Grocery Robots! I wonder what the Costco version is like...

That is one spectacular robot. It's very quick and responsive, seemingly agile, and quite obedient. [We don't need a robot uprising now do we? See Terminators 1-3 or Rosie from the Jetsons when she's angry for reference] Not to mention it's built to resemble a sweet, elderly Asian woman complete with earth tone apparel and the scent of roasted cinnamon. [I think it's the domestic worker model] What could be more endearing? Plus the robot seems to be extremely knowledgeable about grocery items, particularly fresh produce, and handles them with such dexterity. Opposable thumbs, what a great invention! This machine is a fantastic shopping assistant. It fetches items at a moment's notice. It really serves a purpose especially when it's handler is a useless, short dude that can only hold the basket and moves as fast as a pothead. He looks like the product of a one-night-stand between Gonzo the Muppet and a Hoover vacuum. If only we could replace these losers with awesome robots like Mrs. Tanaka here...Even Screech's robot Kevin would be a vast improvement. He can at least make science FUNdamental and does the occasional magic trick.

Dear Brazen Woman on the Train Clipping Her Fingernails,

I am a rebellious sort and truly cherish the resistance of social norms imposed on our society by hegemons and oligarchs and pikachus. I really do. But that said, there is at least one convention that we ought not defy and as a society continue to uphold: the trimming of nails should take place only in the privacy of one's home or a private business that caters to nail maintenance; otherwise, don't do that shit in public.

I realize that people eat on the train, study on the train, sleep on the train, and all sorts of things they might not otherwise have enough time for. But clipping your nails? Really? You can put an eye out with one of those buggers. Fingernails and toenails alike are notorious projectile weapons. They fling wildly through the air looking for any target to assail. So many glass eyes at a nail salon. You're like a suicide bomber cutting your nails in the middle of a crowded train like that. Any one of us could get hit by the schrapnel. One of your loose finger casings could have easily landed in a cup of coffee, a baby's mouth, or on MY iPHONE! This is not a ticker-tape parade; no one asked for your nail confetti.

Though the smell may confuse you, the train is neither your bathroom or a garbage can, so don't treat it as if it were. Your leftover DNA is not welcome here. You can't simply wipe off all the remaining clippings from your lap and get off at your stop and pretend like that's acceptable behavior. How would you like it if I left pubes all over the seat in your car? Yes, I think that's an appropriate analogy, and the answer is no, no you would not like it. My pubes are filthy.

And just because it's small and compact doesn't mean you should carry around your nail clipper with you for purposes of using it on the go. You use cell phones on the go, eat gogurt on the go, or play PSP on the go. But I have never once been to CVS and seen advertised on the nail clipper packaging "Mobile self-grooming device inside! Cut your nails anywhere and everywhere!"

So I urge you to leave the clipper at home. Your nails can be half a centimeter longer for the next 3 train stops. Really, it'll be okay. But if you continue with this brazen behavior, please note that from now on, I will be collecting all my finger and toenail clippings in an empty mayo jar so that in case we do cross paths again and I catch you in the middle of another infraction, I'll have a jar full of clippings with which to nail you.

Sincerely yours,
Boogie Brown

An Exercise in GREATitude

So my self-help podcast guy has been teaching me to practice greatitude. [Shakespearean aside: Isn't it ironic that you have to go to someone else for self-help?] You may be wondering what greatitude is. You may also be wondering why you're still reading this. I can only answer the first. Greatitude is an attitude of self-appreciation for being grrrreat...it was invented by Tony the Tiger. Obviously, his positive mental attitude took him places. Maybe I should be a cartoon mascot. Boogie the Brown. I would be an anthropomorphasized color swatch from Home Depot with sparkly eyes and big goofy hands in white gloves. Have you ever noticed that Mickey has really swollen hands? Get that mouse a Benadryl and a straw.

I digress. [Aside #2: Why do we say "I digress?" Why assert what we are doing exactly at that moment? That's like saying, "I am moving my mouth in concert with my vocal cords and brain to formulate words." "I am breathing air." "I am blinking while trying not to stare at your cleavage."] I am continuing my initial train of thought now. In practicing greatitude, one meditates statements that declare one's own greatness. Knowing how humble and modest I am (my friends call me Father Theresa), this was obviously a challenge for me. So I've started a carefully planned regimen to follow. Every 11 past the hour, I pull from my Bag of Greatitude (a velvet drawstring purse with scrap of paper fastened to it that says "Greatitude") a single slip of paper from the bushel within and read aloud from it. Each paper contains a statement of Greatitude. Some examples:

I am a unique snowflake landing atop the tongue of life.

I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.

I am a butterfuly emerging from its cocoon.

I am the wind beneath my wings.

I am the extra cherry on an ice cream sundae.

I am the clean pair of underwear you find at the back of your drawer that enables you to hold off on doing laundry for one more day.

I am the two by four hoisted into the air by Hacksaw Jim Duggan.

I am the maple syrup that makes pancakes delicious.

I am the flame that illuminates a birthday cake.

I am an endangered animal but in a positive way.

I am the gloss on a woman's lips.

I am an oasis of awesome...an awe-asis.

And so on and so forth. You get the idea. I really think this exercise of greatitude holds much promise. I think it would work wonders for me. But unfortunatley, everytime I draw a slip of greatitude from the Bag of Greatitude and hold it up to my face, I am only filled with anguish and frustration at the awful reminder that I can't read.

I am a perfect example of illiteracy.

[Aside #3: This The Get Down entry is brought to you by Dragon NaturallySpeaking dictation software from Nuance.]

An Exercise in Gratitude

Many thanks to the elastic waistband on my underpants that prevents me from dropping trou when I least mean to, for example, when it's really cold outside.

