Thursday, June 30, 2011

Losing It

Things I've lost:
-My bowling ball (yes, seriously)
-My copy of Iron Man 2 on Blu-ray (I've looked everywhere!)
-The desire (and possibly the physical ability) to watch MTV
-Sleep over which seat to take (thanks to Rebecca Black) and which reality I'm in (thanks to Inception)

Things I wish I could lose:
-My crippling fears of public speaking, spiders, and Willem Defoe
-These last pesky 85 pounds
-A game of Trivial Pursuit (to prove I'm human)

Things I'm losing:
-My hair
-My dignity (because of the hair)
-Ground in my battle to lose weight
-My patience with the lack of response from President Obama to my letters (asking him to bring back Arrested Development)
-The ability to write good blog posts (as evidenced here)

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

A Penny Saved

My older brother likes to brag about how good he is at finding deals. He claims that he doesn't buy anything at regular price unless it comes with something better for free. He even jokes that MSRP stands for "Management Suckering Rich People" (he's frugal, not funny). And because of all that, he's part of every free membership you can imagine, from Best Buy Reward Zone to coupons.com. So even when he buys something at a huge discount (or occasionally free), he gets points towards another purchase later. There's really no telling how much money he's saved. Actually, there is telling. He tells people all the time how much money he saves. In fact, he doesn't stop talking about how much money he's saved.

And I'm not knocking that at all. If you can keep all that straight and remember where and when to buy what, then good for you. But that doesn't mean I won't give him a hard time about it if given the opportunity.

Last year, my brother wanted to buy a converter cable for his computer that could turn his HDTV into a large monitor. And without doing much research, he bought one for about $12 online. And he happened to buy it from a retailer whose email newsletter I subscribe to. And he also happened to buy it the one week it wasn't on sale. So I keep getting these emails with sale items, and about half the time, the exact cable he bought is on sale for $5.99. So every time I get the email, I forward it to him and say, "Hey, weren't you looking for a converter cable like that? Can't beat 6 bucks." And he never responds.

He responds to all of my other emails. But he never responds to that one. And I know it just eats him up that he paid twice as much as he should have for something like that. I like to imagine that he reads my email, realizes he failed for once and then starts silently weeping. And I hope that every time he uses his overpriced cable, he remembers that he could have done about 5 minutes of research and saved himself six dollars.

Also, this post is a lie. It's all about me. I bought the stupid cable and didn't look for a sale. Now it goes on sale all the time and I hate myself for not getting it cheaper. And by the time I realized it, it was too late to return it. Why do bad things happen to good people?!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Seen And Unseen

Things I wish I could see more often:
-People falling asleep where they're not supposed to (conference calls, church, driver's seat)
-My dad "proving" he can still dance
-Watching golf with my grandmother, who's never even touched a golf club ("Are you kidding? I could have made that shot!")
-My golf ball after I hit it
-The face of the drive-thru worker when I order in an accent
-People getting hit in the face by projectiles on reality television (see below)

Things I wish I didn't have to see so often:
-Guys wearing skinny jeans or capri pants (a.k.a. Old Navy commercials)
-Facebook statuses that are just copy/pastes of lyrics (you know who you are)
-Wal-Mart bathrooms
-The face my wife makes when I order food in an accent
-Kardashians

Things I've never seen (and therefore must not exist):
-Aurora Borealis
-The interior of a Smart car
-A shiny new Dairy Queen
-A clean public bathroom
-Someone who thinks the movie was better than the book
-A better reality television moment than this one:


Thursday, June 16, 2011

Get Off On The Wrong Foot

I know it's been a while since I blogged. I can't pretend that three weeks is normal. But on top of being really busy and a good bit lazy, I just couldn't find a good spin on some of the funny stories I'd heard. So instead of spewing out mediocre to low-level blog posts, I figured I'd just wait until some good inspiration came to me naturally. And lucky for you, that was today!

Driving back to the office today after my lunch break, I saw a van in the parking lot of an abandoned Smoothie King with homemade sticker lettering on the windows. In block letters, it said "Foot Massages - $15." And directly below that, in all caps was "Cash Only." And I thought it was worth sharing this with you.

I didn't get a picture, so you'll have to take my word for it. And you'll have to believe me when I tell you that there was no phone number, business name or website URL on the van. And the windows were very heavily tinted. And it was in the back of the parking lot.

So, my question is this: Is there any possible way that was not a portable future crime scene? Is there anyone in their right mind who would get a foot massage from a stranger that only takes cash in a van in a secluded, easily-ignored parking lot? Because anyone who would do that deserves the CSI episode that will be dedicated to them when they get killed in that van.

Which brings me to my next question. Do these "foot massagers" (you're welcome to read that the way I meant it, which is "serial murderers") get any business? I know that 1983 GMC Vandura's are fairly cheap, even with the A-Team nostalgia they elicit. But I can't imagine that you'd get enough business rubbing people in a parking lot at $7.50 per foot to make a living. I must only assume they are criminals. And even if they're not murderers, they're drug dealers, at the very least. Right?

Which brings me to my next question. Do you think they'd attempt to murder me if they saw me taking a picture of their van on the way home?  Because I need proof or no one will believe me that this death van exists.