What the Schvitz?!

So, the new health club place we joined is working out pretty well -- there's nobody in the fucking pool like, ever, and the "bubble tub" is doing wonders for my gamy knee, which is bonus. In fact, yesterday, after a particularly swimvigorating workout, I decided to reward myself with a visit to the steam room. I figured a) it would probably be good for my seriously boogity sinuses and 2) it might help loosen up the ol' rigor mortis that I've been battling daily since turning 43.

So, I turn on the little timer thing to 15 minutes -- I figure I don't want to overdo it on my virgin schvitz. Then I open the door and find myself standing in a 5 x 7 cinder block room with a coupla benches. Seriously no frills steam action. But there was no fucking steam. So, I sit down on the bench and wait... allowing my claustrophobia to really ramp the fuck up. Just as I started to feel the walls start closing in, on came the steam.

Now, I'm sure the sheer terror I experienced at that moment was hard-wired into my genetic code in the early 1940s, somewhere between Krakow and Warsaw. I mean, here I was, a skinny Jew, most likely the only one in mid-Michigan (or in the whole fucking state, for that matter), naked as a fucking jaybird in a darkened, cinder block room, as a billowing, hissing white cloud of steam poured out from under the bench. I KNEW they didn't like my kind at the club! I KNEW IT!

But I tried to fight it. I tried to self-talk and say, "Just relax, crabbs -- it's just a plume of nice, healthy steam and not a noxious cloud of cyanide death-vapor. Just breathe it in... that's it, clear out those lungs... that's--wait, why is my chest feeling tighter? What's that smell? Do I smell... almonds?! Why is the room spinning? I've... I've gotta get OUTTA HERE!! WHERE'S THE DOOR? WHERE'S THE GODDAMN DOOR?! HELP! HEEELLLP!!"

I burst out of the gas chamber and into the shower area, where a lone septuagenarian was hosing off. Never had I been so happy to see an age-spotted methuseleh lathering up his leathery nutmegs. I almost hugged the guy, but I figured he would've called out for the commandant, so I toweled off, got dressed and got the fuck outta there.

So, yeah, I don't think I'm gonna take another schvitz for awhile. I'll stick to the fucking "bubble tub." Keep my eye on those fucking "tennis players." And I'll be sure to wear my swim cap at all times, so they don't spot my horns.

Holy Crop!

With the half-share of veggies we get every Monday from our local CSA, this summer, we've literally got veggies flying out of our crabbyasses 'round here. It's incredible getting all this fresh produce that has sprung from Mother Nature's dirty, dirty loins, but the thing is, you have to be constantly cooking shit or you've got withering roots and greenery stinking up the fridge.

I have to say, though, that the Old Lady and I have been rising to the challenge, of late, and we've been cookin' up some righteous vittles. Instead of yappin' on about it, though, I'll show you some meals from the last week or so.


Lotsa beets. These went into a salad (farm fresh greens) with blue (bleu? blew?) cheese and toasted walnuts. (Cute side note -- my turds were green the next day!)


Yo quiero chilaquiles, por favor! Actually, I don't think anything in this dish was from the CSA, but it still tasted mucho burrito! It was truly fart-tastico!


A real grown-up meal! Soy Vey marinated salmon (fresh from the Fish Truck) with rice, broccolini and bruschetta with basil and tomatoes from the garden. It was so delicious, my butt valve didn't want to let it go! (It did, though, after some Ignatius Riley-like coaxing!)


Hey, it's last night's pizza with fresh basil and yellow peppers! As they used to say to me in Italy, "Qui, maiale, gode di questa pizza su che ho urinato." Mama mia!


Hey, get a load-a me! I made fucking borscht! And I threw fresh parsley and half a hard boiled egg in it! Why? Because I'm fucking insane! (The green turds returned, for those keeping score.)