Muchas gracias for paper toilet seat covers that make public restrooms comfortable enough for me to patronize with my leftovers. And thanks for being septic-tank-safe so that they go down easy when flushed and a volcanic eruption of my own excrement is avoided.

Danke for the plastic casing that wraps the ends of my shoe laces so that they don't resemble untangled candle wicks. How embarrassing 'twould be were someone to mistake them as such and light them on fire.

Domo arigato to real-life robots that seem to always make everything eleven times better whether it's robot soccer or robot culinary arts or robots dancing the human.

Merci to the little pieces of dirt that find their way underneath my fingernails and provide endless amounts of satisfaction when I scrape them out from under there.

Salamat to human eyeballs' inability to process images viewed in the dark and saving me from experiencing too much sight when walking in on my parents...

A Hallmark greeting card with a big "Thank You" emblazoned in a pink heart goes out to that spot on my back that I can't scratch, without which we would never have long wooden sticks with a replica hand fixed on its end. Those things are creepy AND practical.

Thank ye to British accents which are easy to imitate, hardly offend anyone, and used to make every inane thought of mine sound deeply sophisticated. "If H2O is composed of oxygen, does that mean I can breathe underwater??" never came off smarter.

Good lookin' out to pinky toes so that when your bookie comes calling, you have something to sacrifice without really losing much at all.

Much appreciation to the interweb for allowing me to broadcast my essential musings to the world, but mostly to my friends. Otherwise I would still be handwriting these things crayons and toilet paper and hand-delivering them to everyone's doorstep via my 2-speed Huffy.

Sincerest thanks to my 2-speed Huffy for giving drunkards something to pee on at 3 in the morning.

My deepest gratitude to you chin hairs for being there to stroke. My boss really loves stroking my goatee when she has a great idea.

And finally thank you to you, self-help podcast guy who, while I was benching 12 pounds at the gym, told me to thank every possible thing in the world from the gum on my shoe to the glint of a piece of plastic covering a half-eaten pie on the kitchen counter-top of the UNIVERSE. I'm truly grateful you had me busy thanking the pimple in my butt crevasse so I could avoid thinking about the harsh pain the 6th rep of my first set was bringing on. Thank you.

Oh Aziz...we should hang out sometime...maybe go up to Vermont for a long weekend...have an ice cream together...

Note to self: Hire DJ to follow you around and play sirens every time you enter a room and "Buh-buh-buh-boooogie Broooooown!!!" every time you make a joke. Hilarity + 5; Awesomeness +15. Going to parties all by your lonesome -23. Yuh-yeahhh!

RAAAAAAAANDY does Impressions


RAAAAAAAANDY on Jacuzzis


RAAAAAAAANDY on Craigslist


Note to self: Doing a little jig while singing the last word of every sentence = GOLD. Me at next month's staff meeting: "I got me's an IDEEAAAAAAA. Let's sell mushrooms to MINOORRRRRRSSSSS. We'll make lots of MONEEYYYYYYSSSS." Yuh-yeahhh!!

A Freezing Morning

This morning I strolled down to the street corner to greet my Breakfast Guy Juan and his wife who I only know as "ella." And yes, I do view everyone in my daily life as some form of superhero or another. There's Breakfast Guy, Door-Man, The Dry Cleaner, Urinator, Waistbandless Woman, The Pan-Handler, and my favorite Puppet Master. Unlike Puppet Master in the comic books who controls the minds of unsuspecting civilians, Puppet Master dances with marionette puppets in the middle of a crowded Times Square subway station, impeding thousands from getting to work on time and bringing little to no joy to the world. He also smells like pee.

So as I ordered my usual Morning Aneurysm (Mexican chorizo, eggs, cheese, and mayo on a roll) from Breakfast Guy, a tall jovial man sidled up to the food cart flashing a wide smile that felt more eerie than warm. He was dressed in a long black leather trench coat and sported a booted cast on his right foot, most likely the unfortunate result from frivolous merriment and frollicking. He greeted Juan through his perma-smile in a native Spanish peppered with guffaws. Surprisingly, Spanish guffaws sound exactly like English guffaws unlike a Spanish dog bark which goes "guau guau" instead of "woof woof." The man continued to smile and laugh as he ordered breakfast. Juan responded with the universal smile-and-nod often reserved for speakers of a language you don't understand and/or psychopaths. I'll let you decide which was the case here.

As Breakfast Guy prepared the order, the man in the black coat proceeded to joke around nonsensically and belted out a hearty laugh from his diafragem. But then, the most unexpected thing happened. In mid-laugh, he completely froze. His head tilted backward, his mouth open to the heavens, his back arched, and his two hands resting on his protruding belly, all locked in position, motionless, stationary, petrified. Sound no longer emanated from his mouth as his laugh had long since died out. He simply stood there in that mid-laugh pose.

"What the hell is going on??" my internal monologue said. Did Zack Morris call a timeout? Did Evie from Out of This World touch her two index fingers together?? (Have you ever tried doing that action yourself? It's not so easy lining up your two index fingers. Ever trying doing that with another person? I call it a "High One" or an "Alien Kiss," depending on the situation.) Was this the end of a TGIF sitcom when everyone laughs and freeze frames? Was he waiting for the producer to roll credits? Will someone please tell him that this is not a flash mob standing still in Grand Central and that one guy playing statue in front of a food cart is not as cool?



And just like that his watch started again and he continued to move as if nothing had happened. He got his breakfast and laughed while he walked away. And so goes the origin of a new super-person in my life: Mr. Freeze. I hope we cross paths again soon. I hope to one day learn the ways of the freeze frame laugh and apply it in inappropriate situations like staff meetings and Brisses. Juan then handed me my Aneurysm and I walked in the opposite direction, doing the robot all the way to the office. You can call me Mr. Roboto. Binary solo: 0000001 00000011 000000111 0000001111...

