S'more Quotes that I Really Like

'Member a coupla posts ago, I transcribed that conversation from "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang?" Well I put that up as an away message along with a similar conversation from later in the movie. Harry tries to turn the tables on Gay Perry by correcting his grammar the same way that Harmony corrected his earlier on:

Perry: Go. Sleep badly. Any questions, hesitate to call.
Harry: Bad.
Perry: Excuse me?
Harry: Sleep bad. Otherwise it makes it seem like the mechanism that allows you to sleep...
Perry: What, f**khead? Badly's an adverb. Who taught you grammar? Get out. Vanish.

Another words, if any of you try to get above yourselves and correct my grammar, you'll probably screw up, az don't even bother.

So one of my friends saw the quote in my away message, and he said it reminded him of a scene from the movie "With Honors." The following exchange takes place between Joe Pesci's character and a professor:

Simon: Which door do I leave from?
Professor Pitcannon: At Harvard we don't end our sentences with prepositions.
Simon: Well in that case, which door do I leave from, asshole?

I immediately put that up as another away message. Oh, it's a mere coincidence that both of those quotes have inappropriate language. As many of you know, I am in staunch opposition to filthy language of any kind, especially here. This is a family progrum. Anyway, I was inspired to put up these quotes because of a conversation I was having with a certain super heroine about apple pie. As everyone knows, I make the best apple pie this side of the East River, and I've recently been able to increase my output by purchasing an apple peeler/corer/slicer. I said that it was safer for me to use one of those than to use a knife because I'm no longer allowed around sharp things. This reminded me of a quip from "Whose Line is it Anyway" involving Wayne Brady, Drew Carey and the inimitable Ryan Stiles:

Drew: I'm giving you 1000 points for the zippers on your pants. What's that about?
Wayne: It's my tribute to Michael (Jackson)!
Drew: Hey, we should all get zippers on our pants if Wayne's gonna have 'em.
Ryan: They don't let me around zippers.

If any of you haven't seen the show, check out some episodes on peekvid.com. It's finally back up!

Now That's Just Irresponsible

At the end of last night's post, I carelessly mentioned that I was copying all of my posts onto facebook because I was jealous of my friend's readership, but clearly this merits further discussion. I mentioned that it wasn't fair of me to enlighten only my few devoted readers, so facebook provides a platform where many, many others will have access to my musings. It's all about the advertising. There's also a minute chance that someone will offer me a writing job somewhere, like espn.com. Even Bill Simmons had humble beginnings. Meanwhile, facebook.com has this feature that will allow you to update your blog here on Blogger, and facebook will automatically receive the data feed and print it on there too. It will also post up all of your existing posts. I just tried to do this, and facebook only received 25 of the posts, and the software that gets the feed from Blogger can't find the others. This is gonna be an enormous waste of time, but I guess I'll just have to manually copy and paste each entry onto facebook. Can't nobody say Strong Bad never did nothing for the peoples. Now it is my intention to sit down and play video games for several hours (See SB e-mail #64, "English Paper"). I just took a nap so I'm in no condition to be coming up with deep philosophical reasons for posting up on facebook, but I'll work on it later.

Just as a side point, I had endless trouble typing that paragraph, partially because I had no idea where I was going with it, but also because I ran into some keyboard issues last night. For whatever reason the ergonomic keyboard I bought a couple of years ago didn't come with a USB plug, and my one year old computer didn't come with a ps/2 port, az I was forced to buy one of those USB to ps/2 adapters. Anyway, sometimes the connection between the keyboard and CPU resets itself and the keys get stuck. Last night I got so frustrated with it, I just unplugged Kiki (yes, I just named my keyboard) and plugged in my standard keyboard, not realizing that once you go ergonomic you never go back. Az now I'm trying to reacquaint myself with Kiki; I'll be fine in an hour or two. Maybe I should just switch to Dvorak and be done with it.

And now, a word on friendship. Many of you saw me leave a party at around 1:30 am with little or no explanation. There are some times when you have to just drop whatever you're doing when a friend calls you and tells you to meet him/her somewhere, even when he/she doesn't tell you why. And no, I'm not writing this so people can pat me on the back and say "what a good friend you are." I'm writing this so that all of you out there that were ever in the same position realize how honored you should be to receive such a phone call. It's a fantastic feeling to know that someone considers you to be such a close friend that they would ask you to do something like that, no questions asked.

