Friday, June 29, 2007

A beat up piece of Chevrolet...

Blue and white rustin' away

live from my mom's joint, orting, wa.

you know you are in a redneck town when you are standing outside the local watering hole, a parking lot full of either trucks or harleys, and you see a feller pull up in his truck, park, and dump what's left of his can of rainier out while walking across the lot. this totally feels like a jeff foxworthy joke a-brewin': you might be a redneck if you need a beer in the truck on the way to the tavern.

give me a moment to rant:

washington state, in its brilliance, made it illegal to pull in front of a semi too close. that is to say, if a cop sees you cutting off a semi, you will get a ticket. not a nebulous ticket for something like "reckless driving" but a nebulous ticket for "pulling in front of a semi too close."

so, ok. here's my issue: i've never, ever, evfuckinger seen a semi pulled off receiving a ticket for the fucked-up twisted shite i see them pulling on a near-hourly basis, as i drive. today alone, i saw the same fucking dozy coked-up sleep-deprived dim fat hell-bent-for-leather motherfucker a) cut some little car off because he had to get into the lane they were in right fucking now because he waited until the exit he wanted was right fucking there before deciding to make his lane change, and b) force someone attempting to merge with traffic to slam on their brakes and drive on the shoulder for a distance because he couldn't be arsed to either speed up or slow down, or even, for that matter, pay fucking attention to what the sweet cherry fuckstain he was doing in the first fucking place.

if i had a dollar for every time a semi truck was on my ass like a hemorrhoid, causing my anus to pucker and me to pray to the powers that be that no one in front of me cuts me off or slams on their brakes, or flipped his blinker on and came over whether or not i was going to let him, or nearly went off the motherfucking road in front of me (this happened in new mexico, driving along, doobie doo, and hey, presto, the semi in front of me goes so far onto the shoulder he kicked dust and rocks and grass up in a cloud that was almost impossible to see through) or even ran me off the road (again, new mexico, driving at midnight in the dark: the set of headlights in my rearview swerves, and moves rapidly to the side of the road and stops. these are replaced by a set of semi headlights barreling down on me like some kind of bad 70's road rage movie. i watch in horror as these headlights gain rapidly in my rearview without slowing until i, too, am forced to swerve off the road. and later, when we caught up to that addlepated doss cunt, fuck me gently with a chainsaw if there is no number to call to tell his dippy ass "how am i driving?") or saw any other number of stupidities actuated by semi trucks, i would have enough money to buy a tropical island and produce porn movies.

and i understand that these things bring me basically everything i want. i get that. i understand that we need semi trucks to move produce, lumber, metal, guitars, whatever. but we also need store clerks to sell me the shit the semis haul, and if we saw a store clerk running around the store acting the fool, and say, swinging a baseball bat around over his head, we would take that fucker down, would we not? and if it became a trend, then laws would be made against it, right?

that is all.

it is a testament of my serious lack of a life that after nearly a full week of no posting, this is really all i have for you.

hopefully more next time, heh heh.

darth sardonic

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Monday, June 25, 2007

fiction

(again, because my wife asked me "who called at 2 a.m. last night, and where was i?" the last time i posted fiction: this is FICTION)

and some inspirational credit goes to both prada pixie and the ataris.

---------------

for troy barger: me and s still remember you, even if no one else did.

jimmy woke that morning knowing what he needed to do, what would be expected of him.

he felt an odd calm as he waited for his father to be done in the tiny bathroom of their apartment.

these two men who had been together for the 16 years of jimmy's life had never told each other they loved the other. father and son, passing like ships in the night. expressions of intimacy boiled down to the very bare-bones of existance: "pass the salt." "good job on that math test."

as his father walked past jimmy from the bathroom, he did an odd thing; without making eye contact, he placed his hand on jimmy's shoulder for the briefest of moments.

jimmy watched him for a moment as he shuffled down the hall.

as jimmy rode the bus to school, he looked out the window, calm, at peace. the sun was breaking through clouds, rays of superbright light shooting forth like magic, or power.

after arriving at school, jimmy did something completely uncharacteristic for himself: he skipped his first class. it seemed likely to him that no one would even notice his absence, not even the teacher. jimmy rarely spoke, never participated in discussions, and had managed to pass through the halls of the high school unnoticed by almost everyone.

he sat in one of the empty hallways after the bell rang, opened his notebook, and wrote in large block capital letters, "mark, thank-you for talking to me in biology. it meant everything to me. jimmy." and folded it neatly, stuffing it through the air vent of locker number 189.

on another piece of paper, he wrote, "dear mr. steffens, you really have no idea how much you have inspired me in every class i have ever had with you. i wish we had more time. i hope you understand what i am about to do. it is my calling. thanks again, jimmy."

jimmy would've been flattered, and might have even smiled, if he had known mr. steffens would spend the last two hours of the school day neglecting his classes to run around the school trying to find jimmy, and stop what he was sure jimmy must be planning.

mr. steffens would be in the library writing up his lesson plans this period, so jimmy snuck into the class and left the note on his desk.

on another piece of paper, jimmy wrote simply, "it's not your fault. you couldn't have known. please don't beat yourself up, i am happier this way." and slid it into locker number 254.

on the last piece of paper, jimmy wrote, "i know you don't know who i am. few do. but i have always been there, watching you at school. do you ever feel like crying? do you ever feel like giving up? you must go on. and please, remember me."

he paused a moment in front of locker number 113. he reread his note. a choking sound came from his throat. he frowned, swallowed hard, and steeled his resolve before folding the note up and sliding it into the airvent of this nondescript locker, standing for a moment with his palm against the cold metal surface after the paper disappeared from sight.

at 2:14, bill left school a little early. he and his friends were taking his new camaro and driving into the city to catch another friend's band, and they wanted to get there early to hang out.

the group piled in, laughing and jostling, commenting on how cool bill's new car was.

celine had spent the last period of school hiding out in the third stall of the women's bathroom, crying. sometimes she wondered why. why she kept going. wouldn't it be easier if...?

she decided to leave school early, walk down to the park and sit by the pond, look at the new buds on the trees and flowers.

at 2:16, as bill was saying, "look at the rubber trail i will leave on the street in front of the school!" celine was pushing open the double doors of the school.

and jimmy was jumping up from his hiding spot behind the old rhodedendron.

no one would notice jimmy running full tilt across the grass. no one would see the resolve, the determination, in his eyes. no one would see how happy he finally was, for the first time in his life, and how a near-smile seemed to creep across his sallow face as he sprinted towards the epicenter of car and girl.