Offensive Line

While sauntering through Herald Square yesterday and test-driving my new pimp-strut (I think it may need a little more dip in the front step), I happened upon a scene of American gluttony near stereotypical proportions. 3 obese women and their one medium-sized friend (maybe she shrunk in the wash) sat around a small circular park table having a fried chicken party. Each rotund woman had her own 16-piece bucket nestled in her lap that she dug into while a grease moustache-goatee formed a ring around her feeding hole. When a bucket was done, she would don it upon her head as her party hat.

The diameter of the table they sat around was only half that of one of the monster-truck-tire stomachs of these Bertha-sized women. It had the effect of making the party look like a trio of walruses and a blowfish hovering over a pre-school stool that served as a countertop for their chow. One woman had bone hanging out her mouth like a toothpick while she gammed away. And there were enough bones strewn about that one might mistake them for grave-diggers. But they were only digging into fried chicken (or Fried C; KFC isn't exactly chicken) with their teeth, and yet, with each dig, they were one step closer to the grave.

Like any good New Yorker, I stopped in my tracks to observe the spectacle with little regard for propriety. I pointed at them and took polaroids too. Sorry, the polaroids are not to be shared; they're for my personal collection of "Awful Things I Can't Keep My Eyes Off Of." I watched as they devoured that chicken as if they hadn't seen food in three weeks, but yet it was clear from the way their butts enveloped their chairs like a tub of playdough over a child's finger that starvation was certainly not the case here. I waited with bated breath to see who the the first to keel over would be.

I do however feel ashamed for critiquing the bodies and eating habits of these women. I do acknowledge the fact that everyone has a different body type from walking stick to frog body to pear-shaped to Abominable Snowperson. But the combination of them all sitting together around a tiny table inhaling buckets worth of fried meat in the middle of Herald Square for everyone to see made the moment all the more absurd and thus, open to ridicule.

Perhaps I'm being too callous. I should instead celebrate the fact that through their fried chicken party, these bold women were simply defying the rigid and ridiculous standards of American beauty (not to be confused with the classic Kevin Spacey film) and in Manhattan no less, an island that has more unsightly skinny people than North Korea (eww concentration camp joke? poor form). So if it's an act of defiance, a counterhegemonic protest, then that I can get behind. However, I refuse to literally get behind one of these women. KFC = Kentucky Flatulance Catalyst.

Fun with Antonyms! Hooray!...or should I say "Aw Shucks?"

Conan does analogies for SAT prep, I do antonyms for GRE prep. Someone very smart once told me opposites attract. I hope this attracts me a lot of ladies :) Alright! Giggidy giggidy giggidy!

[Note: These are antohymns. Please sing aloud to the melody of your favorite church song.]


trepidation :: confidence

New York Knicks :: success

Sarah Palin :: anything remotely good for humanity

cleanliness :: my dad's toenails-ness

whorehouse :: comic book store

commando :: underpants

thank you :: shiv to the abdomen...and twist

Sammy Sosa :: blackface

delicious :: cream cheese with vanilla ice cream (dairy was a bad idea!)

Pope Ratzinger :: Obi Wan Kenobi

health insurance :: Republican idiocy

Muslim :: Muoverweight

gladiolas :: unhappyolas (Note: my cousin told this joke at his wedding. Yes, that's right, his wedding. Best of luck to his wife.)

butter face :: jelly ass

belly flop :: washboard abs river (a Texas Hold 'Em joke? Really?)

miniscule :: Rush Limbaugh's FACE

dry skin :: wet turkey breast

sense :: this blog

complete devotion to artistic integrity and aesthetic goodness :: Black Eyed Peas

mortal enemy :: my best friend Zombie Teddy!

self-affirming experience :: that time I fell asleep in freshman Bio and I had a dream about Ligers (lion + tiger) and I yelled myself awake in front of the whole class by yelping out loud "Please don't bite me Mr. Pussy Cat!!" to which the teacher replied, "I won't bite...hard."

clowns :: kind-hearted people that make children smile

the beginning of a book :: the end of fun and leisure

cinnamon :: antonym

reading my blog :: curing cancer, ending world hunger, fixing the environment, solving the economic crisis, ensuring world peace, erasing the hate, etc. etc.

Fly Love: Pantalonic Terminologic Question of the Day

Why is the crotchal opening of a pair of pants or boxer shorts called the "fly?" The comparison of an open seam to an obnoxious insect is absurd. I have never once seen a house fly with genitalia coming out of it. And a fly with a zipper is definitely more akin to a Venus fly trap anyway due to the obvious dangers posed by the teeth of the zipper. But if a fly has teeth, wouldn't it be more appropriate to call it a "mouth?" Then again, if it was called the mouth, it would be much more confusing when you walk out of the McDonald's bathroom and Grimace turns to you and says, "Hey buddy, your mouth is open."

But let's not forget that fly is also a verb, just like sting is at once a rock icon and the action most commonly associated with my biting one-liners (e.g. "Your face smells like something very unpleasant!"). Perhaps fly is a reference to opening the cage door of your pants and letting your woodpecker soar free (and hopefully sore-free). I know why the caged bird sings, but who wants that singing coming from their pants. "Is that a caged bird in your pants or is that just your ringtone?" Hence, the term "fly" is really about letting one's self fly free.

When hiphoppers started using "fly" as an adjective on par with cool, were they making the comparison to the crotchal opening in pants? If so, then the declaration "yo you rockin' some fly kicks!" roughly translates to "Excuse me friend, the fashionable sneakers you are wearing have the same high level of appeal as the crevasse found at the top of a pair pants that hovers near the reproductive and waste organs. Kudos to you."

Isn't it odd that a button fly, when buttoned up, merely subdivides itself into a series of smaller flies? That's like shutting your door to keep people out of your room, but then opening up 5 tiny doors instead for tiny people to enter...Did that one fly over your head? Wordplay!

