Laugh It Up, Fuzzball

Elevator Cat says PLZ PRESS LOBBEE THX

This morning I emailed Lindsay and Price and asked them why I couldn't stop laughing at the Roomba Cat. I mean, it's just a cat riding a Roomba, why do I find it so hilarious? Ah well, you judge for yourself:

 

I then received this email from Price, aka The Golden Child, and it cracked me up. I'd try to Twitter it, but the story would lose its humor if I tried to crunch it down to 140 characters. It needs the blog. :)

i was working out in the basement at mom and dad's building last night, and when i went to the elevator bay a cat was sitting as if he was waiting for the elevator.  this isn't just a hallway where the elevators are where the cat was just passing by, you have to actively go around a corner into a little nook to find the elevators.  i found it odd.  the cat looked at me and nodded kind of, so i walked up and pressed the up button.  i scratched the cat; he seemed friendly enough.  so we were both waiting, the cat and me.  the cat was sitting and looking at the elevator door.  it opened and the cat walked in in front of me.  i was like "uh, i wonder if i should keep this cat on the basement floor, maybe he's not supposed to leave and this is like making sure luna doesn't bolt for the open door."  i decided against it... although i was heading to floor 27, i figured the cat wanted off on the first floor, so i pressed that button too.  the cat turned around and sat down facing the elevator doors. the doors closed and we rode up in silence.  the doors opened to the lobby and the cat walked out and went about his business.  the doors closed and i went to 27.

 

very peculiar, these new york cats...

The Golden Child: Random Musings

            Have you ever dropped a credit card or a quarter in between the seat of your car and the center console?  This is perhaps the most treacherous terrain outside of that ice level from Mario Kart 64.  A credit card or license is really the only thing big enough to slide into this incredibly minute space, yet this seems to happen to me frequently.  A botched transition from a cell phone to the CD changer, an inadvertent sneeze during a drive thru transaction, or maybe I just lose a lot of shit in my car (Fuzzball)…any of these instances could result in a frustrating search and rescue operation.

            You immediately think, “god dammit” and ask your buddy if they saw where your card went.  Your first intuition is to look below the seat, but don’t kid yourself, you know you didn’t hear it hit the floorboard.  So you delicately pry the seat cushion away from the console and, joyfully, you see the corner of your card sticking up about halfway down the cushion.  However your initial happiness is immediately overwhelmed by your chagrin.  Here is the most pressing problem in this situation: if you stick your hand down into the space to retrieve the card, the cushion gets pushed farther away from the console, thus opening the space wider for the card to fall further into the crevice.  It’s like you’ve got opposite magnets and whenever you get close to touching the card it just falls further and further away.  Now eventually the card runs out of cushion and falls under the seat, but this is no picnic either.  What’s the deal with all that metal under there?  My arm has to bob and weave and dodge and duck so many times around those metal bars I feel like I’m trying to steal from a vending machine.  So anyways, it sucks when that happens.

Random Musings / Picks of the Week:

Music Picks:

            Sigur Ros: Track 3 – This song will play at the end of the movie made about me.

            The Dissociatives: Forever and a Day – Interesting combo of vocals and electronic

            symphony, capped by a children’s choir singing the chorus.  Cool.

            Bird York: Into the Deep – The title track from one of the most amazing movies I have ever

            seen, Crash.  This song plays during the montage at the end of the movie…very sad.

IMBD.com Spot-of-the-Week

I saw a show on Sci-Fi while channel surfing that featured Iceman from the X-Men series (Shawn Ashmore), Curtis from 24 (Roger Cross), and the dad from Dawson’s Creek (John Wesley Shipp).  Somebody beat that trio (it turns out it was some Outer Limits episode).

6 Degrees of the Golden Child

            My friends and I shut down a bar last week playing 6 Degrees.  Try these on for size (and no cheating on IMDB):

                        Meg Ryan to Diane Lane

                        Hillary Duff to Sean Connery

                        Denise Richards to Robert Redford

--Finally, somebody asked me last week if aliens came to Earth and you only had one song to give them for all of humanity, what would it be?  Well, mine is U2’s One.  For some reason I have to believe it is the single greatest “song” ever, even though I’m not a diehard U2 fan or anything like that.  I’m not sure what defines something like this, it’s got to be just your gut feeling.  How about you guys?

