Heavy on the Rotation

A Healthy Breakfast Starts with Dennis

The Year of the Sloth

Yep. Five months. I haven't posted a thing in five months. Why? I have no idea. I could say it's because I picked up a slight case of mono back in May that knocked me on my ass for six weeks and I have yet to fully recover. Or I could say it's because I've been working on another project with my girlfriend called Questions for Dracula, and I just haven't had the time to get back to this one. Or I could say that I've simply gone and lost my muse. But really, I've just been super fucking lazy.

Well, no more. I'm back, baby!

P.S. This post in no way guarantees that others will follow. It is purely a dramatic exercise.

Honey, You Got Some Shit in Your Eye

It's nice when friends look out for you. Sometimes they'll let you know you've got a "little something on your face", most likely a dab of mayo from that Turkey & Swiss you had for lunch. Or they'll subtly mimic picking something out of their teeth, in the hopes that you'll take the hint and do the same. But when it comes to that crusty shit in your eye you get after taking a good long nap, brutal honesty is the best policy. 

Besides, what is "sleep" anyway? I decided to look it up.

According to Wendell the Worm on DiscoveryKids.com, there is no official name for it. "It's just the pasty stuff that appears after the Sandman's stopped by." he says. Thanks, Wendell, but that kind of response raises more questions than it answers. Who in the hell is this Sandman character? What's he doing with all this sand? And why is he leaving "little presents" in the corner of my eyes? Disgusting. But, before I go off on some long-winded tangent, let's get back to this "sleep" stuff.

When you go to sleep at night, all sorts of shit accumulates in your eyes—a combination of sweat, oil, and tears. Mostly tears. And you know what tears are made of? Salt, sugar, ammonia, water, citric acid, and urea. Yep, that's right. Urine. So maybe this post should be titled "Honey You Got Some Shit and Piss in Your Eye."Just saying.

Whatever this shit is, it has a lot of different names. Some people call it sleep. Some call it goop. Some call it gunk or sand. And if there's enough of it, some people even refer to it in the plural: crusties. But why don't we just call it what it really is?

Well, for one reason, it's easier to call attention to something kinda gross if you don't have to point it out directly. You can kind of hint around it. This works especially well if the stricken is someone you're attracted to. And it's much gentler than saying : "Hey baby, you got some shit in the corner of your eye."

The other reason is, most of us learned this language from our parents. And parents have a hard time telling their kids the truth. So they came up with all these cutesy little names for human excretions. I can understand that. It's not exactly nice to tell your six-year-old son that Mr. Sandman took a shit in his tear duct. Funny as hell, but not nice.

Which is why I'm a big fan of brutal honesty. You see something in the corner of my eye? Tell me. I won't tear up. I promise. I can't. Not until I get this shit out.

It's About That Time

It's early in the morning, around 8 o'clock. Make that 7:59. Which means my alarm is set to go off sometime in the next sixty seconds. But that's not going to happen. Because today, my friends, I have the pleasure of telling Father Time to go suck it.

I don't know about you, but getting up a minute or two before my morning alarm sounds is a ridiculously satisfying experience. Sometimes I feel a bit like a superhero—one of those guys who can sense things before they actually happen. Except in my case, the only disaster I'm capable of averting is the hassle of having to reach over and hit the snooze button. To be fair, I'm not sure having a vaguely accurate biological clock even qualifies as a super power. But hey, if Aquaman can get into the Justice League, so can I.

[It's been rumored that the Justice League, in a calculated move to appear more environmentally conscious, inducted Aquaman into their ranks despite his tendency to openly gossip about League members with sea cucumbers.]

When I'm not feeling like a superhero, I like to imagine I'm a bomb detonation expert. Kind of like that guy in The Hurt Locker. Only I'm wearing pajamas instead of an explosive ordinance disposal suit. And I'm not really in any immediate danger other than being rudely awakened. Still, the morning is chock full of drama:

The time is 8:14 AM. That leaves me with exactly one minute to grab my cell phone, flip it open, scroll down the Settings menu, select Tools>Alarm Clock>OK, then hit “Off.” Nothing I can't handle.

Okay, 8:15 is in sight. I'm moving into position. 25 seconds...

