Can't wait for this movie

Despite the fact that they obviously used the same art director they used for the poster for the 40-Year-Old Virgin, I gotta admit, this is a highly effective teaser poster. Where does the line start?

And now, for the news...

It was a weird news day.

Suspicious devices found all over Boston that sent Homeland security in to full battle mode turned out to be promo materials for the Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. Note to Homeland Security: Hire more people under the age of thirty! Please go back to your lives as normal folks, or else the Mooninites win.


There are parents threatening to boycott any future Harry Potter movies because Daniel Ratcliffe is doing a play in London where he shows off the little Harry Potter. People, it's a goddamned play. Seats are limited. Unless your pre-teen daughter is begging you for a plane ticket to London, settle the fuck down. You can't blame the kid for wanting to avoid typecasting, otherwise I've got two words for you: Mark Hamill.


A woman in Florida gets raped. While being returned to the scene of the crime, the cops find out about an outstanding warrant for her and arrest her. The emergency room doctor gives her the Plan B pills. She takes the first dose, and was supposed to take the second dose within 12 hours for it to work, but a religious nutjob who works at the jail refuses to allow her to take the second dose. Insult upon insult to injury. That tops any "bad day" story anyone has ever had.

Speaking of which, I've been noticing that the same pro-life zealots putting up the "Birth Control is Harmful" billboards around town are now offering couseling for women who've already had abortions. Great...shame-based therapy.

Of course, shame-based therapy may be the order of the day for this guy. Now, I'm all for making your job a little more fun...but if you're a cop, and you bust a teenage couple for rounding third base in the back seat of their car, you don't offer them freedom in exchange for the girl doing topless jumping jacks! I have never understood the appeal of seeing women doing any form of exercise topless. Breasts are supposed to be admired in slow-motion and in soft focus, preferably with some Marvin Gaye playing in the background. Maybe it's because I came of age on a steady diet of arty and airbrushed, but as Seinfeld once put it, "There's good naked and then there's bad naked."

And, back to Homeland Security. If you're going to the Super Bowl on Sunday, and you're undergoing radiation treatments, you better take a note from your doctor. Cancer patients are setting off dirty bomb detectors. Can't you just picture the crew from the Make-A-Wish Foundation having to deal with this shit? Little eight-year-old Timmy spent his once-in-a-lifetime chance to see the Super Bowl in a holding cell being interrogated by the FBI. It's kinda hard to claim jihad with a zero t-cell count, guys.

Moving past frustration to uncontrolable laughter

Last week I had a project for one of our more high-maintenance clients. It was a program (she called it a flyer) for a performance they were putting on. On Thursday, I got an email from her telling me it was perfect, so we got it on the press right away.

Friday morning, she emailed me saying she needed a PDF of the flyer for the performance so the theater could do something with. She said she needed the one with the white space at the bottom. The one I just did, however, didn't have this white space she spoke of. I assumed that she meant that she needed a PDF-only version of the layout that would have space for mailing information. I sent her an email to clarify this.

By the time I was getting ready to leave, I had not heard back from her yet. So, I emailed her a PDF of the program we just printed for her with the message "please let me know what changes I need to make to this PDF for the theater people in regards to this 'white space" thing."

I get into the office yesterday to find three messages from her. The first one telling me that she wanted the PDF of the full-color POSTCARD we did for her back in May. That's what she meant! The second message was the same as the first, only worded a little stronger, and this time in all caps with at least five exclamation points at the end of each sentence. The third was a forwarding of her email from Friday morning with the words "CAN'T YOU READ?!?!?!!!!"

Calling me an idiot three times before I get my coffee. Wait, it gets better...

A few minutes later, she requests changes to the program we just printed with blank space on it for mailing info. I inform her that it had already been printed, and she goes absolutely apeshit! "Why did you ask me about changes, then?" Because I thought you only wanted the changes made for a PDF version of the file for the theater people to use, and I've already apologized for that mix-up. "Why did you print it already?" Because you told me on Thursday that it was perfect! "I can't accept these without space for mailing." Then, we'll re-print it.

Even more mind-boggling, she emails me a PDF of the postcard to show me what she need s a PDF of!

I make the changes to the program, email her a proof and mark the already printed pieces to go to the recycling plant. Within an hour, I get an email back saying it looks perfect...again. I fight the temptaion to ask her if she's sure, and decided to wait a few minutes. Sure enough, she writes back to tell me of another change. I make those changes and proof it again with her. She approves it, but I'm still waiting until the morning to send it to the press...just in case another change comes in overnight.

In the midst of all the emails she sent me today, 23 in total, she asks me to put together a newspaper ad for the performance. She sends me a link to the newspaper's ad specs. There are seven different ad sizes, so I write her back to ask her which one she wants. Her response: "I already emailed you the link to the ad specs!"

