This is why I can't be a parent. Pity my animals.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Baby Cage
Today I read a few snippets in between calls of an awesome blog called Asshole Baby. This blog--while obviously about a loving father and his adventures in the hell fire that is fatherhood--is chock-full of reasons exactly why I am NOT ready to be a mother. Babies poop. They pee everywhere. They eat things. Lots of non-food things. They're a lot like my dog, actually, only they shed slightly less and you can't throw them in the kennel for several hours while you get shit faced off Long Islands and vodka Red Bulls run to the store for a few emergency items. Well...not unless you hook up a pretty sweet baby cage. Throw some blankets in there, one of those little water bottles they hang in hamster cages, only fill it with milk...*shakes self* No! Bad! No baby cage!
This is why I can't be a parent. Pity my animals.
This is why I can't be a parent. Pity my animals.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Brain Cancer
It's been so long since I've posted on here. Too long, in fact.
I promise, there are reasons behind it all.
As all two of my "followers" may know, my very dear friend Hunter was recently diagnosed with brain Glioblastoma. Only about 1 in 4 live longer than 2 years after their diagnosis, and an even more ridiculously small amount live past that. Needless to say, that and school have been taking up a lot of my spare time lately--something that I have precious few of, anyway.
It gets you thinking a lot about dark stuff--cancer. A lot of heavy, existential stuff that tends to crawl into your brain and pry it apart bit by bit, like a starfish going after a meal. Or the cancer itself. Just what is fair? Just what caused it? Just why did it happen right now? Things like that. You never really find the answers, of course. You never will. Thousands of people who were blessed with a whole lot more intelligence than I have are paid disgustingly grandiose amounts of money to just sit and think about these questions--and they're probably just as close to understanding the answer as I am.
What I do know, however, is that life's not fair. It's indiscriminate in who it takes and who it leaves, as long as it can bloat itself upon the trials and misfortunes of many unfortunate misfits. That's a rather bleak outlook on it, I know, but I guess it's hard to remain optimistic in times like these. Hard to remain objective when friends--when family--are being pulled away so rapidly. 2 years. That's not a long time, you know. Think about what you were doing 2 years ago. Now think about what you'd be doing if you knew that by this time--by tomorrow, even--you'd be drawing your last dying breath, having spent much of your time in and out of hospitals, your hair slowly wilting away from your body, along with your strength and ability to function as a normal, healthy adult. You can't run, you can't fight--not from this. It's a staggering concept to grasp. One that I don't think I'd do well to dwell on for too long.
Love you Hunter. I don't know how you manage to remain so upbeat, so optimistic, so--normal--through all of this. I hope so much to someday to be half the person you've always been.
I promise, there are reasons behind it all.
As all two of my "followers" may know, my very dear friend Hunter was recently diagnosed with brain Glioblastoma. Only about 1 in 4 live longer than 2 years after their diagnosis, and an even more ridiculously small amount live past that. Needless to say, that and school have been taking up a lot of my spare time lately--something that I have precious few of, anyway.
It gets you thinking a lot about dark stuff--cancer. A lot of heavy, existential stuff that tends to crawl into your brain and pry it apart bit by bit, like a starfish going after a meal. Or the cancer itself. Just what is fair? Just what caused it? Just why did it happen right now? Things like that. You never really find the answers, of course. You never will. Thousands of people who were blessed with a whole lot more intelligence than I have are paid disgustingly grandiose amounts of money to just sit and think about these questions--and they're probably just as close to understanding the answer as I am.
What I do know, however, is that life's not fair. It's indiscriminate in who it takes and who it leaves, as long as it can bloat itself upon the trials and misfortunes of many unfortunate misfits. That's a rather bleak outlook on it, I know, but I guess it's hard to remain optimistic in times like these. Hard to remain objective when friends--when family--are being pulled away so rapidly. 2 years. That's not a long time, you know. Think about what you were doing 2 years ago. Now think about what you'd be doing if you knew that by this time--by tomorrow, even--you'd be drawing your last dying breath, having spent much of your time in and out of hospitals, your hair slowly wilting away from your body, along with your strength and ability to function as a normal, healthy adult. You can't run, you can't fight--not from this. It's a staggering concept to grasp. One that I don't think I'd do well to dwell on for too long.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Pathos
In my vast and varied life-spanning all of these 23 years thus far-I feel that I have grown both as an individual and as a contributing member to society. Many things that I once saw in black and white are now metaphorical shades of gray--topics of interest in life that can be molded and sculpted to fit different situations and people as the circumstances change. One thing, however, has remained a deeply-rooted conviction in my mind and heart--possibly even growing stronger as time goes by.
