I stopped to get gas today, and the guy behind the counter was reading Playboy Magazine. I didn't see the cover, but I recognized the usual, full page cartoon depicting Santa Clause getting laid. The girls in the Playboy cartoons all want to do Santa's fat ass. This I've always known, and I accept it. What's new to me are gas station attendants "reading" Playboy at 8:30 in the morning.
Is this okay?
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
6 Cheeses? Uh, Surely You Jest, You Nimrod!
So, Gancer Girlfriend and I are watching a commercial, and a pizza joint is boasting a 6 Cheese Pizza. I tell her there's no way in hell there are 6 cheeses on there, cause I can't even think of six cheeses that would be good on a pizza. Naming off a few, I ended up at Gouda, and who in the heck wants Gouda on their pizza? We looked it up online, give us a break, there was nothing else to do on a Sunday afternoon, and sure enough, there are, in fact, six gosh damn cheeses upon that pie: Mozzarella, Parmesan, Romano, Asiago, Provolone and Fontina. I then decided that the odds are slim to none that the people working there know what six cheeses adorn their over-cheesed pizzas. Gancer Girlfriend thought that the nimrod on the other end of the phone would know.The bet begins . . .
Winner buys the Chinese food we would order with our next call, because we'd sooner order a six blends of pickle juice pizza. In fact, the image of that disgustingly cheesey concoction of crappola ruined the notion of pizza for us all together.
To determine the winner, a phone call was to be made to said pizza joint.
1. If the nimrod can't name the six cheeses, she buys.
2. If the nimrod can rattle off all six right away, I buy.
3. If the nimrod asks someone else or looks it up to get the answer, then we would go Dutch.
Here's how the phone call went:
Nimrod: (unenthusiastically) Such-and-Such pizza, can I help you?
Gancer: Yeah, quick question: What six cheeses are on your Six Cheese Pizza?
Nimrod: Uh, I don't know. (Long Pause).
Gancer: Well, I just need to know that real quick, and I'll let you get back to whatever it is you're doing that's more important.
Nimrod: Uh, hold on.
(Moments Later)
Nimrod: Uh (nimrods say "uh" a lot), Mozzarella, Parmesan, Romano, Ass-ee-ah-go (slowly sounding it out wrongly, like the profile faces on Electric Company), Provolone and Fone-tine-uh (again, Electric Company-Esque).
Gancey: Okay, partner. That's all I needed. Have yourself a wonderful day!
So, we went dutch on some Kung Pau chicken, Moo Shoo chicken, hot and sour soup, and a smoothie she ordered that tasted like a Pina Colada, which made me sing "Escape (The Pina Colada Song,)" which she only knows from Shrek, which made feel old, but not as old as I felt trying to describe that the Electric Company was like a Black Sesame Street, or that Morgan Freeman starred on it.
My Beloved Seven Readers, in your comment, after you're done telling me what a colossal dork I am for actually making this call, of course, tell me if you've ever heard of Fontina cheese.PS: Get a load of that Pina Colada song video. He might be the least cool rocker I've ever seen from his Blue Blocker Sunglasses, to his tucked in Member's Only Jacket, to his khakis, and right down to his white sneakers, just to top it off. For that get-up alone, never mind his dance moves or general dorkiness, If he didn't have a hit record, he wouldn't be "makin' love at midnight," or any hour for that matter. Even with the hit record . . . Yikes.
Saturday, April 12, 2008
The Lost Island of Misfit Blog Topics
Either I have the most crippling case of writers block of all time, or I'm just coming up with the worst ideas ever. I'm going to share some of these awful notions with you today, so I won't be tempted to ever use any of these.
1. I jokingly offered to be a sperm donor for a lesbian friend of mine, because I want a baby without a wife or responsibility. Actually, when you break it down, I'm a damn good surrogate father candidate. I'm tall, healthy, athletic-ish, and decent enough looking. I'm not smart, but my parents are, so there's a good chance my kid would be. I figure that I've produced loads, pun intended, and loads of sperm since the early to mid 1990's, and finally it's going to pay off. I could be the proud sort of father of a baby boy or girl, who I'll get to see every now and again, but I will not necessarily be obligated to love or support him/her financially. I just whack it, hand over the joy juice, they turkey baste it in there, or whatever, they do all the parenting, and I just keep doing what I've always done. Whacking it.
