Who ordered the big ass coffee?

Was it you?

Lock up your wives and daughters

The Fiddling Viking is on the prowl again and he's looking to mate before winter sets in.What woman could resist him?

How much you wanna bet...

...that this couple would have been fun to have as neighbors.

We had this many trick or treaters

Which was five more than we had last year.

(I was going to scan my hand but then I thought I better of it.)

My new avatar

I know I change avatars like other people change their underwear but I've finally found one I really like. I'll be keeping this painting of the Chinese version of the Monkey King for the foreseeable future. Until I run across another picture of the Monkey King that I like that is.

In my area of Tennessee...

Cleanliness and good marksmanship are next to holiness.

********

Yes, that is an actual business that is in operation and it is not far from where we live. I laugh out loud every time we drive by it. And then I get scared.

Two for Tuesday

Here's two business ventures you may want to try from a Popular Mechanics from 1964.

You'll be rich in no time!

Funny Books

I was born into a house of readers. There was always books, magazines, and comics around when I was a kid. My mother made sure we all learned to read as early as possible so we would escape into books and leave her alone for a while, having five kids one right after the other will do that to a woman I guess. One of the ways she made sure we all could read was to make us read aloud to one another. I remember being made to read aloud from one of my little story books while my older siblings squirmed around waiting for me to get done.

One of the first things I remember reading avidly, besides the comic strips and the sports section of the Detroit Free Press, was comic books. They were always around and I loved them from the first minute I laid eyes on them. They were really cool and best of all they were in color. My brother Charlie bought most of them in those early years, he had a paper route and he blew most all his earnings on books, comics, and monster magazines. My taste in books did not line up with his, he dug mostly sci fi books but I liked sports stuff at that age, but when it came to comic books we were all on the same page.

We dug the Fantastic Four, Thor, Spiderman, Sgt. Fury, which would later become Nick Fury Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.. We loved the Marvel heroes because they seemed more like us in that they were flawed people, which I've heard Stan Lee say was exactly what they were trying to do. Superman and Batman seemed too perfect, too invincible, too heroic, there was no darkness there, at least in the mid 60's to the mid 70's there wasn't. Superman always beat whoever he fought and he was so damn clean cut while doing it. Yuck. I always thought, and still do in fact that Superman is a fascist dick. For more examples of Superman's dickishness and other unintentionally funny comic covers and panels click here.

After our Mom died and we went to live with our crazy rageaholic control freak aunt and her offspring we practically doubled our comic collection overnight. One of my cousins was a comic book reader too so we pooled all our comics in a big box and we'd all root through that box when we wanted to find something to read. I know, I know, if we had taken care of those comics then they'd be worth a small fortune today, well we didn't so there.

It was during this time, the early 70's when my favorite comic of all time came out. It was called Kamandi and it was drawn and written by comic veteran, nay, comic demi god Jack Kirby.

I loved this comic because it was set in a Planet of the Apes like world, the hero was blond like me, it was action packed, and because I could imagine myself doing all that fighting and heroic stuff. I lived for the day each month when this comic hit the stands. I'd have scour the racks with a quarter in my sweaty little hand waiting and dreaming of what was going to happen next in Kamamdi's world. Looking back on the comic now I see why I really liked it, it was because it was a fish out of water in a hostile environment story with a hero who was anti authoritarian and rebellious. I devoured Kamandi until the dark day Jack Kirby left the book, when he stopped writing and drawing it, I stopped reading it.

Then in the mid 70's found Deathlok. He was half computer, half human and all pissed off all the time. I loved this one. This dude took no crap, kicked ass, and just wanted to mess up the people who made him the killing machine he turned out to be.

I kind of stopped reading comics when I hit high school and found out I could make the pretty girls hang out with me if I made them laugh. I also found out I liked to smoke pot and drink beer and cheap wine. I didn't make time for comics when there was a joint to be smoked or a stray bottle of Boone's Farm to be had. I still read novels, Rolling Stone, High Times, and National Lampoon but not many comics.

I read a few in college but after I left school I really got back into them. I started collecting them hot and heavy in part so I would not have to deal with my shyness around women, it was easier to read a comic than to make conversation and try to make time with a woman. During this time, the mid 80's, I was into American Flagg, X-Men and it's spin offs, Thor but only when they were following Norse mythology kind of closely, Wonder Woman but only when George Perez was drawing her, and a bunch more.

