Hell, I Can Make It Anywhere, Even If I Am A Fuck Up

The way I figure it, in order to avoid sending my friend Celina insanely long, rambling e-mails about myself, I need to first get my thoughts out here. Sort of like, if you want to break in a wild horse, you have to run the fuck out of him until he's just too tired to go on.

So, anyway, I finished the novel and sent it out to just a few people. If anyone else actually wants to read it (and I didn't already send it to you), by all means let me know and I'll e-mail a copy. Just, bear in mind that it's 170 pages of a first draft of a novel. I make no promises as to its quality (especially since I didn't really give it a thorough spell-checking - not only don't I believe in Microsoft's spell checker, but mine doesn't even have the dictionaries installed for some reason). But again, if you're interested in an unfinished novel, I'm your huckleberry.

It's bordering on rediculous: the schedule I'm keeping around here. For the first week, MAYBE I could've blamed it on jet-lag, or being worn out after travelling and then busting my ass in Seattle for the move. But now, I can't fall to sleep until 7am (it's pretty fucking lame when I'm actually TRYING to get some sleep at 2am, but for some reason the body just won't comply), and I'm stuck waking up at 2pm every day. So, tonight, I'm staying up all night to turn the ol' body around.

I went ahead and shaved the beard down some. As a test, I put the largest clip on my clippers, to see how much beard hair I had on. Apparently, I had something over 3/4 of an inch, because the blade on that setting was nipping hair off. So, I put 'er down to a half inch on the 'chops, left the 'stache and left the goatee. It's an interesting look: my face appears thinner anyway. I don't know if I've managed to lose any weight since I've been here - since I don't do much - but my eating has dropped dramatically. A normal day sees me wake up (at 2pm) with a bowl of cereal. Then, I'll have a roll or a bagel with some butter on it later on. Then, if I remember to eat dinner, it's whatever people make, or maybe a couple corn dogs, or whatever I can scrounge. Dinner around here's been generally around 10 o'clock though, so times do go by where I forget. And, if I happen to leave the apartment without eating, I'll grab a meal at McDonalds and call it a day for food consumption.

It's been queried as to whether I'm homesick now or not. I don't really know right now, because even though I'm nearly a month in, it's still really surreal. I don't think I really feel anything at the moment; however there are some interesting quirks to my daily routine. I didn't bring a whole lot with me, but I find that I'm listening to quite a few Stand Up Comedy albums since my arrival. And, lately, everything I go in search for on YouTube is stand-up comedy related (yes, as opposed to all of those hard-hitting editorials uploaded on YouTube ...). I don't really know what that's all about, but I do remember as a kid (pre-stand-up-comedy-albums), whenever I'd feel lonely or out of sorts, I'd go to my vast comic-strip book collection. Calvin & Hobbes, Garfield, Far Side, Peanuts, anything I found funny at the time, and I'd just go through them, one anthology after another. I'd just sit there and read because, more than anything, I felt the intense need to laugh. That's the thing, you know? That's what brings me the most comfort. I'm not really the kind of guy who's gonna seek out depressing shit when I'm sad. I have to go for the opposite, because I know I'm not making myself laugh - and things around me sure ain't getting the job done - so I leave it to the professionals. David Cross and Dane Cook and Dave Attell and Denis Leary and Mitch Hedberg. I'm really kicking myself now that I didn't bring my George Carlin, Sam Kinison, Chris Rock, and Richard Pryor albums.

I dunno, I guess I keep in touch fairly well. It's not really my bag, though. I'm terrible when it comes to calling people! It's not that I don't care, though; I'm just really self-involved. I'm not saying that's an excuse by any means, but you just gotta know that my attention span and my memory are both quite shitty. You've really gotta hound my ass if you're interested in hearing my nasally, morose voice! Then again, we all know I'm ass on the phone anyway (unless I've been drinking, then I'm a pleasure and a treat to the ears); but I kill them e-mails when I get half a chance. Of course, like my unsolicited phone calling, my unsolicited e-mailing is pretty attrocious too; but hot-damn, I'll get back to any I receive within a week or your money back!

Apparently, The O.C. doesn't start until November 2nd (and, apparently I don't think this post has gotten long enough). For all of you fans of the remaining cast members, you better hope like the dickins cider that American Idol is pushed over to Thursdays at 8, because that's the only reasonable way the O.C. makes it THROUGH this season, let alone beyond. Aww, who the hell are we kidding; it's going up against CSI and Grey's Anatomy I think. The O.C. is fucked like nobody's business.