2. I got halfway through a piece about how much I love it when the Liquor Sample Lady is at the grocery store when it dawned on me that it was stupid, boring, and made me look like a booze hound. Seriously though, there's nothing like a snort off some fancy-schmantsy spirit you'll never buy to make shopping feel less like a chore and more like a bar. Why can't everything be a little bit more like the bar? Okay, so I am a booze hound. What's it to you?!?
3. My Hollywood buddy is working on the set of Boston Legal, and I asked that he update me on what Captain Kirk has for lunch every day. He seems to be a fan of the turkey chili and cornbread, if you must know. He also likes nailing green chicks from distant planets, which I find can work up an appetite.
4. More shit about my beloved nephews. My parents always have a bottle of oil and vinegar on the table for salads, and one nephew quite accurately pointed out that it looked like a "potion." His mother and I half convinced him that it was a shrinking potion. He tried some, and he's all, "See, it doesn't make me shrink." I told him, "It will kick in soon enough. You'll know it's working when it looks like we're all getting bigger." The fact that I get my jollies by screwing with a kindergartner's head is probably another reason my fatherly duties should remain strictly surrogate in nature.
5. This idea is actually quite good, but I decided it's a little mean and maybe a little evil. I was skipping through completely random blogs, planning to publicly make fun of a particularly stupid one on my blog. How caddy, right? The blog that was most likely to get ripped was one run by a couple, and dedicated to counting down the days until their upcoming wedding in Napa Valley. There are only a few posts so far, and they all suck. Their profile picture is the two of them and their dog. There's nothing worse than when you get a Christmas card from a couple and they're cuddled up with their stupid dog. I'm going to send out a card with a photo of me and my mailman just to throw people off. Anyway, I get the sense that when this couple's fabulous, scenic, Napa wedding is in the books, they'll be like, "Okay, now what." With any luck they'll have a new blog counting down the days until their divorce. Now that would make for some good reading. I hope it rains on their wedding day and the grapes in the wine go bad, giving the wedding party and all the guests the worst case of the green apple quickies they've ever experienced.
1. I jokingly offered to be a sperm donor for a lesbian friend of mine, because I want a baby without a wife or responsibility. Actually, when you break it down, I'm a damn good surrogate father candidate. I'm tall, healthy, athletic-ish, and decent enough looking. I'm not smart, but my parents are, so there's a good chance my kid would be. I figure that I've produced loads, pun intended, and loads of sperm since the early to mid 1990's, and finally it's going to pay off. I could be the proud sort of father of a baby boy or girl, who I'll get to see every now and again, but I will not necessarily be obligated to love or support him/her financially. I just whack it, hand over the joy juice, they turkey baste it in there, or whatever, they do all the parenting, and I just keep doing what I've always done. Whacking it. 
2. I got halfway through a piece about how much I love it when the Liquor Sample Lady is at the grocery store when it dawned on me that it was stupid, boring, and made me look like a booze hound. Seriously though, there's nothing like a snort off some fancy-schmantsy spirit you'll never buy to make shopping feel less like a chore and more like a bar. Why can't everything be a little bit more like the bar? Okay, so I am a booze hound. What's it to you?!?
3. My Hollywood buddy is working on the set of Boston Legal, and I asked that he update me on what Captain Kirk has for lunch every day. He seems to be a fan of the turkey chili and cornbread, if you must know. He also likes nailing green chicks from distant planets, which I find can work up an appetite.
4. More shit about my beloved nephews. My parents always have a bottle of oil and vinegar on the table for salads, and one nephew quite accurately pointed out that it looked like a "potion." His mother and I half convinced him that it was a shrinking potion. He tried some, and he's all, "See, it doesn't make me shrink." I told him, "It will kick in soon enough. You'll know it's working when it looks like we're all getting bigger." The fact that I get my jollies by screwing with a kindergartner's head is probably another reason my fatherly duties should remain strictly surrogate in nature. 
5. This idea is actually quite good, but I decided it's a little mean and maybe a little evil. I was skipping through completely random blogs, planning to publicly make fun of a particularly stupid one on my blog. How caddy, right? The blog that was most likely to get ripped was one run by a couple, and dedicated to counting down the days until their upcoming wedding in Napa Valley. There are only a few posts so far, and they all suck. Their profile picture is the two of them and their dog. There's nothing worse than when you get a Christmas card from a couple and they're cuddled up with their stupid dog. I'm going to send out a card with a photo of me and my mailman just to throw people off. Anyway, I get the sense that when this couple's fabulous, scenic, Napa wedding is in the books, they'll be like, "Okay, now what." With any luck they'll have a new blog counting down the days until their divorce. Now that would make for some good reading. I hope it rains on their wedding day and the grapes in the wine go bad, giving the wedding party and all the guests the worst case of the green apple quickies they've ever experienced.