Don't.
Fuck.
With.
My.
Animals.
Or any animals, really. There are few things with intentions so honest or typically well meaning in this life than that of an animal's mind and heart. Sure, you get your crazy asshole poodle once in a while, and it seems to me that I heard once that dolphins fuck up sharks just "for the helluvit" (actual dolphin quote), but for the most part--in my opinion--even the most brutal acts from an animal have some underlying, logical reason. Take, for instance, my dogs. Both sweet, both pretty starkly different personalities, but if they feel I'm threatened in any way? Yeah, that's 20 lbs of furry fury I wouldn't want to be on the wrong side of. Like, seriously, these dogs are kind of pathetic. I was out of town for a couple of days and one of them barely ate. This dog was the runt of the litter-wouldn't even fight for his food-and he eats everything.
It's partially because of these reasons that I think most of us develop a sense of righteous anger when we see an abused animal on television, a kid kicking a cat on the street, or a dog in a sweater. It's not right, they don't know why it's happening to them, and they couldn't stop it if they tried. I had one such run-in about a year and a half ago...
It's mid-to-late summer (I don't really remember which, actually) and my roommate had just moved out with a week's notice. Desperately needing a replacement party to fill the empty room, my other roommate suggests one of his friends-a rather odd (and by "odd" I mean bat shit crazy) fellow by the name of-let's call him Thes. Everything went fine for the first day or so, and then he revealed his inner alcoholic artistic genius nutcase side. One such example was when he brought home a young woman he met on the MAX that he knew from high school...supposedly.. Anyways, I get woken up at 1:30 in the morning with her shrieking and bawling at the bottom of the stairs about the injustices of kennel training-which is, for those of you who might not know, the practice of teaching a dog to sleep/stay in a comfortably-sized kennel when you're, say, in bed or out of the house. It really helps you avoid stepping on candy-bar-sized puppies in the middle of the night and keeps them from pooping and or chewing on everything in sight. But nooooo, this was an injustice! This was "sick", "cruel" and "fucked up!" As the poor dear collapsed in a miserable heap in the entryway-weak from the sight of it all-and probably from the alcohol and whatever else she was on-I told my roommates to take her to bed, let her crash on the couch-whatever, just shut her up and let me sleep for 4 more hours until I had to go to work.
It lasted for about an hour.
2 AM, both me and the boyfriend are woken up by the most gut-wrenching, ear-piercing shriek we've ever experienced. Honestly, we thought someone must have been stabbed. Throwing open the bedroom door, we're greeted by one of the puppies-the runt-my dog-crying in pain, unable to use one leg and trying desperately to just get closer to us-to come and greet us like he does every time anyone walks in the door. Now, as I mentioned before, our dogs are crate-trained. He should be downstairs, in a closed kennel, sleeping on his brother, sister and mom. Instead, something has happened that has managed to both terrify and injure him, and the only thing he could think to do was to crawl his way painstakingly across an entire house and up two flights of stairs to us. Picture this:
with the worst case of puppy-eyes imaginable and in pain. And you don't know how to fix it, or even to what extent he's been hurt. Yeah, me too. After passing Runt to the boyfriend, I ran downstairs to see the girl-alone-with the kennel open, cradling one of the puppies and murmuring various drunken promises to it. Another puppy was wandering the living room, exploring various nooks and crannies, while their mom looked nervously back and forth between the two. She was a good mom, just not aggressive.
Now, I tend to get rather irritated with people sometimes. Heck, at my job, I even get downright pissed. But I usually tend to keep a pretty even keel, and I never yell. I yelled. I yelled at her to put the dog down. I yelled at her to go upstairs and crash. I yelled at her to get out of my sight and to sleep off whatever she was on. She slunk upstairs, I checked the puppies, took them and their mom to my room, then I, too, went upstairs. Where I yelled some more. At some point I seem to remember her rolling her eyes and trying to deny doing anything, but this did not bode well for her. I believe were my exact words were
"NO. You're going to shut up, you're going to take it, or you're going to get the fuck out of my house."
I never laid a hand on her-I don't think I had to. The puppies were fine, and aside from being shaken up, Runt was able to walk fine in an hour or two. The girl left the next day (the only reason I hadn't kicked her out that night was because we lived in a sketchy part of town), and that also ended up being the day Thes was asked to move out. All in all, everything worked out pretty well, but I stand by my statement: Don't fuck with animals. Especially mine. Because I will find you.
