OK, enough of the whiny shit, let’s get busy zeroing out this here Moleskine…
And just to be clear, and in the interest of full disclosure, I don’t really use a Moleskine. I tried to get into the habit of carrying one around, because they’re pretty cool little notebooks, but it didn’t take. It made me feel kind of pretentious and tool-like. Ya know?
The only time I used one consistently, was during our trip to London. I stuck it in my jacket pocket every morning, and jotted notes in it during our adventures. Then, every evening I’d go to the bar in our hotel, drink Boddingtons, and summarize the day’s events.
It was perfect for traveling. But not the real world, for some reason. So, when I say “Moleskine,” what I really mean is “cheap-ass spiral notebook from Target.”
I’m never far from one of those. I don’t literally carry one around, but usually have one in my car, and take one to work every night. ‘Cause, if I don’t write down an idea soon after it appears, it’ll be lost forever. I’ve got a black belt in forgetting “genius” ideas, fifteen minutes after they’re born.
And so it goes.
A few days ago I overheard a woman describing a man to someone. And she said, “He kind of looks like a surgeon.”
Any idea what that means? Do surgeons have a certain look? As far as I know, they don’t. I’m fairly certain they come in all shapes, sizes, and colors. So, WTF? What a bizarre statement…
Perhaps she was talking about TV surgeons? But I don’t think even that holds up. I’ve heard people say, “He looks like a mechanic.” And that’s semi-valid. But a surgeon?
What professions can you say “He/She looks like a ___” about? And what do you think that loony chick was talking about, when she was talking about surgeons?
Crazy, man.
I also noticed a woman in a grocery store a few days ago, who just continuously and rapidly changed her expressions. I think it was some kind of tic, but I’m not sure. Her face muscles were in constant motion. She’d be frowning, then smiling, then worried, then sad… REAL FAST.
Perhaps she’s suffering from Restless Face Syndrome, I don’t know. But what are the most memorable nervous tics you’ve encountered in your life?
I’m not sure if this technically qualifies, but Mumbles always goes, “Mmmm…” whenever he’s finished talking. He’ll say, “Can you pass me the salt? Mmmm…” and “Would you mind moving your car? Mmmm…”
What do you have on this one? Anything?
And speaking of grocery stores, I stopped in one today, after picking up the younger Secret from his golf camp. We were planning to have hot dogs on the grill for lunch, and I wanted a bag o’ chips to go with them.
So, I went inside the store, made my selection, and headed toward the self-checkouts. I don’t like the ones with real people, because… well, you know, they often feature people, and all that nonsense.
At this place they have three self-checkouts, and one was out of order. So, I walked over to another. A rotund women with an ass the size of Illinois was leisurely ringing up a heaping cart of food. Grrr…
I went to the other, and there was an old man there, with only one item. Not too bad, I decided. But he was trying to use four or five coupons — on one thing. It was a bottle of ketchup, and he was trying to use a whole stack of coupons against it.
Needless to say, the machine was having none of that, and the light above the register started flashing.
Some zitster shuffled over, and the old guy started getting all argumentative with him. He wanted to use all his coupons, in conjunction with each other. Zitty, all flustered ‘n’ shit, said he’d have to call the manager, etc.
And at that point I lost it, hollered, “Jesus!” and turned and stuffed the bag of chips deep inside a fixture. The thing made a loud crushing sound, followed by a hollow POP! And I left, shaking my head with righteous indignation.
I have no doubt those Lay’s are nothing but a big sack of chip dust at this point. But I don’t care. My ridiculous boolshit sensor was triggered.
I need to take it down a few notches, don’t I?
And finally (this doesn’t really come close to zeroing anything out, but I’m tired), I’d like to know if you’ve ever caught your hair on fire. I have. And I took an informal poll at work, and it appears I might not be in the minority.
When I was in high school, or shortly thereafter, I was drinking beer and smoking cigars at a friend’s house. I bent over a gas stove to light my stogie, and when I turned — a puffin’ away — everyone started laughing.
I smelled something weird, and someone yelled, “Your hair’s on fire!” Shit! I smacked out the flames, and when I looked in the mirror I saw a big gray spot on the front of my Gabe Kaplan ‘fro. My friends, of course, were buckled over and nearly crapping themselves with laughter. But it freaked me out a little.
I brushed at the big gray spot, and the burnt hair just fell to the floor. It was no longer attached to anything. Freaky.
