I don’t have anything coherent for you guys today, I’m afraid.  I’m flipping through my notebook here and it’s going to be mighty difficult to build something useful out of this sad collection of scraps.  But I’ll do what I can…

Last weekend I underwent emergency hair reduction surgery at a local Supercuts, or whatever the hell.  The guy who performed the procedure glided around the place, barely touching the floor as he walked.  It wouldn’t surprise me to learn he had a tattoo on his right shoulder that said:  Born to Style Hair!  Wotta poof.

Anyway, he asked a question that always confuses me.  At the very beginning he sprayed me down with water, and started combing my Bobby Brady ‘do.  Then he said, “How long’s it been since your last haircut?”

Why do they need to know this?  It’s a question commonly asked, but I don’t understand the relevance.  How is that information going to help them in their work?  If it’s been five weeks, as opposed to six, does that make a difference somehow?

When I go to Subway and order a BMT, the sandwich engineer doesn’t stop, tap his chin and say, “How long since your last hoagie?”  Same goes for the post office.  The clerks never ask about my stamp-buying habits, they just hand the damn things over.

Next time I think I’m going to refuse to answer the haircut question.  Because it’s starting to piss me off.

Toney and I sent my parents a selection of Omaha Steaks for Christmas, and now they keep calling here.  Not my parents (they never call), but Omaha Steaks.

They’re aggressive sumbitches…  I use caller ID to avoid them, as best as I can.  But I’m starting to worry they’ll get frustrated and dispatch a “closer,” a person skilled in “changing minds.”

They call literally five or six times a day.  It’s insane, like something out of a Bentley Little novel.  I’m afraid we’ve been assigned to an unbalanced, possibly deranged telemarketer of meat.

Is that paranoid?  ‘Cause I’m sometimes accused of paranoia…

While driving to work earlier in the week I performed an analysis of the cursing I do in front of our kids.  And it seems most of the words I now use are at least loosely associated with the ass.

I frequently shout ASSHOLE! while driving, for instance, and use many custom-built phrases, such as “get out of my way, you turd-juggling piece of shit!!”  You know, that sort of thing.

It wasn’t a conscious decision, but it seems like my cussing has taken a definite assy turn since kids entered our lives.  Ass, and ass-products.

In the old days I used the f-word quite a bit, but almost never say it anymore.  I had no problem with it in 2000, but in 2009 it sounds kinda trashy to me.  Neither of our boys have ever heard me use the word, even though I’m frequently ranting about something or other.

If you have kids, how do you calibrate the profanity-flow around them?  Or do you bother?  I know people who let it all hang out, and also a few who claim to never use “bad words” around their kids.  I’m somewhere in the middle, a-shouting about turds and whatnot.

What are your feelings on this one?  Have you done an analysis?  Tell us about it, won’t you?

Before I call it a week, I have several new Smoking Fish sightings to share with you.  Right here.  Thanks folks!  Keep ’em coming, because our logo, man, he gets around.

And since we’re on the subject…  If you’ve sent pics and I never posted them, please re-send.  I’m not exactly organized when it comes to email, and things sometimes get lost.  Ahem.  So, please re-send to jeff [at] thewvsr.com

And about the t-shirts:  I’ve decided to continue taking orders until 4 o’clock.  A couple of last-minute transactions took place at 11:58, or whatever, so I’m going to extend it a bit.  But after 4 it’s over.  Only pre-ordered shirts will be shipped, I’ll have no extras.

Here’s the order page, for the last time.

Finally, I have something extra-special for you guys.  It’s a story written by a man in South Charleston, WV, which is very near Dunbar, where I grew up.

He apparently posted a version of it to his Facebook page, and a reader sent it to me and suggested I reprint it.  I read it, liked it, and exchanged a few emails with the author.

Chuck Gentry is his name, and he’s given me permission to share it with you folks.  And here it is.  Check it out, I think you’ll enjoy it.

And that’s going to close out the category.  I hope everyone has a great weekend.

I’ll be back on Monday.

Now playing in the bunker.

While taking continuing education classes last month, I met a man who is employed at a hippie commune.  Well, those aren’t his words, they’re mine…  He never actually used the phrase “hippie commune,” he only described one and I connected the dots.

