Great post about a great movie.
There were so many GREAT movies in the 90s, some of them snuck past me. As much as I loved movies, I was busy. My first love was soccer and I had to make varsity and letter all 4 years. That doesn’t happen without obsession and practice. “A League of Their Own” was one such […]
via “Are you coming? See, how it works is, the train moves, not the station.” — Clintington on Film
I didn’t write this!
Featured Photo by: Stephanie Pombo
A while back I started a new blog called Sweatpants Life. Typically, it’s about, well life. I’ve been writing about words and SEO a lot lately. The most recent post was about portmanteaus and one that’s gone bad.
Check it out! Please.
All of them. It was literally the worst fucking year of my life. It could be said that most years have been pretty great so that maybe 2017 isn’t all that bad. While the former is true. That latter isn’t. 2017 was terrible. 2017 sucked shit through a silly straw. Hey, 2017, I loathe you. I will look back at 2017 like the festering speed bump made gawhd god-knows-what organic matter – I swear I see severed limbs and a horse’s head sticking out of it – that it was.
There was a prologue to 2017 called 2016. As far as years go, it was kind of fucky. Until 2017 blew the doors off this muth and showed people what a terrible year looks like. From a statistical standpoint, the quality of years seem to be in a downward trend. Good news is, I’m not alone. Ever since that human toilet fire showed up on a debate stage, almost everyone’s quality of life has been trending down. Even if their head’s up are shoved up their racist uncle’s ass. It won’t grant them immunity as it isn’t the ring of protection the nerds are prattling on about. Now having their head up their rich as fuck racists uncle’s ass, well, that’s a different story.
It’s not just the politics though. It’s not the fact that I can’t go on social media without stumbling upon some trash heap post that’s somewhere between smoldering and five-alarm. Whether it’s from a friend or some troll bot 5000, it doesn’t matter. It’s sucked the fun out of social media. There’s a bit of anxiety. It’s like walking around downtown and happening upon a greasy back alley handy-j while someone is yelling “This is my opinion, my opinion is fact!” Let’s say, I’ve muted a lot of people this year.
I’m sorry, that last bit was kind of gross. On a personal level though, I’ve been obliterated. Bad shit occurred. The kind of terrible real shit that we all eventually deal with and though many have, there’s no good way to deal with it. It’s rough, different. Lives have been forced to change and it can never be undone. That’s why, once again, I’ve vanished for a while. I wish it were because I was working on my novel for nanowrimo, but that has about one days worth of writing against it. In general, I just haven’t felt like sitting in front of the PC and tippy-tappin’ out the words. I’m basically forcing myself to do this right now.
Thankfully, I’m fuelled by rage and the need a laugh. Laughing hasn’t been as prevalent during the last few weeks. Which is too bad because I’m a fairly funny person. Although, since it’s taken me the better part of two months to write this, more laughs have occured. I like to laugh and enjoy making others laugh.
2017 and to that end, life, are like a horse. But not just any horse. One of the big black evil bastards that bites everybody and kicked one of his trainers into a well. Of course that was when he was young and in a good mood. Now he is more days behind him than he does in front of him. The racing days are over due to arthritis. That’s why he started taking PCP*. And to support his cool habit of taking hard to come by drugs he had to get a job. So he hauls trash carts behind him. Basically, that brings him full circle on the hipster scale. Old drug, old job, old technology, in general being a drip with a penchant for black.
At any time did I mention that the trash cart is on fire? No? Doesn’t seem like I did. Well, it goes without saying that fire freaks horses the fuck out and makes them run in the opposite direction. That’s just a regular horse. Not a horse on PCP, hauling a trash cart that is perpetually on fire and four feet behind the asshole, both literally and figuratively.
In closing, 2017 sucked. Drive an oak stake through its heart. Chop off its head. Salt it. Burn it. Bye Felicia.
Can’t wait to see how fucky 2018 is!
Before the Chicken Soup for the Soul demographic get after me, there are plenty of things I’m grateful for. I’m just, pissy.
*PCP ( ) is a horse tranquilizer that was taken off the market in 1965. People took would become dissociative and feel nothing. Case in point, in the original Terminator movie, the police thought that the Terminator was on PCP. Turns out he was a time travelling killer cyborg from Austria.
The Great Site Migration of 2017 is kicking off just about any minute or day now. It’s a special and magical time where one rolls the dice and hopes too high hell that everything moves more smoothly than pacific northwest logging road. Well, everything has been gathered up and both hosts have been contacted. Our websites are ready to blast off into a bold new future.
But first, we have to wait five days or so. I’m unsure if this is standard practice or just one more piece of evidence that our current host isn’t as good as they used to be. Which is basically why we’re moving. I’ve been assured by both hosts that everything is going to be fine, but those are famous last words. They also have a very broad non-specific definition. Some people’s definition of fine is far different and less rosy than man. I say expect the worst and not be disappointed. On that note, here’s an old post you can check out, if my site hasn’t exploded into nothing.
