The Dead Pool

Bad Will Hunting

2009-11-20T11:42:00.001-05:00

: Not Pictured: The real Will and Vinny

Yeah, yeah. Long time no blog. Look, I've been busy so how about you get off me? You think with my meager amount of free time, I'm going to spend it generating ha-ha's for you feebs?

Well, sadly, you're right. But I can't I think of anything to write, so here's some excerpts from my conversation with Willyesterday (edited slightly for readability):

On Mid-90s Rock Chicks From Boston:

Will: Incidentally, I share your Kay Hanley fetish. I still pleasure myself to the image of her turning her back to the crowd and bouncing up and down for an entire song at the Paradise back in about '98 or so.
Vinny: I saw her at the paradise in '08. The years have been very kind to her
Will: Nice. She's my second-favorite 90s Boston rock girl, trailing only Juliana Hatfield, who I met at the People's last year and who has not aged that way. The woman needs to eat. Juliana was on the cusp of big-time but never fully made it. She was on the cover of Spin in '95ish and inside revealed that she was a 27-year-old virgin. So, obviously, insane and crazy catches up to you when you're not young and adorable anymore. Now she's a bit haggard, but I still creep-hugged her for old time's sake.

On Fame:

Will: I never see famous people, even in NYC. I guess Josh Hartnett was in my bar right before me and Patrick and Max got there the night before WhiskyFest, but I wouldn't have recognized him anyway.
Vinny: How can you not recognize the guy from such classics as "Pearl Harbor", "Wicker Park”, and "40 days and 40 nights"?
Will: Saw Clemens here in 2002, while a Sunday afternoon game was still going. I mean granted, he's a starting pitcher and doesn't really need to be there, but it was still strange to see him at the bar. He refered to himself as "The Rocket" in the 3rd person repeatedly, and got a few rounds for the small crowd. I hate to admit, he came across as a pretty good guy, a friendly idiot, the way you imagine Papelbon would be.
Vinny: He referred to himself as "The Rocket"? Tell me he was trying to be ironic.
Will: Affleck and Damon have been in People's on Thanksgiving and Christmas nights before, but I haven't seen them. I guess they're decent dudes but Affleck gets sloppy drunk, which is a problem because he fakes like he's sober now. We know the girls who work at [Bar name redacted], and he likes to go there because all employees sign some kind of confidentiality agreement. But he went there with his mom and/or wife a couple years ago when Guy [name aliased], the bald dude who fills in at HQ sometimes, was the GM. So he drank iced tea until his family left, then got shitfaced, left to get some coke or whatever, and forgot to come back for his tab, which was several hundred bucks--Champagne and shit. So Guy charged it to his room and he freaked the next day because his wife/accountant/whoever would see the evidence and Guy was like "Sorry, buddy, but I can't eat a $400 tab just because you're lying to your family." So, decent dude, but high maintenance in that way.
Vinny: I can see that. I feel like if I became famous I would turn into a dick. Err... that is to say my public image would be startlingly accurate as opposed to a whitewash of lies and DUIs.
Will: Oh, I'd be completely insufferable, I'm positive.
me: I'm pretty sure I'd be hanging out in the Beverly Hills McDonald's parking lot making fun of fat chicks with Megan Fox or something. or I'd be "that guy" who got drunk while hosting SNL and tried to make out with Miley Cyrus (and succeeded, because she's totally a skank).
Will: Sounds about right.
Vinny: Though to be fair, me and Miley sucking face might be the best thing on SNL since Farley died.
Will: I mean, I act like I own the fucking world if I'm someplace where I know the bartender's name, or if I've gotten a blog comment that day or something. Fame would destroy me. I can't wait!

On Same As The Dead Pool Ever Was, The Movie:

Vinny: I feel like we should take a page from the Affleck/Damon playbook and write a screenplay about Boston/Cambridge and cash in on this whole "everything to do with Boston is fucking awesome!" kick that Hollywood is on.
Will: You're right. And I will always appreciate those guys for getting guys like me laid when that movie came out. So many Harvard freshman were willing to believe they'd found the real-life Will Hunting any time they took Daddy's credit card to a bar with a wiseass bouncer. I didn't have much of an accent as a kid--my dad's from Oklahoma and my mom's parents were deaf, so she over-enunciated everything and had no accent. But I sounded like you after 16 beers when it became obvious that it was somehow sexy for a brief moment in time.
me: Yeah, play up the whole Boston thing that makes 'em think "Hey maybe there's a sensitive genius under that rough exterior" and lead them on by showing them angsty teenage poetry, get laid and they find out there's little more to me than apathy and dick jokes. Either way, we should start writing a screenplay so that we can put together the farce that we're actually working on it and bring it up in casual conversation with chicks at the bar, describing it as "Catcher In the Rye" meets "Good Will Hunting" and if they're unimpressed add that "It's got a little more heart, though" or "It's semi-autobiographical".
Will: Yup. I like where this is going. And we'll get Truck to actually write the fucking thing--that dude's hilarious and into movies and shit.
me: Excellent but he's white and hence expensive. We’ll get my Mexican to write it
Will: Good call. In fact, he's worse than white: he's a Jew too.
me: So's the Mexican! He's actually Guatemalan...
Will: Same thing, different flag.

This racism, bigotry, celebrity slander, and misogyny brought to by my lousy job and Will's boredom.

Yes, I'm aware that this doesn't really count as a blog post, but I don't care. I'm leaving here in twenty minutes and starting Thanksgiving week at the bar. See you there.

Future celebrity,
{VM}

To Write Love On Her Arms

2009-11-13T11:23:00.001-05:00

Taking a break from self-serving liver destruction, I'd like to point out that today is "To Write Love On Her Arms" Day. I know, I know. What in the bluest of fucks is that?

: To Write Love On Her Arms

Here's the low-down from the Facebook event link:

To Write Love on Her Arms is a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery.
*****To Write Love On Her Arms Day is a day where anyone can write the words love on their arms, to support those who are fighting against depression and those who are trying to recovering. On this day, just write love on your arms, and show it off, other people will ask why you have love written on your arms, and you tell them you are supporting to write love on her arms day, and how its benefiting a non profit organization helping stop depression, and make love the movement ♥

I'm not normally one for the touchy-feely-queery crap in most cases, and normally I only make exceptions for cancer, children and cute animals (fuck beavers, fur coats look better). I first became aware of TWOHA (I'm abbreviating because of course this non-profit had to go all shitty Emo band when thinking of a name), when I got the swanky, hip, socially conscious "Social Vibe" widget you see down here to the left. No lower. There it is. That's the spot. Mmmmm.

Sorry, what was I talking about? Oh yeah. So that's how I became aware of TWOHA, and I thought it's a solid cause. I've had a lot of friends who have struggled with depression, addictions and contemplated suicide so I figured if they say throwing this widget up on my page would help stop that then count me in. Ditto to this TWOHA Day thing. If rocking some Sharpie art on my arm for a day will get people involved with suicide prevention then hand me a Sharpie, let me get a few huffs and let's get rolling.

Peace (and Love),
{VM}

Goodbye, Liver

2009-11-13T11:22:00.001-05:00

: To the death, I say. To the death!

A wise man (Bill, the guy who sits next to me) once told me (five minutes ago) that a man has to have goals in life. We were discussing the Bukowski Six-Month Club.

For those of you who don't know, Bukowski's Tavern is a bar on Dalton St in Boston (and Inman Square in Cambridge) named after the author Charles Bukowski. The Emperor loves Bukowski and made me watch a documentary on the dude and I gotta say between the alcoholism and misogyny and violence, he seems like me if a few (hundred-thousand) brains cells drifted to the creative side of my brain from the "don't beat chicks" side.

Anyways, Bukowski's is known for having a rather large beer menu - its no Sunset Grill but who can top 500? - constituting somewhere in the range of 120 brews and its greasy food. I know this, sadly, not from firsthand experience but rather through a buddy or two and exhaustive online research (a full ten minutes). I discovered that this "Six Month Club" is for people who have drank all 120 beers within the span of six months. Your reward - besides the obvious pride - is a big-ass mug ('big-ass' being the technical term) engraved with your favorite author's name that you can get filled for the price of a beer every time you go back. Does this not sound like a challenge tailor-made for yours truly?

Apparently, again according to my online research and third-to-fourth hand information, the record for completely all 120 beers is five weeks. Five weeks. That's 120 beers in 35 days or 3.428571 (repeating) beers per day. That right there is what we in the business like to call "weak-ass shit" (or in the vernacular: "shit's weak"). That 41.428571 (repeating) fluid ounces a day is not something impressed with, and frankly hardly a challenge. So I was talking to my life coach - the aforementioned Bill - and has agreed to be my "manager" for this challenge. He even drafted me a schedule for completely it in seven days*. We've scaled back the ambition of our schedule now, but you better leave I'm going for the record.

But its not enough to set a record of this magnitude; you to set the bar so high and so convincingly that people come to loathe and despise you. You become their motivation to be the prolific drinker they know they can be. Your's will be the name they curse while worshiping at the porcelain altar. Five weeks is the record? I'm looking to do it in 12 days.

12 days means 10 beers a day on average, consecutively. That's 120 fluid ounces of booze per day. 2400 total. Uncountable calories ingested and imbibed. Is it possible? Not for mortal man. Will my liver be able to handle it? Probably not. But dammit: nothing ventured, nothing gained. To quote Theodore "The Ruff Rider" Roosevelt:

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly;
who errs,
comes up short again and again,
because there is no effort without error and shortcoming;
but who does actually strive to do the deeds;
who knows the great enthusiasms,
the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;
who at the best knows in the end
the triumph of high achievement,
and who at the worst, if he fails,
at least fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those
cold and timid souls
who neither know victory nor defeat.

I still need to consult with the Emperor and with my Bad Life Choices Mentor (and ignore advice from doctors and parents), but as Bill just said to me, "Anything close to a month is a disgrace in my book." That's why he's the Mickey to my Rocky, the Mr. Miyagi to my Daniel LaRusso, and the black guy from Showgirls to my Elizabeth Berkeley.

Anyone who wants to draft out a plan or schedule, or be kept updated on my plans just leave a comment. Wish me luck.

EDIT: Also, who should I have engraved as my favorite author?

Stay thirsty,
{VM}

* This was when we thought the challenge was 100 beers.

Recklessly Optimistic

2009-11-10T15:26:00.001-05:00

I know I said I was going to write about Saturday night on Monday, but I spent two hours driving to Connecticut to spend the subsequent 13 hours in the basement cubicle dungeon/sweatshop. That was followed by dinner at the only place still open: a diner and finally arrive "home" to the hotel at 11:15pm. So needless to say, I didn't have the free time to update; so stop pestering me, you cads.

I've been waking up earlier on Saturdays, which is slightly disconcerting for me because it means I'm getting older. And getting older means the two things I used to be able to do in bed for a long time, now happen for shorter durations and with less satisfaction. So I was up "early" on Saturday, just after noon, which means I got about eight hours of sleep. That's good for your average low-life but for a cube-jockeying alcoholic it barely passes as adequate. Not one to dwell on my own inadequacies, I got out of bed, had some lunch and a shower and waited until 3pm to text Amy and find out that she didn't want to go to the movies, because - fuck it - she doesn't have to and that flies with a guy like me. So I dicked around the house, ate a pizza and went back to People's to meet up with Bonnie.

Bonnie was busting my balls because she was in Cambridge and I wasn't coming out to hang out with her. I was waiting for the aforementioned plans to falls through, you see. So she gave me a hard time about that, because while Bonnie has a vagina which would intrinsically make her a "ho", we have a significantly more "bro" centric relationship, thus allowing her to bust my balls under the precedent set-up under the court case of "Bros v. Hos". In short: "Fine. Meet me at People's." So we had some beers, I watched the Bruins game and Bonnie tolerated my attempts to teach her about the white people sport. We drank for a bit, I got crap for not talking to a girl in a flannel shirt and subsequently made fun of her choice in men.

Kentes arrived with one of his theater buddies. They started talking about theater and other such nonsense with which I don't normally involve myself, but then we started talking about how my brothers are both actors and how I should've been an actor. I have no background in acting and nothing that should lead anyone to believe I'd have any penchant for it... but I do have a solid Boston accent and those are in short supply these days. Kentes mentioned that he'd love direct me in a one-man play, so I said "Yeah, I'll do MY version of the the complete works of William Shakespeare." I then started quoting what little Shakespeare I know in an overly-thick Boston accent and added my own side-commentary... three minutes later Kentes and his buddy were ready to start making this thing right there in the bar. So look for that on Broadway sometime soon.

