Pour us a road, we’ll both drink and drive

Sometimes, we’re so counterproductive in our society, it’s a wonder we get anything accomplished. Hell, look at government as a good example! Seriously though, if we used just a slice of common sense, we might actually get to the other side of the road and go, “Huh, if I had known it was that easy, I would’ve done that a long time ago!”

The reason I’m mentioning this is that last night, I took a friends brother who is in town for the week to my favorite hockey bar to watch Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Finals while my friend was busy with a previous commitment. After I arrived home from work, changed and was heading out the door, my brother walked in and asked where I was headed, so I mentioned it to him and asked if he wanted to join us. Now I know my brother is only 19 years old, but he has been in this bar before, not with me, but with some other people that know the owners, so I figured we’d be ok.

We get to the bar, find some seats and get ready to sit down, but the bartender spotted us as we were walking in and asked to see everyone’s ID. First off, um, hello? I have a beard and some grayish hair; I think I can pass for 21! Second, I mentioned that my brother wasn’t 21, but we brought him so he could be our designated driver, which I thought would be a logical excuse. It wasn’t likely that he’d be drinking; however, the law in Texas says that he can’t be in there, but then, it also says this:

In Houston, Texas, beer many not be purchased after midnight on Sunday, but can be purchased anytime on Monday...which happens to begin right after midnight on Sunday! So it's illegal to buy it when it’s legal to buy it?

I digress.

This left us with two options, pick up some beer, go back to the house and watch the game, or I drive my brother home and come back. He said it was ok if I took him home and I mentioned option 1, but he said he was cool with going home, so I drove him back there and headed back to the bar to hang out with my friends’ brother.

This brings about non-logical point number two: I know have to waste gas to drive my brother home. This is really not the time to be wasting energy resources! If we let him stay at the bar, I can drink a little more and have a safe, reliable driver waiting to take me home AND only use one trip’s worth of gas. This is opposed to the two trip’s worth of gas I had to use to take him home and then try not to drink too much so I could be a responsible driver for myself. Does that make sense to anyone? Sober driver and less gas used, or slightly intoxicated driver and more gas used, which sounds better?

On a side note, my brother is not a big hockey fan because he grew up in the south, whereas I grew up in the north. He has watched a number of games at home with me during the playoffs, but he’s just not a big fan in general. My friends’ brother on the other hand…anyway.

Needless to say, tomorrow night, we’re staying in to watch the game.

Rebel, rebel and yell cause our people still dwell in hell.

Oooooooo, I am feisty today!

I received what I thought was spam in my email this morning. It was from an American/Israeli group in regards to the war in Iraq, the situation in Israel, the lies being told by American mainstream media...blah, blah, blah. After reading about 5 sentences, I was pretty mad, so I just started to write a reply back, my thoughts flowing like a fire hydrant and I laid into whoever wrote the email real good. However, I did not assault the person personally, I only attacked their "group" for continuing with the lies that they so vehemently oppose from our own media. I'm not going to bore you with details of either email. What I will tell you is that it was not spam! I know this because I got a response from a specific person who attacked me, my upbringing, my marital status (why, I do not know) and my mother!

Need I say more as to why I am feisty today? Well, I'm going to anyway.

Next.

Women. I love women, but for the love of...please wear a bra when you are going to wear a tank top to the grocery store! a) It's usually chilly in the store and men will notice those things; and b) With every step you take, I swear one of your melons are going to fly out the side! I wouldn't have mentioned this if it had just been one weirdo women, but it was more like 5 women - and 3 of them were fairly attractive, so it was difficult not to stare!

Next.

Before I moved last week, I purchased DirecTV. I scheduled the installation appointment for Friday. I didn’t realize that my apartment did not face the southern sky as much as it needed to, so I had to cancel it and go back to cable. When I called to cancel, the customer service lady asked me why I was cancelling and I told her the straightforward reason. Her next question, I kid you not, "Will you want to reschedule your appointment?" I wanted to say, "Well, if my apartment suddenly rotates enough to start facing the southern sky, I'll reschedule," but I politely said, "No, thank you." She then asked, "Why?" I swear I am not making this up! I politely reiterated my statement from earlier and she must have understood my frustration because she said, "Ok then, have a nice weekend!"

Party all the time

Lots o’parties this weekend!

