Monkeys Wearing Pants Read online

  I have never killed an inanimate object before, but I’m about to put my wireless router in a massive chokehold and squeeze until the two crappy signal bars slowly fade away and flat line. Then, there will be nothing left but the memory of me standing on our bed and leaning way to the left to just to get Netflix on my Kindle.

  Randomness

  News flash, there is a lot of random stuff in here. I tried to make categories for everything, but after making the category, ‘famous sayings related to razor burn and a major religion’ I realized that I had gone too far. I had pushed the envelope, literally, all the way to the ‘pushing the envelope’ category. I will invite you, if you are so inclined, to put every random passage into an imaginary category of your own invention. This is particularly fun if you sublet a basement in your mom and dad’s home and have no real friends.

  In a million years, cockroaches will finally be extinct, but Pop Tarts will have survived.

  My new favorite headline: "Man’s prosthetic eye falls out during trial, judge declares mistrial." OK, cue justice is blind joke here...

  Whenever I want to feel better about myself, I head on over to the "Faces of Meth – Before and After Photos" website.

  "Giant Goat Cheese Fire Closes Norwegian Roadway for Six Days." This is my new favorite headline.

  Is it just me, or is there something slightly Medieval and sinister about the name of 'Black Forest Ham?’

  Some things in life are not important. However, understanding and appreciating the difference between a dangling participle and an undescended testicle is critical.

  I want a font that says, “I'm pissed off, but I'm dealing with it.”

  We can put a man on the moon, but we can't make a squeeze bottle of mustard that doesn't dribble out that yellowish, watery stuff no matter how much you shake it.

  The Times New Roman font bothers me. There, I've said it.

  I hate it when you mangle a word so badly that not even spell checker recognizes it. Then you have to rewrite it, making it slightly less horrible each time, hoping that spell checker finally figures out what the heck you were trying to write.

  It really bothers me that people who send spam can't spell better and lack a grasp of basic grammar. I blame the Nigerian school system.

  On January 23rd, it's going to be the Chinese Year of the Dragon, but if you're like me, it will take you 2 months to stop writing ‘Year of the Snake’ on your checks.

  I'm sorry but I'm fed up with generic, boring fortune cookie fortunes. Panda Express may be feeding my stomach, but they're not doing a thing for my yearning for intellectual enlightenment and my need to have the secrets of the universe spelled out for me on a little piece of paper in 50 characters or less (Wait a minute! Holy crap, the Chinese invented Twitter!). To combat what is clearly a glaring need, I'm going to start writing some of these up myself: you will meet a stranger who will spend quality time with you to deepen your understanding of this thing called the Dish Network.

  Why are there no B batteries? We've got AA, AAA, C, and D batteries, but no B. I see a new cause in my future...

  I started out as a morning person. Then for a long time I became a night owl. Now I would love to spend more time just lounging around in bed, but my alarm clock does not care about my happiness.

  This year, "F-bomb," "sexting" and "man cave" are among the newest terms that were recently added to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. I think you could make the case that these three terms have spent some quality time together.

  According to scientists studying Chilean earthquakes, the Earth has been permanently deformed by huge quakes. But please, try not to stare because that's really impolite.

  Why is it that 72 hotel room degrees feels like 98 regular degrees?

  So San Francisco, arguably the most liberal city in the U.S., has banned nudity in public. Another case of the not-very-good-looking naked people ruining it for everyone else!

  Apparently, Bangladesh is the largest country to have never won a medal at the Olympics. I'm fairly certain that will change at the next Olympics now that the entirely new event of “12-year-old girls sitting on concrete factory floors knitting sweaters for rich Americans” has been introduced. Go Bangladesh, go!

  I want the super power of knowing the really intimate details about people that embarrass them the most. “Oh, yeah? Say what you want, but I'm not the guy who wet my pants on that eighth grade field trip!”

  This is terrible, but today, I was talking to a guy who had a blackhead the size of a seedless grape, and all I could think about was getting him in a headlock and popping the hell out of that thing. What is wrong with me?

