I have a problem with yo momma. Well maybe not yo specific momma, but there is something that can happen to women when they turn into mommas that can get a little scary. I understand that a mother and her child share a special bond. I also see how useful a mother's instinctive enthusiasm to protect her brood can be. The problem is that sometimes those instincts seem to corrupt the brain and turn ordinary ladies into whacked-out, self important, lunatics.
I swear that 50% of new mom's are convinced they are the Virgin Mary. Just like the paranoid schizos who hear voices and then run out to eat prostitutes, these women figure that the world is some jealous conspirator bent on destroying their precious, snotty, toddler.
I see this sort of thing a lot in parking lots. Women pushing a stroller somehow think they are invincible. They must imagine that stroller is some sort of crusader's shield -- a divine aura of protection. I've seen these people practically leap out into traffic. I think some of them hide in the shadows like a suburban Lone Wolf and Cub and spring out onto the pavement when you least expect it.
this generally leads to a slamming of breaks on some motorist's part and a cautious "whoa...I'm glad everyone's okay" sortta wave. But rather than just move on with their lives, the stroller driver is much more likely to give you the staring down of your life. I'm pretty sure these people are really trying to use "shame" the same way Darth Vader uses the force to crush someone's windpipe.
and to what end?! I mean sure, if you're a driver and your attention wanes to the point where you put someone's life at risk (even if it's only marginally so) than shame on you. A sincere apology is in order. But shit once the driver raises the hand and mouths the "I'm sorry" through the windshield, make up and move on with your life. You're keeping your kid in FURTHER jeopardy by leaving it out in the middle of the road while you take 15 minutes yelling and doing your best to summon your most self-righteous stink-face.
At the end of the day, no one got hurt and your not THAT special.
I am starting to suspect that I am a bad driver. Either that or people hate Minis. I'll be driving along minding my own buisness when a car will pull up alongside me. I'll look over and see the guy next to me vigorously waving his middle finger at me. The first time this happened to me, I just figured that the guy next to me was some sort of angry freak. Now that it's happened twice...I mean...there couldn't be TWO angry freaks out there in the world could there?
By the way -- regarding the middle finger and it's origins: Stop talking to me about bowmen and french people. please.
I have been known to partake in the occasional game of chance. I've doubled down, made the nuts on the river, rolled hot dice, and tried to hit 4 game parlays on a teaser ticket. For the most part I like to think I'm a pretty savvy gambler. There is one place where I can't seem to wrangle myself a win. That place is where the turf meets the surf -- the Del Mar Race Track.
Despite my dismal record playin the ponies, I still find myself at the races fairly often in the summer. The marketing wizards teamed up with local radio stations a few years back and started bringing some cool bands to the track on race day. All you need to do is buy a cheap ticket into grounds and you can rock out once the horses stop running.
Of course...It's a cheap ticket until you drop 50 bucks on "Ludicrous Speed" in the 6th. Seriously...How do you NOT bet the farm on a horse called "Ludicrous Speed"?
After yet another winless afternoon I took a moment to look back on my horse-betting career and I was pretty sure that I was in the midst of a 5-year dry spell. I don't mean it's been 5 years since I've come out ahead, I mean I think it's been 5 years since I cashed a winning ticket.
Well that dry spell came to a thunderous end this past weekend as I rode "Runs In The Family" to a thirty dollar victory. It was an appropriate name since my dad has always been fairly successful at the track and since this was the first time I approached my betting using advice he gave me a few days earlier.
I also went and saw Cake who played after the last race was run and put on their usual fantastic performance.
While walking around, winning money, and rocking out, I noticed a few things I'd like to share with you.
1) Horse racing and toddlers do not mix.
Del Mar does have a grassy infield that was designed to appeal to families and I can understand wanting to bring your kids out to the races for a few hours. It's a good theory, you got animals (so it's kinda like a zoo), you got junk food, semi-fresh air, and sunshine.
In practice it's stupid. Especially on the day that Coors sponsors a Micro-brew beer festival in the infield. It's a recipe for disaster as droves of drunken beer fans collide (literally) with the stroller set. Little Timmy gets to witness profanity and debauchery first hand while fisting his face with Kettle Korn.
