Thursday, August 31, 2006

professions of love and other sundries...

no. 1 loves the water. the perpetual swamp-like nature of our back yard will attest to this fact.

he's highly blessed in that my mom's housing development has a pool. add to this the fact that the shallow end of my mom's pool is a mere two feet, allowing no. 1 to stand on the bottom with all of his head and most of his chest free of any passing swells, and you have one fucking lucky kid.

he loves to try and "swim" under water at the shallow end. he has even gotten bold enough to venture along the side to well past over-his-head depth and dunk his whole head in. he's one insanely brave and crazy little bastard when it comes to the water.

then we took him to the pool on base.

an olympic-sized pool with a diving appendage. he was still having a blast, but was a little less brave since at no point could he touch the bottom without being underwater. we put a life vest on him, and he paddled himself around in utter bliss.

until he saw the diving boards.

for the next hour, all we heard was "wanna djump daddy, wanna djump." despite much pleading, negotiating, logical explanations, descriptions of drowning victims, etc, he could not be dissuaded, and i was all set to drag him kicking and screaming from the pool when the lifeguard blew the whistle for adult swim.

one of the other lifeguards came over and said, "i wanna see this. you can jump from the diving board ONE time. go ahead."

the wife situated herself in the pool near the end of the board, and the lifeguard guided my son up the little ladder. he happily toddled himself to the end of the plank, giddy with excitement, grinning from ear to ear.

when he reached the end, he looked down, and studied the situation for a moment. he looked at my wife, at the lifeguard, at me. he paced back and forth for a moment. he hunched over to get a closer view.

what was going on in his head was as plain as if he was actually speaking the words: "what the fuck? who raised this board up? i could've sworn it was closer to the water when i was over there watching. really? all along? fuck."

comme ce, comme ca, o beloved nonexistant readers, he backed down off the ladder and we left the pool. but he is not done with it yet, you can just tell by looking at him.

no. 2, on the other hand, is like a barnacle that is mortally afraid of h2o. if he isn't latched to you with both arms, both legs, and both sets of teeth, he is in full-on panic mode. whether his feet will touch bottom or not.

and that's all i got today, more to come you can bet.

darth sardonic

Thursday, August 24, 2006

i feel like string, i feel like nothing...

the past week or so has been the usual rollercoaster, but seemingly condensed, so i will attempt to capture all the ups and downs in mini-posts:

the sunday swap meet is a battleground...

i dig swap meets. i love perusing all the old stuff. stuff i would never even buy or have around, and yet, something about the combined smells of popcorn and steamer trunk and attic that make looking at buttons from wwii (i like ike) fucking cool. it's fun to play "oh my god, check this out!" and it was nice to see that my kids have an ingrained knack at finding the hidden treasures that interest them (no. 2 went home with 50-cent hot wheels cars almost as old as i am, and no. 1 managed to see star wars figures that were in a box above his eye level. he furthermore picked a luke skywalker action figure based on his first duel with darth vader, complete with bruises and scrapes, and a detachable hand, which no. 1 thought was beyond cool, and i have to admit, i did too, and had my wife calling western state hospital.)

she loves to dance, she loves to sing, she loves everything...

(and yes, i did just quote journey there. yes, i am multi-faceted.) before kids, the wife and i were crazy clubbin fools. we have missed those days quite a bit since we had kids. until recently. we take the kids to my mom's, they play and watch movies. we get dinner, and go out dancing or whatever until the wee hours, and come home and spend the night at mom's. wake up, make breakfast. everybody wins. unfortunately, for a bit at least, we're gonna have to go with less-expensive nights out. keep your shirt on, explanations in due time, jesus, ya impatient punks.

when masturbation's lost its fun, you're fucking breaking...

then back to the routine: kids, appointments, work. a bit of a level before the huge plummet.

when i see the sun, i hope it shines on me and gives me everything. well, almost...

can i take a moment, before the big plunge, to say that it is funny how i listened to this particular song several times while delivering last night, with no negative affects, and this morning, simply typing out that line, playing the song in my head, and thinking about the import of the song has caused a little hot spot in the back of my throat? morning is definitely my best break-down time.

i have friends who are enemies. i seem to attract people who don't give a shit about anyone but themselves. enter p, the beloved, good-natured guitarist. fucking con artist more like. the king of saying whatever you want to hear, and then insisting he never said it when the shit hits the fan.