The Golden Child: Riddle Me This Friends

After my wildly unpopular story about the shoe riots I've decided to make a more user-friendly post.  Maybe "user-friendly" isn't the word I'm looking for...I'm studying all sorts of advertising research and media placement right now in school and I've learned a lot about demographics.  I don't think many of my posts fit the older, smarter, and more mature demographic that read this site.  Which is fine, so here is a cool riddle.  Don't check the posts too soon in case someone knows it and answers right away.  It's my favorite riddle/brain teaser ever.

*************************************************************************************************************

You walk into a room, the door closes behind you and disappears.  There are two doors in front of you.  One door leads to heaven, one leads to hell, but they are unmarked.  There are also two men on each side of the room, one "truth teller" and one "liar."  The truth teller always tells the truth, no matter what.  The liar always tells a lie, no matter what.  However, you have no idea which one is which, they look identical.  You get ONE question to ask ONE of the men (in other words you can't ask them both at once) that will help you get to heaven.  You can't go open one door, see what it is, then close it.  Once you open a door, that is your final choice.  You can't get out any other way.  You can only ask one question to one of the men.  The placement of the men in the room is irrelevant (i.e. it's not like the liar is automatically in front of the door to hell.)  How do you get to heaven safely?

note: there is no cooky stupid answer like "you have a gun, and you shoot one of the guys dead and torture the other one till he tells you what's up."  or "you grow wings and fly away."  there is a real answer that you can all come to figure out, just think aloud.  one question to ask...good luck.

note 2: someone has already answered the riddle in the posts...so don't cheat, i'm watching you.

The Golden Child's Shoe Story PART I:

THE SHOES

Shoes are my biggest fetish in the world.  If I had a million dollars (or a job, at least), I would spend all of it on shoes.  Now I’m not talking leather shoes or dress shoes of any kind; I am loyal to one brand and one brand only: Nike.  Now, I do dabble in an occasional retro Adidas or Reebok, and I have an ongoing search for a cool pair of Ponys or Merrells, but there is nothing prettier to my eyes than a clean pair of Nikes.  To clarify, though, I am as white as they come.  I went to a private high school, I own a blazer with gold buttons (although I’ve never worn it), and I am currently in a fraternity at Texas.  These facts would seem to contradict my love for “kicks” as they say; a love more commonly found “in tha hood” or “on tha block.”

The holy grail of my collection has been my search for the Air Jordan XI’s in black/white (known on the streets as “the patent leather concords”).  These are simply the most popular shoes of all time, period.  Worn by His Airness during the first comeback in ’96 when the Bulls won an NBA record 72 games, their initial release ten years ago caused riots and violence, even death.  Millions hit the shelves and were gone within days.  Michael himself claimed he wanted a top of the line basketball shoe that could be worn with a tux.  Needless to say everyone agreed.  I would trade all twenty plus pairs in my collection to get my hands on these shoes.  Simply put, they are “the shoes.”

Nike has been re-releasing Jordans ever since his second “retirement” in 98-99.  There will soon be 21 Air Jordans to date, and every one of them has set the trend for basketball shoes for the year.  Not to take anything away from the other Jordans, because they are all wildly popular as well, but the XI’s are a step up.  I missed the first re-release in 2001 because of a lack of funds and knowledge of the intricacies of the shoe collecting world.  I was devastated.  I did get my hands on a pair of the black/black/red colorway, but the collection would never be complete without the black/whites.  The Nike gods shown down on me again this year, with an unadvertised, incredibly limited re-release of the black/white XI’s (they were combined with the VI’s to form a set called The Defining Moments Package, named for the shoes MJ wore during his first and fourth titles).  January 28, 2006.  I wouldn’t miss it for the world.

Note from Fuzzball: Stay tuned for Part II of The Golden Child's Shoe Story: THE RIOTS!!!