2) Concerts and small children do not mix.
Here's a message to the pregnant chick standing 5 people back, at a general admission rock concert, tryin to control the rest of her under-aged brood while the crowds around her swell and threaten to trample her off-spring...."You are a retard".
Oh and to the guy who standing a couple feet to the side of her with his huge igloo cooler..."You are also a retard".
Da-Do Do Do, Da-Da Da Da is all I want to say to you.
This week is the annual CG conference known as Siggraph. While there is some sort of convention floor, the real draw (at least for me) is the large amount of lectures and classes that go on during the show.
What surprises me at these lectures is how much I actually understand. There is a lot of intense jargon flyin around and the fact that I can pick out most of it and figure out what the lecturer is tryin to say makes me feel pretty good about myself.
Of course a lot of the stuff is still over my head, and even though I understand what each term is meant to convey I doubt that similar sentences find their way into my own thoughts on a day-to-day basis.
Stuff like, "you don't even need to use a deformer for this bit of MEL to work. You can even take a simple locator and select its transforms, and you can see its got a complete rotational matrix in terms of world-space."
or whatever.
There was even more crazy talk to be heard outside the classroom walls at the convention this year. Before I continue I should say that I have spent plenty of time in Los Angeles. Every time you go you get to see some sorta "LA stereotype" played out in front of you. On this particular trip I got to see all the random insane people that I imagine Midwesterners assume exist around every corner and in every boutique.
The bulk of these experiences were had in and around the LA public library. It was a warm sunny day and the grounds outside the library seemed like an ideal place for strolling or finding some shade. It turns out its also a very popular place with the invisible gremlins that plague our nations homeless.
Some of these gremlins are quite the jokesters, as the man sitting just beyond the main entrance could tell you (if you dared to start a conversation with him). Others are clearly annoying naggers like the one pestering the gentleman sitting on one of the shaded benches around the side. Others are more likely to rat you out to the cops -- there was a particularly frantic man who was trying to dissuade his gremlin from that very thing as he ran across the courtyard.
The fun didn't end there though. Once inside the library I found myself in line for a public internet terminal. To my right was a guy who seemed normal until he turned to the woman standing next to him and drawled, "you're beauuuuuutiful. hehehe"
"uh...thanks." she replied.
"you're weeeeeeelcooooooome"
(I don't think he pulled any digits).
but the grand finale was the guy who came in later standing in line but giving the person ahead of him an unusually wide berth. When someone came in behind him and asked if he was in line for the computers he responded with, "yea...Get the fuck away from me". To which the man who asked the question said, "well...I'm standing in line..." but was interrupted with another, "Just back the fuck off man".
Later this same angry computer user randomly shouted at all of us, accusing us of staring at him. "what the fuck are you all lookin at"
I was tempted to say, "Im lookin at a crazy asshole in the middle of the public library" but I thought better of it.
Im not the man I think I am at all, oh no. I'm a rocket man.
Here's me just before surgery:
Pretty fuckin hot eh?
Anyhow...the knee is coming along great. I really never needed crutches and only swallowed four or five pain pills since the operation. My range of motion has pretty much all returned. It's good stuff. If your curious I've got a bit of footage form the actual procedure right here.
Enjoy!
DiscoStupe can tell you what's really goin on in that video.
I was recovering at my dad's house for a few days. Iwan had dropped by one afternoon and we were playing a little with the dog in the backyard. Suddenly we heard some commotion from the golf course behind the yard. We looked over to see a cart full of drunken women driving by. They hooted and hollered. We waved. One of them flashed her tits at us.
I wish you coulda seen Iwan's face. "Did that just happen!?" he said.
"I think it did." Odd that I was in Lake Havasu for three days and say no drunken flashers until I came home to the quiet suburban playgrounds of La Costa.
How many people are afraid to poop in public? I don't mean in the middle of a park somewhere, I mean in a public restroom. I talked to two people (who shall remain nameless...but they were both girls) who told me that they hated dumping in public restrooms because they were afraid that other people would know what they were doing.
