Dearest readers,
I pride myself on being environmentally conscious. I've switched over all of the light bulbs in our house to compact flourescent bulbs, have been pretty good about recycling - I grew up in Michigan, land of the 10 cent deposit - have declared a ban on eating tuna for the last year or so, due to overfishing concerns, have avoided drinking bottled water for years as well unless it's fizzy. AND... I didn't drive a car until I turned 30. That's a big one, right? Put me on the side of the good guys for good ole' Mother Earth.
but...But...BUT!
This whole eco-friendly green shit that's sweeping the nation is getting out of control! Granted, there are people out there who have sensible ideas, and are doing admirable things. E-rock, my co-blogger is spearheading a really cool initiative aimed at recycling medical supplies (I'll let her espouse the details, but take my word for it - it's really cool) This post isn't meant to flame people like my dearest Erica for sure! To be honest, I say this mostly since she's a jujitsu fanatic and I don't wanna get tied into a pretzel, but I also think what she's doing is awesome.
So here's the reason for my rant/tirade today. I was surfing the SF Chronicle website, when I clicked on Violet Blue's weekly sex column for 8/07/08, entitled "Eco-sexuals do it Greener"
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2008/08/07/violetblue.DTL
"I have got to read this..." I think to myself, so for the next 5 minutes I'm reading about rechargeable vibrators, organic, cruelty free sex toys and lube, vegan options for sex toys, and certified organic free trade CONDOMS?!
There's even a section about recycling sex toys! Now my anus is a no fly zone, but if I was a woman, I think I might have some second thoughts about sticking a 2nd gen, recycled dildo up my hoo-hoo.
I think at a certain point that environmentally conscious buying has jumped the shark. I was out hucking frisbees with a cheery soul I'll call Barry, who works at New Resources Bank. New Resources is geared towards financing sustainable development: things like home equity loans for solar panelling and other good stuff. But even Barry had to say "You know what? This whole green thing has become the fad of the 2000's - kind of like interior decorating was a huge thing in the 80's."
I have to agree with Barry, even if he is an absolute shit frisbee golfer. So the point of this post is to point out that just because something's "green" doesn't mean you have to throw out your beloved Jackrabbit dildo. Maybe toss in some rechargeable AA's.
But remember: REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE in that order. Quit buying so much stupid shit.
OK, on that note, all this talk of sex toys is making me horny. I'm gonna surf some porn and beat off with some artisinal lube that's harvested from the blubber of free range baby seals that have been beaten to death with certified organic wood clubs.
Tata!
Friday, August 8, 2008
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Inspirational story of the day
Hey there folks,
I know that Erica and I have been a bit lazy with keeping up the contents of the ole' blog.
So instead of new content, which will be coming soon I swear, read this.
It's a great little story about a US Attorney's big win, in contrast to the horrible shitshow that the Department of Justice has become during the Bush years:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/murray-waas/the-ninth-man-out-a-fir_b_50562.html
I know that Erica and I have been a bit lazy with keeping up the contents of the ole' blog.
So instead of new content, which will be coming soon I swear, read this.
It's a great little story about a US Attorney's big win, in contrast to the horrible shitshow that the Department of Justice has become during the Bush years:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/murray-waas/the-ninth-man-out-a-fir_b_50562.html
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Because you're a valued customer...
I hate junkmail. I hate takeout menus hanging on my doorknob and worse yet, blowing down the sidewalk. I hate the 10 lbs of propaganda that were delivered through my mail slot last month advertising pro's and con's of the 10 propositions we voted on in June. I am going to start working on a proposition for next year's ballot that limits the amount of paper waste created by propositions. I opted out of junkmail at www.41pounds.org, and opted out of credit card offers (here is a resource for you to do the same www.optoutprescreen.com). The junkmail still waits for me daily on my doorstep. Not only do I get credit card offers, I get convenience checks from my banks "Because I'm a Valued Customer...". Because I am valued, I get the opportunity to increase my debt with 4 convenience checks (debt is never convenient, trust me...) from 3 different banks mailed monthly to my house.
I recycle the general junk mail, but the credit card offers and convenience checks are a bit sensitive for the recycle bin. I considered getting a shredder, but it pisses me off that I should need to buy a machine that was made in China and shipped to America and runs on electricity and will break in 5 years to eat the junk mail that I keep asking not to receive! Arrrrrgh! I bought a used pasta maker to cut my mail into fettucini once. Kevin laughed at me, rightfully so. I was delivering my mail to the hospital shred bin until I discovered the shredder scissors seen here http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/gadgets/shredding-scissors-178128.php - I feel like Edward Scissorhands with these things! You just have to cut one sheet at a time or you get a blister.
I've been happy with my slow and bulky manual scissors. It's a great mindless task and a wonderful way to slow down my fast life. I was even happier when I read that my red wigglers will eat junk mail along with my raw veggie waste. So I've been saving my shredded convenience checks and credit offers next to the worm bin and waiting for the right moment.
...Enter honeydew melon. Delivered on Tuesday with my produce box. I cut the flesh into cubes and stuck it in the fridge and was left with skin and rind. So I've been tending worms for probably two months and they've been happily eating my raw veggie waste and coffee grounds and ground toasted eggshells. I think they like it at our house, and now they have friends in the bin: mites and potworms. Fun! I've transitioned from a rough chop of my veggie waste with a knife to a fine chop in my food processor. It's pretty fun putting my garbage in the blender, and it makes a nice salsa for the worms. What this effectively does is increase the surface area of the food that starts to rot, so the worms eat the rot and the waste turns to humus (not to be confused with hummus) in about a day! So back to the melon... I really haven't dealt much with large scale fruit waste, and when I blended the melon scraps it turned to a large bowl of soup.
The moisture content of a worm bin is important to regulate, and my mixture was a bit wet for the bin. And then I thought of the pile of shredded credit card offers. I then made a dough by mixing two cups melon soup and two cups credit offer shreds. Tonight my worms are reaping the benefits of my valued customer status as honeydew scrap soup rots on the shredded offers. Take that, Bank of America! No, thank you, I do NOT want to transfer a balance before August 31, 2008! And furthermore, I don't appreciate you sending blank checks with my name on them in the mail every thirty days.
