, as in I took four calls in two hours. So I asked my manager if I could go home early and he said sure. So I was out at 11:30a. So the wife and I decided to go run some errands together and get something to eat. While I was waiting for her to get ready, my mother called and asked if I wanted to get my Christmas gift early. We all ready decided that it was a nice new 26 in LCD TV a few months back, but I had no idea it was going to be mine that day…super duper! She also paid for lunch too. So now here is where the fun begins. With the new TV, I’m taking the smaller (19 inch LCD) TV that was in our living room and putting that into my room. See, my wife is a photographer and does a lot of nude stuff. As you can guess, the models don’t really want me around while the shoot is going on, and neither does my wife. So now, I can go to my room and do all sorts of things! Play on my Xbox, play with my turntables, work my jigsaw puzzle or just watch a movie. This was the whole reason of getting a two bed room apartment, so I can have my own romper room. Normally I would just sit and work my puzzle. That’s fine and all, but I can’t sit there on my hard folding chair for too long. Oh yeah, and the Wild lost Saturday. 2-1 to the Columbus Bluejackets. Booooo! What the hell is a bluejacket anyways? She and Mrs. Jones

What's on tap for Supertoyz

I work this weekend, that sucks. I hate it because it’s very hard to tell if it’s going to be busy or not. I work in a call center that takes incoming calls from all over the US, so I can’t just look outside and judge the customer flow based on the local weather. I could do that pretty well when I worked in a video store. I will be at the Nine Inch Nails show this coming Tuesday at the Target Center. I imagine that will be a roaring good time. I was able to score floor seats for my wife and her friend…lame. Me and my brother will be on the first level and that’s just fine by me. I mean I’d love to be on the floor, but I almost think that I will have just as good of time where I’m at. This is only my third arena show, I rather see my music at a small club like First Ave or Quest. Speaking of small clubs, I’ll have to check out their calendars and see who’s coming to town. My last small venue show was K.M.F.D.M. That’s was a fucking awesome show. I’d go again if they come back. I think that’s all for now. If I think of anything else, I’ll keep it to myself and post it later if I can remember. Robot Love

Life without TV...is hard.

Big disappointment this week in television. My area was hit with the first real showing of winter. Freezing rain, sleet and snow was enough to mangle the satellite connection to my TV. Most of my Tuesday and Wednesday shows were scrambled. Kind of like when you tried to watch the Spice channel and you had to look really hard to really see anything. But when you did it was oh so glorious. O.k., not quite like that, same concept though, but more digital. Some of my Thursday shows were botched too. I can get some of them online so that's a bonus. Lets see...Fringe, America's Next Top Model, Survivor, CSI: Vegas, The Ultimate Fighter, Dirty Jobs...all crap. I think there are a couple more, but I forget. That's why I DVR everything. Oh yeah, the Wild game last night, that was crap too. But I heard they won, go team! Oh yeah, I missed the first episode of Top Chef. I hope Bravo replays it eight more times before next week. But if you know Bravo like I do, they will. I'm not worried. The Crablouse

Wet and Wild weekend

Well, after another not so exciting weekend, I only have a few items to report. Friday: H (my wife) went to see her little brother in a school play. That was awesome because it gave me a change to catch up on NHL 09 and listen to what she calls "eh" music. I love it though so who cares? FIGHT THE POWER! Actually it was Icon of Coil, Crystal Method and Fluke. Not really your FIGHT! type of music. School plays aren't really my thing, but I kind of wished I went because it sounded pretty fun. It was a collection of Shakespeare plays all mashed together. The fun part came with how the executed some of the "special effects". When the girl had to cry, a stagehand came out with a spray bottle and gave the girl a few shots in the face. Or the balcony scene was the actress perched atop a stagehands shoulders. Saturday: H had a photoshoot at our apartment. She does mostly nude shoots so that means I'm not allowed to watch or really show myself at all. So I hide in my room and play around. I spent most of the time mixing records. You know, the whole two turntables and a microphone thing, without the microphone. It was pretty cool. I could do no wrong, everything I put down was mixing with ease. That was until I ran out of records around the 140 bpm range. Then I went to listening to the iPod and working on my jigsaw puzzle. After that it was a trip to the Olive Garden. I've been reading around where people think the OG is a lame Itallian eatery, but I don't care, I've had "real" Itallian food and it was just too much for me. Too fancy I guess. After the OG, we rented a couple of bad movies. We knew they were bad going in so our expectations were not so high. Jeepers Creepers 2 and a remake of April Fools Day. Jeepers was bad because they invloved the bad guy too much. In the first Jeepers, he was mostly a creepy voice over a CB radio. In part two, the bad guy looses most of the creep factor by showing himslef too much. The bitchey boyfriend was funny though. April Fools was just a bad movie overall. The first had an interesting concept with a fun twist at the end. This weak remake took 40 minutes to even start looking like the original. And when it came to the twist part, it looked more like the actors had rehearsed this scene about 30 times, and it was take 30 they used. Just no excitment to it and quite bland. I also watched my beloved Minnesota Wild lose to Vancover. 2-0...boooo! Sunday: Lazy day. I thought I was going to stay in the whole day, but we wanted Subway. Other than that, H slept most of the day. That gave me a chance to make the site changes she we discussed ealier. It's all new! Also wathed the Minnesota Viking completely crush the Packers. O.k....you got me. It was 28-29 victory for the Vikes. At some points it was looking like a crushing was a coming, but no. And the Vikings only won because the Paackers missed a feild goal with just second left in the game. After that NASCAR time. My man Dale Jr. did pretty well the whole race, witch is unussual for him. Usually he starts strong, and fades to 10th or lower in the second half of the race. I think he came in 3rd or 4th. Good for him. Monday: I'm at work now writing this latest entry. I'm off to get doughtnuts and juice. Doggie Tom