I apologize if The Great Site Migration of 2017 causes any technical difficulties that prevent viewing sweatpantslife.com
My friend, Machismo Wainwright, recently suffered a bout with constipation. Now, I know you may not want to know about it. Hell, I didn’t even want to know about it. The thing is, we both know about it now, so what the hell.
Machismo simultaneously informed myself and several other infirmed souls of his constipation. I guess that’s how to tell that someone really values one as a friend. Telling someone about one’s own bowel movements, or lack thereof, is a level of trust only reached by the best and most trusted of friends. A quick gogel* search states that the only things higher than informing a friend of your constipation are, leaving in Vegas what happened between you two in Vegas and helping each other dispose of a body. Just like Jeremy Piven and Andrew McCarthy in that movie they were in! Now that’s friendship! Wait, or did one of them shoot the other one. Who cares I’m only watchin’ that movie once. Maybe twice in spirit, if I ever watch Rough Night.
Here’s the thing. I’m writing about Machismo’s constipation because I myself, was suffering from a constipation of a different nature. Not that I was suffering from Writer’s Block, it was more of a preparation thing. I needed a post and this topic just seemed to flow faster than the others. Sometimes, some things just percolate faster than others.
Along the way, I had an epiphany. I bet if Writer’s Block were called Writer’s Constipation, there would be a lot fewer MacBook toting, double chai expresso* macchiato, non-fat, extra whip drinking chodes talking about their affliction. Instead of prattling on to their, jealous of the creative lifestyle accountant friends, they’d probably keep it on the down low. Maybe read around for some inspiration. Then again, there’s always the tried and true writer’s ex-lax of adding a gun and killing everyone. Go all George R.R. Martin on that shit and drive it over a cliff.
Now, if you’ll excuse me I need to go see a man about a horse. For more Machismo Wainwright check out this post.
*Yes, I meant to spell it like that.
**Yes, I meant to spell it like that as well.
That’s what the tweet said. Mimicking one of those desperate 900 numbers from the 90’s that wanted to teach me TV VCR repair. “But I’m just a chubby child? What am I going to do with the knowledge to fix a VCR?” Looking back now, I could have made some major coin with that knowledge. Not only would I have been savvy enough to program VCR’s and repair them during their heyday, I could have been the Dr. Frankenstein resurrectionist that hipsters come to for the absolute worst in home video entertainment.
I kept an open mind this time and didn’t shoot it down immediately. Am I failing? Well, by this guy’s definition, yes. How could a single person not be failing when he is comparing them to Huffington Post and Mashable. Is your blog missing the financial backing of a publicly traded company? Do you have less than twenty full time writers, editors and contributors?
The site looked like what a Smart Car would look like all tarted up like a Nascar. Stickers, bumpers, creepers and bleepers were everywhere. My first reaction was to have a seizure. However, before my eyes could roll back in my head and my mouth began to froth, a popup, er, popped up. Perhaps popup isn’t the proper name, as it covered the entire screen and descended from the top of the site, like someone drawing a blind to cover up some hideously bright scene.*
My faculties came back to me. The clickers started clickin’ and the peepers started peepin’. That’s when I realized the shade was wanting my information. My digital digits. I wasn’t in the mood. Hell, I didn’t even know why I would want to come back to this site. Ever! So I clicked the X in the corner. And the nuclear Nascar sensibilities came back into view. I was ready this time though. Steeled like some ancient armored sentinel with an evil looking blade and a worse attitude.
Yet, as quickly as the site appeared, it was grayed out again. As a different popup, well, popped up. This one was the more standard rectangular affair that wanted my email address. At this juncture, I still had no idea whether or not I liked this site. Scratch that, I knew I didn’t like the site, but perhaps I needed the site. Maybe it had an untold trove of information that would turn me into a trend maker. Visions of putting an ad on Craigslist for an unpaid intern, as I read on for the life changing information it contained.
It didn’t! It told writers to write and artists to art. In summary, keep blogging. Post whatever it is that you do. Link it to your other sites and creations. I saw the flailing magician, trying so desperately to get his trick to work. I heard a drumset falling down the stairs, the cymbals rolling at the end. For all the glitz of the site, it seemed lackluster. Like something anyone could have cooked up. A Captain Obvious for obvious times. Yet, there he was with a zillion followers and shares. Who knows if any of them are repeats or if they are the poor souls who don’t know about the X buttons and sign up for something every time a popup, phew, pops up. Heck, maybe he bought them.