many kids who had never heard of jimmy, never noticed him in the hall in his worn polo shirt and cheap jeans, will cry at the assembly the school held to talk about the accident. mr. steffens will smile through his tears, and quietly thank god he hadn't found jimmy that day, an odd understanding clear in his face.

mark will skip school. he will do his crying in his room, alone. later, he will ask his friends if any of them remembered jimmy. a few will admit that they thought they did. mark will ask why he didn't do more to make jimmy feel included. then he will remember the note, the line "it meant everything to me." and will allow himself to be consoled by his friends.

bill will steal his mom's liquor, and drink for a few days. finally, a need for routine will take over, and he will return to school to find jimmy's note. it will take awhile, and quite a bit of therapy, but he will forgive himself.

celine will cry. she will cry and cry and wonder why anyone would do that for her. her mother will take a few days off from work, though this will mean the two of them will eat ramen for a month, because she can see that the time has come to be close to her daughter, to talk about the important things they had never discussed. celine will show her the note, and this will confuse the mother, but she will point out the line to celine, "you must go on." they will cry, and the mother will tell celine how important she is, and celine will reply with the same.

jimmy's dad will find the post-it stuck to the fridge: "i love you, dad."

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Wanted to scream for them but had to stand in silence

my kids are currently watching the mst3k version of godzilla vs. megalon. they love it! which is great, cause as a kid i watched the rubbery dinosaur and his HO-scale-japan-destroying counterparts faithfully. when i got older, i watched mst3k faithfully, and would laugh extra-hard when they made fun of a movie i had seen on saturday's sci-fi theater. and when i stumbled out of bed this morning, my kids actually stopped the video games to ask me for the "mosser/wobot" movie.

friday night me, s, and t went to the l&m tavern. it is actually called the firehouse now (it burned down some years ago, and they rebuilt), but it will always be the l&m to us. my cold was still in play, though getting better, and we ordered up dinner and gin n tonics and laughed and did the kind of bantering that high-school mates with over 20 years of history behind us do.

brooke's eyes are real. they are ridiculously blue. and i have never wanted to just stare intently into her baby b's to figure it out, but while she was taking t's order, i managed to sherlock holmes, and there are no contacts.

as for her boobs, the jury is still out. t "brushed" them with his chest when they were trying to get past each other in a tight space between tables, and informed us they were "pretty firm". they are, also, (not that i really noticed, mind you, but i have been told...) err, umm, rather large for her frame. must do more research...

{we interrupt this program so that no. 2 can spend five minutes pleading and wheedling at no. 1 to get his binkie, when i know damn good and well that no. 2's binkie is probably in his bedroom. but no. 2 would rather spend all this time saying, "plaese (yes, the misspelling is intentional, that is how he says it, a cross between "please" and "place"), plaaaeeeese, plaaaaeeeeeeese, PLAAAAAEEEEEEEEESE." over and over like some fucking whiney-voiced oliver twist crack-addict begging his pimp not to hit him again. it goes without saying that when no. 2 does this, it drives me beyond crazy.

i tell him to go find his own. it is in his bedroom, right where he left it. he continues with the pleeding plaeses until i see red, jump up, pull him by his arm into the bedroom, stern voice on full alert the entire time, and find his binkie for him while he cries like i am hitting him in the head repeatedly with a baseball bat.

when he does this plaese wheedle thing, i am unable to concentrate. since this is a rather largish post covering several days of happenings, drastic measures were called for.

that is all. now back to your regularly-scheduled program.}

as the night wore on, karaoke ensued, and s, t, and i were forced to nearly shout to be heard, and this, combined with the already sandpapery condition caused me to sound like the love child of harvey fierstein and gilbert godfried as it goes through puberty.

saturday, i needed to clean. and clean. and clean. then shower. and nap. then people showed up for my little do. i received presents of tangueray (my friends know me oh, so well, o my beloved bemused non-existant readers), and happily drank and talked and basically had a rather toned-down little fiestita. i did not run around the back yard in my boxers. just wasn't the right mood. (and my new non-existant readers, which is damn near all of you, will have absolutely no idea what i am talking about. suffice to say, the right group of people + the right atmosphere x a drink or two = darth suggesting a boxer run, which is usually seconded by one or two of my more exhibitionistic friends, resulting in a few of my tipsy friends running around the backyard in their respective underwear.)

a&m showed up for a little while, though m looked completely strung-out. he reacted badly to the anaesthesia, resulting in vomiting, followed by reacting badly to the morphine, resulting in vomiting, and then reacted badly to the percocet, resulting in, yep, you guessed it, vomiting. as a result, he was taking tylenol and toughing through the pain, and gimping around pretty poorly. i will mention here, though, that m is a crazy fucking rugby player who took a knee to the eye and wanted them to send him back in with his eyebrow hanging open like a side of beef at the slaughterhouse.

a good time was had by all.

the next morning, i awoke with no voice. one nostril was completely plugged, not with boogers, but with swollen nasal tissue, and my throat was paved in freshly-laid hot tar and gravel. my cold in its death throes, putting up one last-ditch attempt at making me miserable.

and it worked.

i tidied from the party (my friends are not the kind to make a large mess and not help clean), and rested. the kids thought that daddy sans voice = not having to listen, until no. 1 was trying to outtalk me as i was softly lecturing him, and pissed me off, and i stripped my throat out outyelling him, causing him to cry, and resulting in both of them being a little easier to be around for the day, though i did have to repeat the "yelling-till-i-spit-up-blood" manoeuvre on no. 2 a little later on, resulting in him crying, followed by better behavior.

today, the majority of the cold is gone. i still have lingering snot and junk in my throat, and i sound a bit like dirty harry.

so you have to ask yourself, do you feel lucky, punk, huh? do ya?

darth sardonic

p.s. sparx, i am so pleased to be linked at all that you could link me under "boring twat what whines too much about his life despite how good he's got it" and it would make absolutely no difference whatsoever. dj kirby, i left a comment, but don't know if you have seen it, "some people are just small, hard peas" is a line from a codiene song, pea, and i guess you could use it as long as you gave proper credit, though i am not sure how that would work, copyright laws-wise.

