X-Mas Time At The Office

Black Friday has come and gone, and we're full bore into the Christmas season. I realize that this causes a great deal of stress in many people, but if you're careful not to take it too seriously and remember that you don't have to be "in the spirit" constantly, you can breeze right through it. And why wouldn't you want to enjoy the month? After all, look what follows it. Three entire months of bitter cold, snow, days on end without sunshine and crushing abysmal cabin fever.

So, if you look at it that way, December seems like a great month. And it can be. There are parties to attend, family gatherings to go to, and best of all, at least two showings of ... Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer ... the Rankin/Bass production!

Yaaaaay!

Bumbles, Bumbles, Bumbles!

Good times, but not the subject of this discussion. Actually, there is a down side to the Christmas season, at least for me. And that is the office Christmas party. As I've mentioned, Christmas is for friends and family, and the people that you are caged in with for 8 or 9 hours a day, five days a week, are neither. I've never seen the purpose of having to spend your free time with people who you already see more than anyone else during your waking hours. These gatherings are invariable stilted and awkward for everyone involved. Fortunately, the shitty economy is doing it's part to eradicate these hellish events.

But there's always some goody two shoes in any office who feels like everyone has to do something to share the holiday spirit. And thus, we are seeing the rise of a particularly odious office Christmas social event ... the Secret Santa. You all know this one. Everyone drops their names in a hat and you get to pick, totally at random, some other poor soul you work with, and have to get them a present. If you're lucky, you'll draw the name of someone you are at least familiar with, and may have a chance of getting that person something they would actually like to receive. But I've never been that fortunate. I always draw someone I either have never talked to, or in the worst case scenario, don't even recognize their name.

The most terrible of these Secret Santa events for me was the one year I "gifted" a co-worker with an Amaretto gift set, and the guy turned out to be a devout Muslim. Ooops! And I'm sure there are a lot of stories that are even more awkward than that. The point is, that no one really likes what they get at a Secret Santa exchange, and I was thinking this morning that if we're going to be forced to continue these things, we ought to make the gifts so bad that they're almost masterpieces of bad taste. So, I did some looking and came up with the following. Most of these gifts are in a reasonable price range and guaranteed to be unwanted.

Shut The Hell Up Gum - $2.99

Give this to your cube mate and maybe he/she will cram his mouth so full that they'll stop talking about their kidney stones long enough that you can get some work done.

Dog Shit Calendar - $13.99

A lot of people have pets. Most people eat too much during the holidays. Hang it on the refrigerator to curb your appetite. Two levels of perfect.

Fetus Cookie Cutter - $9.99

For that special pregnant cookie lover. Make a batch of oatmeal raisin to enhance the gift.

Gay Accent Breath Spray - $5.99

There has to be at least one gay person in the office. A thoughtful gift in so many ways.

I can almost guarantee that you'll be the "talk of the office" when you're on the giving end of any of these fine products. But just be prepared to have that career track you were on altered just a smidgen.

Happy gift giving!

Shattered Beliefs

Remember when you were a kid and it was Christmas time? And you were bored one day so you decided to pull down the ladder to the attic and see what was up there? And when you turned on the bare light bulb and illuminated the area and you saw a bunch of toys? And in the blinding flash of one solitary second ... you realized that there was no Santa Claus!?

You don't? Well I do. And let me tell you, it wasn't a pleasant experience. One I hoped would never repeat itself. And in the 50-some years that have followed I have been lucky in this regard, until about a month ago.

During my recovery from a long illness several years ago, I discovered The Food Network. The channel became my companion, and the "stars" of it's many cooking shows, my friends. I especially enjoyed "Iron Chef America". I loved the frenzy, the fierce competition and the nail-biting finish to see whose bevy of exotic dishes, centering around the secret ingredient, would win the day. And surveying the mayhem in Kitchen Stadium was "The Chairman" a stoic individual, who I believed was the master of the culinary arts, and who had more talent in his little finger than the rest of the Iron Chefs put together, including that ginormous douchebag, Bobby Flay.

Several months ago, I happened to catch several minutes of "Dancing With The Stars", which by the way, Jan loves and I give up all hope of watching anything else when this over-bloated clown fest is being broadcast. Anyway, I was glancing at the screen when my eyes locked in on "The Chairman"! My mind reeled. What in all that is holy was The Chairman doing on Dancing with the Stars? And then it struck me like a thunder bolt ... The Chairman was a fake, a charlatan, a third rate celebrity. He was ... Mark Decascos!

The Chairman - My Idol

Mark Dacascos - Twinkle Toes Douchebag

I felt like I had been punched in the stomach. And then I got mad. If the Food Network had perpetrated this scam on me, what other kinds of bullshit had they pulled? So I started doing some serious detective work, which encompassed all of ten minutes, and came up with several stunning revelations.