Go Blue! and Go Marcie!

So, the elections were last night. Mr. Obama won, and I'm happy. We're still waiting for our senate race to be decided. Coleman beat Franken by less than 800 votes so that means it's automatic recount time. I don't get that part. All of our votes were read by this scanner machine. Did the machines get it wrong? Won't a recount turn up the same results? I'm sure there is much more behind it, but I'm not looking too deep into that. I'm sure one of my podcast or blogs will explain it better than I could research it.

In other news, my friend won her class in this fitness comp she was in at Myth Nightclub in St. Paul. Well, she's more my wife's friend so I don't have all the specifics. And I didn't go to the event either. Shows what kind of friend I am huh? Anyways, she won and that's cool. Story goes that she did this just to prove to herself that she could. Now she's going back to being just fit, not all ripped and shit. I'm happy about that. I liked her better when it still looked like I could take her in a fight. 

Feed My Hungry Soul

Survivor and more!

I love reality shows. Hold up, I love "reality" shows. We all know most of these shows are as much about reality as pro wrestling is the real deal. Does that make sense? Whateve, you know what I mean. I'm guessing it's about 60% real. I'm watching the current season of Survior and I'm really rooting for Team Awesome (Kota). The reason I bring this up is because I follow the recap of the show from TWoP, written by my new best friend Sara. She who I've never met, has never met me (far as I know) or even knows I exist. But that's o.k., we don't have to know each other. I really just love reading her recaps and blog. But there is one flaw in my new BFF. She's rooting for Team Not-So-Awesome (Fang) and also thinks that Jeff (TV Host) is against them and is only assisting with their downfall. That may be true. But in my defense (because somebody is attacking me right?), I've been cheering for Kota from day one. I think I'll do my own recap of the show. Kota won both challenges, Sugar went to Exile Pond and Ace got the boot. If I know one thing about Sara, she's as happy as I am about that. Oh, and the look on Mattys face was priceless. Like, banana: .50. green ball on my work desk: 1.00. Matty after he knows his only pal was duped by his fake girlfriend: priceless. Oh, and Dan who my wife thinks looks like Nick Lachey, also got the boot in a surprise double eviction! On a side note, Bob is awesome. I'm also a hockey face. The Wild lost last night 2-1, bummer. ha! I really meant to say hockey fan, but somehow typed out face. I'm keeping it there, my simple giggle for the day. Once my work day gets jumpin' there won't be many more. Undress and Possess

Where are my dollars going?

The dreaded pledge drive is in full force this week on Minnesota Public Radio. They are really hurting this time, the hosts are practically falling out the their chairs trying to get you to pledge. Maybe they should start adopting Howard Stern type stunts. Like maybe Gary Eichten can juggle midgets if we contribute just $10 a month!

Anyways, the point of all this is...I was listening to the radio and one of the programs was being sponsored by PBS. How weird is that? So, if I gave money to PBS, am I really supporting PBS or MPR?

I bested Best Buy

Don’t expect an entry this long very often. My life usually doesn’t lend its self to such tale very often.

My wife H (yeah, that’s her name, not legally, but most refer to her as such) had been meaning to clean out the inside of her camera. Took the lens off and started puffing air around using one of those baby nose mucus things. She then had the bright idea to clean the plastic part that helps you focus and frame your shot through the viewfinder. We took that piece out to get the few fuzzes and hairs that have gotten in there through the last couple of years. First of all, she couldn’t get it 100% clean. It would either have streaks on it, or water spots would show if we tried to let it air dry. After about 15 minutes, she got it to “good enough.” She gave the piece to me to put back in the camera. I end up dirtying it up again, and also made a good couple of scratches on it. That was bad.