Don't.
Fuck.
With.
My.
Animals.
Or any animals, really. There are few things with intentions so honest or typically well meaning in this life than that of an animal's mind and heart. Sure, you get your crazy asshole poodle once in a while, and it seems to me that I heard once that dolphins fuck up sharks just "for the helluvit" (actual dolphin quote), but for the most part--in my opinion--even the most brutal acts from an animal have some underlying, logical reason. Take, for instance, my dogs. Both sweet, both pretty starkly different personalities, but if they feel I'm threatened in any way? Yeah, that's 20 lbs of furry fury I wouldn't want to be on the wrong side of. Like, seriously, these dogs are kind of pathetic. I was out of town for a couple of days and one of them barely ate. This dog was the runt of the litter-wouldn't even fight for his food-and he eats everything.
It's partially because of these reasons that I think most of us develop a sense of righteous anger when we see an abused animal on television, a kid kicking a cat on the street, or a dog in a sweater. It's not right, they don't know why it's happening to them, and they couldn't stop it if they tried. I had one such run-in about a year and a half ago...
It's mid-to-late summer (I don't really remember which, actually) and my roommate had just moved out with a week's notice. Desperately needing a replacement party to fill the empty room, my other roommate suggests one of his friends-a rather odd (and by "odd" I mean bat shit crazy) fellow by the name of-let's call him Thes. Everything went fine for the first day or so, and then he revealed his inner alcoholic artistic genius nutcase side. One such example was when he brought home a young woman he met on the MAX that he knew from high school...supposedly.. Anyways, I get woken up at 1:30 in the morning with her shrieking and bawling at the bottom of the stairs about the injustices of kennel training-which is, for those of you who might not know, the practice of teaching a dog to sleep/stay in a comfortably-sized kennel when you're, say, in bed or out of the house. It really helps you avoid stepping on candy-bar-sized puppies in the middle of the night and keeps them from pooping and or chewing on everything in sight. But nooooo, this was an injustice! This was "sick", "cruel" and "fucked up!" As the poor dear collapsed in a miserable heap in the entryway-weak from the sight of it all-and probably from the alcohol and whatever else she was on-I told my roommates to take her to bed, let her crash on the couch-whatever, just shut her up and let me sleep for 4 more hours until I had to go to work.
It lasted for about an hour.
2 AM, both me and the boyfriend are woken up by the most gut-wrenching, ear-piercing shriek we've ever experienced. Honestly, we thought someone must have been stabbed. Throwing open the bedroom door, we're greeted by one of the puppies-the runt-my dog-crying in pain, unable to use one leg and trying desperately to just get closer to us-to come and greet us like he does every time anyone walks in the door. Now, as I mentioned before, our dogs are crate-trained. He should be downstairs, in a closed kennel, sleeping on his brother, sister and mom. Instead, something has happened that has managed to both terrify and injure him, and the only thing he could think to do was to crawl his way painstakingly across an entire house and up two flights of stairs to us. Picture this:
with the worst case of puppy-eyes imaginable and in pain. And you don't know how to fix it, or even to what extent he's been hurt. Yeah, me too. After passing Runt to the boyfriend, I ran downstairs to see the girl-alone-with the kennel open, cradling one of the puppies and murmuring various drunken promises to it. Another puppy was wandering the living room, exploring various nooks and crannies, while their mom looked nervously back and forth between the two. She was a good mom, just not aggressive.
Now, I tend to get rather irritated with people sometimes. Heck, at my job, I even get downright pissed. But I usually tend to keep a pretty even keel, and I never yell. I yelled. I yelled at her to put the dog down. I yelled at her to go upstairs and crash. I yelled at her to get out of my sight and to sleep off whatever she was on. She slunk upstairs, I checked the puppies, took them and their mom to my room, then I, too, went upstairs. Where I yelled some more. At some point I seem to remember her rolling her eyes and trying to deny doing anything, but this did not bode well for her. I believe were my exact words were
"NO. You're going to shut up, you're going to take it, or you're going to get the fuck out of my house."
