I am the new owner of an...

...aquarium! Yes, by golly, we have a new fish tank, thanks to a friend who noticed how me and my GF were admiring his and his GF's so much. Ours (above) is a 28-gallon model, and our friend gave us 10 gallons of his well-established aquarium water along with an old bio filter.

Over the last several days, we've started a colony: We started with six guppies, then a few days later added two hockey-stick tetras and two black phantom tetras. Just today, we inserted seven (!) tiger barbs. Ah, you say, the barbs are semi-aggressive while the others are less so, but since they are in a small school, the violence level shouldn't be that ugly. Interestingly, over the last two hours, one baby guppie has been eaten, but not by a barb, by a stressed out hockey stick.

Along with that, I got a decent pair of pajamas, a bottle of Blue Label Johnny Walker (!), and an iPod Touch (16G).

What loot did you get?

Skid Marks for the Season

• Flew the other day on a 45 minute flight at about 7:00 A.M. Know what they gave me to eat? Party Mix. On the return flight, just yesterday, at about 3:00 P.M., know what they had to drink? Water or O.J. No coffee. I can see that that airline is in tune with humanity. Those fuckers.
• Those in-flight magazines? They must be the most boring magazines in the world.
• Airline pilots crack me up with their hyper-casual sounding voices on the loud speaker. They speak about all this stuff, flight information, take off and landing times, nearing land marks, the weather, as if they were an auto mechanic discussing snow tire options. As doctors have bad handwriting, airline pilots have these voices. It's like a law.
• Speaking of airline pilots talking about the weather, what's up with that? It seems like they talk about it a lot, er, I mean, they kind of go on and on and on... about it. Just fly the damn plane and concentrate on your landing, don't talk weather to me. I realize you have to know a lot about the weather, but all I care about is landing safely. I can look out the window to see the weather.
• My GF likes to cook, thank Goodness. It's funny, but when she does up a Prime Rib, she doesn't speak in terms of minutes or hours, she speaks in terms of degrees. "Hey, Babe, when's dinner, I'm starved?" I'll ask. "Oh, not for another 44 degrees or so, but you can do me a favor and go to the garage and grab another bottle of red, please." "OK," I'll answer, "how about in another 20 degrees or so?"
• Watching about capital punishment on 60-Minutes with my buddy, he asked me the other day, "Do you have to be a doctor to do that?" "Yeah, I guess so, if it's lethal injection. I also suppose you'd have to be an electrician to pull the switch on the electric chair, too," I said. This got me to thinking. If the executioner were a plumber, the method of death ought to be drowning. I wonder. What would your profession have to be if the method of death were, say, mechanical separation? Helicopter pilot!
• You know, eating a nice, thick, juicy, medium-rare slab of Prime Rib is a wonderfully joyous experience. It really involves many of my senses, certainly taste and smell, but others, too, like touch and sound. This got me to thinking: I suppose that, in a few ways, it is not unlike eating pussy!
• I still love my cigars! That evening (previous post) when me and my buddy had pizza and cigars? Well, those cigars were purrrty damn enjoyable. They tasted good and they smelled even better. The smoke was thick and enveloping. Again, that's a kind of enjoyment that stimulates all the senses. I would take a big puff, let the smoke roll around inside my mouth, and let it leak out in a thick stream. As the last of it exited my mouth, I would put the body of the cigar next to my nostrils and take a whiff... That, mixed with the thick cloud of smoke, smelled so good. This got me to thinking, too: It's a lot like eating pussy!
• Incidently, to answer the question, "How was the pizza that night," the answer is it was some of the best I've ever had... It was remarkable.
  

Conspiracy

I am so distressed here. I can't get over this. The other day I attended a small get together with friends. Sometime during the evening, I and the host dude went out to grab pizza. People had to move their cars so he could pull his sporty little thing out of the garage. As somebody was moving her truck, I noticed she had her ultra-bright fog lights on along with her head lights. Zing! Then I watched somebody else back their SUV Zing! from the driveway which took no more than 14 minutes to do because it was dark out and they wanted to be careful. Zing! As me and the dude were pulling away, I noticed him flick on his headlights. They were those really super bright blue lights. Zing! Then, as we were heading for pizza, I noticed he wasn't using his turn signal hardly at all! Zing! All this happening within a 30-minute time period and among people in my own circle.

All those zings in one hour, let alone a day or several days. It's a conspiracy. I know it is. I thought I was having a nightmare.

OK, I'm awake now and I feel better.

No good title. Common sense? Yeah.

