I apologize, reader, that I have neglected my bloggery for nearly two months. I'll pick up where I left off and summarize the mundane events of my existence over the last few weeks.
I'm still driving Daddy's car. He's basically letting me use it as long as I like, which is a load off, given the financial strain we'll likely be under for a while while we pay off my wife's surgery. Yes, my bride finally had to go in for a diagnostic procedure, where they found the likely cause of her abdominal pains and we hope fixed the problem. Thanks to my shitty insurance through my employer, we'll be facing bills to the tune of several thousand dollars, which we'll have to pay off in monthly installments for years to come. So much for my plans to get my wife a nice Volvo or something.
Thanksgiving was much more relaxing this time around. Instead of cooking all day for 7 people, or bunking down in a residence with 8 relatives and 3 dogs, we checked into a nice Marriott for 3 nights and made our various family visits during the day, then retired to our quiet hotel room and took a dip in the hot tub downstairs, waking up to a sumptuous breakfast buffet each morning. We considered it a last hurrah before the upcoming surgery consumed our lives. During the week before the procedure, I became possessed by the spirit of Howard Hughes (or maybe Howie Mandel, who's still alive), growing paranoid over bringing home infectious organisms that could jeopardize my wife's health and delay the procedure (which she already had to reschedule because the first week of December wasn't convenient for her self-centered employer), so I washed my hands every chance I got and used sanitizer in between hand washings. And yet, I still caught a cold! So I had to avoid kissing my wife and took to wiping down doorknobs with disinfecting wipes. I guess the paranoia paid off because all went according to schedule. The silver lining to the dark cloud of surgery was that, with the surgery taking place on the 22nd, we had a solid excuse not to travel and visit family on Christmas day or the following days, and instead we spent the holiday and my remaining vacation days sitting around in our cozy house, eating sweets, sipping hot chocolate, watching movies, and viewing the entire first season of Bones (a gift for my wife). Coming back to work today was such a drag.
I did not allow my body to atrophy completely, however. I have resolved to exercise at least a little bit every day, from now on, health and schedule permitting. After finally undertaking the task of cleaning out the upstairs library, I made a little headway towards my goal of setting up the room as a dual-purpose library and gentleman's gym. Keeping the heavy tasseled draperies and oriental rug, I added a fake potted palm from downstairs and the twin standing fans from the master bedroom. My rudimentary set of weights -- consisting of only a pair of 35-pound and a pair of 20-pound dumbbells -- sits on a pair of end tables side-by-side, and the stability ball and Bosu sit in the corner. For extra old-time strongman appeal, I downloaded a $4 collection of piano rags to play while exercising.
A generous gift from my wife will ensure that my workout won't be completely mired in the 19th century. On Christmas morning, I was bestowed with a brand-new Xbox 360 Kinect with a Zumba game and a game inspired by The Biggest Loser. If it works out for us, we'll cancel our gym membership and save $50 a month. I hope to purchase additional used dumbbells for a little more variety -- and resistance -- in my exercises. I would go out and get some tonight, but I'm afraid I already spent all my Christmas money on my lingering L.L. Bean habit. I really hope this particular "look" I'm going for sticks, and it's not just another stupid phase in my lifelong journey to find my ideal fashion sense. While I was going "preppy" back in the summer, I overdid it and took it too far in the conservative direction, at one point going to the beach bars wearing polo shirts neatly tucked into belted khakis, making my wife feel like she was out with her father. Now that I'm halfway into my 32nd year, and no doubt coinciding with my desire to relive my college days, I'm developing an obsession with looking, feeling, and staying young, and if I've learned anything on that long road lined with castoff garments, it's that one's clothing choice can make a great impact on one's perceived age, so now I wish to bring to mind a smartly-dressed college student. Not quite frat-tastic, not quite Junior Republican, just somewhere in the middle that says casual, youthful, and effortlessly put-together. The first great leap I made in this direction was acquiring 3 pairs of dungarees, or "blue jeans," as today's youth calls them, and wearing them daily. The outermost layer of my winter wardrobe shall be a classic duffel coat with toggle closure, long the choice of the ivy-leaguer who wants a long coat but wants it to be a bit more cavalier than the Crombie while looking more put-together than a simple fleece coat. Other layering garments shall include rib-knit cotton sweaters, worn with t-shirts underneath, not a stodgy collared shirt, as if I just rolled out of bed and threw one on before heading to PSY-101, waffle-knit crewneck shirts for variety, sometimes worn underneath thick, soft chamois shirts, and plain white long-sleeve t-shirts worn under contrasting short-sleeve t-shirts or polo shirts. I'll still don the brightly-colored rugby shirts for '80s throwback appeal, and I'll keep my oxford shirts in the mix, interspersed with my weathered canvas shirts, all worn untucked, of course. I also purchased a pair of L.L. Bean's gumshoes, not just for urban downpours (could have used them last week when I had to make a grocery run in pouring rain), but also for strolls on the beach in early Spring when it's still a little too nippy for bare feet. By dialing back the conservative vibe and shaking it up a bit with colors, patterns, and textures, I hope to look as if I woke up next to a naked sorostitute with no recollection of how she got there, and plan to head to the beach or the mountains as soon as I get through my morning exam in Rocks for Jocks, blowing off my afternoon "cake" class so I can get there while it's still daylight. I now feel smugly superior when I cross paths with a suit-clad stooge in my office building who, despite probably earning far more money than I do, has no choice but to wear that itchy gabardine cocoon with a silk noose around his neck. While I covet his salary, he no doubt covets my youthful freedom. If I could only afford a car for my wife, I could reclaim the 4runner, the perfect car for the preppy, outdoorsy college douche.
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Thursday, November 3, 2011
A Return to Normalcy
The automobile is more than just a means of getting to work and back, or at least it should be. For me, for quite a long time, that's all my personal vehicle was, because, quite honestly, I became scared to drive it more than absolutely necessary. Nothing is mechanically wrong with my Crown Victoria; it's perfectly safe to drive and capable of going hundreds of miles with no trouble. What's wrong with it is the message it sends to other motorists and, of greater concern, law enforcement officers. The unfortunate fact of life regarding large sedans, Crown Victorias in particular, is that they are popular among essentially two types of people: the elderly, and criminals. So, if a cop sees anything other than a white-haired mass of shriveled flesh at the wheel of a big sedan, he immediately assumes the driver is up to no good. Younger white guys like me driving Crown Vics are assumed to be police impersonators. In the years since that traumatic incident when I was actually detained under such suspicion, I have tried hard to buck the stereotype, making every effort to appear average and harmless while asserting my right to drive whatever car I want without harassment. I've gotten sick of it, reader. I'm caving in. I'm ditching the Vic.
