Nonculture

4 Asbach colas, 2 captain/colas, 4 vodka orange, 1 scotch.  That is the roadmap from tonight.  So far.  Work’s been suckin’ blah blah, plus they’re talking about laying people off again, so why not…just, why not.  The fact that it’s Monday night is irrelevant.

I do have an untouched bottle of Bacardi left here by a friend, but I’m debating the rations of ice left and what they should be spent on.  Somehow, Bacardi never comes up in the top spot.  The scotch is top shelf, but I’m putting it on top of this sweet mixer, which is probably a mortal sin.  A proper mouthwash with it solves that, but it also nearly makes me gag.  The burn going down is excellent as usual, but the fucking taste in my mouth is as bad as the stale, smoky air trapped in this fucking cubbyhole in the apartment; and like work, it all truly makes me want to throw up.

I’m house hunting, which is unreal in itself.  I’m keeping my 13 year old bimmer on the road with electrical tape and brake fluid bottles every week, but it’s working.  Apparently there’s a loophole in the home buying system where they don’t care if you can get a car loan - fuck it, they’ll give you a house!  So, sure, I’m qualified, and looking.  My agent has so far sent me every house in the motherfucking ghetto, but to his credit, they’re fairly nice houses.  I think I’m going to go outside the box and get something in a decent neighborhood; if I have to lose the pool to do it, well, y’know.  Life is tough.

Shit, a fucking house.  I have trouble getting 300 dollar unsecured credit cards.  Say what now?  But, to be honest, I’ve rebuilt all of that bad 20’s anti-credit, and am now a responsible citizen.  Maybe they can smell it on me.  Or maybe they can smell the fact that my credit score has jumped over 100 points in two years.  Either way, they need to get their noses out of my ass.  Maybe they smell me giving up.

I’m semi-under the grid.  Being completely off the grid would be awesome, but outside of winning the lottery or walking down to the labor pool every day at 7am, I don’t see a way to pull it off.  The labor pool isn’t that bad; I did it for a while.  You walk down, sign up, and wait for a job to come up.  Sometimes you wait for an hour or two and you are shit out of luck, but if you do get called, chances are it’s some kind of new shitty job in some new area with some other shitty boss.  The variety isn’t all that bad.  The work, maybe, but like today being Monday, that’s irrelevant for this post. 

I’m sure that made sense somehow.

Unless you are homeless or extremely good looking, you probably have heard about the supercollider whatever that they built in France, and the theoretical danger it poses.  They finally got it cooled down to “space” temperature and the day it turns on approaches.

http://www.lhcountdown.com/

When they turn this thing on and it creates a black hole the size of a silver dollar, it is going to eat everything and we will all be slowly pulled into France.  I know, everybody’s worst nightmare, because once you enter the borders of France your will to fight against the pull of the black hole will just evaporate and you will try to surrender to the black hole.  Unfortunately, black holes don’t take prisoners.   Still, you might want to buy a beret and a mime outfit, because I hear those are popular where we all will be going.

So, you may want to rethink your life real quick like, then go ahead and do all of those things you’ve been putting off.  Me, I’m going to finish this drink then pour another and watch the chaos from my porch in my overpriced run down apartment.  Because I’m already living the dream; I have it all.

Back a few posts ago (find it yourself), I mentioned that a small dream of mine was that somebody would do a retrospective on our current failure of a President.  I thought Michael Moore might wind up at the helm, but apparently Oliver Stone has already been filming “W”, which covers G-Dub and his fascinating fumble to power.

In Stone’s words, the film asks: “How did Bush go from being an alcoholic bum to the most powerful figure in the world?” 

http://www.slate.com/id/2188423/

 So, kind of, in a way, I can relate to Bush.  Because I’m an alcoholic bum too.  And apparently I could be president as well.  I should look into that.

Slate goes on to say that the script is uninspired - and they review it at the link above.  But, I don’t care if it’s uninspired, because it inspires me nonetheless to watch it and probably even buy the DVD even though I decided months ago not to buy DVD’s until Blu-Ray prices came down…and until I got a Blu-Ray player.

Oliver Stone making this is a bit more bonus than I expected, because Stone doesn’t pull punches and gets more attention across party lines.  Aka, the Republicans might not dismiss it right off the bat, like they would if Moore had made one.

