The Xth "I'm Back" Post

If you're like me, you have yourself a blog that you have neglected.  Perhaps you started a photography blog but then your camera broke (not me); perhaps you started a personal public journal then realized maybe people shouldn't know that you are having troubles coping with the fact there are no more episodes of Firefly (more like me); or perhaps you simply got high and sort of wandered off (more like Towelie).

Either way, you have felt as though you are neglecting your little corner of the internet and it needs some TLC.  Unfortunately it's been a while so this will probably be more like some Rough LC, but hey, this isn't a company... it's not a person or anything, it won't mind.

So here I am, picking up the pieces of this little blog, partially completed posts and all.  And I swear by the hairs on my chinny-chin-chin that I will commit to writing posts for this blog on a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly frequency, or 2 more, whichever comes first.  After that all bets are off.

I feel most blogs are just chances for people to rant, a "soapbox" if you will, but speaking stands are not relevant in digital discussions and I personally don't like being yelled at all the time.  Occasionally, sure, but I think things that are amusing or cool would be much more worth coming back for.  So I leave it to you, my faithful 3 subscribers...what would you like me to write about?  I'm open to any and all topics.

Leave a comment below and it might just be the subject of a not-rant.

[photo source]

The End of Originality

If you're like me, you do a lot of internet surfing.  Despite this experience, you couldn't stand up long on a surf board laying down in the sand cause that ya know... requires balance... or patience.

Surfboards aside, I guess my point is, there is almost too much out there now (how this transitions, I don't know).  Too many celebrities, websites, products out there and it seems impossible for anything to be original or unique anymore.  Even if something does a really good job, I find myself picking it apart for simply imitating something else.  Don't get me wrong I love how much we can access now...no... hate, I'm hating in this post.  Well maybe it is just that there is something out there for everyone now.. Hmm.

So fine, my main point, then, is this: I hate Dairy Queen.

Cookie dough blizzard is superb do not get me wrong... but have you seen their commercials lately? (and by lately I mean about 5 months ago when I initially started this post and am only getting around to posting now.) Well specifically this series of commercials.

Observe:

 

Honestly that commercial might have been hilarious.  Ya know... if it hadn't already been done before...

Hats off to Old Spice, this commercial was so LEGEN...... wait for it......  that almost anyone in America and probably some people in other countries has seen this commercial.  The whole lulling you into a false sense of security with a strange muscular man in the shower and then BOOM! you are on an emotional roller coaster ride of joy and fear that can only end when you are safely on a horse... or have bought some deodorant...  awesome.

Unfortunately, being reDQlously over the top has just lost its appeal now, at least in this idiom.  Old Spice has cornered this market and anything else just comes up short or seems catty.  The only way to even get close to touching Old Spice is in a non-commercial sense, parody if you will.

Ok, so maybe this is not the end of originality, but in the corporate world, it is just so disappointing to see something so blatantly and poorly ripped off.  That series of DQ commercials just really grinds my gears and I needed an outlet.  This post was long overdue but I feel better for finally writing it.

DARY!

Have any commercials you hate with a passion?  Throw it in the comments below and we can all cry together in the fortress of solitude of togetherness.

Casual Mondays

If you're like me, you are not a fan of Mondays.  But instead of whining about it, I have adopted a new practice to help me ease into the work week.  It is known as the Casual Monday.

Some people feel refreshed after a weekend.  That may be true, but honestly I am not going to feel that refreshment until about 2 in the afternoon.  I just got done sleeping in until 11:30 two days in a row, and now I am supposed to get moving a full 4 hours earlier and drag myself into work.  I don't know about you, but I prefer to eek out every second of sleep I can on Monday mornings.  Getting up in time to shave, make breakfast, pick out matching clothes... It just doesn't sound like fun after a weekend of reckless abandon.

My guide to starting this unavoidable part of your week:

Hygiene:

A shower is still essential.  I have been blessed with hair that completely greases over if I sleep for more than 45 minutes at a time.  Plus, if someone forgets to change the setting on the shower, that cold water on your back wakes you up with a scream and a dance that proves you are still more limber than you thought.

As far as brushing your teeth... you did that last night.  Bring a toothbrush and bit of toothpaste to keep in your desk and work it into the first 5 minutes of your work day.  Mouthwash should tide you over if you feel the need for an emergency chemical wash.

Shaving? Ha!  Best part about Casual Monday.  You and your 24 o'clock shadow are going rugged today.  Stay in your cubicle and stay out of well lit areas.  No one will notice or care, and you won't cut yourself trying to get that silky smooth chi..... CRAP! Missed a spot... and it is the first thing you noticed when you sat down at your desk.  The 24 o'clock shadow does not miss spots.

Wardrobe:

The public face of Casual Mondays. Hopefully you don't work in a place where you need a suit.  Also, I feel most meetings land in the Tuesday-Thursday range, so chances are you don't need to impress anyone today.  As you finish drying off, try to land the towel on something where it can hang for the day and not clump in a ball.  You could take the 5 seconds to put it on its hook, but that is 5 seconds of sleep you just can't budget for.