I never laid a hand on her-I don't think I had to. The puppies were fine, and aside from being shaken up, Runt was able to walk fine in an hour or two. The girl left the next day (the only reason I hadn't kicked her out that night was because we lived in a sketchy part of town), and that also ended up being the day Thes was asked to move out. All in all, everything worked out pretty well, but I stand by my statement: Don't fuck with animals. Especially mine. Because I will find you.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Brain Soup
Sometimes-and by sometimes, I mean all the time-work kills my brains. When I get yet another degenerate gambler screaming at me in some unintelligible accent (Jamaican, Bostonian, Italian, doesn't matter..) about how his account is short five bucks because he can't do simple math or learn to navigate a fucking website because his grandkids thought it would be a hoot to buy grandpappy a new laptop so he could email them pictures of his new cat and type his entire topic IN THE DAMN SUBJECT LINE!!!! *gasp...collects self*...well, I just feel a little bit of myself die inside. I swear, it really is like these damn headsets we snake over our craniums every day slowly seep off tiny bits of gray matter with every call-like skimming oil off a pot of Pho. Then, they whisk it away to feed to a giant, hideous, cloud-like monster that feeds off of our very thoughts and souls-devouring anything of substance. But unlike Pho-where eventually after all that skimming you are left with the best parts of a savory spiced broth that is like a little orgy in your mouth when you add the noodles, flank steak, bean sprouts, basil and Sriracha-all this leaves me with is a steadily dwindling store of intellect, sanity, and drive for life. And that monster is the voice on the other end of the line.
Now, I've never met someone who I actually knew for a fact had an IQ of 70-but I guarantee you that I talk to at least 20 of these people a day at my job. On a good day. And by "good" I mean "doesn't end with me seriously contemplating the benefits of shaking my head so hard I get a concussion from knocking my brain against my skull over and over again." Yes, I know how hard that would be to accomplish. That's how god damned hopeless my work life has become.
Oh, sure, not all of them are that bad, and the fringe benefits certainly help-but aside from the occasional pair of movie tickets, iPod Shuffle or brief chat with a B-list celebrity, for the most part, I am dying a little inside every time I hear yet another middle-school dropout mouth breather posing as his girlfriend's "legal counsel" answer the phone threatening to go to the FBI over twelve dollars that was never missing to begin with. On the bright side, only 30 minutes left until my weekend! Then I can regroup, refresh, and come back to fight another day! Right?...Right?
......Anyone?
I literally just got back last week from vacation. God help us all.
Now, I've never met someone who I actually knew for a fact had an IQ of 70-but I guarantee you that I talk to at least 20 of these people a day at my job. On a good day. And by "good" I mean "doesn't end with me seriously contemplating the benefits of shaking my head so hard I get a concussion from knocking my brain against my skull over and over again." Yes, I know how hard that would be to accomplish. That's how god damned hopeless my work life has become.
Oh, sure, not all of them are that bad, and the fringe benefits certainly help-but aside from the occasional pair of movie tickets, iPod Shuffle or brief chat with a B-list celebrity, for the most part, I am dying a little inside every time I hear yet another middle-school dropout mouth breather posing as his girlfriend's "legal counsel" answer the phone threatening to go to the FBI over twelve dollars that was never missing to begin with. On the bright side, only 30 minutes left until my weekend! Then I can regroup, refresh, and come back to fight another day! Right?...Right?
......Anyone?
I literally just got back last week from vacation. God help us all.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Dear Cheese
Dear Cheese Stick,
I'm sorry you're forced to sit there in front of me, looking all delicious in your tidy little clear plastic wrapping-the soft white and warm, pleasant orange melding together in fantastic Colby Jack-ness. It's just, well, I have a job, you know? It's not that I don't want you-hell, you know I positively drool over those sharp little curves that make up that luscious rectangle that is you-but I have to make enough money to support both of us, and it would look really bad if they graded one of my calls and heard me...you know...eating. You're still my cheesy little goodness, it's just a bad time for me right now. I don't know...maybe I should have left you in the fridge at home-you had family there, ya know? The half block of Cheddar, the shredded Mexican blend (even though he was kind of an asshole sometimes), your other fellow cheese stick brethren-yeah, it wasn't perfect, but at least you had each other, right? You had a support group-you weren't just laying there, getting all room-temperature and soft in your packaging. You deserve better than that. Don't worry, we'll be together soon, I'll take you somewhere nice-like the break room-you'd like that, right? Yeah, the break room, where I'll eat you. And we'll finally be happy together.
