31 Things I've Learned in 31 Years

1. Dogs are indeed better than cats. But they require commitment and constant attention. People who insist that cats are better tend to view themselves as intellectuals, usually do not like children, have either too much or too little disposable income, and do not make good drinking buddies.

2. Ten years ago I was infinitely smarter than my father. He's grown much wiser, while I've become much dumber.

3. The ability to drive stick, shoot a gun, and balance a check book are far more important criteria by which to judge women than a pretty smile and nice boobs.

4. That most annoying attribute of the male species which causes us to go weak in the knees, lose total cognitive function, and all but drool on ourselves when a pretty girl smiles at us doesn't get better. It gets worse.

5. Yes. Men really are thinking about sex every 1.7 seconds. Even those of us who try to disguise it by being sensitive, good listeners, engaging in meaningful conversation, or any other facet of adult like behavior that doesn't involve thinking about your num-nums. Or we're gay.

6. There are plenty of Nancy's in the world, but real men have two emotions. Anger and nothing. If we're not angry, there is nothing happening upstairs. If we're dancing drunkenly around a bonfire with our buddies, we're not happy. That's just euphoric rage.

7. It is no longer possible to throw two cans of refried black beans, a bag of frozen corn, half a jar of salsa, and a handful of shredded "Mexican" taco cheese in a pot, consume it, and not suffer near immediate, and dire gastrointestinal consequences.

8. Life doesn't come at you fast. It's actually rather slow and predictable. It's only the things you were too ignorant, or too negligent to prepare for that hit you like a freight train.

9. Toddlers become increasingly more charming the more you age. The shrieking, temper tantrums, and otherwise annoying behavior that vexed you at 25, is absolutely delightful once you know that it is only a phase.

10. People die. Suddenly and unexpectedly. You may never have a chance to make amends for the hurtful things you said. Think about it the next time you end a conversation on a sour note.

11. Those useless, well-dressed, student-council type, preppy jackasses in high school really did grow up to be politicians and lawyers. They're still well-dress, preppy jackasses, and they're just as useless.

12. The Gov't is totally damned. Changing the political affiliation of the Commander in Chief, — or blaming all of the current administration's shortcomings on him—, isn't going to change things. The whole lot of them need to be fired.

13. Because someone speaks with a foreign accent doesn't mean you're smarter than they are. Do you speak two languages? Three? No? Then it's safer to assume they're smarter than you. STFU. Maybe you'll learn something.

14. Racism is the safe-haven of shallow, self-absorbed, insecure idiots. Stereo-types are damn funny though. If you can't laugh at the nacho cheese joke, — regardless of race, color, or creed—, then you need a mental enema. Or perhaps you should consider a career with the ACLU.

15. Decent looking men who can cook, — and I mean really cook, not whip together a pseudo-shrimp scampi drenched in a two dollar bottle of Newman's Marinara Sauce with a $10 dollar bottle of wine because they're trying to get their dour, disappointed, materialistic wife in the sack on Valentine's day—, were probably painfully shy in highschool, probably didn't play varsity sports, but were nevertheless clever enough to discover an alternative method of bedding cheerleaders. They're worth talking to. And will almost certainly make good business partners. Unless they're also cat lovers. In which case they're gay.

16. Men who can bake, — and I mean really bake—, are gay.

17. Friends are important. The best ones are the ones you don't have to see or talk to for months, even years at a time, but they'll show up out of nowhere when you need them.

18. Only couples without children can pull off the whole "soul-partner we share everything, go everywhere together, everything is equal" load of imaginary Valentine's day marketing gimmick bull poop. The rest of us do indeed need our space, need our friends, and sometimes need to keep things, — even semi-important things— from our spouses. But we're OK with that, though we sometimes envy your brought to you by De Beers lifestyle.

19. Money is a means to an end, not an end in itself. When you fight about money, you're really fighting about the fact that the end you seek is a little further off. Focus on the end, and not the immediate lack of money, and you'll discover a way to make more.

20. Take the time to randomly help out others. What goes around really does come back around. Call it karma, charity, whatever. Someday you're going to need that favor.

21. Anyone who says "what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger" is an idiot who hasn't really lived. You should shoot their knee caps off, and maybe burn down their house. Then they'll realize that whatever doesn't kill you, wounds you deeply. And that you live with those scars for the rest of your life. What separates the survivors from the rest is the way in which they live with those scars.

22. Sometimes getting drunk and falling down is a good thing.

23. Be kind to the little creatures. It's a reward in and of itself.

24. Make every effort to avoid mediating in a confrontation between friends. It will only come back to bite you in the bum later.

25. When you encounter a new person who dominates the conversation, act stupid. Ask leading questions, and let them talk. It will put you in a position to take advantage of them later.

