Random words for the day:

A well-dressed late-thirtish Indian businessman walking down 49th street late last night and talking on his cellphone was overheard to say "Oh, come on. It's nowhere near as cool if it doesn't have sparks flying out of its ass!"

I'd like to think he was talking shop about how to advertise some new product to the base American market, but somehow I doubt it.

Backwards Underwear and Two Ticked Off Toes

I wore my underwear backwards yesterday, and it may be the reason for my change of fate...

Toe One:
I finally decided to put together that entertainment television furniture stand, that comes with book shelves, drawers, and a place for my x-box, television, and dvd player. It took me two hours, putting together plywood A to B and etc. Finally I had it all together, with the final nails in place (as in impossible to pull apart again), and I realize I put one shelf on backwards. So much for those notching holes to hold up the books. I figured I’d not care too much and figure out a solution to that later. I pulled the heavy lugging item through my door frame without harming anything, except my left big toe. I removed enough skin that it would have needed stitches, if there was any skin to stitch back together. It bled considerably for about an hour off and on, as I’d move it. My brain wasn’t thinking straight, because the circulation was cut off down below - yet seemingly made it to my toe still.

Cleaning and Photographs:
I cleaned all of yesterday, the family party for my dad’s side was today, and I had to vacuum the whole house, bring chairs and tables up, and do whatever my parents wanted. I did so willingly, as I’ve been able to have more flexible communications with my parents lately. My dad instructed me to go to Inkley’s to get some special photographs of my girlfriend and me printed out. I did so, getting doubles of 8x10, black and white 5x7, 3x5. I had matching frames and everything already. I hope they turn out because I spent a lot of time in that project. The price wasn’t too bad too, picking them up before New Year’s Eve. I also shopped at Smith’s for groceries for the family party and New Year’s Eve, where I’ll be throwing my bash with all my friends.

Toe Two:
Somehow my girlfriend’s parents were convinced to finally let us see each other since Christmas day. I was with one of my best guy friends, who I’d spent practically no time with during the month of December because of Madrigals gigs every day. She didn’t really want to see him, they never really got along - but he came any way when she called me saying, “My mom says it okay if you come over and stay till 11pm, but my younger sister (age 14) has to baby sit us.” I rented two movies, Jet Li Hero, a Chinese five star movie with subtitles (I loved it), and Secret Window. We watched Hero, because no one else but me wanted to watch Secret Window. (I’m a romantic, but found Hero a great romance too). Any way, the movie wasn’t that long so we had some “time on our hands.” Somehow I ended up wrestling with my girlfriend, and I smashed my right big toe seemingly shattering the fragments of the toe nail. I could almost not push on the accelerator with my root foot, it was blazing hot and hurt like Hades.

Backwards Underwear:
While at my girlfriends house, during the wrestling I was pretty sure that my pride was hurt, or bruised at least. I went to the restroom to check, it was sure enough, but upon inspection I noticed my underwear was on backwards! I came out of the bathroom smiling and almost crying of laughter - and her little sister takes one look at me and glaringly says, “Do I need to get the plunger?” I took no offense to this, asked everyone in the room to not laugh, but went to my girlfriends ear whispering, “My underwear is on backwards.” She then went to tears laughing, (She works in the woman’s section of a shopping mall anchor store), and my guy friend starts randomly talking about man thongs. He didn’t know yet, but my girlfriend asks him for the color and further description of my man thong. He does, pink, upon other identifications. We told the other two people in the room finally, and all started laughing all over.

I do think that when I put those on this morning, I changed my fate for a day. I suggest anyone who wants to despite normality to do the same. Do not go as far as Kramer and go commando though.

Hi everybody! How was your Christmas? Mine was GREAT!

At my dad’s house everything I got did not plug in or need batteries. I think that’s really neat because so many kids my age are hooked on television. I also got a hamster a little while ago. I named him Sprint Prudence Toborg.

Sprint because he runs really fast on his wheel and then all of a sudden just stops. Prudence is the name I usually call him. It comes from the Beatles song “Dear Prudence”. Even though it’s a girl’s name I don’t think he cares. He’s just a hamster.

All in all it was one of the best Christmases ever!!!

I wrote another poem last night while listening to the song “Young Americans” by David Bowie. It’s called “Evolving”. I hope you like it!

Evolving

Life does not care
to take you anywhere.
You have to dare
to take life somewhere

Everyone make a difference,
that’s how the world evolves.
The earth is a big jigsaw puzzle,
every person is a puzzle piece

Don’t think about it
and it will come

Time cannot be time without a little life,
yet
life cannot be life without a little time

Have a Happy New Year!!!

Bye!

/me says Usual disclaimers apply

jessicapierce says "Your kid's a weirdo, man. It's pretty great."