I love watching these prison documentaries on cable, like "Lockup" on MSNBC, and a few others. Man, life looks miserable for those losers. These guys, the ones who've been locked up for the rest of their cheap, annoying lives for murder and other heinous violence, they ain't got nuthin; they ain't deserve nuthin; and fuck them to hell. They spit at and fling their shit at the guards; they throw tantrums of the most violent kind; they are simply primitive animals who have nothing left to give to society, and nothing left to take from society, except tax dollars, of course. Lots and lots and lots of money gets poured into their sorry maintenance, and for what? Still, I laugh when I hear them talk into the camera about how unfairly they're treated. (Yeah, shitface, how about the way you treated your victim, you scum?)

I'm not talking about the guy who ripped off a million bucks from his company, or the corrupt politician doing time. I'm not even talking about the dumb ass hole who robbed a bank.

I'm talking about murderers.

The super-high security prisons are what get me. I mean, it really gets my goat that we provide a living for these scum bags. Why does our nation insist on having high-security prisons? "Segregation Unit my ass!" My retort: We should abolish them immediately. If some slime bag deserves super-high security for the rest of his slimy life, why don't we just suck the air out and end it now? Better for him, much better for us! If a man can kill somebody in self defense, why can't The State kill somebody after the deed is done? Eye for an eye, sucka!

Blue Tooth Ear Devices

OK, that's enough. You look so stupid with that thing sticking out of your ear. Have you been assimilated into the Borg or what? The next thing you know, people will affix an external hard disk on their forehead so they'll have all the nation's telephone directories handy. Even better, people could get something akin to a Darth Vader helmet to house your communications, web surfing, email, global positioning system, AM/FM/MP3 system, and porn movies.

Trying to keep up with the technology? Well, I have news for you: It's not there yet. Blue tooth speaker devices suck and they're a pain in the ass to switch from regular mode to "Blue Tooth" mode.

Trying to be fashionable? Well, I have more news for you: You look stupid. You also look really conceited. Really, who are you trying to impress? Are you that important and lazy that you can't stumble around with the rest of us zombies and use your cell phone in a normal manner, like, discreetly?

If there's anything that drives me crazy, it's hearing and seeing somebody apparently talking to himself or herself when, moments later, I see their little device. You're already inconsiderate enough to have your conversation wherever you please no matter who are you disturbing, now you're just making it easier for yourself and more puzzling (and annoying) for those around you.

Take that thing out of your ear. I have a better place you can stick it.

Women. Again.

Let me get this straight. If men are mostly into visuals ("Great legs!") and women are more into their feelings, then why is it that when my GF and her friends get together spontaneously at a bar we like to go to from time to time (I enjoy my martinis), she can turn away from me completely and cackle with them like a flock of geese and completely ignore me and my martini? You can venture an educated guess at what would happen if I did that to her. Anyway, this happened last night. While I enjoyed a peek or two of her cute friends (over her shoulder) (visuals, you see) I enjoyed my martini and paid attention to the three-piece jazz band playing. (Incidentally, Shadow of Your Smile is a great tune and it keyed in well to my feelings at the time!)

I should speak only for myself here, but sometimes I feel that, while a man's heart can lay mostly hidden or buried, it is still a fragile thing, but women want it to be a strong thing. A woman's, on the other hand, seems to be in your face and is much stronger than a man's heart, but we want it to be a softer thing. I don't get it. Or maybe I do.

Women.

Kid wants a bike

So there was this kid who asked his dad if he could get a bike. The dad says, "Kid, if you can touch the head of your dick to your ass hole, I'll buy you the bike!" The kid tried, tried, and tried again, but just couldn't.

Couple years go by... the kid tries it again. Can't do it, dammit. He's 15.

Couple more years. Tries it again. Almost.

Finally, he's 18 and a half. He just manages to plant the head of his dick next to his ass hole.

"Dad! Dad! I did it! I did it! I got my dick head right in my ass hole! Can I have the bike now??"

The dad replies, "No, but now you can fuck yourself!"

OK, Ok... bad blog material. I'll do better tomorrow.

My New Twitter

Amazing, I can see that I have 497 readers, 332 subscribers, and 14 million page views per day here. This is incredible*. But, hey, what the hell. I wanted to make a note here that I am live with a Twitter account. Please check me out. It will be spontaneous, off the wall, offensive, and very idiotic at times. Hear me out...

*I'm one step ahead of you, sweetie...

Smells

You know, if you can take pictures and video and record sound, I wonder why we can't yet record smells. I'm being an idiot, you say? Nay! So why would this be of any use?

I do a lot of walking for exercise and enjoyment, but I tend to take the same route every day, only varying it slightly, and only occasionally at that. Anyhow, along my route I notice that there are lot of scents along the way that I have found over time to be quite enjoyable.