  I’m going to start living more dangerously – only looking one way when I cross the street, only chewing each bite eleven times, getting stuck toast out of the toaster with a fork. You know, crazy stuff like that.

  If I were really rich, I would develop a subdivision of homes just so that I could name the streets. I would give them all really awful names, like Hump a Camel Court, Ass Wipe Circle, Peeling Scab Street, etc. Then, I would make the homes so cheap that people would buy them despite the terrible names. The best part would be when I ran into them as a total stranger and struck up a conversation. So, where do you live? Huh! What? You're kidding, right? That's the name of your street? Oh my God, what mental degenerate thought of that?

  I am writing an erotic novel about a young, well-to-do stud horse and a young, inexperienced filly called 50 Bales of Hay.

  Famous Last Words

  I went through a period when I gave a lot of thought to the last words I would ever say before kicking the bucket. I realize that I probably don’t have a choice in the matter, but I don’t want the nasty rumor circulating around at my memorial service that I left this world after stating, “Hey everyone look at this bucket? I wonder how far I can kick it.”

  I’ve started compiling a list of what I DON’T want my last words to be. Too much time on my hands? Maybe. Here are the first five:

  1. Old chainsaws really are the best!

  2. Can you believe a brand new Xbox for $50? I’m meeting this guy I found on Craigslist…

  3. Hey buddy! Why don’t you pick on someone your own size!

  4. This is my 15th Red Bull, and, honest to God, I still don’t feel a thing!

  5. I had no idea you could buy black market lunch meat!

  I’ve started compiling a list of what I DON’T want my last words to be. Here are the next five:

  1. Chupacabra? No, that’s just some kind of weird-looking dog…

  2. Sure, a plunger will work, but let me show you how I like to do it.

  3. I just got the KIA tuned up; get ready to feel the power.

  4. Is it the black or the red cable that’s the ground? In this rain, I can barely tell them apart…

  5. Just to be sure I have this noodling thing down, I catch the fish by letting it swallow my arm, right?

  I’ve started compiling a list of what I DON’T want my last words to be. Here are the next five:

  1. So if I buy two extra-large meat lover’s pizzas, I get the third one free? Really?

  2. OK, I’ll stand here, but don’t take the picture until there’s a really big wave behind me.

  3. Interesting fact: the guy who makes the blowfish sushi here is an ex-con.

  4. Directions? Check. Snacks for the trip? Check. Full gas tank in the old Pinto? Check…

  5. Hey! Check this out. I just bought a diet book by the doctor who killed Michael Jackson!

  And the next five:

  1. Something smells really, really weird in here.

  2. Ten to one I can still fit in these jeans!

  3. I’m pretty sure that mayonnaise lasts at least 5 years.

  4. Why does the voice on my GPS suddenly sound weird?

  5. I can almost reach it…almost…just a little further…

  But wait there’s more…

  1) They say to turn off the computer before replacing the RAM, but whatever...
r />   2) Oh my God! Look at those cute little bear cubs! Poor babies are all alone.

  3) This black market Viagra doesn't work as well, but you can't beat the price.

  4) There's no way this door will open while the plane is in flight, right?

  5) Those damn gang bangers next door are so loud! I'll take care of that.

  6) Weird...I keep getting these messages, but I don't know anyone on Skype named Rat Man.

  7) Wow! Look at all the trucks parked in front of that diner! It must be an awesome place to eat.

  8) This new Dyson hand dryer is not only great for drying your hands. Check this out...

  9) I'm just heading over to the Mitt Romney stump speech to freak them out with my Obama t-shirt. Ha! 10) I swear to God that the sea monkeys are flipping me off. Really!

  11. We cancelled the party, so I’m stuck eating, like, 12 pounds of cheese dip.

  12. LOL! I’m texting you from the carpool lane right now!

  13. I don’t care how gross this restroom is. I’m using it, and I’m not coming out until I’m done!

  14. If the friggin’ automatic pin reset doesn’t work, I’ll just crawl in there and get those pins unstuck myself!

  Getting Older

  I’m not obsessed with getting older, and even though the time machine I ordered from Hong Kong turned out to be a bread maker (my God, that was the worst translation ever) I’m still not sweating my march forward to adult diapers and thinking my wife is some lady from the Welcome Wagon.