Bonnie's friends showed up and had a few drinks. Someone ordered a Sprite which was fucking pointless. I like Sprite as much as the next guy, but when in fucking Rome get hammered. These were the broads who asked for directions to Phoenix Landing, and around the point where my chronology gets hazy because I'm not sure if Porter and Evelyn showed up before or after this point, but I do remember they were the last to leave which is really all that matters.

Around midnight-ish, I'd been there for about five hours and we're guessing I'm at a two-per-hour clip (conservative estimate, fuckyouverymuch) then I'm about 10 beers and $50 in, minus the beers I bought for other people and the $2.50 for the Sprite*. I get up to use the can and when I get back Porter and Eve are talking to each other as people who live together are wont to do, or so I'm told, and some dude is sitting on my stool. And yeah, it is my stool. I've spent the past five hours farting into it and pounding beers atop it: it is my stool. But I'm having a good night so far, king of my little corner of the bar, so I politely say to the guy "Excuse me, you're in my seat." What I should've said was "Hey, fuckstick, get the fuck out" and given him the Stone Cold Stunner, but I opted for more Ghandi, less Kamala. So the kid gets up off the stool (which has my jacket on it and my beer in front of it, mind you) looks at me and then gives me the "Are you asking for it back?" No, asshat, I'm just making conversation. Please continue to rub your ass on my coat and stick your finger in my beer.

First of all, fuck this guy for sitting in my seat, on my jacket and within sipping distance of my brew. On a bad day that's grounds for execution, but I was charitable and gave him a chance to scram. But dickhead wanted to act all tough because he was balding and had a small penis. Look, pal, not my problem. You deal with you bald impotence, I'm here to drink. So I look at the bastard and say, "No. I'm not asking," and sit right the fuck down in my fucking stool. He, of course, did and said nothing. Fuck you, hot shot. So I went back to my drinking and indulged Evelyn in a game of "Okay, well what's wrong with THAT girl?" Surprisingly, the game went on for a good thirty minutes until she finally said, "Okay fine. Well what about that girl standing by the end of the bar?"

The girl at the end of the bar? Amy. Nah, I'm fucking with you. That'd have been a great story though, right? It was Kelly, though. So I said, "Alright, no problem," and walked over like I was hot shit, gave Kelly a hug, and pointed back and Porter and Eve. They left while I was talking to Kelly, and before I met Big Sexy - an enormous black man in a pimp fedora that was absolutely the coolest fucker ever - and probably somewhere around the time Kelly stone-walled the Guido in the motorcycle jacket. I ended up kicking it there until about 4am, learning secret handshakes with Kelly and Big Sexy, before finally calling it a night.

Good times, though Saturday was kind of a "had to be there" story, wasn't it? Probably should've mentioned that about a thousand words ago, huh?

Everything I know about "peace", I learned from Dominican baseball players,
{VM}

* Actually that got comped. Some Euro-Trash stiffed Patrick on the tip so I offered to pay $10 for my next Bud. Classy kid that he is, Pat wouldn't take it and comped the Sprite that I was embarrassed to even order. I actually asked what booze they wanted in the Sprite. I mean, seriously, Sprite?!

Cautiously Pessimistic

2009-11-08T15:32:00.000-05:00

So first I think I owe an apology to Will, who insisted that I rub Kelly's stomach at my earliest convenience. Well I saw Kelly twice this weekend but didn't remember to molest her midsection. To be fair I knew I was supposed to do something creepy to her, but I figure I accomplished that through the normal course of conversation. So to make up for that I said I would write about my weekend and specifically about my time at my second home* with someone who looked decidedly unlike the Emperor**.

Friday night I went out to People's - which reminds me, their website needs more bells and whistles... maybe a blog? - where I sat in the corner like the alcoholic trainee that I am and watched the Celtics lose to the Phoenix Suns with some dude named Chris from Arizona. I was there early drinking up some confidence while I waited for Amy to show up. You remember Amy, right? Cute blonde girl. Like's metal. Somehow got me to dance like an asshole and (even more baffling) answered my phone calls afterwards. Well I finally manned up and asked her out for a drink. Creative and imaginative bastard that I am, we settled on going back to the scene of the crime.

Brief tangent: it was brought to my attention that despite spending an incredible amount of time in Cambridge, I rarely (if ever) leave the Republik. Never been to Plough and Stars, never been to Phoenix Landing, or River Gods. I've been to both versions of the Middle East (I prefer Upstairs because they have Tullamore Dew and they hide it from the feebs that don't know about it), and TT & the Bear's to see Kay Hanley, who is probably my biggest MILF crush. I gave someone directions to Phoenix Landing and when they asked about how it is, I said I'd never been which confused them but I'm not in the business of enlightenment; just directions, sugar.

So I'm watching the C's and drinking my Bud Heavy when Kelly shows up. Kelly - who was formerly perfect in every way until we discovered she's a Yankees fan - gets a lot of credit in my book for recognizing me, because I'm a kind of generic-looking kinda guy and if I'm not with the Emperor I can blend in with a crowd. Granted, she's been tacitly tolerating my existence for a long enough time that I feel comfortable using the F-word*** with her, but I also have a rotating system of hats and facial hair that makes me the man of 1,000 (generic) faces. So anyway, Kelly comes up gives me a hug and asks to talk about the universe with her. Normally I'd spend my night buying her beers, leering, and arguing string theory but normallyI'm not gonna run into ANOTHER blonde girl who is willing to spend her time in my presence. So I says to Kelly: "Listen, baby, I ain't no master conversationalist and this girl expects me pretend I'm charming and interesting for hours, literally hours, and I don't have enough in the tank to satisfy both of you intellectually." At least that's how it went in my mind, in reality I talked to Kelly until Amy showed up which makes me look like a dink, but hey let's keep their expectations low, right?

Luckily they both have better memories than I do and recognized each other, said their hellos, and only in my mind was there a cat-fight for my company. So I pretend to be charming and intelligent with moderate success while Amy tolerated my presence and amused herself by pouring Corona into my Bud and watching me struggle to force it down, because dogs gotta eat and boys gotta drink. It went as well as these things are supposed to go - I think. I didn't get my kiss goodnight, but as Kelly would say later you don't want a girl who kisses that quickly. Obviously she doesn't know me very well; I'm out of shape and even when I wasn't, I was never good at the chase. So I walked her to her car, made plans for Saturday (which got nixed) and went back inside to talk shop with McFee.

Of course, while I'm talking to The Big Guy some chick with one of those 80s off-the-shoulder shirts comes right the fuck up with her entourage in tow and just hands McFee her number. Just. Like. That. The chicks leave and he looks over at me and catches my "Motherfucker, what the fuck?!" look and goes "That does not happen." To which I respond, "Shut up, you Lou Ferrigno-looking motherfucker with that 'this doesn't happen' bullshit." It's a good thing he's got a good sense of humor and is a gentle giant, because he could easily rip my sternum off.

Long story short: I'm cautiously pessimistic about this whole Chasing Amy situation, so we'll see what happens. Kelly at least seemed impressed so if worse comes to worst at least I'll have a shoulder to cry on. And a stomach to rub.

Peace,
{VM}

PS. Saw Porter, Evelyn, Bonnie and Kentes (and the People's People) on Saturday. I'll write about that tomorrow.

* My first home being a hotel in Connecticut and my third home being the place where I sleep alone and they mail my bills.
** Feel better, homie.
*** Friend. I say 'fuck' in front of my own mother (but not grandma, she'd whoop my ass).

Fine. This One Is About Cougars

2009-11-06T10:46:00.001-05:00

Some of you got all pissy because I didn't talk enough about cougars. And Bonnie said I was the only person that could make a cougar attack sound boring (I think she's confused as to what type of cougar I'm talking about it), so here's the explanation of the cougar story...

But first - and this is my real reason for writing this besides the fact that, fuck me, its 9:23 in the morning and I'm stuck in this goddamn cubicle AGAIN - does anyone else get the ads on Facebook to meet Christian singles? Facebook, I'm pretty sure, uses Google to generate their ads so they're supposed to be tailored to you specifically. Obviously I'm listed on Facebook as single because 1. I am single and 2. I don't care. So I get a lot of ads like "23 and Single?" or "Hey, Desperate Lonely Fat-Ass, here's a picture of a chick you'll never meet" or "Seek Help: Alcohol Addiction" and those are understandable given my age, physical appearance and vices. But my religious affiliation is not listed on The Facebook, so I have to just assume that either 1. Mark Zuckerberg is stalking me or the less likely 2. Facebook is taking a shot in the dark since 90%+ of Americans consider themselves Christian.

Anyways, like most of my generation I consciously ignore the ads and let them subconsciously mold every manner of my existence until I am the perfect consumer. And I'd be happy continuing to ignore them until she appeared...

: "Boyfriend Wanted"? Sign me up, coach.

Let's ignore the fact that she's probably a Bible-thumping Jesus-freak, and also ignore the fact that there's something vaguely hypocritical about a good Christian girl showing more cleavage than a Dolly Parton tribute and focus on someone finding out who in the blue Buddhist hell this girl is, tout fucking suite. Long story short, the things I would do to this girl on top of a stack of Bibles would make Sodom and Gomorrah look like Vatican City. Go, my minions. Search through the Intertubes and find me my future ex-wife.

Oh yeah, cougars.

So I went out to dinner with some people from work and spilled beer on my pants, which caused my co-workers to laugh until the point of guilt wherein they bought me a Jack and Coke. Now I don't usually drink Jack and Coke, but I also don't usually sit in a puddle of Miller Lite either so when in Rome... I get back to the hotel and change into some clean clothes and head to the hotel bar and have a few drinks with some other people from work. Our project is so large at this point, you can't go anywhere in CT without running into someone from the team. Anyway, so there's always a motley crue of barflies of a generally older variety there but on this specific night the resident cougar (Betty) was being outclassed in Cougarocity by the upstart rookie (Tammy). Tammy had a gaggle of balding dudes in sports coats hanging around and her, leading them on. But what was really weird was that she'd keep looking back and staring at me*. So I point it out to my buddy Dave and wouldn't you know it, Tammy comes waltzing (see: stumbling) over to talk to us. A few drinks and a lot of personal space invasion later, last call at the hotel bar has come and gone. But last call at the Marriott is at midnight, so no one is quite ready to call it a night.

How or why we decided to go to the other bar is irrelevant (probably because it was my idea), but we get in the Malibu and drive over there with Tammy in the backseat. Dave told her she should sit back and buckle in, but if she did that she couldn't be nibbling on my ear. She should've listened to Dave's advice because I took a hard left and sent her flying across the backseat in a moment that will live in hilarity to quote FDR. We get to the other bar and like all drunk older women, she transforms into a petulant five year old: "I wanna play darts." Good idea. Because really what I want to do right now is arm you with sharp metal projectiles; what am I retarded? Well yes, I'm retarded. So we played a round of darts which became increasingly difficult for Dave as he was being molested while trying to throw.

So I won the darts game - naturally - and we ended up at the bar and who shows up but Betty with the hotel bar staff in tow. And who gets the seat between the two cougars? Yep... Captain Vin. I forget how their little argument got started but I just remember being caught in the middle of a leopard print and silicon sandwich praying to the God of Christian Singles to get the hell out of there. Eventually it subsided with Tammy focusing her attention back on Dave and Betty (and the glock she keeps in her purse) between me and the cute Eastern European girl that works the Marriott bar. So I look over toward Dave for the cue to leave and Tammy catches my "let's get the fuck out of this Tim Burton-level-of-fucked-up nightmare" look and hiccups her way through some snide mumbling about me wanting to leave or being jealous or something. To which I respond in my best Clark Gable: "Frankly, my dear, I couldn't give a fuck."

So she tried to turn her attention back to Dave but he was too busy laughing his ass off to really care, and I turned my attention back to the bartender who looked like Caity the Red Bull Girl with the same smile that made me fall for the original Caity. Connecticut Caity's name is Sam, and she might be only the chick in the whole state that is tolerable for more than five minutes. Of course, I didn't get to test that theory because last call there was at 1am. So I bid adieu to the Red Bull and Jager Girl, put the cougar in the cage and drove back to the hotel. Dave managed to escape with his life and only a few claw scratches and I passed out in the handicap room that they gave me this week because they lost my Platinum status number.

Now let's never speak of this again.

Cougar bait,
{VM}

*To be fair she was probably so drunk she was probably like "Hey, why are those triplets all dressed the same? Oh, the middle one is kinda cute."