Did someone say "dessert"? 'Cuz the Old Lady just whipped up this gonad-draining, no-bake cheesecake with fresh blueberries and bing cherries. Holy crapstain, it was tasty! Unfortunately, the spawnage decided they'd rather have popsicles, so the Old Lady and I had to suck it down ourselves. Oh well -- it was arteriosclerosinful!

Pretty impressive, huh? And the great thing about eating all these veggies is that I've never been more regular in my life. (By the way, is it normal to dump every half hour?) Well, gotta go sleep in the tub!

Happy Buddha to You...

'Twas the Old Lady's birthday yesterday and, by gum, methinks I can chalk another one up this year in the "win" column, gift-wise. If you'll recall, I've basically gotten her two gifts (over the last 22 years) that I would deem completely "successful" -- these two rings:



And I fucking lucked into those. The first one was total pulled-outta-the-bung luck, but it was early in our relationship and I think she was just easier to please back then. For the second one, she actually said, "I'd sure like me a turquoise ring," so I basically just had to find one that didn't have a goddamn howling coyote on it or any of that other southwestern bullshit, and I was golden. It wasn't easy (I had to find some hoser jeweler in Canada) but I eventually found "the ring."

This year, I was planning on going the ol' just-buy-a-shitload-of-stuff-and-she's-bound-to-find-something-
in-there-that-she-likes route, when I remembered that she used to have this Buddha ring that she totally loved, but it broke a coupla years ago. It was a huge silver ring with this carved red coral Buddha set in the middle of it and she really dug it, but she was apparently gesticulating wildly during one of her heated lectures and it flew off her hand and shattered into thousands of puny Buddhlets.

It became my mission to replace the Buddha ring.

So basically, over the last six months or so, I've visited every fucking online ring store, jewelry emporium, head shop, importer, exporter, cole porter, silver smithee, pawn shop and monkery that you could possibly imagine. And I found no fucking ring and no fucking enlightenment, whatsoever. He may look all happy and roly-poly, but that Buddha's a wily mofo.

Then I chanced upon ebay. You remember my ol' pal ebay? Those goddamn corrupt swindling dicksacks who stole my matched set of eight Danish mid-century modern Kofod Larsen teak dining chairs?! Yeah, that ebay.

But this was before the chair incident, so I hadn't yet realized just how dicksackian they were truly capable of being. Anywhich, my ass basically fell off my back when I saw this listing:



There he was!!!! It was basically the same, exact red coral Buddha, but he was in pendant form instead of his natural ring state. Oh, you are a shape-shifter, my rotund, be-robed one. Well, I wasn't gonna fuck around with any of that bullshit bidding, so I went for the "buy it now" price and closed the deal.

Okay, now this story's getting really fucking long and it's boring as shit, so I'll start condensifying. I took the new Buddha, the Newddha, on our trip to Chicago, and dropped it off at this jewelry repair shop in Highland Park that my mom has used since Flintstonian times. They magically turned it into a ring while we were in Lake Geneva, I picked it up on the way out of town and, blammo, I presented it to her yesterday:



It's pretty much perfect, except for the fact that I got the fucking ring size wrong and we have to go get it fitted, but shit man, I give myself props for making it up to that point without a major fuckup. And just for good measure, I padded the presentation with a coupla CDs (Sondre Lerche & Radiohead) and an awesome book about Lucian Freud, and, overall, I'd say she seemed pretty pleased with her haul. Oh, and I made her blueberry scones for breakfast:



So I'm gonna really fucking bask in my gift-giving glory for as long as I can because basically, from here on out, I'm on my own. I'll have to be "original" and actually "think of something" to get her. Which I've learned, after 22 years of buying the wrong things, is pretty much impossible. I am so fucked.

All I can hope for is that she loses/busts another ring before next July.

Say Goodnight, Miss O...

Bedtime conversation with Miss O tonight:

MISS O: I wish the week were eight days long so there could be a three-day weekend every week.

ME: That would be awesome. Maybe I'll send a letter to whoever's in charge of the weeks.

MISS O: Oh, you mean [doing air-quotes with her fingers] "God"?