Dating Dues and Donuts

Have you ever wondered what you should and should not do on a first date? If you answered yes, then I feel sorry for you. But rest assured, POTUS B-HO has come to save the day..t. When he's not busy bringing peace to the entire world, he gets his administration to issue Dating Do's and Don'ts via this government-sanctioned site: http://twoofus.org/educational-content/articles/dating-dos-and-donts/index.aspx.

I think B-HO should issue similar guides on other everyperson preoccupations like "What to do when you're in a public bathroom and realize your stall is out of toilet paper" or "Magic tricks on a job interview? Tada! or Nah-uh!"

Here is the Obama administration's list of Dating Do's and Don'ts for successful heteronormative, gender-conforming relationships:

Dues:
Take precautions and keep yourself safe. Wear elbow pads, knee pads, bicycle helmet, chin strap, mouth guard, jock strap, shin guards, mythril under armor, armor, chest plate, dinner plate, finger condoms, tanooki suit, and ride in the pope-mobile. That thing is virtually indestructible and can probably destroy demons and vampires should you happen upon any during the course of your date.

Be attentive. Focus very carefully on your date's cleavage or the spinach stuck between their teeth.

Be courteous. Always curtsy after your date says something. "Nice to meet you." Curtsy. "Why are you curtsying?" Curtsy. "Stop doing that weirdo." Curtsy. "I'm gonna kill Mona for making me go on this blind date!" Curtsy..

Remember to have fun! Bring a slip-n-slide. 60% of the time those things are fun everytime.

Follow Up. If you want to see the person again, wait for them by their place of work and follow them home. Then peer into their window while they change into house clothes and watch them prepare dinner. Is that paella you smell? Yes, yes it is. Excuse me, I mean, Si, si esa es.

Donuts:
Don’t be late! But just in case you are, wind all the clocks at the restaurant back an hour right before meeting up with your date. Then convince them that they're extremely early and must've forgotten about daylight savings. If you are late for more than an hour, wind all the clocks back for even more time and convince your date that they must be from the future! Great Scott!!

Don’t discuss emotional or controversial topics. Try not to bring up that time you cried in front of thousands of people after a five year-old made fun of your argyle socks at an anti-abortion rally. Instead, talk about safe, mundane things like the word plug and how weird it sounds when you say it over and over a hundred and three times. Or talk about every digit of the number pi. You'll never run out of conversation that way.

Don’t come on too strong. Try not to lift ridiculously heavy objects like city buses or baby elephants in front of your date so as not to intimidate them with your freakish mutant abilities. However, if your date becomes compromised by an attack from an army of giant wasps from another dimension, use full force to kick some thorax butt.

Don’t hide who you really are. I'm looking at you Clark Kent. Also, don't hide, you know, like behind the bushes or beneath a table or camouflaged as a brick wall. Though there exists sweatpants hot and sick-in-bed hot, there's really no such thing as creepy hot.

Don’t get too physical, too soon. In fact, don't even move a single muscle the entire date. Simply stare the whole time. Just channel Bernie from Weekend at Bernie's. He clearly had a good time AND got a sequel. It'll work for you too.

If this dating guide helped you in any way, I again continue to feel sorry for you.

MiserMatch.com

My friend recently started dating a woman he met over the internet. No, it wasn't something trite like eharmony or match.com. He instead opted for a free dating service, because that's where all the cheap singles are. Their slogan hooked him in: "Love is priceless so why pay for it?" In other words, "The only thing better than hooking up is hooking up for free."

It's a smart move since you can be assured that the women that use this service are not only cheap themselves, but they're also looking for cheap mates. That is a low bar and utterly attractive to this non-pole-vaulter. A woman found on this site expects no fancy dinners, no cab or carriage rides. She wouldn't even expect to be swiped in on the subway. She'll know to crawl underneath the turnstiles instead. And no broadway shows or even off-broadway shows, just sock puppets over a cardboard box-turned-stage. She won't even shake her head in disapproval when after the show, you put the socks back on her feet.

The only risk you may have to deal with in using a free dating service is the ugly factor. Your spendthrift date may also be looks-thrift. Let's face it, beauty isn't exactly natural. More often than not it's paid for. Hygiene products like skin moisturizers, teeth whitenizers, assorted Zit-Offs, dandruff shampoo-carpet cleaner-all-in-one are all pricey. Hair cuts cost money and so do tweezers, razors, clippers, and other weed-wacking instruments. Gym memberships and healthy foods have a price too. So you may find yourself enjoying a Happy Meal over a milk crate with a pepporoni faced manatee with full beard, brillow pad hair, and a couple spare tires. It's never a good sign when your date asks you to roll them home.

But let's hope both of you are so cheap you've both refused to buy glasses your eyes desparately need. Or that you're trying to save on electricity by having a lightbulb-less apartment. A moonlit dinner is very romantic afterall...but mostly because you can barely make out the schlub sitting across from you. Love is blind for a reason.

Hair-ummm...?

After searching my nose this morning for candy and other buried treasure, I discovered a single white nose hair (not to be confused with a single white female). Is this an indication of old age? Is my time on this planet starting its slow painful descent to the grave? Am I gradually transforming into Santa Claus?? I did also find a belly on my stomach this morning, but that's nothing new. It would be truly ironic if I were suddenly morphing into St. Nick considering I recently purchased reindeer sausage. I have yet to eat it. I'm saving it for Christmas Eve. I hoped it would teach Santa a lesson for leaving lit coal in my stocking last year and nearly burning down my house (the gingerbread variety).