Love,
Me
I'm sorry you're forced to sit there in front of me, looking all delicious in your tidy little clear plastic wrapping-the soft white and warm, pleasant orange melding together in fantastic Colby Jack-ness. It's just, well, I have a job, you know? It's not that I don't want you-hell, you know I positively drool over those sharp little curves that make up that luscious rectangle that is you-but I have to make enough money to support both of us, and it would look really bad if they graded one of my calls and heard me...you know...eating. You're still my cheesy little goodness, it's just a bad time for me right now. I don't know...maybe I should have left you in the fridge at home-you had family there, ya know? The half block of Cheddar, the shredded Mexican blend (even though he was kind of an asshole sometimes), your other fellow cheese stick brethren-yeah, it wasn't perfect, but at least you had each other, right? You had a support group-you weren't just laying there, getting all room-temperature and soft in your packaging. You deserve better than that. Don't worry, we'll be together soon, I'll take you somewhere nice-like the break room-you'd like that, right? Yeah, the break room, where I'll eat you. And we'll finally be happy together.
Love,
Me
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Tis' the season
To forget about shitty customers. So, for no apparent reason, here is Marlon Bran-dough with a stack of dough dressed up like a male doe-which is technically a buck, but it's my blog here, so if you want to split hairs, go suck a d'oh.
Speaking of things that don't make sense, last night I was taking my dog on her normal 20 minute "This spot's not quite right to bless with pee" walk (the sweet momma one, not the demon), when all of the sudden these two mops-I mean rats-I mean dogs-come tearing up to us with their owner shouting at them, and they are piiiiissed. They were seriously all like "maah! We're evil little cockapoos and we're bitter because we're not a real breed! maah! Fie on you and your dog for bequeathing this ground with pee!" Also, I'm pretty much in possession of the worst reflexes. Ever. Young Anakin I am not. Ever heard that quote "he who hesitates is lost"? I would be the first to die on the battlefield in times of yore. I often reflect upon this minor tragedy of life-often while I should probably be reacting to the urgent-and sometimes dangerous-situation at hand. Anyways, that's neither here nor there-the point is, it's because of these "reflexes" that I have to almost manually engage, that it wasn't until the little beasties were almost upon me that I reached down to pick up my dog, who was currently standing with her feeble little chest puffed out and her head back-looking more intrigued than anything. Suddenly, just as I'm about to lift her up and out of harm's way, I hear the familiar click of an extendable leash and the dogs come to an abrupt halt-half choking themselves. Just like that. The woman who owned them had a leash on them the entire time and for some God knows why reason decided that the best solution to keeping them under control is to run after them, shouting nonsensical half-formed commands. As they're slowly pulled away (apparently controlling two dogs who weigh all of twenty pounds put together is a very laborious task), barking all the while, my dog and I walk back to the apartment, she determinedly snuffing in a very "psh, I could have taken them" way. Later on, as I saw the same lady walking the same dogs down the same sidewalk, the same 10 feet in front of her, I had an epiphany: I hate little yappy fucking dogs.
Speaking of things that don't make sense, last night I was taking my dog on her normal 20 minute "This spot's not quite right to bless with pee" walk (the sweet momma one, not the demon), when all of the sudden these two mops-I mean rats-I mean dogs-come tearing up to us with their owner shouting at them, and they are piiiiissed. They were seriously all like "maah! We're evil little cockapoos and we're bitter because we're not a real breed! maah! Fie on you and your dog for bequeathing this ground with pee!" Also, I'm pretty much in possession of the worst reflexes. Ever. Young Anakin I am not. Ever heard that quote "he who hesitates is lost"? I would be the first to die on the battlefield in times of yore. I often reflect upon this minor tragedy of life-often while I should probably be reacting to the urgent-and sometimes dangerous-situation at hand. Anyways, that's neither here nor there-the point is, it's because of these "reflexes" that I have to almost manually engage, that it wasn't until the little beasties were almost upon me that I reached down to pick up my dog, who was currently standing with her feeble little chest puffed out and her head back-looking more intrigued than anything. Suddenly, just as I'm about to lift her up and out of harm's way, I hear the familiar click of an extendable leash and the dogs come to an abrupt halt-half choking themselves. Just like that. The woman who owned them had a leash on them the entire time and for some God knows why reason decided that the best solution to keeping them under control is to run after them, shouting nonsensical half-formed commands. As they're slowly pulled away (apparently controlling two dogs who weigh all of twenty pounds put together is a very laborious task), barking all the while, my dog and I walk back to the apartment, she determinedly snuffing in a very "psh, I could have taken them" way. Later on, as I saw the same lady walking the same dogs down the same sidewalk, the same 10 feet in front of her, I had an epiphany: I hate little yappy fucking dogs.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Spice Sharks!
Got bored yesterday at work, thought I'd create the next big pop hit: The Spice Sharks!
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