The City of Houston, Metro and the Downtown District wish to thank the community for its support as we celebrate the completion of the Downtown Midtown Transit Streets Project.
Friday, December 9, 2005
11:30 a.m. - 1 p.m.
Main Street Square

Enjoy fun, festivities, live music, a visit from Santa Claus and special surprise guests! Plus, register to win a holiday prize package to be drawn during the Mayor's Holiday Celebration, Saturday, Dec. 10 from 4:30 - 6:30 p.m. at City Hall.

Yea, I think I’ll pass.

You wreck me baby, yea, you break me in two

Ok, I have two different gripes right now and I’m just going to get ‘em off my fingers and onto my screen.

First off, I’m leaving for lunch and it just so happens that I am parked right next to the man who I shared the elevator with to my level in the parking garage. He drives a Lexus SUV and me, well, I don’t, let’s put it that way. He was parked inside the lines (in case you were wondering), but he said the rudest thing to me as I was getting into my car, “Watch that door!” Of course, he was probably only being half-serious about it, but still, that’s just rude. I mean, here I am in khaki’s and a polo, not an expensive polo either, just a casual, plain blue polo getting into my so-so car and he is dressed in a tailored suit getting into his leather interior, gold-trimmed Lexus SUV. Does he think I am not going to be careful about hitting his door because I have the money to throw away and do it? Hello? I’m being as careful as a brain surgeon is right now! Nevertheless, I chuckled, got in my car and went to lunch; but he lit a fuse and here you get to read the bomb going off.

Now for my second issue: I don’t understand gasoline stations and their prices. I filled up today at the logical station, the least expensive one. On the same corner, there are three stations, each with different prices. None of the three was close to the other. What? That’s right, three stations, same corner and three separate prices. One was $2.39, one $2.45 and the last one $2.54. Can somebody please explain to me why anyone would pay .15 cents more to go across the street? How does this station expect to compete? For every six ½ gallons of gas sold at the least expensive station, you’ve saved $1 that you would've spent the most expensive station. Therefore, if you have to put 24 gallons into your Lexus SUV that was not hit in the door earlier in the day, you would pay $4 less. That doesn’t sound like a lot of money, but over the course of a year, that equals $208. I know I could do many other things than waste my money on gas, which I could’ve and should’ve bought cheaper. Of course, if you’re driving any SUV, the price of gas is most likely not affecting you as it does the rest of the real world. Even so, there were people across the street filling their tanks up. Probably those same adults dressed up for Halloween. Apparently, people enjoy throwing money away.

We reserve the right to refuse service to you

I really need new lunch partner:

It took P 11 emails back and forth (for a total of 22!) to decide where to go to lunch.

The problem I guess was that I told him it was his choice.

The funny thing is that he likes to go to lunch early and I like to go late, but I conceded this time and said I would go at 12, but he took so long deciding that we’ll now be meeting at 1230, more to my liking!

I’m on the highway to hell

Some random notes while driving to work this morning:

A. The speed limit is 40 mph, you should try it sometime.

B. Don’t fly by me in the right lane at 60 mph and then cut me off and slam on the brakes so you can make a left turn because 1) it’s rude and 2) you could’ve very easily eased into the left lane BEHIND me where there were NO CARS and no potential for causing an accident!

C. Stop staring at the joggers and go when the light turns green. Oh wait, that was me.

D. When the three cars ran the red light, which was well within their limits of stopping for, why didn’t the motorcycle cop who made the left turn heading in their direction pull them over? If that had been me running the light, I would’ve been pulled over in a flash, but these three people apparently have “Don’t pull me over – I didn’t do anything wrong” written all over their cars and the cops believe it!

E. The white lines that define the parking spaces in the garage serve as a guide as to where you should park, might I suggest using them? If you choose not to, I will park next you, in between my lines, and don’t be surprised if you can’t get into your car because mine is right up against it. See, I’m of the firm belief that if you can’t even park the car, then you shouldn’t be driving it!

Accept certain inalienable truths: prices will rise..you too will get old & when you do you’ll fantasize, when you were young, prices were reasonable

(Click the link to read about the where title of this post originates - it's worth the read!)

We were thumbing through the pages of a new J. Crew catalog earlier this evening and as my girlfriend points to a picture of a mildly attractive woman, wearing an ensemble that she would probably never wear, she proclaims how much she likes the coat that the lady is wearing. I tell her that I don’t care for it much, but of course, in this discussion, my opinion will not matter!