Have you ever caught your hair on fire? Or have you seen it happen to someone else? If so, tell us about it in the comments.
And please don’t feel obligated to answer all these questions, I’m just plowing through the stuff I have scribbled in my Target notebook.
I’ll see you guys next time, whenever that happens to be.
Thanks for reading! I sincerely appreciate it.
Now playing in the bunker
Visit the Surf Report Souvenir Shop!
“He looks like a BIKER”….duh…
Dorothy: I have been laughing like a village idiot at a taffy pull too. Where is WB in OH’s comment you mentioned? I have to go back and read that myself!
Jeff: It seems as though Mumbles resembles Billy Bob Thornton in “Slingblade”…….”I like me some of them fried patater’s….MMMMMM….UH-HUH….”
Never caught my hair on fire. But since I perform laser hair removal on patient’s, I sure know the smell. Blecch.
I am also still laughing over the whole self check out story with the bag-o-chips. That is so me… People like that makes me absolutely ape shit.
Here’s a goodie………
I was behind some dude last week at Shop-n-Save that asked for a “sub-total” after each item. EACH. ITEM. His cart was loaded. When the final total was reached, he sifted through the bags of groceries and began handing things back to the poor cashier to now DEDUCT them from the total. It was at that time I think MY hair caught fire. The cashier deletes 5 or 6 items from the bill, gives him a new total. He then reaches over me for two candy bars and hands them to the cashier to ADD ON. Are you fucking kidding me??? And how does he pay, you ask? With a goddamn CHECK (!!) not previously filled out, nothing. He had to pull it out of his wallet and dust it off. Fuck me, man. I gotta hand it to the little zitster behind the cash register. She handled her self a hell of a lot better than I would have.
The bunker cam: I think I know him….
dorothy-Your batting .500, clintcurtis’s comment about the 55 gallon drum brought tears to my eyes as I did something similiar back in the day but you have me confused with someone else about the headrest. I don’t recall whose comment that was but perhaps one of our peers could shed some light on it for us.
I’ve got nothing on the first two topics but I applaud your stance on checkout ass baggery! At my normal grocery store there is checkout girl who is the slowest person you’ve ever seen. It takes her a full ten to fifteen seconds to grab an item and scan it. It’s like slow motion, and just brutal to watch. The whole time she’s scanning your groceries she has this whole face of determination look going on. She squints her eyes and I don’t know I wish I had Jeffs way with words, looks like she’s trying to remember Pythagoreans theorem or something. You just want to reach in and scan them for her and scream ‘see how fast I can go, why don’t you try it this way’!
I’ve singed more hair than I care to recall.
And just for those of you keeping track at home;
Beer 1
Me 0
I forgot about a dental hygienist that worked on me once. She did the mmmm thing. She gives you the whole play by play of the cleaning with each little “that looks pretty good” followed with a “hmmm yes”.
And would someone tell me what I did to my laptop that I now have to enter my name and e-mail addy every time I want to comment?
Lit my own hair on fire as an alter boy at the end of Mass. Luckily a women reached out and patted my ‘greg brady’ style flaming hair. The smeel was terrible and I remember it well.
As for the look; I agree on the ‘stripper’ look for cettain women.
Growing up my Father who was a computer repair man for IBM was often mistaken for a police detective. Once on a business trip to Chicago he went into a local establishment for drink and several folks quickly left the joint. The owner eventaully asked a bunch of questions and fiured out he was not a detective. I think the reason was that he looked and dressed like Earl Holliman of the Police Woman televison series staring Angi Dickinson.
I always use the peopled check out lanes because I feel if I am going to pay those high prices someone has to work for it and maybe even give me some lube for the ass raping.
My issue with the self checkout is that it seems that the vast majority of imbeciles can’t figure out the line structure. Inevitably someone just strolls up to a machine where the person is about to leave. “Hey fuck-tard, do you think we’re all standing here, queued up, for our health??!!” Since I have no qualms about yelling shit out, my store trips tend to be interesting! Probably why my girl won’t let me go shopping with her anymore.
Never set my hair on fire, but since I cook for a living, my hands tend to stay hair free!