A huge wrong in my world has just been righted. My paper nemesis has been shredded and fed to manure worms. Today I feel like a valued customer, and I will smile the next time I receive a special offer from Citibank at my door.
Oh happy day,
Erock
I recycle the general junk mail, but the credit card offers and convenience checks are a bit sensitive for the recycle bin. I considered getting a shredder, but it pisses me off that I should need to buy a machine that was made in China and shipped to America and runs on electricity and will break in 5 years to eat the junk mail that I keep asking not to receive! Arrrrrgh! I bought a used pasta maker to cut my mail into fettucini once. Kevin laughed at me, rightfully so. I was delivering my mail to the hospital shred bin until I discovered the shredder scissors seen here http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/gadgets/shredding-scissors-178128.php - I feel like Edward Scissorhands with these things! You just have to cut one sheet at a time or you get a blister.
I've been happy with my slow and bulky manual scissors. It's a great mindless task and a wonderful way to slow down my fast life. I was even happier when I read that my red wigglers will eat junk mail along with my raw veggie waste. So I've been saving my shredded convenience checks and credit offers next to the worm bin and waiting for the right moment.
...Enter honeydew melon. Delivered on Tuesday with my produce box. I cut the flesh into cubes and stuck it in the fridge and was left with skin and rind. So I've been tending worms for probably two months and they've been happily eating my raw veggie waste and coffee grounds and ground toasted eggshells. I think they like it at our house, and now they have friends in the bin: mites and potworms. Fun! I've transitioned from a rough chop of my veggie waste with a knife to a fine chop in my food processor. It's pretty fun putting my garbage in the blender, and it makes a nice salsa for the worms. What this effectively does is increase the surface area of the food that starts to rot, so the worms eat the rot and the waste turns to humus (not to be confused with hummus) in about a day! So back to the melon... I really haven't dealt much with large scale fruit waste, and when I blended the melon scraps it turned to a large bowl of soup.
The moisture content of a worm bin is important to regulate, and my mixture was a bit wet for the bin. And then I thought of the pile of shredded credit card offers. I then made a dough by mixing two cups melon soup and two cups credit offer shreds. Tonight my worms are reaping the benefits of my valued customer status as honeydew scrap soup rots on the shredded offers. Take that, Bank of America! No, thank you, I do NOT want to transfer a balance before August 31, 2008! And furthermore, I don't appreciate you sending blank checks with my name on them in the mail every thirty days.
A huge wrong in my world has just been righted. My paper nemesis has been shredded and fed to manure worms. Today I feel like a valued customer, and I will smile the next time I receive a special offer from Citibank at my door.
Oh happy day,
Erock
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Monday, April 28, 2008
Side effects of Chantix
Hey dear readers,
Aside from the occasional blog and my daytime job working in tech sales, I moonlight as a smoking cessation guinea pig.
Besides acupuncture and hypnosis, I have tried:
http://www.madkorean.com/blog/?p=49
And here:
http://www.madkorean.com/blog/?p=25
Last week I tried the latest and greatest in quitting smoking products - Chantix. Chantix (varenicline) works the same way that methadone works for heroin addicts, but for nicotine!
What Chantix does is bind to the nicotine receptor in your brain, thereby reducing your cravings for cigarettes. As an unexpected bonus, if you smoke while taking Chantix, you won't get a nicotine buzz either, since the Chantix is already at home in your nicotine receptor.
The whole process, I'm told, takes 3 months. You quit sometime between 2-3 weeks after you start taking it, with a "ramp up" dose for the first week.
I've just begun week 2 at the full dose. My experiences so far:
The positive: I don't crave cigarettes as much
I can now go 3-4 hours without having a cigarette, and successfully restrain myself from murdering others! I found this out while I was lying in bed trying to get to sleep. I realized that I had watched 3 back to back episodes of House MD without getting up to smoke cigarettes! Crazy...
The negative: Shit makes me crazy yo
From the Chantix website:
"Some patients have reported changes in behavior, agitation, depressed mood, suicidal thinking or behavior when attempting to quit smoking while taking CHANTIX. "
While I'm not suicidal or depressed, Chantix gives me a little pep in my step. I'm a bit more manic than usual. This may not be a good thing for innocent bystanders - saying I'm a bit more manic is like saying Charles Manson is a little more crazy today.
Well shit, if I'm catching a little buzz, it's ok by me. What's worrisome to me though is that I've developed a bit of an involuntary facial tic. Hope that goes away soon.
"The most common side effects include nausea (30%), sleep disturbance, constipation, gas and/or vomiting."
The nausea hasn't really bothered me that much - sometimes my stomach hurts a bit in the morning if I take Chantix on an empty stomach. I'm always kinda gassy so I'm not too sure about that. No to constipation or vomiting (yay!)
Sleep disturbance though...
"You may have trouble sleeping, vivid, unusual, or strange dreams while taking CHANTIX. "
There's a bit of an understatement. Within the last 3 days I've had 2 very vivid, hypersexual dreams. The hypersexual part would be cool if they weren't in situations that were highly embarassing/anxiety ridden.
Dream #1 aka The La Mer incident
I had this dream over the weekend on Friday night. In my dream I got busted by my girlfriend for rubbing one out. In typical dream fashion, my girlfriend wasn't my real girlfriend, just some generic girlfriend entity that was pissed at me.
I'm sure that there is some sort of generic catch all Freudian analysis for my dream. Guilt over unresolved issues with getting caught by my mother while at a young age blah blah blah. However this rationale doesn't necessarily apply since in the dream, my girlfriend wasn't pissed at me because I was rubbing one out.
The reason I was getting yelled at was because in lubing myself up for my one on one, I inadvertantly used my girlfriend's very expensive facial cream ($300 a bottle! Gadzooks!)
So in my dream, I'm sitting down with my pants around my ankles, with my hands and penis covered in white, fragrant lube. Getting screamed at. Ugh.
