Aliens…it’s About Time

Aliens are here, finally. A man named Stan Romanek of Colorado has found seemingly irrefutable, airtight proof that aliens exist, and they like to stare at him while he’s sleeping. He was on Larry King showing his video of an alien peeping through his window and now he and his supporter(s) want to form an “extra-terrestrial affairs committee” for the purpose of seeking out alien life in the United States. And here’s the alleged “leaked” video that didn’t appear on Larry King.

If you think his video doesn’t clearly show the peeping tom was an alien, the Larry King Show even provided an expert interview from a film analyst indicating that it would have been “very expensive to fake such a creature.” Furthermore, to hammer home the point that this is 100 percent real, the show has a re-enactment of what the alien would look like in the window if the video was of good quality, and what the alien would look like if it was walking around your house, and what the alien would look like if it was playing the oboe.

Looking at the Larry King video, it seems pretty clear that a midget would have fit the bill for Romanek’s alien. A midget who has a funny shaped head. A midget with a funny shaped head who has a crush on Romanek. The “leaked” video alien looks more like a midget from Romania, or maybe Belarus.

But, Larry King is an alien anyway. And so is Sam Cassell. So I don’t see what all the fuss is about here.

And isn’t it just a bit of a coincidence that just before the news of this alien surfaced the Vatican declared that it’s OK to believe in aliens? Just on May 13 the Church happened to have a change of heart–this essentially verifies the fact that a huge conspiracy is taking place involving Romanek, the Vatican, the U.S. government, and Eli Manning (I’m still in shock that the Giants won the Super Bowl).

The good news here is that the alien is adorable. It likes to play Peek a boo and probably won’t destroy the earth, because adorable creatures don’t destroy the earth. For those of you who read one of my previous posts, giant bug aliens from Starship Troopers should be our primary concern. Especially that “brain bug.” He’s a wily one.

Eye Balls

As a writer, I never really liked reading much. That, and the fact that I never had formal grammar training in school, explain my sub-par grammar. Once I get involved in a book, I tend to like it. But I have to get over that hump. For example, I much rather do something active and play baseball than read a book. Or, I much rather do something inactive and watch TV than read a book. I’m a equal opportunity book-hater.

My girlfriend Leslie loves reading and she loves Barns & Noble-like facilities. And when I’m in a bookstore, a craving for knowledge comes over me. I want to read everything in the store. Women’s romance section? Who cares, bring them on…I’ll cram everything into this brain that I can.

But then I don’t buy anything because I remember I don’t like reading. Plus, my cost-benefit analysis wouldn’t work out in favor of reading–if I were to spend my time reading a book, I wouldn’t be able to watch that rerun of Scrubs.

So I had an eye doctor appointment on Sunday for the first time in about a year. My vision is fairly awful…I believe it is around 20-300, whatever that means…I think it means I might be able to see a bird flying if it swooped down and crashed into my face. I wanted contact lenses, again. I had contact lenses fitted when I was in high school, wore them for like a week, got annoyed with cleaning them, and gave up.

I have astigmatism, making my awful vision even more awful, and I saw on TV they made a daily contact especially for astigmatism. Meaning, not only do they have decent contacts for my kind now, but I could toss them in the garbage after each day. Jackpot.

The optometrist is a new guy, as my previous optometrist went out of business or something not good like that. But the fact that he went out of business became all too clear when my appointment with my new optometrist began.

He starts out by doing the standard flash of light in the eyes. I blinked a little. “Look left,” he said. “Now look right. Now look at my ear.” He then looks at me and says, “Did you know you have floating eyes?”

Now, I don’t recall if he said floating eyes. Maybe it was hovering eyes. Maybe it was googly eyes. I hope it was googly eyes. Either way, my eyes apparently have a tendency to “float” apart at times. And then he goes, “Do you ever feel like you have blurry vision?”

“No.”

“See double?”

“No.”

“Trouble reading?”