Admittedly, looking through quotes from the script, it looks weak.  Really weak.  Hopefully it’s tweaked during production.  The latest news from production is that 2 of the actors got in a fistfight at a wrap-up party, then the cops showed up and tased the shit out of Wright while he already lay prone in the street and called him the “N-word” (it’s being filmed in the south).  Meanwhile, Brolin got a face full of mace for offering no protest at all.  Allegedly, of course.  Regardless, that is some high drama.  Hopefully the fight was just carry over energy from all the high drama that will be W, and wasn’t just two drunk, spoiled actors playing grab-ass. 

On a side note, I was on the way to lunch today with some coworkers, and one of them said “too bad we can’t impeach Bush, it’s too late.”  I said it’s not too late - at least we can show, just for historical posterity, that we weren’t bad Americans for the whole 8 years…just for 7 ½ of them.  So, there are lots of people out there who still think it would be a good idea .  And some of them are even Republican, tax-paying, hard-working, “patriots”.

Some fun related links:

Bush schedules a pep talk about the economy at the same time the Fed Chairman does…interestingly they have different viewpoints.  Coincidence?

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=176740&title=headlines-its-the-stupid-economy

Bush tours the U.S. to survey his disastrous presidency

http://www.theonion.com/content/video/bush_tours_america_to_survey

Oh January 2009, where art thou.

Photo is from maroonedinmarin.blogspot.com…in case they want credit.

It’s summer, a time to hang out with your friends at BBQ’s and enjoy the sun and drink beer.  Then either puke or make a pass at somebody’s wife and get punched in the face, whichever way you roll.  And what can make a BBQ better than friendly drinking outdoor games that involve everybody and get you shit faced as fast as possible? 

Nothing, of course.

So here is a review of the summer BBQ games that you might be enjoying over the next few months if you have any friends, and some notes on them.  Notes on the games, not your loser friends; nobody cares about your fucking life enough to take notes, sorry to break it to you.

Beer Pong

America’s frat house favorite, Beer Pong is a game that will get you fucked up right quick, especially if you have bad hand eye coordination.  You use a ping pong or ping pong-like table and set up plastic beer cups in a bowling pin shape on either end and try to throw a ping pong ball into the beer (half full).  If it goes in, you or your teammate have to drink the beer.  Pretty simple.  There are other rules about whether you bounce it off the table or throw it right in (it’s easier to throw it right in, plus the opponents can swat away a bounce…but a bounce is worth 2 drinks) - and there are other rules but the main point to hit on with Beer Pong is that it is actually fun, especially the drunker you get.  It is also the most unsanitary game on the planet because the balls bounce off of the table and all over the place, but what are you, some kind of germ pussy?

Beer Pong hint:  You can try throwing at the same time as your partner and have one of you choose to bounce it.  Distract the other team with a regular shot, then a split second behind it have the other team member bounce it in.  Also, if you are interested in a girl at the party, ask her to be on your team then either tank it so that she has to chug beers fast, or compete honestly and try to win to keep the table.  Because you are going to be drinking regardless, and it’s proven that girls are actually very good at this particular game.  I don’t have any science to that, just going from experience.

Cornhole

Throw the bean bag into the hole.  Take a drink or hand out drinks accordingly, however you want to do it.  I’ve played this, but it was set up on my dogturd mine field of a yard, so a hint with this one would be not to own a dog.

Washers

This surprisingly complicated game, for being invented by someone with obviously a lot of free time and washers and pvc pipe on hand, is actually a lot of fun.  Much like the other games, you and your partner stand at each box half (though opposite sides) and you try to throw your 4 washers into the box, into the pvc pipe in the middle, or land it on the edge of the box.  Each is worth different points, and certain points wipe each other out, and so fucking on.  This is easy to set up, or even build yourself, if you have a lot of free time and washers and pvc pipe hanging around.  Otherwise get it on Amazon, like the rest of these.

Washers hint:  Try throwing the washers with a backwards spin, this seems to make them stay in the box more.  And don’t play on concrete around children; that was a mistake.  Metal washers bounce off of concrete.

Top Toss

Somebody I know owns one these, though not the fancy NASCAR one, but it just sat to the side the entire BBQ and nobody showed interest in it.  Probably because it not only looks difficult even if you are sober, it also looks stupid.

Nonculture Drinking Darts

This is a homegrown invention, aka a Nonculture premiere.  Set up a dartboard outside - on the garage door or wherever.  You play a regular game of cricket (3 each of 15-20 plus bull…wiki it).  Also, set up cups underneath the board in whatever pattern you like.  Because as the beers go on, darts will be falling.