Dream #2: Why oh why did I do that?
While I got a good laugh out of dream #1, my second dream (last night) had some comical notes to it, but just really stressed me out.
In dream #2, my girlfriend (my real girlfriend this time) was not around for some reason, and I ended up getting wasted and hooking up with a rather unappealing specimen of the female persuasion (refer to Matt Dillion in There's Something About Mary: "Was Mary a big girl when you were in high school.... like a deuce, deuce and a half"
So in the aftermath of my coital episode, I was CONSUMED by guilt. "Why oh why did I do that! I'm so fucking stupid, how am I gonna tell her... will she find out? Of course she'll find out. I'm fucked. WAHHHHHH!!!"
And then I woke up to the sound of my alarm. Not very restful sleep, unfortunately.
Also a plug for the greatest of women (besides my mother of course) Nancy Zam, who is the hottest, coolest, sweetest, sexiest girlfriend ever. Seriously. She rocks, and fortnightly, I offer up live chicken sacrifice to Baron Samedi for granting me the black magic hoodoo to make her mine.
Summary:
Too early to tell if Chantix is working out in the quitting smoking category. However, I have gotten the double barrel in terms of undesirable side effects. I guess I can count my blessings that I haven't gotten horribly depressed or suicidal, but jesus man, I've experienced everything BUT.
Still, I'll stick with it for a month or two if it works as advertised. I should be completely off the cigarettes by May 15. Check this space for updates.
Until then, keep the high priced lube away from me!
Cheers,
-Shim
Aside from the occasional blog and my daytime job working in tech sales, I moonlight as a smoking cessation guinea pig.
Besides acupuncture and hypnosis, I have tried:
- Nicotine patch
- Nicotine gum
- Nicotine mints/lozenges
- Zyban
http://www.madkorean.com/blog/?p=49
And here:
http://www.madkorean.com/blog/?p=25
Last week I tried the latest and greatest in quitting smoking products - Chantix. Chantix (varenicline) works the same way that methadone works for heroin addicts, but for nicotine!
What Chantix does is bind to the nicotine receptor in your brain, thereby reducing your cravings for cigarettes. As an unexpected bonus, if you smoke while taking Chantix, you won't get a nicotine buzz either, since the Chantix is already at home in your nicotine receptor.
The whole process, I'm told, takes 3 months. You quit sometime between 2-3 weeks after you start taking it, with a "ramp up" dose for the first week.
I've just begun week 2 at the full dose. My experiences so far:
The positive: I don't crave cigarettes as much
I can now go 3-4 hours without having a cigarette, and successfully restrain myself from murdering others! I found this out while I was lying in bed trying to get to sleep. I realized that I had watched 3 back to back episodes of House MD without getting up to smoke cigarettes! Crazy...
The negative: Shit makes me crazy yo
From the Chantix website:
"Some patients have reported changes in behavior, agitation, depressed mood, suicidal thinking or behavior when attempting to quit smoking while taking CHANTIX. "
While I'm not suicidal or depressed, Chantix gives me a little pep in my step. I'm a bit more manic than usual. This may not be a good thing for innocent bystanders - saying I'm a bit more manic is like saying Charles Manson is a little more crazy today.
Well shit, if I'm catching a little buzz, it's ok by me. What's worrisome to me though is that I've developed a bit of an involuntary facial tic. Hope that goes away soon.
"The most common side effects include nausea (30%), sleep disturbance, constipation, gas and/or vomiting."
The nausea hasn't really bothered me that much - sometimes my stomach hurts a bit in the morning if I take Chantix on an empty stomach. I'm always kinda gassy so I'm not too sure about that. No to constipation or vomiting (yay!)
Sleep disturbance though...
"You may have trouble sleeping, vivid, unusual, or strange dreams while taking CHANTIX. "
There's a bit of an understatement. Within the last 3 days I've had 2 very vivid, hypersexual dreams. The hypersexual part would be cool if they weren't in situations that were highly embarassing/anxiety ridden.
Dream #1 aka The La Mer incident
I had this dream over the weekend on Friday night. In my dream I got busted by my girlfriend for rubbing one out. In typical dream fashion, my girlfriend wasn't my real girlfriend, just some generic girlfriend entity that was pissed at me.
I'm sure that there is some sort of generic catch all Freudian analysis for my dream. Guilt over unresolved issues with getting caught by my mother while at a young age blah blah blah. However this rationale doesn't necessarily apply since in the dream, my girlfriend wasn't pissed at me because I was rubbing one out.
The reason I was getting yelled at was because in lubing myself up for my one on one, I inadvertantly used my girlfriend's very expensive facial cream ($300 a bottle! Gadzooks!)
So in my dream, I'm sitting down with my pants around my ankles, with my hands and penis covered in white, fragrant lube. Getting screamed at. Ugh.
Dream #2: Why oh why did I do that?
While I got a good laugh out of dream #1, my second dream (last night) had some comical notes to it, but just really stressed me out.
In dream #2, my girlfriend (my real girlfriend this time) was not around for some reason, and I ended up getting wasted and hooking up with a rather unappealing specimen of the female persuasion (refer to Matt Dillion in There's Something About Mary: "Was Mary a big girl when you were in high school.... like a deuce, deuce and a half"
So in the aftermath of my coital episode, I was CONSUMED by guilt. "Why oh why did I do that! I'm so fucking stupid, how am I gonna tell her... will she find out? Of course she'll find out. I'm fucked. WAHHHHHH!!!"
And then I woke up to the sound of my alarm. Not very restful sleep, unfortunately.
Also a plug for the greatest of women (besides my mother of course) Nancy Zam, who is the hottest, coolest, sweetest, sexiest girlfriend ever. Seriously. She rocks, and fortnightly, I offer up live chicken sacrifice to Baron Samedi for granting me the black magic hoodoo to make her mine.
Summary:
Too early to tell if Chantix is working out in the quitting smoking category. However, I have gotten the double barrel in terms of undesirable side effects. I guess I can count my blessings that I haven't gotten horribly depressed or suicidal, but jesus man, I've experienced everything BUT.