26. In the same vein, allowing someone to talk down to you because you're younger than they are is a sign of wisdom. You'll have that stupid-old person's job in no time.

27. People who don't read regularly have stopped exercising their brains, and can be easily confounded, defeated, left in the dust. The same way people who don't exercise their bodies can be outdistanced.

28. You're children will have issues. It doesn't matter how perfect of a parent you are. It's more important to love them for who they are than it is to fill their lives with all of the semi-meaningless activities that every other parent in town is engaged in.

29. You are not the person you think you are. That is not George Clooney looking back at you in the mirror. It's far more important to focus on your personality than it is to spend time on your looks. The packaging ages, it's what's inside the box that matters.

30. Old vehicles are an indulgence, not a way of life. You know you're being financially irresponsible by keeping them running, but that's OK... It's one of the minor pleasures that make life worth living.

31. I still don't know how I got here, why I'm here, or where I'm going. Check back in another decade or so.

An Old Friend...

A decade ago I swore off Tequila.

It's the devil.

I married a girl because of it.

That said, a dear friend brought a bottle to my house a few weeks back, — a bottle which I promptly lost, because it was one of those nights—, anyway, I discovered it hidden up in the eaves of the addition we've been slowly putting up on our shoe-string budget.

It is beautiful. There's a clarity of mind that shots of straight Tequila possesses that I used to associate with Jack Daniels. But Jack has become an old, worn out, annoying sort of friend who brings nothing to the table but misery. Jose on the other hand has brought something special tonight.

You know, I've often spoken about how drinking lets one touch the Devine. You have a few and "poof!" you are communing with God.

The problem is that alchohol is a deceptive mistress. As are most mistresses, but that's a subject for another post. You drink a bit, and you are suddenly God-like, ethereal, in the Garden with all of the tame, happy, non-meat eating animals. And Alchohol whispers: " if you've drunk half the bottle and feel this good, you'll feel twice as good if you drink the rest."

Bitch.

So you drink the rest, and you end up falling all over yourself and trying to explain to your spouse that you "really, really, loooovadflakdflakdsjf 'love' them"... then you pause to pee or puke... and come in and start over again... and if they're understanding they let you do this, and quietly sort of hug you, — at arms length—, until you pass out. And in the morning they start to bitch at you, but realize in your booze-fueled frenzy you managed to do the dishes, the kids long-division homework, and set-up the coffee machine for the next day, and they leave you alone.

The problem with booze is this: a few drinks, and you craddle the face of the Creator in your hand. A few dozen more, and the ugliness that is man burbles to the surface and you are left alone, out of control, and wallowing in your own filth.

Well tonight I am at that point where I shall be wallowing in my own filthy, unworthy, and incontrollable anxiety and despair. But I'll post this before tossing back another shot of the glorious gold liquid and sitting down to watch Keiffer Sutherland torture Arabic sounding American actors on the national past-time now known as "24."

I’m Having a Crisis of Faith... and a Beer

I spent the last seven years working for a family run Catholic publishing company. We were saving the world, and the Catholic Church from itself. We were indeed more Catholic than the Pope. We sold books, traveled around giving talks, raised money from old women under the auspices of preserving Catholic traditions. We were busy saving the miscellaneous detritus that the institution they loved had cast off over the last three or four decades.

Somewhere along the line I stopped believing.

I don’t think it was the homosexual scandals. If you’ve spent any time in the industry in the last couple of decades, then you’ve known about it for a lot longer than the media has. It's always been the deep, dark, ugliness scratching away at the veneer of piety.

I remember an acquaintance remarking about how you couldn’t go to the drinking fountain in seminary without someone reaching out to grab your ass.

That was fifteen years ago.

I think maybe it was just the slow realization that I was immersed in an institution like any other non-profit, politically motivated group with no viable product to offer that makes loud, angry noises about how they know what’s best for people, yet people don’t see the need to pay for their services.

I despise politicians, activist organizations, and other "humanitarian" groups that have the answer to all of our problems, yet can’t seem to run financially viable operations. Maybe I’m just a die-hard capitalist, but it rubs me the wrong way...

Humorous interlude now-

So I’m hanging out in the house with the baby right now. She comes ambling up and announces:

"Daddy, I popped!"

She’s at that age where announcing to the world every time you poop your pants is actually a sign of intelligence. I think to myself, how cute... popped... she meant pooped, but that’s OK. Then I look over at her...

"Holy fuck! You did pop!"

And there she stands in a stinky pile of that explosive kind of diarrhea that blows out the bottom of your pant legs and through the top of your turtle-neck. The kind that only one year olds in diapers get, and is invariably filled with raisins and frozen peas.

"Don’t move!" I scream, diving for the baby wipes, as she scampers away.
Full tackle. Poop everywhere.