My decision results from an escalating trend of unwanted attention from those armed, undereducated mouth-breathers comprising the police and sheriff's departments. I became more and more nervous and tense just driving the two miles to work and back as they would give me long stares or attempt to follow me. The past few weeks reached a boiling point, of sorts. One afternoon, a police car tried to turn around and follow me, but couldn't get back into traffic from the driveway. A similar event went down just last week. A police car drove by in the oncoming lane, whipped into a parking lot to come back for me, but got delayed by a slow driver exiting the parking lot, so I had just enough time to pull into a strip mall. I got out and watched from a position of concealment as the officer doubled back, waited in an empty lot across the street, then gave up and left. The day before, I saw one coming up the road to my rear, so I ducked into a McDonald's parking lot before he could get close enough to follow me. By the end of last week, my nerves were so shot that I couldn't even drive home for lunch. I explained the whole situation to my dad, who was very understanding and even let me borrow his spare car for a few weeks while I shop around for something else.
I really feel no sadness over the matter. I mostly feel relief. Today, driving my dad's car, a nondescript Volvo sedan, I finally felt "normal" again, for the first time in ages. My heart wasn't pounding, and I wasn't constantly looking in the mirror and sweeping the road and driveways ahead for cop cars. I no longer dread the drive to and from work, darting down back roads in hopes of avoiding the po-po. Seriously, my anxiety got so bad last week that I spent an hour studying the satellite map looking for back roads and usable commercial parking lots, anything to avoid the main roads. No more of that; I can take the direct route again, in a sensible but forgettable Volvo, without fear of persecution.
In a way, it felt like the '90s again, probably because I was associating my dad's Volvo with my dearly departed 1989 Volvo sedan, which I drove all over town and beyond from 1996–2003. I may have to make a '90s CD for tomorrow's commute to enhance the mood. Oh, how I miss Old Blue. It took me to high school every morning, down to Cameron Village with its blue & white plastic awnings, up to the Barnes & Noble at Crabtree Mall on weekends, out to Pleasant Valley for trips to Best Buy, and to the Mission Valley Cinema countless times. Sure, it had a leaky sunroof and hesitated to accelerate, but it was the embodiment of the freedom one has during the early driving years and the college years. I think, deep down, everyone wants his first car back. If I had the money for a spare car, I'd snap up an identical model as soon as one turned up for sale and stick on an NCSU decal and a replica annual inspection sticker.
For now, though, I'll have to settle for my '90s room for Jack Finney-esque time-travel. Progress is stalled out a bit due to cash-strappedness, but I'm coming up with ideas here and there for what to do as funds become available. I think I'll get a vintage poster promoting Blink 182's Enema of the State. Since it's supposed to be an apartment bedroom, I can get away with not having a mini-fridge or microwave, but I still need a computer desk to show off my 1996 Compaq. I'd love an old 500-series HP printer, too, and I need to hit up Edward McKay to look for period textbooks. For best effect — and I don't know if I can convince my wife to agree to this — I need to repaint the room off-white. What college apartment has walls in any color other than off-white or possibly light gray?
So far, the room does have a nice effect despite its lack of thorough authenticity. Last night, I plugged my iPhone into the vintage TV's AV input and played a 12-minute compilation of TV commercials from Fox primetime, dated October, 1999. I swear my mind really did drift back and forth in time as these commercials, many of which I'd nearly memorized from repeated exposure and then forgotten, played as background noise while I folded laundry. For brief flashes here and there, it really was the autumn of '99.
My decision results from an escalating trend of unwanted attention from those armed, undereducated mouth-breathers comprising the police and sheriff's departments. I became more and more nervous and tense just driving the two miles to work and back as they would give me long stares or attempt to follow me. The past few weeks reached a boiling point, of sorts. One afternoon, a police car tried to turn around and follow me, but couldn't get back into traffic from the driveway. A similar event went down just last week. A police car drove by in the oncoming lane, whipped into a parking lot to come back for me, but got delayed by a slow driver exiting the parking lot, so I had just enough time to pull into a strip mall. I got out and watched from a position of concealment as the officer doubled back, waited in an empty lot across the street, then gave up and left. The day before, I saw one coming up the road to my rear, so I ducked into a McDonald's parking lot before he could get close enough to follow me. By the end of last week, my nerves were so shot that I couldn't even drive home for lunch. I explained the whole situation to my dad, who was very understanding and even let me borrow his spare car for a few weeks while I shop around for something else.
I really feel no sadness over the matter. I mostly feel relief. Today, driving my dad's car, a nondescript Volvo sedan, I finally felt "normal" again, for the first time in ages. My heart wasn't pounding, and I wasn't constantly looking in the mirror and sweeping the road and driveways ahead for cop cars. I no longer dread the drive to and from work, darting down back roads in hopes of avoiding the po-po. Seriously, my anxiety got so bad last week that I spent an hour studying the satellite map looking for back roads and usable commercial parking lots, anything to avoid the main roads. No more of that; I can take the direct route again, in a sensible but forgettable Volvo, without fear of persecution.
In a way, it felt like the '90s again, probably because I was associating my dad's Volvo with my dearly departed 1989 Volvo sedan, which I drove all over town and beyond from 1996–2003. I may have to make a '90s CD for tomorrow's commute to enhance the mood. Oh, how I miss Old Blue. It took me to high school every morning, down to Cameron Village with its blue & white plastic awnings, up to the Barnes & Noble at Crabtree Mall on weekends, out to Pleasant Valley for trips to Best Buy, and to the Mission Valley Cinema countless times. Sure, it had a leaky sunroof and hesitated to accelerate, but it was the embodiment of the freedom one has during the early driving years and the college years. I think, deep down, everyone wants his first car back. If I had the money for a spare car, I'd snap up an identical model as soon as one turned up for sale and stick on an NCSU decal and a replica annual inspection sticker.