ME: What? Where'd you get that from?

MISS O: Don't some people believe that [doing air-quotes again] "God" is in charge of the weeks?

ME: [amused by her early-onset atheistic cheekiness] Uh... I don't know. I guess... maybe.

MISS O: Well, I don't believe in [air-quotes] "God."

[pause]

MISS O: So... what does it mean when you do this [air-quotes] with your fingers?

No Rest for the Crabby...

Sorry my posts have been a bit spoo-radic of late, but I've been working on this freelance gig at night and, you guessed it, a new one it is ripping me, yes. Basically, I do the occasional music and sound-effecting gig for an online game company. The time frame for the gigs is usually really fucking short and the whole thing is really fucking frantic, but I make a little money out of it and, in theory, it's fun. It's not, though. I really only enjoy it after it's over and I play the game and listen to the sounds and music and go, "Holy fuckshit, I did that?! I have absolutely no recollection of ever making any of that shit. Oh well... OOH, A CHECK!"

I'm not sure if you need to sign up on the site to play the games I've worked on, but I think some of them are free. Let's see...

Here's a recent one I did. It's a jigsaw puzzle thing. Click "Play as a Guest" if you want to... uh, play as a guest. The direction for the music was something like, "Make it adventure-y sounding." Is it? Fuck if I know. You tell me.

Ooh, this one was one of my faves. It's an Ali Baba-themed slot machine, and they wanted Ali Baba-style music for it. I had no fucking clue what I was going to do, but I said, "Sure! No problem! Ali Baba-style music is my middle name!" I had to find all these sitar/flute/tabla patches and I was in WAY THE FUCK over my head, but in the end, I think the music turned out great. Is what I created an accurate reflection of the music one might have heard in ancient Arabia? Probably not. Did the check clear? You bet yer harem-pants-wearin'-ass it did.

I think you have to join to play the other games I did. It's free, I think, but you have to give them all your info, along with a pint of blood and a stool sample. There's a great one called "Hog Heaven Slots," that's got a cherubic-piggy theme, and one of my other faves was the 70s Moogy-electro-pop flavored "Keno Pop."

The only thing that sucks about the gig is that after mixing everything down, the sounds/music I make sound pretty awesome (crisp, full, in stereo) but for the big audio files to actually work in the game, I have to compress the shit out of them into this ridiculously tiny file size that makes them sound like they're playing from inside the dickhole of a dung beetle. But as long as the check clears, I'LL play from inside the dickhole of a dung beetle. Crabby needs cash.

And there you go. I just wasted 10 minutes and I still haven't figured out a sound for "weekly bonus ding." All right, back to work. I guess the spawnage have to eat next week. Now where's my 'ding' folder?

A Five Crab Review!

Oh my crap. That was, quite possibly, the best dinner experience I've ever had. And it had nothing to do with the fact that I started off the night with a Cucumber Gimlet and followed that up with a half bottle of wine. All I know is that Logan - An American Restaurant, at 115 West Washington Street in Ann Arbor rocked me to my crabby core.

Fuck the set-up of the evening and all the preliminary exposition bullshit -- we drove the hour to Ann Arbor, eventually found parking (we forgot that it was the fucking Art Fair weekend and the streets were awash with assholes buying mixed-media weather vanes and batik jodhpurs) and we made it to the restaurant.

On to the food:

Appetizers
1. A savory Antique Gruyere custard served with handmade poppy seed crackers, and a quenelle of warm soffritto: onions and tomatoes that are caramelized for ten hours. A solid app that we order every time we go there. I don't know what a "quenelle of warm soffritto" is, but I think it has something to do with shoving a onion-y glorb of rich, cheesy pudding into your drooling face-hole, over and over and over again. Only complaint: more crackers! Enough with the cracker-rationing in this country. I realize there's a war on, but let's ration some other dried flatbread... like Chicken in a Biscuit.