Why is it that kids think its funny to started squirming and trying to run away when you finally get the diaper off and are cleaning them up? Hey! That dumb old balding bastard is finally mine to toy with... Watch this! I’ll wriggle and wipe poop all over his hands. Then you finally hog-tie them, get them cleaned up, and are about to pierce their ankles and leave them on a hill to die of exposure, and they batt their eyes and cuddle up to you...awe... heart melts, and they get to live to poop all over you another day...

Anyway, I’m done with Catholics for a while. I can’t even step into a church without getting palpitations and feeling hair follicles forcibly ejecting what few strands remain on the top of my noggin. This is a point of some minor contention in my mud hut, and will doubtless lead to many a shouting match in the future. It’s not that I don’t still hold to the fundamental tenets, it’s just that I need a break. I want to be a person in the world who just happens to ascribe to a particular set of beliefs, and not one who ascribes to those beliefs and is constantly broadcasting them to any and everyone they encounter.

We’ll see how it goes.

For now, I’m going to have another beer.

Girls are Pretty and Nice as Long as They're Dancing Naked and not Talking

Many apologies for not posting in the last six weeks. I was kidnaped by a neighboring tribe, and forced to preform horrendous sexually deviant acts with livestock... It was an initiation rite of sorts, and now I am there household god.

Seriously, I quit my job of the last seven years, and took a new position at a manufacturing company that caters to the law enforcement market.

The downside is that I actually have to learn a new market, company, distribution network, etc.

The upside is that I can now walk to work, I’ve traded in desk accouterments of bibles and icons for MP5's, Colt Sporters, Benelli Pumps, and I can smoke in my office.

I have also inherited an office dog by the name of Cornelius who puts Cerberus to shame.

Seriously, this is a gigantic, vicious, jet black Great Dane who lives only to devour small children, cowardly office workers, and the UPS guy. Now I’ve known this dog since he was a puppy, and I made it quite clear to him that I taste like hollow-point bullets. You bite me, I put one through your head. Just like the last one that bit me that’s buried in the back yard.

So every morning I show up with a pocket full of processed cheese and little chicken bits.

We’re getting along swimmingly.

***
Christmas was grand. Miles of trekking around to the folks and the in-laws and boxes upon boxes of really annoying flashy blingy siren type toys. Too bad they stop working when the batteries run out.
***
We had our annual post-Christmas bash two weekends ago. There were horses, and a man on fire, and I killed a guy with a trident. Or rather we murdered a few dozen handles of Captain Morgan, had a big fire, and wrapped it all up around 5:00 am on a Sunday.

Which leads me to the headline...Life needs more pretty, naked, dancing, mute girls,... and less Church.

Or at least once or twice a year.

The War Against Tibi

...is over. I lost.

Very bad things are happening in my head right now. I'm between jobs, and clinical depression is hitting hard. It's been seven years since I made a move, and I forgot how I take to my bed for days in between careers, etc.

More on that later. There's another freaking Rocky movie coming out? Has Hollywood totally thrown in the towel, or what? Seems like every other movie coming out is a remake of something done thirty or forty years ago.

Except for the Passion of the Christ. That was one of the best comic remakes of a two millenium old story I've seen in a long, long time.

The Hills Have Eyes

Life in our country village is quaint, remote, charming, and sometimes outright terrifying. Like when you're running down the road at five in the morning, wearing only your tighty whities, waving a heavy caliber semi-automatic handgun at a fox that just tried to raid your chicken house and your neighbor drives by on his way to work.

“There was a fox, see?” Pointing to the woods where the only thing visible is tendrils of mist rising from amidst the trees.

“Ayuh.” He replies, and drives off.

And you pinch yourself to wake up, and don’t wake up. You’re already awake. And standing in the middle of the road in your underwear with a pistol and all you got from your neighbor was an "Ayuh."

That’s the terrifying part.

But even scarier than that is how closely the other villagers are watching you. They don’t stress enough in anthropologist school the scrutiny you’ll face when you move into tribal lands and adopt native customs.

Every village has a busybody, too. Ours is named Kathleen, but we call her the Town Crier. She spends each Saturday and Sunday visiting everyone’s teepee, peering into their homes from the threshold, and then gossiping about what she's found out with the neighbors in the next teepee.

She just called me on Sunday to find out what she could do to help us. Why she was calling is beyond me. The last time I actually spoke to her I was chasing her off my porch, gesticulating wildly, and making exaggerated claims about how much money I made. Evidently, it is customary in this village to dump large black garbage bags full of discarded clothing on the doorstep of any family that has three or more children. Obviously these breeders must be unfit parents who cannot afford to keep said offspring in clothing, let alone feed them.

So she calls because it is quite evident to the rest of the village that I have taken to my death bed. They hadn't heard any power tools running or seen me on the roof working on the addition we’re building, so something tragic must've happened.