Detoxification Station

2009-11-05T09:35:00.001-05:00

Working from home has two distinct benefits:

I'm not in Connecticut
I get to listen to "Those Monday Blues" on WWPV in Vermont via webcast.

"Those Monday Blues" are hosted by avid reader and sometimes-commenter, John "One Chord" Connors who offered up several shout-outs to yours truly and one to the Dead Pool on the show tonight. That means very little to everyone else but for me it means a lot because I thought the only mention of The Dead Pool in other media would be on the TV news when I snapped and killed an office full of people with a Bates stapler. But I suppose that's neither here nor there... time for a weekend recap.

Friday
Friday started with the trip home from Connecticut around noon, and the reminder from Kentes that Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day was opening that night. So Kenny and I and Kenny's buddy Mike went to the Loews theater on the Common. If you haven't seen it yet, and you're expect the same movie as the first, you may or may not be disappointed. I did, and I wasn't disappointed but it wasn't what I expected. All Saints Day has a little more trouble than the first with deciding whether it wants to be an action movie or a comedy movie and ends up meandering somewhere in the middle as a pseudo-manifesto on the state of masculinity with Rocco making appearances to speak as of the voice of "men past". All in all, if you don't expect an art-house movie and are in it for the jokes and the gunplay and the stone-cold fox by the name of Julie Benz (who remains hot despite her horrible and unnecessary Southern accent), you will enjoy this movie. Since Duffy actually spent some time learning about film-making between this film and the last, its a little steadier to watch and comes off less as Tarrantino and more as John Woo (early Woo, not likeMission Impossible 2-Woo) without the doves.

Anyways, after the movie we went to Bonnie's friend Holly's Halloween party. Yeah, it was a day earlier than Halloween, but whatever an excuse to drink is an excuse to drink. I had been all amped up for Halloween, because I had actually put a modicum (no more) into my costume this year, purchasing a Comedian costume. That was supposed to save me from having to scramble at the last minute for a costume. Yeah well, guess what didn't fit? So fuck that time to scramble for a last minute costume. Goodbye, Comedian. Hello, The Spirit. For those of you who are unfamiliar with these characters, I switched from a murderous, rapist anti-hero to a sex-obsessed superhero. All told, probably a good call. Furthermore, it continued my pattern of Halloween costumes rotating between either my red flannel shirt or my black suit. I'm now on a five year run going suit-flannel-suit-flannel-suit. So ideas for next years flannel-based costume are welcome.

We got to Forest Hills and changed in the parking lot - always a bold decision at night - and entered Holly's house to find Bonnie shitplastertrashfaced. She spent most of the night either clinging to my arm so as not to fall down - and then when she fell down, to my leg to ease the spinning - or vomiting. Not exactly the most eventful of parties for myself, but there were a weird group of fire-throwers there. Let me tell you, that is one sub-culture that just goes over the edge on the fucking crazy scale. Now I enjoy playing with dangerous things as much as the next hombre, but the weird secret-name, pseudo-bisexual, quasi-polygamist swerve they added to playing with fire was not up my alley. So I drank Miller Lites with the boys, wished there were prettier girls there, and crashed in on to kids trying to bump uglies because I was trying to check on Bonnie before I left. That was about it. Also, got some texts from the blonde girl that has been mentioned in at least three blogs (The Pool only being one) which was weird because I'd texted and called her earlier in the week to no avail, so I'd given up. Then outta the blue I get the "Hey" text*, which if you're an overly analytical cat like me can mean a million different things. But there was nothing I could do because there was a drunk girl clinging to my leg and another one trying to molest me and I didn't feel like driving into Back Bay.

Saturday
Saturday was Moosh's Halloween party. I got there early, because fuck it why not? I had more than my $5 worth of beer and Jello-shots and probably got roofied a couple times so that was a blasty-blast. I went as The Spirit again, but decided I didn't want to wear the mask so I didn't. So I was basically a guy in a suit and a fedora and everyone seemed strangely comfortable with that. I made some new acquaintances by guessing costumes and being overly-friendly like I'm from the Midwest and don't bleed from the ears I hear anyone say "Yummers!". Wendy, Kelley and Catt ended up showing up at some point which meant I'd be driving them home in all likelihood. Works fine for me. I'd rather leave with people I'm not gonna sleep with than leave alone. At least I can give people the impression I'm taking three girls home with me and I'm some super-pimp. Speaking of being a super-pimp, I actually met another gorgeous girl at that party. She has a bad-ass name and apparently poses nude while people take pictures of her. Part-time, though. I instantly became regretful that I possessed no camera and had not spent my whole night talking to this girl, since I had found her attractive/interesting when we were both sober and I thought she was "just" an insurance broker. I ended up taking her home. By which I mean her roommate abandoned her and I offered to drive her home. I'm assuming she was initially like "No thanks. I don't feel like being violated and/or lowering my standards THAT far tonight." To which I probably responded, "Look, sugar, you're wearing a four inch skirt, five-inch heels and have been walking up and down this staircase all night; you're practically dating half the party at this point." To which I'm sure she responded, "You're funny and gorgeous. Take me home, stud."

That or she gave me her number in the hopes of scoring a free ride and then blowing me off when she's sober. Either way I dropped her off, went back, picked up the other girls and dropped them off before crashing at home.

Sunday
Went and saw Boondock Saints II for a second time. Enjoyed it much more. Watched the Bruins game and was thankful there wasn't a football game I had to give a fuck about this week, so I could catch up on some reading, movies and detox.

I'll be in Boston Monday night, driving down to CT for the rest of the week Tuesday after jury duty. Looking forward to that. And to the cube. And to getting blown off by two chicks this week instead of one.

Stay positive,
{VM}

* Technically it was "Yo", which may be the first time I've ever been texted "yo" and it hasn't been followed with "-yo out of my ass" and preceded by "Come help me get the".

Hitchhiker's Guide To A Hangover

2009-10-26T16:40:00.001-05:00

Apparently the answer is 42, which for me actually works out quite well because my question was "exactly how much did I drink this weekend?" I don't know if that's 42 glasses, bottles or gallons but having a rough approximation makes me feel slightly better about myself until I remember there was a Jager Bomb involved. How do I excuse such reckless liver endangerment? Well, for one I'm not a condescending, judgmental prick so get off my case. And for two, it was done in celebration.

No, not Halloween. I'm not so bad that my internal calendar is a full week off (though I can't say the same for the kid at People's Friday that was dressed like a rabbi*). The celebration was the short-lived, albeit triumphant, return of everyone's favorite, non-cartoon alcoholic. I went out early Friday, and met up with Porter and his girl, neither of which I'd seen in a long time but will probably see more frequently do to their fortunate (for me, unfortunate for them) proximity to my favorite Cambridge watering hole. We shot the shit for a while, which mostly consisted of one of saying "Remember that time when..." followed by laughing, followed by an obligatory attempt to explain the context to Evelyn. She's a good kid for putting up with that bullshit for at least two hours, but let's be honest; once you leave school your life because infinitely less interesting. This becomes especially true if you're a cube jockey like Porter or myself. Anyhoo... I described Will to Porter as "the guy that will probably come in already shitfaced with a black eye." Wouldn't you know who strolls in but the man of the hour sporting some face-ink and a Sully's "Shitfaced" T-shirt.

So Friday was spent drinking, reminiscing, drinking some more, sleeping in my car and eventually crashing until two in the afternoon, which is where Saturday picked up with the Notre Dame Fighting Irish vs. the Boston College Eagles. I'm morally obliged to give a shit about this game being both Irish and Catholic (well, I was Catholic, its the one "-holic" where I'm "recovering"), so I put it on but didn't pay too much attention. I'm supposed to root for the Irish because that's what you do if you're raised Irish-Catholic and your nickname in High School football was "Rudy"**. But when you remember that Charlie Weiss is the coach and that if the Eagles win, he might get fired... you don't feel as much shame rooting for the Chestnut Hill sweater-vest brigade. I still went Irish, though. And they won, which dooms them to at least another season of mediocrity under Weiss. Anyways, back to People's...

You thought I was kidding? Nope, I went straight back to People's (for the second night in a row without any food in my gut) and proceeded to have the aforementioned Jager Bomb (kept it down, too. BAM!) and a Jackie Gleason number of Buds with Will and the rest of the People's crew. Brief aside, it has no reached the point where at any given moment I know at least 5-7 people in People's. It's like that bar where everybody knows your name, but without Kirstie Alley so that's a bonus***. After several beers, twice as many racial slurs, and a impromptu game of musical stools I ended up three seats down from where I was originally, sitting next to some blonde girl. My memory of what follows is fuzzy, as are the majority of my memories, but I remember something about metal (the heavy variety, not the structural) that sparked a conversation between me and this chick - big ups to the Green Bastard for apparently playing the metal that inspired said conversation - and, as I learned later, a side bet as to how long it would take before this girl's man-friend put his fist in my eye.

Luckily for me, he resisted what had to be the overwhelming urge to do so long enough for me to get the girl's number. Texted her a bit on Sunday and tried to make plans. Still haven't firmed anything up, but I'm going to hang onto the two remaining shreds of optimism and dignity that I have, because I'm stilling riding the weekend high through most of today. The text exchange with Will helped:

Will: Where did I go wrong in life that I find myself jealous of Vinny?
Me: At least you're a better writer.
Will: That's a lie I'll warm myself with while Amy is demanding you pull her hair.
Me: Oh good, you remember her name. I thought I had forgot it.

Yeah, that last line was just to be a dick (okay it was 90% to be a dick, and 10% relief because I suck at remember names). Saturday night came and went and I strolled into the folks' place as the family was getting ready for mass. My dad asked if I wanted to come with him, and I resisted the urge to tell him I'd probably burst into flames upon entry and took a nap, took a shower and went back to People's (again without having eaten) for the Patriots' game. I managed to keep the beers to under a hand's worth before heading home for a nap, dinner and then hockey.

As I was waiting to PTFO I realized that my body hates me for attempting to live my life at speeds that would make a meth-head panic and fueled entirely on cheap beer and red meat. All in all, a great weekend. Lost the hockey game though.

Peace,
{VM}

PS. I almost forgot, and I'm too lazy to go back and insert this in the proper spot, but I ended up dancing with the blonde girl (Amy) in the middle of People's. If you've ever been to the Republik you realize how awkward that is... or if you've ever seen me dance you realize how awkward that is. If you're one of the people who has experienced neither, I leave you with this: the first time I brought the Emperor to People's we spent twenty minutes making fun of a hipster couple for dancing... There does that last shred of dignity.

* Sidenote: The kid asked Nils if the slow service was because he was Jewish. Nils abruptly answered "Yes" and proceed to glare at the kid. I laughed, and didn't feel the slightest bit anti-semitic.
** Rudy got approximately 1/3 less playing time than I did. Jerks.
*** The bonus, however, is negated by its lack of Woody Harrelson.

Our Love Is Real!

2009-10-13T11:16:00.001-05:00

: How my first three relatioships ended

Today, I got to work and locked my keys in my car. But that's neither here nor there because I don't to explain how I managed to lock them not only in the car, and not only in the trunk, but in the dead hooker's hollowed out kidney in the trunk of the car. Like I said, neither here nor there. I managed to McGyver them out.

Instead I want to talk about what happened when I got into work and logged onto ye olde work laptop o' destiny. Being a futuristic quasi-genius, I have the latest and great of technologics that the Intertubes has to offer. Case in point: Google Chrome. I make the point to mention that it's by Google because 1. it gives it instant credibility and 2. to point how eerie it is that it gains instant credibility has Google is slowly but surely morphing into some surfer-chic corporate version of "Big Brother." "SERGEI IS WATCHING." My point is that Chrome, like Firefox (and IE, but fuck IE. Seriously), let's you have a metric ton worth of tabs open at time. So I'm always logged onto my e-mail, RSS, calendar, and - relevant for this story - Facebook.

So my Facebook starts blowing up around 8:35 this morning with an IM message.

Amanda
hey hi
8:39amAmanda
are you there?

This isn't the Amanda of Blog War fame, but rather some chick I met once in Sophomore year. I'm not gonna change the name to protect the innocent because luckily Facebook chat doesn't record last names and I know about 6,000 Amandas (which coincidentally is a great band name). Anyway, I am intrigued by this random early morning Facebooking...

Vinny
Hey yeah I am
Sorry. At work wasn't paying attention
8:40amAmanda
thank God you respond on time
8:40amVinny
lol I do what I can
8:40amAmanda
am in a terrible situation here
8:40amVinny
?