B. Logan Sashimi
Sliced yellowfin tuna* served with a coconut curry sauce, organic micro cilantro, and lotus root chips. Garnished with a Serrano chili “caviar” and citrus foam.

Stellar. The tuna was like butter, and when all the shit was piled together onto that root chip and shoved face-holeward, it was like an ocean-y fishgasm exploding in my quavering maw. And even if the iodine from the tuna causes my thyroid to balloon and then burst, it will have been worth it. Tuna? Tune-yeah!

Then we had some salads and I sucked down my Hendrick's gin Cucumber Gimlet, which was cucumbrilliant, and then along strolled the wacky sommelier. The Old Lady and I were just planning on getting a glass of wine each with dinner 'cuz we were both pretty wiped and we had to make the hour long journey back home after dinner. But this grape guru comes by and tells us this rambling-yet-riveting story of a Sicilian winemaker who planted his one-of-a-kind vines on some mountain and he personally tastes every batch and if it's really fucking perfect it becomes this $300 bottle of wine but if it's not quite as brilliant, but still fucking brilliant, it becomes this $80 bottle that they just happened to have there and which just happens to pair perfectly with both of the pastas we were about to order and then, well... we ordered an $80 bottle of wine.

And if fucking ROCKED! Seriously, if you ever see this wine, get it. Ejaculate of the gods, I'm telling ya. And yes, I know it's only $31.99 online, but restaurants always at least double the price of a bottle and this sommelier-savant could've gotten me to buy a fucking Yoo-Hoo for 38 bucks, he was that convincing, so what're you gonna do?

Okay, lets move this along...

Entrees
The Old Lady got this: Freshly made potato gnocchi tossed with a green olive, piquillo pepper, garlic and shallot sauce. Topped with fresh roasted pinenuts, Parmesan Reggiano cheese, and arugula micro greens.

It was excellent. The gnocchi was cooked perfectly, light and rich, and not gummy and rubbery like most attempts. The olive tapenade was intense but amazing -- really drew the saliva outta the glands, if you know what I mean. Solid dish.

I, on the other hand, got this: Handmade tortelloni filled with goat cheese, braised artichoke hearts, and rosemary. Smothered in a herb infused cream sauce and topped with Parmesan Reggiano cheese.

Sounds simple, right? Hands down, the best pasta dish I've ever inhaled. If you know me, you know that I'm not the kinda dude who tosses the word "transcendent" around, but I actually invoked that word when the 15-year-old waiter asked me how my meal was. No shit. I don't know how such a simple dish could have been that mind-blowingly pastarrific, but it was. Eating it was like tucking my colon in for the night with a warm, goat-cheese-filled comforter and an artichoke/parmesan/rosemary-filled pillow. Of course, this morning, all that luxurious bedding looked liked it had been through the fucking wringer as I got a second look at it in ol' commode, but last night, it sure was dreamy.

After the meal, we were both perfectly sated and, frankly, drunk off our asses. I asked Waiter, Jr. if they had any cots in the back where I could sleep the meal off, but he, instead, showed us the dessert cart. I literally didn't know into which body hole I could fit any more food, as each one was already brimming with percolating pap. But I ordered a tasty wine-soaked pear egg-rolly number that pretty much corked up all the orifii quite nicely. I had the Old Lady take a quick photo to document my culinary contentment:



It kills me that we're so far from Chicago and all the amazing eateries that dot every block in every neighborhood. But being an hour away from an amazing dining experience like Logan - An American Restaurant makes living in a victual-void village like Okemos almost bearable. If you're ever in Ann Arbor, go to Logan and make sure they don't end up closing like every other restaurant we like in this state. And tell them Crabbydad sent ya.

A Reservation for Two at Tooth-Hurtie, Please...

Of course the Old Lady and I are going out to dinner in Ann Arbor tonight (sans spawnage) -- the day after I got my new gold crown forcefully rammed into my throbbing jaw. The dentist even numbed me up, but I swear to shit, it felt like he was taking the exposed raw nerves of my molar and weaving them into one of those lanyard keychains I used to make (through my tears) at Camp Mishawaka. And, since the crown is gold, it's apparently really sensitive to heat and cold for awhile, which, so far, has been fucking GREAT!