For now, though, I'll have to settle for my '90s room for Jack Finney-esque time-travel. Progress is stalled out a bit due to cash-strappedness, but I'm coming up with ideas here and there for what to do as funds become available. I think I'll get a vintage poster promoting Blink 182's Enema of the State. Since it's supposed to be an apartment bedroom, I can get away with not having a mini-fridge or microwave, but I still need a computer desk to show off my 1996 Compaq. I'd love an old 500-series HP printer, too, and I need to hit up Edward McKay to look for period textbooks. For best effect — and I don't know if I can convince my wife to agree to this — I need to repaint the room off-white. What college apartment has walls in any color other than off-white or possibly light gray?
So far, the room does have a nice effect despite its lack of thorough authenticity. Last night, I plugged my iPhone into the vintage TV's AV input and played a 12-minute compilation of TV commercials from Fox primetime, dated October, 1999. I swear my mind really did drift back and forth in time as these commercials, many of which I'd nearly memorized from repeated exposure and then forgotten, played as background noise while I folded laundry. For brief flashes here and there, it really was the autumn of '99.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Lovely little delusions
Sometimes reality is just too much to deal with. My life isn't particularly difficult or challenging; rather, it stays stuck in the same place, going nowhere fast. I'm not drowning in debt, facing unemployment, or worrying about getting my next meal; instead, I'm doing the same shit I've been doing for the past 4 years, in the same cubicle, in the same city, and until recently, for the same pay. Yes, reader, I did finally receive a real raise. By "real raise," I mean a 7% increase in purchasing power after adjusting for inflation. Last year's raise brought my purchasing power, in 2010 dollars, back up to exactly where it was when I started in 2007. So after 4 years here, I'm basically grossing just shy of an additional $200 a month more before taxes.
This reality, while enviable to some, often becomes unbearable for me. Due to the standards set by my upper-middle-class upbringing, I feel that by now my life should have amounted to a lot more — more money, bigger house, and one or two children that I could afford to raise. I look at what my father had when he was my age — a charming house in Raleigh's premiere inside-the-beltline neighborhood, two little children, and a nice job that paid for it all and then some. Now that I'm that age, what do I have? An entry-level job with no hope for advancement, a townhouse in a questionable neighborhood, a Ford P.O.S. going on 13 years old, and no hope of ever being able to give my wife the children she wants and the upbringing I want for them. The depressing effect abates slightly when I step back and realize that most people my age are in similar, or equally unappealing, situations. Most of the friends my wife keeps up with are single and working mindless jobs, only one friend of mine is married, and those acquaintances of my wife's who are married with children seem tired and miserable. My own brother is aging like a U.S. President. The American dream appears to have crumbled; jobs are too undependable to make buying a home attractive, banks have tightened up the mortgage market, making homes too hard to get for those who want them, and education and healthcare costs have made child-rearing affordable only for those with six-figure salaries.
Here's where the woulda-coulda-shouldas take root. I could be in a much more favorable situation, even in this shitty economy. I could have chosen a more lucrative career, if only I had the forethought to understand how important it would be later on. When I chose my current career, I figured the money wasn't too important as long as I could earn a comfortable living. I didn't foresee a wife or a house. If only I had a crystal ball and knew who I was going to marry and where she was going to school; I could have chosen a career in law or medicine and met her back in the glorious late 1990s, giving me a few extra years with her in my life and avoiding wasting so many years on two degrees that would never pay big returns. By now, I could be a hotshot lawyer or a young doctor, saving up for a house in the old-money neighborhood, maybe with a kid on the way, whom I'd send to the most exclusive private school in town. If I had a kid right now, he'd grow up in a crowded townhouse and go to god-awful public schools with unrefined middle-class children, either taking the cheesewagon home or getting picked up in his mom's decade-old Toyota.
To cope with my yearning to change the past, present, and future, I turn to little delusions to distract me from the banality of my real life and the unobtainability of the standard of living I grew up with. While going through my routine this morning, I thought to myself, it's October, 1999. I'm at my apartment near the ECU campus with my girlfriend who stays over every night. I'm getting up to go to my pre-med classes. Later on, we'll meet up for lunch on campus, and be back at the apartment about 3:30 and take a little nap or have a little afternoon delight. Then we'll work on homework, have some Ramen noodles or Lean Cuisines for dinner, and have a few beers while we watch Time of Your Life and Ally McBeal.
Yes, now and then I wish I were back in college, in the late '90s when the economy was rock-solid and jobs were hanging from trees. At least back in college, you had something to look forward to. Nothing was forever, and yet the real world still seemed forever away. Every semester offered something new and different, with all-new classes, classmates, and professors, but you still had the comfort of knowing where you were going and what you were doing every day, all with a goal to strive for in the form of a degree and a job or a spot at a professional school. Loathe one of your classes this semester? Well, just tough it out and it'll be over in a few months. Is it cold and rainy outside? Rather stay in your cozy apartment instead of go to class? Blow it off, dude, you get 3 unexcused absences per class, per semester, and there's no supervisor to call with a lame excuse in a fake scratchy voice. Bills? What the hell are those? Those go to Mom and Dad's house. Your only money concern is catching Lean Cuisines on sale so you'll have more for half-price pitchers.
Last week I went on a staff retreat, where I carried my stuff in my old backpack I'd used in high school and college. When I got home that evening, I swear I had a time-travel experience like something out of a Jack Finney novel. Years and years of muscle memory, fallow for so many additional years, snapped back into service instantly as I came in the door, raised my right hand to my shoulder, slid my thumb under the strap, twirled the pack around 180 degrees, and lowered it to the floor, all in one smooth motion as I'd done thousands of times before, and for that quick second of time, my brain thought it was about 3:30 in the afternoon. For that brief flash, I was still in college. I didn't have overdue bills waiting in the mail, I didn't have to make dinner, I hadn't driven home in a piece of shit, and the whole afternoon lay ahead of me to goof off. My God, it was wonderful.