***Spoiler Warning*** (Tee-hee, I feel like one of those people who has nothing better to do than write video game walkthroughs so that other players don't have to do any work.)

This is gonna sound uber-cheesy, but on a recent episode of "Grey's Anatomy," Christina decides that she needs to tell Meredith that she and Dr. Burke are engaged before she tells anyone else. Why? Because if she ever murdered someone, Meredith would be the person she would call to help her drag the body across the floor.

***End Spoiler***

Do all of you have a friend like that?

Early Week Update

It's only Monday, but it's already been a productive week. My life potentially changed twice today. This morning I received a call from a recruiter who's trying to get me a job in investment banking. He asked me how much I'm making at my current position (he thought I was still working), and when I told him, this was his response, verbatim: "Dude, you need to get outta there." Tell me about it. So he said I really should get into one of the training progrums (see SB e-mail #s 113, 120, and 167, entitled "pizzaz," "radio," and "the movies" respectively) at a big bank; it would change my life. I told him "yes" and "yeah" so many times, I think he thought I was obsessive/compulsive. And just now, in preparation for tomorrow morning's interview at the ISE, I finally took the plunge and learned how to use Pivot Tables in Microsoft Excel. Man, if any of you out there don't know how to do these, make it a top priority. Now all (=2) the spreadsheets I have on my computer can become all kinds of fancy, those being my non-existent spreadsheet containing data on all the girls I've dated, and the spreadsheet with the list of the scotches I'm gonna buy when I become rich (and maybe I'll have a seat by the eastern wall!). Ooh, I also found a pair of glasses to buy. They're really hot; I might have to really set aside some sticks before Shabbos to ward off the girls. Az, I clearly made several positive strides in improving my career situation today, and it's only Monday! Additionally I got to hang out with some top quality people, eat some top quality Hot Dog / Laffa, and watch some top quality Jack Bauer action. It's amazing how even when life is really stinky, it's still only slightly less awesome than it usually is. Also, I got jealous of my friend, so I decided it was time to have my blog visible on my facebook.com page. News of my brilliance needs to get out; it's only fair to the amei ha'aretz out there. I'll discuss this in detail shortly, but not now; I just received word that there's tons of free sushi available. In my current financial state, it would be criminal of me not to partake.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Today I watched "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang," a highly underrated comedy/action/mystery starring the underrated Robert Downey Jr. In a scene early in the movie, we have the following exchange between Downey Jr.'s character and his love interest:

Harry: I feel badly...
Harmony: Bad.
Harry: Bad? Sorry?
Harmony: You feel bad.
Harry: Bad?
Harmony: "Badly" is an adverb. So to say you feel badly would be saying that the mechanism which allows you to feel is broken.

What a brilliant discussion! Nonetheless, Harry ends up getting the girl. Is that the secret to how it's done? I didn't know correcting grammar was an aphrodisiac. All I need to do is start correcting every girl's grammar and they'll be throwing themselves at my feet! (assuming I give them a thorough scrubbing beforehand.) Especially if I looked like Robert Downey Jr.... wait, is he cute? (did you notice the period for the "junior" abbreviation followed by the ellipsis? Yes, that's right, there were four dots there.) I don't think so. I'm more of a Jude Law man, or Josh Holloway. Speaking of which, my buddy mentioned his top five female celebrities to me last week, az I think I need to come up with my own top five. I'll work on that this week. One thing that definitely won't be on my top five? Dry T-shirt contests (absolutely no H2O! See SB e-mail #133, Bottom 10). Hmm, I might have set a new record in parentheses usage; that was my third pair. Sounds like an ancient Greek hero, doesn't it? And Parentheses smote the Kerrek, and all was laid to burnination! (See SB e-mail #62, Interview). Okay, that's just about enough of that. Monster.com here I come!

Weird Dreams

Last night I had a really bizarre dream. Now, the main focus of the dream is one I've had a bunch of times before, but let's start with the other stuff in there. Basically, the dream took place in my old high school. Apparently, they had turned the top few floors into strangely constructed dorms so that out-of-towners could go to school there. That was so not important. The crux of the dream was that at one point, one of my front teeth chipped off, and soon after that, one of my molars fell out. I can't begin to tell you how many times I've had dreams about my teeth falling out. Sometimes they all just fall out at once, at other times they just start to shatter into a million pieces.

