Saturday, June 24, 2017
The Morning After
Do you ever have one of those mornings after drinking where you are filled with deep regret and fear and you know not why? I'm not talking about mornings where you repeatedly empty the contents of your stomach -- which may well be bright pink and gelatinous -- into the nearest receptacle, although of course I've had those too. I'm referring to the mornings where you don't quite recall all of your actions from the previous night and become overwhelmed with the sense that you may have done something horrible. Like, for instance, tell your friends the truth about what you think of their bangs, or leave a two liter of Diet Mountain Dew in their crop top closet. Not that I've done either of these things, but I did throw up on a girl once and not remember it until two days later. In my defense, I had mixed gin and vodka. Like, in the same drink.
Anyway, I had one of those recently, and while it turned out that everything was fine and I didn't do anything untoward, it made me realize that I'm way too old for that shit. I should be, like, waking up and realizing I enrolled in the AARP or something. But as long as the Zima reissue lasts, I'm likely to find myself in this state from time to time. So somebody please stop me from peeing in the kitchen sink.
Sunday, June 18, 2017
To the Wonder
We saw Wonder Woman this week. I enjoyed it, but have to admit that I'm a little perplexed by the critical rapture that's surrounded it. Aside from Wonder Woman herself, I found very few of the characters interesting or complex enough to actually care about. In particular, I thought her little band of sidekicks was literally one-dimensional; we basically knew one thing (He's Native American! He's got PTSD!) about each one of them. And they played Wonder Woman herself as so naïve that she sometimes came across as mentally ill, staring contemplatively at people or things for minutes on end. I mean, she understands dozens of languages but finds the concept of floor-length skirts overwhelming? Plus, like pretty much every movie I've ever seen, I'd cut at least a good fifteen minutes out of it. There were probably forty minutes of punching and kicking alone.
Anyway, I don't want to be too negative -- I did enjoy it, and thought Gal Gadot did a good job. It was attractive to look at and had some great action sequences. I just wouldn't exactly start lining up the Oscars yet. Unless they have one for Best Use of Weaponry as Fashion Accessory; that one's all locked up.
Saturday, June 10, 2017
Food Fight
Last night Ian and I went to the grocery store, as we frequently do on Friday nights, because we are cool. (The REAL Friday Night Lights are in the produce section.) My mom needed a few items -- largely junk food, since she is the woman who raised me -- so she decided to come along. What followed was an amazing adventure.
As so often happens, the checkouts were packed. But Ian and I found one where there was just a nice-looking older couple and no bagger, which we favor, because we seem to be the only people in the greater Cook County area who understand that large, flat items go on the bottom of the bags. Plus bagging your own is kind of like an even lower-fi version of Tetris. So far, so good.
But the older gentleman asked us if we minded if they had two transactions, which of course we could not say no to for social politeness reasons. And the second transaction was for like fifteen gift cards, which had to be individually activated at the correct amounts. And of course the cashier messed up on entering the final amount and couldn't fix it, resulting in a call to management, which resulted in five minutes or so of us awkwardly pretending to read about Jennifer Aniston likely dying alone in Closer magazine until a manager who likely had to get up early for debate club practice arrived.
All of which would have been irritating but not that big of a deal had my mother not rapidly zipped through the express lane with her twelve items or less and stood losing her patience just past the elderly couple in question. Her ice cream was melting, she later explained. We offered her the keys to the car, but she instead insisted on walking home. And so we passed her as we drove back about five minutes later.
At least there wasn't a sexagenarian fist fight. Those never end well.
Last night Ian and I went to the grocery store, as we frequently do on Friday nights, because we are cool. (The REAL Friday Night Lights are in the produce section.) My mom needed a few items -- largely junk food, since she is the woman who raised me -- so she decided to come along. What followed was an amazing adventure.
As so often happens, the checkouts were packed. But Ian and I found one where there was just a nice-looking older couple and no bagger, which we favor, because we seem to be the only people in the greater Cook County area who understand that large, flat items go on the bottom of the bags. Plus bagging your own is kind of like an even lower-fi version of Tetris. So far, so good.
But the older gentleman asked us if we minded if they had two transactions, which of course we could not say no to for social politeness reasons. And the second transaction was for like fifteen gift cards, which had to be individually activated at the correct amounts. And of course the cashier messed up on entering the final amount and couldn't fix it, resulting in a call to management, which resulted in five minutes or so of us awkwardly pretending to read about Jennifer Aniston likely dying alone in Closer magazine until a manager who likely had to get up early for debate club practice arrived.
All of which would have been irritating but not that big of a deal had my mother not rapidly zipped through the express lane with her twelve items or less and stood losing her patience just past the elderly couple in question. Her ice cream was melting, she later explained. We offered her the keys to the car, but she instead insisted on walking home. And so we passed her as we drove back about five minutes later.
At least there wasn't a sexagenarian fist fight. Those never end well.
Sunday, June 04, 2017
The Bachelorette
So one of my female friends (we'll call her Bonnie) is getting married next month, and yesterday was the shower and the bachelorette. The invite list for these events was entirely female but, as so often happens, I knew I would be getting last-minute pleas to join in, less because I am interesting than because when you are drunk lots of things seem like a good idea. And so, when I got back from my run around 3 yesterday, I had the following text messages:
Men, we need you to be strippers for Bonnie's bachelorette party tonight.
This isn't a joke.
100% serious.
Wait, stop responding to this chain.
I'm an idiot. I put Bonnie on it.
You're dead to us. Because you don't know how to text.
When the conversation resumed on a new text thread, I politely demurred, explaining that I had a prior engagement stripping for someone else. But as one might have guessed, this was not to be the last of it. Hours later, while walking the dogs on the 606, I got the following text messages:
Guys, the frosting on the penis cake is melting.
Premature ejaculation.
When does it officially start?
7:30 I think, but I don't know, because I never do.
Jay are you really not coming? Bonnie may not go through with the marriage if you do not.
Why did I take an uber pool with my inflatable penis?
PHOTO OF INFLATABLE PENIS IN UBER POOL
Why did you inflate it before you got there?
I held out for a few more hours -- really just long enough to get through this week's DVR offerings -- before heading over. And it was super fun, even if I did have to get up at 8 this morning for church with my mom.
So one of my female friends (we'll call her Bonnie) is getting married next month, and yesterday was the shower and the bachelorette. The invite list for these events was entirely female but, as so often happens, I knew I would be getting last-minute pleas to join in, less because I am interesting than because when you are drunk lots of things seem like a good idea. And so, when I got back from my run around 3 yesterday, I had the following text messages:
Men, we need you to be strippers for Bonnie's bachelorette party tonight.
This isn't a joke.
100% serious.
Wait, stop responding to this chain.
I'm an idiot. I put Bonnie on it.
You're dead to us. Because you don't know how to text.
When the conversation resumed on a new text thread, I politely demurred, explaining that I had a prior engagement stripping for someone else. But as one might have guessed, this was not to be the last of it. Hours later, while walking the dogs on the 606, I got the following text messages:
Guys, the frosting on the penis cake is melting.
Premature ejaculation.
When does it officially start?
7:30 I think, but I don't know, because I never do.
Jay are you really not coming? Bonnie may not go through with the marriage if you do not.
Why did I take an uber pool with my inflatable penis?
PHOTO OF INFLATABLE PENIS IN UBER POOL
Why did you inflate it before you got there?
I held out for a few more hours -- really just long enough to get through this week's DVR offerings -- before heading over. And it was super fun, even if I did have to get up at 8 this morning for church with my mom.