@hot fuzz
but someday baby, you ain’t gonna worry my life anymore
I have also though about carrying around a little notepad cause I seem to have good ideas when I’m smoking. I always forget them when I sober up lol. At least they seem like good ideas at the time. BODDINGTON’S!!! I seriously hope it tastes better in England than it does here. I bought a four pack of the stuff in tall boys and neary yakked when i took the first drink. In fact it should be called yak piss. I drank half of one and gave the other three to a friend. That was some of the worst beer I have ever tasted.
my bad. i should have mentioned that it was in the column about bad excuses for missing work. i get behind sometimes and read a week all at once, then forget who wrote what. anyhow, the person (whoever it was) said that he had a close call in traffic and was still cleaning the shit off the headrest. too funny. i’ll go back now and see who it was. the story made a big hit at my writers’ workshop and i think it will be appearing in several publications someday. remember! don’t ever say anything in front of a writer that you don’t want written down somewhere or used in a story. i myself have plagiarized buck (on occasion) sorry about that, buck.
i’m back. it was bill in wv. i knew it was somebody from some state.
reference—“bad call off excuses”
Hey WB did you erase your browsing history and cookies and stuff. Thats what you get for looking at all that porn and trying to hide it man.
I’ll see if this works. I had a non-porn related (would I lie to you guys?) virus scare a couple of days ago and increased my security settings. Just lowered them back.
Bingo, thanks Valentin!
OK…the Further Evidence link is seriously disturbing. I always thought of guinea pig as a crock-pot dish.
@bikerchick – My dad has picked up the MMMM sentence ending in his old age. Dead on Slingblade.
They make a dollar, I make a dime, that’s why I poop on company time!
Caught my hair on fire once while lighting a 2 or 3 ounce pile of gunpowder (FFFG) when I was 12. Good times!
Everyone have a great 4th!
EAT, (you know) and be MERRY!
I’ve singed the hair off my legs a couple of times horsing around the fire pit back on the farm.
Surgeons: They have extra clean and pink hands. Really short nails, and often seem to have hairless hands and arms which just add to the extra pink look. Thats all I got on that.
I don’t use self checkouts for the same reason as Sam. I don’t see store prices dropping or rebates when using self checkouts, so pay the zitster to do the labour.
Hey hot fuzz…yeah. Thanks.
Back home from Taos. Enjoying a thunderstorm and looking forward to the fairly decent fireworks they’ll do in this little ‘village’ nightly over the weekend.
Good times to all!
I reallllly hope I don’t offend anyone by this, if I do I am SO SORRY…
‘That person looks jewish…or like a jew’
Please don’t tell me to fuck myself. lol
The lady with the rapid facial ticks may have been epileptic. Rapid facial movement generally happens just prior to a seizure.
Does Mumbles have Tourette’s Syndrome? Just wondering.
I know a guy that ends every sentence with the phrase “on there”. EVERY FRIGGING SENTENCE. It makes me slightly nuts.
Brittney…people often ask me if I’m Jewish…I tell them “Go fuck yourself.”
i saw a friend of mine catch his beard on fire. it was pretty funny to watch him hit himself in the face to put the flames out
I can’t believe how much my life sucks.
That is all.
At this time.
ADubb – sorry, not sure I understand. Please type answer slowly because I don’t get stuff if you talk too quickly.
Honestly, couldn’t be sure if I made you laugh or offended and wouldn’t want to miss out on either opportunity.
🙂
Chuck, try setting yourself on fire. That seems to brighten most people’s lives. Well, at least your friend’s lives.
Crap, i forgot my own self-immolation story.
Eight years ago, we were camping and tossing the burnable materials from dinner in to the fire pit. This attracted a few flies so what seemed like a good idea was to spray Raid Wasp spray on to the garbage to kill the flies.
Here’s a little known fact…that stuff doesn’t like to dissipate too quickly and is quiet flammable, But it does make a cool sound when you light the vapors – sort of like a low frequency phoomp.
I found myself in a 10′ circle of flame cloud that lasted just long enough to exfoliate my shins. The boy and the girl still laugh when the see any reference to “Raid” on TV or see a can on the shelf.
t-storm lights farts
Made myself a large mango champagne, watched some Mad Men, then went for a walk, whereupon two teenage boys pulled up in their shitmobile, gunned their engine, and waved wildly like retards on a merry-go-round. Jeezus, I’m twice their age!! Yet I’m not embarrassed to admit it sorta made my night….even if they were merely on a Truth or Dare mission.