Still, I'll stick with it for a month or two if it works as advertised. I should be completely off the cigarettes by May 15. Check this space for updates.
Until then, keep the high priced lube away from me!
Cheers,
-Shim
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
An ever growing personal addiction
So folks,
I have a problem. I'm addicted to all of the media coverage of the 2008 Democratic Primary, and I'm consuming an alarming amount of internet bandwidth to slate my thirst for news/spin/commentary/etc...
At first, it started innocently enough: I've been a loyal NYTimes reader for quite some time, but after the whole Judith Miller thing, the Duke lacrosse thing, and the unholiest of unholies - Times Select, I started branching out and reading the Washington Post. The Post (owned by the same company as the NY Times) piqued my interest in it's extensive election coverage (much better than the Times), so I kept reading on and reading on.
To my dismay, I found that the Times and the Post couldn't keep up with my insatiable thirst for spin on Reverend Wright, sniper fire in Bosnia, and the pros and cons of wearing a US Flag lapel pin, so I dug deeper: Wonkette, The Huffington Post, DailyKos, Politico, The Carpetbagger Report, Talking Points Memo. Add the fact that I'm a really fast reader into the mix, and I was horrified to discover that I devoured ALL of the daily content from these web sites BEFORE 9 AM every day.
Eeek!
But even throughout all of this, I kept reassuring myself: "Shim, you don't have a problem. You just like to stay up on politics, which is a good thing, right? You're doing your patriotic duty, even though you're spending an inordinate amount of time watching Obama girl, the McCain girls (truly a horrifying set of vids, trust me), and random Clintonista/Obamite rants by unknown supporters on YouTube.
This whole house of cards came crashing down on me earlier today. No, not even when I found myself clicking through the Fox News website to see what the conservative spin on the Democratic primary was. Not even then.
It was when I was reading through the archive of Ann Coulter's blog that I had to walk away from the computer, go to the bathroom, and take a good, long hard look at myself in the mirror.
Seriously, Ann Coulter? Really? Have things gotten that bad?
Yes. I mean honestly, the last 2 weeks of coverage were worse than having your heroin dealer go out of town for a 3 week vacation in Mexico. I was lying in bed, shivering with cold sweats under the blanket, ranting "The Zogby, Gallup and Quinnepac polls are all a sham! The numbers don't add up! AAAAAAAAHHHH!"
What's a man to do? After PA, I got 2 MORE WEEKS until Indiana and North Carolina! I might need to check into Crossroads, or Betty Ford or some sort of shit like that, and the most pathetic part of it all is that I'll probably have to make up an addiction of some sort. Heads for crack, tails for heroin?
Call it!
-Shim
I have a problem. I'm addicted to all of the media coverage of the 2008 Democratic Primary, and I'm consuming an alarming amount of internet bandwidth to slate my thirst for news/spin/commentary/etc...
At first, it started innocently enough: I've been a loyal NYTimes reader for quite some time, but after the whole Judith Miller thing, the Duke lacrosse thing, and the unholiest of unholies - Times Select, I started branching out and reading the Washington Post. The Post (owned by the same company as the NY Times) piqued my interest in it's extensive election coverage (much better than the Times), so I kept reading on and reading on.
To my dismay, I found that the Times and the Post couldn't keep up with my insatiable thirst for spin on Reverend Wright, sniper fire in Bosnia, and the pros and cons of wearing a US Flag lapel pin, so I dug deeper: Wonkette, The Huffington Post, DailyKos, Politico, The Carpetbagger Report, Talking Points Memo. Add the fact that I'm a really fast reader into the mix, and I was horrified to discover that I devoured ALL of the daily content from these web sites BEFORE 9 AM every day.
Eeek!
But even throughout all of this, I kept reassuring myself: "Shim, you don't have a problem. You just like to stay up on politics, which is a good thing, right? You're doing your patriotic duty, even though you're spending an inordinate amount of time watching Obama girl, the McCain girls (truly a horrifying set of vids, trust me), and random Clintonista/Obamite rants by unknown supporters on YouTube.
This whole house of cards came crashing down on me earlier today. No, not even when I found myself clicking through the Fox News website to see what the conservative spin on the Democratic primary was. Not even then.
It was when I was reading through the archive of Ann Coulter's blog that I had to walk away from the computer, go to the bathroom, and take a good, long hard look at myself in the mirror.
Seriously, Ann Coulter? Really? Have things gotten that bad?
Yes. I mean honestly, the last 2 weeks of coverage were worse than having your heroin dealer go out of town for a 3 week vacation in Mexico. I was lying in bed, shivering with cold sweats under the blanket, ranting "The Zogby, Gallup and Quinnepac polls are all a sham! The numbers don't add up! AAAAAAAAHHHH!"
What's a man to do? After PA, I got 2 MORE WEEKS until Indiana and North Carolina! I might need to check into Crossroads, or Betty Ford or some sort of shit like that, and the most pathetic part of it all is that I'll probably have to make up an addiction of some sort. Heads for crack, tails for heroin?
Call it!
-Shim
Monday, March 31, 2008
Facebook Funwall
Let me preface this post (soon to be rant) by saying upfront that I am an unabashed technologist. I work for a web startup down in San Mateo, I used to be a web programmer, and I keep busy by playing the most popular computer game in the world, World of Warcraft.
In addition, I'm on all of the major social networking sites: Tribe, Friendster, MySpace, and... Facebook.
I dig Facebook. Building a zombie army so I could beat down my friends is fun as hell! Bringing back The Oregon Trail is the coolest! And while I'm not a Scrabble enthusiast, I can see the appeal of playing Scrabulous online.
BUT.
I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD.
The FunWall/SuperFun Wall/Poke/SuperPoke etc. shit is driving me fucking crazy.
I've never been forwarded as many stupid videos, as well as Snopes fodder on web hoaxes (listen, and I swear to you - adding a friend to your Facebook profile in no way puts your email inbox in peril.) I swear, I promise that this is the case, now STOP FUCKING FORWARDING ME SHIT ON MY FUNWALL!