I want so badly to go back and do it all again, only this time, do it right. Pick pre-med or pre-law right out of the gate so I'd be earning six figures by the age of 30, go to school far away enough that I can't go home every weekend, have a few random sex partners before I meet my future wife then and there instead of years later, and get out and fucking live the college life instead of hole up in my dorm/apartment watching TV and getting fat. Hence, I am beginning to cook up plans once again for a "'90s room." A few years back I posted photos of my first, pitiful attempt. If I really want that authentic college-in-the-'90s atmosphere, I have to do better and go for the '90s college apartment bedroom look. I have already moved the old TV, VCR, and CD changer into the guest room and even dug up my autographed photo of Bill Clinton. I need to procure some immature posters, such as the old "Beers of the World" poster, John Belushi as Bluto in his COLLEGE sweatshirt, maybe Kenny McCormick on the toilet, and some sort of scantily-clad nubile female, be it a generic unknown or a '90s celebrity such as Carmen Electra or Jenny McCarthy. I'd also need some empty beer and liquor bottles on display, and even lay out some everyday objects such as my vintage bottle of "Woods" by Abercrombie & Fitch and a Surge bottle. A couple of vintage Playboy or Penthouse issues would be a nice touch. I'd need a cheap desk as well to display my vintage Compaq desktop computer. While this is very different from what my dorm room actually looked like, I am living a fantasy, here, in which my very personality would have been different. I would not have been an overweight dork who shied away from women and was scared to death of getting drunk. I would have been a sort of genius douchebag, who was highly intelligent and secretly liked the X-Files, but still got laid regularly and binge-drank every weekend. I'd go in there, turn on Third Eye Blind or Matchbox Twenty, and drift away into '90s collegiate bliss.
This reality, while enviable to some, often becomes unbearable for me. Due to the standards set by my upper-middle-class upbringing, I feel that by now my life should have amounted to a lot more — more money, bigger house, and one or two children that I could afford to raise. I look at what my father had when he was my age — a charming house in Raleigh's premiere inside-the-beltline neighborhood, two little children, and a nice job that paid for it all and then some. Now that I'm that age, what do I have? An entry-level job with no hope for advancement, a townhouse in a questionable neighborhood, a Ford P.O.S. going on 13 years old, and no hope of ever being able to give my wife the children she wants and the upbringing I want for them. The depressing effect abates slightly when I step back and realize that most people my age are in similar, or equally unappealing, situations. Most of the friends my wife keeps up with are single and working mindless jobs, only one friend of mine is married, and those acquaintances of my wife's who are married with children seem tired and miserable. My own brother is aging like a U.S. President. The American dream appears to have crumbled; jobs are too undependable to make buying a home attractive, banks have tightened up the mortgage market, making homes too hard to get for those who want them, and education and healthcare costs have made child-rearing affordable only for those with six-figure salaries.
Here's where the woulda-coulda-shouldas take root. I could be in a much more favorable situation, even in this shitty economy. I could have chosen a more lucrative career, if only I had the forethought to understand how important it would be later on. When I chose my current career, I figured the money wasn't too important as long as I could earn a comfortable living. I didn't foresee a wife or a house. If only I had a crystal ball and knew who I was going to marry and where she was going to school; I could have chosen a career in law or medicine and met her back in the glorious late 1990s, giving me a few extra years with her in my life and avoiding wasting so many years on two degrees that would never pay big returns. By now, I could be a hotshot lawyer or a young doctor, saving up for a house in the old-money neighborhood, maybe with a kid on the way, whom I'd send to the most exclusive private school in town. If I had a kid right now, he'd grow up in a crowded townhouse and go to god-awful public schools with unrefined middle-class children, either taking the cheesewagon home or getting picked up in his mom's decade-old Toyota.
To cope with my yearning to change the past, present, and future, I turn to little delusions to distract me from the banality of my real life and the unobtainability of the standard of living I grew up with. While going through my routine this morning, I thought to myself, it's October, 1999. I'm at my apartment near the ECU campus with my girlfriend who stays over every night. I'm getting up to go to my pre-med classes. Later on, we'll meet up for lunch on campus, and be back at the apartment about 3:30 and take a little nap or have a little afternoon delight. Then we'll work on homework, have some Ramen noodles or Lean Cuisines for dinner, and have a few beers while we watch Time of Your Life and Ally McBeal.
Yes, now and then I wish I were back in college, in the late '90s when the economy was rock-solid and jobs were hanging from trees. At least back in college, you had something to look forward to. Nothing was forever, and yet the real world still seemed forever away. Every semester offered something new and different, with all-new classes, classmates, and professors, but you still had the comfort of knowing where you were going and what you were doing every day, all with a goal to strive for in the form of a degree and a job or a spot at a professional school. Loathe one of your classes this semester? Well, just tough it out and it'll be over in a few months. Is it cold and rainy outside? Rather stay in your cozy apartment instead of go to class? Blow it off, dude, you get 3 unexcused absences per class, per semester, and there's no supervisor to call with a lame excuse in a fake scratchy voice. Bills? What the hell are those? Those go to Mom and Dad's house. Your only money concern is catching Lean Cuisines on sale so you'll have more for half-price pitchers.
Last week I went on a staff retreat, where I carried my stuff in my old backpack I'd used in high school and college. When I got home that evening, I swear I had a time-travel experience like something out of a Jack Finney novel. Years and years of muscle memory, fallow for so many additional years, snapped back into service instantly as I came in the door, raised my right hand to my shoulder, slid my thumb under the strap, twirled the pack around 180 degrees, and lowered it to the floor, all in one smooth motion as I'd done thousands of times before, and for that quick second of time, my brain thought it was about 3:30 in the afternoon. For that brief flash, I was still in college. I didn't have overdue bills waiting in the mail, I didn't have to make dinner, I hadn't driven home in a piece of shit, and the whole afternoon lay ahead of me to goof off. My God, it was wonderful.