It’s an institute, he said, populated by militant vegans and earth people.  They own a defunct college(!), comprised of several large buildings on many acres of land.  And they generate income by publishing a series of magazines on the subjects you’d expect, stuff like ecology, organic foods, and carbon-neutral sandal repair.  Who the hell knows?

Anyway, many of the “employees” live at the institute full-time, there’s a vegetarian lunch room there, and the whole nine yards.

However, they also hire regular folks to perform various high-skill functions, and the guy I was talking with fell into that category.  He was involved somehow with the technical side of their publishing venture.  But he’s no hippie, he’s just an Average Joe.

One day, he told me, his boss called him into her office and told him to have a seat.  And she said, “I need to talk to you about your body odor.”

How’s that for an ice-breaker?

The guy blinked ten times real fast, and sputtered, “My body odor?  Um, I shower every morning, and use both deodorant and cologne.  I don’t think…”

“No, no, no.  Not that,” she said.  “I mean you stink of meat.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’ve had several complaints, and noticed it myself.  You have the smell of baloney wafting off you, or roast beef or something.”

He said they’re fixated on baloney, and seemingly believe all meat-eaters sit around at home gnawing on enormous logs of the stuff.  Baloney is the subject of a disproportionate number of conversations at the institute, he assured me.

Caught off-guard (I mean, seriously), he asked what she wanted him to do about it.  “It’s not like I’m walking around with my pockets full of pork chops.  Are you asking me to stop eating meat?”

“No, I’m not allowed to do that,” she said, “but I wanted you to be aware of the complaints, and ask that you take your co-workers into consideration.”

How’d you like to work under those circumstances?  Good god!  Your colleagues are complaining because you smell like yankee pot roast.  And it got me to thinking about people I’ve encountered in my life, who REALLY DID stink-up the workplace.

And, as a public service, I’ll now give you a brief run-down of each…

In Atlanta there was a sales manager (probably pulling down $150K) who sat in his office all day farting.  I don’t know if he had some kind of medical condition, or just didn’t care.  But it often smelled like vaporized turds near his workspace.

Two elderly black women worked in the credit department adjacent to this weirdo’s office, and they were always utterly disgusted.  I remember them walking up and down the hallway spraying Lysol and hollering in protest:  That man is nasty!  This caused me to buckle over in laughter every time.

The farter happened to be gay, and one of my co-workers believed the smell was so strong because of “compaction.”  Heh.

There was another guy who worked at the same place, who always smelled like deep-fried food.  I mean, every article of clothing he owned was saturated with it.  People called him Fry Daddy behind his back.

Out in the hall was a place where folks could hang their coats, and his red ski jacket was always by itself.  All the other coats were bunched together, but everyone avoided that red (semi-filthy) jacket like it was dripping with disease.

It was every single day with that guy.  In fact, I bet he’s sitting around right now, wherever he ended up, smelling like a corn dog stand at a carnival.

I once worked at a bookstore, and management was forced to have a talk with a hippie hemp-sack bicyclist who arrived at work most days smelling like an open-grave.  He rode that bike everywhere he went, through the Georgia humidity, and often worked-up a good stink.

They weren’t exactly tactful about the whole thing, or confidential either, and I felt kind of bad for the guy.  Something needed to be done, as evidenced by the customers passing out and hitting their heads on the fixtures, but they could’ve gone about it a little quieter.

He seemed like an OK guy (for a hippie hemp-sack bicyclist), and the managers humiliated him.

In Greensboro I worked at a grocery store with a man shaped like a teardrop.  Know what I mean?  His shoulders were an extension of his neck, just straight down, and his ass was the widest part of his body.

He apparently made no effort at stink-suppression, and the longer he worked, the worse it got.  By the end of the shift nobody could come within fifty yards of the dude.  We called him The Funk Pump.

But since we worked overnight, and had little contact with customers, management never said a word to him about it.  Finally, one of the other guys purchased a Speed Stick, or somesuch, and handed it to him.

“Here, you might want to start using this,” he told the guy, all matter-of-factly.

I’d never have the courage to do something like that, but it worked.  The Funk Pump stopped pumping funk after that night.