I'm sick to death of stupid videos of people being stupid, or pets doing stupid things. I swear to fucking God, it's like getting spammed by America's Funniest Home Videos.
And Poke/Super Poking? Don't even get me started on that. What the fuck is a "poke?" Stop poking, prodding, bitchslapping, hadouken'ing (although I do dig the SF II reference).
If you want to say hi, say hi. Write me a nice personalized message on my Wall. Not my FunWall, or Super FunWall.
I'm gonna cut this post short, since I gotta go take down my FunWall and SuperPoke. Stupid apps.
You all have been given official notice. Blast me any pokes or funwall fodder, and I'll break into your house tonight and shit on your pillow.
Seriously.
-Shim
In addition, I'm on all of the major social networking sites: Tribe, Friendster, MySpace, and... Facebook.
I dig Facebook. Building a zombie army so I could beat down my friends is fun as hell! Bringing back The Oregon Trail is the coolest! And while I'm not a Scrabble enthusiast, I can see the appeal of playing Scrabulous online.
BUT.
I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD.
The FunWall/SuperFun Wall/Poke/SuperPoke etc. shit is driving me fucking crazy.
I've never been forwarded as many stupid videos, as well as Snopes fodder on web hoaxes (listen, and I swear to you - adding a friend to your Facebook profile in no way puts your email inbox in peril.) I swear, I promise that this is the case, now STOP FUCKING FORWARDING ME SHIT ON MY FUNWALL!
I'm sick to death of stupid videos of people being stupid, or pets doing stupid things. I swear to fucking God, it's like getting spammed by America's Funniest Home Videos.
And Poke/Super Poking? Don't even get me started on that. What the fuck is a "poke?" Stop poking, prodding, bitchslapping, hadouken'ing (although I do dig the SF II reference).
If you want to say hi, say hi. Write me a nice personalized message on my Wall. Not my FunWall, or Super FunWall.
I'm gonna cut this post short, since I gotta go take down my FunWall and SuperPoke. Stupid apps.
You all have been given official notice. Blast me any pokes or funwall fodder, and I'll break into your house tonight and shit on your pillow.
Seriously.
-Shim
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Ode to Glass
by: Erock
Glass panes taken from the picture frames that I converted into stylish albeit mildly ghetto bulletin boards with a bit of cork tile and craft glue-
Glass panes sitting on my crowded bedroom floor, along side my desk. Will you continue to collect dust indefinitely? Will I trip over you both one morning on my way to check my email on the way out the door causing a gouge in the floor and a slice on my heel and a ruined sock and a missed bus? But I cannot throw you away.
Glass panes, untapped potential, good times in the making, very functional… somehow...
And I’ve never etched glass before, and there is no time like the present.
Glass panes, waiting patiently aside my desk on the cold hardwood floor while I occasionally google ‘glass etching’ and then refuse to buy more craft supplies. Not to mention that glass etching chemicals are toxic. I then google ‘environmentally friendly glass etching’. How invisible you must feel as I walk passed you every day, not to mention that you are by nature transparent.
And then one day as I meander down Haight Street on my way home, I see a picture frame, made only from a glass pane with two holes drilled for mounting and a ribbon hanger. I gain true vision for the lonely and cold glass that sits on my floor, and it’s all perfectly clear.
All I have to do is figure out how to drill holes in your delicate glass surface, then find trendy picture frame stencils and paint onto my glass panes, and THEN … THEN I will utilize you for creative and functional purposes.
I google ‘how to drill glass’, and find diamond drill bits for the dremel. I wonder to myself if these diamond drill bits are conflict free. I then wonder if sometimes I wonder too much. I silently attempt to push from my mind the image of small children in Sierra Leone losing an arm for my goddarn diamond drill bits purchased so that I may save two panes of glass from the garbage can.
I google ‘dremel’ and find an amazing multifunctional tool. This tiny yet powerful machine drills, grinds, sands… I could get rid of my sonicare and use it for oral care (if I wanted to…). I must own a dremel. Dremels are extravagant, disposable and unnecessary. I should never own a dremel. My internal battles rage on (more accurately… my internal debates continue. I just thought battles raging was a much more dramatic image).
And still, my glass panes, you sit next to me now as I blog about planning to etch your surface or drill holes through your depth save my resistance to buy more craft supplies. And still you collect dust and patiently wait. And what about those poor children in Sierra Leone?
Glass panes taken from the picture frames that I converted into stylish albeit mildly ghetto bulletin boards with a bit of cork tile and craft glue-
Glass panes sitting on my crowded bedroom floor, along side my desk. Will you continue to collect dust indefinitely? Will I trip over you both one morning on my way to check my email on the way out the door causing a gouge in the floor and a slice on my heel and a ruined sock and a missed bus? But I cannot throw you away.
Glass panes, untapped potential, good times in the making, very functional… somehow...
And I’ve never etched glass before, and there is no time like the present.
Glass panes, waiting patiently aside my desk on the cold hardwood floor while I occasionally google ‘glass etching’ and then refuse to buy more craft supplies. Not to mention that glass etching chemicals are toxic. I then google ‘environmentally friendly glass etching’. How invisible you must feel as I walk passed you every day, not to mention that you are by nature transparent.
And then one day as I meander down Haight Street on my way home, I see a picture frame, made only from a glass pane with two holes drilled for mounting and a ribbon hanger. I gain true vision for the lonely and cold glass that sits on my floor, and it’s all perfectly clear.
All I have to do is figure out how to drill holes in your delicate glass surface, then find trendy picture frame stencils and paint onto my glass panes, and THEN … THEN I will utilize you for creative and functional purposes.
I google ‘how to drill glass’, and find diamond drill bits for the dremel. I wonder to myself if these diamond drill bits are conflict free. I then wonder if sometimes I wonder too much. I silently attempt to push from my mind the image of small children in Sierra Leone losing an arm for my goddarn diamond drill bits purchased so that I may save two panes of glass from the garbage can.