Scrolling. Scrolling. 15 seconds. Damn, where is that damn alarm clock? Here we go...

No, not the Tip Calculator. Stupid thumbs!

10 seconds. Alarm Clock>OK. Yes.

5 seconds. Turn On/Off. Scroll. Set.

4 seconds. Off. Ha-ha!

3 seconds...

Alarm should be set to [Off]?
> Yes
> No

FUCK! A follow up question? This guy is good.

2 seconds...

Not this time old man.

And then...

Silence.

Time is now 8:15. IED diffused. No casualties reported.

Sure, alarm clocks are great. But in a world where every tick and tock is measured with beeps, blips, and buzzes, it's nice to wake up on your own once in while. Besides, I'm getting tired of some old fuck poking me in the shoulder with a scythe every morning. That shit hurts.

An Unfortunate Friday

Some things just go together. Simon and Garfunkel. Peanut butter and jelly. Chinese food and fortune cookies. But last Friday this beautiful pairing of East meets West was wrenched apart by some sinister hand at Sampan, the take-out place down the street.

After looking down into the dark recesses of the brown paper bag and finding nothing but a few extra napkins and a packet of duck sauce, I started to panic. Where in the hell was I going to get my two-bit wisdom now? What was I going to do with this now superfluous “in bed” on the tip of my tongue? It was quite vexing.

To me, the fortune cookie is one of the main draws of ordering Chinese food. Without it, all you've got is a bunch of mediocre chicken covered in red sauce. Then again, Chinese has never really been my thing. But that's where the fortune cookie comes in. It's the great equalizer. No matter how shitty your food is, you can always count on the fortune cookie to balance things out. Except this time.

For years and years, those little folded messages have given me perspective on my life and relationships. Hell, even my career. They also served as an introductory course in Taoism—from the vague poetic musings of Lao Tzu to the sly military strategies of Sun Tzu. But there's more to a fortune cookie than the message inside. Cracking one open after wolfing down a #12 is part of a tradition—a tradition that someone at Sampan forgot to pass on. Why? I'll never know. But I do know this:

"Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you."

Yeah, right. I want my cookie, goddamnit.

The Science of Sleep

I finished my taxes today. It feels good to get that off my shoulders. But I decided not to amend that return. Fuck 'em. If they wanted more people to do the right thing and own up to their fiscal mistakes, they'd make that shit easier to understand. How in the hell can you have a negative income anyway? Ah well, I should be getting my refund soon. Which means I can finally spring for a new bed (no, that wasn't a pun)—something that sleeps two.

Now, don't get me wrong. I love my mattress. I've had it for about 10 years now and spent nearly a third of that on it. Deep, restful sleep. There's just one problem: it's made for a single guy who doesn't think he's ever gonna get laid. Not that I expect to get laid that frequently, but once or twice a year I'm going to need something that allows two average-sized human beings to occupy the same space without actually being on top of one another.

Just a few weeks ago, on a whim, I walked into my local Sleepy's. They're the mattress professionals, in case you didn't know. Now I'd normally question the credentials of anyone who referred to themselves as a mattress professional, but the salesmen's thick European accent seemed reassuring enough, so I took him on his word. Anyway, he proceeded to tell me that sleeping on a really firm mattress, like I had been doing for the last ten years, isn't a good idea. I needed something softer—one of those weird NASA beds made out of space-age foam. I said, “Okay, you're the mattress pro. Enlighten me with your comfy wisdom.” Next stop: the Sleep to Live machine.

For those of you who aren't hip to new mattress technology, they've got computers now that can help you find something ideal for your unique body type (in my case, thin and bony). Sounds sophisticated, right? All it really means is that buying a mattress has gotten really fucking complicated. Here I was, thinking I'd just walk in with a photo of my old mattress, throw it down on the salesman's desk and say “Give me one of them.” Instead, I felt like I was being fitted for an Avatar. God, can't anything be simple anymore?

Still, you've got to hand it to the mattress professionals. They know their shit. Just like I know that having a reasonably active sex life is next to impossible when your bed is one step up from a race car. So when that refund check comes, you can be damn sure I'll be cashing it. Because the next time I wake up in the morning with a smile on my face, there's gonna be someone there smiling right next to me.