"Even if your quiet about it, they people in the stalls next to you can hear if you take more than one piece of toilet paper! One piece = goin pee, anymore than that and they _know_"
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My knee has been troubling me for the past month or so. I've been seeing a sports medicine doc and along with some anti-inflammatory pills he prescribed some physical therapy. I've never been to a physical therapist before and it was kinda neat. I always like it when a doctor can tell you with certainty what's goin wrong and how to fix it.
My PT was very good. She showed me what a normal knee looks like, what me knee was doing in comparison and explained how we were gonna fix it. Huzzah. Luckily it doesn't seem like a big deal. Basically she told me that my knee cap naturally "rides high". It's also apparently a little outta alignment compared to a normal knee. All that causes it to "swim around" a lil. Her solution is to do some strengthening of my quad muscles to keep that kneecap in line. Hopefully it will work...I'd like to be able to play soccer again soon.
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I built a sauna this week. Well sort of. H-bomb ordered this "pre-fab" sauna to aid in her Lyme treatment. It came in about 10 pieces with poorly written instructions that left us scratching our heads for a lot of the process. It was strange to me that such an expensive piece of equipment would come with such horrible directions -- directions completely devoid of illustrations. But we figured it all out in the end and now there's a sauna in her garage. Knowing that I was instrumental in it's construction made me extremely concerned for H-bomb's safety while she actually used it. Apparently it works fine...but I don't think I'm ready to go in it yet.
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A big golf tournament took place last week. It was a match-play competition that featured many of the top players. Since my dad's house is right on the course...the game basically took place in his backyard. I had dinner with him (and other family members) last night. He told me that he was hanging out outside for much of the semi-finals and had the television broadcast of the event piped out to the exterior speakers. This was partially so that he could be outdoors and hear it...but also so that the course rangers and tournament staff (those who were stationed at the hole close by) could listen in as well.
Since it was late-round match-play there wasn't much activity on the course and he left the broadcast blasting on (for the aforementioned reasons) and went inside to putz around. Lost in his other tasks he suddenly remembered what he had done sometime later and turned to one of the TV's inside to see that the tournament had made it's way to the hole just beyond his yard. The announcers were saying something like, "Davis Love is clearly distracted right now by one of the near-bye residents who's television is blaring out onto the golf course".
My dad bolted outside and he said the entire audiences attention followed him as he ran across the backyard to the remote control where he finally turned the volume down.
Love's opponent had not yet taken his tee shot yet but Love did. After my dad turned the sound down he turned back towards the course to see the other golfer's caddy surreptitiously give him the thumbs up.
One more thing. As Salah was finishing up he started smacking his lips all over the place. Like...eating chewing gum but much sloppier. It was really bizarre.
I admit that I prefer to get my hair cut at a "salon" rather than a barber shop. Maybe it's psychological, but I always feel like I get a better haircut when I pay thirty dollars for it. Salon's put my in contact with salon stylist...Which are a totally different breed from the white-jacket barber. In general the only thing I dislike about salons is the forced conversation, but you find someone you don't mind talking to and you stick with that person when you can.
Today I was a little desperate to get my hair cut and I didn't care to wait for my "regular girl" to be available so I just took what they could give me. What I got...Was this guy.
This guy was a reeeeal piece of work.
First of all...When your in the salon chair...Your at the mercy of the stylist. Your personal schedule, your politics, your interests (beyond how you wear your hair) generally mean very little to them. What are you gonna do...Change seats?
Salah had a bit of an accent, was well dressed, spoke fast...All the stereotypical "gay hairdresser" stuff. He talked a lot about women though. He told me I should party in Tijuana more often since we were bound to meet hot girls and were practically guaranteed to get laid there.
Salah was very much interested in the entertainment industry, and making lots of money. He must have told me about three or four different schemes and projects he was cookin up. All of them big money makers.
He did a lil networking while I was trapped in his chair as well. Upon learning that I was an animator he told me about a film he was writing that we might be able to collaborate on. It was hard to know what to say to all this. Mostly I just laughed nervously and tried changing the subject.
He also didn't' seem to like black people very much...And seemed to feel that most women were "lazy" and not very creative.
He finished off the session by dumping three different hair styling products in my hair and sending me on my way. I smell like Paul Mitchells secret laboratory right now.