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Sometimes, All I Need Is Imaginary Ice Cream and to Love You.
When you were young, did you ever lay your big wheel* or bicycle, preferably big wheel, on its side, spin one of the wheels around using the pedal, and tell a friend that the ice cream store was open for business, or some shit?
I thought this was just something we did on our block, maybe due to all the led paint we ingested, but I came to find out people from other suburbs of Chicago and surrounding Midwestern cities also ran imaginary ice cream shops. Then, just today, I was IM'ing with SO@24 and Laughing Through My Chardonay, and they were both proprietors of big wheel ice cream joints in parts of California and Kansas, or wherever Chardsy is originally from.
This blew my mind, because the whole game is just a dumb concept. What does a spinning plastic wheel have to do with ice cream? Every 31 Flavors I've been to has a long, but not at all round, counter where people select the flavor on the other side of the glass that they want on top of their cone, bubblegum perhaps.** I know not of spinning wheels of flavors, do you? Who was the cool kid on the block who started doing this, and how did it take off nationwide? If I recall, it was not a game I'd play long, as it would usually play out something like this.
Neighbor: Around it goes . . . and you get . . . Mint Chocolate Chip!
A Young Dr. Ken: Uh, great. This is dumb. Let's go dine on some delicious paint chips.
The game's tendency to be over soon after it starts is kind of like when you grabbed a dandelion and said, "Momma had a baby and her head popped off," as you "popped" the flowery part of the weed off with your thumb. Once the head popped off, you were off to find another baby or do something else, perhaps something a little less sick and twisted. I mean, come on, popping baby heads off? I really shouldn't make off like I wasn't a little twisted too, since a neighbor and I used to play Lightning Bug Home Run Derby with those fat, red wiffle ball bats. Those poor little guys just kept lighting up and giving away their position. They didn't stand a chance against Ryne Sandberg and Jody Davis***. At least nobody got hurt at the ice cream parlor. Not mine, anyway.
I poked around the Internet a little on this matter, and it is speculated that grabbing that big wheel pedal and turning it is to signify cranking an old fashioned ice cream maker. Others believe the spinning wheel of flavors is an homage to some shop in San Francisco that had a wheel customers could spin, and on it were the titles of fifty flavors available daily. If you ask me, even if one or both of these facts are true, it still doesn't explain how something so darned stupid made its way across the country.
Readers, please tell me in your comments if you did or did not play the Big Wheel Ice Cream Parlor Game. Also, for extra credit, drive your bike to work, get down on the floor with it, spin the wheel, and say, "Ice cream! Get your ice cream here . . ." See who laughs, who gets nostalgic, who looks at you like you're nuttier than squirrel poop, who fires you on the spot, and let me know that too.
___________________________________________
* I was thinking that someone should come out with Big Wheels for adults, but instead of in the style of A Team, Transformers, or G.I. Joe, have them decorated for Grey's Anatomy, The English Patient, Brokeback Mountain, or whatever else adults watch.
** I remember getting bubble gum ice cream and thinking it was so cool, even though the frozen, hardened collection of gum bits I had accumulated were giving me lock jaw. My parents would always say how gross and stupid it was, and now, as an adult, I see the light.
*** He and I are still Cub fans, and those are still our favorite players of all time. I can't speak for him, but for me it has to be the Lightning Bug Home run Derby connection. Jody was a lifetime .245 hitter, so how else do you explain how this scrub remains so near and dear to my heart?
I thought this was just something we did on our block, maybe due to all the led paint we ingested, but I came to find out people from other suburbs of Chicago and surrounding Midwestern cities also ran imaginary ice cream shops. Then, just today, I was IM'ing with SO@24 and Laughing Through My Chardonay, and they were both proprietors of big wheel ice cream joints in parts of California and Kansas, or wherever Chardsy is originally from. 
This blew my mind, because the whole game is just a dumb concept. What does a spinning plastic wheel have to do with ice cream? Every 31 Flavors I've been to has a long, but not at all round, counter where people select the flavor on the other side of the glass that they want on top of their cone, bubblegum perhaps.** I know not of spinning wheels of flavors, do you? Who was the cool kid on the block who started doing this, and how did it take off nationwide? If I recall, it was not a game I'd play long, as it would usually play out something like this. Neighbor: Around it goes . . . and you get . . . Mint Chocolate Chip!