“Umm…yes!” You see, I have always been averse to reading, but it’s not just because of my laziness and love for TV. I get headaches after reading for a while. I lose my space a lot. Reading has always been extremely frustrating, but I figured that was normal. In college I tried something new: I followed along with my finger. Everything went pretty well. But when people started staring at me at the library, I followed along with a pen. Even now at work I read by following along with my mouse cursor or highlighting sentences. I should have realized when I went up to a coworker once and said, “Do you ever feel it’s easier to highlight with your cursor?”

“No. Why?”

“Oh. No reason…”

And who wants to read a book for pleasure when you have to follow along with a pen. I rather watch TV and follow along with nothing.

“So is there anything I can do?” I asked the optometrist.

“You can see someone who can teach you some exercises for your eyes,” he said. And voila. Now I can hopefully read again. It’s not like I wasted 20 years or anything depleting my knowledge base astronomically.

But I still can’t fall behind on the Scrubs reruns that I’ve only seen four times a piece. A man needs to have priorities.

Oh, and add googly eyes to my list of problems.

Herbs

Picture yourself in 6th grade. You get into a scuffle with some kid, and then you get into a diss-off. A good old-fashioned diss-off. Maybe one of you makes a mom joke and the other most probably also makes a mom joke. But then your opponent goes, “Oh yeah, well, well you’re a herb.”

A herb…What were we thinking? When did that ever mean anything? Were people named Herb really dorky back in the day? I’d feel awful for a kid unlucky enough to be named Herb. Some kid yells out: “Hey herb!” And Herb is like, “Why yes! Did someone call my name?” And the other kid’s like, “No, I called you a herb.” And then Herb hangs his head and goes, “I hate myself.”

If it wasn’t meant to be a reference to the name Herb, then it could have originated from the botanical product or drug. And the hilarity of the situation derives from the  de-silencing of the “h.” Saying “erb” is not funny, I don’t think. But when troublemaking, slick teenagers convolute the word and make it their own, all hell breaks loose. Not only is it hilarious to mispronounce the word, but the act of mispronunciation unleashes potent powers. By inserting an “h” the conveyer of the word releases a world of uncoolness on the poor victim.

Out of curiosity, I did what any self-respecting herb researcher would do, and I took a look at Urban Dictionary. I found this entry to be quite enlightening:

Insult synonomous with loser but can have multiple negative connotations. Pronounced “HURB” with no silent ‘h.’The term was popularized in upstate New York and spread from there.
The word herb has nothing to do with marijuana.
Guy 1: Yo, I saw Melvin in the bathroom crying because he got a 93 on the math test!
Guy 2: Word? That kid is a total HERB!

See, now I had no idea the term was born in upstate New York. That makes me that much prouder to be a New Yorker. Poor Melvin, though. But I’m still not satisfied with the definition…let’s try this one:

used by rapper esoteric, in the song herb. pronounced like its spelled, no silent h. it doesnt mean weed or drugs, its a term for someone who follows trends, or just is a complete bullshitter. basicly one of those kind of people that nobody likes.‘

yo you a herb, if you say you rhyme off the mind
but your hype mans backin up every single line’

‘you a herb, if you steal out the tip-cup
if you still wear a hat with the visor flipped up’

See, now that’s the kind of definition I was looking for. People who continue to wear hats with the visor flipped up are herbs. I realize the term has somewhat fallen out of use since 6th grade, but now it has meaning, substance. I think it deserves to come back. That is my edict.

So I’m gonna proudly wear my ultra wide JNCo jean’s to work tomorrow, walk up to the first guy with a popped-up visor I find, and call him a herb. Hopefully his name isn’t Herb.

I Have No Idea What to Title This

I know I said I would only write short, concise blog posts, covering one topic for each one so that I don’t infuriate my readers with mindless awfulness. But I lied, and you should never listen to anything I say. Anything!

First things first. Purell smells bad. That’s right, I said it. Not only does it smell bad, but it’s going to cause our extinction as humans. Not only is it going to create a world of germophobes, but it’s going to deplete our immunity to diseases and before we all know it, we’re all dead, and Purell is just gonna be sitting there, laughing.

