Things That Are Awkward

When a strange dude unintentionally follows you to your car trying to make awkward small talk, because you had to wait together at a crosswalk and are headed in the same direction at the same speed.

That was creepy, Strange Dude.  If my car had been any further away I would have stopped at any random parked car, just to get rid of you.

Batman Maybe

I'm so glad Call Me Maybe became a meme.  It created such glorious things.

Why I can't ever be a nail blogger

I admit it, I am wildly jealous of people like Ash and Jen.  Their lovely long nails, their skill at applying nail polish and holding the camera steady so they can photograph their work, plus not to mention all those pretty colours!!  To have a nail polish blog must be a wonderful thing indeed.

I will now show you exactly why I can never have a blog like theirs.  Feel free to point and laugh.

It was really hard to take a photo of my nails.  I suck at holding cameras steady, let alone holding the camera steady and focused at my other hand which also must be held steady.  

Fifteenth time's a charm!  Finally got a not-blurry photo, now you can see how carefully and accurately I did my nails.  I don't even bother trying to do a tidy job of nail-painting, by the way.  I learned years ago that it's hopeless to even try.  I just tip my entire hand in a bucket of house paint and clean it up later.

Oh fuck it, I can't keep both hands steady at the same time.  I finally compromised and found something to put my hand on so I could take another picture (it's the edge of my sink, not the toilet bowl.  Though now that I've brought it up you probably won't believe me anyway).  I wish I could grow my nails longer than this, I'd love to have Ash's eye-gouging talons.  They'd probably be easier to paint, too.  Unfortunately I've been a nail-biter all my life.  If I let my nails get any longer than this they start driving me nuts and I start chewing on them.  It's a pretty hard habit to kick :(

Look at this, I can't even show the bottle without fucking it up.  Can you read the name on that?  I can't.  If I didn't have the bottle in front of me right now I couldn't tell you that this was a picture of Wet n Wild's Wild Shine polish.  The colour is Sunny Side Up but that's on the back, so I have an excuse for blocking that.

So this is why I can't have a nail blog.  I thought it would be funny to show the world how bad I am at painting my nails.  It kind of backfired, though, because this isn't funny at all, it's just boring.  Turns out there's not much point in writing about nail polish if you know nothing about nail polish and can't take decent photos of pretty nails.  At least the colour is cute?

Internet Dating Tips for the Discerning Gentleman

"I can't say it or you'll punch me -- oh I can't hold it in! You seem to have the best breasts ever!" probably isn't going to go over all that well with the lady you are trying to e-woo.  Pro tip, if you think it'll get you punched you might not want to bring it up.

Following up with "Oh but don't get mad!" isn't going to suddenly make your comment any more tactful or appropriate.  No, not even if you are "just stating the obvious!"

And after your dazzling compliment, the lady in question seems less than flattered by your attentions?  She will not suddenly be more tolerant or understanding or pleased when you tell her "Well it's only the truth! What, did you want me to lie?"

Just in case I need to spell it out for you, she didn't want you to mention it at all.  Trust me, there is no shortage of men on the internet chomping at the bit for a chance to talk about a woman's breasts.  Whatever it was you wanted to say about them, she's heard it before.  Multiple times, by multiple douchebags.  And usually the same thing, too.  Dudes apparently aren't all that creative when it comes to boobs.

well, when it comes to talking about them, then.

Now normally I'd assume that if a guy has randomly started talking about a girl's chest, he is a raging dickwad.  Seriously, it's pretty basic!  Polite friendly guys do not start talking about how a girl has boobs like the Mona Lisa has paint.  They do not point and make grabbing motions and honking sounds.  They do not write soulful titty haikus.  They do not make motorboat noises.  In general, they don't make awkward, rude comments about a woman's body if they are hoping for a chance to get to know said lady.

But JUST IN CASE!  I'm gonna let you in on a little secret.  If you are an earnest dude trying to compliment and flatter your lady-friend, boobs are probably not the first choice you should go for.  Butts and legs are also out.  In general, body parts are not the first thing you should aim at when you want to fire off a compliment.  You know what a good compliment sounds like?  "Hey, I love your scarf!" or "You're really good at piano!" or "You do a really good impression of a penguin choking on a cell phone!"  Rather than, "Your tits are boobful!" or "Yum."

boobs: probably not poisonous?