I google ‘dremel’ and find an amazing multifunctional tool. This tiny yet powerful machine drills, grinds, sands… I could get rid of my sonicare and use it for oral care (if I wanted to…). I must own a dremel. Dremels are extravagant, disposable and unnecessary. I should never own a dremel. My internal battles rage on (more accurately… my internal debates continue. I just thought battles raging was a much more dramatic image).
And still, my glass panes, you sit next to me now as I blog about planning to etch your surface or drill holes through your depth save my resistance to buy more craft supplies. And still you collect dust and patiently wait. And what about those poor children in Sierra Leone?
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Be Mine
By: Erock
Dedicated to my Mema
So this is my valentine’s story, and it’s a good one… It’s the ultimate love story. And it’s totally true.
Mema is Southern for Grandmother. My Mema was Birmingham genteel. She was raised on the Bible and Southern Charm. She never uttered a curse word in her entire life. She never raised her voice at my dad… ever. Was it prayer, or was it Valium that inspired her undying patience? Perhaps it was both. It was the fifties, and the distinction had yet to be made between pharmacy and the divine. Mema was, oh so fittingly, born on Valentines Day; kissed by cupid on the day of her birth. She was a beautiful woman with fair skin and dark hair in pin-curled waves and pleated skirts like June Cleaver. Her inner beauty radiated, as she shone grace and wisdom and strength.
The beginning of the story for me is really the end of the story, so try to follow along as I skip decades… For my sixteenth birthday, Mema gave me a ring that was made from the diamonds of her original wedding ring. My sister received the same, from Mema’s twentieth anniversary set. “One day you’ll know just how special you are to me.” I can still hear her honey-sweet voice as she made this promise to my sister and I. We were touched, and so grateful.
Six months after my sixteenth birthday, we were faced with the tragic news that Mema was dying of cancer. She came home with hospice, and spent her last days in the house that she and my Gan (Southern variant for Grandpa) had built in Saint Petersburg, Florida after he came home from the war in 1948. We went through the family relics and jewelry and pictures that the house held like a buried treasure, bringing closure to a life of faith and love. And then one day, my mother came across a little document box sitting alone on a closet shelf. It contained the birth certificate for a boy named William Geoffrey who had been born on the same day as my dad. I’ll never forget this moment of truth that we stumbled upon in my grandmother’s room. All the while she lay in a hospital bed in the next room praying that we’d find her out and bring this secret to light.
Let’s flash back to December 22nd, 1954, the day my dad was born. He was the illegitimate son of a daughter of a deacon in the Episcopal Church. Like many girls of her time, when she fell pregnant she went away to a group home to deliver and surrender the child for adoption. My dad was born with water on the brain. The doctors assessed him and concluded that he would not be long on this earth.
On December 26, one day after Christmas, social services brought my dad to a foster home, with the instructions to ‘keep him comfortable’ because he wasn’t going to live for very long. Well, we already know Mema was kind and compassionate and beautiful. Let’s add ‘foster parent’ to the bill just in case you doubted all the accolades I’ve been throwing her. Mema kept foster children intermittently for several years, until the day my dad was brought to her doorstep. Mema recounted, “I took one look in his eyes, and I fell in love with him.” She named him Timmy, after Tiny Tim, given he was sick and it was Christmas. Then she secretly took him to the pediatrician, against the directions of social services. Together, they saved my dad’s life.
**Tangent interesting point: this same pediatrician cared for my sister and I our entire childhood as well.**
Social services took notice that my dad survived, and promptly came to collect him for permanent placement. Mema and my dad were already quite attached, and she couldn’t give him up. So she told the authorities that she was pretty sure he was developmentally delayed and thereby un-adoptable (by 1950’s standards in Florida, mind you). And so it went with Mema and my dad for the next five years. Social services would come to pick him up every three months, and Mema would tell them he was mentally slow. After five years of this (that would be approximately 20 visits from Social Services), someone at the agency finally caught on. They picked up my dad and took him in for IQ testing, and my dad was pretty intelligent – even at 5.
Mema was faced with losing her son, Timmy, as foster parents by legal agreement were not permitted to adopt. She and Gan went to court and appealed for custody. When the judge asked my Mema why they should let her adopt, she explained, with tears in her eyes, “He’s my son.” And so Dad was adopted when he was six years old. Mema and Gan asked Timmy what he’d like his middle name to be, to which he replied, “Elvis.” They in turn suggested Jeffrey, the name his birth mother had given him. And so they raised Timmy Jeffrey as their own, in Saint Petersburg, FL, in 1960’s suburbia. They saved his life and gave him a family and a home.
Of course, it was the South of yesteryear, and don’t ask - don’t tell was the modus operandi for dealing with all uncomfortable situations, and as my dad never asked ‘am I adopted?’ no one ever told him. Mema was looking for the right time to tell him, and never really found the right time, until we found his adoption papers in a little box on a shelf in her closet in 1994.
It was pretty dramatic when we told my dad he was adopted. These are the stories the Oprah Winfrey Show is built upon. My dad, then forty years old, stood crying, lamenting to me, “I have no idea what to even say to her…”
“Well, you could probably say ‘thank you’.” I thought it was a good start.
And so we went to Mema’s house and sat by her hospital bed while she told us the story of my Dad as a baby, and our pediatrician, and adoption and true love. She told my sister and me that this was the reason she had given us her wedding diamonds. She wanted us to always know just how special we are to her.
I remember feeling sad when I realized she wasn’t my biological grandmother, because I felt as though I’d never be as beautiful as she was. But she’s still alive in my heart and soul, and even though I’ve grown into a naughty nurse with a mouth like a sailor and a feisty sense of resolve and a penchant for trouble, she’s still inside me. I’m forever grateful.
And so my valentine’s tradition doesn’t involved chocolate or roses. I tell this story to someone new every year, and spread a little bit of love and grace in celebration of Mema’s Birthday.
Dedicated to my Mema
So this is my valentine’s story, and it’s a good one… It’s the ultimate love story. And it’s totally true.