In the Wikipedia article on recurring dreams, "losing teeth or the ability to speak" is one of the five most common ones. Az, I just googled "Teeth dreams" and the first hit was an article on dreammoods.com. Dreams about losing teeth can mean many things:
1. Anxiety about my appearance. I know I can afford to lose a few pounds, but overall I don't think I'm upset with the way I look. Girls don't care overly much about that anyway, as I hear it told.
2. Embarrassment in a particular situation. I think there are very few people out there who care less than I do about embarrassing myself. Az I don't think that's it either.
3. A sense of powerlessness. I think this one makes the most sense. There are so many things I'm unable to do now because I don't have a job. But even so, I've had this dream at least a dozen times over the past few years, and I certainly didn't have a sense of powerlessness for all that time, az let's just see what else the website says, just for kicks.
4. A woman in menopause. Umm... no.
5. Malnutrition. Umm... probably not.

Schmutter, get a job.

East Sizide and Some Other Jazz

Az last Sunday while I was skiing, I had quite the ocular mishap. Instead of leaving my glasses in the car I put them in my jacket pocket, and obviously they split right down the middle when I fell in the snow. And thus ended the blue Oakley/Captain Transition Lenses era. Az now I need a new pair, az on Thursday, I invited my buddy on an exciting eye-glasses excursion. It's been a while since we had an opportunity to spread cheer around the neighborhood whilst running an errand, az it was time. Since my parents are staunch supporters of exactly one optician/glasses store, I brought my friend over to said store on the east side. He needed his glasses' screws tightened anyway, az he wasn't coming only for moral support and for the spreading of said cheer, but also for utilitarian purposes. Forget the fact that I couldn't find any glasses I liked which fit; that's not the purpose of this post. The point is that whenever we left the car or whenever we left any store, he had absolutely no idea where we were and which direction we had to go; he was completely and utterly lost. Now, whenever I'm in my 'hood, I always assume that people know where they're going because I do, but then I remember that no one goes to the east side. Ever. There's just no reason for any of my friends to go there; there are plenty of restaurants on the west side and tons of other stuff to do. Learn about your city, people! Sewiously!

Az today I returned from Toronto, and during the long, cold, snowy trip, my beautiful anthracite gray car got all frosty white. Even though I knew it would just get dirty again in a hurry, I still needed to give Erin a bath, az I bought her a car wash. A couple of hours before that though, as I hear it told, two of my friends were walking out of the store and saw a beautiful gray car that was all frosty white. One nudged the other, pointing at said car, and stated flatly, "man, sucks for that guy," at which point I lowered my window and said hi to them. Oh, those two tricksters, always in and out of prison. They didn't mean it, Erin. Don't worry, the joke's on them, they don't even have cars. They're just jealous of your sublime beauty.

A couple of posts ago, I gave a little insight into how the Coswell cogs of my brain operate, az now I will give another example. Az tonight, I went with some friends to an all-you-can-eat sushi event at a restaurant on the upper west side. On the way down there, one of them mentioned that even though she wasn't going to eat a lot, she was still gonna order the buffet (pronounced boo-fay). Obviously I made fun of her for incorrectly pronouncing the word "buffet," noting that the word is not pronounced the same was as Lisa Kudrow's character on Friends' name is pronounced. Now at that point I made the connection between the name "Buffay" and the name "Bouvier." A couple of days earlier, when I was on that glasses errand with my other friend, the name Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis came up. I'm not shy to admit that I had no idea that Mr. Onassis was her last husband, but the point is that he said that she was born Jacqueline Bouvier. According to Wikipedia, her full name is Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis. When he told me that, I automatically recalled the episode of The Simpsons, where Marge's sister Selma gets asked if she would marry Apu, to which she responded that she didn't want to be Selma Bouvier Terwilliger McClure Nahasapeema-whatever. I need to lay off the doobies. Now that all of these ideas are off my chest, several things can happen: A. One of my loyal readers can stop complaining that I haven't posted in a while, B. I can look online for jobs, and C. I can drink myself into oblivion. Hameivin Yavin.