Want to know what makes them good compliments?  The person you are complimenting has chosen to wear that Fourth Doctor scarf.  She practiced really hard to be able to play Rach 3 flawlessly.  She did a lot of hands-on research to find out how choking penguins sound, and what ring tones they would choose.  Those things are indications of her choices and her personality.  She didn't look at her boob closet today and go "Hmm, the C-cups will look nice today!"  Her breasts are just something she happens to be shaped like.  A meaningful compliment would be on something about her personality, something that is relevant to her as a person.  Boobs are nice but they don't make her who she is.  And when every girl gets the "i like your breasts" message all the time, it's kind of like saying "I only noticed one thing about you, and your personality is less noteworthy than the fact that you, like many women, have breasts that I would like to play with."  And that just gets tiring.  So please, non-dickwad guys, will you please shut up about the breasts already?  I would tell the dickwads to shut up about them too, but well, they're dickwads.  They wouldn't listen to me anyway, the fuckers.

Don't get mad at me,

You have nice boobs -- should I lie?

A titty haiku.

Good advice, doc.

My sister had to get stitches a couple of weeks ago.  Her bike fell on her or something and gouged her leg open.  It kinda looked like a zombie bite or something, it was pretty rad.  Luckily for the world it was not a zombie bite, it was just an assassin bike that was bad at its job.

She had to go back to the doctor the other day to get the stitches removed, and apparently one fell out or something.  Or at least, he shaved off the scab that had grown around it and couldn't find it under  the scab.  So either it fell out or it's still in her leg somewhere.  Apparently the doctor told her, "I think it fell out, but it might be still in there.  If your leg gets a massive infection and starts smelling and is all pussy and gross for weeks and you can't figure out why, come back and we'll look for it then."

Great.  Exactly what you want to hear from your doctor.  Take two and come back when you ooze pus. 

The Adventures of Batman and Robin

I want another dog.  My old dog, a black lab named Pal who was a very good boy oh yes he was who's a pretty puppy boy, died about two years ago.  I desperately want to get another dog because dogs are freaking awesome, as we all know.  Unfortunately I can't get one because we had Pal for about fifteen years and Brogue before that for about the same amount of time.  Sure, Dad would love to get a new dog, but Mom is somewhat less enthusiastic.  Actually, she's just enthusiastic for the idea of not getting another dog.  She's pretty tired of dogs after having had one for twenty-five or thirty years now.  Besides, he works in a daycare, she spends all day dealing with small noisy creatures who can't go to the bathroom unattended as it is, she doesn't want to come home to it.

So right now a new dog is not really an option.  But eventually I will get a new dog, and I was talking to a friend the other day when the thought occurred to me -- what will I name my new dog?  Naming a dog is a big responsibility.  My sister named Pal, after the puppy on Arthur.  You know that book series/cartoon, it's about an aadvark with a tiny people-type nose even though the first book gave him a normal big aardvark nose and an aesop about how he shouldn't care about how big his nose is because looks aren't important.  Did you know that cartoon is still running?  Because I didn't!  Holy crap, that thing's been going since I was a kid, I remember watching it in the mornings before going to school.  That's a crazy long time for a kid's show to run.  What about Inspector Gadget, how long did that run?  Apparently they only made 85 episodes or something, but kept it in syndication for like a decade.  Dang, now I'm just getting huge nostalgia bombs.  I should look up that show about the Chinese cats who write with their tails.  Wait, cats?  I'm writing a blog post about dogs!  Dammit, keep on track.

Dog!  Naming dog.  My sister named Pal after, you know, Pal.  It was a really good name for him, because he was the sweetest, friendliest, stupidest dog you'd ever meet.  It would have been really dumb if we'd named him something that didn't suit, like Ripper or Sherlock.  Unless we were going for irony, but my sister was like seven when she named him so I don't think we really understood irony enough to base a dog's name on it.  We lucked out with Pal.  There was no guarantee that the next dog would be so accommodating to what we'd name it.

Clearly this was something to give serious thought to, while I still had time in the years between now and when I eventually get this dog.  But the other day I was talking to a friend, and it hit me!  The perfect name for whatever dog I get.  I can't believe I didn't think of it before.  I mean, my name is Robin, how can I name my dog anything other than Batman?  It's perfect!