A pair of dark jeans and the first shirt with a collar in your closet will do today.  Every color goes with jeans (or so I am told) so it doesn't ultimately matter what you grab.  The collar does class it up a bit over the classic t-shirt and you might even fool someone into thinking you spend more than 5 minutes getting ready this morning.  A pair of shoes and you are done.  Dressed in 50 seconds... make that a minute flat, let's put some underwear on.

Breakfast/Lunch:

The most important meal of the day should be filled by the most important food... grain.  Everyone eats it, and bread has a few grains in it, sometimes as many 12.  If you can time it right, drop this in the toaster on your way back from the shower.  If you have some cinnamon/sugar prepared, some pb, or some j, you have yourself something to keep your stomach busy until you can hit the vending machine or secret stash of snacks at work during your morning break.

If you are going to prepare a lunch, you better have done it earlier.  Something you can grab out of the fridge and throw in your bag is about all there is time for.  I like using those containers that Chinese food comes in. Not the real paper folded up and you can hold like a bag a 2 year old girl would skip gleefully around with, I mean those black plastic containers with the clear top.  Those things are amazing, and microwaveable to boot.  Don't have anything prepared? I think you can justify eating out one day of the week.

So you and that now 25 o'clock shadow are out the door and on your way to a week of work.  You aren't looking sharp and ready to go, but no one is looking for or wanting that sort of enthusiasm at 9:00am on a Monday morning.  Drink your coffee, slam that energy drink, and take Monday to start revving your engine.  When you squeal the tires it takes a while for the car to get up to speed.   I find I am more productive as the week goes on and my wardrobe reflects that.  Fridays are great and if there is any day to look great why not make it the end of the week?  Hit the bars in style or just take joy in the satisfaction of throwing those dress pants in laundry, knowing you have two days that are all yours.

Care to refute, repudiate, or refrigerate my argument? Leave a comment below and suggest your friends do the same.

Is Your Glass Half Full?

If you're like me, you've heard the "philosophical" question "Is the glass half empty or half full?"  I use the word "philosophical" because that is what a lot of people might categorize this question as.  I use quotes around the word "philosophical" because it is not a philosophical question.

No my dear friends, you have erred greatly over the years when either posing, commenting with, or even insinuating this question with any aim to determine a person's outlook on life.  Are they an optimist or pessimist? Capitalist or Communist? Really, you are taking this phrase the wrong way.

If you look to your right, you will see a .jpg of a glass that has some water in it.  No, on the screen Mr./Ms. Literal.  Now I ask you:

Is the glass on the right...
A.) Half Full
B.) Half Empty
C.) Not Enough Information


YOU FOOL! Or... you caught onto the point I'm trying to make and that is that there is not enough information based on the picture.  The answer is C.  A glass is not half empty or half full based on your view of the universe.

If you want to get literal about it, I suppose it is both, and in this case that is about all you can say.  All you have is the glass so it is both half full and half empty.  If you wanted to say one way or another there would have to be one more factor to this equation... what's the last change in the volume of water contained in the glass.

A glass that is "half full" is half way to being completely filled.  A glass that is "half empty" is half way to being emptied.  It's that simple people.  Just because I drink a glass of water and then set it down doesn't make me a pessimist if I say it is half empty.  These words describe the process the glass is undergoing, not my view of the universe.

Irrefutable evidence of your fail at the English language having been provided (thank you Ablative Absolute), I would like to suggest some alternatives you might use in lieu of this thing that really Grinds my Gears.


*Was the Twins' season 99 Losses (pessimist) or 63 Wins (optimist)?
*Is the Vikings' season 16 losses (pessimist) or 16 reasons to drink on Sunday (optimist)?
*Is Latin hard (pessimist) or does it have 2 fewer principal parts than Greek (optimist)?
*Is David Tennant done being the Doctor (pessimist) or...... or....... ok that sucks.
*Are the Packers fun to root for (pessimist) or are you simply not from Wisconsin (optimist)?

(please click "Wisconsin," you can finish out the whole clip if you want)

Okay, none of these are particularly half and half type of situations, and they're mostly sports cause I feel that's the best way to make fun of Wisconsin.  Still, the point is, this phrase doesn't have a "philosophical" meaning, so stop asking the question that way.  If you ask if my drink is half empty or half full, i'm saying half full.  Not because I'm an optimist, but because you better finish filling my damn drink up.


If you have any good half this half that ideas that belittle Wisconsin, Iowa or any other unprivileged group in America in order to truly express optimism vs. pessimism, please leave it in the comment section below.  You stay classy Minneapolis.

99 is better than 100

If you're like me this was a rough summer for baseball.  Don't get me wrong, there was plenty of amazing action.  Game 162 was huge for the wildcard race in both the AL and NL and I got to fully flex my mlb.tv subscription with 4 games playing at once!

After watching the Twins drop so many games I will admit that I fell into a bit of a depression about baseball, but the playoffs are on now and I must say that I am very excited.  The Twins did pull through and win 3 of their last 4 to avoid losing their 100th game for only the second time in franchise history (see the abysmal 1982 season w/ 102 losses).