Second, my editor Anne mentioned something this morning about Sue Simmons. So I’m like, “What happened with Sue Simmons” (even though it is my job to stay up-to-date with all news). Apparently Ms. Simmons was on the air, but she believed she wasn’t, and she thought it would be hilarious to yell at poor Chuck Scarborough: “What the — are you doing?” Chances are, little kids throughout New York were doing their homework, finishing their little algebraic equations, and then Sue “The Ogre” Simmons decides to ruin their lives. They were probably frozen in front of their TVs with their mouths wide open for hours, until their parents had to tase them.

Speaking of tasing, that brings me to my third topic. I never had any idea what people were talking about when they said “Don’t tase me, bro.” Because I’m ignorant and what not. But that YouTube clip with the kid who was tased by the police is the funniest thing possibly ever. I wanted to tase him myself he was so annoying, but luckily, the police beat me to it. “Help! Help! What are you doing!” They’re tasing you, that’s what they’re doing! Maybe if you shut up they wouldn’t continue to tase you.

Fourth, I just saw the Fantastic Four movie on TV. I feel so bad for that rock guy. Everyone has cool powers and they look normal. But he’s a rock! A giant rock. But his name is Ben, which I must say is an appropriate name for a rock. Wherever he goes, he is a rock. He walks into a diner for breakfast, “Sorry, no rocks.” He tries to wear a suit, “Sorry, this suit is not meant for rocks.” Of course he couldn’t get the power to turn into fire or fly throughout the world and get with all the really hot women…he got to be a rock. A rock named Ben.

Fifth, we just turned on Man vs. Wild and Bear Grylls is hanging out with a remote tribe. Do you think Bear had to ask them to hang out with them? “Excuse me, can I video tape you making me look really manly so I can make more money?” And they just look at him confused with their loincloths. But Bear’s not the first to do this sort of thing. There’s another show on Discovery Channel called “Going Tribal” where they tape these tribes. I wonder how much these tribes know about the rest of the world, and if they know they are on TV…and if they knew so, would they be really pissed. But seriously, in this day and age, how could you possibly stay so secluded…it’s quite impressive.

Sixth, what’s the deal with “.net.” Sites on “.net” must be so lonely and scared. So I wikipedia’d .net, and I found something far more interesting; .net comes in third in terms of domain popularity, behind .com (obviously), and .de. Pardon? Allegedly, .de is Germany’s domain. So .net was beaten out by Germany.

Seventh, an embryonic twin was removed from a girl’s abdomen….gross.

I hope this blog entry was enlightening…if you made it this far, my apologies.

Office Bathroom Part 2: In the Bathroom

Welcome to Part II: Inside the Bathroom. I hope the title doesn’t get your hopes up, or the fact that it’s been about a week since Part I came out. And, as a warning, or lack of warning for that matter, I’m not going to get all disgusting because that wouldn’t be in my best interests. But here I go. I left you with my constant urges to use the facilities because of my inordinate water intake….

The bathroom is like a mini-society. It has its rules and regulations–but they are implicit…and if you disobey them the worst thing that’ll happen is public humiliation and a possible caning.

I’ve seen the women’s bathroom, but only from a distance. All I can make out is a carpet, and I’m not sure, but there might a couch. The men’s room doesn’t have carpet…we have floor. And we don’t have a couch…we have urinals. I realize that women need some comfort when they are in the bathroom, but three massage chairs and a violinist is just excessive.

So I can’t speak anymore about the women’s room. But in a public men’s room, there’s generally no acknowledgment of other life forms. It’s all about tunnel vision. But the question becomes, in an office setting, do the rules change.

Let me set the stage: our bathroom has two urinals and two stalls. Two scenarios…in the first scenario two co-workers simultaneously enter the bathroom, and both have to urinate. Do they both use the urinals, or does one go for the open toilet in order to avoid the “closeness”? Second scenario…one employee is using a urinal, and another one walks in…does the second one use the other urinal or head for the stall?

The problem is, the rules are very unclear. Nobody really knows the rules, and because of that, awkwardness is sure to ensue. Because if one person uses the other urinal, the other person might be thinking: “What, you couldn’t use the stall and give me some room you perv?” But if one person heads for the stall, the other individual may think: “What, do I have cooties or something that you can’t go next to me, weirdo?”