Now, if you're anything like me, you're immediately skeptical of this little exchange. In fact, I'm so skeptical I don't even ask "what situation?" but rather just offer up a simple "?" that encapsulates my complete confusion with the entire exchange.

Amanda
i went for a short vacation in Dundee ,but i got mugged by some Scottish Hoodlums and they took all my stuffs away
8:43amVinny
That sucks

And indeed that would suck, if I believed for one second that it was true. "Scottish Hoodlums?" You're serious right now? Sounds like a shitty Brit Pop band. Why is Hoodlums capitalized? Is this a particularly well known brand of scoundrel that I'm just not aware of, like Hell's Angels or something? And they took all your "stuffs" too? That's a damned shame. Please, tell me more random chick from Sophomore year...

Amanda
Wallet ,Credit cards ,cell phone and all cash is gone
My flight leaves in about 3hrs from now and i need to sort out the hotel bills
but the Hotel manager won't let me leave cause i have no money to pay right now
8:48amAmanda
are you there?
8:49amVinny
Yep
8:51amAmanda
please i need some help from you till i arrive back in the states tomorrow cause my flight leaves in about 3hrs
8:52amAmanda
I promise to refund your money back as soon as i return back
8:53amVinny
Yeah... I met you once about 4 years ago
So I don't think I'm going to sending you money internationally
With no way of confirming that is actually you and not some dude in a Scottish basement

Yeah, I know... I fucked up. I should've kept this guy going for a while for shits and ha-ha's, but it's 9 in the morning and the evil part of my brain doesn't start functioning until at least 11am. Until that point it's just survival mode. Luckily for the safety of my bank account, survival requires a base level of logic. Exactly what hotel has you pay when you leave? How did you book this hotel if not with a credit card? Was it with the promise to pay them back as soon as you return back? Sorry, sugar. Promises and rainbows might work on Scottish hotel managers but not on me. And what chick carries a wallet? I know some serious tom-boys, but all of them still rock a purse. And this chick, if memory serves correctly, was especially dainty and done-up. She's not the no-purse type.

Amanda
how on earth will i be able to pick the money you send me without having my ID do that?
8:55amVinny
The hoodlum didn't take your ID?
8:56amAmanda
i have my Passport with me ...

This story is getting more and more suspect by the second. So, these hoodlums - sorry Hoodlums - took everything... oh, except the passport. Which wasn't with the wallet, of course. Thank God. It's a good thing you carry everything separately and not in a convenient effeminate satchel of some fashion...

Vinny
Then go to the airport or the US Embassy. They have procedures for these situations.
8:57amAmanda
it takes a longer process i already did all that....

Here's where I start to hate my mother. Not really, but she's instilled such a sense of guilt of faith in humanity so deep into my brain that no amount of logic, sarcasm and cynicism can completely uproot it. Believe me, I've tried. Alcohol is only a temporary fix. So I offer some legitimate advice. After all, this was a cute sweet chick from Vermont that I didn't have any beef with, but also had no reason to maintain contact with either. I had a friend who lost all their shit in Europe and managed to make it back okay to bore me with the story, so this chick has the one up on them. Of course, at this point - after being mugged - it doesn't appear she's reported to the police or a hospital, which begs the question why was she hadn't already checked out of the hotel by 1:00pm GMT (8am EST)? If you're going out to snag breakfast on the day you leave, why wouldn't you check out first? But I digress...

Vinny
Then go to the airport or the US Embassy. They have procedures for these situations.
8:57amAmanda
it takes a longer process i already did all that....
8:59amVinny
Call your folks, then.
9:00amAmanda
they have helped me out with some money is just that the exchange rate isnt fair enough
9:01amVinny
Then ask them for more. You're there responsibility not mone.
mine*

If your bullshit meter isn't in the read, it's broken. Time for repairs. Oh.. so you already tried the Embassy and the hotel... and it took too long, so you thought "here's what I'll do: I'll go on Facebook and try to get some random guy to send me money." Brilliant plan. Why not your parents. Oh you tried them too, but they didn't send you enough money. That makes complete sense. Exchange rates, of course! That nefarious multiplication can be a complicated little bastard, huh? Sadly, that is where the conversation ends. I was hoping the scammer was going to keep trying to get me. Of course, they're still online and its an hour and a half later... so now I'm sure it's a scam and I'm also sure they won't IM me again. Which makes me said, because now the email part of my brain is functioning and I wanted the conversation to go something like this:

8:57amAmanda
please i really need ur help
8:59amVinny
Do you even remember how we met? This is the first time we've talked in four years and you expected me to send you money after what you did?
9:00amAmanda
i'm sorry
9:01amVinny
Is this some kind of cruel revenge? I'm sorry I puked on you while we were making out, and I'm sorry I couldn't get it up later on. I was drunk. It happens. You didn't need to tell your friends I had ED. That's wasn't cool.
Amanda
i'm sorry...
Vinny
Whatever. You were just a spiteful hook-up to get back at my ex-girlfriend. I was cold and lonely... like the bathroom floor I ended up sleeping on.
Amanda
i'm gonna go try asking someone else now...
Vinny
But I love you! Take me back!
Amanda is offline

Win some, lose some. But either way it was a nice way to kill time while waiting on my Nigerian lottery winnings to get here. Prince Yabbadabbado said it'd be here any day now...

Never con a con man,

{VM}

Blondes Have A Way With Breaking Hearts

2009-10-12T13:12:00.000-05:00

: Tom Brady, pictured here cradling Jonathan Papelbon

It's Columbus Day and I'm working... which is kind of how it should be, let's be honest. As much as I would love the extra day to recover from heartbreaks and hangovers, its days like this you man up and drag your ass across state lines to your shitty cube away from home. We all know Columbus Day is a bogus holiday. Double C is what we in the corporate world call "management" even though Amerigo Vespucci (and I) do all the work, some one else ends up with the credit. Though I have no sympathy for Vespucci either, because last I checked I'm not paying my taxes to the United States of Vin-merica. Of course, I'm not paying my taxes at all but that's neither here nor there.

What really gets my goat (take your pick on inserting a Tom Brady or Jon Papelbon joke here) are the people that get all huffy about the hypocrisy of Columbus Day. On what is most people's day off, my bullshit detector is working overtime.

"Oh, Columbus didn't ACTUALLY discover America!" No shit? I saw that episode of Where in Time Is Carmen San Diego too, hot shot. You're knowledge of third grade history and ability to name drop some other piece of Euro-trash explorer that didn't sail the ocean blue in 1942 is about as impressive as a Papelbon post-game performance. And yes, you are getting a whole off-season worth of these pot-shots.

"Oh, but the Indians were here first!" First of all, you political incorrect fuck-wit, they're Native Americans. Don't be an asshole. For my money if you don't have mud and leaves covering your twig and berries, you ain't a civilization and so point goes to whitey on this one. Columbus is like the kid who got C's in your elementary school class that everyone is proud of when he rises to manager of the local McDonald's franchise. Cut the kid a break. Yeah, he's a glorified burger flipper. Yeah, there were technically already people here and technically some other guy "discovered" it first, but give the kid a break. Why don't you go push a midget, or steal a kid's ice cream while you're at it? Dick.

"Oh, but the white devils raped and pillaged the native American culture, and here's a few more buzz-words about genocide that I learned from my first American history teacher that went off book, and I still harbor a hard-on for." This sort of bullshit has always pissed me off because anyone with even a cursory knowledge of history that isn't American in nature will tell you that were probably about as coddling to the American tribes as any invading civilization in history. Sure, it doesn't look that way because they're living in glorified prison camps called "reservation" and their "culture" has been diminished to card-counting and dice-rigging, but that's only because they're actually still alive. For the longest time civilization was just the biggest guy with the biggest club who went around having rape for dinner. I'm not about giving blanket free-passes to anybody, but compared to other invading civilizations, the early European settlers were downright neighborly compared to what the British or the Vikings did to the Irish, Scottish and Welsh. See also: Romans.

Fact is, the only thing more bullshit than Columbus Day is bitching about Columbus Day. Which makes bitching about the bitching about Columbus Day a productive use of my time, fuckyouverymuch. You have a day off, I'm stuck in Patheticut listening to the Bruins game on radio feed through a dorky microphone headset instead of drunk in my basement watching it in HD on a big screen.

Which reminds me of the Friday night spent drinking alone in my basement whilst texting my ex-girlfriend. As vagtastic as that sounds, it was one of the highlights of my weekend... until the Sox lost again and drinking became drowning. She probably went to bed sometime around 11pm but I kept a one-sided conversation going until about 1:30am when I passed out on my couch.

Sox eliminated. Pats lost. And as of this writing, Bruins are losing 2-0 to the Avalanche in the first. Fuckity fuck-nuggets.

On the plus side, remember that blonde girl Brea I wrote about in passing once or twice? Of course you do. It's your job to keep a photographic record of everything I write. Don't tell me you've been slacking. Anyways, Brea and I are going to spend a weekend before Christmas in Vermont, living it up in a swanky hotel, getting boozed and going skiing. I'm pretty fucking stoked for that, but on a day where blondes* have caused me a ton of head- and heartaches maybe I should go back to being a pessimistic little bastard.

Stay blonde,
{VM}

* We're going to assume Columbus was blonde. First because it completes my triumvirate of fucked-uppitide with Brady and Papelbon and two, because how the hell else do you miss the West Indies by that fucking much?

I'd Stop Smoking, But I'm Not A Quitter

2009-09-24T10:32:00.001-05:00

So I started writing that article I was talking about concerning relationship deal-breakers and how 9 times out of 10 they're just asinine bullshit cover-ups for deep-seated insecurities. However, it came off as super-pretentious and a thinly veiled assault on hipsters and Yankees' fans. So I scrapped it. I may come back to it at some point, but I'm nolonger letting it consume the few precious seconds I still devote to The Pool.

Unfortunately outside of complaining about Kanye West or complaining about people (see how I implied Kanye West isn't a person?), I don't have very much to write about. Except that it has been a recent OCD tick to avoid ending sentences in prepositions. Something I just failed at. Twice. I did just get about 10 personal emails in the last 5 minutes, which I guess is sort of exciting when you spend the majority of your time in a yellow-green cubicle or a yellow-white hotel room trying not snip a mural into your chest hair with toenail clippers because fuck me I'm so bored I almost contemplated watching ABC the other day. Holy shit, two more? I'm popular today.

You know what really grinds my gears? People asking me about my day. I mean, I appreciate that you're putting forth the effort to fake your way through a conversation by pretending that the monotony of my day isn't mind-numbing and soul-crushing in the hopes that maybe I dodged a falling satellite or that I'll launch into one of these run-on sentence diatribes that ends with me out of breath and everyone around snickering. Fact is my day is so simple it would make most people who haven't worked an office job cry tears of blood. I wake up; I shower and get dressed; drive to the office; turn on my laptop which I left on standby because I'm too fucking lazy to wait for the thing to boot up because the company loads so much bloatware on it; I get some water; take a leak; sit down; stare off into space for a few minutes; entertain revenge fantasties; write the blog; get lunch; take a crapper-napper; get a snack; check Facebook and my RSS feed; cry silently; go back to the hotel; cry some more; sleep. Repeat as needed until clinically insane.

The truth is I don't hate my job. It's not particularly challenging which appeases the lethargic sloth in me, but that also makes it boring which pisses off the rebel without a cause/clue in me. On the plus side, there's blue Post-It notes and all the free office supplies you can cram into your bag (FYI: printer doesn't fit and you'll get funny looks if you try. Trust me). And the pay isn't bad either, which makes it easier to work for the white devil slave masters who just canned two of my buddies yesterday. There are points were I want to turn my frontal lobe into a finally tenderized slab of skull beef through blunt force and lager, but mostly I just want to sleep.

In slightly more exiting news, I'm going to the Ring of Honor show on Friday night. I'm dragging Will along with me, because its an excuse to get drunk and indulge in the inherent masculine blood lust (that shameless pandering to the female of the species is brought to you by the fact that Amanda is writing again and I've officially ended the cease-fire in the Blog War). If I were a better planner I'd have grabbed tickets to the show Saturday in NYC. It's a better line-up, and since Will's moving to NYC and I've never spent a real day in the city it'd make for a good excuse to take Vinny's Travelling Debauchery Circus on the road. But I'm dumb and lazy and that show's sold out.