Cliché Things I Want to See or Have Happen to Me Before I Die

Hello to all the various nerds and geeks enjoying the blogging world over the Thanksgiving holidays, I hope all went well.  This is the GC, back to aid Fuzzball during her weekly flu attack.  Recently I spotted a cop grabbing some dough nuts at the local Shipley's restaurant...sure this seems to be normal, right?  Almost too normal for my taste in fact.  I went as far as to think, "wow, that's cliché...I wonder what other cliché things I will see today?"  Turns out I didn't see anything else, even when I strategically left a banana peel outside my roommate's door, hoping he would come out and be like, "hey can I have a capri su....WOOOAAAAH!!!"  Sadly he stepped right over the trap, then proceeded to drink my Capri Sun anyways.  Here are some other cliché's that I'm all about:

• See someone slip on a banana peel, still

• Pull a tablecloth out without disturbing the place settings

• Wear pajamas complete with a night cap and a button flap for my ass

• Carry a bag of groceries that has a huge unwrapped loaf of French bread sticking out of the top

• Put my jacket over a puddle for a lady (actually there is no way in hell I would do this…why would I ruin my jacket? just walk around the damn thing.)

• Throw tomatoes at a bad comedian

• See someone hammer their thumb instead of the nail, then watch as their thumb triples in size and beats like a heart

• Get in a sword fight, jump on top of a table, then jump over my enemy’s blade as he swings at my shins

• By the same token, if my enemy loses his sword I won’t be civil and let him pick it up…I’ll go ahead and run him through (this isn’t cliché, I just want to kill him)

• Jump to grab a hold of a helicopter as it takes off, then dangle wildly as the chopper weaves through buildings

• Hit a baseball through a window, then run away

• Create an incredibly complex scheme to steal some famous artifact that involves breaking into huge vaults and using timed movements and lasers and infrared goggles and cool black catsuits, but have it depend entirely upon a fat security guard watching Nick-at-Night instead of the camera feeds

• Run into a pole while chasing a train

• Wear a football helmet that has a face mask with only one bar but no identifiable logo

• Play the harmonica while in jail

• Tell a cab driver to “follow that car!” and speed through red lights

• Get disconnected on a phone call, then frantically hit the cradle yelling “hello?” (has pressing that button EVER worked?)

• Become a chief of police and constantly complain that “the mayor is really riding my ass” and then angrily tell my rogue detective to drop his current case before I suspend him

• Be in an alien race, because clearly they have the whole peaceful democracy down…there is always only one ruler, and clearly the aliens work well together because the entire race has teamed up to kick Earth’s ass

• Cut the green wire to stop a bomb from going off with one second left on the readily visible timex clock

• Star in a confessional commercial for an old person type medicine and be seen riding a two seater bike with my spouse in the closing scene

• Be a football player or a cheerleader (if I was a girl) in high school so that I could wear the respective uniforms to school every single day, no matter the season

• Rob a bank and happen to get the teller on their first day on the job (and I’ll use bags with big green dollars signs on them)

• Give a teacher a red apple (even though no one likes those)

• Shoot a gun in the old west, only to have it ricochet and make that really funny noise

• Make a hilarious joke about how white guys can’t dance, but include that black women have big “booties”

• Be interviewed after a participating in a sporting event and comment about how “we came together as a team, focused, executed, and brought our A games”

• Lose my dog, have him found and taken in my some bad dude, then find them together and have a contest to decide who gets to keep the dog by each calling him at the same time…then after he goes to the bad dude, expose his hand to find that he had a doggie treat and that’s why he won

• Be in movies so that I never ever have to worry about my contacts falling out, even if I jump out of planes or swim under water or dive from exploding objects

• Tie someone (preferably the hero, as I am the villain) to a chair, but leave a piece of broken glass within reach to be sure they can cut their way out

• By the same token, I will of course tell the hero my entire plan before killing him

Tell me your favorite cliché's, including those you've seen, heard, or really want to see.  See you next time.

Guest Blogger: The Golden Child

Job Opportunities for Michael Myers, Post Halloween Franchise

Hello again to one and all! Golden Child has once again stepped up to aid Fuzzball in her time of business. Here I am to talk pop culture and pick your nerdy brains over the nuances of our mundane daily lives.