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Friday, June 22, 2007

some people are just small, hard peas

sometimes i think it's me...

we here at not even star-crossed, just unlucky strive to bring you the best in blogger technology at regular intervals. if you have found our service to be lacking, please press...

heh heh, saw on one of my pal's blogs (can't remember off-hand which, and can't be arsed (what a great turn-of-phrase that is--i think it was pixie's blog i saw that in, totally gonna steal that too) to find out just now) that they had me linked as "not even star-crossed, just unlucky" as opposed to "darth sardonic", and the paragraph above totally popped into my head like the recording you might get when you call your insurance, or internet provider support line.

for my birthday, i received a head-cold. sinus head-aches, dripping nose, dry lips, sandpaper throat. it has taken me the better part of a week to kick it. actually, truth be told, it is still lurking about sometimes. hope to drown it in alcohol tonight. they use alcohol in hospitals to kill germs, right?

mostly, that didn't stop me from doing what needed to be done (read: i fucking had to do shit despite the fact that i felt like a pile of warm dung), but left little energy for the side-projects. just started to get back into the swing of things yesterday. (now that i am in the swing of things, if i could just get someone to give me a push... man, english is fucked up!)

when i was feeling the gunkiest, the days were sunny. bright, cheery, pleasant. now that i am feeling better, it is overcast. oh, cause that makes perfect sense. ty, o mighty whatever thing you are that is running the show up there, he he.

(i posted once about possible past lives i may have had, and i mentioned that i must have been close to (and teased incessantly) someone of significant religious importance, say jesus, or buddha (though i think it would've been ultra keen to have been chilling with vishnu), because the powers that be (and i would capitalize that probably, if i bothered to capitalize anything in this tiny flake of dead skin caught in the world wide web) seem to occasionally poke fun at me in mostly harmless ways.)

i guess, for now, we will leave it at that, o my beloved non-existant readers, and no doubt after tomorrow i will have a (hopefully) clever post about drunken party shenanigans (lo and behold, i had always been spelling that word with too many n's, my irish forebears would kick my mostly-german ass) and sundry silliness for your reading pleasure.

until then.

darth sardonic

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Wednesday, June 20, 2007

tagged--18 and...

dj kirby tagged me with a musically-inlcined tag this time around. i'm sposed to travel back in time to when i was 18, wax nostalgic about the music i listened to, and tell you all about it. this oughtta be lots of fun:

the university. it was my first time out from under the oppressive thumb of my uber-conservative dad and stepmom, and by god, i was going to enjoy it. i grew my hair out and ratted it into a snarl a la robert smith, of the cure (and frequently wore the white base, black eyeliner, and garish red lipstick to complete the ensemble), dressed in nothing but black nearly every day (shit, i still do that a bit), and wished i was dead 90% of the time.

i wanted to be different. i wanted to be the same. i wanted to be liked. i wanted to be despised. i desperately wanted to date as many girls as i could (in high school, due mostly to the aforementioned looney folks, i had had one, and only one, official date), but i didn't want to belong to the mainstream. so i did what any 18-year-old does when he wants to be a noncomformist: i conformed to the popular subculture (hahahaha, we all think we are so fucking cool, that we are doing something that has never been done, that we are proving our independance, when in reality, we just pick option "b", buy the appropriate uniform (with one or two "personal" twists), and hang out with people exactly like us.

so you, o beloved non-existant readers, will hopefully forgive me if my list of songs isn't familiar to any of you. i will also point out that the bands/songs i list here are all songs i still listen to today. these are not the songs of a fleeting moment, these are songs that affected my life.

the very first song that came to my mind when i read what was expected of me this time around, was dear god, by midge ure. this song is actually quite like a soft pop song, building in intensity towards the end, with expansive and epic feel. a beautiful song, i recommend it for anyone. the former lead singer of ultravox takes on spirituality vs. humanity. and don't worry, the god of the title isn't being railed against, if you listen close, we as humans are: we had it all, and we threw it all away/give me, love for the lonely/give me, food for the hungry/give me, peace in a restless world.

so this would fall at the top of my list, and i recommend everyone check it out, i think it will be a crowd-pleaser.

as for the rest of the list, well, take your chances, heh heh.

i fell asleep listening to skinny puppy once (the album cleanse, fold, and manipulate), and had horrible and strange nightmares and woke feeling anxious and paranoid. i still love old skinny puppy, but make a habit of not sleeping to their music.

anything by bauhaus, but especially all we ever wanted was everything, it's a simple song, but something about it fit my general mood of "what's the fucking point?" that i had at 18.

the cure, obviously. a night like this was a good one, i was "coming to find" her if it took me all night, i thought, hahaha. also, inbetween days, which is sort of a break-up song, but with surprisingly upbeat music. odd, i was listening to that kind of stuff the other day and posted about it, hmmmm.... a running theme, maybe?

joy division. ah, one cannot begin to capture how connected i felt to joy division. the lead singer had killed himself after they had been a band maybe 2 or 3 years (the rest of the band went on to become new order), and their songs were mostly dark, and brooding. i loved it. i love it still.

a plethera of punk bands: the clash, sex pistols, minor threat, 7 seconds, the exploited, dead kennedys, et al.

and finally, and to keep this semi simple (too late), the smiths and morrissey. morrissey has never written a happy song in his life. and while i find some of it a bit whiney now, i really felt that morrissey "got" me at the time, new the pain i was going through (it's called "teen-angst" ya dippy, and nearly everyone goes through it, god i was a pain in the ass to be around at 18!).

as far as who to tag with this, i will have to get back to you on that, as i have to get ready to take the kids to their therapy.

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Tuesday, June 19, 2007

did i remember to keep your beer as full as mine?

i am 36 years old today.

i should point out that i don't feel, look, or, for that matter, act like a 36-year-old. well, that is, if there is even a way that a 36-year-old should look and act.

i'm a bit pensive today, though i think it has little to do with my birthday, it is just something i do every so often.

i am happy. right here, right now. with things just the way they are. that is not to say that i don't have some regrets, and that there aren't things i might like to change about our current situation, but overall i am extremely pleased with my life.

actually, i think it is better than i could've hoped when i was, say, 16. or even 26.

on a different subject, i have some great friends. i have, during this time my wife has been gone, tended to keep strictly to myself. i don't want to be the kind of fella that calls everyone hoping someone will keep him entertained. i don't feel that it is anybody else's job. i don't mind being by myself, and i enjoy my own company, particularly when i am feeling down. no one else should have to put up with me when i am being whiney and mopey. at least that is my attitude.

well, despite all that, i get regular calls from a few of my friends. checking up on me. seeing if i need anything. only just now, one of our friends called and sang me happy birthday, and although she was sick, said she wanted to try and make me dinner this week. she's already planning on coming to my birthday shindig this saturday, but on top of that wants to make me dinner. my buddy s instists he is paying for our regular friday night's food and drinks, even though he, too is coming to the party on saturday. my other friends, a&m, will also be at the party, despite the fact that m is having hernia surgery tomorrow.

this group of people, along with a few others, have made regular contact and made sure i am alright, physically, spiritually, mentally, and emotionally.

the joke about "friends will help you move, good friends will help you move a body"? i think i could easily call s, e, a&m, m&g, and probably my mom, and by christ, they would turn covering up a homicide into a big party, complete with h'ors deouvres and entertainment. not saying that i will kill anyone, but they would help me if i needed it.

i have to say, i am a little overwhelmed suddenly to become aware that finally, after having discarded numerous "friends" over time, i am surrounded by people who care about me easily as much as i care about them, and show it openly.

everyone in the world should be as lucky and as happy as me.

a few notes: yes, a winged unicorn. so that i might fly around, and could stab people who ask too many questions. hahahahaha. mainly, i was coming up with stuff that seemed as unlikely as me getting a weekend to myself.

