My Christmas Was in June

I stopped into the local Starbucks today, on the way to work. I seldom carry cash, and it's the only neighborhood coffee shop that doesn't have the $3-5 minimum purchase requirement for debit card purchases.

I'm very conscious of music, so whenever I walk into a place it's usually the first thing that registers. It sounded eerily like the kind of 19th Century European churcy music that makes caucasoids feel warm and fuzzy in December.

"Is this Christmas music?" I ask the Plain Jane standing in queue in front of me.
"I think so," she responds, motioning for me to notice all the snowmen and Crapmas knickety-knackety sh*t for sale. "It's a little early for me."

"Me too," I replied.

The line breezed through pretty quicky and I was up to bat.

"Large coffee, please."

The clerk turns around to pour the beverage and returns to the counter. "Can I get you anything else?"

"No thank you," I say as I hand over my charge card.

He runs the card through, turns around and says, "Venti Christmas blend. $1.90. Happy holidays."

The fist thing that struck me was that he actually corrected me and my 'order' with the "venti" thing, but it took me an extra few seconds to process the f*cking "Christmas" remark.

I stood perplexed, looking at the bright red paper cup, the snowflakey sleeve and my credit card in my hand, feeling like I just got a reach-around from Tiny Tim's mother. Then my eyes started darting around the place, waiting for Santa or Frosty or some other Christmas a**hole to come by to add some holiday flavour to this nightmare.

I left in a daze, trying to ascertain whether the three weeks after election day had been cancelled without my notice. I chuckled to myself as I made my way to the exit as another patron smiled at me and said, "I know."



And god chafe us, everyone.

Firmly Insert Foot in Yap...

Hairshirt's Joe Wack hosts this week's and asks us to hark back to a moment in miserable existence where we might have said something we wish we hadn't - not something necessarily offensive, just something that might have made us feel plain dumb.

Heh. I remember getting set up in the sh*tter in high school, where a couple guys started in on talking about a guy I didn't know very well, but didn't much care for. I decided to chime in my less than favourable opinions on the chap and probably used a few expletives do describe him when he comes out of the stall, saying, "You guys don't know what the f*ck you're talking about."

I felt about an inch tall.

Pay Josephus a visit and 'fess up. What's the dumbest thing that was ever expelled from your voicebox and how much of a jackass did it make you seem?

The Return of the Four Play! - Volume 8

There's a window of about 8 to 10 years in a guy's life where music plays a crucial role... usually. Right about half-way through high school you gravitate towards a particular personal style, and with it comes the soundtrack of your youth. You could've been one of those turtlenecked choads, writing sub-par poetry in a leather bound blank book who cut your teeth on Philip Glass; or an maybe you were an unfortunate soul with hessian hair and an affinity for the bong stylings of Sabbath or Zeppelin.

Perhaps you were one of the stinky hippie types that caught the tail end of the Grateful Dead and are still wearing tie-dye t-shirts and doing "'shrooms, dude." Almost everyone else moves on... shelves the Twisted Sister records, gets a job they hate barely enough, weds and spends the afternoon raking leaves and fixing the washing machine.

Once in a while you dust off the turntable or CD player and hark back to simpler times: before the squabbles with the spouse and dinners at the in-laws -- where you could take the fifteen bucks in your pocket and buy the new album by 38-Special rather than a 48-pack if Luvs or Huggies. You'll find that you outgrew most of your music collection, but there is always a small handful of albums that are both timeless and nostalgic. Yeah, Venom and Morbid Saint might suck ass to listen to now on the way to work, but for some reason you could still listen to Megadeth.

Me? Out of the muck that was the mid-80s there are several albums and artists that I can still listen to. Some of it still speaks to me as an adult, but nothing makes me feel like a kid more than the Descendents.

Their playful lyrics, catchy choruses & rudimentary harmonies take me back to a time when all I had to worry about was meeting girls - all I had to do was hang out with friends and all I owed was one months' rent in a sh*tty college apartment.