I watched "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest" today on my computer and it got me to thinking. You know, back in the day, seeing the World Series was a pretty big fucking deal. Don't you kinda wish it was still that way? That it could actually be important again? To be honest, unless there are two REALLY compelling teams, no sport's championship series is interesting to watch unless A - you're a fan of one of the teams, or B - you just happen to be a diehard sports fan with nothing else better to do. But, just to us regular joes, championship series' just don't matter. We might watch if we're in a room and it's on and there's nothing else on. Maybe! You know who we have to blame for that, don't you? ESPN, man, ESPN. The over-saturation of everything sports has tried to inform us to the point where we just don't care anymore! It's like, when you say a word over and over and over again, really fast. After a while, the word just begins to lose all sense of meaning - it doesn't even sound like English after a while if you say it rapid-fire long enough. And, the only reason why this phenomenon hasn't spread to the NFL is because football is still only played once a week for 17 weeks a season plus playoffs. It's kinda hard to overdo football - and yet, every year, the week before the Super Bowl, we're given so much useless information that nobody cares about. If we were free to seek our own information, and they just let the teams play the game without all the fucking hype, these games and series would be much more appealing, because there'd still be a sense of mystery. What's wrong with a little mystery?

Fuck it, man, this is what you get when I stay up all fucking night. I'll tell you one thing I've picked up since moving over here (not that it has anything in particular to do with being in New York): I'm getting my news from the UK Guardian now. The website anyway. It's much simpler than Google News: they don't have too many pictures, it's pretty much just a list of the top stories of the moment going straight down the page in one column, and if you like one particular segment (say, something about Israel or the Sudan), they provide a link to more stories on that subject. It's great, and that's my special Link of the Day for you.

OK, I'm gonna get on that e-mail now. I find, with the novel finished in its first draft, I have much more time to write. Fingers are itching, my friends.

How many of you have voicemail messages saved on your phone? I know, I know, sometimes it can be a pain in the ass to keep 'em around - which means, if you DO have some, they must be something awesome.

I've dabbled in keeping messages in my voicemail to listen to over and over, but eventually, after a week or two at the MOST, my anal-retentiveness takes over and I get tired of my Voicemail Lady telling me I still have messages saved in there. I don't know, there's just something satisfying knowing you don't have any fucking messages in there.

Which is why it's surprising that I've had a message in there pretty much since I've been in New York; and every time I listen to it, it ALWAYS makes me laugh. It's from Pete and, I've just gotta say, I don't see myself getting rid of it. I'm not quite sure, but I think at the end he rambles something as he's hanging up that sounds like, "Love ya bro; suck a dick!"

Do you know what makes for a quality Drunk Message? Brevity. I know drunk people are usually funny, and they can come up with some awesome things to say on a message, but it's DAMN hard to pull off the long, 3-minute rant about what you're observing as you're walking around. I've only heard about the rare few times where I've just killed a fucking message; I'm pretty sure I was out of body in those instances. But, if you keep those messages short, and I'm talking 30-seconds or less, you get your point across, and you leave off with something like "Love ya bro; suck a dick!" then I guarantee you that you'll have a winner.

Mario called me the other day and wanted to share for me a couple of messages I left for him on his voicemail. Now, these were very damn short messages, maybe 10 seconds or so. However, I was screaming at the time and you could hardly tell what I was saying. That brings us to Rule #2 of the Quality Drunk Message - Enunciation. Obviously, if you're drunk, that's no easy task. You're already at a disadvantage; nevertheless, don't yell. ESPECIALLY don't yell into a cell phone! If your intention is to make the everlasting Drunk Message, you gotta go with what your strengths are. Unless you're Sam Kinison, Adam Sandler, or Sylvester Stallone, loud unintelligible emissions from the mouth won't get you anywhere.

Finally - and this is the most important - Make Sure You're Drunk! This is twofold: you don't want to do the Drunk Message after a couple beers and a shot. That's a Buzz Dial, and you might as well just be sober. Buzzed people are NOT funny, they're usually just annoying ("Oh my God, I'm so buzzed right now; I don't need to drink anymore! I don't need you to defile me in the backseat of your Camaro!). Also, if you're sending out the Buzz Dial, chances are the person you're calling will still be awake and they'll pick up. The whole point of this thing is to Leave A Funny Message! Now, if you're getting on the horn, preparing what you're about to say to a voicemail machine, and the person picks up ... you're fucked! You're not ready for actual human interaction! Now you're stuck saying, "Oh, uhh, hey. I'm buzzed." LAME!

Another point on a related note: You don't want to be a part of the Drunk Dial experience when you're actually drunk and they pick up anyway. Now, you're drunk, you're talking to a human, AND you won't be remembering a word of what you say tomorrow. This opens things up to the possibility that you'll say something you'll regret later - which, can be done with a message too, however, if you're talking to a person, you're sinking into that quicksand MUCH quicker. It's harder to blow something off as Just Drunk Talk when you've been talking to the person for ten minutes. "No, but seriously! I ... LOVE you man!" Nobody wants to hear that when you're drunk! Unless it's in a funny little message where the person promptly tells you to Suck A Dick afterward.