Recently A&E has been showing a bunch of “classic (also known as cheap sequel)” horror films for Halloween. During one of my commercial breaks from the three hours of Star Trek: The Next Generation that I watch every weekday (another post, don’t worry) I caught Halloween 5. Halloween 5??? Where did that come from? Upon further inspection (via IMDB.com) I realized there were in fact EIGHT Halloweens (including Halloween 3 which for some reason has nothing to do with Michael Myers or anything else, so we’ll throw that out). Halloween H20 and Halloween: Resurrection star heartthrob Josh Hartnett and washed-up rapper Busta Rhymes respectively, so these aren’t just your run-of-the-mill sequels. Needless to say at this point I was intrigued. I had seen the first Halloween, but didn’t Michael die? Or did he? I was completely perplexed as to how in God’s name the producers kept making up ways for Mike to survive. Much to my pleasure it gets more and more ridiculous each time. In fact at the end of Halloween 4 “The Shape” is hit by a car at full speed, knocked through a fence, shot fifty times by a bunch of cops with shotguns, and then falls down a well which collapses on top of him, only to have the cops toss dynamite down on top of him. After this climatic scene I had the “Thank Jesus we finally got the bastard! There’s no WAY he survived that!” face on. Sure enough, however, Halloween 5 starts by showing how Myers found a service shaft at the bottom of the well, crawls to safety before the dynamite hits, floats down a river and is revived by a hermit for a full year (he promptly kills the hermit upon recovery).

Maybe my problem with this series is the lack of humanization of Michael. I realize this lends to his mystery and thus his terrifying demeanor, but after seven Halloweens I have to admit I’m a little more interested in seeing how Myers spends his time during the years between killing sprees. He has to be doing something, right? I mean I realize surviving a gas tank explosion is an everyday type of thing, but what about those late night Wendy’s cravings? I want to see Michael irritated over someone buying the last orange Gatorade from the local Stop & Go. I want to see Michael in a laundromat sitting in his boxers and mask next to a mother of four while his jumpsuit is on the cool-down cycle. Doesn’t this guy ever have to take leak? I want to see Michael running to a port-o-potty to relieve diarrhetic cramps over that bag of Peanut M&Ms he ate. After he ices everyone, does he just take a big sigh and hail a cab? Where the hell does he go? Much like the “Tori” episodes of Saved by the Bell without Kelly and Jessie, there are some glaring gaps in Mike’s story.

After watching Halloween: Resurrection I have decided perhaps it was time to end this charade. Michael Myers, the sadistic masked killer, has been disposed of seven different times (at the end of each movie…or so it would seem). Perhaps it’s time to hang up the butcher knife and look for work elsewhere? Here are my career suggestions for Mike:

Police S.W.A.T.

Pros: Myers has been brutally shot and survived on three separate occasions. He has been set on fire (twice), electrocuted, blown up, beaten with a shovel, fallen from both a two story window and into a deep well, and been run over by a car at 50 mph; “endurance” is this guy’s middle name. Throw out the shields and pay Myers to knock down doors and take the first few rounds from those criminals for you.

Cons: Will have a problem working for good rather than evil. Probably will kill teammates. Not good with authority.

Professional Wrestler

Pros: Myers’ character practically writes itself… “six foot six two hundred and forty pound crazy killer is out for blood…and the title belt!” Plus you know he’s strong, he’s always busting through locked doors in the movies. Plus he already has his own mask and theme music!

Cons: Not much on banter with the crowd. Will have problems not killing the fellow wrestlers and fans.

Mortician

Pros: This guy obviously has no problem being around dead people, and he can always finish off the ones who aren’t quite there yet. The strange hours fit him nicely as well.

Cons: Confused over lack of “living” people, Myers may become lackluster and look for work elsewhere.

Chef

Pros: He’s always carrying around that big kitchen knife; you have to think he was in a kitchen at some point in his life. Myers also enjoys cutting things more than most.

Cons: Cutting up things that are already dead may not appeal as much to Myers. People who aren’t satisfied with their meals may end up dead, which won’t be good for business.

Librarian

Pros: I’ve never heard Myers say a word in his life, so he’s not going to disrupt any studies. Plus you know once he starts, there will never be another overdue book again.

Cons: Typical populations of public libraries (nerdy kids and old people) may not put up enough of a fight for Myers’ tastes. I’m not sure he ever took the time to learn to read, either.

Garbage Man

Pros: Myers wears that dark jumpsuit around all the time anyways, so he doesn’t even need to be issued a uniform. He doesn’t really care about socializing, and thus the long hours won’t bother him. I’ve never seen Myers preoccupied with personal hygiene, so the smell won’t be a problem either. He’ll be most useful during Christmas time when hacking up those old trees is necessary as well.