When two people are using the stalls there is the wall of separation. But what happens when two co-workers go into the stalls at the same time? Is there any talking? The same thing applies to the urinal situation. Generally, the golden rule of guy’s bathroom’s is no talking. But what if you started talking on your way into the bathroom…do you abruptly end the conversation?

But if someone you know walks into the bathroom, do you even acknowledge him with a “hello sir,” or a head nod, or a g’day, or is there no acknowledgment at all?

Conversations aside, when you’re in the stall, and someone is in an adjacent stall, it can get loud, to say the least. Is it imperative upon both parties to remain as quiet as possible? Or does it not matter? (Hey, it’s the guy’s room, after all). But, no matter what gender you are, loudness can be embarrassing…But, no matter what, if matters do get a little out of hand, it is incumbent upon both parties to pretend like nothing happened. Nothing happened.

As a side note, I would love to take a poll counting those who line public toilets with toilet paper and those who leave it bare. I personally fall into the former category. In fact, I’ve triple layered on occasion. Public toilets are gross. Even if toilet paper does absolutely nothing, as I’ve been told by a med student (not Leslie, she thinks it’s gross too), it still makes me feel better. And when you’re in the bathroom, perception is all that matters. Until you get herpes.

I have no answers here, just questions. Nobody has the answers. It’s a lose-lose situation you see…it’s a game of politics and tact. The bathroom represents the heart and soul of who we are as people, as humans…and to try to understand the bathroom is to try to understand oneself.

Office Bathroom Part 1-Getting to the Bathroom

There comes a time in every blogger’s life when he must shed all dignity, and discuss bathroom awkwardness. Sure, this blog is read by my coworkers, and my boss, and my parents, and my grandparents, and other family members…but this must be done. Not only do I lack another topic to write about at the moment, but a blog should portray my life…and the bathroom takes up a significant part of my daily life.

Let me preface this by saying I go to the bathroom a lot. I don’t have the best stomach, but more importantly, I’ve been on a water kick for the past few months. Every day, I make sure to drink one of those gigantic waters that should seemingly only serve the purpose of a weapon. And sometimes, I might even go over to the water cooler, and fill that baby up again. I also take credit with spreading my ingenious giant water plan with coworker Adam. Now everyday he, too, drinks at least one, and bystanders may get lucky and witness us race. Because that’s what adults do.

Of course, about a week after I started drinking my 1.5 liter water with the hopes of upping my energy and improving my overall health, a study revealed that it’s probably not healthier to drink such large amounts of water.

Nevertheless, I’ve plodded on. I’ve reached the point where I actually have to drink water. Somehow, I’ve become addicted to water. But I don’t ask questions, I just drink, and go to the bathroom.

Every hour, at least. At least! Often, the 1.5 liter sends me there every half hour. And sometimes that’s every half hour while holding it in. But I consider this to be a good thing. My job, like most jobs I’m sure, requires a lot of sitting. Going to the bathroom gets me up and moving around–preventing a blood-clot induced pulmonary embolism like you hear about on planes.

My frequent urination worked like a charm for a few weeks, and then, out of nowhere we get office bathroom keys. My days of worry-free strutting to the bathroom were over. Now the door was locked, and I had to plan ahead. What if I really, really had to go, but both keys were taken? What if one of the lawyers next door stole our keys? But more importantly, now I had to make one more stop before making it to the bathroom (granted it’s right on the way, but this was a lot of stress).

The stress got to me…I had been working for 9 months and then a key suddenly comes into the picture. I became forgetful. I would pick up the key, go to the bathroom, come back and sit in front of my computer. What did I forget? No bother…

So five minutes later an angry co-worker would come up to me…”Josh, have you seen the bathroom key?” After reaching into my pocket, I would hand him the key with my head down.

Let’s just say this situation has happened an ungodly amount of times. Now the situation is a little different. Now, coworkers simply walk up to me and stick out their hand. I give them the key.

One time we went out for happy hour. At about 10 PM I reached into my pocket to get my cell phone. I felt my cell phone of course, and I felt my apartment keys, and I… I felt another key. “Anyone have to go to the bathroom,” I asked. This happened a few more times–I would notice the presence of the key once I arrived at the apartment.