However, I quickly noticed numerous other issues that I had with the picture that were in little relation to the actual outfit. The first thing I noticed was the fact that the woman was standing in a fountain. Why? What does that have to do with selling clothing? After I noticed that, I glanced at the background of the photo, which was a picturesque garden of sorts. The kind you would think of when describing an old English or French manor with a large plot of land behind the house. Again, what does this have to do with selling clothing? How does someone see this picture and say to themselves, “This is a practical time to be wearing this outfit, while walking around my enormous backyard!” If the person was wearing this outfit and standing in an office, walking along a city street, sitting at an outdoor café or even standing in front of a mirror while getting ready to go out, I could certainly see it as a reasonable idea to sell the product, but in a scenic garden? I don’t get it.

The next and most important problem with the picture, in my opinion, was the price of the clothing: $250 for that jacket, $300 for the skirt and $180 for the blouse. The ironic thing about seeing those ridiculous prices was that the two of us had a conversation earlier in the day about the outrageous cost of a pair of jeans that I almost bought.

I went to The Gap earlier in the day because fall has arrived and I was in need of new jeans. First of all, I’m not a victim of fashion as any one of my friends will tell you. I like shorts/jeans and a t-shirt or polo, but none of it has to be a name brand and I don’t care what people think of that. I’m not preppy, nor would I want to carry a look that screams “pretentious”, whether I am or not. I’m not grungy, nor would I want to carry a look that says “scrubby”, whether I am or not. I just don’t care what people think of what my clothes say about me, even if they say “I don’t care what you think of me!” I can, and do, look good wearing the clothes I wear and most important, I’m comfortable in them. Anyway, the past 6 or 8 pairs of jeans I’ve bought have all been from The Gap and I like how they look and feel on me and they seem to last a couple years, which is great considering how much I’ll wear one pair. So I went again today, walked over the area where all the jeans were and picked up a couple pair to try on. Now, as I said, I’m not a slave to fashion, so when I tried on the first pair and I couldn’t see my feet because the bottoms of them were so wide open or flared-out, whatever it’s called, I quickly dismissed this pair, whether the rest of them fit correctly in other areas or not. I then tried on the other pair and while the opening at the bottom was a little better, but still not how I would like them, the other areas did not fit that well. Well, two pairs down and hopefully not too many more to go. I walked back out and looked for more styles and when I couldn’t find any, I asked for some help. Surprisingly, the pretty young associate (read: blonde hair, blue eyes, big breasts and I admit, I assumed air-headed) was attentive and knowledgeable as she lead to me to the area of what I was looking for. She asked if this was what I was in search of and I nodded, thanked her and said I would come find her if I needed anymore help. She said, “You’re welcome”, which I was a little shocked at, but no less happy to hear and she walked away to tend to other customers. On a side note, I have issues with customer service these days, if you couldn’t tell, but that’s for another day. I found my size, walked back to the dressing room and proceeded to try on my 2 new pairs of jeans. The first pair was almost perfect in fit, except the waist was a little tighter than I’d like. I figured they would stretch, but I would prefer to just be able to put them on without worrying about it. Anyway, I took them off and went to put on the 2nd pair when I noticed the price tag on the first pair - $44.50 – for denim, blue jeans. One of the least expensive fabrics and least expensive products to assemble was selling for $44.50. I could not believe that a store could charge that amount for a product that costs so little to produce!

How have we valued the material goods in our lives that a pair of blue jeans costs this much money? Maybe I sound old and dated, but seriously, $44.50 for blue jeans! People should stop paying these prices and start being outraged about them. I could go on about numerous items that are overpriced and overvalued by society, but that would just be redundant, so I’ll spare everyone those words.

So let’s go back to the J. Crew catalog now: $250 for that jacket, $300 for the skirt and $180 for the blouse. Need I say more?

You drive me crazy

I know I already ranted about poor driving skills, but seriously people, let’s get it together. Time is money and sitting behind these people is costing me a lot of money! If we could take the millions of crappy drivers out there and get them off the road, just think of how much more productive the rest of us could be because we aren’t stuck in traffic!