dnL

Az, I just left my friend's place, and as I was hitting the button for the lobby in his elevator I noticed something odd. Apparently the lobby button was broken so they needed to replace it, however they were out of "L"s. I kid you not, in the place of the "L" button they put an upside-down "7." Now, normally I would give the superintendent a pat on the head, a tuna-flavored treat, and some sage advice (see SB e-mail #130, "Do Over"), but in this case, I can only thank him for adding more hilarity to the situation. Once I noticed the upside-down "7" I examined it more closely, and then I realized that you could turn the button around to make it a normal "7." Obviously, anyone smart enough to read will know that to get to the 7th floor you need to hit the "7" above the "5," but still. By the way, as an aside, "yeah, but still," is the best comeback in the English language according to Bill Simmons. So, on my way out of the building, while I was contemplating this 7-L phenomenon, I was reminded of the dnL era. Remember dnL? The upside-down 7up? It came in a green bottle with a green label, and the website listed on the wrapper was www.dnL.com. I wonder if the site is still up? Lemme check. Aha! Interesting. Normally, I would say that typing in www.dnL.com redirects you to the regular www.7up.com website, but it doesn't; the address in the navigation bar never changes to www.7up.com, it just stays as www.dnL.com even though it's the exact same website. Reminiscing about old sodas brings back some memories. Like, remember Crystal Pepsi? I remember it tasting almost exactly like plain ol' Pepsi, but that might just be me. Also, for some reason I remember the commercials for Cherry Cola Slice and Apple Slice. I need to investigate these to see if they ever actually existed. I'll do it tomorrow. And yes, I mean tomorrow, Friday, it's still 11:53 pm. Let's make these last seven minutes productive. Happy last seven minutes of Nirvana Day!

Restaurant Depot

On Sunday, I went with a couple of friends to this place in Teterboro, New Jersey, called Restaurant Depot. This is one of the most amazing places I've ever seen. The last time I was in a building that interesting was a few weeks ago, when I went to a baby furniture warehouse in Piscataway. I'll return to that trip shortly. Anywho, Restaurant Depot is like a grocery/drug store, that has everything in industrial sizes. You know when you go to the store to buy sugar and the packages of Domino sugar say like "Five Pounder" on them? Well, they had the "25 Pounders" at Restaurant Depot. My favorite moment was when I found a massive egg-whisk. I decided I must have it, at least in pictorial form. Check it out on facebook.com. But they don't just have giant-sized versions of normal things, they also have all that other stuff you see in restaurants and wonder where they got them, like signs for the restroom and no-smoking signs. It really was the highest of high comedy.

Now onto my previous trip to a large, flat building in Jersey. A couple of weeks ago I went with my buddy to get baby furniture from the Munire warehouse in Piscataway. He knew I was not working, and we have been known to spread cheer around the neighborhood whilst running errands. There were several hilarious moments, including our almost right-turn onto South Randolphville Road. Our turn was actually on New England Avenue, and once we realized our almost-error, it was inevitable that we start cracking jokes about the South Randolphville Patriots, and perhaps turning down said road on the way back to "see how she rides." Anyway, the reason we went all the way to the warehouse, was that my friend's father knows a guy who knows a guy in the baby furniture business, and got him a special deal. So we're in the warehouse causing a ruckus and discussing various ways we could use 99,000 square feet of warehouse space. We concluded that we could have four football games going on simultaneously without anyone bumping into anyone else. Then we could play video games on our 1,000 inch plasma screen. One day...

Lighters, Shavers and Pens, Oh My!

Az I was making small talk with the RHR this morning, and she mentioned that she got some new pens. Az I wanted to know if they were fancy pens or just the plain ol' Bics. What a bizarre company! When you look up "Bic" on Google, the top hit is for bicworld.com, and the description is as follows. Ahem. "Leading manufacturer of stationery products, lighters and shavers." Now, from my experience, when companies make more than one product, they're usually related in some way, like Sony makes TVs and DVD players, and other types of electronic equipment. But what's the connection between pens, lighters, and shavers? They're all made of plastic, and they all fit in your pocket, but still. You might as well say they all have the letter "e" in them. Speaking of companies that make a wide variety of products, what's the deal with White Rose. Is there anything they don't make? Nothing says "yummy!" like a tall glass of White Rose Orange Juice in the am. Okay, time to watch some more Hoiz. "You're risking the patient's life!"