I politely let her know that Theresa was out of town, and that I’d been riding herd on this gaggle of children of ours. Hence, -no work. Just Barney, puzzles, getting my can kicked at chess by a six year old, lots of Tibi and Kom Putii worship, and endless treks in the minivan of wonders back and forth to Girl Scouts, basketball games, church, etc.

Allegedly she and her husband are moving up north, and there is in fact a for sale sign in front of their mud hut. I'll miss Steve. We've spent many an hour commiserating over a bottle of fermented goat beer. But I don't believe she's leaving. I can't imagine any man patient enough to spend the remainder of his natural years stuck on a mountainside in Bethlehem alone with that woman.

She vexes me.

Oh I am terribly vexed.

Unrest in the Mud Hut

There is much unrest in my tribe right now. A rift has developed between the worshippers of Tibi (pronounced Tee Bee) and the worshippers of Kom Putii. The majority of the tribe are loyal practitioners of Tibiism. And though all pay varying degrees of tribute to Kom Putii, Tibi is hands down the greater of the two deities.

I am a high priest of Kom Putii. I spend each day prostrate at the altar of Kom Putii, and each evening pouring Wiki libations before the small Kom Putii shrine in our hut. Kom Putii is a demanding, yet benevolent god, who allows his adherents the illusion of communing with the divine on an almost equal footing. I pour Wiki libations deep into the night, and eventually have a vision and go to sleep, or post something supremely embarrassing that must be deleted before dawn in the hope that none of the other followers of Kom Putii who are channeling into me have read it.

It’s usually too late.

Tibi on the other hand is a puerile, authoritarian, selfish, self-centered, exacting, unsatisfiable bitch of a goddess, and favors her adherents in Asia above all others. Tibi tells you what to think. If you do not agree with something Tibi tells you, she punishes you with reruns of Desperate Housewives or by interrupting Grey’s Anatomy with news conferences from the Great Stammering Banana Slinging High Chief Chimp in the Whitehut. Every three and a half minutes Tibi demands that you buy more useless crap from her beloved Chinese.

My woman is a high priestess of Tibi.

It is going to bankrupt me.

Tibi is clever, and conjures many different lesser deities to control the minds of her followers. Each morning starts the same for us. The infant awakes screaming and demands “Momma food now. Tibi now. Tubbies. Tibi Tubbies. Now!”

And then goes into a trance and hisses and hits and bites you if you do not immediately place her before the altar of Tibi with whole grain offerings.

The Tubbies are seditious, wicked, androgynous, brightly-colored demons who wiggle and jiggle and feed off of the minds of the youngest members of the tribe. In the Western religious writings of the middle ages, they were known as Incubus and Succubus. In the dead of night, they were sent by Satan to anally probe and otherwise sexually torment devout Christians. To this day, —when not feeding on the minds of children at the behest of Tibi—, they creep and probe in the middle of the night.

The post-Christian era has a new term for it though: alien abduction. A full 25% of the American population reports some form of Teletubbie probing, yet no one has ever seen a space ship. Demonic possession, or course, is just to antiquated a notion to explain why, Po has you ball gagged with that circly thing on its head and is blinding you with a flashlight, while Dipsy is mining your rectum with its cranial probe. Aliens.

Now in the universe of my tribe there is a binding, metaphysical, and ubiquitous force from which both Tibi and Kom Putii draw their power. The vernacular term is electricity, but in reality it is a form of black magic created by all living things. It surrounds us, penetrates us, and binds the galaxy together. Without it we are reduced to groveling, filthy, savages who wail and gnash our teeth in the outer darkness.

You must never disturb this force, or the gods become angry and punish you. I recall a time many moons ago when I was committing the ultimate sacrilege by attempting to channel “electricity” into a new section of our hut during the high holy hour of Desperate Housewives.

Tibi was angered by my transgressions and the force became unbalanced.

It was suddenly dark. Tibi and Kom Putii abandoned us. We were left to wail and gnash our teeth in the inky blackness. Then Tibi took possession of my woman, and she chased me around shrieking that I had blasphemed against the gods, and struck at me with a broom and any other blunt object that was readily at hand until I made proper amends by clicking fuse switches, and worship services at the altar of Tibi were restored.

So the unrest in the tribe grows from the fact that Tibi has grown too powerful, and other mindless rituals such as homework are not being completed. I am preparing to strike at the followers of Tibi in much the same manner Conan struck at the Snake People. But I am a follower of Kom PutIi, not Conan’s great god Krom. I fear it will be a desperate, grueling battle. Much blood will be shed. And I am fairly certain that instead of crushing my enemies, seeing them driven before me, and hearing the lamentations of their women, I will most likely retreat to the temple of Kom Putii with a bottle of Wiki and post supremely embarrassing drivel in the middle of the night.

I’ll keep you posted.