You wouldn't immediately think that the smell of an auto garage, with its dirty oil, rubber tires, exhaust and other fumes, and stale cigarette air would be that great, but during a breezy day walking past this place, the fleeting poofs of the smelly air aren't that objectionable. Being only temporary whifs, they remind me of my past days, working on car motors, lubing things up, getting all dirty.

I also walk past a hotel and a brewery. You might imagine what the brewery smells like. It is really heaven with the sweet scent of the malt before any of the hops are added to the kettles. Nice! I love that smell; it is not unlike that of a bakery.

The hotel is also nice. It's huge ventilation system is always blowing its warm air out onto the sidewalk. It smells like clean laundry and fried food mixed together. During the rain, it makes you feel like you're in a tub of warm water. During the cold months, it is soothing, and the sidewalk there seems to be always free of snow.

These are scents that I think would be novel to have at hand. Maybe whoever invents such a device could make it so it could hold say, 50 different scents, each under their own category.

One could be food. "Honey, I stopped by the bread store and couldn't figure out which loaf to buy. There was the Rosemary stuff which smelled great -- here, press the button and smell, -- or they also had sourdough that smelled wonderful. Here, press the button and smell that one, too. Which one do you like better?

How about the nose of a fine wine? Many that I can remember have had such a nice smell that I'd definitely like to be able to refer back to them.

Dumb? OK...How about a physiological category?

Let's say your GF always informs you of your horrible breath, but you can never seem to smell your own bad breath. I sure can't, and I've tired everything. The only time I can smell my bad breath is after I've smoked a cigar. Mix that with a strong cup of coffee, and, well, now there's trouble. Well, it would be great to breathe into a certain breath odor recording device -- let's call it The Breath Odor Recording Device -- and have it blown back at you so you can gain the same perspective as your victims. Excellent!

Not good enough?

Well, let's say you had a particularly strong fart, one with such a pungent and sharply offensive odor that it not only makes your eyes water but it also casts a sort of greenish, yellowish tint on everything you see. This you'll definitely have to save. C'mon, if not for your GF when she gets home from her Garden Club (although she argues against me on this, I think she's particularly fond my stinky ones), at least for your buddies while out having pizza and beer. "Hey guys, bottoms up, and, hey, smell this!" Anyway, I think it would be useful to save these sorts of olfactory stimuli so they don't go to waste.

Or, maybe for later analysis for, say, what if you weren't feeling well and were cutting loose a batch of particularly dangerous-smelling farts all day. Wouldn't it be great if the medical field were advanced enough to accurately diagnose and treat the problem based on the smell of a saved fart?

They can tell a lot from blood, urine, and stool testing, why not fart testing? I'll bet they could tell what you ate for the last three days. I wonder if they could detect illegal drug use from one? By the way, isn't the word stool a stupid euphemism for shit?

Anyway, can't get to the doctor's office before they close? There could be a device, say, a flatutainer that you could buy at drug stores and Wall Mart. (They'd be stocked close to the enema treatments.) Simply strap it on, let loose, seal it up, and drop it off at your doctor's handy after-hours drop box.

Audio Cues for Drivers?

My - and probably your - computer has many different sounds that are associated with events, you know, like program errors or when the operating system loads. These make great audio cues so the user can be sure of what the computer is doing. I was thinking, why can't cars have different sounding horns for all the events that happen on the road? I can think of several.

Though in my city we wouldn't use them very often, I think it would be nice to have a friendly sounding mode, something that sounds like tingle tingle, or whatever, to say thank you to those few who use blinkers, or who don't cut you off.

More useful, however, we could have the soft, polite, coaxing little "beep beep" so that you can calmly remind the driver ahead of you that the light has just turned green and he can take his gaze off iPod or his GF and go. (I tend to gaze at my GF at red lights because she is extremely cute - hey, I'm talking reeealy cute - when, on more than one occasion, I have been reminded in this way. It is embarrassing, but it happens.)

You could have a slightly louder and more assertive sound for when somebody may not see you as they're changing lanes. It happens, and I wouldn't vote to have people arrested for this, though maybe a good honk would help to deter this stupidity. How about a a loud, growling sound? "Watch it, buster, stay out of my turf!"

OK, it's time to get serious and show those idiots just how angry you can get. The jerk-off who changes lanes right in front of you without the use of the turn signal. This guy deserves something ear-piercing. How about an accurate and loud rendition of a train-wreck? Or a gun-shot if capable speakers exist.

How about that guy who who refuses to drive faster than 25 MPH in the acceleration lane before merging into the main highway. Idiot. He'll get the loudest, most obnoxious horn.

Naw, wait a minute. These are bad ideas. There'd be so much noise pollution in this town, nobody could hear the commercial jets fly over anymore. Never mind.