Anyway, I just remembered a fire story. I had a blonde moment once with an indoor gas fireplace. I was trying to light it without, er, opening the fucking flue first. When the gas finally ignited the ensuing fireball was impressive. Not enough to torch the living room, but still violent enough to force my dog into a highly unnatural Matrix maneuver. I smelled singed hair, but I was never sure if it was me or the dog.
Actually…I don’t know that for a fact. He just looks like a guy who lights farts.
Gretchen, you’re killin’ me! LOL !!
Thanks, Greg. 🙂
I do remember a drunken night in the air force when a friend caught his pubes on fire lighting a fart. singed the guys a bit.
Good Morning Surf Reporters…..
oh, for what it’s worth, I look like a radish…
@ hot fuzz Whoops! That shouldve been directed to t-storm! This is why I lurk and never post! That and I’m always sleep deprived!
Hey no worries ADubb. Please post more!
Everyone please post more – it helps with a sense of community and more importantly makes me stick out less. I’m proof you don’t have to have anything funny to say!!!
at this time
🙂
He looks like a fag. He looks like a maniac. She looks like a circus freak.
Self checkout lines seem to attract people who don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. I recently asked a guy if he’d just got out of prison. He was baffled by the credit/debit machine and was actually trying to slide cash through the slot. I wanted to follow him home and murder him.
When I first met my wife she worked in a tile shop. There was this guy that also worked there and he’d let out squeeking noises and jerk around. I don’t know what was wrong with him but it would scare the shit out of me. I’d be talking to her and he’d yank his head to the side and go “eeeaakkk!!” Jesus. Got me every time.
I thought Jeff talked about shitting the headrest in one of his updates. I could be delusional, I don’t know.
She looka lika man.
She looks like a praying mantis that hasn’t caught a meal since men wore powdered wigs and pantyhose.
He looks like his face caught on fire and someone put it out with a hatchet.
I caught my hair on fire on purpose because I heard it would grow back more lush and colorful. Turns out they were talking about lawns.
People often ask me if I am a Jew. I tell them no, I am a Baptist. That usually draws nervous laughter. And a WTF? expression.
sitting in the stl airport drinking headed to cincinnati. Am i going for pride or the northside rock and roll carnival? Can’t it be both? Also looking at houses tomorrow.
Rocked out with my cock out last night in South Citayyyyy.
Met a girl I can totally steal from her boyfriend.
I like jack, and I like hammers, but I do not like jack hammers
Marcellas Wallace looks like a bitch.
HE LOOKS……
LIKE A BITCH
Who the hell is Marcellas Wallace?
So random story that I wanted to share…today my boyfriend and I went a waterpark and after a few hours of swimming and lazy rivers, we went to go lay on our towels. There was a mom and her 16 daughter who set up camp right behind us and as soon as we sat down they started arguing. They weren’t trying ot be quiet at all. Apparently mom was mad because her daughter was spending too much time with grandma, and before we knew it they were punching each other and whipping water bottles at each other.
So what did we do? We layed there and laughed at them.
It was a good day.
16 year old daughter, not 16 daughters. Woah, that would be nuts.
Chuck – I googled it, looks like that’s a line from pulp fiction.
Don’t remember burning my own hair, but as a kid, I do remember my Dad losing his eyebrows lighting a coleman stove. We laughed & laughed – but knowing his temper back then , probably not for long.
Chuck, “Pulp Fiction”. Awesome movie – you should watch it you have a spare couple of hours sometime. Awesome, but this is NOT a film for children – on many levels. Once you’ve seen it, you too can drop lines like “Martin and Lewis, or Amos and Andy?”
No…I’m just the odd man out lately. Like a very wise man once said:
“Do you ever feel like the world is a tuxedo and you are a pair of brown shoes?”
Yeh…like that.
Chuck,
That wise man was George Gobel, frequently known as “Lonesome George”. He had his own TV show from 1954 to 1960, and was a frequent guest on TV shows thereafter until close to his death in 1991.
The context was a walk-on appearance on The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson in 1969. Gobel walked on after Bob Hope and Dean Martin had walked on, and none of them was dead sober. They were all carrying adult beverages and Dean Martin kept flicking his cigarette ashes in Gobel’s drink. Gobel delivered the line and everyone lost it. A very funny moment.
Gobel was a funny guy, and I always enjoyed watching him on TV.
And just for the record, you seem neither out nor odd to me. Or just odd enough to hang out at this site.
jtb
Yep…I saw that show when it happened.