Cons: Outside of Christmas, there’s not much cutting or stabbing involved.

Maybe the American workforce isn’t ready for Myers just yet…What are your suggestions for young Michael? Halloween 9 anyone?

Rita

Hi everyone. This is Torrie.

As most of you know, Tracy lives in Houston. She was planning on evacuating, but then the mayor announced that they should stay put. It took Tracy's neighbor's cousin 8 hours to drive what usually takes a half an hour. People are running out of gas on the freeway. It's over 100 degrees and you can't drive with your A/C on because it saps gas, so people are suffering from heat stroke. Officials were telling people yesterday that if they left they would be stuck on the freeway when the hurricane hit.

Tracy is at her parents house, which is a large, sturdy house. She has Emma (her dog), and Monty (her parrot) with her. They have been preparing her parents house for the last couple of days. They will probably ride out the storm in her parents church which is just a couple of blocks from their house, and is a huge brick building which has withstood all other storms. The church is letting people bring their pets.

The phone lines have been shut off, so Tracy probably won't be able to post for a few days. It has been very hard to reach her on her cell, because the lines have been jammed, but I have managed to talk to her twice in the last couple of days.

The fact that Katrina hit first was a blessing in disguise because people are taking Rita very seriously. Tracy and her family have been preparing since Wednesday.
I will continue to update everyone, if I hear anything. I'm sure I won't be able to get through to Tracy for the next several days.

I'm sure Tracy will be fine, but I'm also sure that she would appreciate your prayers.

If you have any questions, please email me at [email protected]

It's still coming soon, I promise...

Remember way back when I promised a post on blog censorship? Well, I wasn't blowing smoke up your skirt, you're still gonna get it. I received a number of really good responses to my requests for help, so thanks for that. The upcoming post will feature the authors of:

• A Perfectly Cromulent Blog
• Gymshoes
• suburban misfit
• Random and Odd
• and My Sad Little World

Are you excited? I know you are. Try to control yourself. Especially you, Pete. You're the only guy in the panel, so just think of us as your Blog Harem. Woo hoo!

Ever visited Fratania? Guest Blogger The Golden Child lives there...

THE RUSH PARTY

I am in a fraternity. A FRAT. I live in a bubble world I affectionately call Fratania. I can already tell your brain’s stereotype warehouse is being emptied as fast as it can, and that’s alright. The little clone bloggers running around in your heads are desperately trying to piece together your frat schemas…

Clone Brain Worker 1: “Somebody get me a six foot tall college boy with curly hair and who hasn’t shaved in two days!! Make sure he’s fat…no no that’s too fat, I mean fat like ‘I used to be athletic in high school but the last time I broke a sweat was when I was running from campus police’…yeah, just a little pudge in the belly that makes him suck in and a little dangle under the chin…there you go.”

Clone Brain Worker 2: “Are we going with the pink Lacoste shirt? Or the navy Polo??? Dammit the choices! Somebody get me a set of 64 Crayolas and just pick a pastel at random! Blizzard Blue? Laser Lemon? Flesh??? Just pick one! Somebody get me a pair of sear sucker shorts! That’s right, I said SEAR SUCKER SHORTS!

Clone Brain Worker 1: “Get ‘Accessories’ on line 1, tell them we need a high priority order of croakies, top-sider boat shoes, a case of lukewarm Keystone Light and a Chevy Tahoe with a big W sticker on back. Also see if we can’t find one of those big King Ranch wallets to stuff in his pocket. You guys don’t know what that is? Well just brand some stupid symbol of a cow on the side of one of those little books fancy restaurants put their checks in and stuff it in his pants.”

Clone Brain Worker 3: (breathing heavily) “Okay I just made it back from linguistics and they’ve given me a survival kit that includes sleazy pickup lines, bullshit for the parents, and some racist jokes for later.”