Drummer Bill Stevenson and vocalist Milo Aukerman are two of the most talented songwriters ever to fly under the radar. They helped us recover from sh*tty girlfriends and made us daydream about meeting the next. They included tracks full of their own farts (gotta love a band that appreciates toilet humor). Their songs melted away the miles on road-trips with as we sang along at the top of our lungs - a tradition that I've maintained with the O-Dog, who can sing all of "Clean Sheets."

Enjoy... but I ask: What takes you back?

Bikeage
Silly Girl
Cheer
Clean Sheets

Mille Grazie

Recently, the O-Dog and I sent off another original O-Dog design on a tog for Jaques Roux from the brilliant but oft-dormant Hubris & Hate blog. (Understandably the homes is in law school. What's a brother gonna do if he gots to study). As a thank you, Mr. Roux was generous enough to send 4 lbs. of Hershey, PA chocolate.

Here's the O-Dog's design. Somehow I felt it went perfectly with Mr. Roux's blog and his current role as a student.



On behalf of the O-Dog, the Fletch and our family dentist, merci beaucoup, bro. And thank you for patronizing my little dude's art.

From the Annals of "My B*tch Can Beat Up yo' B*tch"

Trick-or-treaters around here usually include neighborhood kids and an influx of kids from Buffalo's 'less affluent' neighborhoods. Not that this is a problem by any means, but along with them come older teens with no costumes, and an even bigger chafe: twenty and thirty-something women holding out bags to fill.

Usually I give a handful of treats to the little ones and then a piece of candy to the aforementioned scavengers. My neighbor is less tolerant. While doling out the goods he'll take one look at a questionable costume and inquire, "What are you supposed to be?"

"A football player," responds the costumeless teen, holding a football.

"I don't think so. Get off my porch."

In years past I've had some sh*theel in a Barry White voice at my door scrutinizing the candy and inquiring, "You ain't got no chocolate? I don't like those."

[F*ck you, a**hole] "Nope. No chocolate."

Fortunately this year's trick-or-treaters were largely legit, with a couple of twenty/thirty-something heifers partaking in the festivities... which leads us to the highlight of the evening.

Mrs. Prego was out with the kids, along with our friend Nicole and her son. After a block or so their paths with some older heavy hitters on their cell phones telling their friend, "Yeah, we're in the rich neighborhood getting some good candy."

Things got a little heated after a while as these broads got a little aggro, shoving past kids and complaining. "Mother f*cker gave me pixie sticks. Probably got anthrax in it."

Meanwhile, Mrs. P did her best to ignore them, snapping pictures of our kids. After a while the heifers took exception to that. "Is she going to take pictures at every house?"

At the next house one of them mumbles to the other, "Hold on, it's picture time."

"Excuse me. Do you have a problem with me taking pictures of my children on Halloween?"

"I wasn't talking to you!" came the response.
"No, but you were talking about me."

After that I'm sure there was the typical posturing and "bitch" lobs that accompany such encounters and they parted ways without further incident.

As Mrs. P retold me the story I ask, "Was she bigger than you?"
"Much."

"Oooh. You don't tangle a**holes with the heavy hitters. She would have kicked your ass."

The missus is from South Buffalo Irish stock, but she grew up in the 'burbs so I doubt she's ever been in a physical altercation with anyone.

"There were other people around," she replied.

"Nicole?" I said. "She's scrawny."

It reminded me of the scene in Dazed and Confused when the Mike Newhouse character decides to stand up to drunk bully Clint at the kegger. He figures he can get one swing, theorizing that the onlookers would break up the fight before Clint delivers a painful reprisal.

The onlookers, much to the disappointment of Mike Newhouse, watched idly as Clint delivered an ass-kicking before anyone intervened. I have no doubt the missus would have suffered a similar fate.

Well, fortunately for Mrs. P it never came to that. I'm willing to wager that the 250 lb. sister would have wiped the sidewalk with the missus. I'd have to teach the boys to feed mommy through a straw and I'd have to wipe her ass for her.

On the plus side, if she ever 'vents' on me or throws one of her patented tirades because I didn't help her with the house work I could always pull the plug.

Just kidding. I'm proud of you, baby. You've got cojones.