Alright, I'm tired of writing. Yeah I know I owe you a lot more than this given the Great Post Drought of '09, but fuck it: you don't pay my bills, pretending to work does. If you want more bang for your buck either start coughing up the bucks or throw some damn topics at me. Until next time, you scoundrels and harlots stay classy...

Peace,
{VM}

I Can't Brain Today, I Have The Dumb

2009-09-17T09:40:00.000-05:00

If the definition of insanity is repeating the same function over and over and expecting a different result, then color me Tom Cruise. You'd think that after yesterday's crapper-napper I would do what any normal, productive member of society would do and catch up on my much-needed sleep. We all know the love machine is fueled by cheap beer and red meat, but even when filled with premium fuels it still requires the occasional maintenance (insert Chlamydia joke here). You know this, I know this, Gary Busey knows this... and yet here I am on another day with only three hours of sleep.

When you're tired and you only get three hours of sleep, its like taking your car to the mechanic and just getting a car wash. Yeah, it was something but you really should, you know, get those brakes checked before you crash*. So I'm sitting in the cube staring at a requirements matrix like a would-be novelist stares at a blank Word doc, and thinking "Yeah, this isn't gonna happen." But on the plus side, I did think of a good idea for a novel... and I knocked over the Sunsphere.

But I know you're asking, "But Vinny if you're as brain-dead as a Kanye West fan/Twilight reader/MTV viewer - and are too tired to even choose who to be snarky at - how/why on earth are you posting the blogski?"

To which I say, "Be quiet. Daddy has a headache." And then after some deliberation I'd add "And don't ever let me hear you call it 'the blogski' ever again." But the truth of the matter is, as I discussed a few weeks ago with Will, writing in the blog is easy and fun. While Will and Jen (at least appear to) put a modicum of time/thought/effort... I take the easy-sleazy way out and just make random references to quasi-humorous or topical bits of popular culture (e.g. in this post alone: Tom Cruise, Gary Busey, The Simpsons, Kanye West, Twilight, MTV). My point is writing in a blog is easy, and therefore there is no legitimate excuse besides "I didn't wanna" for why I haven't posted in so long. Unfortunately for all of you, this particular post is as formulaic and un-entertaining as an episode of Sex and the City (yep, did it again).

If I were a less lethargic individual I'd code up a little widget for the sidebar where you could plug in a topic, select a number of pop culture tidbits and it would create an almost indistinguishable replica of something I'd actually write on here like "To be fair, Kanye wasn't the first to pull that trick. My ex-girlfriend used to say to me when we were having sex 'I'mma let you you finish, but I just gotta say my last boyfriend was better.' You'd think I'd have developed a complex, but I became strangely comfortable with it. Almost as comfortable as that the last boyfriend is in the trunk of my car right now." Maybe I should just get Greg to code it up for me. Or Gabe.

Instead I'm going to sit here, look busy, occasionally ask one of my stock "this will make me look like I'm working" questions (e.g. "Hey, Jack, were you planning to update the requirements matrix?"), listen to Placebo and Sneaker Pimps and count off the minutes until 5:45pm when I get to drive the two hours home to Boston. Then I'll probably end up going out again tonight. The nights are becoming as repetitive as the days.

I need a catchphrase!,
{VM}

*Note to self: Fix squeaky brakes on the Malibu.**
** Note to self: Stop reading own blog. It's really pathetic. ***
***Did I just invent nested footnotes?

That Could Be A New Low

2009-09-16T14:36:00.001-05:00

I should probably try to get more than three hours of sleep tonight... you know, after I get back from going out. I should buy stock in Red Bull.

Also, a beard is a good way to hide the fact that you didn't shave today. Cologne, however, is not a good way to hide the fact that you didn't bathe. That's why I don't own cologne. It's nice to smell like you're not hiding something.

Oh yeah, I just look a nap in the bathroom with my head on the toilet paper dispenser.

{VM}

Broadcasting From Park Ave

2009-09-02T07:35:00.001-05:00

Times like this I think a camera would significantly improve this blog.

I'm in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on the 37th floor of an office building on Park Avenue. For those of you who don't know this is my first time in New York City, despite living in Boston for the past 23 years. Well, that's not entirely accurate. I've been to both airports before, and a Clarion hotel in the shadow of La Guardia, but this is the first time I've ever ventured into the city.

The flight in took a loop around all the "big buildings" on the island and then went right past CitiField where the Mets play, which was pretty cool. I'm not much of a tourist - I am after all the son of a man who toured the Louvre in 15 minutes (I'm pretty sure he used a checklist) - and I never get excited about stuff like that, so I'm going to chalk it up to the fact that it was about 6:45 in the morning and the most exciting thing to read was the SkyMall magazine.

I'm here for training from 10am until 6pm and I'm flying back out at 9pm tonight. I may try to get dinner in NYC, but my general paranoia around travel - especially air travel - will probably end with me eating at a McDonald's in the terminal at La Guardia. That said, despite the 4am wake-up call this was the easiest flight I've ever had. There was no one at the security checkpoint, only 5 people (8 if you include the flight crew) on my plane, and I had no problem getting in or out of the airports.

Anyways, I hadn't updated in a while so I figured I'd drop a line in here. I'm working (ha!) on a post about what no one should consider "deal breakers" when looking for a boyfriend/girlfriend. As usual, I don't follow my advice because I'm better than the rest of you, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't blindly heed my advice.

I forgot my Sox hat.
{VM}

Complimentary Nuts

2009-08-26T13:48:00.001-05:00

I was driving to work this morning listening to that song by Michelle Branch where she's yelling at frozen people in the video when I realized something. I realized I have terrible in taste of music, but that wasn't exactly a revelation. What I actually realized was that the only compliment I've gotten in recent memory was a few weeks ago at People's. It was whispered to the Emperor while I was apparently blacked-out starting a fight with an "Elvis Costello-looking motherfucker" (my words) and telling the entire bar that the Emperor is gay (he's not). Anyway, the chick said "I really don't like your friend, but I really want to suck his dick."

A brief pause to reflect on that old saying about the company you keep. Anyways, you know who are and I wish you had followed through; not because I like you either but because - let's be honest - a blowjob is God's way of saying "Thanks for hanging in there, kitty." God call you "kitty." Get over it. And ladies, just remember what I said: oral sex is God's work. It's in Leviticus right after getting stoned with gays... or something. Whatever, I failed Bible study.

Now I'm not sure that even really qualifies as a compliment because:

It wasn't said directly to me
There was no follow-through. I say a lot of things, most of them a lot more disgusting/inappropriate than that, but if I don't actually go molest the fire hydrant then its just talk.
The classy broad in question has never seen me in any state of undress, and there has no fore-knowledge of the situation going on in Pantsville. So its not like she's impressed with anything and super-psyched because its me. She just likes giving head apparently.

But even if its not really a compliment, at least whatever it is has degenerated down to a level I can process. The compliments I do get, few and far between as the are, are usually much more abstract and strange to the point where I don't have any idea how to deal with them. When you look like a mutant cross between Eric Bana* and Frodo**, you tend to get a plethora of these puzzling pseudo-kudos. The most standard one, or one I've received the most has been "you have nice eyes," which - as far compliments go - is relatively flaccid. There is a blatantly obvious exception to that statement and her name is Brea.

I used to get bullshit at people who said whatever about someone has "nice eyes." It's impossible to have bad looking eyes. Even if you got a lazy eye or that disease that makes the two eyes different colors, when taken individually the eyes still look fine (the package screws up the deal, but the majority of us "norms" still have "nice eyes"). So I never really registered that as a legitimate compliment until I met Brea. Now I've got awesome blue eyes, but hot. fucking. damn. Nobody and I mean nobody has blue eyes like this girl. They pretty much sinched my descision to marry her (the fact that she's blonde, gorgeous and a bad ass didn't hurt either). But she's out breaking hearts and bones out on the Left Coast (and looking for things to do in Denver when you're dead) so I'm stuck here shopping for mistresses. I probably shouldn't be broadcasting that, because she's a derby girl and could kick my ass.

Anyways, this is about me. I was talking to my 57-year old co-worker last night about trying to get "nookie" (his word) at the beginning of the sexual revolution. Which was interesting from a socially historical perspective and slightly nightmare inducing because old people plus sex equals no bueno. But apparently the girls who would give up weren't the kind of girls you wanted to bump uglies with and the majority of women weren't "liberated" yet. So he got married. Can't beat 'em, join 'em right? So I guess that's the lesson to take away from fellatio female above; not worth it, stick to marriage.

Another part of the conversation was about the guy's criteria for women (none physical, Amanda, in case you've suffered through this and you're still reading), which got me thinking about tastes in mates. For example, the Emperor tends to end up with chicks that are in the upper middle-left quadrant on the Hot-Crazy scale before drifting over the Vicky Mendoza diagonal. To be fair to J, he does appreciate a certain kind of crazy that is initially endearing and takes time to mature into "fuck I don't want to hang out with this chick anymore." Will - obligatory plug for our joint Patriots blog: Cult of the Hoodie and pathetic attempt to prod Will to give enough of a fuck about the preseason that I actually press myself to write something myself - and I share infatuations with two particular friendly females whose names end with the sometimes-vowel***. Of course, this isn't exactly surprising. My criteria have been scaled back from previous statements to a girl who is attractive and not retarded. And I don't mean retarded in the common parlance. I mean as long as she doesn't have mittens pinned to her jacket, she's a go. I'm pretty sure Will is partial to mittens, so my women are a subset of his (math reference, sorry) which causes natural overlap. He's also less lazy about pursuing them than I am, but that doesn't really make much and is about all I know on that subject.

I lost my train of thought and don't have any more shit I can link. Read Cult of the Hoodie, or I'll hate you forever. Also, leave me a compliment in the comments. And nothing flaccid like "nice eyes" or "you're a good writer."

Here's looking at you, kid.
{VM}

PS. Despite what you may think, this was not just an excuse to use my favorite tag: "blowjobs and regret"

* My first girlfriend said this. It was reiterated last night by a co-worker and confirmed by others.
** I'm short, hairy, have big feet and sparkling blue eyes. That's right, I called them sparkling. You can get real fucking lost in these bad boys.
*** Emily's name ends in the aforementioned sometimes-vowel. Emily is awesome. She's been bitching at me to write more about her in my blog, which is endearing because it means

She can read
She reads this blog

So I promised her I'd write something that wasn't narcissistic bitchin' about bitches, and satiated her own need for an ego-stroking. This officially makes her "needy" in my book and since I'm recently become a commitment-phobe who maintains an excellent penchant for keeping promises: Emily is great in ways my meager vocabulary cannot express using the impotent lexicon offered by modern language. Her awesomeness can only be expressed in languages of stars and gods. Happy, Em?

How I Ruined My Life (And Met Your Mother)

2009-08-26T13:47:00.000-05:00

I've been promising a Vinnypolooza* recap for a while, but I've been busy crying and drinking so I never got around to it. Right now I'm in a cubicle in Manchester, NH. Pretty soon I'll be driving to a cubicle in Berlin, CT. The funny thing about that was at this time yesterday I was in a cottage in Ossipee, NH and in between Ossippee and Manchester, I was home in Boston. So really I'm just impressed that I'm 1. functioning, 2. working, 3. not drunk or hungover, and 4. alive right now because it's been a hell of a week.

Two weeks ago, my iPod, charger and GPS were stolen from my car (a 2002 Chevy Malibu which has made appearance in previous posts that I'm too lazy to link. The Malibu has gone by many names in its short life:

The Silver Surfer - because its silver and you surf in Malibu or something
The Silver Bullet - because its silver, I drink beer, and I drive fast. Not always in that order, but not always not.
The 'Bu - Which is just short for Malibu
The Fierro - In reference to an episode of How I Met Your Mother in which Marshall's shitty car finally dies.
Sandy - When I got my GPS, I programmed it with a female British voice, and since Malibu is sandy...

Anyways the car has gotten more and more feminine in name (and more and more haggard in appearance) over the years. So like all women, Sandy found a way to screw me... and not in the boom-boom, naked-time way. So the shit got stolen two weeks ago today, and then that following Saturday I had the party in which two screen doors were destroyed and one glass door protecting a DVD case was shattered. On top of that, my house stunk of raw meat and Ryan's feet, and various other odors that I tried several times to clean out, but succumbed to the fumes of both the smell and the cleaning products.