This single strand of monochromatic nose hair is dangling out of my right nostril like an escape rope for whatever miniscule damsel is trapped in my nasal passages. At first I thought it was finely woven mucus, but upon closer inspection, it turned out to be a long strand of hair-string peaking out of my nose and looking for an eye of a needle to pass through. My immediate reaction was to clip it with a nail cutter (I don't have skissors handy) or to grasp it between index finger and thumb and yank it out like there's no tomorrow.

[Sidebar: If I yank, then I am the yanker and therefore, the hair would be the yankee. If that's the case, who is the yanker of the yankees? A-Rod's girlfriend? Heyyyoooohhhh!]

But then I stared at it for a moment longer and realized how unique it was. This single white strand asserting itself in a bushel of black hairs. How could I destroy this ugly ducking when it may yet still transform into the nose-hair equivalent of a swan? I'm really not sure what that would be, but I am excited to find out. Maybe it'll turn into cashmere. Who knows? Not to mention, I also have the irrational fear that if I yank the thread-like hair, somehow my whole sweater will unravel.

So hanging out my nostril it remains, oscillating in the wind like the pendulum of a grandfather clock. Perhaps it's just my nose that's turning into a grandfather. I hope the rest of my hair doesn't go salt and pepper on me. How odd it would be to have white leg hairs. I could just say I was wearing mink boots. But let's not get ahead of myself. My one nostril hair is enough. I shall call it Snowball. I just really hope this whole white hair thing doesn't start to, you know, snowball.

Germaphobic Waste Management Question of the Day

The Germaphobe Dilemma (not to be confused with a Germanphobe --one who fears all things bratwurst): When a male germaphobe goes to the restroom to relieve his bladder after having interacted with the filthy city, does he wash his hands first before handling his waste hose? If he does, he runs into the risk of having wet hands while undoing his fly, inevitably covering his crotchal region with water stains. Though he may get the satisfaction of relieving his bladder, he will exit the bathroom giving others the impression that his bladder relieved itself all over him.

To avoid being called Mr. Piss Pants, he may decide to wash his hands first and then go through the process of drying them. In public restrooms that attempt to save the environment by providing blow dryers mounted to the wall instead of sand paper that pass as towels, this could easily become a long, drawn out process. By the time his hands are drip-free, his anxious member won't be.

If the germaphobe has an extreme phobia, would he also be afraid of re-dirtying his hands by touching his zipper, his buttons, his draws, his nethers? He may have to purell after every step of the way. This could be a very troublesome process given that the man-snake is known for lashing out if frustrated by an excessively long amount of waiting. It may spit hot venom all over his pants.

Portable catheters and daily-use disposable rubber gloves seem like the only viable solution for the male germaphobe. The former can deposit into a bag neatly strapped away to his calf. It can double as a heat pack. The latter will help deter any possible human interaction so as to avoid germ encounters since the rubber gloves raise his creepiness level to an all-time high (or should I say low?). Plus in the event he finds himself disrespected for any reason, he can finally challenge his disrespector to a duel since he will be equipped with a glove with which to slap this person in the face. Germaphobes everywhere, you're welcome. I just solved your life.

Funky Cold Nostalgia

With a certain blogger's birfday drawing near (PS3 or Red Bull BC One tickets please, Birfday Santa), I am inclined to look backwards on my life. Note: Do not try looking backwards while also walking forwards. You may unknowingly run into oncoming traffic, a lamppost, or worse, an exgirlfriend...you know, the one with the herp. OCK WORD.

As far as reminiscing goes, I tend to view my life in the form of a cartoon. My first day at school takes the shape of a Tiny Toons episode. My first crush is an episode of Care Bears (my Care Bear "stare" has never been more inappropriate). My first time playing basketball morphs into ProStars with MJ, Gretsky, and Bo Jackson. My first encounter with a little person: David the Gnome. And the list goes on.

When thinking about my first black friends (of whom I carry pictures to prove to people I'm not a racist), one particular cartoon jumps from my memory banks: C-Bear and Jamal. It features a gullible young boy Jamal and his smooth talking, sunglass-wearing, fuzzy wuzzy teddy bear C-Bear, voiced by real life teddy bear Tone Loc. You may remember him for his visionary and seminal rap hit, aptly titled Wild Thing.



I was gonna say this was my favorite cartoon growing up until IMDB dutifully informed me that it aired in 1996, when I was already 13 years old. Based on this trajectory, that means I hit puberty when I was 24. That sounds about right.

Unlike other cartoons that featured token characters coded as black (read: Panthro from Thundercats, Jazz from Transformers), C-Bear and Jamal put the black family upfront and had plenty of non-white, non-black, non-animal characters to boot. The show also taught me about peer pressure, social problems, and re-enforced the notion that taking the advice of a talking bear is actually the wise thing to do. Ha, and they laughed at me in high school for walking around with a Teddy Ruxpin doll. Those fools.

So when in doubt, trust C-Bear even though he may sound like he's been smoking herb and slapping around hookers. Yogi, Baloo (naked or pilot version), Berenstein, Gummi, or Care are also bearable substitutes. You'll bearly notice the difference. Bears are our moral compass and best friends, but only as long as they have the ability to talk. If however they only speak in roars, I recommend a different cartoon, one that taught me about Latinos: Speedy Gonzalez. Better make quick and "Andale! Andale! Arriba! Arriba!"

The Nighty Nose Def

It has just come to my attention that a friend of mine has a serious disability. It pains me so much to see him suffer that I felt it was my obligation to inform the world of his condition even though he has not authorized this entry.

I discovered his unfortunate circumstance recently. It all started at a slumber party in my friend's basement last weekend. I brought my Masters of the Universe sleeping bag. It glows in the dark so not only is it kickass, but neon green He-Man protects me from the dark too. My friend's mom made chili and we devoured it like crabs on crotch fuzz. And as these boys-only slumber parties go, the evening devolved into a veritable fart-fest, as in a festival of farting, as in a continuous celebratory display of flatulence. We called it Difwarti (high five for culturally competent puns!).