And finally, I once worked with an enormous morbidly-obese man who walked with a four-legged cane.  He always smelled kinda musty, like a house with a dampness problem.

I figured it was because of the place he lived, but one of my co-workers thought it was the smell of “bursting cysts.”  WTF?  Aren’t cysts under the skin?  I think she was talking about zits, but that’s not what she said.

Anyway, her theory was that his “folds” were loaded with these so-called cysts, and would explode during exertion.  Every time he reached for his Big Gulp cup, she believed, a few would go-off.

I have a suspicion this woman had no idea what she was talking about, but it was a hard image to wipe from my mind.  In fact, I’m seeing it right now — and I’m thinking about filing a lawsuit.

Hey, and wasn’t there a band from the San Francisco area called Bursting Cysts?  Or am I mistaken about that?

In any case, it’s now your turn.  Use the comments section to tell us about former or current co-workers who stink to high heaven.

And I’ll see you guys tomorrow.

Now playing in the bunker.

I’m not sure how I graduated from high school in 1981, and managed to never see the film version of Pink Floyd The Wall, but I pulled it off.  I didn’t attend a single midnight movie showing of it, which is a miracle (I saw most of the must-sees), and never rented it.

But on Friday night the older boy went to a dance(!?) at the middle school, and the younger youngling asked if I wanted to watch the movie with him.  He’d recorded it off VH1, or somesuch, and I had no interest whatsoever.  God knows it’s true.  But I said yes, because I’ve heard “Cats in the Cradle.”

I don’t hate Pink Floyd, but I don’t like them very well either.  They’re high on the list of “classic rock” bands that irritate me the most.  Also on that list is The Doors, Stevie Nicks, and pretty much any group that falls under the heading of progressive rock.

Progressive rock is for other musicians, I believe, and people who are good at math.  I don’t give the tiniest of shitlets about a complex chord progression in the third measure; it means nothing to me.  You can’t make a bad song better by stuffing extra notes into it.

But back to the movie…  It’s a turd of the highest order.  The thing is pretentious, incoherent, and seemingly made our clocks run backwards.

It stars Bob Geldof, and we have a bag of gardening mulch in our garage with more acting ability.  Have you noticed he’s never really done much film work since then?  Care to guess the reason?

The “plot” revolves around a rock star who is emotionally isolated, as the result of a series of unfortunate artsy-fartsy events earlier in his life.  So – are you sitting down? – he builds a metaphorical wall around himself.  And that’s deep, man.

But what do I care about it, really?  If some weirdo with a shag haircut wants to sit in a chair all day and shave his chest and eyebrows, it’s no skin off my scrotum.  I couldn’t care less, and no amount of incomprehensible World War II flashbacks is going to make me feel any differently.

I kept my opinions to myself, though.  There’s nothing worse than a person hollering about how bad something is – while you’re enjoying it.  I didn’t know what the Secret was thinking, so I just stared at the screen and blinked away the tears of boredom.

Finally he turned to me and said, “This isn’t very good, is it?”  And that broke the ice.  From that point on we openly mocked the film, and it became more enjoyable for both of us.

Wow!  Wotta load of pure, undiluted crack-spackling.

A few days ago I was sitting in Moe’s, having lunch by myself.  And a woman walked in who I pegged as a grade school teacher or a real estate agent.  You know, tinged with kookiness.

As is the tradition, the manager hollered, “WELCOME TO MOE’S!” and the rest of the crew halfheartedly followed her lead: “weeelcome Moooe’s….”  They always sound like the living dead, like a gang of Bela Lugosis.  And they always leave out the “to” in the middle.

“Oh, you’re closed?” the woman said, and turned to leave.  She misunderstood what the zombies had shouted, and thought the restaurant wasn’t open for business – even though there were people sitting in nearly every booth, chewing.

“No, no!” shouted the manager.  “We said WEL-COME TO MOE’S!”

Brooch Woman, now chuckling, came back inside, proceeded to the cash register, and tried to place her order there.  Unfortunately, it’s set up like a Subway and the cash register is the end of the process, not the beginning.

Perhaps they should post an illustrated tutorial out front?

After that bit of fun was sorted-out, a man sitting near me started to choke.  He was gasping for air, and sprang to his feet.  Why do people always stand up when they’re choking?