"off" was my nice way of saying that my sister-in-law is "not right in the head" or "slow" or "not all there."

the father's day bbq wasn't as bad as i thought it was going to be, and it was nice, considering how i have been feeling about my own kids lately, to see them calmly sitting and watching a movie whilst their cousins tore around the house getting into everything they could reach and nearly ending up in the er numerous times. by comparison, my kids are sweet, cherubic angels, and i just needed reminding.

darth sardonic

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Sunday, June 17, 2007

happy father's day

happy father's day to one and all.

i'm going to a bar-b-que at my mom's, which is sure to be fun, because my brother and his wife, who is, to put it nicely, "off", will be there with their hellion kids (not that mine are angels, but i battle to keep them behaving. my brother and his wife's idea of getting their kids to behave is to follow them all over the house spouting a constant litany: "c don't touch that. c put that down. c don't do that you're gonna break it. c quit climbing on that. god kid you are driving me crazy. c stop that...."), and overall, my brother and i can tolerate each other's presence (but only for so long).

family dynamics are fun. wheee.

what i really want for father's day (barring the ability to transport my wife back here for a weekend), is someone else to watch my kids for a weekend while i fuck off to hawaii or cancun or aruba.

oh, and world peace, a winged unicorn, and my own personal rainbow complete with pot of gold.

again, happy father's day to all those dads out there.

and to you too, dad.

darth sardonic

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Friday, June 15, 2007

i wish this would be your color...

the day dawns cold and gray. the air is chilly with misty rain, but will later be muggy, despite the clouds and lack of sun.

i go on my run. for the third day in a row, as i pass the pond (the sign refers to it as a lake, but it is barely a pond, almost a swamp, actually), birds dive-bomb me, chirping angrily. they are getting more aggressive, and today i actually cover my head with one arm, just in case.

i need to change my route.

fucking birds and their over-developed sense of danger. any animal with half a brain would wait to see if i was even headed towards their nest, posing a real threat, before going on the defensive. winged motherfuckers.

i have a general underlying malaise. i am forcing myself to do the things i would normally, run, work out, do the bills, clean the house. i am missing my wife a little extra for some inexplicable reason, and everything seems to have an odd sad undertone.

then the kids come home from school, and it is off to grammy's. only when i call to tell her we are leaving the driveway she says she has to run into town fast and help a friend who is in a nursing home. no problem.

we can get lunch.

i attempt to fanagle the kids into wanting lunch where i want, someplace we can sit down and kill an hour or two. someplace where i can stick to my newer, healthier diet. i try to bribe them with mango lahsis or pancakes, but i should've known better:

"we want fwenss fwies!"

sighing heavily in exasperation (stephen king says writers tend to overuse adverbs: i know i do), i pull out of the driveway.

why is it i love the sad songs about breaking up? alkaline trio improves my mood some, by juxtaposing catchy tunes with depressing lyrics, and i buy a mocha at a local pull-up coffee hut where the baristas are all women and nearly always extremely scantily-clad (during the week, they have theme days: today's was "fantasy" (read: lingerie). my barista was wearing a brocade corset with matching panties, long, curly hair, a smile, and nothing else.), and head out for the evil golden arches, followed by my mom's unlocked but empty front door.

i hope this is good-bye, i hope this is good-bye.

if i ever make writing my full-time job, my kids simply won't allow it: no. 1 wants me to set up the game, that i told him i would do when i was done posting, and now runs in every five minutes to see if i am "done yet", to which i reply, "when i am done, you will be the first to know." which is actually a lie, because i will be first to know, and it is possible that one of my non-existants might log in before i make it into the living room to let my oldest know i will set his game up, and then he would fall a lame third. no. 2 says, "i wan' a sit on ya yap."

my mother's keyboard is so old that some of the letters are completely rubbed off. i never realized just how much i look down when i write until doing this post in the empty office, the kids enmeshed in star trek: first contact (which i would have thought would be too scary, but they love it. i tried to play them the wrath of khan the other day, and they were bored. no. 1 kept asking where the robots were. they didn't get interested in the movie until ricardo montalban blew up the genesis device and the whole fucking planet goes up in flames. should i be worried?), the air conditioner humming loudly throughout the house like a spirit caught between worlds.

tonight, it is out again with my oldest remaining buddy, s, for drinks and silliness and long talks about then and now and the upcoming, and flirting with brooke, our regular cocktail waitress. maybe today i will figure out if her breasts and blue eyes are really real. maybe not.

i guess i am horny. i'm too lazy to care, or even do anything about it. not that you wanted to know, but there you have it.

my kid just set the timer (the method we use for letting him know that it is time to put the video games away) on me. when it went off, he said, "ok, daddy, it's time to stop on the computer and get my games!"

i guess i am done.

darth sardonic

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Thursday, June 14, 2007

god, i hate being right

lord knows how many times i have told my kids to ask for my help when handling the dvds and games. i keep telling no. 2 not to handle them, that they get scratched and finger-printed and crudded up, and that he might break them.

so why exactly was i surprised when no. 1 said, in his pained voice, "oh daddy, look, he bwoke it." and held up two halves of melody time?

and immediately began the tirade. "if you guys would listen to me, and pay attention, these kinds of things wouldn't happen. i tell you to ask me for help, and what do you do?"

it goes on in that kind of vein for some time, while no. 1 mourns the loss of a movie that i think is shite but is apparently near and dear to his heart (though he hasn't watched it in several months, maybe even years), and no. 2 pretends to listen and care (though it is quite clear he is doing neither).

this is the sort of thing that happens alot around the sardonic household alot. "someone is going to get hurt." waaaah, my head. "you're going to break that." gish, snap, tinkle. "it's not going to work if you put it in the pool." wahwaharble, pop, fizz.

the thing is, it would be easier for all involved if: a.) they would listen and comply, and hence not test daddy's prophetic abilities, and/or b.) daddy was always wrong.