For instance, Alton Brown, The Food Network's resident smart ass was the director of photography for an REM music video, and operated the steadicam for Spike Lee's cinematic masterpiece "School Daze". And this qualifies him for a cooking show how? Oh sure, he later graduated from the New England Culinary Institute, but so what?

Once A Steadicam Operator

Always a Steadicam Operator

And what about Robert Irvine? The Food Network made big huffing and puffing noises when they found out that he had fudged his culinary resume and kicked him off of "Dinner Impossible", but after replacement tuna steak Michael Symon turned out to be a bust, look who's back on the show?

"I Got No Personality"

I'm Back Babeee!

Dig My Guns!

And in what is the final straw for me, The Food Network was featured in a series of strips of "Cathy" ... probably the worst newspaper comic strip in the history of the civilized world. When Cathy Guisewite spots a trend, it has normally been dead for a decade or more.

AAACKKK!

Food Network, you have betrayed my trust, and are now featured in terrible new venues ... and I must move on to other things. Yes, I'm now pledging my foodie loyalty to The Travel Channel, which has much better cooking shows anyway, including this guy.

But I'll probably sneak back occasionally to watch Guy Fieri. He may be gross and sloppy, but at least he knows he can't cook.

Tasteless Guy Humor

Last night I was wandering through the intertubes, looking for some information on Pancho Barnes. Pancho was a woman aviator in the 1920's and 30's who was almost as famous as Amelia Earhart, but usually took a back seat to her accomplishments, because Earhart and her husband were better hucksters. Pancho held the world air speed record for a period of time, and in later years gained notoriety for her Happy Bottom Riding Club, just outside of Edwards Air Force Base in the high desert of California. You might remember that she was a character in the movie "The Right Stuff". Unlike Earhart, Pancho did a lot of stunt flying in the movies made during her earlier years, including the one featured in the picture I've predominantly displayed above.

Pancho ... Looking awesome!

Being immature, the first thing I did when I saw this was snigger. "Cock Of The Air" ... Heh, heh ... heh, heh. This made me think of George Carlin's "The Seven Words You Can't Say On Television, and my favorite line from his act "You can prick your finger, but don't finger your prick". This, of course, made me snigger some more. Wouldn't it have been hilarious if Howard Hughes had managed to ram through the title "Prick Of The Air"?

This picture was made before the Hays Act was recognized and the motion picture industry was forced to knuckle under to "family" standards. In fact, a lot of movies made right after the advent of talkies and into the early 30's could be quite racy. And Hughes was in the forefront of constantly challenging the MPAA's forerunner on the content of his movies, until he was beat down by the association over his movie "The Outlaw", starring Jane Russell. After that, he pretty much gave up the motion picture producer game and went on to realize his lifelong dream of becoming a world class weirdo.

And speaking of Howard Hughes, if you've somehow missed the cinematic treatment of his life "The Aviator", I highly recommend that you put it on your viewing list for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday/weekend.

As long as I'm prattling along, I might as well take the opportunity to answer a question that was sent to my highly occasional feature "Mr. Answer Guy". Today's question comes from JD, who hails from the perpetually soggy but beautiful town of Tacoma, Washington. JD writes:

Dear Mr. Answer Guy, I was at a baby shower recently, and we were playing one of those incredibly stupid games that they insist on doing at those things. I was thrown the question "What is a baby eel called?" Well, of course, I didn't have a clue, and everyone started laughing, and I got so nervous that I started sweating and the sweat stain spread from my armpits across my chest and my back, creating a phenomenon called "saddlebags". But the joke was on them, because no one knew the answer. What is a baby eel called? And how do I get the sweat stain out of my blouse?

Well, J ... this is a pretty simple one and I'm surprised that you didn't know the answer. A baby eel is called an "elver" or in local parlance, a "glass eel". I would file this one away in the old noggin, because it comes up often in daily conversations. Oh, and use Shout with Oxyclean to get that stubborn stain out.

Finally, to all of my loyal readers ... followers and lurkers alike, a very pleasant Thanksgiving to you and yours.

Blaze

I've mentioned in several posts that my Granddad owned a farm outside of town during the time when I was growing up. On any given weekend, we would more than likely end up going out there on a Sunday afternoon. I never really did know why, as my Mom never really seemed to like her old man. And she certainly never cared for her step mother, but I guess she had her reasons for visiting.