POINT/COUNTERPOINT:
Tyler Evans, Grade 3, Mrs. Baker's Class, Shady Grove Elementary
and
Vichizzle McNizzle, Pimp Daddy

---

Celebrating New Year's Eve

Vichizzle: Hey, what's up all you partyin muthafuckas, it's the Vichizz again rappin at ya bout the par-tay to end all par-tays, the fuckin banginest, rockinest, motherfuckingest e-vent of the entire fuckin year: New Year's Eve, y'all! Two-thousan-foe, kick his ugly ol ass out the doe cuz it's time to ring in the New Year, muthafuckas. Werd. Dis is where you gets out yo best hooch and yo best weed cuz it's time to get completely stoned and boned. Foe real. Get together with yo best homies and hos, gather up yo best toonz, and fuckin knock the night out! Yeah, knock that bitch out. Get yo ass as fuckin stoned and shitfaced as possibly!

Now some people be sayin they rathah stay at home, maybe have a few friends ovah and watch that fuckin ball drop. Fuck that, dawg! Don't be watchin no Dick Fuckin Clark, knowhaddi'msayin? Yeah I know his old ass not be doin it this year, got himself a shitload of stroke in his toke, but you know what I'm fuckin sayin, man. Don't be watchin him or any utha bitch they gots to replace his prune ass. You bettah be smokin, drinkin, and fuckin the night away, muthafuckas, cuz it be on at the start of two-thousan-five, bitch!

Tyler: This New Year's Eve Daddy decided that we would stay at home and not go out because lots of people get drunk on New Year's Eve and are out on the roads, making the roads dangerous. There will also be a lot of hippies on the roads that are on drugs. Daddy says that they drink a lot of beer and smoke a lot of grass. I don't know why people smoke grass. I ate some once and I didn't like it at all. Anyway, Daddy says that we will just stay at home and watch the ball drop with Dick Clark like we do every year. My daddy is mad, though, because it doesn't look like my older sister Tara will be there. He says she will probably be out doing really bad stuff with that stupid wop boyfriend of hers. Mommy gets really sad and starts crying and yells at Daddy when he says Tara's going to hell with all the fags and other sinners.

So anyway, it looks like it will just be me, Mommy, Daddy, and my baby brother Lucas here at the house on New Year's Eve. But it will be fun. Daddy's gonna let us eat all the chips and drink all the soda we want! He says we're gonna play games like Rummy. The only thing I won't like is that Uncle Rod is coming over. He is my dad's brother. I don't like the games Uncle Rod used to play with me and Tara. I hope he won't be playing those games this year. Probably not because he only likes to play them when nobody else is around and that's probably because Uncle Rob usually has us take off some of our clothes.

Vichizzle: Oh, bettah reminds you all, if you crank out those toonz, be better sure you crank up that fuckin bass because if you don't, Vichizzle be comin over and personally givin you a ride down Kickass Boulevard! Ain't no music be playin without no fuckin bass turned up enough to shake, rattle, and roll the house, lease not the real partyers, knowhaddi'msayin? I know it hard to be hearin yo friends talkin with that bass, but who the fuck be talkin anyways? Mouth should be too busy smokin something, drinkin somethin, or fuckin mackin on yo ho. Werd! But remember, theres gots to be at lease one person payin attention to the time, cuz you should do that final countdown. Get some fuckin honkey dork to do it. Cuz you gots to know who to fuck when the clock strikes twelve! No, not kissin! I know most peoples be kissin on that fuckin twelve-strike. No, fuck that. At the stroke of twelve yo better be havin you dick stroked by the finest pussy you can find! And fo any bitches readin this, better be fuckin the finest hunk of cock you can find! Do it right there in the fuckin livin room, fur real! Everbody be too drunk or high to give a flyin shit, knowhaddi'msayin? So remember, in this order on New Year's Fuckin Eve: gather yo friends, lotsa hooch and hos, yo finest weed, rockinest rappinest toonz, crank up that fuckin bass, party hard and get to fuckin when the short hand gets to that muthafuckin 12. Peace!

Tyler: Oh, good, it looks like Uncle Rod won't be coming after all. He said he was busy studying to be a priest. He's been going to priest school, you know. It is very hard to become a priest. Anyway, Happy New Year everybody. See you in 2005.

---

11/24/04 == 12/20/04 == 12/21/04 == 12/30/04 == 01/31/05 == 02/10/05 == 02/14/05 == 05/18/05 == 07/25/05 == 09/01/05 == 10/24/05 == 12/22/05 == 07/20/06 == 10/31/06 == 02/07/07 == 07/13/07 == 12/18/07 == 9/17/08

And the upvotes roll in...but why?