he is moving out when he deploys, and since we can't afford this place on our own, we are forced to break our lease, and pay a hefty fine. (now you see why, for awhile at least, we have to curb unnecessary expenditures.)

he stood there, bold-faced lied, and said he never said he would set up an allotment and leave his stuff here and continue to pay us rent while he is gone.

so i watched my wife cry herself to sleep two nights in a row, and then we told him to get his shit packed up and moved by this weekend, and give our bed back.

wanna hear the clincher, o dear beloved reader? i know you do. his reply to this was: "what the hell is going on here?!? why are you guys being so mean to me?"

i think i want to vacation in the world in which he lives.

the good news is, we've already lined up a house back on base, which we can move into in the beginning of september. and we've learned our lesson.

so the roller coaster is slowly climbing back up...

and the words you're looking for are, respectively, codeine, nirvana, journey, green day, and codeine.

darth sardonic

Friday, August 18, 2006

2nd anniversary

two years i've been at this. two years i've been sitting down to this little chunk of the internet and babbling about the crazy shit that goes on around me, or between my ears.

i guess it could be said i've gathered a bit of a cult following (though i imagine this little following is even tinier than i might first think), the beloved nonexistant readers. i just want to say that the thought of you folks out there helps to make this whole thing come about. an idea, however vague, of people out there reading this, gives me an audience for which to write.

i've come a long way (baby, as i light up my virginia slim. hahahahaha) in the course of spilling my surreal, stream-of-concious vitriol. and this blog has played a major role in that. the times i have sat down to type out what i thought was going to be a very short and concise post about something (johnny carson, a dream about whales) and it has completely gotten away from me and i have inadvertantly dealt with issues i thought i had already cleaned up. these times have helped me to grow and become more centered.

and i am happy. happy with life, happy with this dumb little blog, happy with myself.

so, here's a big thank you, and a toast, to many more years of this silly drivvel. may we all find our peace.

darth sardonic

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

tv tastes funny

boy time flies when you're...whatever.

to sort of catch you up on what has been going on since last we saw our antihero:

no. 2: waaaaaah!! no. 1: son, don't tell me no! coffee. darth: aaaaaarrgh!! the legend of zorro would've been made cooler by "duh duh dunda duh duh daaaaaaaaaaa" (raiders march. i know, i know, you were like, "what the fuck?") moshing. vroom. zoom. here's your pizzas. used mom's bday money to punch two holes in my ear and insert a barbell. she rolled her eyes. more moshing. landing on thomas the tank engine toys. darth: #%*%$&!!! (no one does this anymore. we've all gotten old enough to actually write out a rather vast plethera of foul words, but sometimes it's just fun to go with the old zingers.) bbq. s: when'd you get the rebar through your ear? mikeritas. friend i haven't seen in awhile: you've lost so much weight. darth: aww, thank you, you are my new best friend. more coffee. random pizza recipient: cool chuck t's. no. 2 went pee pee in the potty! yay! gin and tonics. i should have said, "dude." misery with mom. (misery is a card game, not troubles over the piercing.) no. 1: did you hear me? huh? huh? huuuh? even more coffee.

and i am adding tyler to my friends list. this site fucking cracks me up. i know, i know, everyone is talking about this site. since no one is talking about mine (cept me, to friends who shortly thereafter serve me with restraining orders), i figure this is as close to famous as i can get.

talk to you again soon, o beloved nonexistant readers.

darth sardonic

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

let's unwrite these pages and replace them with our own words...

i'm listening to rise against's swing life away, and for some inexplicable reason it is making me sad. and i don't even want to bother with that, since it is sleep-deeprivation induced and fueled by a song that, for this moment anyways, i am taking as melancholy. though i doubt that's even it. so, instead: funny stuff about my kids!

the kids and i were watching dexter's laboratory on boomerang.

if no. 1 walks around in lab coats and gloves all the time, (and he probably will soon), i am ripping up the foundation of the house. will totally find a man out of body parts down there. a robot cat. a hunchback. the monster dances and sings "puuuuuuuuuun ahhh da riiiiiiiiiiiiii!" a cave with form-fitting body armor and shit. and you might laugh, but i bet were we to excavate this house right now, we'll find moon unit zappa with a little mini me humping the "lazer."

no. 2 says to me "atommabeeshee." then cries like hell cause i sit and look at him blankly. blink blink.