this was followed by me trying to purchase a replacement on ebay, whilst addressing a care package to the wife in far-off places and filling out the necessary customs paperwork, and no. 1 saying "daddy?" "daddy?" "daddy?" "daddy?" and then staring blankly each time i said, "what?" "what?!" "wha-haaat?!?" "what?!!!? for the love of christ!" and no. 2 walking into the room with another dvd that he has pulled out of the case so hard and fast upon bearing the brunt of my lecture, this time with slightly better results, though if the cops need his fingerprints, the media side of buzz lightyear of star command seems a very safe bet.

i've a feeling my kids are never going to learn to listen.

i am, as an aside, also scared to death about teaching them things that i can't remember ever really learning: like, how do you teach a kid to be polite? i mean beyond "thank you" and "please". how do you teach them to be respectful of others? to not be judgemental? to love and respect women? and on, and on, and on.

anyways, i know it has been a bit since i have posted, i have been alternately busy and drained of energy. and another little note, i am not one to leave comments on every post of the blogs i read, but rest assured that i read each and everyone's blogs on a regular basis.

darth sardonic

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Saturday, June 09, 2007

saturday fezzle

i am always amazed that as a race we survive past the age of five. humans are clearly the exception to the survival of the fittest rule.

i am further amazed that people who live in one of the wettest areas of the united states are scared to drive in the rain, and clearly don't have any notion how to do it safely.

and if kids were dry-clean only, i would need a second mortgage to afford my laundry bill.

i needed to get a certain amount of grocery shopping done today. bleary-eyed and only half-awake, i got dressed, and somehow convinced the kids to accompany me to the the store, after which, i had decided, in my brilliance, i would take them with me to a local used bookstore to trade in a largish box of books i no longer wanted for items i did want.

overall, at the grocery store, we did well. we only needed a couple of things (kitty litter being the utmost: i had only just run out a day or two before, but apparently we own two felines who crank out enough piss n shit for eight), which, of course, got expanded by a few more ("we need coogies, daddy!"), and constant reminders to "pay attention" and "listen to daddy and do what he says" combined with threats of losing videogames had the desired effect of maintaining obedience.

until we were outside and i was laden-down by a 35-pound bucket of kitty litter, and no. 1 decided it would be a good idea to run into traffic without holding my hand or even bothering to look or heed my shouted warnings. he was narrowly missed by a van (that was, to avoid being overly melodramatic, coming to a full stop near their almost-encounter anyhow), and even this, combined with gasps of surprise from the onlookers, and my bellowings, was not enough to wake him up to the sheer magnitude of his utter stupidity at this maneuver. having my fists bunched up in the collar of his coat while my eyes were inches from his and i was using the stern voice magnified by five (and i hope i had bad coffee breath, too) also seemed to do little to sink it home for him, which enraged me more.

threats of loss of games illicited repeated "i'm sorries", to which i could only reiterate that sorry would do him a fat lot of good if he were in the er instead of getting into the car, and that it is hard to play video games when you can't use your arms. (i try not to be, but i can be quite fantastical and melodramatic in the scenarios that play in my head sometimes.)

since it is western washington, it is raining. combine that with the drivers who are unable to actually drive in the rain, and the trip from the grocery store to the bookstore was fraught with danger (well, i was still very shaken from the whole kid vs. van incident, and further angered by no. 1 still being blase about the whole thing), but we managed to arrive unscathed though nearly rear-ending a lady who clearly didn't know which lane she wanted to be in and thought coming to a complete stop in the middle of a major thoroughfare to decide might be a good idea.

into the store, and it quickly became clear this would've been a better trip sans kids. i dropped off my box of books at the counter where they would decide how much they were going to offer me (which would be a fraction of what i thought they ought to offer me), and peruse the cd's and books while they took their time coming to that conclusion.

now, o beloved non-existant readers, i had, in my head (which has not been the most reliable source lately), a rather longish list of cd's and books and such that i wanted. but the noise of my two sons battling each other for the title of "most disruptive and destructive in a book store" drove most of what i was looking for right out of my grey matter, which, i imagine, looks a little like swiss cheese from overexposure to my children, lack of sleep, and overindulgence in the imbibing of spirits.

while trying to remember what exactly it was i was hoping to find here, my buds a & m texted me saying they were going to the store and did i need anything?

to which i texted back, nah.

"stop poking me, no. 2. i gonna smack you!"

"nooooo."

u sure?

"no, no. 2, don' pay wif dat."

"leeb me 'lone. owwwww."

maybe some gin?

i did remember to look for a few cd's i had wanted (that they didn't have) and a few william burroughs books i needed (that they didn't have) and anything by bukowski (that they didn't have), all while playing human tug-o-war rope between two increasingly rowdy kids, who finally drove their father to the breaking point:

"owww, you're hurting my arm!"

"let gowa meee!"

(whispered harshly through clenched teeth:) "i am going to hurt more than your arms if you two don't stop messing around right now! ("messing around" being said with the same inflection that i would say "fucking about" when i am really pissed) and i am sick of reminding you to listen to me and do as i say, to no avail, so you can kiss the games goodbye, for today. if you continue as you are, you can kiss 'em goodbye for tomorrow as well."

"noooo, i need my games!" (says the junky)

"well," say i, all cold-hearted carved marble, "you shoulda thought about that when i told you before to behave and listen to what i was saying, instead of deciding a wrestling match in the comic books section would be a good idea. it is, sad to say, way too late now."

i locked my face and heart against the wails and pleadings that followed, dragging my spawn around by their arms. i find one book, out of the entire store, that i am interested in. i spend much time wandering aimlessly.

finally, they call me back to the desk, offer me the pittance they think my large stack of books is worth, and i am so fucking eager to get out of anywhere with other people around that i take it and run.

my future world dictators are completely rude to another young fella who wanted to be their friend whilst waiting in line to cash in my chit and pay for my book, and i am forced to stand between them as mine tell him to "shush" loudly, and try and tell him how to live his life, and he looks like his feelings are hurt, and his father chuckles good-naturedly.

on the way home, i discover that my stomach has eaten itself and is tugging on my spinal cord to drag the brain down to be the main course in a feeding frenzy, so i decide we better eat. the whole drive, i battle in my head: "sit down meal with the possibility of more disastrous behavior from my little hellions, or drive through, which leaves me the choices of grease, deep-fat-fried, or gutbomb?"