Hopefully, the special tonight (at Logan - An American Restaurant) will be Room-Temperature Pudding over an Advil Pilaf, floating in tepid clove-oil gravy with a dollop of Novocaine-chutney. And a bottle of their finest Pinot from Napa Valium.

I'm bringing along a blender just in case.

We Don't Need Another Hero...

I told myself I wasn't gonna do it again. I said, "Self, don't fucking do it. The last time you went there, you nearly ended up with a goddamn blown O-ring." But I was at the bank during lunch time, and it's really the only place around there to eat, so, like an asshole, I went back to Jersey Giant Subs.

Now, I'm all for supporting local merchants (which is not easy to do in this town, unless you're really into banks, assy-tasting food and lingerie/dance tog boutiques). But the crew at Jersey Giant Subs is completely fucking bonkers. First off, they only have one size for their subs -- ELEPHANTINE. It's basically like eating a leg. A dry, dry leg. And B, they slather about half a bottle each of mayo and mustard all over this dry, dry leg so that the slimy, snot-dipped meat slices that they flop on there go shootin' out the sides with every bite.

And to top it off, it's not very... it's... it's not good.

But I was hungry, in the neighborhood and I obviously have some sort of vendetta against my colon, so I stopped in and ordered the turkey breast flavored dry, dry leg. I could barely lift the thing when the sub girl handed it to me. I had to carry it outta the place like a mover might carry a bookshelf down a staircase -- hoisted on my back with straps as I leaned forward at a 45 degree angle, gaining speed until I plowed headlong into the side of my car.

When I brought it home, the Old Lady saw it as it was being unsheathed and gasped, "Good God! What is THAT?!" I told her not to be afraid of it because it was simply a submarine sandwich... and because it can smell her fear. She was convinced I could never finish such a sub-bomination, as was I.

Oh, how I wish she and that earlier, more innocent, less loaf-laden me had been right. I literally cannot fathom how that beastly bread torpedo fit inside my digestive system. It's akin to stuffing a water buffalo into an elbow macaroni. And it smells basically the same.

Anywhich, just to give you a feel for the sheer size of this beast, I did manage to snap a shot of the meaty monstrosity before it entered me.



Now if you'll excuse me, I've gotta go spread the tarps out in the tub so I can get me some sleep.

eHEY!?!?!

Sorry, you were outbid. This item sold to monoxylous for US $25 more than your maximum bid. And it sold to that turd-licker monoxylous with one goddamn second left, by the way.

You know what? Fuck you, ebay. And double fuck you monoxylous, you fucking cheater. Why even bother pretending that there's even a scrote-hair of a chance of winning a goddamn auction anymore? It's impossible. These bastards with their win-at-the-last-nanosecond bidbots, or whatever the fuck they are, are like the asshole kid who runs into the party and licks all the fucking cupcakes before anyone has a chance to get one. So all the cupcakes are dripping with little Johnny's Ritalin-infused sputum and now he's ruined the fucking party for everyone. NICE GOING JOHNNY! I hope you fucking choke on your spitty cupcakes!

And NICE GOING MONOXYLYOUS! I hope you fucking choke on your matched set of eight Danish mid-century modern Kofod Larsen teak dining chairs. Ya dickbag.

So, yeah, the Old Lady and I lost out on an auction for some dining chairs. And they were underpriced and pretty awesome. Of course, I didn't want to get them, at first, as the Old Lady has a history of getting all fired up about buying vintage furniture that a) we don't need and 2) we can't afford and iii) seems like a major fucking ripoff. But she broke me down this time and by the time the auction was nearing its end, I was getting all fucking worked up and we were the only bidders and it sure looked like we were going to get these fucking awesome chairs and there's only seven seconds left and I can't believe we're going to--

WHAT THE SHIT JUST HAPPENED?!