I thought I had Everything figured out. Put your time in, contribute some interesting stuff, and play the social butterfly. Before too long you are toasting your comrades in the catbox and plotting the next global revolution. I learned quickly that personal growth here takes a certain amount of grim determination. I quite recall reading one day and coming across a write up about insulting softlinks, which had me return to some of my original writeups to see where the softlinks led. Even then, there were those who were helping to guide me in the right direction and here I simply passed it by.

Many of the softlinks were to writeups involving the E2 Mentors and Everything University. One link suggested that my writeup would be better seen on LiveJournal rather than here. I took pause and did not node anything for a good while, but I stuck around and read what others wrote. I pored over the Everthing FAQ, read through Everything University a couple of times and just kept lurking in the shadows. Suddenly, someone came across one of the few writeups I did that was reasonably well recieved and asked me about writing menus, since that was something they had always been curious about. Suitably encouraged I decided to take a crack at it, although I could not imagine anyone wanting to read about it. Writing menus (something I did all the time) wasn't engaging for me, how could I make it interesting to others? I asked a few people for some input and I was amazed at the positive and helpful commentary I recieved back. After working on the piece for some time, I finally decided to post my writeup and let the community at large judge my efforts.

The lesson is that level doesn't matter here. Who you know isn't all that important either. What you put in is what you get out. So now, my last effort is a veritable cracker (to quote sneff) and if you ask me why it's doing so well, I haven't the faintest idea. But I am hopeful that whatever else I node will be half as well recieved. If I spend my time wisely, make sure that whatever I put here is the best I can make it, all voting aside, the community here will treat it accordingly and do what they can to help make things better. I just wanted to say Thank You for all the help.

Amidst reports of over 120 thousand reported dead, there are many hundreds of thousands of children who have survived. Most, of course, are local children, but a few are tourists. Most have someone surviving in their immediate family to cling to, so they can return to some semblance of their former life. Some, unfortunately, do not.

Karl Nilsson is a seven year old Swedish tourist, who went to visit Phuket, Thailand, with his parents and brothers. He was swept out of his hotel room by the tsunami, thus separating him from the rest of his family, and was found wandering alone in the aftermath.

Hannes Bergstroem, another Swede, is only about two years old. Amazingly, not only did he survive, but just recently he's been reunited with his father, though his mother is still missing, presumably dead. But in times like these, this is miracle enough to be thankful for.

You can read the details of these kids at the links below, or by Googling the news for their names. But all you really need to know is in Karl's mournful, exhausted eyes, as he holds up a sign begging for word of his family. Family which, local workers believe, likely all perished in the waves.

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,11808458%255E952,00.html
http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/EdmontonSun/News/2004/12/29/800375-sun.html
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1471712004

Remember that for USA citizens, it's not yet too late to donate to certain charities and receive a tax break for 2004, but time is absolutely of the essence. The front page of Google now lists several relief organizations, and I'll make a pitch for another one, Mercy Corps at www.mercycorps.org, if you remain undecided. Some progressive airlines will even let you donate your unused mileage points, so if you have some that are expiring soon, all it will cost you is the five or ten minutes' time it takes to call your reward program and ask.

Hannes is going home with his father. Karl, on the other hand, like countless other children in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Seychelles, Somalia, Kenya, and Tanzania, may have no one to take him home. Please lend whatever support you can.

WalMart blows.

Michael has taken to calling me ‘Snakebite,’ which is edging ‘Boushh’ for the best nickname I’ve ever had. The punctures are healing too nicely. I wanted some cool scars. I think I got india ink into the ones on my finger (by accident), so hopefully those will last longer.

On the other hand, Ophion will live out the rest of his days as my ward, so he can bite me again any time he wants. And will.

Steve and I got a WalMart gift certificate for Xmas. But we learned tonight that going there isn’t even worth $50 of free merchandise. They carry very little that’s small enough for either of us. I managed to find one pair of black pants that fit. Size? 3, juniors. I bought them anyway.

All I heard while I was browsing was “How come plus size is more expensive? You gotta pay more just ‘cause you fat? That ain’t fair!” I thought about telling her that I’d rather the plus size person have to make up the difference for the extra material, instead of raising the price of the entire line and making me pay for cloth I’m not using, but she was a lot bigger than I was. That, and I understood her frustration. Walmart bras rarely go below 36C, so I was fucked too. I was completely unsuccessful in finding a strapless bustier, and I need one SO MUCH. I should have just stolen my former roommate's when she moved. They also don’t carry the Feria Power Reds line, so I got some at Bartell’s on the way home. I’m planning on being very Waterhouse for the NYE party tomorrow.

I also picked up some blue fishnets and a white thong that I’m going to dye. My NorWesCon costume is going to kick nine kinds of ass in an eight-ass town. Wait and see. (hubris brought to you by leftover WalMart rage)