"you guys want pancakes?" (my kids are suckers for pancakes)

"yeah!"

so into the international house of pancakes, which, i have no doubt, is familiar to all my foriegn non-existant readers as well. it is, after all, the international house of pancakes. no doubt reformed bolsheviks enjoy a "passport breakfast" on red square, the bohemians eating crepes below the eiffel tower, punjabi's laying aside their nan in favor of french toast? has to be, right?

so my little mad scientists pick the "smiley-face" pancakes, and juices, and a rasher of bacon (which i actually have to remove from their grasp, because no. 1 will eat greasy bacon until he chunders it an hour or two later. i know, we've been there. on a road trip, no less), and then proceed to eat the whipped cream, chocolate chips, and maraschino cherries off the flapjacks without so much as breaking the surface of the griddle cakes, much to my chagrin. next time i will just ask them to bring two juices, a side of crispy, oily pork fat, and a large bowl of reddi-whip sprinkled with chocolate-flavored sugar gobs and do away completely with any attempt at healthy eating habits.

so back home, where i stick to my guns and make the kids play with toys or watch a movie while i begin my new book (read: fall asleep on the couch), until it is bedtime.

and now the monsters are asleep, and i think i am going to watch a movie and in general be an uninteresting slug, followed by going to bed early.

darth sardonic

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Friday, June 08, 2007

bout damn time

paris is on her way back to jail. occasionally, things happen as they should. now, could we send tom cruise, nicole richie, britney spears, k-fed, lindsay lohan, and the rest of the worthless pieces of slime to join her?

and a moment to bag on tom cruise and john travolta and their chosen religion: i'm pretty open to just about anything. but apparently this religion (scientology) is a bit wacky, as they apparently don't really allow their wives to leave the house or do much of anything, guys apparently know way more than women about post-partum depression, and how to combat it, don't really believe in autism, and think that kids with autism should just be handled with herbs, and not just all this, but will gladly tell you, whether you really want to know or not. and actually finding out something about their beliefs above and beyond what these two knuckleheads cram down everyone's throats on a regular basis seems virtually impossible. basic tenets of the religion are, to me at the very least, as vague as words written a thousand years ago in blood on papyrus.

and i might be just channeling tyler durden here for a sec, but something is seriously wrong with suri cruise. i mean look at her. she probably just needs some more ginger root in her diet, as well as some complex-b antitoxins. yeah, yeah, pretty sure that is all she needs.

that is all.

darth sardonic

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Thursday, June 07, 2007

more porteno, for fun

just cause:

(and i am not really sure where this idea initially came from except that yesterday i saw an ad for the movie nacho libre, and began to think, what would that be? free chips? a pound of chips? then it occured to me that i never heard the word nacho used in argentina. not once. no. cause they don't have nachos, or tortillas, or anything of the sort there. then i wondered what chips would be in castellano, and it further occured to me that when i first got there (and before a freer trade was established between the states and argentina), the closest thing was galletitas, the sweet versions of which were similar to cookies, and the salty versions more like british "bisquits"--or maybe british bisquits are actually more like our cookies, and the salty versions of galletitas are more like our crackers? oh, fuckt if i know, shit. now i am all confused. anyways, the point being that galletitas aren't really like chips at all. then the free trade occured, and we started seeing pringles and the like in argentina. and they were simply called cheeps, which is how portenos would pronounce the english word "chips", and that led to the following insanity:)

when i first arrived in argentina, i was relieved to see some familiar name brands in the local kioskos (small corner stores, from the word "kiosk"--there is a plethera of european, middle eastern, and even asian influence in argentina), though all packaged or bottle or whatnot in argentina.

so i went into a local store and asked for colgate (toothpaste), pronouncing it as we do here in the states, kol-GAYT. the proprietor looked at me a bit blankly and said, "que buscas? flaco, que no te entendi" (and let me take a moment to say i sure miss being able to type accents and upside-down punctuation, cause that sentence is horribly lacking) [what are you looking for, man, cause i didn't understand].

i explained i wanted the red and white toothpaste, and pointed, and he said, "ooo, colgate." pronouncing it as it would be in porteno, or that is to say, col-GAH-tay.

yes, i tell him and he gets it off the shelf.

now, the really funny thing about that is colgate in castellano is, literally, "go hang yourself!"

no biggie, back the next day for a liter of 7-up. i ask for "siete-ooop" cause that is how it would be pronounced.

again, the proprietor makes with the googly-eyes and brushes with the tips of his fingers under his chin (the universal porteno sign for "i've no fucking clue"). i point, again, and he says, "ooo, seben-ahp."

what we have here is a failure to communicate.

so it became a fun game of, do they pronounce it in porteno or in an approximation of the product's name in english? the big chains of pop were all in yank: pepsi was peksee, coke was, plainly, coke, and 7-up was seben-ahp. sprite, however, was SPREE-tay.

the beatles, who is, was, and always will be, huge in argentina, was a tricky one. in el campo, or small towns in the country, they called them los bay-AHT-lays, which was confusing as hell: "te gustan los bay-AHT-lays?" to which i would brush my fingertips under my chin with a slight shrug.

"los bay-AHT-lays? jone, pahl, ringO, shorj?"

"aaa, the beatles! si, me gustan."

"como se dice?"

"the beatles?"

"de beeetells?" (which, in their mind, must be spelled "bitels")

in the city, i asked a pibe if he liked "los bay-AHT-lays" and he did the chin-brush thing, and i explained, and he said, "ooo, de beeetells, si a mi me re encantan."

oh, and those cheeps they imported from the us, they called them "PREEN-gless"

so i fucked that up, too.

darth sardonic

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Monday, June 04, 2007

oh my god i miss my wife...

a package arrived in the mail today. inside was a mini dvd of my wife reading the boys two stories.

there was my wife, illuminated on the comuter screen, absofuckinglutely radiant despite having her hair pulled back and being clad in her pt gear.

o my dear, patient, long-suffering non-existant reader, this was, quite simply, gorgeousness and gorgeosity as of the finest spun heavenmetal. the kind of moment that is so awesome and brilliant in its expansiveness that the human body can almost not contain it. i watched, entranced, as she began one story, mesmerized by her eyes and her mouth. i wanted to fall deep into those orbs and never climb free.

the boys sat on my lap and watched and laughed and interacted as if their mommy was seated right there in front of them, shouting "yup!" when she said she hoped they were having fun with daddy.

as you might guess, i alternated between wanting to pull her from the screen and bury her with kisses, and gulping back impending sobs.

when the fourteen-minute movie was over, my boys gave me hugs (as they had been instructed by their mom from afar) and went back to playing games.

and i broke down, and logged in here, and broke down some more. i'm still breaking down in waves as i write this (which is getting increasingly harder and harder through the veil of tears), and snot is dripping out of my nose unchecked.

i might need a fucking shower once i have posted this. hell, i might need a shower and a drink. shit, i might need a shower, a drink, and a long nap in which i will dream about holding my wife's body against mine without ever letting her go again...