Literally, with one second left, this bastard comes outta nowhere and steals OUR CHAIRS right from around our dining room table from Room & Board that we haven't bought yet. How is that legal? That's not how real auctions work. You always have another chance to outbid the last bidder. There was no "going once, going twice, sold to the douchebag who fucking cheated and bid at the last second." I've never heard of a Sotheby's auction where one minute they're saying "One million dollars, one million-- do I hear one-million five-hundred thousand?" and then the auction suddenly stops and the auctioneer says, "Oop! Auctions over! A mystery bidder just bid one million twenty-five dollars at the last second and so they win. That's it. They get the jar with Napoleon's penis in it. Everyone go home!"

Not only do I curse you, ebay, but the crabbydad boycott of you is officially ON! You'll rue the day you ever fucked with my dining room chairs. Oh how you'll WISH you had blocked monoxylous's illegal last-minute bid. I'd so hate to be you, right now ebay.

And as for you, monoxylous? I hope those chairs get shipped over to your fucking mid-century modern store ('cuz I know you didn't buy those things for your house, you cheater) and I hope you unpack them and you stand there admiring them, and then you decide to try one out, and as your dirty, turd-caked cheater ass sets down on the cushion, one of the dry, brittle 1950s teak legs splinters and the jagged wooden stake that remains rams up your poop chute, pierces your sigmoid colon and you fall to the floor and lie there, writhing in mid-century modern pain, as your art school flunkie assistant tries to extract the Danish dagger from your shit-spraying busted bung.

No one licks my dining room chairs and gets away with it.

Coolin' off in the Cement Pond...

The whole crabbyfamily hoofed it on over to the "new club" today for the first time together, and I must say the excursion went swimmingly. Miss O and the Old Lady spent most of the time in the indoor pool, where the water temp is kept at a brisk 80 degrees. Nothing gets the blood moving like a pool of tepid human consommé.

Mr. Z and I braved the outdoor pool which, acccording to the membership woman, is also set to 80 degrees. Judging by the speed at which my balzac shot up from my nether region to my neck, however, I'd guess the temp was closer to, oh, five? We had the pool to ourselves, though, so we didn't feel embarrassed by our scrotum's apples.

After sufficiently splishing and a-asplashing, the spawnage and I spent some time in the whirlpool. Wait, do you call it a whirlpool or a hot tub? Or a spa? I'm not used to all these fancy health club gizmos, so maybe I'll just call it the bubble-tub. Anywhich, we were steeping there in our crabbystew when this older couple came in and plunked their wrinkly asses down. I tried my best to distract the spawnage so they wouldn't stare, and it worked pretty well until Mr. Z, while gesticulating wildly as he related some Pokemon-themed tale, splashed the scalding bubble-tub water into the woman's face.

And so ended our bubble-tub tenure.

Then it was just a matter of getting the boy in and out of the locker room without him spotting an unattired schvantz, which would surely send him into fits of cockularity. Luckily, there was only one lone gent whose junk was sufficiently cloistered, so we made it out of there with our memberships intact.

The crazy thing is, when I belonged to the Y, I never saw anyone I knew from town. It was like all the members were flown in from out of state or something. At the new place, though, every other person I see there is someone I see on a regular basis. There's tons of neighbors, kids/parents from the spawnages' school, INCLUDING the asshole bully from Mr. Z's class last year, by the way. Yeah, apparently, when the Old Lady took Mr. Z swimming last weekend, they saw "Sluggo" from Mr. Z's class in the pool. The greatest thing is that Mr. Z saw him, paused, and then sneered, in perfect Seinfeldian, "Hello... Sluggo." The Old Lady said it was hilarious.

The strangest encounter, though, happened as we were leaving today. In the parking lot we ran into the spawnages' doctor. But it was their doctor in his casual-going-to-take-a-dip-at-the-club attire, instead of his doctorin' getup. He had a t-shirt and some big ol' shorts and some wacky Croc-like slipperettes on. Fucking bizarre. It's amazing the dorkiness a little lab coat can cover up.