So I was thinking about that and doing random blogspot searches -- you know, just typing in random blog names and seeing what came up -- and I found something amazing:  the name The Adventures of Batman and Robin wasn't taken.  How is this even possible.  I had assumed every single Batman-related blog title had already been imagined and claimed, especially the super-obvious ones like this.

So of course I took it.  I mean, I couldn't not take it.  What if when I get my new dog in the distant future, he wants to start a blog?  I'd have to be all, "Gee, Batman, a couple of years ago we could have had the best blog name ever, but I didn't nab it and now some twelve-year-old registered it, made one post and then fucked off into the ether never to return.  Tough luck!"  You just can't let that happen.  I don't think I could handle letting Batman down.  He's been through a lot of shit in his life, man.  Seeing his parents killed before his very eyes.  Having to wear that dorky cone after getting fixed.  Me constantly pretending to throw the ball when it's actually in my hand the entire time.  It's a hard life.  He deserves a win now and then, don't you think?

By the way, the blog Bat Shark Repellent is also free.  You know, just in case you wanted to make a totally awesome bat-blog.

Tropical Storm Leslie

So the house is making a lot of cracking sounds and swaying a bit.  But on the bright side, it isn't raining any more!  I can even see the sun.

The power went out this morning for about an hour, but luckily it went out right the very second I was done making my spaghetti.  Yes, I make spaghetti at eight thirty in the morning, and no that's not weird.  You're weird.  Shut up.

I wish somebody had told me there was a hurricane coming.  I would have stocked up.  Well, we've got food and milk and shit, I don't mean that stuff, but I'm out of pepsi.  I might walk to the store later to get some.  It's not that windy out.

Besides, half the fun of hurricanes is going out adventuring in them!  I had a blast with Hurricane Igor two years ago.  We went out walking around Kent's Pond and that area, and I blew away a couple of times!  Granted, I only went like two or three feet, but it was still cool.  I highly recommend going out in hurricane winds wearing big oversized jackets that can double as sails, it's fun.

Update!!  Storm's over, it's a super-nice day now.  Except for the broken branches all over the lawn.  The wind ripped long strips of siding off the front of the house and broke the fence in the backyard, that's gonna be fun to fix.

Soap Mummies FTW

I WANNA BE A SOAP MUMMY.

 Holy crap, look how friggin' awesome these dudes look!  How lucky are they, huh?

When I kick it, I want to be planted in good soap-mummy-growing-ground so I turn into a giant people-shaped block of waxy death-soap, and then eventually dug up and put on display somewhere to look totally fucking badass.  Like this lady!

She looks pretty happy about the whole situation, right?  Of course she does.  Who wouldn't be?

I guess if being a soap mummy is off the table I'd settle for being one of those other, boring mummies.  Or maybe sent to a body farm, that would be cool too.  Just hanging out with a bunch of other corpses, having a rot party.

But I don't want to be like, some Immaculate Lenin style corpse where I look all fresh and sleepy-dead.  I want to be this terrifying monstrosity that is the embodiment of death.  I want people to look at me and go "Oh holy shit, am I gonna look like that when I die?  OHGODNIGHTMARES" and go home and look at their kids and be all, "my children will die and be terrifying."  And my mummy-corpse will be satisfied.

Baby corpse, always classy.  Aww yiss.

Notes on Jem

I'm writing a recap/review thing for the first episode of Jem, and something occurred to me.  The Misfits are the "bad" group, and Jem and the Holograms are the "good" group.  So the Misfits embody all the negative traits, like greed, anger, arrogance, etc.  And Jem and the Holograms embody the virtues: honesty, friendship, kindness, charity, etc.

So what's with the names?  How come it isn't "The Holograms" and "Pizzazz and the Misfits"?  Pizzazz is both the indisputable leader of the Misfits and one of the most arrogant, self-centred people on the show.  But Jem is the one that feels the need to distinguish herself as the Leader And Most Important Person in the name of the band, above her friends and sister.

So is Jem/Jerrica secretly a bitch?  I mean, hints of it show up all through the series, like the continued lie to her boyfriend and being a total snob when it comes to the Misfits (she called them and the music they sing trash the first time she sees them, it's no wonder they hate her so much).  Is it really so important to her that she be the most famous and identifiable member of her band?

LOOK AT MEEEEEE