Sorry to write so many words on the bathroom. Or getting to the bathroom for that matter. Stay tuned for Part 2 when I actually arrive in the bathroom!

Balloons

Everyone loves balloons. They blow up, and hilarious clowns transform them into rabbits and pretzels. But what happens when balloons go bad? That’s something that we don’t often think about, but maybe, just maybe we should.

I wrote an “On This Day” for today about killer balloons from Japan during World War II. I was a history major, yet I still had no idea this happened. Apparently, during World War II the Japanese attacked the United States by launching balloons over the Pacific Ocean and into North America. The intention of the Japanese was to create forest fires and divert the U.S. war effort away from the Pacific.

The balloons failed. Well, there was one incident, and that’s what my On This Day commemorated: A pregnant Reverend’s wife and five children died when they tried to drag an unexploded balloon bomb out of an Oregon forest.

But the U.S. did quite a good job in keeping the balloons under wraps. By covering up the occurrences, not only was most of America in the dark (and still is today), but the Japanese had no idea if their brilliant plan worked. And so, they eventually scrapped the plan.

This is also balloon month at Dulcinea for some reason. Tomorrow’s “On This Day” is about the Hindenburg crash. And before that we did a story about the Brazilian priest who disappeared over the ocean when he tried to fly with 1,000 balloons because it seemed like a good idea at the time.

The point of this blog entry is, I guess, balloons can be fun when treated right. But the second you let your guard down, that clown is gonna try to bomb your country.

Star Wars Episode 33 1/3: Attack of the Pinkberry Clones

Strolling down the streets of Manhattan you might have to shield your eyes when a bright glare obscures your vision. Once your eyes adjust to the fluorescent violet, peach and green hue, you’ll discover the one and only Pinkberry yogurt cucina.

Ah, the brilliance of Pinkberry. You see, after hours upon hours in a top secret, most likely nuclear, lab-or-atory, scientists uncovered the truth about life. If you take regular, healthy, bacteria-composed yogurt, and FREEZE IT, you’ve created heaven in a styrofoam cup.

But it gets better. You can also choose from a number of real fruit toppings, like mangoes, bananas, and of course, the signature berries. And if you’re feeling particularly naughty, there is a grand selection of unhealthy yet scrumptious cereal toppings, like Captain Crunch, or the really really naughty chocolate chips.

Pinkberry’s okay, in my opinion. I thought it was somewhat nasty at first, but then it grew on me, like the bacteria. Just when I started liking it the doctor told me that my blood sugar was high, and apparently Pinkberry’s got a good amount of sugar. So that was the end of that.

But I’m more concerned right now with the phenomenon. I’m sure Pinkberry’s made a pretty penny for itself. So the wonderful free market caught on, and now you can’t kick a rat in New York City without coming across a Pinkberry clone. By the way, I’m not sure if Pinkberry was the “original.” It may very well be a clone as well; but people know Pinkberry…they must have done something right.

Now, these clones are literally I-don’t-know-why-Pinkberry-can’t-sue-for-infringement clones. For example, a place opened up around the corner from my apartment…instead of the peach and pink hue, it’s aquamarine, lavender and teal. For the sake of upsetting anyone I’m not gonna call it by its real name, but I’ll call it what may as well be it’s name: Magenta Berry.

You see, all these places HAVE THE EXACT SAME NAME. There’s no creativity in name. No creativity in color. No creativity in flavors. It’s like we’ve all died and gone to “freezed” yogurt heaven/hell, depending on your liking. Sometimes the names will get really kooky, and remove the “berry.” You might find a Violet Strawberry, or maybe, just maybe, a Blush Pineapple.

I want to see Bob’s Yogurt Feedbag. If a Bob’s Yogurt Feedbag comes along, colored in all black, with completely un-swanky chairs and tables, then I’m gonna forget about the sugar diet altogether and frequent Bob’s.

But if that’s the case, then I might as well just eat Haagan Dasz…because real ice cream is like a bajillion times better than any of this yogurt razz ma tazz anyway. Why would I have green tea yogurt with an apple on top when I can have ultra-super-duper-high-fat triple fudge, coma inducing Rocky Road Phish Food cream?