Wonder where I can get me a lab coat?

Crabstipated, Once Again...

So, I kinda feel like I'm in a bit of a rut with this ol' blorg. I used to sit my pointy ass down at 11 each night, stew in my own stink for a moment, and then the daily bile would just voluntarily bubble forth from my diseased liver, up through my fingers and, via my lunch-crumb-and-booger-encrusted keyboard, would end up sharted onto the screen in the neat little rectangular blogger text box. Piece-o-pie.

Lately, however, I can hardly muster the strength to spew forth said bile. Oh, it's still there, mind you, percolating like week-old Sanka in a spum-caked coffee urn in some dank-ass bar in Davenport, Iowa... Stickman's, let's say. Home of the Jumbo Porky. I just feel like I've got nothing new to say. Yes, I get sick a lot. Yes, the spawnage enjoy farts, draw funny pictures and can, on occasion, drive me fucking koo-koo-for-cocopuffs insane. Yes, I live in a town and a state that's sapping my will to live and turning my soul into a dessicated husk of hopelessness and, at 43 years of age, I don't know what the shit I want to do with my life.

Okay, that took a dark little turn there.

Basically, I need to churn up the fecal stew that is my life. I need some fresh ideas, I need to look at my futile existence with fresh, bloodshot eyes. And I need you, dear reader, to help. I've got a few ideas floating around in the noggin' that I might want to try out. Of course, they're most likely idiotic and, ultimately, will turn out to be embarrassing, but that's how I roll. So here are a couple of the ideas I'd like to try out, but probably won't because I'll either forget about them or they'll just require "effort" on my part:

a.) I've always wanted to do an advice column. Kind of a "Dear Crabby" kinda thing. If anyone has any questions that you'd like answered, be they marital, parental, or just moronic in nature, leave them in any comment section. If someone actually comes up with a question that I deem answerable, dammit, I may just answer it... maybe.

2.) I've got to get on that cooking show idea where I video myself making a meal for the crabbyfamily. This requires no action on your part... I just needed to write it down somewhere so I don't forget it again. I bought the fucking video camera, so I'm halfway there. Now I just need that pesky "content" part of the equation and I'll be golden.

iii.) Uh... that's all I've got. Two half-assed almost ideas. Lemme know if you have any suggestions. I'm open to anything, as long as it doesn't involve my ass leaving this chair.

Okay then. Hey, lookie there -- a post. It's working already.

Well I'd Like to Know Where, You Got the Lotion...

So, by the time we got to Lake Geneva, all my camera batteries had crapped out on me (both still and video) so I didn't get a whole lotta photos from that part of the trip. Surprise. Luckily, Miss O drew an incredibly detailed blueprint of the condo we rented, so you'll at least be able to check out the digs:



As you can see, the accommodations were quite spacious and the decor was simple, yet tasteful. And yes, those beds were as comfortable as they looked!

Actually, the place wasn't too heinous. It's owned by these brothers who apparently run a "moderne" furniture store in Chicago -- the condo seemed to be a repository for all the factory seconds and "lightly fucked-up" pieces that they couldn't pawn off on recent college graduates who LOVE THE 80s!!! Lotsa frosted glass and black lacquered appointments. Surprisingly, no Nagels. Or paint spattered Japanese flag wall art. Or skinny piano ties.

The condo was part of a larger condommunity that had a golf course and restaurant and marina -- basically, a lot of shit we didn't get to use. Except for the pool -- we did go swimming a coupla times. One day, I took Mr. Z and Mr. L to the pool while the Old Lady and her friend took Miss O and Miss M to the beach. We tried to play 500 with this little squishy football thing, but things got a little too competitive and Mr. Z almost drowned a wrinkly lady, so we had to put the kibosh on that.