This gives me hope, hope for the future, hope that someday Minnesota baseball will return to form.  We've been playing the "if only we were healthy" card for too long.  Having said that, if we come back healthy next year and finally make some smart moves in the front office the Twins could bounce back in a big way next year.  I won't go into how or why because I'm writing this over break and haven't blogged in a month or so and just trying to get back into the swing of this, BUT... It makes me feel better about our prospects by saying we have a shot.

I am very much so looking forward to playoff baseball, Tampa is hot right now and the Yankees are hopefully dragging after that joke of a finish.  I really haven't paid attention to the National league so um....... yeah.

Well, this is another post, here is where I make a non-committal promise to continue posting more often now that life is blah...blah...blah.

Here's a "song of the day" for you to listen to so that this post has some multimedia to it.  Yay shiny things and Comedy Central.

I do apologize for the lack of real content to this post, [more false promises of future ones being better here].

If you've got an idea for a topic I could blog on, or want to enter our drawing for fabulous prizes, post something in the comments below.

If She Weighs as Much as a Duck...

If you're like me, you have never been accused of being a particularly good horse jockey.  This, of course, leads in perfectly to my discourse on the problem of self-contradiction.


Logic (from the Greek λογική), goes back to the days of cavemen.  Why else would the word be Greek?  Philosophers, mathematicians, and rock, paper, scissor champions have grappled at the workings of this abstract idea for millennia.  Taking on many forms, it reached its highest intellectual age during mid 70's in Britain.

I need not explain further so ... I won't.


I recently had an interesting go at logic myself.  You see my camera, which is digital, stores its pictures on an SD card.  Now I was wrong to say "an SD card" because S is a consonant, but "a SD card" just sounds weird.  When I go to plug this card into my computer it takes hours to either open the folder or copy the files to my computer.


I reasoned, that a logical person would get or at least try a new SD card.  This, I believe, counts as logic.  However, I have come upon a quandary.  Since I have not tried to get or even try a new SD card, logically I am not a logical person, but in deducing this I have proven myself to have a logical nature.  This troubled me greatly and I sought to meditate on this.   


Here my problems got worse.  I have never been able to meditate before, nor do I know how.  You can imagine how wracked my brain was as to what should be done about this impasse (I hate using French words so you can appreciate how vexed I am).


To cope with this and try to get some perspective, I decided to write things out in a blog and see what came to me... so um..... yeah.....


If you have logiced yourself to a headache or believe there is more to granola than meets the eye, leave a comment below and contribute to the engaging conversation that takes place on this blog.

Liam Neeson Will Attack You With All of His Weapons!

If you're like me, you have recently seen the action-adventure, romance, sci-fi, western, comedy, what-the-hell-is-this movie: "Cowboys and Aliens" starring Number 13, Indiana Jones, and Bond...Blonde James Bond.

 Now, I chalk it up to peer pressure that I went, what's your excuse?  I heard nothing but terrible things about this movie so I went in with pretty low expectations, and for the most part enjoyed it.  If you want a full review of this movie there are sites for that, I don't feel justified in review a movie that has been out as long as this for my mass of followers.  However, this movie, and more accurately a trailer to this movie, revealed an interesting but not unexpected look into the American movie-goer psyche: we like explosions!

Ever since the ancient Chinese gave the world fireworks as far back as the 7th Century (go Wikipedia!), explosions have fascinated the minds of Kings, Emperors, and the people on whose back they were sitting.  The "Ancient Chinese Secret" did not last however and now Americans have been blowing their fingers off ever since.

Not only do we like shiny fireworks, we get our kicks with what a three year old might call "big a-'sploshunz."  If you look at the film industry today, you don't even need a plot to rake in millions, you simply gotta blow (following adult content not suitable for children) "shit" up.  See: Battle for LA, Transformers 3, Cowboys and Aliens and now...........BATTLESHIP!

    

Go ahead and watch it, I'll wait.......

No I don't know the answer to the Jeopardy question....but what the hell was that trailer!?

Now, as I said above, I liked Cowboys and Aliens for what it was...just gunfight after explosion after super-powered bone club (it actually had other merits as a Western until the aliens showed up.)  I just hope that this movie tries to live within its means as the same thing.  Any chance to see what the NAVY has to offer is good with me, but these movies aren't going to be anything more than something shiny to distract you for a couple hours.

At the end of the day I thought Cowboys and Aliens was "Awesomely Horrible."  No real plot and most of what happened didn't make sense, but it would be worth the $1 at Redbox some night if you have nothing better to do.  I foresee Battleship being about the same.  I have no idea what that thing in the trailer is supposed to be, but I expect the end of the movie to zoom out to 2 kids playing the classic board-game in a colorfully painted game room. 

I was going to write something about moving (which I just did this last weekend) but watching C&A last night and seeing the Battleship trailer made me want to rant a bit.  I guess this post was kinda like the movie and didn't really accomplish anything but I've effectively taken up about 10 minutes of your time.

If you have had any horribly awesome movie experiences recently or know the name of every ship in the trailer, post it in the comments below for all of the IYLM faithful.