ah, i see. looked it up in my numbertictionary. it means, "do you have passage to alderaan?" now he's saying, "we don't want any imperial entanglements." all along he was speaking outer rim and i never knew.

no. 1 has gotten into the nasty habit of calling me son. pisses me off.

he says, "daddy i need you getting candy."

i say, "no."

he says, "son, ..."

i usually miss the rest cause i'm busy saying, "don't fucking call me son."

it's not the word son, it's how he says it. like a southern cop from the 50's would say, "boah."

funny, cause when he says "son" like that, i usually either say "boy" or "kid" in a similar fashion. gee, wonder where he gets it? can't for the life of me figure it out.

jesus, just now clued in. might set back my father of the year award a bit. the only thing saving me is the fact that i actually say "boy," as opposed to "boah."

after dexter's lab, it was the smurfs. i hate the fucking smurfs. and yes, i know you're thinking it has something to do with all the guys and only one girl. but i hated em before i really cottoned to the odd sexual dynamic. here's why: every week, something or someone is trying to eat them or destroy them. and every week they are dancing and singing and shit. then, when all hope seems lost, papa smurf says, "oh, hey, i totally forgot, i have a potion or a recipe or whatever for azreal repellant." smacks himself upside the head, cranks out the potion. back to singing and dancing and gangbanging the girl.

always a potion or a recipe or a spell.

i changed the song too:

lalalalalalaaaaaa kill a smurf today/hack a smurf , and choke a smurf and blow a smurf awaaay.

yes, even back then i was a screwed-up motherfucker. no, i did not seek help.

darth sardonic

Monday, August 07, 2006

like some junky cosmonaut

i want to find out where i might get my hands on a recently-deceased elephant carcass. the parcel place next to my place of employ has a big sign out front that boasts: "we ship ANYTHING!!"

speaking of work, or as i call it, the inner circle of calzone hell, last night was yet another red-letter day in the annals of my history as a delivery driver.

first off, my work schedule has finally acheived some sort of normalcy. i have predominantly been on the schedule m, w, f, and sun. unless i ask for a day off, or in some other way change it, this has been my schedule now for several months.

so when my high school buddy s called and said he was having his summer bbq on the 12th, i of course said, "no problem, mate. i will be there and we will get drunk."

then i checked the schedule last night.

fuck me gently with a chainsaw sideways if, for the first time in something a few minutes short of forever, my manager hasn't switched my sunday night with a saturday night. well, of course i pissed, moaned, swore, stomped around a bit, all to no avail. he fed me some line about everyone wanting that night off and so he switched nights blah blah blah. what her forgets is that if it isn't directly related to me, i am not in the slightest interested in what happens at that fucking store, or the people in it.

but the under-manager, when the manager wasn't around, says to me, "don't worry, we got it covered. just don't tell the manager." nice to know a few people there got my back.

so all fixed, and my night improves greatly. and it is slower than that slug i mentioned in one of the other recent posts. (fuck that, i'm not gonna find it for ya, shit. lazy bastard here, find it your own fucking self!)

then it is about an hour out from the time i am supposed to be off. i have just returned from a run, and there is dickly shit going on. i'm thinking they oughtta send my ass home.

i keep thinking this while i fold boxes and sundry other bitch work for forty FUCKING minutes!!! yes, that is right, o my droogies and only friends, who have suffered much at the hands of your humble narrator, there was nary a delivery for FORTY goddamn minutes. meanwhile, one of the other two drivers is also standing around. i should be allowed to leave.

but my manager has a tickle in his ass that it is going to get busy, (he gets these tickles alot, i think he should check into some preparation h), so he wants to keep me around.

then, when it is nearly time for me to go home, and i have sufficiently reamed both nostrils and my ass, he sends me on a long double.

as a result, i get out of work a whole fucking HOUR later than i should've.

oh, and as for getting busy? yeah, umm, a whole lot more of the aforementioned dickly shit.

so with yet another year of my life sucked away, and my vampire manager licking his lips, i head home feeling utterly tired and defeated.

not gonna miss that prick this week while he is on vacation.

darth sardonic

Sunday, August 06, 2006

physically fit (i like to move it move it)

paris hilton is giving up sex for a year. yeah, i know. i know.

it's almost just too easy.