I inform her of the seven different ad sizes listed in the specs, and I get back the message: "Oh, full page, sorry." Great, color or black/white? "Color." I hand off the info so a work order can be written, and in the meantime, I get another message: "WAIT!!! We want a HALF PAGE instead. Still in color, though!"

Again, I'm waiting for whatever weird changes come in overnight before I proceed. All throughout this ordeal, I successfully fought off the temptaion to write this woman "Please ask your doctor if Zanax is right for you."

Monday Night Caption Contest

Post your captions in the comment section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. Okay, I don't know how they managed to sneak a camera into my subconscience, but that settles it. No more garlic bread pizza right before bedtime.

2. Wanna know something really scary? I found this picture attached to an ad on Craigslist. Even scarier, this guy was trying to sell a used futon.


The winner of last week's contest, much against my personal policy regarding puns, was CleverName with the caption "Apple's new EyePod". I must admit, the pun was pretty good, but what makes me laugh harder is the thought that, odds are, Apple's gonna do something like this one day.

Tweakers, puking fiddlers, thieves and drunk, drunk people

Last night was the first time I worked the door at Arnie's in almost a month. Larkin was playing, which is enough of an indicator of a strange night ahead. However, just when I think I've run out of new experiences to have on this job, something even stranger always happens.

Early in the night, I glanced out the front windows to see a guy sitting on the bench outside. At first blush, it appeared he was talking to himself. Then, his movements got a little more erratic. I asked a guy coming in to the bar what the guy was doing out there, and I was told he was rapping to himself. I really didn't mind what he did out there. He appeared to be off in his own little world. As long as he wasn't bothering the customers as they came in or started begging for money, I was willing to just let him be.

Just as I pointed the guy out to one of the owners, he leaned forward on the bench and it looked like he was going into convulsions. She leaned out the door to ask the guy if he was okay, and he just flipped out. He was picking up and throwing anything he could get his hands on, and as we got closer to him, he'd back away, screaming his head off, doing some badly coordinated karate moves and making absolutely no sense whatsoever. Case in point, after a botched roundhouse air-kick that threw himself off-balance, he screamed, "I'm undercover! Do you really want to mess with me? I'll rat you out to your parents!"

It was one of those things that simultaneously weirded us all out, scared us a little, but most of all, made us laugh our asses off. He eventually left...with his brain firing off like a set of tangled christmas lights, screaming like a madman. A walking poster for drug prevention. It makes me wonder why people start taking meth in the first place. It's hard to imagine someone seeing a guy like that and saying to themselves, "That guy's got the right idea. I gotta get me some of that action."

As Larkin was setting up, we got the news that their fiddle player was home sick with the flu. Karen, the fiddle player, told them she'd try to make it, but as soon as the words "puking my guts out" were mentioned, they decided it would be best for her not to come in for the gig. Besides, can you imagine having to hold a bucket in front of someone playing a violin for four hours? They briefly considered calling in a replacement, but ultimately it was decided that they'd rather go one one member short than have someone who didn't know all the songs. The irony was that while they were mulling it over, I saw at least three people from the Tulsa Symphony performance that just let out walk past the front of the bar with violin cases on their backs.

Another bit of irony for you: Around 12:30, I had a guy try to leave the bar with an empty beer pitcher. He had it barely hidden under his coat, but he was so drunk that he started taking it out of his coat before he made it completely out of the bar. I swiped it back and told him to get lost. About an hour later, one of the girls with him came back to the bar frantically trying to find her wallet. She found it, only it was completely cleaned out. Her cash, credit cards, ID, everything was taken. He failed at stealing, and his friend turned out to be a victim. Gotta love karma.

So, I made it through another weird night working the door. I got to thinking how this job has changed my perspective. I remembered how there was once a time when closing down the bar bummed me out and the only cure for it was to head to Village Inn for some pancakes. Now, I find myself really wanting to get home as soon as possible, but only after making sure my friends are gonna get home safe..and I find myself sick of everyone else. I used to commiserate with total strangers as we were getting ushered out the door at closing time. Now, it's like "C'mon...those telephone poles aren't gonna hit themselves. Time to go, buddy!"

We can be heroes...but there's a catch

Imagine you could have a superpower, but with limits. Which would you rather have?

1. You could see the future, but only a couple minutes ahead.
2. You can move things with your mind, but only things you could easily move normally.
3. You can fly, but you're afraid of heights.
4. You have X-ray vision, but only good for about a 1/16 of an inch.
5. You can't walk through walls, but you can fall through floors...but sometimes you can't control it...and you live on the fifth floor of your building.
6. You can hear other people's thoughts, but only in backwards Portuguese...with a lisp.
7. You can communicate with the animals, but you're allergic.
8. You can shoot laser beams from your eyes, but only with the approximate strength of a laser pointer.
9. You can't make yourself invisible, but you can decrease your opacity to about 20%.
10. You can hear things at great distances, but you can't hear anything within 100 feet of you.
11. You can control the weather, but can only adjust the temperature a few degrees...however, you have total control over upper-atmosphere humidity.
12. A highly evolved sense of smell, but you live with very gassy people.
    