  I'm feeling really old, like 7 or 8 in underwear years.

  Ten seconds after I turned 50, I started getting mail from the AARP. They are relentless in their efforts to have me join and are constantly reminding me of the savings an AARP membership brings for things like burial arrangements, oversized rectal thermometers, hearing aids and adult diapers. Seriously, I get something in the mail from them at least 2 or 3 times a week. You would think the AARP would be run by kindly, silver-haired folks who like to sit around and reminisce about the times when gas cost a nickel per gallon and you could have someone killed by a gangster for half a cheese sandwich. But no, oh no. Apparently, it is run like a Glengarry Glen Ross senior center, and someone keeps shouting, “Get that bastard Waldrep! Sign him up! Seal the deal!”

  So, two of the top trending searches on the internet today were “Grandparents' Day” and “Bladder Infections.” I'm not saying they are related, but I did drink a huge glass of cranberry juice after I got home today from meeting up with the girls' grandma and grandpa just in case.

  One minute, everything is going along great, and the next minute, you wake up to find you have an ear hair long enough to use as a high wire across Niagara Falls. What the hell?

  So, driving to Reno today, I realized that I had left my right blinker on for like 10 miles. Christ, it's starting!

  I hope that my wife will still love me when she has to wheel me around and change my adult diapers (occasionally shouting at the girls, “Who fed your father corn?”).

  Sometimes, I think wouldn't it be great, knowing what I know now, to go back in time to high school? Then I remember algebra.

  Has anyone actually died kicking a bucket?

  You know you are getting older when you are trying to hold on for that rest area twenty miles down the road, but your bladder keeps tugging on your shirt sleeve and saying, "Are we there yet?"

  It's not having two kids in college, remembering the pet rock craze or the fact that I voted for Jimmy Carter that makes me feel old. It's how far I have to scroll to find my birth year every time I fill anything out on the internet!

  I hadn't realized this until recently, but apparently, when Mr. Magoo died, I inherited his eyebrows.

  So, a nurse from Kaiser just called to schedule my first-ever colonoscopy. Apparently, I'm at the age where it's a good idea to occasionally shove a rubber broomstick with a camera on it up my ass and put the smack down on my colon until it gives up the goods. What goods? I don't know. Maybe it's been withholding information about my small intestine harboring a fugitive hamburger for the past five years. Maybe my colon has turned into Section 8 housing for polyps, and it's cramming them in there like drunk college students in a phone booth (I know, I know...what's a phone booth?). At the end of the conversation, the nurse did ask me if I had any questions. “Just a comment,” I said. “I lost a mini-Beanie Baby in 1998, so while you guys are in there doing the Roto-Rooter thing, maybe you can just take a peek for me.”

  “A Beanie Baby?” she responds, puzzled.

  “Yeah, well, I wouldn't ask except that it's collectible. You know...” Silence on the other end of the line. Now, I've got her. “And,” I add, “what about any spare change you might find? I get to keep that, right? You guys don't divvy that up while I'm knocked out and butt naked, right?”

  “Change?” she asks softly.

  “And what about the rights to the video?” I ask. “I mean, you guys are rolling while we all take this mystical journey up my ass's dryer vent, right? I'm not going to wake up and have some kinky video of my internal junk on YouTube, am I?”

  “YouTube? What do you mean, YouTube?” she asks.

  “Listen,” I say, “you're right. Let's cross that anal passage when we get to it.”

  So, we say our goodbyes. I'm pretty sure my chart has now been flagged at Kaiser. That's OK. When I go in for the colonoscopy, just before they put me under, I'm going to tell the doctor that I knew I was supposed to eat lightly and then fast right before the procedure, but that week-old tuna casserole wasn't going to eat itself when I woke up that morning...