I want so badly to go back and do it all again, only this time, do it right. Pick pre-med or pre-law right out of the gate so I'd be earning six figures by the age of 30, go to school far away enough that I can't go home every weekend, have a few random sex partners before I meet my future wife then and there instead of years later, and get out and fucking live the college life instead of hole up in my dorm/apartment watching TV and getting fat. Hence, I am beginning to cook up plans once again for a "'90s room." A few years back I posted photos of my first, pitiful attempt. If I really want that authentic college-in-the-'90s atmosphere, I have to do better and go for the '90s college apartment bedroom look. I have already moved the old TV, VCR, and CD changer into the guest room and even dug up my autographed photo of Bill Clinton. I need to procure some immature posters, such as the old "Beers of the World" poster, John Belushi as Bluto in his COLLEGE sweatshirt, maybe Kenny McCormick on the toilet, and some sort of scantily-clad nubile female, be it a generic unknown or a '90s celebrity such as Carmen Electra or Jenny McCarthy. I'd also need some empty beer and liquor bottles on display, and even lay out some everyday objects such as my vintage bottle of "Woods" by Abercrombie & Fitch and a Surge bottle. A couple of vintage Playboy or Penthouse issues would be a nice touch. I'd need a cheap desk as well to display my vintage Compaq desktop computer. While this is very different from what my dorm room actually looked like, I am living a fantasy, here, in which my very personality would have been different. I would not have been an overweight dork who shied away from women and was scared to death of getting drunk. I would have been a sort of genius douchebag, who was highly intelligent and secretly liked the X-Files, but still got laid regularly and binge-drank every weekend. I'd go in there, turn on Third Eye Blind or Matchbox Twenty, and drift away into '90s collegiate bliss.
Friday, September 9, 2011
iLove my iPhone
I finally made the great leap into the 21st century and got a smartphone. Not just any smartphone, but the most coveted of smarphones, the iPhone. I adore this little device that puts the whole freakin' world in my hands.
It's not the dream device I've described before, capable of storing my entire media library, but it will do for now. The PDF reader is painfully slow when loading large picture books, such as the 1902 Sears Roebuck catalog, but at least I'm able to read my favorite comics any time I wish. My main complaint is Apple's stranglehold on the app market and censorious nature toward submitted apps. Most recently, bending to pressure from loudmouth Congressmen, Apple yanked several apps from the market that allowed users to post the whereabouts of DUI checkpoints. WTF Apple? Did too many people get MADD at you? At least they still have trapster, which will have to serve as a back-door DUI reporting app. Get a "live police" alert late at night and just assume it's a checkpoint.
Speaking of apps, of course after getting my sexy new iPhone I immediately went shopping for sexy apps to make my life easy and sexy and awesome. I added apps to my arsenal such as conversion calculators, bar code scanners, trapster, a police scanner, local and national news apps, Wikipedia, IMDB.com, Redbox, and of course the TMZ app.
As of May of this year, only about 35% of adults have a smartphone, so for now I feel that I have a keen advantage over the other 65% due to my instantaneous access to damn near any kind of information I desire. Trapster tells me where the pigs are hiding. Breaking news is within instant reach, instead of having to go to a computer or channel surf. Wikipedia and IMDB are there for me to satisfy intellectual or pop-cultural curiosity. Redbox gives me a jump on the suckers waiting in line at the machine. The Papa John's app lets me order 'za when I'm still 15 minutes from home, so it will show up at my door, without having to talk on the phone to a brain-dead teenage clerk. I can shop on amazon.com anywhere the mood strikes me. I can be that dick-bag who goes into a store and scans the bar codes to find better prices online. With the help of the Fast Customer app, I no longer have to go through an endless string of recordings before getting to a live customer service rep. Let the huddled masses who don't have smartphones waste precious minutes of their lives doing the touch-tone shell game. My local supermarket even has an app that lets me order deli sandwiches in advance, so I don't have to wait in line at the counter. Were I bidding ferociously on something on eBay, I could place my winning bid anywhere. I have instant access to youtube's wealth of mindless crap. I can stay up-to-date with celebrity gossip on the john at work while the other 65% of the population pooping at work remain completely cut off from civilization. Oh, how iLove my iPhone!
It's not the dream device I've described before, capable of storing my entire media library, but it will do for now. The PDF reader is painfully slow when loading large picture books, such as the 1902 Sears Roebuck catalog, but at least I'm able to read my favorite comics any time I wish. My main complaint is Apple's stranglehold on the app market and censorious nature toward submitted apps. Most recently, bending to pressure from loudmouth Congressmen, Apple yanked several apps from the market that allowed users to post the whereabouts of DUI checkpoints. WTF Apple? Did too many people get MADD at you? At least they still have trapster, which will have to serve as a back-door DUI reporting app. Get a "live police" alert late at night and just assume it's a checkpoint.
Speaking of apps, of course after getting my sexy new iPhone I immediately went shopping for sexy apps to make my life easy and sexy and awesome. I added apps to my arsenal such as conversion calculators, bar code scanners, trapster, a police scanner, local and national news apps, Wikipedia, IMDB.com, Redbox, and of course the TMZ app.
As of May of this year, only about 35% of adults have a smartphone, so for now I feel that I have a keen advantage over the other 65% due to my instantaneous access to damn near any kind of information I desire. Trapster tells me where the pigs are hiding. Breaking news is within instant reach, instead of having to go to a computer or channel surf. Wikipedia and IMDB are there for me to satisfy intellectual or pop-cultural curiosity. Redbox gives me a jump on the suckers waiting in line at the machine. The Papa John's app lets me order 'za when I'm still 15 minutes from home, so it will show up at my door, without having to talk on the phone to a brain-dead teenage clerk. I can shop on amazon.com anywhere the mood strikes me. I can be that dick-bag who goes into a store and scans the bar codes to find better prices online. With the help of the Fast Customer app, I no longer have to go through an endless string of recordings before getting to a live customer service rep. Let the huddled masses who don't have smartphones waste precious minutes of their lives doing the touch-tone shell game. My local supermarket even has an app that lets me order deli sandwiches in advance, so I don't have to wait in line at the counter. Were I bidding ferociously on something on eBay, I could place my winning bid anywhere. I have instant access to youtube's wealth of mindless crap. I can stay up-to-date with celebrity gossip on the john at work while the other 65% of the population pooping at work remain completely cut off from civilization. Oh, how iLove my iPhone!
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
'Tis naught but a refreshing lemonade, constable!
The Man is clamping down at my beloved seaside retreat. While the ban on alcohol on the beach has been on the books for years, this is the third consecutive summer I've experienced the authorities enforcing it strictly. There was a time when they only hassled youngsters, leaving adults alone to drink responsibly, but these days they shake down anyone with what's obviously booze, and sometimes even question people who are drinking from plastic cups. What is a high-functioning alcoholic to do in the face of such tee-totaling tyranny?