But there was one problem: my friend, let's call him Luke, couldn't join in on the fun. You may be wondering, does Luke suffer from a mute colon? No, far from it. But he does suffer from a deaf nose. That is to say, his nose knows no scent. So while we continued to release putrid gaseous waste into the air, Luke sat there unkNOSEngly and incogNOSEnt of what was going on. The nose-cripple bastard ruined Difwarti! 90% of the fun comes from making someone cringe at the vile sent emitted from your escape pod (the other 10% comes from the satisfaction of emission), but alas, Luke cringed not. That's when he came out to us and said, "You guys, I've been meaning to tell you this for a long time...I'm nose deaf...I hope we can still be friends."

We were shocked. A few guys even stormed out of the room. One yelled, "I knew you were lying when you said I didn't have B.O.!" As for myself, everything suddenly made sense. I always found it odd that Luke never put his nose up to scratch-n-sniff snickers, but instead just kept scratching, kind of like a pathetic dog trying to get into the house. And rarely did he ever have blue or red marker ink on his nostrils from getting too close to the Mr. Sketch markers. And never once while we were in a public restroom did he laugh at my joke that "damn, this bathroom sure smells like a bathroom!" Then again, no one ever did, except my cousin Borris who can give you a contact high just by breathing on you.

Luke went on to describe his condition to us and how it's affected his life...how he loves hard-boiled eggs and tuna fish sandwiches, how he never knows when to change his baby sister's diaper, how he's tasted spoiled milk more times than he can remember, and how this one time, someone told him to stop and smell the roses, and he cried himself to sleep that very night. This after he surrounded his bed with a roomful of crushed roses and he screamed over and over towards the ceiling "I CAN'T!"

After hearing his heart-wrenching story, I committed myself to finding a cure, not just for Luke but for all the nose-deaf people out there deprived of enjoying the full experience of a warm apple pie. I don't care if it involves shoving smelling salts covered in Sex Panther(made from real bits of panther) up his nose, I will find a way to jumpstart his malfunctioning sense. Just call me Nostrildamus 'cuz I only see his nose in my future.

As for the rest of you, you can learn more about Luke's condition here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anosmia. And I encourage you to donate to my foundation NoseNoLimits.org because you just never know who might be nose-deaf or eye-dumb or mouth-blind or ear-mute or brain-impotent.

Paranormal Activity, I’m Glad You Weren’t in 3D

excerpt from my review:

I really dislike scary movies (and the Scary Movie series for that matter). When I saw The Ring, it was on HBO at 10 in the morning in the middle of July with the summer sun beaming into my living room, and I still couldn’t bear to see a television screen for an entire month afterwards. I totally went analog and had to read books for entertainment. It was terrible. All the characters sounded like me!...

Read the rest of my review at pinkraygun.com!

The Hand-ler

Today on my morning commute, I nestled my buns in between two seated passengers on the train. While hunched over with my head down, the man to my left caught my gaze with his peculiar actions. He sat there with his arms rested on his lap, and continuously wafted each of his hands with methodical consistency. And when I say wafted, I mean the same way one might discreetly waft away the gaseous cloud of stank after a public display of fartulence. He would extend his left hand forward, palm turned inward, and waft it with the right hand for three times. Then, he would extend the right hand forward, palm turned inward, and waft it three times with the left. He performed this absurd act over and over for at least four stops. Was it some kind of ritual? Was he blessing his hands? Or cursing the attractive male to his right in a fit of jealous rage? Or maybe he was trying to cool down his palms after handling hot coals? [Tangent: When Santa Claus leaves naughty little boys and girls coal in their stockings, is the coal lit?? That's just cruel Santa. Way to burn down the house.]

It actually reminded me of this one time in high school when we caught the Latin teacher (not to be confused with the Latina teacher, Profesora Gomez) at his desk doing what only can be best described as seated tai chi with the intent to kill. Whatever the guy next to me was doing, I prayed to Jesus (my Chicano friend, not the son of God) that he did not have the intent to kill.

In any case, he was clearly focused on his hand routine. He breathed heavily and in rhythm with his actions as he did it, kind of like lamaze class (uhh, not that I've ever been...). Maybe he was about to give birth I thought. Then suddenly, he sped up the wafting. Instead of three wafts per hand, he went down to two wafts each, and then to one each. My head was spinning watching his hands go faster and faster and faster and then....the train screeched to a halt. He stood calmly and deboarded. "What the hell just happened?"

As soon as he left, I did a seat slide-over. Now, directly seated in front of the window across the way, I could see my reflection. My head had shrunken to the size of a kiwi.

Words with The oGRE

That's not a hug, that's an abduction.

A passage written almost entirely in GRE vocabulary:
The stolid but stalwart novitiate prevaricated the inimical harangue by fallaciously paraphrasing the elegic obloquy of an urbane and spleen progenitor. However, the impetuous, saturnine, and jejune tyro equivocated inchoate intimations that inveighed veracity and engendered disultory promulgations, fomenting a proliferation of inauspicious opprobrium. The neotitialate remonstrapulated the exigentuousity of the falendipitous resplengence akin to a malifstontae capalictus deronstata and pusillanimous puissant forendent nakamura pluribus unum poughkeepsie duodenum oblongata krzyzewski teppanyaki veni vidi vici optimus expiallodocious pinky toe.

Translation: Fuck Your Life cuz you're not getting a good score on this exam, you torpid-minded ignoramus. Even Ghostwriter can't help you now!

A passage written almost entirely in Boogie Brown vocrapulary:
I don't get it, you walk on a "runway," walk forwards on a "sidewalk," and sit down at the "movies." wtf?