As part of the party, I rented sound equipment. On Monday (a week ago) I was driving the equipment back to the rental place, when Sandy made a suicide attempt and plowed into the back of a pick-up truck. Fortunately, there was no damage down to the truck. Unfortunately, Sandy went from my beautiful babygirl to Amy Winehouse's face in the blink of an eye. Normally, I'd be happy to get rid of the car. Sandy and I had a nice run, but I was looking for a sexier ride (I'm so good at double entendres) and ready to dump her for Jacqueline (the name for the Mustang I want, named after Jacqueline Bissett). Unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to learn to drive a stick shift yet - so for the sake of this analogy, we'll say Jacqueline is a gold-digger and she ain't messin' no broke-da-broke-da-broke. So I've come to a cross-roads...

It's going to cost a ton of money for cosmetic surgery to fix old Sandy up, and I can't afford Jacqueline yet. So my options are fix Sandy, or go slumming in the new-and-used market. Well I decided to fix Sandy to the tune of 3,000 clams. In the meantime, I've got Ellie (Hyundai Elantra) as a rental. Which is basically the same as hiring a prostitute, but she's got cool bells and whistles and whips and chains that Sandy doesn't have, so I can get kinky for a week (to the tune of another 600 bones).

But on the plus side, all the empties from the party covered the cost of repairing one of the doors (~$30 or 600 cans/bottles)... and I knocked over the Sunsphere**.

So its about lunch time for me. I didn't even get through all the shit that happened, but those are the highlights. We'll see what the week with Ellie holds. I'm such a car whore.

Peace,
{VM}

* For those of you who don't know: I threw a pretty big birthday party for myself at my parents' house while they were away. Karma paid me back for this in spades.
** This inside joke is a reference to a Simpsons episode where Bart rents a car and drives to the Knoxville World's Fair several decades after it happens. Upon arrival Nelson throw a rock at the Sunsphere which causes it to fall over and crush the rental car. After they bemoan the fact that they're stranded and broke Nelson chimes in "But on the plus side, I knocked over the Sunsphere." Followed by the obligatory "Haha."

I'm Not Sick But I'm Not Well

2009-08-10T13:01:00.000-05:00

So I woke up this morning to drive down to work and saw my car door slightly ajar. I thought, "Great, I'm a freakin' moron who can't even close his door properly." Nope I'm not that kind of moron. I'm the kind of moron that leaves his car unlocked, thinking "I'll be back out here in a few hours and if its raining I don't want to deal with locks."

Well it did rain, but that didn't deter someone from breaking into my car and making off with my iPod, iPod car charger/FM transmitter, and my GPS. Thank God they didn't take my collection of empty soda cans and shitty CDs.

So this is obviously my fault, there's really no two ways around that and I'm kicking myself over it. Its not that any of the stuff that was taken is irreplaceable, I could get it all back with a trip to Best Buy. I've never had anything stolen from me before, at least not blatantly. I could argue a lot of theft from my college, or emotionally from ex-girlfriends... but that would be petty theft since I'm pretty morally and emotionally bankrupt. I'm not excited about losing $500 worth of stuff, and re-upping to a new iPod will be a pain in the ass (and you're out of your mind if you think I'm springing for an iPod Touch).

But this just confirms two things about myself and about life:

1. I can't have nice things. Everything nice I've ever had I've either lost (nice pen I got for Christmas), broken (my car) or had stolen (iPod, GPS). I've never had a decent pair of sunglasses and the only really nice thing I own now is my laptop. My new one. The old one broke. As did its external hard-drive. This is all depressing as fuck, because while I'm a simple man (both of intelligence and lifestyle), I enjoy having nice things. Yeah, now if I get lost I'll have to bumblefuck my away around until I find a landmark I recognize and blow through expensive gas. That sucks, and in the wrong neighborhood its potentially life-threatening, but its not mission critical. When my brother took the iPod charger/transmitter to school I didn't have it in my car, so its not like I needed my iPod or my charger, but it was nice to have.

I drove down to CT this morning listening to the radio and all the morning personalities are on vacation this week. Even the no name dudes on some Worcester rock station. So I didn't have any familiar voices, and when I hit I-84 when I switch over to my iPod, I just got static and I was sad. Legitimately sad. Sandy (my car) tried to cheer me up by making the blinkers work for a change, and for putting "Semi-Charmed Life" on one of the stations, but I'm still in a funk over this. Its making me rethink the whole Mustang thing. I talked with Pops about it briefly on Sunday, and while he understood my desire for the car he also said "you don't take care of things." Which - haha - turned out to be a pretty apt prediction.

So now I'm down on myself, down on life, out $500 worth of nice things I really liked, and...

2. What little lingering faith I had in society is officially gone. Yeah, I'm a cynic. Yeah, I'm a pessimist. Yeah, I'm an asshole and though that last one has nothing to do with this, it doesn't make it not true. Point is, for as much of a heartless prick as I am/can be... I'm also a geniunely nice dude. Sometimes. Maybe. Fact is deep down, I actually kind of like people. Not all people, and not all the time. When I'm in traffic, for example, everyone and their mother can rot in hell. But most of the time, I'm a fairly happy-go-lucky kind of guy and - despite the smell - I like to think I'm pleasent to be around. Now, I just don't know. I feel a little violated and little sick. And yeah, its really my fault and nobody else's but then again its also this thief's fault and I hope he/she/it gets cancer of the AIDS of the leukemia of the genitals.

Sorry. Don't mind me, I'm just upset about this. Doesn't help the Sox got swept by the Devil Rays and the Yankees or that I'm in CT right now. On the plus side, its supposed to be 80 degrees and sunny on my birthday...

And now I've got some things to add to my birthday wish list...

Bummed,
{VM}

Things I May Or May Not Have Said Last Night

2009-08-09T13:38:00.000-05:00

"Fay wants me to tell you that the Facebook message you sent out was the funniest thing he's ever read."
Me: "Holy shit! Fay can read?!"

"I feel bad about him driving all the way out here, driving me back to Natick and then driving all the way home."
Me: "Well, there's always road-head."

Text: "Okay cool. I kinda don't remember getting your number but I had a vague recollection of you and my phone."

Text: "Either way you're going to have to learn to deal with "Drunk Vinny." He fell asleep with his jeans on thinking he was going back out."

"Yeah you're not pushy "at all" but after a few drinks you think "hmmm what girl can I text to hook up with me." "
Text: "True. And?"

Text: "Invite me over already. PLEASE"

Text: "Beer is the best."

"Thanks for the thigh massage."

"If there were arranged marriages, you and I would've been married a long time ago."
Me: "Yeah, and you've have pumped out a couple of kids by now."

"That wasn't free. You bought my drink."
Me: "I did? That doesn't sound like me?"

Me: "The best part was that she didn't know what an 'Eiffel Tower' was and she's giving me the 'what the fuck' look and you're behind here going 'STOP! STOP!' "

As you can see, I'm a classy guy. And last night was no exception. Anyone care to add to the list? I'm sure there's ones I've forgotten.

Attention Defic-Hey! What's That?

2009-08-06T13:23:00.001-05:00

So Twitter's down and I've finally got a few seconds to come up for air from under the paperwork. Lucky you.

Last night I was stuck in the dungeon until a little after 9pm, which wouldn't be bad if I hadn't been there since 8am. C'est la vie. But after work Jack, Alan and I shot down to the Outback Steakhouse because I was jonesing for a Bloomin' Onion and 22 oz of beer. Apparently, I was jonesing for every fucking thing they put in front of me... or offered to put in front of me.

: Yeah... that lasted about 0.34 seconds (Bloomin' Onion)

Jack and Alan opted for the kid-size beers, and since I wasn't paying I opted for the 22 of Sam Summer. After devouring 3/4 of that tasty-as-hell brown bread they start you off with, I order the Honey Chicken Dijon which comes with sweet fucking potato fries. I love sweet potato fries. If they're ever an option, I always get them. I could be dying for some greasy-as-an-Italian McDonald's fries, but if McD's started serving sweet potato fries... man, I'd be on that like reality TV producers on unhinged women. Anyway, the chicken also came with my choice of side. I went with the clam chowder even though I don't like seafood if you put enough pepper and potatoes with something it'll make it taste awesome. Unless its Neapolitan pizza. Nothing can save that fucking train-wreck. Speaking of which, they just opened an Upper Crust in Westie. Who the fuck eats that garbage? If the crust is thinner than my first book report, it's not a fucking pizza; it's tomato goo and look-at-me-I'm-cultured cheese on a cracker.

Right, so after mowing through bread, the Onion, and chowder, I tore through that honey dijon chicken and sweet potato fries like Vinny tears through pointless analogies. After putting down 22 oz beer numero duos the waitress offers dessert, but I'm totally not ready for that even though I was eyeing the Peanut Butter Pie. Well, they have a "sample size" for a few bucks less. So I says to myself, I says "Steve," because 'Steve' is what I call myself when I'm talking to myself so I don't confuse myself, "Steve, man the fuck up and get that Peanut Butter Pie." So I did, and it was an excellent choice. So to recap:

Tasty-ass bread
2 22oz Sam Summers
Bloomin' Onion
Clam chowder
Honey Dijon Chicken
Peanut Butter Pie

And yeah, when I went back to the hotel I was bloated like Octo-Mom, and yeah when I burped this morning it still tasted like onions, and yeah that meal probably took a good year and a half off my life but that's of the end of my life and those years suck anyway. Call me a glutton, it was totally worth it you food-prude.

The great thing about cramming all that stuff into your food-hole is that it puts you right into a food coma that essentially knocks you right out. But before I went off to fight dream terrorists, I had an epiphany. I realized why so many kids from my generation are diagnosed and medicated for Attention Deficit Disorder... and it might also help to explain why I get off on so many tangents.

We of Generation Y (also known sometimes as "the Millennials") are the first generation to be brought up in the new technology era, as well as partly in the pre-dot com era. As such, we are quite literally the middle-children of history between Generation X and the kids born into a wholly integrated technological world (like my youngest brother). We've been brought up with the juxstaposed impulses of nostalgia (Generation X) and of disposable culture (Generation Z). Now that we take up a large part of the main Hollywood demographic, we're seeing a lot of our childhood heroes updated to be resold to us in disposable format. Its the amalgamation that creates disposable nostalgia. Look at "I Love the 90s" for another example.

: Because, really, I'd have died a horrible life if I didn't get a damned GI Joe movie.

Generation Xers like to hold on to their cultural identity (even if that identity includes more than one Beverly Hills Cop movie and A Flock of Seagulls) whereas Generation Z is caught in a constant media-consumption cycle that results in devouring and regurgitating anything that vaguely resembles culture as fast as humanly possible. ADD, in this sense, is not a problem... its a by-product of technological evolution. I'm a tech-savvy kinda guy, but I'm nothing compared to 13-year-olds that tear through YouTube videos and Internet memes like Vinny tears through sweet potato fries. As a result, Generation Y - perpetually caught somewhere in the middle - is now getting nostalgic about Internet memes. Remember "Charlie" or "Drinking Out of Cups" or that ninja website or "Salad Fingers" or even The Best Page In The Universe?

Its no coincidence that the rise of the Internet (*cough* SkyNet *cough*) has coincided with rise of diagnoses and rise ADD pharmaceuticals. More than half the people I know have a prescription for (or at least easy access to) Adderall, Ritalin, or some generic version of these drugs. There's been plenty of people that say that ADD and ADHD are over-diagnosed given the socio-phramo-ecoonomic complex in western societies (especially America), but even with over-diagnosis, there's still has to have been an underlying actual decrease in the attention-span of the average child. Given the constant media blitz that assails the eyes, ears, and RSS feeds it shouldn't come as a surprise that our attention is scattered into a number of different arenas.

Just look at this blog post. I've given you pictures of food and an upcoming movie poster, while linking to three Wikipedia entries and one external site. Or look to the left and right of this post. There's links to other blogs and websites, there's a stat tracker, a search feature, a calender of blog posts, a SocialVibe app (which you should click on), a listing of the most recent comments and a lot of other frivilous shit. And I make a conscious effort to try to keep the clutter down. There's no ads on The Dead Pool like there are on almost every other website these days. My RSS feed now has embeded links, pictures, videos and advertisements.

I'd give you a comprehensive solution this problem, but I just a new e-mail and its almost lunch time...

Seacrest Out,
{VM}

Guess How Many Beers It Takes To Pitch A Complete Game

2009-07-27T12:42:00.000-05:00

No, I'm not taking about David Wells (because that was a no-hitter), and no, I'm not talking about John Smoltz (because he can't even last five innings). I'm talking about myself (shocking, I know). That's right, kids, it's time for weekend recap blog.