To the two SUV’s in front of me, that’s right, you in the Toyota Land Cruiser and you too in the tractor-trailer sized Ford Excursion; your vehicles are made for rough terrain, therefore, a few bumps in the road ARE NOT cause for slowing down! I know the speed limit was only 30mph, but doing 12 over a couple bumps in the road is completely unnecessary and slowing me down from getting back to work.

Maybe you don’t know why I have to get back to work so quickly, is that why you’re driving me insane – at 12 mph? Well, let me tell you why I have to get back to work…oh wait, I’ve already covered the fact we aren’t getting paid for hurricane time and I have to gather all the time on the clock that I can.

Put me in coach, I'm ready to play, today. Look at me, I can be, centerfield.

Going to a baseball game is usually a joyful experience for me, especially at this time of the year and the fact that we are currently leading the Wild Card race makes every game exciting: except today. I don’t know what it was about today’s game, but the atmosphere inside the ballpark was very “dead”. I even made this comment to my friend whom I went with and we both said afterwards that it was a boring game, not because we lost, in fact, we won today, but because there was barely, if any, buzz, aside from a handful of moments. The announced attendance was around 35,000, but it definitely seemed as though there were numerous empty seats to contradict that number. The fans only got loud after we scored or if an important pitch needed to be made, which was pretty rare since our pitcher was really shutting the other team down. Otherwise, there was no buzz in the air, which is something I’ve grown accustomed to and I tend to expect when attending any sports event. The other thing that confuses me is that we had a lot of opportunities for atmosphere to emerge and grow. We left 12 men on base and had the bases loaded twice, I think. That usually gets the crowd into the game and it did for those moments, but soon after the end of our mini-rally, the crowd went back to whatever was holding their attention, which certainly wasn’t the baseball game.

I have only one theory for this rare occasion: Sunday afternoon baseball games are days for families to bring their kids to the ballpark and have a family day. We saw plenty of kids with their parents and many of them were very young, as was the case 2 rows down from us where the one child was around a year to 14 months old and the other child looked less than a month old. Don’tget me wrong, I could care less how people spend their dollars and if they want to bring their kids to the ballpark I think It’s great, but those people aren’t paying attention to the game because their kids are too young to have the attention span to sit for 3 hours and watch a baseball game and the parents, consequently, have to spend the majority of time occupying their kids attention, which then detracts their attention from the game. So, maybe out of the 35K that attended today’s game, let’s say 35% are the parents of or are the kids, which is roughly 12,250 people. Those 12,250 people aren’t taking the necessary interest in the game to help generate excitement and only 22,750 remain to carry the energy. Of those people, I would guess 5-10% will be occupied with watching other people’s kids or making faces at the babies. It has also become apparent to me that when at the ballpark, people cannot stay in their seats for all 9 innings and tend to wander the hallways, whether it be for food, restroom or just to stretch their legs. Let’s assume this is another 2%. Now we are down to a little over 50% of the announced attendance actually in their seats and cheering at the appropriate times.

You’ve probably guessed that I don’t have kids, but I do have a 3 year old nephew and I know his attention span is very short. I spend all of 25 seconds on the phone with him before he gives it back to my sister and says “later!” When I do have kids, I will probably bring them to sporting events while they are still at that uninterested age and all of this will just be me ranting while I’m currently on the other side of the ball. In the meantime, we’re in a playoff race and I’d like to feel like it while I’m enjoying a well-pitched game with my friend. Going to this game was actually a little bit of a downer and we won! I went to a game last month that we lost poorly and there was a lot more excitement than today. It’s just weird, that’s all I’m really saying. I want encourage bringing your kids to the ballpark. In my eyes, any show of support for your local team is a positive and spending time with your family is doubly important and it is really special when you can mix the two together. Just remember to scream a little now and then to let us folks who are paying attention to the game that you’re here and that you’re going to help us scream and shout our team to victory. Go ‘stros!

We've all come to look for America...

All right, to the old lady at the Belgian restaurant tonight who probably didn’t speak any English, at least make some simple observations! You can see us all grabbing our wallets/purses to pay our check, so stop filling our water glasses! You’re wasting water, time and energy.

On the other hand, maybe you couldn’t hear our drunken friend R, screaming the F-word in almost every conversation he involved himself in, so you wanted to get a little closer to us in hopes of learning some real American-English. Nonetheless, I now feel compelled to drink some of the water as to not have it go to waste. Hundreds of thousands of people along the Gulf Coast desperately needed this lady a couple weeks ago to come around and continuously pour water, but here she is wasting it on us. Ok, ok, that was a little harsh, but you know you the thought ran quickly through your mind too!