Translation: I need friends, but there are obvious reasons why I don't have so many in the first place. I was so disappointed when I found out that "Paypal" wasn't a rent-a-friend service. Platonic escort FAIL.

Needless to say, I didn't score quite as high on The GRE as Zack Morris did on the SAT (fifteen hundred and two to be exact).


I think Stansbury is calling.

When will the hurting stop?

The guard at the door made me turn my front pockets inside out. He then had me turn around and said in his coarse blase voice, "now the back pockets." I was at a loss as to how I was supposed to turn my butt pockets inside out. I settled instead for stuffing my hands into each pouch and molesting my own butt cheeks to prove the pockets were empty. I thought my performance deserved at least a 20 dollar tip, but he was no bachelorette party and I doubted a desk jockey like him would carry anything bigger than a five anyway.

After proving I was contraband free, he led me into a sound-proof room with soul-sucking fluorescent lights, and sat me down at my station. Big brother looked down at me from a series of cameras hovering over each station. They broadcast to a bank of monitors at the guard's desk, where I'm sure he looked on like the albino from Princess Bride delighting in every year extracted from my life by "the machine." Where was Andre the Giant and the jerry-curled swordsman when you needed them?....To my knowledge, the former is 6-feet under (but laid horizontally, not vertically; otherwise his head and torso would be sticking out of the plot) and the latter got typecasted and now appears as the omnipresent swashbuckler on bottles of spiced rum. But I digress...

I clicked start on the computer screen, and the game of torture known only as the GRE began. For those that don't know, GRE stands for Generating Responses of Excruciation. It's more like a psychological experiment testing my ability to endure pain for 3 hours than it is an aptitude exam. The GRE (pronounced "gree," short for "grief") comes in the form of a computer adaptive test that adapts to my every move. It's like a Darwinian bird and I'm the environment, and unfortunately, the environment always gets shitted on.

The problem is that the GRE does not function like normal evaluators in our society, utilizing positive enforcement for accomplishing goals and strong performance. It does not give gold stars for sharing my toys or smelly stickers for raising my hand before talking. Instead of high fiving me, The GRE rewards correct answers by sweeping my leg with harder questions! That's like a firefighter that saves a cat from a tree and gets rewarded by being thrown into a lion pit with a bread knife and a half can of spam. It's like winning the 100 meter dash at the olympics, and instead of gold, you get your left leg chopped off and then forced to run the New York City marathon. Abu Ghraib, eat your heart out...too soon?

I frantically clicked away as my body sunk lower into my chair with each passing question. Several times during the test I looked up at the cameras and gave the guard the finger. My brain was getting bruised worse than Kanye's ego at the hands of POTUS B-HO. Images of mushroom clouds erupted in my mind over and over and over. After nearly three hours, it was finished...or so I thought. The GRE decided to throw an extra 30 minute section of "experimental" questions at me. It was the encore to the show that no one asked for. A second helping of Aunt Tom's wild meat surprise while you're still trying to hold down the first serving. But I endured.

At the end of it all, I was slumped over the side of my chair, drenched in my own sweat and other anonymous wastes, my mouth agape and begging in dry whispers for water and/or my mother. A pair of burly men in white lab coats came and dragged me away. I think one of them stole my wallet and flicked me in my teeth. When I came to, I found myself in a barren field half naked (I'll let your imagination decide which half...left or right). I crawled to the side of a lonely road where I stuck out my thumb with a cracked nail. A weathered Chevy pickup pulled over beside me.

The driver leaned out the passenger window and asked, "Where ya headed?"

"Grad school," I replied.

"I see. That explains why you look like shit. The GRE..."

I climbed in and we drove off into the horizon.

Ro-bust

I drew this while waiting in line for the IMAX screening of Harry Potter 6 (i.e. "Dumbledore is Dumble-dead!"). Needless to say, not only does this indicate the extent to which I am a nerd (level 12, with +3 scimitar and -5 TI 89), but it also illustrates (punned!) how lugubriously pessimistic I am about the future....the future of robots! Not to mention the fact that I'm totally exploiting the plight of quadraplegic robots for a good laugh. How ableist robotist of me! I'm going to robot hell...a locked room with no wall sockets! Oh the agony!

Beware...the FUTURE of the FUTURE!

In the not too distant future, ramen-cooking robots will be responsible for spitting in your soup. Spit will come in the flavor of motor oil. Instead of finding a band-aid in your meal, you'll find a piece of duct tape. Then a panhandler will enter the restaurant. His name is Johnny 5 and he just wants some input. More input. And while the jukebox is playing Digital Getdown by N-Synchronized, please refrain from doing the robot. That's just as bad as donning blackface and doing a tapdance. However, at the end of your nourishment session, you can finally, proudly say "Domo arigato, Mister Roboto!" without coming off as a racist prick (or should I say screw?).

Beware...the FUTURE!

In the near future, cutesy but stoic little puppy bunny furball heads will rule the planet. They will enslave our hands and make us play typing games. "130 words per minute? Pitiful. Repeat....283 words per minute? Pitiful. Repeat...You mispelled tatterdemalion. Prepare for death." Because these puppy bunny furball heads remain tacit they will send electric charges directly to our brains via USB ports (minimum requirement: USB 2.0) that deliver the message to continue typing out words that are highlighted...in our MINDS!


This Get Down entry is brought to you by the letter Y and Crazy Pills, America's favorite over-the-counter halucinogen.

Animal Attraction

Every morning I walk to the train station. Never to actually take a train, no, but I go to watch suited self-important people get mangled by closing train doors. It's a delightful way to start any day. On the way there, I often encounter the myriad sights, sounds, and smells that New York has to offer. The sight of brown-skin women pushing strollers of pasty white babies, the sound of souls being crushed by corporate jobs, the smell of exhaust and refuse emanating from sanitation trucks. It's pure sensory bliss. And it goes great with coffee.