  What is going on with my bladder? My bladder used to be the size of a Coleman cooler. Honestly. When I was younger, I could take in and hold more water weight than a pregnant, two-hump camel. I was a human wading pool. I once drove 16 hours straight from Washington State to Northern California consuming, along the way, 12 bottles of water, 10 cans of soda and a bottle of healthy tea that I bought by mistake. Did I stop and pee along the way? No. I held it like a man and didn’t even have to start clenching until the last 100 miles (the last 20 minutes, I admit to doing the crazy-leg, Mexican hat dance in the car…not recommended). When I finally let loose, I peed for about two hours straight, making me somewhat of a hero among truck drivers, race horses and (I’m pretty sure) volunteer firemen. Today, my bladder is about the size of a dried lentil. If I back out of my driveway in the morning and there’s condensation on the windshield, I have to run back inside to go to the bathroom. If I’m driving, the minute I twist open the top of a bottle of water, my brain sends a signal to my urinary tract to start doing the Macarena, and I’m looking for a place to pull over and try my luck on the urinal bull’s eye. If I get a soda at a fast food drive-thru, the second I take the paper off the straw, I have to park and actually go into the fast food place, which very much defeats the purpose. If I’m driving along and, God forbid, the songs “Smoke on the Water,” “Bridge over Troubled Water” or “Madman across the Water” comes on the radio, I get an immediate, cringe-worthy urge to go. And sometimes, when I’m driving through a forest and I really don’t have to go, I’ll still pull over, walk into the woods and let loose. Of course, that has more to do with being a guy and just digging the fact that I can pee on a tree than having a bladder the size of a sea monkey. I’d love to keep writing, but I gotta go…

  I still have my wisdom teeth, and lately, they have been doing their best to push through. I don't really feel that much wiser, but I signed up to re-take the SATs just in case.

  So, two of the top trending searches on the internet today were “Grandparents' Day” and “Bladder Infections.” I'm not saying they are related, but I did drink a huge glass of cranberry juice after I got home today from meeting up with the girls' grandma and grandpa just in case.

  One minute, everything is going along great, and the next minute, you wake up to find you have an ear hair long enough to use as a high wire across Niagara Falls. What the hell?

  I don’t rea
lly mind kids blasting their music at gas stations or convenience stores. I think that kids of every generation have done that (although, blasting Bachman Turner Overdrive on my 8-track with my tiny car speakers didn’t exactly cause the windows to shake). I think I’m going to get a new sound system with massive speakers and a roof-mounted woofer and start blasting “Muskrat Love’ by the Captain and Tennille. I think that would make a bunch of teenagers freak out and start clawing at their ears. Oh, middle-age payback is sweet!

  So, driving to Reno today, I realized that I had left my right blinker on for like 10 miles. Christ, it's starting!

  I hope that my wife will still love me when she has to wheel me around and change my adult diapers (occasionally shouting at the girls, “Who fed your father corn?”).

  Sometimes, I think wouldn't it be great, knowing what I know now, to go back in time to high school? Then, I remember algebra.

  You know you are getting older when you are trying to hold on for that rest area twenty miles down the road, but your bladder keeps tugging on your shirt sleeve and saying, "Are we there yet?"

  It's not having two kids in college, remembering the pet rock craze or the fact that I voted for Jimmy Carter that makes me feel old. It's how far I have to scroll to find my birth year every time I fill anything out on the internet!

  I hadn't realized this until recently, but apparently, when Mr. Magoo died, I inherited his eyebrows.

  I'm wondering how old a guy has to be before he can join the "Men wearing plaid shorts, black shoes, and white athletic socks club?" I think I would really rock that look.

  Travel

  I travel quite a bit for my job. After not making it in stand-up comedy, as the lead singer of a rock band or as a professional basketball player, I navigated to the next logical choice…retail. Here are a few of my observations and mostly true accounts from my travels. All aboard! (That’s a poor choice of words as not one of these anecdotes takes place on a train. I apologize profusely. I really feel terrible now).