A Young Dr. Ken: Uh, great. This is dumb. Let's go dine on some delicious paint chips.
The game's tendency to be over soon after it starts is kind of like when you grabbed a dandelion and said, "Momma had a baby and her head popped off," as you "popped" the flowery part of the weed off with your thumb. Once the head popped off, you were off to find another baby or do something else, perhaps something a little less sick and twisted. I mean, come on, popping baby heads off? I really shouldn't make off like I wasn't a little twisted too, since a neighbor and I used to play Lightning Bug Home Run Derby with those fat, red wiffle ball bats. Those poor little guys just kept lighting up and giving away their position. They didn't stand a chance against Ryne Sandberg and Jody Davis***. At least nobody got hurt at the ice cream parlor. Not mine, anyway. I poked around the Internet a little on this matter, and it is speculated that grabbing that big wheel pedal and turning it is to signify cranking an old fashioned ice cream maker. Others believe the spinning wheel of flavors is an homage to some shop in San Francisco that had a wheel customers could spin, and on it were the titles of fifty flavors available daily. If you ask me, even if one or both of these facts are true, it still doesn't explain how something so darned stupid made its way across the country.
Readers, please tell me in your comments if you did or did not play the Big Wheel Ice Cream Parlor Game. Also, for extra credit, drive your bike to work, get down on the floor with it, spin the wheel, and say, "Ice cream! Get your ice cream here . . ." See who laughs, who gets nostalgic, who looks at you like you're nuttier than squirrel poop, who fires you on the spot, and let me know that too.
___________________________________________
* I was thinking that someone should come out with Big Wheels for adults, but instead of in the style of A Team, Transformers, or G.I. Joe, have them decorated for Grey's Anatomy, The English Patient, Brokeback Mountain, or whatever else adults watch.
** I remember getting bubble gum ice cream and thinking it was so cool, even though the frozen, hardened collection of gum bits I had accumulated were giving me lock jaw. My parents would always say how gross and stupid it was, and now, as an adult, I see the light.
*** He and I are still Cub fans, and those are still our favorite players of all time. I can't speak for him, but for me it has to be the Lightning Bug Home run Derby connection. Jody was a lifetime .245 hitter, so how else do you explain how this scrub remains so near and dear to my heart?
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Groomsmen or Boozemen?
In their tuxes, on the walk to the church for their good friend's wedding, a conversation somewhat like this went down . . .Gancy: I'd like to not be a vision of drunken buffoonery at this wedding.
Heterosexual Life Partner (HLP): You mean like the one where you ended up doing your date in her car in the parking lot of the hotel, only to open the car door and barf naked.
Gancy: Yeah, something short of that. I thought at the time it was my civic duty as a groomsman to set a grueling pace for the other guests, like an out of control pace car of fun.
HLP: And now . . .
Gancy: Now I'm 31.
HLP: Yeah me too. Did I tell you that at the last wedding I stood up in I grabbed the microphone and sang what I later learned was a horrible rendition of That Loving Feeling by the Righteous Brothers, only the Top Gun version?
Gancy: "She lost it," huh?
HLP: Yes. "I hate it when she does that." What's worse is that it was supposed to be a sing-along, like in the movie, but I wouldn't relinquish the mic. I guarded it with my life. I even did the "Baby, baby, I get down on my knees for you-ou" like the Black guy. What was his name again?
Gancy: Sundown
HLP: Really? God, that's racist. Anyway, I'm with you. Let's go classy this time.
Gancy: Yes, like gentlemen. Just because it's open bar, doesn't mean it's open season for shots, double fisting, and doing the electric slide with our ties wrapped around our heads.
HLP: So, tonight we're gentlemen? Shake on it?
Gancy: Done
Shake hands they did, but only one of them held up his end of the bargain.
HLP was a class act, in comparison, but Gancer got blind drunk, jumped into the center of a dance circle, did a ripping air guitar version of the solo from Let's Go Crazy by Prince, and in the process, at just the right moment of his performance, much to any guest who saw its simultaneous disgust and amazement, with his picking hand, somehow shot the base of his wine glass across the room without cutting himself.Okay, next wedding it's class all the way for this guy.
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