Here are the drinking rules:

DART IN MUG ON FLOOR = DRINK WHOLE DRINK

DOUBLE = PASS OUT 1 DRINK

TRIPLE = PASS OUT 2 DRINK

BULL = SOCIAL, EVERYBODY TAKES 1 DRINK

DOUBLE BULL = EVERYBODY TAKES 2 DRINKS

LOSING BY MORE THAN 9 HITS = TAKE 2 DRINKS

LAND A DART ON LEDGE = TAKE A DRINK AND PASS OUT 1 DRINK

 Darts hint:  I recommend only playing steel tip darts on real boards, not electronic darts.

Happy drinking.

“Dr.AliyuUmar” <umaraliyu@millarumrali.com>

—————————————–

I knew something like this would happen someday.  I’ve just had that feeling, all my life, that my ship would come in.  I just had to be patient.  And as you can see, good things come to those who wait.  Though I can’t believe I din’t show up (oh no I din’t!), I see other arrangements can be made for me to pick up my birthright of 600,000.00 dollars.  I’m glad there were no cents added to the amount, because that would look suspicious.  I did look twice at the fact that Dr. Ahmed Umar doesn’t capitalize his “I’s” when referring to himself, but that is probably just because he is humble and does not want to flaunt his title of “Doctor” and “Minister of Finance” as the executor of my birthright.  Of 600,000.00 US, I must repeat.  Plus, he sounds Saudi, and they are all rich, so I’m certain this is legit.

Obviously I need to contact the finance minister’s secretary to correct my “delivery address” before I get my chedda, but I’ve already taken some steps towards my new life.  I’ve quit my job and told my landlord that I’ll be moving out within the week.  I’ve booked the Orlando Magic Dancers for a mud wrestling party, and…well that took up my life savings, but hell, that was peanuts compared to my new roll of cash.

I can’t wait to start my new life.  I’m sure it’ll be so different from my current life of drinking and fucking around and not thinking beyond the next few months.  I can feel the wind of change!

Just like Rudi Schenker!

And pirates are what made this country great.  Well, at least the one to the left here has helped make it tolerable for me.  So, that’s worth something.

I’ve gone through and cleaned up previous posts so that they are now somewhat legible, and maybe even logical enough to be entertaining.  Depending on how wasted you are.  This is going back up for public view since I’ll be linking it from my other, new blog, The Literate Hypocrite (see blogroll to right).  It’s a site for drunken book reviews that make very little sense.  Because somebody’s got to do it.

So, with Captain Morgan in hand, we’re back online!  Oh, and I added my latest story, Downfall of Houlis, to celebrate all this online-ness, even though the story is still in its 4th draft and needs some work.  It’s your basic bar story, as usual.  Have to have the short story collection ready by October, so back to work. 

Happy 4th, mofos.

Yeah, so, I don’t know what the problem with the booze is, but it hasn’t been going down so well the past oh, 10 or so days.  Could be stress.  Or the lack of time caused by the stress.  But I think it’s stress, which is weird, because it is usually stress that causes an increase in the booze.  So go figure on that one, Miss North Carolina.

I didn’t really miss the booze too much.  I didn’t really sit there saying, “Damn, I need a drink.”  Which is super neat and all that, but I seem to have some side effects from not drinking over the past 10 days.  These side effects are not the side effects that I expected to have.  In fact, they are the opposite.  They are:

1. I’m way fucking over stressed.  Maybe I should diet.  Or exercise.  Or generally change my lifestyle.  Alright, that’s a stretch; have they invented a pill that simulates eating a salad and running while you actually drink a rum and coke and sit and write?  I’m a sedentary heart attack waiting to happen. But that’s ok; I’ll still be clutching my lottery ticket in my rigor mortis grip.  Because I am filled with hope.  That is why people buy lottery tickets; they are happy, hopeful people.
2. I’m just a tad bit more impatient than usual.  For instance, I’ve been finishing all of my girlfriend’s sentences for her because I am so impatient that I think I am clairvoyant and I think I know what she is going to say.  So I finish our conversation before she has 3 words out of her mouth, then turn my head and continue what I was doing.  I’m sure that isn’t annoying to her at all.
3. I have this awesome appointment with the toilet from 3 to 4 am for a massive mud shit that is painful, yet somehow gratifying.  Just, y’know, throwing that one out there.  I haven’t figured out yet where this fits in, especially since I used to think that this part especially was alcohol related.  Now I’m really fucking confused.