Mema is Southern for Grandmother. My Mema was Birmingham genteel. She was raised on the Bible and Southern Charm. She never uttered a curse word in her entire life. She never raised her voice at my dad… ever. Was it prayer, or was it Valium that inspired her undying patience? Perhaps it was both. It was the fifties, and the distinction had yet to be made between pharmacy and the divine. Mema was, oh so fittingly, born on Valentines Day; kissed by cupid on the day of her birth. She was a beautiful woman with fair skin and dark hair in pin-curled waves and pleated skirts like June Cleaver. Her inner beauty radiated, as she shone grace and wisdom and strength.
The beginning of the story for me is really the end of the story, so try to follow along as I skip decades… For my sixteenth birthday, Mema gave me a ring that was made from the diamonds of her original wedding ring. My sister received the same, from Mema’s twentieth anniversary set. “One day you’ll know just how special you are to me.” I can still hear her honey-sweet voice as she made this promise to my sister and I. We were touched, and so grateful.
Six months after my sixteenth birthday, we were faced with the tragic news that Mema was dying of cancer. She came home with hospice, and spent her last days in the house that she and my Gan (Southern variant for Grandpa) had built in Saint Petersburg, Florida after he came home from the war in 1948. We went through the family relics and jewelry and pictures that the house held like a buried treasure, bringing closure to a life of faith and love. And then one day, my mother came across a little document box sitting alone on a closet shelf. It contained the birth certificate for a boy named William Geoffrey who had been born on the same day as my dad. I’ll never forget this moment of truth that we stumbled upon in my grandmother’s room. All the while she lay in a hospital bed in the next room praying that we’d find her out and bring this secret to light.
Let’s flash back to December 22nd, 1954, the day my dad was born. He was the illegitimate son of a daughter of a deacon in the Episcopal Church. Like many girls of her time, when she fell pregnant she went away to a group home to deliver and surrender the child for adoption. My dad was born with water on the brain. The doctors assessed him and concluded that he would not be long on this earth.
On December 26, one day after Christmas, social services brought my dad to a foster home, with the instructions to ‘keep him comfortable’ because he wasn’t going to live for very long. Well, we already know Mema was kind and compassionate and beautiful. Let’s add ‘foster parent’ to the bill just in case you doubted all the accolades I’ve been throwing her. Mema kept foster children intermittently for several years, until the day my dad was brought to her doorstep. Mema recounted, “I took one look in his eyes, and I fell in love with him.” She named him Timmy, after Tiny Tim, given he was sick and it was Christmas. Then she secretly took him to the pediatrician, against the directions of social services. Together, they saved my dad’s life.
**Tangent interesting point: this same pediatrician cared for my sister and I our entire childhood as well.**
Social services took notice that my dad survived, and promptly came to collect him for permanent placement. Mema and my dad were already quite attached, and she couldn’t give him up. So she told the authorities that she was pretty sure he was developmentally delayed and thereby un-adoptable (by 1950’s standards in Florida, mind you). And so it went with Mema and my dad for the next five years. Social services would come to pick him up every three months, and Mema would tell them he was mentally slow. After five years of this (that would be approximately 20 visits from Social Services), someone at the agency finally caught on. They picked up my dad and took him in for IQ testing, and my dad was pretty intelligent – even at 5.
Mema was faced with losing her son, Timmy, as foster parents by legal agreement were not permitted to adopt. She and Gan went to court and appealed for custody. When the judge asked my Mema why they should let her adopt, she explained, with tears in her eyes, “He’s my son.” And so Dad was adopted when he was six years old. Mema and Gan asked Timmy what he’d like his middle name to be, to which he replied, “Elvis.” They in turn suggested Jeffrey, the name his birth mother had given him. And so they raised Timmy Jeffrey as their own, in Saint Petersburg, FL, in 1960’s suburbia. They saved his life and gave him a family and a home.
Of course, it was the South of yesteryear, and don’t ask - don’t tell was the modus operandi for dealing with all uncomfortable situations, and as my dad never asked ‘am I adopted?’ no one ever told him. Mema was looking for the right time to tell him, and never really found the right time, until we found his adoption papers in a little box on a shelf in her closet in 1994.
It was pretty dramatic when we told my dad he was adopted. These are the stories the Oprah Winfrey Show is built upon. My dad, then forty years old, stood crying, lamenting to me, “I have no idea what to even say to her…”
“Well, you could probably say ‘thank you’.” I thought it was a good start.
And so we went to Mema’s house and sat by her hospital bed while she told us the story of my Dad as a baby, and our pediatrician, and adoption and true love. She told my sister and me that this was the reason she had given us her wedding diamonds. She wanted us to always know just how special we are to her.
I remember feeling sad when I realized she wasn’t my biological grandmother, because I felt as though I’d never be as beautiful as she was. But she’s still alive in my heart and soul, and even though I’ve grown into a naughty nurse with a mouth like a sailor and a feisty sense of resolve and a penchant for trouble, she’s still inside me. I’m forever grateful.
And so my valentine’s tradition doesn’t involved chocolate or roses. I tell this story to someone new every year, and spread a little bit of love and grace in celebration of Mema’s Birthday.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
My New Years Resolution:
I sat on a log bench in the shade on a chilly December morning while a woman in cotton sweats and a long black skirt and converse sneakers spoke of raw garbage and decomposition and the value of worm poop. I was under dressed for the occasion, under-rested as well, perhaps still a wee bit under-sober. And so I shivered as a frosty breeze blew threw the arm holes of my warm up vest, watched the sun warm the earth – causing an adorable tiny ground layer of fog, and listened to our compost master school us on raw trash. My interest in rotting waste had started a few months prior as I began to take notice of all the green trash we throw in the regular garbage. As my trash-guilt grew, so did the realization that a compost bin was not logistically possible for our apartment building. So I started collecting raw waste in a kitchen compost bin and sneaking it into my neighbor’s green bin on garbage day. However, illegal dumping is no way to save the earth. Nor is it a way to make friends with the neighbors. It was then that I looked to the composting abilities of red wigglers. My history with red wigglers was limited to bating my fishing hook and bob-fishing for Brim on Saturdays with my Dad. He thought it was cool that his little girl could bait her own hook, and I thought it was cool that he thought I was cool. Who knew that these little guys (God rest their tiny squirmy souls) eat the rot off of green waste, turning your fruit and veggie scraps into big balls of worm poo. This poop is nitrogen rich, and has anti fungal properties. Its like adding vitamin supplements to your potting soil. This whole process fascinates me and I love the idea of making something useful from my garbage. I decided then that I would bring garbage eating worms to our home, but that I would never tell them any fishing stories about me and my Dad.