When, why, did blogging turn into this? Sure, it’s great to gain followers and have readers, but this was such an overt desperate plea for attention and numbers. It was making a scene, dropping down to its knees, made huffing puffing sounds as it tried to work up some tears. “I love you so much, stay with me forever, follow me.” It’s like going to the bar and someone sneaks up behind you and demands your phone number before you can even turn around or talk to them. That’s some power tripping creepazoid Fifty Shades of Grey shit right there. That being said, I’m going to turn on all the wingdings and doo-dads my blog can muster.
The love child of a Sally Struthers quote and this post: “Failing at blogging? Sure, we all are!”
*Something that happens all the time in Las Vegas.
Blogging has been a hobby of mine for the last three and half years. That’s a long time for me to stick with anything. Maybe it’s because I’ve gotten older that I’m able to focus better on one thing. Perhaps I simply enjoy blogging so much that I’m still willing to put in the time. Regardless, when compared to other hobbies I’ve had: video games, comic books, magic cards* – it’s inexpensive. Especially when one makes the cheap choices like I do. It may also have something to do with me moving the blog several times.
I started out with blogspot, which was fine. It let me post, which was really all I was wanting to do. Yet, when I would go to other blogs I couldn’t help but notice how much cooler they looked. Good looking themes seemed easier to come by on other platforms. That was when I decided to move to wordpress.com. Which was a better move, but overall frustrating. I got the cool themes I was looking for and wordpress reader was a great way to gain readers. Yet, there was a paywall that was always lurking behind a button click or grayed out options. Themes and features could only be used to certain points before wordpress would ask me to shell out two to four times the amount of money I would to host a site somewhere else.
That was when I decided to move to wordpress.org. Which I’m overall happy with, I get to implement all the plugins and features I want and customize any part of a theme – granted it’s not hobbled by the developer. Although, most things that present a problem can be fudged in CSS, but sometimes they lay beyond my current skills. That’s when I use an alternative, which are easy to find in the wordpress dashboard and marketplace.
Still there was one small step back. That’s the lack of wordpress reader integration. As mentioned, it’s a great way to gain readers. It’s an RSS – think facebook feed – for wordpress.com blogs and others. It does what Feedly and Bloglovin’ do, but automatically and with a shootin’ fish in a barrel attitude. Anyone who posts to wordpress.com gets access to reader on top of their other platforms. Those not on wordpress.com do not get the auto access, although they can still be subscribed to.
Ultimately, I find running my blog through wordpress.org preferable and wish I would have started with it. The move was basically a tear down that burned it all to the ground and started over. I changed the name of my blog from the difficult to remember Zweihander Plus Eins to Sweatpants Life. So basically, I threw some of my audience off the trail. That’s my bad. Although, I am doing my damnedest to earn them back and gain new ones.
Fun Fact: Sweatpants Life is preferred by Apple users.
*The card game, not for doing magic tricks. I’m not that nerdy!
Did anyone else know that the fist is the unofficial unit for measuring blog posts in a week? Me neither, probably because it isn’t. Yesterday I hit a teeny tiny landmark for blogging. I had a new blog post everyday for a week straight. Heck, one day even had two posts!
I know some bloggers have gone on for years without missing a day. It was after reading one of their inspiring posts that I set a goal to post everyday for a week. I never even intended for my blog to live in that kind of time. I didn’t think I could sustain this kind of output, I guess I still don’t.
Prompts and time to write aren’t necessarily growing on trees at the moment. However, I am trying to squeeze the time in whenever and where ever I can. I am also open to a lot of topics and prompts.
Now with camp NaNoWriMo I find myself to be challenged and stretched in a multitude of different directions. Where do I spend my time at. Can I manage to hit two goals on the same day? Those goals being approximately 1,500 words for camp and a blog post. I am going to continue to try my best.
My wife and I recently took the opportunity to go see The Kids in the Hall. Let me tell you something about comedy shows in the theatre setting. The comedians are funny, the people in the audience probably aren’t. For the same reason that many of us type-B personality types, who think of the right thing to say fifteen minutes too late, and never punch people watch Clint Eastwood movies, folk who aren’t all that funny wander into comedy shows.
The Kids were okay, hell they were better than okay, they were hilarious. My face hurt from grinning all night long. However, lets talk about the people in front of us. The show started at eight on the dot. Four seats sat empty in front of us. I thought to myself, I bet these people are going to be a problem or at least a minor issue. By the beginning of the third skit my fears were easing as I didn’t think they were going to show up at all.
Oh, how wrong I was. Pretty much at that exact moment they appeared, there was three of them. What is said about senses being deprived making the other senses stronger, is true. In that dark theatre I could smell the light remnants of alcohol presumably consumed at dinner and the scent of hippy on the group. They seated themselves quickly, the remarkably tall man sat in front of me. I adjusted in my seat, but overall they really weren’t that big of a problem.