Needless to say, I finally got some drinks down tonight.  It feels good.  And it’s Friday, but that stress is still sitting there, on my shoulder like a fucking pirate’s parrot, ready to repeat any negative thought right back into my ear.  I want to wring its neck, but it’s imaginary.  At least that’s what my therapist says, but I don’t know if I believe him.  Peg Leg Petey the Parrot is real, I tell you.

Or whatever my job title is.  I don’t even know what it is, because I don’t give a fuck what it is, to be honest.  It doesn’t matter unless there is a “manager’ of some kind in front of it.  I’m a year older and still in the trenches and am not getting glitter on my face tonight.  So, some stripper isn’t singing me Happy Birthday Mr. fucking President, which I guess is good, especially since being the real president isn’t even good these days.

Don’t even know what to say about this birthday.  It’s a weird one, a big number.  I think my father was that age when I began to remember things.  So, is it fitting that I’ve developed a drinking problem that helps me forget things at this age since I have no children at this age?  Can you even follow that line of reasoning?

My girlfriend asked me if I’d have a problem turning this age and I told her in no uncertain terms, hell no.  Well, I’m thinking now that maybe I do.  But I’m not sure if they are issues carried over from the year or if they have to do with the turning of, basically, kind of old.  Old enough where even I feel like creepy old guy when I go downtown drinking and can’t help but look at the 18 year olds dressed in those short short skirts with practically nothing else on.  Let’s be honest; they’re hot as hell and legal, or they wouldn’t be down there in the first place, and maybe one in a hundred could be into older guys.  So maybe you’ve still got a chance, creepy old ogling guys.  Just stop tucking your polo shirts into your hiked up khakis and/or flashing big belt buckles.  It doesn’t work like it did in 1980, hotshot.

 Anyway, all this talk about 18 year olds and strippers is making me want to hit Dancers Royale, the closest strip club.  Except Dancers Royale is also the shittiest strip club on the planet.  Once we took a cab there drunk from downtown, walked in, ordered a drink, saw the girls and walked out.  The cabbie had barely left the parking lot.  Looking at cigarette burned skanks with cellulite can kill your mood pretty quick.

But, by my logic, I could still pull some hot young tail if I played the odds.  I’m going to have to order some Viagra as a present to myself, and as a reminder not to give up hope.  So, happy birthday to me, Mr. Old Ogling Computer Guy!

I’ll tell you one thing; sake does not stay hot for long.  That shit is annoying.  I’m tired of reheating the shit, so it’s back to Asbach and coke for the night. 

I think most of the guys I know, myself included, are going through the mid-life crisis.  But there’s a lot of weird shit about that, especially since it hasn’t been redefined since the last 1970’s Corvette ad.  It’s not like that now, and it happens before you are 40.  Acceleration of culture and all that shit.  And yeah, nobody wants a goddamn ‘Vette anymore.  And we aren’t really skirt chasing either.  Sure, we think about young, tight ass, but the allure is fleeting, pleasant; like the thought of a trip to strip club is, or how driving the latest 6 series would be when one passes us would be is.  But a strip club is out of the way, expensive, and somewhat of a pain in the ass, and a 6 series is expensive and impractical - both are hard to justify in daylight.  It’s not a genuine pursuit. 

We’re half dead; we know it, we accept it.  It’s ok.  We’re not trying to fight it off with sports cars or silicone face slaps these days.  But we are trying to accept it with the proper grace.

Ah, but what is the proper grace these days?  That is what we are trying to find out.  We’re bouncing around like pinballs between depression, rounds of golf, trips to Vegas that are disappointing,  hours spent at poker tables winning or losing (doesn’t matter), fishing, fuck - whatever - we’re fucking searching for what drove us when we were young.  The thing we don’t realize is that when we were young it was blind ambition, the world was wide open - it could be a career, rock star, family, lottery, all at the same impossible, improbable time.  Because we were young and naïve, aka stupid.  Now we have some mix and/or one of whatever of those.  And we wonder what might have been.  Even more importantly, it was ok NOT to have ambition and just be - it was ok to just live and see what happened.  I would be lying if I said I never thought about trying that shit - just being - traveling on a shoestring budget and going whichever way the wind blew, but I know where that road goes.  I’d be writing this on a 2 by 3 memo spiral memo pad from a bench at the bus station with the plastic from the tip of my shoelace if I tried that shit now.  And I’d smell like ass, but you know how it is.