For a couple of seconds it was touch-and-go, and I thought someone might have to administer a medical punch to the gut.  But he finally got his shit correct, and returned to the boof with tears and snot flowing.

Man, that place has the best floor show in town!

Toney and I attended an event recently (please note the ambiguity) where we met the spouses of some people we sorta know.  And in several cases we were shocked.

A woman, who reminds me of Mary Tyler Moore circa 1974, introduced us to her husband – who looked like Robert E. Lee.  He must’ve been twenty years her senior, and should’ve been carrying a musket.  I was, as they say, taken aback.

And a man who is apparently a former athlete, who carries himself like a gym coach, had a wife the size of a Macy’s Parade float.  She glided across the floor in one of those “don’t hide it, decorate it” floral dresses, rocking from side to side.  And I was fully expecting to see Clay Aiken lip-synching on her back.

When we got home Toney and I talked about seemingly mismatched couples, and wondered if anyone thought we fell into that category.  I don’t think so, but it’s hard to say from my perspective.  Toney’s certainly more outgoing and social than I am, but we don’t look like we’re from opposite ends of the twentieth century, or anything.

And that leads me to the multi-pronged Question of the Day.  None are spectacular, I don’t believe, so I’ll hit you with three.

What classic rock artists really rub you the wrong way?  You know what I’m talking about when I say classic rock, right?  All that Foreigner / Journey / Styx / REO stuff from the ’70s and early ’80s, that’s been playing in an endless loop like Rousseau’s distress signal on LOST?

Do you have any “choking in restaurants” stories to tell?

And, finally, please use the comments to tell us about the most mismatched couple you know.  Based on outward appearances, anyway…

And that’ll do it for today, boys and girls.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

Now playing in the bunker.

It’s incredibly windy here.  Or, as our British friends like to say, blowy.  I realized it’s also trash day, while I was outside letting Andy (Black Lips Houlihan) sling some urine around.  Nothing short of fantastic…

A few years ago I was nearly decapitated on an especially blowy trash day, by a cardboard discus from the bottom of a pizza box.  The thing came sailing out of nowhere, at exactly neck level!  So I was on high-alert this afternoon, dammit.  I will not be taken-down by an airborne Hi-C bottle; I will NOT go out as a Fark link.

But everything worked out OK.  I just stood on the porch and watched the endless parade of garbage march past, while Andy searched for another dog’s pee to trump.  I imagined me out there with one of the Secrets, when they were younger:

“Look there!  It’s a Frito’s bag — family sized!  And look what’s behind it!  An empty butter tub, and a vortex of Tide bottles!!”

“Daddy, can I sit on your shoulders?!”

It was fairly amazing, and Andy got a surprise as well.  I don’t think he’d ever seen his pee go in an L before.  It went straight out, as normal, then made an abrupt left turn, because of the high winds.

And that’s as far as I got with Thursday’s update — before the loud explosion, and the complete and absolute nuclear winter loss of power.

Turns out a telephone pole tipped over.  And how does something like that happen?  Aren’t they generally in the ground pretty deep?  Sure, the wind was blowing at an accelerated clip, but it wasn’t exactly a hurricane out there.  How could a telephone pole just fall down like that?

And it’s a good thing nobody was driving past at the time, because it fell directly across a well-traveled street(!).  The big transformers (or whatever the hell) at the top EXPLODED when they hit the pavement, and stray wires were dangling from the treetops.

Wotta mess.  But luckily, and miraculously, several elderly men were on the scene within seconds, sporting reflector vests and carrying flashlights with plastic extenders on them.  Where do those guys come from?  Are they always standing by?  Apparently so.

In any case, they kept the traffic from approaching the danger zone, and just a few minutes later several police cars, an ambulance, and a couple of fire truck were on the scene.  Eventually, the power company arrived as well.

Our electricity was out, of course, and I told Toney I was going to use the opportunity to get a haircut.  I’d been needing one badly, but couldn’t find the time.  Since everything was now disturbingly quiet at our house, and getting colder by the minute, I figured the time was right.

So, I went to the mall and paid some guy to dance around me and carve great hunks of graying fur off my head.  The dude moved as if on wheels, just gliding from here to there.  If there was ever a man born to cut hair, he was it.  Holy crap.