-------------------------------------

i'm better. sort of. i keep telling myself that i am not going to rewatch the dvd after the kids go to bed, but i think we all know that i will.

i realize that this is the job. i realize that thousands, maybe millions, of people do this, and not just in this country, but many others as well. i realize that some wife in afghanistan or iraq is watching her husband leave the house and wondering if he is ever coming back. i realize a spouse in another part of the world is aching for his or her significant other. i realize that my friend a's hubby's company lost two soldiers just two weeks ago in an incident that was widely publicized on the news here. i realize that my wife is so far from any danger as to almost not even feel it. none of this changes the very real fact that i am sitting here awash in a yearn to feel my wife and hear her laugh and touch her skin that i can actually feel in the pit of my stomach like a hot knife, o my droogs and only friends.

but let me have this moment of pain, and emptiness, and ache, and lust, and yearning, and bawling, and then i will be alright, and ready to again tackle the day-to-day with my sarcastic wit and aplomb, smirking like the motherfucker i am, and quirking my eyebrow in that way that lets you know i am thinking things i oughtn't to be, and no, i won't share those thoughts with you. heh heh.

-------------------------------------

and to sorta answer your question (and at the same time, artfully dodge the details of the full answer), wuastc, usually i tell people when they ask why i was in argentina that i was on a student exchange. not because i am ashamed of going to argentina, nor of what i did there, but because the man i was when i went to buenos aires is so different from the man i am today, and yet, at the same time, so alike. so in all fairness to you, the non-existant readers, and because i doubt highly that any of you will buy some bullshit line, i offer you the truth:

at the time i boarded a plane to fly to south america, i was very active in the religion to which i belong. i believed very strongly that its tenets could help everyone. i wanted to share this with anyone who wanted to hear.

i don't regret that decision, even now, when i haven't been to church in years, and (clearly) no longer even attempt to follow the specific teachings thereof. and maybe someday, i will post as to the reasons and events that led to me abruptly switching the course of my life. for the sake of brevity (too late), suffice to say, i am much happier now than i ever was before, except when i was in argentina.

the reasons i am glad that i went to do missionary work in argentina are completely selfish: i learned so much about who i was, how i viewed the world, and what was really, truly important to me, than i ever would have if i had stayed home. argentina taught me so much more than i ever taught it, or its people.

so the reason i don't usually give the real reason i was there is not because i am ashamed, either of the choice to go or of having gone, or even of where my life is now, but because the two would appear to be on opposite ends of the spectrum, and i wouldn't want one to cloud or mar or skew the other.

but, again, bucket of contradictions, hahahaha.

and so my biggest, darkest secret is out. i could say here that i was gay, or once killed a man in cold blood, or that i have alien eggs incubating in the back yard, and in my head that would be a fraction of the deep, dark secret that the real reason i went to buenos aires is.

hopefully, that doesn't change anyone's opinion of me. actually, i don't really care, hahaha.

thanks for playing along though.

darth sardonic

ps. holy shit, the corrections i had to make to this post once my eyes cleared. and a side note: i am not gay, i have never killed anyone in cold blood (except some wasps, and sundry other nasty bugs, a few garter snakes, and a toad. i cried heavily for the snakes and toad when i got a little older and realized just how unnaturally cruel i had been. they told me to quit fucking worrying about it.), and i do not have alien eggs incubating in the back yard (that's my story, and i am sticking to it, heh heh).

ds

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Sunday, June 03, 2007

porteno for beginners...

mina is, actually, the spanish word for "mine" (or a hole in the earth from wence precious minerals are produced), so it could be possible, i guess, to take it very derrogatorily (and some may), but in proper porteno (literally, "of the port", but most often used, in argentina at least, to refer to people from buenos aires, and the peculiar dialect they speak), it refers to young (young, of course, being subjective. i have seen the word mina applied to women in their 30's and 40's who were young-looking/acting), beautiful (again, subjective), hip women. i never encountered any minas in argentina who took offense to this slang term.

the male equivalent is pibe. this really has no other translation. sometimes piba is used instead of mina, piba being what would naturally follow as the female of pibe.

los pibes piropear a las minas. that is, hip young good-looking men will piropear the hip young good-looking women as they walk past. in my experience with the two languages, there is no direct translation in english for piropear. i guess "to flirt" would be a close approximation. but flirting, as we think of it, is so far removed from what piropear really is.

imagine, if you will, a warm, sunny, humid day in the city. los pibes son chetos (cool) in their nicest white t-shirts and pressed jeans and their soccer hair (moptops seemed to be quite popular when i was there. grunge before grunge was cool, i guess. we called it soccer hair. it was also bien cheto (really cool) to hold it back whilst playing soccer with a woman's black headband, or whatever they call those things that are hard, covered in cloth, and shaped like a horseshoe).

a pair of lovely minas walk by in short summer dresses, sun-kissed skin, long, flowing straight hair, long legs descending into leather sandals, flounce past, pert smiles on their lips, eyes carrying just the slightest hint of naughty things going on in their heads, as los pibes wash the sidewalk outside their shop.

los pibes stop scrubbing the sidewalk, lean on their brooms, smile, and, so low as to almost not be audible at all, begin complimenting las minas. "beautiful ladies, lovely smiles, gorgeous legs, your eyes are heaven, etc etc." often, it is hard to make out what is being said exactly, as, again, these compliments are almost whispered.

i should note here that, a) piropeas are never shouted. they are never even said at normal conversational level. b) they are never crude. while a pibe might compliment a mina's breasts (using only the nicest and cleanest of phrases), he would never refer to her buttocks or crotch. he is more likely to stick to safer zones (i.e. hair, eyes, smile, neck, shoulders, and legs) and he would never dream of saying something along the lines of what she would look like naked or what he would love to do to her should he find her in his bed in that state. this is just simply not done. piropear, it could be said, is the antithesis of the yank version of the business lady and the construction workers.

it is the duty of las minas to completely ignore los pibes. they don't look in los pibes' direction, they don't smile, they don't nod, they don't in any way acknowledge that they are being piropeadas by los pibes bien chetos. however, i think were you to follow them, they would be talking about little else another block down the road.

and that is it. no numbers are exchanged. no one says, "want to get a drink?" no one asks what the other is doing later. los pibes feel good because two minas hermosas (lovely, or beautiful) walked by and they were able to be present, and be ignored, and las minas feel good because they were basically just told, in the nicest way possible, how hot they look.

yank, in porteno, is yanqui. in most of argentina, the y is pronounced as sh. so this word would actually be pronounced SHON-kee.

so there i was, a pibe yanqui amongst the portenos. i loved it. my accent got so good they used to ask me which province i was from.

i would reply, "oh, a little province from the north called los estados unidos."