Not that I speak for everybody, of course.  There are those who take risks.  I’ can understand the guy who divorces his wife and kicks the kids to the curb and gets a phat crib downtown to nail some hot talent every night. You gotta look good to try that one though.  Keep trim at Metro Muscle.  Wear expensive dark striped shirts and Lucky Jeans from Park Ave and leather sandals.  Your sideburns and smartly spiked hair should only be done by boutiques from within a 5 mile radius of Thornton Park.  Find a good coke dealer.  If you aren’t individually wealthy enough to tan during the day, self tan at an artificial place, but be sure that it looks natural, because people in that scene can tell the difference between a real tan (money) and a fake tan (has to work).  One misstep can cause a crisis in your carefully planned 2^nd adolescence.

You see, crisis comes in all forms, whether you are sitting on a bench at the bus station, or on your Adirondack on your 2 Million studio balcony overlooking Lake Eola.

The difference is definition of crisis.  To the person at the Waverly on their Adirondack, crisis is dropping a precious Chihuahua into the bushes next to a Mercedes AMG, where the Chihuahua might not feel comfortable because he prefers to only ride in Porches.  Whereas, to the person at the bus station, the crisis is the anal raping that could include getting A.I.D.S.  It’s always important to see things from both perspectives, and the lesson here is that from the perspective of near middle aged guys, they have it tough, but not as tough as near middle aged guys in the 70’s, because they all had to buy Corvettes. 

So shut up about that beating and raping, poor bus station person.  We all have our problems.  Jesus.

I dunno, I guess this is the way the day was supposed to wind up.  My girlfriend has been wanting to throw up Japanese food and Chardonnay all over bums at the crosswalk, and I gave my last two smokes away to some couple at Monkey Bar for some god fucking unknown reason.  I probably gave it to them because I just got paid and I feel rich for a day, and they were out, and why the fuck not.  Now, I’m not only wishing I had those two cigarettes, I’m wishing I had the chairs, and was at the bar, and maybe even wasn’t myself right now.

I’m at that corner of Central and whatever that godforsaken street Casey’s bar meets Central Avenue is.  Most natives know that sinkhole.  There is a bus stop there; usually filled by cabs, bums, drunks, people you don’t want to see at any given hour.  I am in this sinkhole now, having crawled here after slithering out of the elevator of Monkey bar, through Slingapour’s outside bar, and across bum park.

My usually reliable mental case of a cab driver hasn’t shown up, and Faith has slid down to her ass on a traffic light pole, wanting to spew all over passers by.  I’m left with her goddamn Prada purse that I bought her on sale in my hand while her eyes glaze at the passing rims, and I have a half broken cigarette in my mouth that I’ve pulled from my pocket that I’m desperate to light.  I’ve got plenty from my paycheck in my pocket, but at this moment, it doesn’t help me fix my cigarette, light it, get the cab here, fill my drink, help my girl throw up…fuck, I don’t know what the sequence is.  I don’t know what I want the sequence to be.  I guess I’m old now; part of me wants to be home too.  The magic mental midget cabbie carpet should be here already to whisk us home, where the girl will fall asleep in her panties on top of the covers and I’ll stay up writing, drunk, to try to say something interesting about something.

So, here I am, in about that situation. My usually reliable mental case of a cab driver and I got in a shouting match in the driveway because she didn’t like the puking in the cab.  But my girlfriend, it turns out, is very handy with a plastic bag and puke.  The cabbie couldn’t argue with no spillage, so she decided to argue with the possibility of spillage.  Which is a pretty thin argument, but as I mentioned, all of her marbles arent’ there.  So we went round and round, arguing in the driveway about the possibility of my girlfriend having puked on something in her precious cab.  I like those arguments.  Because I win them.  Even with slightly challenged people.  Maybe especially with.  Maybe only with.  I dunno.  I don’t count.

I don’t know what I want the sequence to be.  That’s honest.  Just let me be the DJ.  Let me hold the mouse to the iTunes forward button while it is on random.  Sometimes it has fits, and those fits are unbearable.  Sometimes it chooses exactly what you want, but exactly what you want ­isn’t exactly what you want halfway through.  We’ve all been there.  That song that’s great that turns bad.  That song that has great memories that turns into something else, that turns into regrets, into streams of things that could have been, could have been paths of totally  - whoa, this is getting off on fifty tangents here.  Alright, enough left field for one post. This should come with a disclaimer but, shit.