I quit collecting cold turkey in the late 80's because I decided that I had to be a part of the real world instead of sitting stoned in my bedroom reading comics and because I left my aunt's house and moved to Roanoke, VA. When I got my own apartment I had no money for comics and money got tighter when my deadbeat room mate John C. flaked out on me and moved out. I eventually sold my comics to help pay the rent but I did save some of my Thor's and a few American Flaggs, unfortunately they all got water damaged in an aquarium accident and I had to toss them. About the only time I read comics now is when I check a graphic novel out of the library but I think it's really cool that more and more folks read them and that women are not only reading them they are also writing and illustrating them.

I learned a lot from reading comics and I used to hate it when a "grown up" would see me reading one and they'd say, "Oh so you like funny books huh?" I wanted to shout at them, "Have you ever read a comic book? Not all of them are mindless crap like Archie and Jughead and talking animals like Scooby Doo!" It was from comics that I learned about issues like hand gun violence, drug addiction, racial intolerance, cloning, rape, child abuse, and different mythologies (It's not like I didn't already know something about all those things but I paid more attention when the information was in comic book form.).

I loved reading comics but some of the movies they've made from them you couldn't pay me to see, for instance Daredevil, or The Punisher or The Hulk, despite the fact Jennifer Connelly is in it. I've got mixed emotions about the up coming Watchmen adaption and I'm praying they don't dumb it down for the masses. And I fervently hope they don't make a movie out of Kamandi, because knowing Hollywood they'd hire someone like David Hyde Pierce to play the lead role. If they did something stupid like that, then I'd might have to get a blow torch, a pair of pliers, and some pipe hittin' brothers and get all medieval on their asses.

Getting older

One night back when I still did improv comedy back in the mid to late 90's the fact that I was getting older got hammered home to me in a big way.

We asked for a famous person's name to build a scene around and some young men in the audience shouted out, "Steve Austin!" So my friends Todd and Paul and I began to do a scene based on Lee Major's character Steve Austin The Six Million Dollar Man. As we were doing the scene I looked out into the audience and I looked over over at the young men. They were looking at us like we had three heads each or something. I could tell they just weren't "getting it."

When I found out later the Steve Austin they wanted a scene about was the pro wrassler (what that guy did was not wrestling, it was wrasslin') Stone Cold Steve Austin I felt like I was a billion years old. Hell those kids had probably never seen The Six Million Dollar Man so it was no wonder they looked at us like we were crazy.

The good news is...

... this fun couple are swingers too.

Did someone request an angst ridden French woman?

Really? No one did? Well sorry, she's here and now you'll just have to listen to her.

Ah mon petit lapin Charlotte, when will we be together? Jamais? Mon dieu, now I am as sad and as angst ridden as you. Oh well. Life goes on.

One more day!

It's Friday! And it's not just any Friday, it's the last Friday before we leave for the beach in the morning! Yay! Yay beach! Yay vacation!

I'm gonna be honest with you kids, I really don't need a vacation but my girlfriend does. And if we don't go tomorrow she may kill me. Sure, she'd feel bad about offing me and she'd get pissed because she'd have to learn how to use all the complicated remotes but she'd do me in in a heartbeat if she did not get a break from her work. While our last get away was not very relaxing for her, this one should be.

For starters we rented a condo at the beach from a nice woman who we've rented through before so we know the place will be nice. And even though we're taking the gf's parents with us, and her sister as well, they all like the beach and we all get along great together. Well except for her mother has a habit of trying to remain the queen bee in the kitchen even if someone else is cooking. I have to shoo her out repeatedly when I cook but if that's the only problem I have all week next week then I'll be doing peachy. We're taking her folks because they like going to the beach, her dad loves to surf fish, but they are getting on up there in age and they don't want to chance a long drive by themselves anymore. Her sister is going with us because she likes the beach as well and she volunteered to drive the folks in their Jeep Cherokee so that means we can drive the gfmobile, the ScionXA. All of us went to the beach last year at this time of year and we all had a great time together, especially me and her sister because she and I both caught the biggest fish we had ever caught in our lives, they were both four/five pound sheepshead fish. I'll miss blogging for the week but we all have to make sacrifices to keep our significant others happy some times. I know the world may go to down the toilet with Bush running our country into the ground (holy shit did I just mix metaphors?) but I trust all of you to write your usual sparklingly good posts about politics and life and I'll read them when I get back. I do love going to the ocean and I look forward to bobbing in the waves, getting sand all over my feet and in most every body cavity I have, sitting on the beach and reading books as the tide goes in and out, and I love long walks down the beach. Wow, I just read that last sentence aloud and I sound like a Playboy Playmate. I'll be taking the digital camera so I'll be taking lots of pics too and some will end up here of course, no matter how much you may not want to see them.