give my kids a hose, a spigot, and a couple hours, and they can turn my backyard into lake front property. and themselves into 3-foot-high mud pies. and the carpet from light blue to brown-grey. and the vein in my temple to fill with blood that has been stolen from the part of my brain that is rational and maintains calm.

certain people should never, and i mean never be allowed to dance in the presence of other people. if they want to dance in their living room, cool. but never within view of the public. i was witness to one of these fellas recently. he actually did bullhorns with his fingers, something that looked like a boob-grabbing/tiger maneuver in the air in front of him, and actually rubbed his nipples. it didn't help that he looked a little like kenny g with a 70's porn stache.

though it would be fun to see a battle to the death between micheal jackson and porn stache kenny.

totally had a flash for a moment of ken-and-barbie-esque doll with long curly hair and a stache with "looney-moves dancing action!"

shit, i crack myself up.

and i want to do one of those dating video things. you know, like one of the rather well-known cable/internet/long-distance/fresh-fish/garbage-retrieval providers has on demand dating. i would sit there and do one of these numbers:

"yeah, i'm darth. i'm 35, and i like to play the bass and guitar [shut up!], and ummm, i write in this shitty little blog that no one reads [shut the fuck up!]. uhh, i like long walks on the beach at sunset [no, shut up, i am trying to do this thing!]. ah, i have a large crawl space and lots of black plastic bags [fuck, stop it, no! shit, see what you made me do?!?]"

i think that would be funny as hell. no, i am not seeking help.

and you know, as one of my close friends pointed out, the scary thing is that someone would actually call.

darth sardonic

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

10 minutes in the shower

i have not even finished my first cup of coffee, and already i have given swamp thing 1 and swamp thing 2 showers.

i have turned the house completely upside-down looking for a remote that i know no. 1 had a hand in the disappearance of. i threatened him with permanent removal of toys, and movies, the indefinite end of tv privileges, and even loss of prom-night, all to no avail. he watched blithely as i dashed about overturning furniture and cursing under my breath.

when i finally said, "fuck it", and went for coffee, he says, "here it is" and produces it out of thin air. thin fucking air, i tell you. for his next trick, he is going to make the statue of liberty disappear. i said thank you and walked away shaking like daffy duck at the end of that one cartoon where it turns out bugs bunny is the artist.

i saw a bumper sticker recently: if you can read this, thank a teacher. since it is in english, thank a soldier. i love, love, love the troops. i appreciate what the military does. i am proud to be a yank. but this whole "speak english" thing really chaps my ass. did you know that the united states of america does not, i repeat, not have an official language. the closest we ever came to having one was german. yes, german. we are e fucking pluribus unum. out of the many, one. bring your language and teach it to us, it makes us strong.

why is it that if you are the only couple dancing on an enormous dance floor, and another couple joins you, they have to dance close enough to you so as to crash into you every so often? when i am dancing, the fewer bodies pressing mine, the better. i know, i know, i should be asking for more female bodies please, but i am a veteran of the mosh pits. when dancing to something other than mosh pit fare, i prefer not to be bumped into. makes me want to throw elbows.

i had a dream the night before last, that for some reason has stuck with me. i was swimming across a mountain lake. now, you know it is a dream, cause there is no way in hell i could do the swimming that i was doing. back in the day, i could do some long-distance swimming. back before cigarettes and kids and before i quit going to the gym.

everything about this lake and its surroundings was ominous. the mountains around me seemed to bear down on me. the sky was a dark charcoal grey with clouds. the very water was an opaque midnight blue.

then the blue-green hump of a whale broke the surface of the water in front of me.

i look around. there are literally hundreds of humpback whales darting back and forth in the water all around me. i suddenly felt pressed in on all sides by whales that were little more than shadowy shapes.

and everything was deadly silent.

don't ask me what the dream is supposed to mean. i have no idea. the creepy factor on this one caused it to stay in my mind. and suddenly this morning it ties to something else in my life. not really me, or a situation of my own, but an empathy for a very good friend, who may be feeling pressed in and borne down upon.

if we could lend our nonexistant reader energy to courtney, that the sun will break the clouds, that birds will chirp, that the water will shine, that the snow-capped mountains will glisten, that the whales will burst forth into song, and that she will flip over to do the backstroke, and smile at the blue sky as the pods dip in and out of the water around her.

and we'll all grill and drink and have a party on the shore.

darth sardonic