I signed up for the Saturday morning Worm Class at Garden for the Environment, in the Sunset District. I got a definite maybe from Aaron when I invited him to attend with me. Friday night holiday parties kept us out into the early morning, and I was sleeping soundly in my bed when Aaron woke me up for worm school. I wasn't going to attend, but he was going with – chased me out of bed, gave me a banana and a beer and we set off to class together. When we pulled up at the garden, Aaron informed me that he was way too hung over to sit outside for two hours but that he knew I really wanted to go to school and that’s why he woke me up and pretended he was going to go with me. I was pissed for about 10 seconds, then I realized what a sucker I was and what a truly thoughtful and endearing dirty trick he pulled on me. I kissed him goodbye and joined the class, he returned to the couch and football.
I froze my arse off for those two hours, but gained a lot of practical worm knowledge. I followed up class with the book, Worms Eat my Garbage, written by the grandmother of Vermiculture, Mary Appelhof. I was educated. I shared my worm knowledge with Courtney, who seemed cautious yet quite excited as she asked, “Can we name them?!!” Kevin and I hammered out basic details of a house worm bin over a few glasses of wine. We addressed such items such as location of the bin, successful worm tending, and if we should mark and name each individual worm or just give them all one name. I was ready to get a worm bin! My favorite worm bins are condominium style, where the worms eat trash on the first floor and then move to their new flat on the second floor when they’ve exhausted their first floor food source. You can add many floors, if you prefer a high-rise. This type of bin is easier to manage indoors, and saves me sorting worms and worm shit once a month. It also has a tap at the bottom that drains ‘worm tea’ – Nitrogen rich liquid former waste that plants just can’t get enough of.
As I prepared to purchase my bin, reviewing the order in my on-line shopping cart, I looked around my room and let the air out of my own sail. There were papers on my desk, random belongings on my bedside table, and clothes strewn so fervently in the room – it looked like the forty niners locker room after a football game. And so I amended my New Years Resolution, to first – keep my room clean for a month, and THEN, after my month of success, after I finally stop leaving a trail of belongings in a path to my room, after I stop forgetting to do my dishes and stop repeatedly losing shit in my purse. THEN I will celebrate by rounding up some worms and bringing them to our Oak Street digs… and placing name tags on each one of them.
Addendum: I always make a throw away resolution… one year I resolved to wear more skirts. This years is to moisturize my hands more often…
The throw away resolution serves two purposes. Every time I moisturize my hands, I will be reminded to keep my room clean. AND, If one day my room is trashed, I’ve lost my keys again, and there are dead worms at my feet – as I’m asking myself when the hell I’m ever going to pull it together, I will reach for my hand lotion and take solace in the simple act of moisturizing.
The End
I signed up for the Saturday morning Worm Class at Garden for the Environment, in the Sunset District. I got a definite maybe from Aaron when I invited him to attend with me. Friday night holiday parties kept us out into the early morning, and I was sleeping soundly in my bed when Aaron woke me up for worm school. I wasn't going to attend, but he was going with – chased me out of bed, gave me a banana and a beer and we set off to class together. When we pulled up at the garden, Aaron informed me that he was way too hung over to sit outside for two hours but that he knew I really wanted to go to school and that’s why he woke me up and pretended he was going to go with me. I was pissed for about 10 seconds, then I realized what a sucker I was and what a truly thoughtful and endearing dirty trick he pulled on me. I kissed him goodbye and joined the class, he returned to the couch and football.
I froze my arse off for those two hours, but gained a lot of practical worm knowledge. I followed up class with the book, Worms Eat my Garbage, written by the grandmother of Vermiculture, Mary Appelhof. I was educated. I shared my worm knowledge with Courtney, who seemed cautious yet quite excited as she asked, “Can we name them?!!” Kevin and I hammered out basic details of a house worm bin over a few glasses of wine. We addressed such items such as location of the bin, successful worm tending, and if we should mark and name each individual worm or just give them all one name. I was ready to get a worm bin! My favorite worm bins are condominium style, where the worms eat trash on the first floor and then move to their new flat on the second floor when they’ve exhausted their first floor food source. You can add many floors, if you prefer a high-rise. This type of bin is easier to manage indoors, and saves me sorting worms and worm shit once a month. It also has a tap at the bottom that drains ‘worm tea’ – Nitrogen rich liquid former waste that plants just can’t get enough of.
As I prepared to purchase my bin, reviewing the order in my on-line shopping cart, I looked around my room and let the air out of my own sail. There were papers on my desk, random belongings on my bedside table, and clothes strewn so fervently in the room – it looked like the forty niners locker room after a football game. And so I amended my New Years Resolution, to first – keep my room clean for a month, and THEN, after my month of success, after I finally stop leaving a trail of belongings in a path to my room, after I stop forgetting to do my dishes and stop repeatedly losing shit in my purse. THEN I will celebrate by rounding up some worms and bringing them to our Oak Street digs… and placing name tags on each one of them.
Addendum: I always make a throw away resolution… one year I resolved to wear more skirts. This years is to moisturize my hands more often…
The throw away resolution serves two purposes. Every time I moisturize my hands, I will be reminded to keep my room clean. AND, If one day my room is trashed, I’ve lost my keys again, and there are dead worms at my feet – as I’m asking myself when the hell I’m ever going to pull it together, I will reach for my hand lotion and take solace in the simple act of moisturizing.
The End
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