In case you were wondering, Belgian food is not very different from anywhere else. With 12 of us at dinner, we had an array of different dishes ordered, but I could’ve eaten at most chain restaurants and had the same meals. My filet mignon was cooked accurately to medium, which is a rarity it seems these days, but was ultimately very bland tasting. The mashed potatoes were good, but I could’ve used more of them on my plate. What was that stuff on top of the tomato and lettuce thingy you put on the side of my plate? We saw a couple plates of Chicken Diablo, which looked to be nothing special; Salmon filet, which also looked to be sort of blasé, as in it wasn’t dressed up at all, just a piece of fish on a plate. The mussels in tomato sauce looked interesting, but why does it come with French fries? That seems like an odd combo.

Who's Gonna Drive You Home, Tonight?

6pm. Rush hour, people are jockeying for position, buses are stopping traffic at corners to pick up and drop off people and cars are jutting in and out of lanes. Does this sound familiar? Well, here is my opinion on rush hour. JUST DRIVE PEOPLE!! We go through these issues five days a week and everyday it’s the same thing.

Why, oh why, don’t you have a routine of getting into the lane where you’ll do the core of your driving and stay there!

I drive the same way home everyday. I exit my parking lot to the right, turning into the middle lane, driving about 2 miles before I reach a large intersection where cars are always turning right and I can move into the right lane because the middle lane turns into a left turn only lane. I know this because I drive this way everyday! I then stay in this lane for four more miles before I have to turn left. You see, it’s pretty easy for me to do this routine on a daily basis.

The problem, however, is when all the other people driving around me fuck this routine up! People are zipping in and out of lanes, figuring out they’re in that left turn only lane when they need to go straight and all of a sudden they try to cut in front of me! Or they cut in front of me at other times. I don’t mean they enter my lane because there is room, I mean they are cutting me off, no signals flash and no wave for not bumping their ass as they slice in between cars.

While I’m speaking of cutting in; just because there is some room between myself and the car in front of me, does not mean that you should make a right on red into that space! Space does not equal time. If there are a few car lengths between 2 cars, it is because tailgating is not a good practice when driving! It doesn’t mean you should attempt to jump out in front of me and slam on the gas. Obviously since you’re picking this space to try to enter traffic, you are not a NASCAR driver! You need to take at least 8 seconds to make a right turn and get up to the speed and flow of traffic as to not disrupt my flow in traffic!

With gas being the price per gallon that it is right now, I don’t want to be in stop and go traffic for 25 minutes on my way home and I’ll bet a lot of other people feel the same way.

Fortunately for other drivers, even though I am quickly losing patience, I know that in less than 30 minutes, I’ll be home and you won’t because you’ll be jutting in and out of lanes instead of driving straight to your destination.

Ok, so here’s the plan: pick a lane, don’t cut me off and don’t jump out in front of me.

Another postcard with chimpanzee's...

It’s 5:40pm, there are only 2 people working the counter with 15 people in line and the post office will be closing in 20 minutes. I realize this is a government job, but for the love of Billy Joe, stop talking, do some work to get this line moving so we both can go home! Pretty simple isn’t it? Why are you still talking? SHUT UP! Ok, good, you’ve stopped talking, you’re exchanging money, the customer is packing up her things and we’re doing much better now.

Wait, where are you going? At least let me know that you’ll be coming back instead of teasing me after that last customer left the counter. You stood there as if you were awaiting my arrival, then as I begin my trot to come see you, you walk away without a word. Now I have 14 people staring at me like I am in 5th grade and they’re teasing me and yelling, “Psyche!” It’s almost embarrassing, just standing there.

Oh, good here you come.

Wait, no, you’re just putting something back on the counter and walking away again.

Its 5:50pm now, still 14 people in line and I’m still standing there as well.

Finally, you’re back at the counter.

Are you ready for me now? SAY SOMETHING! Don’t stare at me and expect me to know what you’re thinking. “Next!” Seriously? You couldn’t be a little more polite by saying, “I’m sorry for the delay, can I help you?” Whatever. Here is my letter; you may get it there whenever you feel like doing some work. Can I go home now?