Today on my morning walk to the train station, I came across a middle aged woman (but not a Middle Ages woman; that would be so much more impressive) who came a across a tight-jeaned fellow walking his miniature dog--a doglet, if you will. She stopped and exclaimed to the entire block what an adorable doglet it was. She then got down on both knees and proceeded to stroke his back (the doglet's back, not the tight-jeaned fellow's). "She needs friends," my inner monologue said. And then, suddenly, in a hideous display of affection, she started making out with the canine, tongue and all.

"What a great way to start a day!" she said to anyone listening. Apparently, the best part of waking up isn't Folgers in your cup, but rather doglet tonguelet in your mouth.

It was like a combination between watching your parents make out and sitting through a PETA video of a pig slaughter. That's just not right. I'm all for interracial love, but I'm sorry, I'm still closed minded when it comes to inter-species spit-swapping face-sucking sessions. And yet she was taking so much joy out of her moment of bestiality foreplay. That may have even been the most upsetting part because really, what is worse than witnessing another person's happiness? Can I get some schaudenfraude up in here?

In utter disgust, I kept walking, my right hand cupping the side of my face to serve as temporary blinders from the show. But then, as I approached the stairwell to the train station, a pigeon took a huge dump on my chest. Cleveland steamer? Really? Damn, these animals are getting kinky.

At least one...

I'm not sure what to make of this one yet. It's a follow-up to last year's First Asian Boy, which apparently didn't work because this track has less boasting and more beseeching (GRE word! someone's taking Kaplan). But I suppose "...at least $#&% one" is still a better line than "I'll pay you for it." I can't wait to see what lubetube music video comes out next summer. I predict we'll see George Takei on a Casio keyboard using the maracas preset while singing "thank goodness I prefer guys, otherwise I wouldn't get anyyyy. My hetero bros can't get girls, that's why they're drowning in hennyyy..." Le sigh.

A Rose by Any Other Name? Chyeah Right!

I just saw the summer feel-good foodie movie Julie + Julia (damn blogger won't let me use an ampersand; even Vana White uses ampersands! Blogger, you are officially less classy than Wheel of Fortune). The title character Julie, by associating herself with the world renowned Julia (Child...no relation to perennial/alcoholic Knick point guard Chris Childs...shouldn't it be Chris Children?), is able to maintain a thriving blog where she had thousands of fans who left her dozens of comments per entry. (Ahem, ahem. Leave me comments. I know there are people out there reading this; they tell me so in the real world. But I don't care about the real world. That's why I blog. Tell me online by leaving a comment. The silence is killing me!) Her blog ultimately leads her down a path of success, celebrity, a bestseller, a feature film, a cocaine addiction, a failed marriage and burnt down house, a run-in with the law for soliciting prostitutes, and eventually an obligatory meteoric rise back to the top. I can only dream of such heights.

So to emulate Julie, and to catapult The Get Down upwards, I'm considering changing the title to associate myself with something or someone awesome. Here are my top choices so far:

Brown + Braun (as in the electric shaver)

Brown + Brawny (as in the paper towels)

Brown + Sienna (as in the popular crayon choice for people of color skin tones)

Brown + Brown v. Board (as in the ever popular Supreme Court case that ended school segregation, or something like that)

Brown + Brow (as in that hairy bush resting above your eye; whether high or low brow is up for debate, but considering I use the words "poop" and "testicle" consecutively in the About Me portion of this blog, I'm leaning towards high.)

Boogie + Booger (as in America's favorite nose candy)

Boogie + Boogia (this one will have to wait until someone named Boogia cures cancer)

Boogie + Bookie (as in the guy who takes your money for every Monday Night Football game)

Boogie + Boobie (as in the universally preferred vessel for milk)

Boogie Brown + Booger Brow (as in that sticky bush resting above your eye, constituted of the accumulation of wet snot...high or low?)

Please vote for the title you want to see! Until then, I will be training Meryl Streep to mimic my colloquial accent and the nasally way I say words like "comeuppance" and "bunghole."

the mess You're In!

Pouring your own urine into a small vial is like handling liquid uranium. It's the most delicate, high pressure task you've ever taken on. This is not pouring out a foamless glass of Sam Adams or funneling new shampoo into your roommate's bottle of Head & Shoulders so he won't know you wasted all of his while washing your secret teddy bear collection. No, this is hot piss you're handling. Your own hot piss. Not only is it infinitely nasty, but you still feel beholden to care for it gently, like an ugly baby you never wanted.

It's an intense procedure that makes your heart stop with every passing second. It's like defusing a bomb for the FBI. One false move is all it takes…You grip the plastic vial in your left hand, tilting it precisely at 45 degrees. You nervously hold the warm paper cup in your other hand, a few centimeters above the vial, and begin to tilt it ever so slightly...oh no, you have an itch on your nose that you can't scratch!...

And don't even get me started on how that cup came to be filled. The terror in my eyes rose exponentially as the liquid rose in the cup, quickly rising to the top, and then, inevitably, menacingly, spilling over. Audible screams from a bathroom are never a sign of anything good.

"Oh shit!"

But the fear is ironically irrational. It's not like you haven't touched your own urine before, as if the splashback from the urinal never graze your hands, or as if you've never been wildly drunk on New Year's Eve in Steve's basement pissing all over yourself because you momentarily forgot how fly zippers worked.

I watch closely as the volatile waste slides down the barrel of the tube like liquid gold. As soon as the vial fills, I cap it off like catching fireflies in a jar. I flush the leftovers, and then ring my shirt from all the sweat. More liquid waste. Then I exit the bathroom like a pro, calm and collected, and hand over the vial to the lab tech, passing the baton with more care than the US Relay Teams. Mission accomplished. Now time to have blood drawn...::faints::