While purchasing provisions for an upcoming beach trip, I spotted 6-packs of Minute Maid light lemonade in half-liter bottles. For years now, my wife and I have favored what we call "Jack Sparrow Lemonade" — lemonade mixed with lemon-lime soda and vodka or light rum. One could simply put this in a plastic sports bottle and drink it on the beach, but ever since a zealous beach ranger asked our friend what was in her plastic cup (it was empty), I began to fear that using any kind of reusable beverage container would invite unwanted attention. So there, in the supermarket, the solution hit me like I was on a date with Chris Brown — mix the Minute Maid with booze and put it back in the bottle! This is actually a time-honored solution to the no-drinking-in-public problem, practiced by many of my high school classmates, who would sit in class sipping all manner of spirits from innocent-looking soda bottles. Apparently Everdew was a popular cocktail, consisting of Everclear and Mountain Dew. Employing this strategy, the freedom-loving drunk no longer must live in fear of the roving patrols of buzzkillers and their citation books. To all others on the beach, he will be just another law-abiding tourist.
Jack Sparrow Lemonade was fine for a while, but I eventually grew tired of the same drink. A friend informed me of an interesting liquor: Firefly Sweet Tea Vodka, a vodka nearly identical to sweet iced tea, in flavor and appearance. My friend instructed me to mix one part Firefly with four parts store-bought lemon-flavored tea, also available in half-liter bottles. The resulting concoction tastes almost just like plain old sweet tea, and smells just like it to boot, but got me fucked up considerably better than the Jack Sparrow Lemonade. I had found a new favorite beach cocktail: delicious, easy to make, and, to any passing lawmen, identical to a nice, refreshing Lipton iced tea.
Hopefully someone who was as naive as I was in high school will stumble across this entry and pick up a few tips about how to expand his drinking horizons beyond the legal confines. Maybe you're going to an event whose uptight coordinators want to keep "family-friendly." Maybe, like me, your favorite vacation spot has outlawed alcohol. Hell, maybe you'd like to get a head-start on forgetting about your job on the drive home from work. Whatever your reason, cheers!
Jack Sparrow Lemonade was fine for a while, but I eventually grew tired of the same drink. A friend informed me of an interesting liquor: Firefly Sweet Tea Vodka, a vodka nearly identical to sweet iced tea, in flavor and appearance. My friend instructed me to mix one part Firefly with four parts store-bought lemon-flavored tea, also available in half-liter bottles. The resulting concoction tastes almost just like plain old sweet tea, and smells just like it to boot, but got me fucked up considerably better than the Jack Sparrow Lemonade. I had found a new favorite beach cocktail: delicious, easy to make, and, to any passing lawmen, identical to a nice, refreshing Lipton iced tea.
Hopefully someone who was as naive as I was in high school will stumble across this entry and pick up a few tips about how to expand his drinking horizons beyond the legal confines. Maybe you're going to an event whose uptight coordinators want to keep "family-friendly." Maybe, like me, your favorite vacation spot has outlawed alcohol. Hell, maybe you'd like to get a head-start on forgetting about your job on the drive home from work. Whatever your reason, cheers!
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
I mock your label with my label!
Pursuant to my latest obsession with stocking my wardrobe with L.L. Bean, for an upcoming trip to the beach, I ordered two t-shirts emblazoned with "L.L. BEAN" across the chest in athletic block lettering, so that all who pass by on the strand will know to which mail-order clothier I pledge my allegiance.
I don't even feel silly about wearing such a large logo, either. While 12-inch-wide "HOLLISTER" logos cry out "Behold my discretionary income!", wearing a large L.L. Bean label makes a mockery of that trend. Bean's label tells the label-whores that I spend half as much money as they do for goods of comparable or superior quality, leaving me with enough left over for entertainment and dining out someplace other than Taco Hell.
Ah, someday, my closet will be replete with L.L. Bean to serve my everyday needs — at work, going to movies, puttering about the house, recreating at the park, outdoor activities, shopping, sleeping, and casually socializing with friends or family. I'm afraid there will have to be anomalies, however. For instance, Bean doesn't offer a full-length wool overcoat for winter, and a parka doesn't quite cut it when you want to look smart in cold weather, so I'll have to hang onto my Chaps Ralph Lauren overcoat from Kohl's. Yes, I went to a Kohl's a couple of times. I don't know why that makes me feel dirty, it just does. My Brooks Brothers polo shirts are all in perfect working order, so they'll see continued regular use; ditto for their sweaters and corduroy trousers. It would be plain foolish for me to replace my $400 Barbour jacket with Bean's field coat; do I really want to look that middle-class instead of being easily mistaken for a member of the Peerage?
I don't even feel silly about wearing such a large logo, either. While 12-inch-wide "HOLLISTER" logos cry out "Behold my discretionary income!", wearing a large L.L. Bean label makes a mockery of that trend. Bean's label tells the label-whores that I spend half as much money as they do for goods of comparable or superior quality, leaving me with enough left over for entertainment and dining out someplace other than Taco Hell.
Ah, someday, my closet will be replete with L.L. Bean to serve my everyday needs — at work, going to movies, puttering about the house, recreating at the park, outdoor activities, shopping, sleeping, and casually socializing with friends or family. I'm afraid there will have to be anomalies, however. For instance, Bean doesn't offer a full-length wool overcoat for winter, and a parka doesn't quite cut it when you want to look smart in cold weather, so I'll have to hang onto my Chaps Ralph Lauren overcoat from Kohl's. Yes, I went to a Kohl's a couple of times. I don't know why that makes me feel dirty, it just does. My Brooks Brothers polo shirts are all in perfect working order, so they'll see continued regular use; ditto for their sweaters and corduroy trousers. It would be plain foolish for me to replace my $400 Barbour jacket with Bean's field coat; do I really want to look that middle-class instead of being easily mistaken for a member of the Peerage?
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Independence Day Summary; Obsessive Branding Disorder
When I come back from a three-day holiday weekend, I find it best to ease back slowly into the daily grind by doing maybe one work-related project in the morning, interrupting myself repeatedly to check e-mail and news-like fluff, and then in the afternoon after lunch, post a blog entry about my activities over the extended weekend.