Surprisingly, some people live for these things, which I cannot understand. I would've that my zany, irreverant commentaries on society would put the asses in the seats, but apparently everyone would rather read about me getting drunk and barfing on a rodeo clown. No such luck with that (this week), but find me a rodeo and I'll work on it. We call that "journalism."

Friday sucked. Let me make this perfectly clear: Fuck Allston. Fuck it long, fuck it hard. Allston, you suck like a vacuum cleaner, or a whore, or a whore made out of vacuum cleaner parts (which, coincidentally, was my prom date). The Emperor and I went to People's Republik on Thursday after I got back from CT and found Will* there holding court. J and I got to meet most of the People's crew: Nils, Max, Patrick and got good and fucking lit. I wish I could remember the evolution of the joke/story, but Max's nickname is "The Green Monster" which has something to do somehow with pro wrestling which inspired the shot "Parts Unknown", an homage to the hometown of many a pro wrestler (including The Ultimate Warrior). The shot is made of parts unknown (get it?!) and is green in color (get it?!). I forget how many we had but that's probably the point.

Oh, right, Friday. Friday sucked.

Alright fine! I'll tell you. The Emperor and I, in our infinite unpredictability and creativity, decided to go out to People's. However, on the way there we got a call from Fay who was in Allston at some place called Our House. So we made a game-time decision to change our plans. I plugged the (wrong) address Fay gave me into the GPS and away we went... or not. For as much shit as I give people about driving through the Fens after a game, guess what Captain Vinny did? In my defense, I hadn't planned to drive by Fenway Park, but I got diverted. So J and I spent an hour and a half in traffic on Boylston St only to fucking loop around and end up going down Comm Ave. Of course then finding a place to park took forever, and we managed to get ourselves lost. We started out at ten. It was midnight when we got to Our House. I proceeded to drop beers like Britney Spears drops her kids. Of course, my fun was short-lived (why wouldn't it be?) because someone (see: everyone besides me) wanted to switch bars. On the way there I got to meet one of the dudes I didn't know. Turns out he's a cartoonist for the new (or piloted or something) Adult Swim show Southies. Being a failed artist myself, that was pretty damn cool.

Everything went downhill from there. The pack numbered roughly ten at this time and contained Fay, Campbell, Amanda (not feminist Amanda), Steph, some other dudes whose names I forget, J and me. White Horse was the decided next destination, but we nixed that because it had a line. At some point our crew went from roughly ten to roughly thirty for reasons that are still not fully clear to me. Anyways, I suggested Sunset Grill because it has 500 beers, I've been there before and I don't like new things. Campbell, J and I made it all the way in the door, but apparently someone stuck a tampon on the wrong hole because suddenly we weren't going to Sunset, we were going to Big City. Yeah, well, Big City's is closed. At this point its about 12:45am, The Emperor is getting ornery and I'm not getting drunk so its bad times. We decide to break away from the now-small-army and meet up with my friend Maria at Great Scotts. But guess whose not there when we get to Great Scotts? So NOW we're going to Joshua Tree. I fucking HATE Joshua Tree. So does J. And apparently so do Maria and her roommate. Which really begs the question: Why the fuck were we at Joshua Tree? (I realize I'm swearing a lot, we got pretty fired up about how shitty this night was)

Joshua Tree closes its door at 1am, on the dot, but stays open for people already inside until 2am. The Emperor and I roll up at 12:59:59am. No shit. That last "59"? Not an exaggeration. The cop that was counting down until 1 called it the second after we got in. He probably just felt bad for us at that point, I would have. So we have a few drinks with Maria, who is a bitch about music but hates dudes that wear polo shirts. You gotta respect a classy broad like that. Fast-forward, J and I are walking back to my car when up ahead there's a body in the street (we already had walked past the crime scene where some dude got stabbed) and unsurprisingly its Fay. He's just taking a breather in the middle of the street, doing the Burt Reynolds.

Saturday consisted of drinking in Drew's backyard. Drinking in a backyard/frontyard is the summertime-Northeastern equivalent of Midwestern kids drinking in some dudes basement. That's what happens when your options are drinking in the basement (yard) or some other dude's basement (yard). I tried to get a game of Asshole going, but my friends suck at cards and everyone always quits when I'm three-term president and before I can fucking make a rule. I'm heated about that still. The crew was me, J, The Fern, Dan, Laura, Ed, Jess and Drew's sister Alicia... who I was unaware existed until Drew said "This is my sister, Alicia." I often feel like I slip into the Dad/Older Brother role with this group and that's mostly because when the discussion switches to music I just tune out those wacky kids and their new-fangled slow jams and whatnot. Which is why I ended up spending most of the night talking to Alicia. Its good to occasionally meet someone else whose world view and psychological development was stunted sometime in the 90s. Granted, she's older than I am so she's got the maturity thing that I don't but whatever. We somehow ended up in Drew's basement (shit, my life sucks) and The Emperor PTFO'd on the couch so I went home.

: Jennie Finch, I'm like her. Except a dude. And its slow-pitch. And I don't look as good in a bikini.

Sunday was easily the highlight of my weekend, hence why I save the best for last, motherfuckers. I had resigned

myself to a day of bitching about the heat and boiling hot dogs to cram in my food-hole, when Will came through like a drunken savior. My plans now consisted of beers and softball. Not to brag about my incredible athletic prowess, but I did pitch a complete game. Sure the final score was 10-8 but I don't think you understand how much athletic ability it takes to pitch slow-pitch softball. I had to put my beer down and everything. Also while my beer was down I hit a three-run, inside-the-park dinger. I required a little assistance running the bases in the form of a fence serving as my bumper rounding third. Oxygen was not available on the bench, nor was water, so I went with PBR. We went back to People's to celebrate. McFee and Jimmy kicked my ass at darts. Kelly came down and I didn't my best not to get my drool on her with mixed results.

THAT is how you recap a weekend.

Congrats, Jim Rice.
{VM}

*Usually mentioning Will comes with an obligatory link to his blog. However, go-getter that he is, he's started up about 16 new blogs in the past week. One can only assume this is to keep the Federalis and Chris Hansen off his trail. When he settles into a new rut, I'll make sure to link it.

The Deconstruction of the American Sex Symbol

2009-07-23T14:03:00.000-05:00

Unless you've been living in a cave (in a fucking cave!*) for the past few years, you've no doubt noticed the trend in Hollywood toward shamelessly pumping out comic book/graphic novel-inspired blockbusters. Off the top of my head I can rattle off The Dark Knight, Watchmen, Sin City, 300, Superman, Spiderman 1-3, Wolverine, X-Men 1-3, Ghost Rider, Iron Man, Daredevil, The Hulk (both), Elektra, and on and on and on. More recently, the trend has leaned toward embracing the "darker" heroes. More accurately, the protagonists of these movies are flawed heroes. They're "good" in spite of the themselves and their inherent character flaws.

: Rorschach, played brilliantly in the movie by Jackie Earle Haley, became the most popular character from the graphic novel "Watchmen" despite Alan Moore's characterization of him as a "right-wing nut-job".

For example, Christian Bale's Batman is a self-loathing narcissist with a messiah complex; Robert Downey Jr's Iron Man is a misogynistic alcoholic; pretty much every character inWatchmen and Sin City would be completely despicable is they weren't busy beating the piss out of someone MORE despicable than themselves.

This really shouldn't come as much of a surprise given the market. Americans have always loved to feel good about themselves. Who doesn't? The antihero-as-hero model allows people to feel good, because they're allowed to compare themselves to heroes while not only fantasizing about themselves as capable of similar heroics (since these heroes are "only human"), but also in some ways superior to these characters because of their flaws (again, since they're "only human"). Most people are not alcoholics with a desperate need to fill the emptiness left in them by their father's death with promiscuous sex (obviously, I don't include myself in this grouping), so they allow themselves to slightly condescend to the character of Tony Stark/Iron Man and see themselves as an inherently "better person".

What's interesting is that males seem to have a monopoly on the role of "anti-hero". The obvious exceptions that come to mind are Sally and Laurie Jupiter (Watchmen), but I have trouble considering them as much more than minor characters that fill in the blanks for the male, anti-hero protagonists. Outside of those two, and maybe Catwoman (who is actually a villain, so she doesn't really count as a hero), there really aren't ANY female anti-heroes. The major roles for women, both in cinema and in comics, are either as a supplemental character that "rounds out" the protagonist or as an antagonist**. Essentially they serve either as "love interest" or "femme fatale". In works where the female is the central character, she is rarely flawed. Jodie Foster is a perfect example. Foster has often been cast as the strong-willed, tough-as-one-of-the-guys woman that can kick ass and take names when necessary (Silence of the Lambs, Panic Room, and that one about the plane that wasn't half-bad). And while she's initially manipulated by Anthony Hopkins' Hannibal Lecter, in no way is she ever portrayed or perceived as an inherently flawed character.

While I'm sure there are counter-examples to this***, I'm relatively confident in saying that in the majority of popular culture the portrayal of female protagonists and minor characters is rarely flawed (as a caveat, female protagonists are often portrayed as eminently human (different from flawed) which makes them relate-able to approximately the same level as an anti-hero, but with a different dynamic. I'm also ignoring stereotypes like the geek-turned-hottie formula ofShe's All That). I find this interesting, because outside of characters, American society often turns to the actors and actresses that portray them as objects of idolization.

Which leads me to the title, "The Deconstruction of the American Sex Symbol". Our culture is one that often thrives on the flaws of its false idols. Christian Bale's tirade against the lighting guy, Lindsay Lohan's DUI, all of Britney Spears' life. We prefer not only for our fictitious heroes to be flawed, but even for the people portraying them to be flawed. The motivation is the same: self-aggrandizement. However, the trend is slightly skewed when it comes to the female American sex symbol.

The quintessential American sex symbol is obviously Marilyn Monroe. While I'm no historian (social or otherwise), I can say that the general portrayal of Monroe is as the 1950's pin-up. The most famous and enduring photographs of Monroe always show her wearing white; white being the color of purity and, hence, chastity/virtue. While Monroe occasionally posed for nude photos (her first nude which appeared in Playboy was "excused" by the uppity 50's crowd because she said she needed the money to pay her rent), most of those photos are with some sort of white accessory (e.g. the famous nude photo-shoot that Lindsay Lohan mimicked, showed Monroe with a sheer white fabric). Monroe was also

: Marilyn Monroe

famous for her romantic involvement with Joe DiMaggio. Monroe didn't just follow the stereotype of the prom queen and the captain of the baseball team, she practically invented it. Monroe and DiMaggio were, arguably, America's first "power couple" the way we think of "Tom and Katie" or "Brad and Angelina".

Monroe's allure was that she played up an image of the "good", all-American girl but hinted at a sexual promiscuity that is naturally intriguing to men (especially men in an era that was notoriously sexually repressed). Her most famousphotograph is an encapsulation of this, where she tries to cover herself as her dress blows up, while also smiling in faux-embarrassment and innocence.

I'm going to fast-forward through the 1960s, because the way I see it (and the way its portrayed in popular culture) there were too many drugs and naked people fucking in the streets and/or protesting Vietnam that trying to make sense of anything from that decade is a futile effort. Kind of like an intense version of the 80s but with less camp and more LSD.

In the 1970s, the biggest (or at least most-enduring) sex symbol was Farrah Fawcett. Fawcett had an appeal similar to Monroe's, but progressive given the tumultuous/evolutionary nature of the 1960s. No longer was sex some extreme taboo ("Deep Throat" came out in

: Farrah Fawcett

1972), and to treat beautiful women as paragons of chastity must have seemed insulting and asinine. Again, let's look at the most famous photograph of Fawcett: the famous red bathing suit. She still fits the Monroe archetype: long blonde hair, million dollar smile... but gone is relative subtlety. The photograph was "controversial" and became because - at the time - it left "very little to the imagination." That's probably why its the best selling pin-up poster of all time. By today's standards is incredibly tame; Fawcett isn't even showing her midriff, which is more than can be said for girls like Miley Cyrus (more about which later), but she's already a far departure from her predecessor. The dramatic change is evident from Monroe to Fawcett and it says simply that America doesn't necessary want to hold its sex symbols to a higher standard of morality that only hints at a stified desire for sexual deviancy. Subtlety is officially gone by 1976. Fawcett also started the assumed pre-requisite that a sex symbol has to be slender.