I went along because I had to, being too young to stay home by myself. You would think there would be a lot on a farm to occupy me, but there really wasn't. The yard around the house was huge, so I'd go out there and wander around if the weather was nice. I tried climbing some trees once, until I encountered a bull snake in one of the branches, then I never did that again. There was a barn, but the barnyard was fenced in and guarded by a bull who was perpetually pissed off because there were no other cows around. I guess he had a case of blue balls all of the time. And there was a smoke house and an equipment garage and a hen house. All pretty boring shit.

But they did have a horse. His name was Blaze (for a white mark on his muzzle), and he wasn't good for much besides just being there. He was broke and all, but I don't think either Granddad or Loma rode him much, except for just exercise once in a while. Every time we went out to the farm, I had hopes that they would get him out and let me ride him. But they never did.

However, one Sunday in the early summer, old Troy must have been feeling magnanimous towards his black sheep grandson and asked me if I wanted to ride him. He got him out of the barn and saddled him up and told me to climb up. Well, I had never been real close to Blaze before, and it turned out that he was at least two stories tall. But with a little help, I managed to get my foot in a stirrup and hauled my fat ass into the saddle. After a half minute of reign instruction, the horse headed out on the dirt road that ran in front of the house.

We trotted down the road. And trotted ... and trotted ... and trotted. Because Blaze wouldn't do anything else. Blaze wouldn't turn left, he wouldn't turn right. He wouldn't speed up, he wouldn't slow down, and he wouldn't stop. No matter how much I yanked the reigns, or dug my heels into his flanks, or yelled at him, he just kept on keepin' on. Right down the road.

Then at a tree beside the road, which must have been a predetermined marker for the horse, he abruptly turned around and started back, with no help from me. And again, no matter how much I yanked, kicked and screamed, he serenely trotted back to the farm house yard, turned in and stopped. And that was the end of the ride.

Fucking horse.

On the way home that evening, I was bitching about the horse not doing what I wanted it to, and my Mom told me I was lucky that I hadn't been hurt, because she thought Blaze was a mean animal. And this turned out to be true. About 5 years later, Loma was out riding Blaze in a pasture when it threw her. She broke her leg and pelvis, and since my Granddad was in Bolivar that afternoon, shooting the shit with his cronies, she had to crawl the mile back to the house and summon help from there. If nothing else, she was a tough old bird.

Being up there in years, it took Loma a long while to recover, but she eventually started walking around again, albeit not as well as she did before being thrown. One day, when Troy went over to Bolivar for another one of his good old boy gatherings, Loma took the Army 45 that he had brought home from the Great War, hobbled out to the barn and shot Blaze straight between the eyes.

I wish there had been a more pleasant end to this story, but sometimes farm life is not all chickies and duckies and sunflowers swaying gently in the summer breeze.

Sometimes there's a good dose of frontier style revenge.

Scenes From Suburban Hell (An Irregular Feature)

This morning I was busy cleaning the house. I'd gathered up several bags of trash and took them out through the garage and through the side door, where our big garbage can is stored. When I opened the door and stepped through, I looked at the side of our neighbors house and saw this:

WTF?

I stared at it for a couple of seconds and thought to myself "No, that must be one of those trophy wall mounts that this guy decided he didn't want anymore, so he put it out by the trash".

But there wasn't any wood plaque on the back, and the eyes looked sort of funny, and there were flies buzzing around it. So I got a little closer ... and :

AAAAAAAH! A Severed Deer Head!

This is so typical of this guy. He, his wife and his two kids are all nice enough people, but he has a penchant for collecting junk. I've come home to find his yard full of bicycles that he bought at an auction. Another time his driveway was filled with old lawnmowers, and then wheelbarrows ... I'm sure if he was certain he wouldn't get fined, he'd have a rusty old car jacked up on cinder blocks in the front yard with a "For Sale" sign in front of it.

And, as you might have guessed, he is a hunter. A bow hunter to be exact, the purists of the hunting world. When he is not out bow hunting, or collecting junk, he likes to use me for target practice in his back yard.

From past experience, I know that the severed deer head is going no where. It will sit there all winter and into the spring, letting the forces of nature wear away the hide, sinew, muscle and flesh down to the bare skull. And then he will put it in his special "garden" in one corner of his front yard, where it will join the other deer skulls, a dead sapling in a rusty coffee can and a half inflated Canadian goose decoy to delight all the visitors to our humble cul-de-sac.

And I know exactly what's going through your minds. You're thinking "Rob, you must take pictures chronicling the decay process and update us on it's progress from time to time". And gentle readers, you can be assured that I will be there for you.

To do this right, I'll need to personalize this partial former resident of the forest. I need to give him a name. In honor of all of the flies that were busily feasting on him today, I'm going to call him ...

Buzzy.