Hey, I’m here to tell all you condescending assholes what’s up…your preconceived notions and your little brain engineers are mostly correct. I like to think my rag tag group of frat boy friends is an exception…we usually try to avoid the standard Fratania uniform requirements…but man, it gets tough sometimes. I was at the final rush party of the summer the other night actually, and you all would have loved (or hated, I can’t even tell anymore) the scene… I’m sitting on a bench off on the side watching these newly inducted frat boys mingle with each other and a few various scattered frat guys and sorority groupies. I mean these kids could have come off a fucking assembly line. Every kid looks identical (mind you this style is the “Going Out” outfit, the standard): Polo or Lacoste collared shirt, usually single color, with khaki shorts (or god forbid sear sucker shorts), and a pair of top-sider boat shoes or grey New Balance 900’s. I just feel bad for them, their closets are like the Bat Cave, or maybe more appropriately the Frat Cave. There was so much pastel I felt like I was at the Easter Bunny’s bachelor party.

You see what’s interesting about Fratania is that you can look essentially the same for all occasions of the day:

Going to Class: It’s hot, so you rock the t-shirt of the party you had last weekend and your khaki shorts that have the imprint of your dip can in the back pocket. Not only can you show the campus that you are in the coolest frat (the original ones that make t-shirts where famous college movie characters like Ron Burgundy have cartoon talking bubbles that say stuff like “Sig Eps: We’re Kind of a Big Deal”), but you can show to all the ladies how you aren’t afraid of a little ol’ mouth cancer. [Editor's note: If I find out that The Golden Child is in fact dipping I will drive to Austin myself and personally stuff that dip can up his ass.]

Working Out: A shell of your former self, the frat man’s rare athletic ventures involve low-hoop basketball games and late afternoon golf matches that usually include more drinking than putting. Usually appropriate for the non-golf trips: a high school football/lacrosse shirt with various holes around the neck and underarms; mesh shorts from your roommate’s high school; backwards hat with your school’s logo; and those god damned grey New Balance 900’s that look like they were stolen from your grandfather’s closet. Regarding this low-hoop phenomena, the eight foot baskets (real hoops are ten) help the less gifted (white guys) dunk on each other. While still better than most WNBA games, frat ball is usually decent for the first two possessions until everyone starts huffing and puffing so much that one team loses a guy to puking in the corner and one guy trips and falls and skins his knee and one guy gets so pissed that he sucks that he punts the ball into the street and the game ends. You’re in and out in about seven minutes.

Going Out (Bars, Frat House, Friend’s Apt., etc): The uniform is usually accepted as the norm here: Single colored collared shirt of Lacoste or Polo persuasion, khaki shorts, and boat shoes/Rainbow flip-flops. The really secure guys can break from the khaki/navy shorts and wear the bizarre pink/yellow/light blue colors. Now imagine what you’ve possibly got: a big burly guy sitting there with a hot pink collared shirt and light blue khaki shorts, plus one of those khaki hats from a ranch with the rope across the bill…now you’ve got one of those department store manikin models that you go “who the hell would actually wear that?” Now, like the seven different versions of the Astros’ uniforms, there are alternates to the Fratania uniform. For the winter (or hell, most anytime for the hick fools) you’ve got a substitute of Wrangler jeans and boots. Boots…if Satan had a family reunion, it would be his retarded half cousin that would walk in wearing boots. “Hey Lucifer! Check these out! They’re like high heels for guys!” Keep them on the ranch fellas, cause my god you look ridiculous.

Well I’m about spent…just remember to imagine these outfits on a larger scale. Think of a big gathering of over 80 of these clone superstars whispering into drunk sorority girls’ ears that they have Pretty Woman on VHS in their dorm rooms. When you have kids, be wary of naming them something like Towers, Perry, Graham, or Todd…and you don’t HAVE to give them little loafers for their first day at school. Buy ‘em a pair of Nikes, that’ll set ‘em straight. Feel free to respond with some of your own experiences during your various visits to Fratania…

Coming soon...

A Fuzzball Roundtable Post on BLOG CENSORSHIP

If you have something that you'd like to include in this post, feel free to email me and I'll add your two cents to the post. Unless of course I don't like what you say, in which case I'll censor it.

Yeah. That last part was a joke, for the humor-impaired out there. I'll put it all up, warts and all, so send it on or sit back and read quips and quotes from the creators of:

• Art. Humor. Larceny.
• Random and Odd
• A Perfectly Cromulent Blog
• Gymshoes

...and more! Stay tuned, dear Fuzzbuckets. I'm determined to tackle this topic head-on.