The 80s are kind of like a tame, campy version of the 60s. Again, these generalizations are entirely from the view of the portrayal of these decades in popular culture. I'm too young to have lived through all these decades, and frankly I didn't have to. How these times actually were is inconsequential compared to how these

: Bo Derek

times are remembered and thusly portrayed (and thusly recorded historically). As far as the 80s go, Bo Derek sticks out as the decade's sex symbol. Derek made her first appearance inPlayboy in 1980. Derek mirrored the quirky nature of the decade with her braided hair. While Derek isn't the first sex symbol to appear naked for magazines, she may be arguably the first whose entire career was based solely on her sex appeal (only if you want to argue that Fawcett had acting talent), especially considering she was as the "Worst Actress of the Century." She's also the most buxom of the women mentioned thus far, which shows the progression (or regression depending on your perspective) of the beauty ideal. The requirement of talent as an entry point has started to erode.

By the 1990s, its completely gone. Enter Pam Anderson. The 90s can be summarized as Silicon Valley and silicone peaks. Pam Anderson is, again, a blonde and like Derek, buxom. However, Anderson is the first sex symbol to have surgically enhanced breasts ("enhanced", of course, being a matter of taste). The 90s saw a fusion of humanity (literally and figuratively) and technology that revolved around major technological advances and the "dot com boom." The excess of the 80s combined with the advancement of the 90s and created an army of women in the Barbie Doll mold of Pamela Anderson. Anderson's sexual exploits are quite literally public knowledge; she's posed for magazines numerous times and her sex tape with ex-husband Tommy Lee is as easy to find as a copy of Caddyshack. Anderson personifies the heights of our decadence and lack of restraint, and may arguably be the low point or the far extreme from which the pendulum had to begin to swing back. What other taboos were left?

Well I can think of one, and American society became acutely aware of it when 16 year old Britney Spears released "...Baby One More Time." She fit all the pre-requisites for sex symbol status, but also introduced a new criteria: youth. The rise of the (supposedly) virginal Spears pushed us past the last taboo of pedophilia. Grown men were unabashed to talk about their infatuation with an underage girl. This a trend that has only intensified since Spears. Websites are maintained counting down the seconds to legality of girls like Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, Hillary Duff, Lindsay Lohan, Emma Watson and Miley Cyrus. Its no longer a taboo to look at an underage girl and extrapolate her "potential hotness" for when, you know, you're "allowed" to notice such things. Spears, for her own part, fully embraced the role of sex symbol, hyper-sexualizing herself by the age of 18 with a skin-tight red catsuit for "Oops! I Did It Again" and then later for "I'm A Slave (For You)". These songs and their accompanying videos leave nothing to the imagination in the way that Spears' earliest predecessors had. Because of this, Spears lived/lives a life that she's set up for herself and been destined for: she was the same skinny, blonde, untalented, surgically enhanced latest upgrade to the American sex symbol even intoning the old virginal imagery. And it destroyed her, much to the roaring approval of contemporary society.

: The (D)Evolution of Britney Spears

Which leads us to the present day where celebrity is so ubiquitous and the famous females are so made-up and shrouded by layers of bullshit and make-up its hard to distinguish one that rises above the fray. If you've read other articles I've written, though, you know where my money lies: Megan Fox. Fox's first major appearance was in the movieBad Boys, where - as a 15 year old - she danced atop a bar under a waterfall in (aptly) an American flag bikini. At the age of 22, we already know more about her sex life than perhaps even she herself knows. Fox, however, does break the mold in a number of ways. Cosmetically speaking she's the first brunette on this list. Intellectually speaking, she may the first one that is so acutely aware of who she is and how she's perceived at such a young age. Where it can be argued

: Megan Fox, a "hero" for our times

that the other sex symbols got caught up in the wave of hype created by their physical beauty (Monroe died young, Derek ran away to Germany when she was 16, Anderson and Spears completely self-destructed), Fox seems hyper-aware of how she is perceived and usees that to market herself. Fox also strips away the bullshit attempts of the predecessors to "prove their worth" so to speak. Fox has stated that she has shyed away from roles where she'd actually have to act. She also said that she'd kill herself if she was ever as fat as Marilyn Monroe, whose face is tattooed on her right forearm. She's also notoriously outspoken, especially sexually, to the point where it almost makes men uncomfortable. The fact that she's darker physically mirrors how she's darker socially. She is, in a sense, the female anti-hero; the completely deconstructed American sex symbol who has used the stereotypes that culture has set up and bent them (and us) for her own success. We no longer root for virginal the girl-next-door (Superman), we root for the beer-swilling, cursing, tattoo'd, dark vixen (pun intended, by the way) (Rorschach).

And in a sense that makes Megan Fox, our new American sex symbol, a more perfect encapsulation of American society than any of her predecessors. Hail the new queen.

Peace,
{VM}

* Inside joke.

** There are obvious exceptions to this, of course, especially given the recent boom in female-oriented movies and comics. I'm referring in this instance more to blockbusters and traditional "hero" narratives.

*** I've never seen Monster's Ball so maybe I've got a blind-spot.

Nectar of the Gods

2009-07-20T16:28:00.002-05:00

What follows is an obligatory update regarding my weekend in Vermont. I call it obligatory because so much happened that I really don't have a choice - as a self-centered egotistical blogger - but to write about it. What's odd is that interesting/confusing events did transpire, which for most people would be a good thing. For me, however, it isn't. The Dead Pool is really an exercise in how I make my monotonous and mundane life seem somehow exciting and interesting. So now when exciting/interesting things happen, I'm left with no real voice to describe them with. Anyways, I soldier on for your masochistic amusement...

Traffic. Its more evil than Nazis, Commies and Amanda* combined. I got stuck in hours of traffic on the way up to Ludlow, VT. There's no interesting anecdote or story I have about this particular set of traffic, but I really wanted to bitch about it and you can't stop me.

I ended up getting off of I-89 much earlier than I anticipated thanks to Sandy, my British navigator. Yes, I reprogrammed my GPS to have a British accent. And yes, I named my GPS. "Sandy" is a reference to the model of my car: Malibu. As in "the beaches of Malibu are sandy" ergo "Malibu is Sandy". Anyways, Sandy sent me through Bradford, NH which is Payson's hometown. It was an ironic twist of fate, that doesn't seem ironic now but will when I finish my story so be patient and get off me.

I arrived in Ludlow, VT where my friend Devin lives. You may remember Devin as the girl I affectionally referred to as "kidnapper chick." The long and short of the story with her is this: we met randomly when I was hammered. I helped her find her way around Boston and then home to VT, because I'm a nice guy and she's a pretty girl. We exchanged numbers and said we'd hang out again. "Again" never ended up happening... until, weirdly enough, the stars aligned for this weekend when I was already planning to head to VT for the Vermont Brewers' Festival. So we hatched a plan that we'd hang out Friday, I'd stay at her place and then we'd go up to Burlington for the Brew-fest together on Saturday and probably return on Sunday.

This is where cheeseball lines like "the best laid plans of mice and men" come into play. I'm not quite sure if I'm a man or a mouse, but I pretty sure that whichever I was/am; she wasn't interested. I'm willing to cut her a little slack on the basis of lack of sleep, but after she greeted me rather affectionately I was routinely ignored for the rest of the night. And this is where the experienced readers start thinking: "Oh no, what did you do, you idiot?" Well (this time) the idiot didn't do anything. Here's where I'm relying on my female contingent of Pool aficionados for some help in deciphering what happened.

She invites me up to VT, says I can stay at her place.
I invite her to come up to Brew-fest with me, she agrees and takes the whole weekend off from work.
I show up, get a big hug and get told how excited she is to see me.
We get to her place and she tells me to drop my stuff off in her room. You're thinking what I'm thinking at this point, right?
She has to run some 'errands' for her brother so she disappears for a while, some random people show and I sorta chill with them until she gets back.
Everyone else leaves to go to some party, and she tells me she's tired but how she wants to go to this party. She ends up deciding to go, so I drive because I'm a nice guy and she's tired.
We get to the party and essentially she abandons me. I do my best to mingle/blend in and so forth before wandering off to find her. I'm being careful to avoid the whole puppy-dog-follower thing, but after every time I get back into a conversation with her she wanders off after a few minutes. So now I'm really confused. I came up to hang with her, and that's why she invited me up... and now it seems like she's ignoring me.
We end up at her brother's apartment, and the same thing happens. I'm winnowing several hours of this down into bullet points, but I'm not really missing any important details outside of drinking cognac from the bottle with two of her friends.
I end up driving her and her friend Casey (dude) back to her place where there are, again, random people hanging out. One of the random dudes, after a while there, says something about pillows and a blanket. My natural thought is that he's going to crash there.
Nope. I'm wrong. Apparently those pillows and blanket are for me. Apparently now I'm sleeping on the futon.
At this point (3-4am), I'm bored, tired and done with trying to figure out what the fuck is up so I decide to crash.
Turns out she has to work Saturday after all, so she can't come up with me to Brew-fest, but says she'll come up after work and catch up with me. So I give her the ticket I bought for her and head up to Burlington to meet with my friends.
At this point I'm sure you'll be able to guess who didn't end up showing up after all.

The weirdest feeling is the one between when you realize its a sure-thing and when you realize, oh wait it ain't a sure-thing. Now I don't want to oversimplify or oversexualize this, because I really dug this chick. She's pretty, cool, independent and interesting. And it seemed from the months of texting that she was interested in me. I know I was interested in her and I think that by now I know when I'm doing a good job of showing it. Call me crazy, but I don't think its common practice to invite a dude you (sort of) just me to drive up three hours to hang out with you and then ditch him. Right?

And I don't want the tone to be off on this; I'm not pissed off, but I am kind of bummed. Like I said, I dug this girl and I was under the impression she dug me. And I'm pretty sure all the signs pointed that way and I'm not crazy (at least not moreso than normally). I wasn't going up there to get laid (though, let's be honest, I'm a 22 year old dude, it was on my mind), but to get to know this chick, perhaps in a more-than-friends way. And I got the kabbash put on that. Then I went to visit my friends who are in long-term relationships, living with each other, and also to see Ray and Ashley's baby boy, Ethan, on the way home Sunday. Between driving through my ex's town to start the vacation and seeing Ethan at the end, it was...errr, "interesting" we'll say. I'd elaborate (maybe) but we're already over 1000 words. Suffice it to say, I'm out $30 and 3 hours. That's comparible to a bad dinner-and-a-movie date, so we'll call it a wash.

BREW-FEST, on the other hand, kicked ass and took names. I didn't get to see JC because he came down with stomach flu, but I did get to drink with Jon and Lauren. Also ran into Scanlin (Matt variety), Max, Mac, Bill, Mark, Carrie and Kaigle. Apparently Lindsay was also there, but I didn't see her and she didn't pick up her phone so her loss. Best beer I had there was High And Mighty's St. Hubbins Ale. Switchback (no site), was awesome as always. The rest of the beers were decent-to-good, but ultimately forgettable (for obvious reasons).

I got KKD after brew-fest, which is unquestionably the best "I've been drinking" food in all of Vermont. If you're ever in Burlington, go there. I had a burger and onion rings so greasy that'd make an Italian's hair jealous. Jon and Lauren beat a hasty retreat after KKD, leaving me to fend for myself on the mean streets. I ended up finding Pepin and Kara et al at RJs. I fucking hate RJs so we moved on to What Ales You. Pepin bought shots of SoCo which is always a bad decision, as it was followed by a Switchback at What Ales, an Irish whiskey (Tullamore Dew, obviously) on the rocks at Finnegan's (where I got to see Cait briefly) and a number of Miller Lites, gravy fries and chicken tenders at Nectar's with Scanlin (James variety), The Mayor of Chuch Street (Carl), Petey, Pepin, Kara and Eric. Scanlin (Matt variety) went to the Metronome club upstairs for 80s night. He didn't stay there long for reasons I won't put into writing, but as he was standing outside Nectar's I wrote "I (heart) U" on the window for him. And that's how I started talking to the cute waitress.

Her name is Brittany and she was definitely young enough to make me feel creepy. But Scanlin (James variety) called me a "pussy" and told me to "man up", and as everyone knows I'm contractually obligated to do anything that is followed by "man up."

So I got Brittany's number, and thankfully Chris Hansen didn't show up.

Peace,
{VM}

PS. I went to see Ashley, Ray and Ethan on Sunday after crashing on Pepin and Kara's floor. I would write more about this but I wanted to end on the "To Catch A Predator" line.

* In an attempt to avoid random anti-feminist comments, I've decided to make any blanket comments about feminists or feminism a direct assault on Amanda. It's an aggressive/desperate move but I'm losing the war and its time to bring out the big guns. You're welcome.