Many people make grand plans designed to make the most of their time off during a holiday weekend; for July 4, hordes of sun-worshipers descend upon the beaches and take up every square inch of sand. Others are more content to stay home and have people over for grilled animal parts. Still others attend parades or other public spectacles, and go out into the hot, sticky July evening to watch sparkly things go boom in the night sky.
I feel that my wife and I made a very wise choice this year to keep to our own damn selves the whole weekend. On Saturday we just sat around watching movies on the idiot box into the late afternoon. I got to see Terminal, which I'd never seen, as well as Rock Star with Mark Wahlberg, plus one I'd never heard of, Necessary Roughness, starring Scott Bakula. We ventured out into public and took in X-Men First Class at the cinema, using a discounted Fandango voucher to get seats for an evening show for less than the price of a matinee. After the show we went to our favorite watering hole, only to find it nearly deserted. The outdoor patio was slightly more lively, but had a fairly crappy "band" playing, which consisted of a guitarist and a keyboard player. We left after one drink, grabbing some burgers on the way home. On Sunday we went on a shopping spree of sorts, the boring kind where you buy shit you actually need. We used an online coupon to get some barbecue pork, ribs, and sides for half-price. On Monday we were invited to a get-together in our friend's parents' neighborhood, but it's a 30-minute drive and it was just too damned hot anyway, so we stayed home, watched even more TV, and ate leftover BBQ. So unlike last year, where we wore ourselves out hosting a cookout and everyone left much earlier than expected, this year we stayed in our comfortable, air-conditioned home with a fridge full of food and drinks and watched an unhealthy amount of TV. I can't imagine a more perfect Independence Day weekend.
Also over the weekend, I did a little online clothes shopping, bringing me to a discussion of a bizarre tendency I've had for a long time, which is to have everything of a particular category come from the same brand. For example, long ago, I had this obsession with the Pinaud brand of men's grooming products, and insisted on their brand of shaving cream, talc, and aftershave. Similarly, for a little while, I wanted products that bore the Royal Warrant, and purchased groceries such as Weetabix cereal and Twinings tea, and even went as far as to procure a Barbour waxed cotton jacket. Later on I turned to collecting Brooks Brothers garments, and built up a respectable array of jackets, dress shirts, sweaters, polo shirts, chinos, and corduroy trousers. Right now I have a habit of insisting on Target's private label for health, grooming, and household products whenever available, just so the labels will all look good together; I wish there were an Up And Up version of deodorant and hair gel. Most recently, out of necessity, I'm having to mess up my Brooks Brothers collection by adding L.L. Bean to the mix. As much as I've praised Brooks Brothers in the past, recently I've been disappointed by the way the fabric in their chino trousers tends to fray and tear over time. Some research online turned up that most retail stores refuse to refund or replace unsatisfactory purchases more than two years old, despite the brand's "unconditional" guarantee. So, I have returned to L.L. Bean, a supplier of quality trousers that I've known since childhood but haven't patronized in a long time. After many years of wearing other brands, I'm returning to an old trusted favorite with a no-questions-asked, lifetime guarantee on all of its merchandise. I started with ordering three pairs of chinos, which I love, and this weekend I went a little nuts and ordered a pair of jeans, a safari-style shirt for rustic travel destinations, a couple of striped rugby shirts, and a lightweight, extra-long rain coat (which Brooks Brothers doesn't make, anyway).
L.L. Bean is a perennial favorite among the "preppy" set, whose outward appearance I strive to emulate. It appeals to them because it's an established outfitter they've known all their lives and offers a great value through well-made items backed by a lifetime guarantee at lower prices than other brands such as Brooks Brothers and Orvis, and it's especially popular among preppy parents who want to instill their children with the preppy fashion sense, but don't want to spend a great deal on things they'll outgrow in a year. What preppy person didn't own at least one article of clothing or footwear from L.L. Bean as a child? Seems like at least a third of my classmates had a monogrammed L.L. Bean book bag. It's comfortable, familiar, timeless, and affordable but not dirt-cheap—the foundation of the preppy aesthetic.
As much as I've maligned some of Brooks Brothers' product line, I continue to stand behind their polo shirts. The ones I own are excellently tailored, constructed of lightweight, cool cotton piqué, perfect for hot summer days or layering under a sweater, and retain their color wash after wash, and I expect them to provide me at least a decade of reliable use. I also continue to be pleased with the sweaters and casual shirts I've bought from them, which look practically brand-new after 3-4 years of ownership. My blazer has held up very well, and there are no signs of wear and tear on the corduroys I wear so often in colder months. They do have rugby shirts, but I gave up on waiting for them to introduce basic red & navy and blue & navy stripes, and just got a couple from L.L. Bean instead.
Adding L.L. Bean to the mix presents me with some problems. While it would satisfy my obsessive compulsion to have everything in my wardrobe come from one brand by replacing all the sweaters, polos, corduroys, and sport shirts from Brooks Brothers with L.L. Bean, I cannot justify the financial cost of such an undertaking, nor can I justify the cost of buying new pants every two years just because they're from Brooks Brothers. Plus, were I to replace my Brooks Brothers polo shirts with L.L. Bean, I'd lose that smug sense of superiority I get from showing off that little Golden Fleece logo, giving others the impression that I can easily afford $60 polo shirts (never mind that they can be found gently used on eBay for a fraction of retail). And how can you beat that "oooh!" reaction people undoubtedly have in their heads when they spot the Golden Fleece buttons on my Brooks Brothers blazer? And truly well-heeled individuals will recognize and respect that icon of WASP-ness, the Barbour jacket. Hardly anyone can tell the difference between Brooks Brothers chinos and L.L. Bean chinos without yanking them down and looking at the inside label, anyway, so I'll just have to let people assume that if the shirt is Brooks Brothers, the pants must be, as well. I really do wish I could just be normal and have a dozen different brands all mingling together in my closet like I did in high school, when I had Abercrombie & Fitch, Nautica, Joseph A. Bank, Chaps by Ralph Lauren, Izod, Alexander Julian, L.L. Bean, and Old Navy all living together in harmony. Well, maybe that's the silver lining: by throwing L.L. Bean into the ring, perhaps I'll get a '90s nostalgia thrill out of it.