Best, better, good, bad, worse, worst

Best: Home run
Better: Third base
Good: Second base
Bad: First base
Worse: Goodnight hug with sympathetic pat on the back
Worst: Restraining order

Best: Free dinner in a fancy restaurant
Better: Dinner in a fancy restaurant and the credit card isn't declined
Good: Dinner, period
Bad: Food poisoning
Worse: Parasite
Worst: Symbiant

Best: Powerball jackpot
Better: Scratch-off winner
Good: Found five bucks on the sidewalk
Bad: Overdraft
Worse: Audit
Worst: Garnished wages

Best: Mortgage paid off
Better: Refinancing at a lower interest rate
Good: Efficiency apartment
Bad: YMCA
Worse: Youth Hostel
Worst: Sidewalk

Best: Being the boss
Better: Promoted
Good: Raise
Bad: Demoted
Worse: Fired
Worst: On fire, literally

Best: A movie that changes your life
Better: A good movie
Good: A movie
Bad: Loud talkers
Worse: Broken projector
Worst: David Spade

Best: Empire Strikes Back
Better: A New Hope
Good: Revenge of the Sith
Bad: The Ewok Adventures
Worse: Holiday Special
Worst: The Phantom Menace

Best: Original
Better: Clever homage
Good: Parody
Bad: Remake
Worse: Re-imagining
Worst: Michael Bay

Best: Yeats
Better: Cummings
Good: Kerouac
Bad: Haikus
Worse: Limerics
Worst: Jewell

Best: Loved
Better: Needed
Good: Wanted
Bad: Denied
Worse: Ignored
Worst: Mind games

Approaching done

I have three boxes left to unpack tonight. Then, I'm done until I get my drafting table back from my mom.

I kinda over-extended my bank account this week. I went to Target on Sunday, and they've always been good about not posting the payment to my account for at least two days. Unfortunately, it posted Monday night, so it overdrew my account. And because of my bank's policy of posting debits from highest to lowest, I got $75 on overdraft charges, instead of $25 if they went the other way. So, I had to float a quick loan from the folks to be able to eat for the next couple weeks.

Speaking of which, I cooked my first meal in my new place. Since I'm watching the cash flow, I cooked a pot of chili. At least seven meals worth for just under $12. Sure, I've got enough gas to achieve liftoff, but I'm saving money, dammit!

It looks like money won't be much of an issue very soon. Every day at 4:55, I ask my boss if he's got anything he needs me to take care of before I leave. Today, he said he had enough on his desk to keep me busy until midnight, but he said it could wait until tomorrow.

I've been busy ass hell as it is, and the only thing that's kept me sane has been tons of green tea and DVDs playing in the background while I work. However, I need to think things out a little more than I do. The two DVDs I had to choose from today were the Godfather and the Muppet Movie. Weird double feature, there.

Tomorrow night, I'll get to go catch an advance screening of Catch and Release...gotta love having friends at the Tulsa World with access to free passes. However, the passes I've gotten so far has been for chick flicks, but a free movie is still a free movie.

Monday Night Caption Contest

Fire away, kids. Post your captions in the comment section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. Someday, technology will advance to the point where the latest innovation won't make you look like a total idiot.

2. That reminds me...gotta sell off my Oakley stock.


The winner of last week's contest is Watercolor Trapezoid with the caption "On the news today: Cloned cat experiment is going well scientist say. The new study actually uses one specimen to clone another within. Cat is expected to birth itself within the normal gestation period."

Just the visual of a cat giving birth to itself cinched the deal for me.

I'm moved in

I've been moving all this week, and it's been going really smooth. The old apartment is all cleared out, swept, mopped and damn near sterile. The new place is almost completely unpacked. The living room is just how I want it, and now I've run out of furniture for the rest of the apartment. I'll be getting my huge-ass drafting table back from my mom, and that should taake care of the big empty space in the middle of the dining room.

Thursday night was my first official night in the new place. I had five of my friends help me move all the big stuff as well as whatever we could fit in their respective cars. I did have to resort to a bit of disception, though, by not telling them until we got everytrhing loaded up that my new place is on the second floor...and there's a curve on the stairs...and the ice was worse at the new place than at the new place. Everything was loaded and unloaded in about an hour, so at least the torture didn't last long.

Chuck took a couple days to get used to the new place. Apparently, he had a fear of ceiling fans, so the living room and bedroom was avoided at all costs unless I was in there with him. He's good now.

Even though the old place is all cleaned out, I'm gonna wait a week to turn in the key. I gotta let the change of address take effect before I will finally be rid of that place. Given the fact that when I moved in there, there was a stack of old mail about a foot high, I don't feel too comfortable leaving my credit card apps around for the next guy.

I'll take the next week to finish unpacking. I've got the place comfortable enough at this point.