Oh and I won't be the only blogger Presidential candidate taking a break this week. Dr Smith is attending the NAMBLA convention in Climax, Georgia. Jon the intergalactic space pony will be hanging out in the Crab Nebula. Phydeaux will be cowering under his trailer while the hounds from the North Carolina State Troopers office sniff around his compound for weed and peyote buttons. Sleestax will be working double shifts at the Orange Julius in Hell, Michigan while he plots to spread more lies about me. And Dr. Zaius will be doing what he loves best, lobotomizing marginally talented B list celebs.

Ah well, at least I'll be having fun in the sun with the people I like best.

I am quite the fashion plate

Yes, I did wear that dark blue plaid shirt with those light plaid shorts. Sometimes I wish I had kids so I could embarrass them with my clothing choices.

Is she really going out with him?

Damn, she's dating that clown again. When will she ever learn?

I tried to warn you but did you listen? Nope

The mighty chicken army is here. One of these days you'll learn to listen to me. Maybe a good pecking is what you need dumb ass.

Two for Tuesday

Here's two pictures that sum up how I feel about Charter Cable's so called high spped internet service:

The high speed internet I pay on time every month for has been off and on, mostly off, all day today. I called the customer service line and I spoke to about three or four smirking assholes who seemed to think that if they say "Ok" enough that everything will be fine. I finally got one of them to give me the number for the St. Louis HQ of Charter Cable. But guess what happened when I called it, I kept getting a recorded message telling me that all of their represtatives were busy helping other customers. They must be really busy handling people like me on those phones because I've been getting that message for about an hour now.

Oh how I hate them. If that son of a bitch Neil Smith, Charter Cable CEO, were here right now I'd shove my cable modem up his ass.

On a more positive note I finally figured out how to save MP3 files to my computer, I simply click "Save" before I download them! But hang on, it gets better! I also figured out how to burn a CD on my computer! So I have been busy burning the first Green Monkey Music Project (Total Absorbtion Mix) on to some CD's. I've also been scavenging Beth and Splotchy's blogs for more MP3's to download, when my shitty internet service is on that is.

I know what you're thinking and you're right, I do lead a full life.

I don't want to alarm you but...

...we just became bucket hat wearing people.

The girlfriend's hat looks like this:

Except that it's also reversible and when you turn it inside out, it's pink instead of tan.


And this is my actual hat. I realized that the last picture of me I was using as my avatar I did not have my glasses on. So now you get me wearing my hat and my glasses. I'm cute as hell aren't I? You know I am.

Fun with presents

Last Friday at around midnight I noticed that my aquarium was leaking, I guess it was a good thing we cut our mini vacation short after all or there would have been a huge mess when we got home Sunday, so I took the whole shebang down and I put the tank and all the accessories in the attic of our condo, and yes the fish are dead now but I made sure that they died a humane death. My gf bought me that aquarium years ago for my birthday and it was one of the best B-Day presents I ever got, but we can't have a leaky aquarium now can we?

After I took down all the aquarium related stuff including the stand, I rearranged things a bit in the room where we kept the aquarium. I put my gf's metal filing cabinet next to our CD rack and I stuck my globe on top of the cabinet. She gave me the globe a few years back for Christmas and it has a cool light inside it which I had not been able to use lately. However now that the globe is in a place where I could easily plug it in, I'm enjoying it more than ever.

Last night, after dark, I took a picture of the globe with no flash. I was trying to capture how neat it looks when it's the only light in the room.


Then I took another shot of it using the flash:

I like the first one better.