Many people make grand plans designed to make the most of their time off during a holiday weekend; for July 4, hordes of sun-worshipers descend upon the beaches and take up every square inch of sand. Others are more content to stay home and have people over for grilled animal parts. Still others attend parades or other public spectacles, and go out into the hot, sticky July evening to watch sparkly things go boom in the night sky.
I feel that my wife and I made a very wise choice this year to keep to our own damn selves the whole weekend. On Saturday we just sat around watching movies on the idiot box into the late afternoon. I got to see Terminal, which I'd never seen, as well as Rock Star with Mark Wahlberg, plus one I'd never heard of, Necessary Roughness, starring Scott Bakula. We ventured out into public and took in X-Men First Class at the cinema, using a discounted Fandango voucher to get seats for an evening show for less than the price of a matinee. After the show we went to our favorite watering hole, only to find it nearly deserted. The outdoor patio was slightly more lively, but had a fairly crappy "band" playing, which consisted of a guitarist and a keyboard player. We left after one drink, grabbing some burgers on the way home. On Sunday we went on a shopping spree of sorts, the boring kind where you buy shit you actually need. We used an online coupon to get some barbecue pork, ribs, and sides for half-price. On Monday we were invited to a get-together in our friend's parents' neighborhood, but it's a 30-minute drive and it was just too damned hot anyway, so we stayed home, watched even more TV, and ate leftover BBQ. So unlike last year, where we wore ourselves out hosting a cookout and everyone left much earlier than expected, this year we stayed in our comfortable, air-conditioned home with a fridge full of food and drinks and watched an unhealthy amount of TV. I can't imagine a more perfect Independence Day weekend.
Also over the weekend, I did a little online clothes shopping, bringing me to a discussion of a bizarre tendency I've had for a long time, which is to have everything of a particular category come from the same brand. For example, long ago, I had this obsession with the Pinaud brand of men's grooming products, and insisted on their brand of shaving cream, talc, and aftershave. Similarly, for a little while, I wanted products that bore the Royal Warrant, and purchased groceries such as Weetabix cereal and Twinings tea, and even went as far as to procure a Barbour waxed cotton jacket. Later on I turned to collecting Brooks Brothers garments, and built up a respectable array of jackets, dress shirts, sweaters, polo shirts, chinos, and corduroy trousers. Right now I have a habit of insisting on Target's private label for health, grooming, and household products whenever available, just so the labels will all look good together; I wish there were an Up And Up version of deodorant and hair gel. Most recently, out of necessity, I'm having to mess up my Brooks Brothers collection by adding L.L. Bean to the mix. As much as I've praised Brooks Brothers in the past, recently I've been disappointed by the way the fabric in their chino trousers tends to fray and tear over time. Some research online turned up that most retail stores refuse to refund or replace unsatisfactory purchases more than two years old, despite the brand's "unconditional" guarantee. So, I have returned to L.L. Bean, a supplier of quality trousers that I've known since childhood but haven't patronized in a long time. After many years of wearing other brands, I'm returning to an old trusted favorite with a no-questions-asked, lifetime guarantee on all of its merchandise. I started with ordering three pairs of chinos, which I love, and this weekend I went a little nuts and ordered a pair of jeans, a safari-style shirt for rustic travel destinations, a couple of striped rugby shirts, and a lightweight, extra-long rain coat (which Brooks Brothers doesn't make, anyway).
L.L. Bean is a perennial favorite among the "preppy" set, whose outward appearance I strive to emulate. It appeals to them because it's an established outfitter they've known all their lives and offers a great value through well-made items backed by a lifetime guarantee at lower prices than other brands such as Brooks Brothers and Orvis, and it's especially popular among preppy parents who want to instill their children with the preppy fashion sense, but don't want to spend a great deal on things they'll outgrow in a year. What preppy person didn't own at least one article of clothing or footwear from L.L. Bean as a child? Seems like at least a third of my classmates had a monogrammed L.L. Bean book bag. It's comfortable, familiar, timeless, and affordable but not dirt-cheap—the foundation of the preppy aesthetic.
As much as I've maligned some of Brooks Brothers' product line, I continue to stand behind their polo shirts. The ones I own are excellently tailored, constructed of lightweight, cool cotton piqué, perfect for hot summer days or layering under a sweater, and retain their color wash after wash, and I expect them to provide me at least a decade of reliable use. I also continue to be pleased with the sweaters and casual shirts I've bought from them, which look practically brand-new after 3-4 years of ownership. My blazer has held up very well, and there are no signs of wear and tear on the corduroys I wear so often in colder months. They do have rugby shirts, but I gave up on waiting for them to introduce basic red & navy and blue & navy stripes, and just got a couple from L.L. Bean instead.
Adding L.L. Bean to the mix presents me with some problems. While it would satisfy my obsessive compulsion to have everything in my wardrobe come from one brand by replacing all the sweaters, polos, corduroys, and sport shirts from Brooks Brothers with L.L. Bean, I cannot justify the financial cost of such an undertaking, nor can I justify the cost of buying new pants every two years just because they're from Brooks Brothers. Plus, were I to replace my Brooks Brothers polo shirts with L.L. Bean, I'd lose that smug sense of superiority I get from showing off that little Golden Fleece logo, giving others the impression that I can easily afford $60 polo shirts (never mind that they can be found gently used on eBay for a fraction of retail). And how can you beat that "oooh!" reaction people undoubtedly have in their heads when they spot the Golden Fleece buttons on my Brooks Brothers blazer? And truly well-heeled individuals will recognize and respect that icon of WASP-ness, the Barbour jacket. Hardly anyone can tell the difference between Brooks Brothers chinos and L.L. Bean chinos without yanking them down and looking at the inside label, anyway, so I'll just have to let people assume that if the shirt is Brooks Brothers, the pants must be, as well. I really do wish I could just be normal and have a dozen different brands all mingling together in my closet like I did in high school, when I had Abercrombie & Fitch, Nautica, Joseph A. Bank, Chaps by Ralph Lauren, Izod, Alexander Julian, L.L. Bean, and Old Navy all living together in harmony. Well, maybe that's the silver lining: by throwing L.L. Bean into the ring, perhaps I'll get a '90s nostalgia thrill out of it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)