H is now upset with the whole situation, questioning why she even started to clean it in the first place. We have the warranty on it, which also includes accidental drop coverage. Per the Best Buy website: We don't fix it—we replace it. I take it to Best Buy and speak to the folks there. They don’t want to replace it for me, they want to send it in for a repair, and it would be out for 3 weeks. That’s no good. H has two shoots lined up. So I take the camera over to a camera repair shop and they tell me that it would cost $250+ to fix the little plastic piece. Mind you that the newest model of this camera is only $799.

I tell H the news and she says that she’ll live with the scratches for the next two shoots then bring it in to Best Buy.

It’s about 6:30p now and H is off to her father’s 50^th birthday party. I get this great idea to try and take apart her camera, so I can damage it from the inside. I only plan to “damage” it in such a manner that I can fix it if my scheme doesn’t work. Unplug a few wires or something like that. I work at this for about 45 minutes. I can’t get all the screws off, and everything else looks like its pretty solid. No getting into it with out really breaking it.

I now know what I must do. I have to actually break this camera, so that is shows physical damage. I take a moment to syke myself up. I get dressed into my normal out-of-the-house wear and head down to my apartment parking lot. I stand by my car, trying to build up the courage to drop the camera. That takes about 10 minutes. I try and I try to let it drop out of my hand but I keep asking myself, what am I going to do if this doesn’t work. What happens if Best Buy doesn’t replace it for me on the spot? First, I would be a dead man. Second, I would never be able to live this down. I would be the worst person who ever lived. Then it happens. It falls out of my hand and lands on the asphalt. But it doesn’t break. I mean there are some nice gouges in the plastic case, but no broken parts inside. I guess that makes sense, these digital camera don’t have many moving parts, and I didn’t have the lens on. The hard part is over. I drop it a few more time and still nothing. I then take it and just start smashing it on the ground. The plastic lens that started all of this pops out but that’s about it. I decided to keep that part as a souvenir.

I think it looks pretty beat up now. As I head on over to Best Buy, I’m rocking out to my music, using the camera as a club to hit along with the beat. My heart is racing because I still can’t believe what I just did, and still wondering if I’m going to be able to pull this off. On my way there, I feel that it looks like it’s still just a few scratches. So I pull into a parking lot near Best Buy and look for something in my car that I can inflict further damage. I find my windshield scraper. That will do. I take the end of it (end of the handle, not the scraper) and just start jamming it into the digital screen that’s on the back. A couple of blows later the screen cracks. Success!

I walk on over to the Geek Squad desk and tell them “You gotta help me out guy, I was fucking around with my wife’s camera and when I was changing the lens, I dropped it from our third floor apartment. I need this fix tonight because she has a shoot tomorrow.” The Geek kid had this look on his face like he’s been there before. He started going into his speech about sending it out for repair. I thought I was fucked at this moment. I tell him that I talked to Best Buy customer service at their 1-800 number. 1-800 lady said that you would do this for me tonight. (Not true, she said it was up to the tech at the store, but he didn’t have to know that part). He’s like, “Oh you did? Why don’t you talk to our customer service people?” So I walk around the other side and tell them the same story. Poor kid there has no idea what to do. He gets a supervisor over to help out. She starts in with the repair speech and to send him over to Geek Squad. I step in here and say I’ve all ready spoke to them, they sent me here. I’m also stressing that I have the accidental drop coverage. I then bring up the talk I had with 1-800 lady. She starts talking to a supervisor for the Geeks. She then starts talking about getting a comparable SKU. I think my luck is picking up! She asks if I have the accessories and the lens. There’s only one reason why she would be asking for that right?! I head out to my car to get the other things. As I get back into the store, I see the box for the new camera. I’m super giddy at this point. I can’t believe I pulled this off.

I head on home, with the new camera. Open it up and put it in her camera bag. She calls me on her return home from the party. She’s going on and on about how much it’s going to suck with a scratched up viewfinder. It was hard not to tell her what I did.

She gets home and I tell her that I think I fixed her camera. She opens up her bag to find the new camera. She wonders how in the hell I did that. I told her “I beat the shit out of your camera.” She wants to throw up. She was telling me to stop telling her all of what I did. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to scold me, or hug me for getting the new toy in the manner that I did. I’m now a superstar in the house. I wonder how long I can ride this out?

The only thing I regret is that I didn’t take any pictures of the beat up camera.

The meaning of all this

O.k...so I decided that I'm a blogger. As of right now, this is just a test blog. Questions I'm hoping to answer with this are:

• Do I have enough to say each time I post to keep even myself interested in continuing the blog
• Does anybody else care? (I have the answer to this one, hoping for a surprise!)
• Can I keep up with it. As in, can I promise myself that I can post to this on a somewhat regular basis.

If I can answer these questions with a positive, I'll keep it going. If not BELETED! (not a typo, Strongbad, google it).

Special Moments

What to do when I'm bored...

My life is a bore, and not very interesting...so I think I'll just start making things up. Such as, I own 4 cars, all driven by my flock of geese.