While driving home my cell phone rang, and it was Toney.  She’d called the power company to get a status, and the recording told her we’d be without electricity until at least 7:30.  So, she was proposing dinner at a restaurant.

Well, if we absolutely have to…

We went to Five Guys, and my burger was uncharacteristically disappointing.  Way too saucy.  Whoever was manning the ketchup pump got overzealous with it, and rendered my dinner a gloppy mess.  The prick.

Afterward, Toney called the power company status line again, and they were now saying 10:30.  What the hell, man??  It was dark outside, and the temperature was plummeting.  Plus, we had a new episode of LOST to watch.  I didn’t care for any of it.

The younger Secret was supposed to have basketball practice, so we went home and he changed his clothes by flashlight.  Toney and the older boy went to swim practice, and we left poor Andy in the dark:  the Woody Allen of dogs.

Since a big section of our neighborhood was now closed-off, I had to take an unusual route.  And near the elementary school there was roughly a thousand flashing lights — emergency vehicles as far as the eye could see.  What the hell, man?  Are we under attack??

Traffic was completely balled-up, and we couldn’t get through.  As we sat still, waiting for an opportunity to escape down a side street, I saw a horse standing in the middle of the school’s playground.  Way off in the distance, with nobody around.  A horse!

“Is this the Sundance Channel?!” I said out loud, while performing a fully-illegal U-turn at 2 mph.

I drove through a residential section, and eventually emerged near a grocery store a few blocks away.  And cops had all the main roads sealed-off, directing cars away from downtown.

“Screw this,” I told the Secret. “You’re going to miss practice tonight, because we’re going home.”  There was far too much incomprehensible weirdness going on.  Were we under martial law, or something?  I seriously thought those thoughts.

We returned home, and it was inky black inside.  I went to the baffroom and took a leak with a flashlight in my left hand.  At one point I thought I heard something, got confused, and pointed what wasn’t a flashlight in the direction of the shower stall.  Woops.  Where’s a towel?

I grabbed a Yuengling from the fridge, and the Secret and I spent the next hour sitting in the living room, smiling into the darkness.  I felt like David Putty.  And it was freakin’ cold in there.

Needless to say, I blamed Obama for all of it.

Toney and the older boy got home around 9:00, and all four of us sat there talking without being able to see each other.  I noticed a candle flickering in the living room of the house across the street.

“Well, this blows a whole flat of eggs,” I said.  And even though it made no sense whatsoever, the family agreed to the general spirit of my statement.

The Secrets went to bed, and Toney and I had another beer each.  She called the power company again, and they were still saying 10:30.  “Forget this, I’m going to bed,” she said.  I considered doing the same, but it was still so early…  Wonder if I could watch a movie on my laptop?

So, I fired up In Bruges, and made it two-thirds of the way into it, before the battery died.  I really liked the first two-thirds, though.  It was a really good partial-movie.

Finally, I sighed and climbed atop the platform.  And I did something that’s completely unheard of:  I wore socks to bed.  I hate that, in warm weather I don’t even like my feet covered by a sheet.  But these were unusual circumstances; it was like a refrigerator in that room.  Sweet Maria.

And at exactly 12:27 am I was awakened by a low hum, and sudden light in my eyes.  Finally, we were back in business.  Toney got up and adjusted the thermostat, and within minutes it started to warm-up a little.

Good times!

Yesterday, before tragedy struck, I sent out an email announcing that I’d bowed to public pressure and would be offering a limited edition long-sleeve Surf Report shirt.  Several people said they wanted them, but I wasn’t convinced we could meet the minimum order requirement of twenty-four.

But, to my surprise, twenty had already been ordered by the time the power went off.  And this morning I was pleased to learn the number had nearly doubled.  Thanks, folks!  I really appreciate it, and am genuinely shocked.

I’ll keep the order form active until noon on Friday, February 20, and will then call the T-Shirt Lady with our numbers.  I’m not ordering extras this time, so if you want one you’ll need to pre-order.  Sorry, but it gets too complicated and convoluted; it’s better to do just one big mailing, all at once.