I made up a buncha games like "see which of you guys can swim around the perimeter of the pool the slowest without using your legs" and "I'll hide the ball and you go find it for the next 20 minutes" -- games that really challenged them and pushed them physically... and kept them occupied for chunks of time so I could try to swim some fucking laps.

But they eventually got tired and ended up lounging on the deck chairs while I tried to raise my heartbeat above 74 for longer than two minutes at a time. When I finally got out of the water, Mr. Z and his pal were sitting there tittering like a coupla nine-year-olds who had just done something either a) illegal, or 2) dirty.

It was 2.

I asked them what the fuck was so funny, and Mr. Z, in his loudest stage whisper ever, said, "That lady over there just rubbed lotion... ON HER BOOBS!!!" And then they both fell into hysterics again, as said lady looked over at me with her best "I figured they were with you... pig" look.

We high-tailed it outta there as I explained to the junior-pervs that it's not polite to point and titter at women who are lubing up their pointy titters. But it was no use -- the lotion-on-the-nanners story had already become the go-to instant hysterics reference for the rest of the trip.

They may have not learned anything from that episode, but I gained some valuable insight about myself that day. I learned that I can actually say the sentence "Dudes, it's not nice to laugh at women when they're applying suntan lotion to their breasts" to two nine year olds without cracking a smile.

Now if I could just stop spraying whatever I'm drinking outta my nose every time one of them farts.

Great, So When's MY Vacation?

Okay, there's no way I'm gonna sum up the whole fucking trip in one post. Frankly, I don't even feel like talking about it at all. It was fine, I guess. The party for my folks went well and the week in Lake Geneva was... well, no one died, so bonus. But, as expected, I'm way the fuck more tired now than I was before we left and I'm totally not ready to get back to work, let alone write this bullshit again every goddamn night.

So yeah, great to be back!

One positive -- we snagged four dozen bagels and bialys from New York Bagel & Bialy before we headed home, so I won't be in a complete shit-ass mood until they run out... in about a week-and-a-half.



Highlights, you ask? Ah, shit. Okay...

a.) Miss O and the Old Lady picked up some weird rash from one of the kids we were hanging with in Wisconsin. Based on my extensive medical training, I'm guessing it's this. Just to be sure, I confirmed it with my brother (the "real" doctor) and he concurs. So, he went to med school for what, 80 years, and I have a BA in Psychology and I come up with the correct diagnosis. I'm just sayin'.

2.) I learned that Lake Geneva is apparently the home of Andy Gump.

I have nothing further to add to this observation, other than "who gives a steaming pile of shitballs?"

iii.) We made it back to my home town on Friday in time to catch the 4th of July parade. Apparently, this years' parade theme was "All Hail Tooth Decay!" as the spawnage walked away from the event with enough candy to choke a diabetic. They've basically been running the same parade since I was a wee lad. They even had the same fucking purple & yellow Lion's Club lion that they've been yankin' down Deerfield road since 1968. Although I did notice that its front left paw has become shriveled and withered -- most likely the result of decades of fruitless attempts to gnaw it off to escape this yearly humiliation.


D.) I took an awesome pic of a Shriner.

I'm tellin' ya, I don't know what those fuckers do, but I'm pretty sure it involves chanting in unison, the occasional murder, homo-erotic horseplay with chimpanzees, and shitloads of weed.

5.) We finally broke down and took the spawnage to their first 4th of July fireworks. I know, we're shitty parents for not having done so up until now, but they don't start the fucking things in Michigan until like 11 p.m., so fuck off. Since we were in Chicago, though, we went for it and Mr. Z and Miss O flipped their collective lid. Granted, it was a nonpareil pyrotechnic presentation -- firework technology has definitely improved since last the sparklers and snakes of my boyhood. So the spawnage are really getting the full childhood experience -- last year they saw their first sunset, this year they saw fireworks. Maybe if they play their cards right, next year we'll let them eat bacon.

Ow, okay now my brain hurts. I'm done. I should've eased back into this. More later.