"sos yanqui!?!"

and i would always reply, to smiles, laughs, and sometimes the hearty clap on the shoulder:

"soy yanquiporteno."

darth sardonic

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Saturday, June 02, 2007

the larch

today dawned bright and beautiful. my wife called from the second buy-in of a base sponsored poker tournament, mostly to see if she could afford to buy back in. we had a nice conversation for a bit before she insisted i lay back down since the kids were still asleep.

yeah, easier said than done.

no. 1 was up not much later, feening bad for his games that he had gone a full eight hours without. that boy is on the nod bad.

after he got his fix, i decided to head up to snoqualmie, a mountain town, in search of a collectibles shop i suspected might have vintage star wars toys and the like, hopefully for very reasonable prices. (d & k, if you're reading this, it was spur of the moment, and i forgot to put your phone number in my cell. or i would've at least called.)

so we left the house in a state i believe most people refer to as a shambles and got in the car to head out and have some fun on the road, even if the store was no longer there.

we had a great time in this little town whose big claims to fame are a still-working train line where one can ride on antique passenger trains, logging, and some beautiful falls. the building that the collectibles store used to be in was in a state of condemned-to-be-rebuilt-as-a-historical-monument, so we popped into a local garage sale, and i asked what had become of it.

"oh you mean the flying frog, it's across the street now. it's expanded too. you'll see it right there, across from the depot on main."

i thanked her, and we headed to the flying frog. we found it, and indeed, they had a plethera of vintage star wars collectibles, as well as real fossils and geodes, other sundry collectibles, and--

"oh my god, space 1999."

the owner pops his head up with a surprised chuckle and says, "yeah. do you remember what the name of the ship was?"

"oh man, ummm. alpha 1?"

"the eagle."

"the eagle?"

"yeah, the eagle from moonbase alpha."

"ah, that must be where i got the alpha thing from. i was what? 5, maybe 6. i had some of the action figures, but never the actual space ship."

i stood for a few moments, basking in fond, though vague, memories from my childhood while staring at the object that i had no doubt ogled and fantasized about whilst looking at a jc penneys catalog near christmas time.

my hope of very reasonable prices was a bit misplaced, but the proprietor did have a largish box of star wars figures, and i decided to go ahead and buy a few i didn't already have.

the boys were beyond well-behaved.

as we were heading back to the car, we passed a cafe, and popped in for hot dogs and sandwiches. we sat at the old-fashioned counter, and i asked the soda jerk for two of his finest kid's hot dog meals, and two of their finest root beers. i plunked my two bits down, only to discover that we've come a long way, baby, and whipped out my card instead.

the boys devoured their dogs, mowed through their chips, slurped their root beers, and made a huge mess (much to many of the patrons' delight) of their ice-cream cones, while boba fett kept falling off into the sarlacc pit, a power droid nearly lost his legs, and the death star commander kept reminding them that if they weren't well behaved, they weren't going to get to play video games when we got home.

the day was wonderful, my kids were angelic, the sun was bright, and a good time was had by all.

and i noticed something about western washington: it is full of hot, scantily-clad minas, just add sun.

darth sardonic

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Friday, June 01, 2007

the continuing saga...

so "toll free" called one more time after i posted yesterday. upon hearing a male voice say, "hello, helloo?" they promptly hung up.

i was fuming.

then i read all the comments left me by you, the (not so) non-existant readers, and had a good laugh. i have actually done things like that in the past. though none nearly as clever as all that. particularly the "how long have you known the victim" thing and "she's left me and i am going to kill myself." dear lord, i was rolling! i do, it might be good to reiterate here, have an extremely twisted sense of humor.

"toll free" called again today. i did not swear, i simply asked if it was company x (the company that my wife clearly and firmly told to fuck off, though not quite in those words), and no, this is company y. i let the poor girl do her schpiel, and then told her that thank you, but we were not interested as we didn't need that particular service (sorta like having insurance on your credit cards--you pay a little each month and if you lose your job or whatever, you can defer your payments for a short period of time).

i was extremely polite.

if i am in the right mood, i will totally mess with these people. the following are a couple examples:

i once answered, and proceeded to attempt a conversation, in a made-up language.

"gumka? gumka, bigga est baclay. du cannae wattapukomp?"

they hung up.

another time, a telemarketer called while both my children (then 2 yrs and 6 months) were screaming loudly in the near-background. i hit talk, waited a moment, and said, "now is a really bad fucking time. so if you can't say what you need to say in ten seconds or less, then don't even bother." (all with harmonizing wails so loud as to make it virtually impossible for me to hear myself talking.)

click.

the funniest, and funnest, time i had was on a call offering a similar thing as "toll free". i had been getting calls once a month from one of our other credit cards for this insurance thingie. every month i would tell them no, thank you, we didn't need it.

then one morning, a nice-sounding young man with a pleasant voice called. a real go-getter, judging by his phone ettiquette.

so i say, "let me tell ya, john (or whatever it was), my wife is in the military. it is damn near impossible to get 'fired' from the military." [we knew this, because one of my wife's troops, who was a complete and utter fuck-up, was in the military a full year-and-a-half of fucking up before they finally booted him.]

he chuckled and said, "right."

then i said, "now, let's imagine for a moment that, god forbid, my wife loses an arm or a leg or her mind. the military will medically release her, giving her a large lump some of money when they kick her out, as well as a percentage of her pay at the time of release every month until she dies. which we would use to pay off this credit card."

he's laughing a little harder, and says, "uh huh."

"now, john, let's go for the big one. if, by some freak chance, and i'm not wanting this to happen, mind you, but we are talking about worst-case scenarios here, my wife is killed in some way. well, through the military we have a wonderful life insurance policy, which i again would use to pay off all our bills, including this credit card."

he is outright laughing now, and says, "ok."

"so, as you can see, i really don't need this protection plan, and if you wouldn't mind passing on to whoever, you guys don't have to call me anymore and use up your precious time on me."

(still laughing) "i will get that done mr. sardonic. and ty for your time."

"no, thank you."

now, if that telemarketer had been selling something i might've even thought i might be remotely interested in, i would've told him yes, just for having so good-naturedly put up with my diatribe.

clearly, the time of sufficient rest continues. we'll see for how long, hahahaha.

darth sardonic

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