That’s what I thought.

The Cold, Hard Truth About American Samoa

So I’m watching the Mets game (it seems like most of my blog posts start out that way), and commentator Gary Cohen says that the pitcher from the Pirates, Yates, is from Hawaii.

That’s such an interesting concept…being from Hawaii. First of all, if you lived in Hawaii, would you ever get sick of living in Hawaii to the point that you would come live in the continental U.S.? So, I’ve concluded that the only possible way I would move out of Hawaii and into the continental U.S. would be if I were the pitcher from the Pirates. Because the only thing more awesome than being from Hawaii is to be a professional baseball/football/basketball/tennis/golf/chess player. I knew someone from Cornell who was from Hawaii. Why he left Hawaii for Ithaca, NY is borderline psychotic.

But, professional athlete aside, I suppose one can become “bored” of living in paradise. I mean, there are the obvious perks of living in Hawaii. There’s no traffic when you are commuting to work via surfing on the Pacific Ocean. There aren’t any lawyers, businessmen, or accountants in Hawaii of course, just surfing instructors. And everybody is eternally jolly, hula dancing, tanning and being genuinely chill.

Then again, if you live in Hawaii, you really have to be eternally delighted, because if things somehow become depressing, you have nowhere to go. You can go to American Samoa, I suppose…or you can become a professional baseball player.

By the way, as the I write this, Duaner Sanchez just loaded the bases in the 8th inning, and walked in a run, after coming into the inning with a 4-2 lead. The New York crowd does not take kindly to not playing well…and we don’t care if you’re season has been great thus far. We have short memories, short tempers, and a lot of angry people who aren’t looking forward to leaving the game and sitting in hours of traffic.

In Hawaii, you could always just go surf…problem solved.

(p.s. He got out of the inning giving up only one run, but it’s a looong season. I’m watching you Duaner.)

(p.p.s. Billy Wagner just blew the save…this is why we don’t walk in runs).

Talkin’ Bout my Hagaddah

Here comes number four. You should all be thrilled. Not only am I blogging now, but I’m blogging more coherently. You may now actually be able to understand the points I am trying to make.

Passover occurred this weekend. Well, it’s still occurring, but it occurred in all it’s glory on Saturday and Sunday night. I’m not going to go into my family’s antics on Saturday night, because that’s for the most part censored. In fact, I was specifically told “not to blog about this” from a number of family members who told me, “and please don’t use my name.”

And I won’t. But I will have my say on the Hagaddah. For ye non-Jews, the Hagaddah is the book we read during the Passover seder, “ordering” what we do, telling us to point to the shank bone, and explaining that means the Jews in Egypt fought the Egyptians using shank bones as swords.

But recently the Hagaddah has been getting on my nerves. I’m usually a big fan of the Hagaddah, because Passover is my favorite Jewish holiday. And it still is. But the Hagaddah has this tendency to focus on the seemingly least-relevant matters; although I’m sure my massive Rabbi readership will beg to differ.

We all know that there were ten plagues in Egypt. Blood, frogs, and rabid hippopotami are the popular ones. But then the Hagaddah says something like: “Well, how can Rabbi Akiba prove that those ten plagues were really 30 plagues?” Hrmm, that’s a good question I suppose. And then Rabbi Akiba proceeds to demonstrate that the ten plagues were equivalent to 30 by using logic, algebra and quantum mechanics.

But then it says, “How can Rabbi Gamilel prove that the 30 plagues were really 300.” Hrmm. Okay, now the Rabbis might be pushing it a little bit. And Rabbi Gamilel proves that they are 300 plagues, because apparently, each Hippo was really pregnant at the time with quintuplets, and the blood was diabetic blood.

Let’s just say, the Hagaddah would go much smoother, in my opinion, if it focused on the story, which is pretty amazing in and of itself. I think ten plagues is pretty bad. I’ll give the Holy One plenty of miracle status for those ten plagues.

If Charlton Heston were still alive, he’d focus on the story. “How can Rabbi Ezekiel prove that the Second Commandment really secured the right to bear arms?”

Too soon?