I do still owe a few of you short sleeve shirts, and those will go out on Saturday morning.  Thus closing-out the category.

Thanks, folks!  Your support is much appreciated.

And that’s that.  I’ll leave you now with another deceptively simple question from the Stealing Clive Bull‘s Topics desk.  I’d like to know what you’re addicted to.  What do you have trouble doing without, for extended periods?

For me, it’s beer (especially on Fridays and Saturdays and on days when we have no electricity), email and the internet, the maintaining of this website, and music.

What about you?  Tell us about it in the comments.

And I’ll see ya on Monday.

Now playing in the bunker.

OK, I admit it, yesterday’s update was supposed to appear at Suggestaholic.  But I spent so much time on it, I wanted more than thirty people to read it.  Is that so wrong?

I trust it wasn’t too painful?  You know, for everyone besides Buck…

Yesterday I logged into an old Yahoo email account, which I hadn’t used in YEARS.  I was kinda surprised it was still active, but everything was there, just as I’d left it.

In fact, there was still a message in the drafts folder(!).  It was addressed to my friend Tim, and dated 10/27/2003.  The body of the email read, “This place is starting to make me feel like Bill Buckner!”

WTF?

Have you ever revisited a long-abandoned email account?  It’s a weird feeling, like walking around a house or apartment where you used to live.  I scrolled through the address book, and kept shouting, “Oh, I remember that guy!  …Wonder why we’re not friends anymore?”

For about an hour last night, I was convinced the transition was finally complete, and I’d become a character in a situation comedy.

I had to pee, you see, with a red-hot urgency.  But because of a series of improbable circumstances, I was repeatedly denied the opportunity.  And by the end, I was standing there talking to my boss, looking like Elvis Costello’s first album.

I was peppered with several “Jeff, can you take a look at this?” slippery-slopes, was called into an unscheduled meeting that lasted for more than twenty minutes, and received two phone calls I couldn’t let go to voicemail.

At one point I actually made it to a bathroom, but there was a woman inside with a crash cart.  She was wearing rubber gloves, and using a long-handled brush to mop-up the drippins.

“Dammit!”  I almost shouted.  “Why won’t anyone let me urinate?!”

But I’m happy to report that everything worked out OK.  I finally found sweet relief, and was undoubtedly moaning like a porn star for the duration.

And since we’re on the subject…  I know we’ve already covered this, but I can’t remember if a conclusion was reached.  Do women experience the phenomenon known as “piss shivers?”

I think it has something to do with the sudden loss of body heat (is that correct?), and causes urinators to experience a literal full-body shiver.  I assume this happens to women, as well?

Also, is my body heat information correct?  Is that what triggers the violent convulsions?  Help me out, won’t you?

I believe the Roll Call page is reasonably up-to-date, and we still haven’t had any Surf Reporters check-in from South Dakota or Wyoming.  Are any of you reading today’s update from those places?  If so, please tell us about it in Thursday’s comments.  We need representation from all fifty states.

And even if you aren’t in South Dakota or Wyoming, go ahead and log your location for us — if you haven’t already done so.  For some reason it’s kinda fun.

A couple of days ago I told you about a bizarre video clip I’d seen featuring eight nude Japanese women spraying something liquid out of their asses, simultaneously.  I mean, the synchronization was impeccable!

Anyway, check out this article that appeared the very next day.  Spooky, huh?  Thanks to Brad for spotting it.

Nancy and the gang are supposed to be visiting during the coming weekend, but they’re insisting on staying at a hotel.  I don’t know what that’s all about…  And even though it certainly makes our lives easier, I feel a little weird about it.  Ya know?

They’ve used our place as a bed & breakfast inn for years, and suddenly won’t stay here?  Wonder what triggered it?  I have no idea.

In any case, I’ll leave you with a Question that’s more of an assignment, really.  Are assignments OK?  They are?  Good.  I’m planning a complete overhaul of the ABOUT page (long overdue), and want to include, among other things, a glossary of terms.

So, if you guys could help me come up with a list of uncommon phrases, terms, and nicknames used here at the Surf Report — which might confuse new visitors — I’d be much obliged.  Definitions would be a plus, as well.

Thanks in advance!

And I’ll see you folks tomorrow.

Now playing in the bunker.