Buddy (Scott Thomas) continued his monologue. That is when one of them appeared to not fully understand how jokes work. Continuous laughter racked her throughout the buildup and well before the punchline. Too the point that I assume that the word “knock” causes gut wrenching guffawing both times it is mentioned at the beginning of a knock-knock joke.
She calmed down as Buddy exited stage left. Another skit began and about half-way through, her man companion showed up. How do I know it was her’s? Well, the remarkably tall man stood straight up and swapped seats with her. A total distance of two seats each.
I am sure everyone around me was as displeased as I was. At least the tall guy was gone and I could sit how I like and see everything. Oh, how wrong I was, again. As Dave Foley expressed his appreciation of menstruation, she would throw her fist in the air pumping it repeatedly while yelling “Woooooo!” Each. And Every. Time. He would say menstruation. “Wooooo!” While a fist flailed around like she was self-promoting her used car lot as some sort of abominable mockery of a wacky waving arm inflatable tube man.
Luckily, she was able to get her remediality under control. Allowing only a few outbursts from time to time. Premature ejacutlation of laughter was still an issue for her though. Patience is a virtue that she still needs to attain. The punchline is right around the corner.
As The Kids In The Hall wrapped up the show, the lights came on. My first thought upon my return to full vision was, Of course you have blue hair! Followed by Fuck! I have been reading too much Cormac McCarthy. As an encore, the “I’m crushing your head!” Guy came out armed with a camcorder. It was hooked up to the screen behind him. He cruised the audience for victims, not volunteers. She was one of the few who stood up, her extroversion casting off the shackles of theatre. She looked and sounded like a god damn berserker who had just quaffed a pint of organic blood before careening into battle. I would love to have seen her get her head crushed, but I guess he has a rule against over exerting volunteerism.
Foodies, what are they? Are they: hedge chefs, super fans of food, food photographers? All of the above and then some? Where do they come from? What is their education background? What is their profession? Am I a foodie?
Who doesn’t like food? I mean even just a little. Regardless of the flavors or culture. If you have a friend that says they don’t like food, they either hashtag thigh gap and need help or they are quite possibly an alien! Get out of the house, call the J. Edgar’s, run for your life!
However, if you have a friend who says they are a fan of food as in, “I loooooooooove foooood, sooooo gooooood.” As if they think they are special or deserve an award, that is an asshole! For I as well, am a fan of living and not contracting scurvy, gout, rickets, or having my teeth fall out of my head! If it tastes good while doing so, so much the better.
A few years ago I started cooking a majority of our meals from scratch. I rarely use canned goods unless something is out of season. I will boil tomatoes and process them. I save vegetable trimmings to make a stock for soups. Bread and biscuits are conjured from flour and water, sometimes beer. Pudding from scratch from an old family recipe, sure I have to stand there and stir like crazy, but it is far superior to anything in box. I find it amazing how little time it actually takes to make something from the very base and how much that teaches you.
A friend of mine was complaining about food photography. He made the mistake of doing this in front of me. Who in turn notified a bunch of other smartasses at lunch. Which caused people take out their phones and tag him in their photos of Big Macs and Quarter Pounders. That’s right, this happened at McDonald’s. This could have quite possibly been the first case of food photography at the entire history of the brand. When it comes to McDonald’s, I don’t care much for the food, I can choke it down. It is more for the company.
I must admit, when I see people break out their phones and snap a photo of their food, I sometimes snicker. It isn’t bad to take a photo every now and then. I’ve been known to do it from time to time. When the food arrives and my eyes uncontrollably bulge with excitement like hyperventilating french bulldog who just sat on whoopie cushion. However, when the food arrives mid conversation and the phones come out and go away in one movement, leaving just enough time to make sure the food is on the screen. That is when I start laughing.
What a douchebag. Who in your social media life is truly going to give a shit, really? The fact that they are doing it out of habit, to add to the collection, is kind of creepy. Like a serial killer who always takes a token or that artist who takes a zillion photos of the exact same kind of thing. The difference is those two are aware of what they are doing.
Can you imagine what this trend would have been like about forty years ago during the age of neighbor vacation slideshow nights. Having to sit through slide after slide of what they ate. Then there were the Johnson’s who always took photos of the aftermath. What a bunch of weirdos.
Have I decided that I am a foodie? Not yet, I seem to like having good food, but won’t turn down anything as long as it is meatless. Yet, I thoroughly enjoy preparing delicious and large meals that last through the week. I take the occasional photo, mostly of donuts. I won’t buy Budweiser, but I will drink it if that is all you have.
Regardless, I am outraged by the term. I can’t help that I want to eat decent food. You only have so many years on this planet. You only have so many calories you should intake. Tell you what foodies, take charge. Spit out your craft beer. Yell at the top of your lungs, ” We ain’t foodies! Ya’ll just a bunch of poodies!” I can’t believe auto correct didn’t turn that into poodles as I was expecting it would.
