Evil

A TALE OF TWO FATTIES (PART 1)

My two youngest cousins are 9 and 12. Conveniently, the 9 year old weighs 90 pounds and the 12 year old weighs 120 pounds. Also conveniently, we (the older cousins) refer to them as the Fatty Brothers. The nickname started of course as a joke, but it kind of stuck and sometimes the meanness of it makes me feel bad. I first realized this when the older kid started to understand the meaning of Fatty Brothers and every time we used that term, he would protest:

"Don't. call."

At this point, he would need to pause and catch his breath.

"Me. That!"

But relatively speaking, being one half of the Fatty Brothers is still much better than his original nickname, the one we gave him before his younger brother popped onto the scene. See, the older one didn't start speaking until very late. He didn't even have the ability to babble, like most kids do before they learn how to form words. Instead, he just grunted. He would sit at the table and grunt to his dad and his dad would give him more food (more food!). He would run to his mom and grunt and his mom would give him and hug and say softly, "Aww, are they picking on you again?"

So naturally, we called him Grunty.

My sister hypothesized that Grunty might be retarded. At one point she even set a firm deadline, saying "If that kid doesn't start speaking within 6 months, I'd bet anything that he's retarded." I almost took her up on that bet just because betting on whether a family member is retarded is really damn funny.

(To be continued...)

Evil

CONGRATS

By the way, congratulations are in order... to Mr. Shoulders, for making VP... to Kentaro for getting that huge banking bonus this time of year. I'd be happy for you two if I weren't secretly plotting your demise. Muhahaha.

Evil

SEASON OF GIVING

I met some friends for drinks last week and one of them told me a pretty interesting thing: when you donate blood, they can put that stuff on the shelf for up to 6 weeks, but platelets are only good for 5 days... so around the holidays, platelets are in seriously short supply everywhere because people rarely think about this stuff while in the midst of holiday shopping.

Since I live only a few blocks from Memorial Sloan Kettering (and seemingly, a dozen other hospitals as well), I dropped by to donate platelets after work on Dec 23rd. I've given blood before, but apparently, donating platelets is a whole other monster. I stepped into MSK feeling pretty jazzed about doing a good thing but things started heading downhill, and fast...

They made me sign all sorts of disclaimers. I easily waived my right to sue in the event of death (who ever heard of a dead man suing anyone?), but when I read the part about "the procedure may cause bruising..." I seriously thought about bailing. But I didn't. Toughness in action right there, boys.

Then came the medical history forms. Like I said, I've donated blood in the past, so I knew there would be a checkbox that asks "Since 1977, have you had sex with a man?" And this question always makes me chuckle: "Have you ever had sex with anyone with jaundice or anyone who appeared jaundiced." HAH. I don't know why that's funny, but it is. The thing I didn't expect is that in this hospital, you fill out some of the answers in a form, but for the morally-probing questions, they ask you face to face! So I sat in front of this lady as she ran me through a battery of moral challenges:

"Have you ever paid for sex?"
"Have you ever had sex with someone who has paid for sex?"
"Have you ever been paid for sex?"
"Have you ever punched someone in the stomach while soliciting sex?"
"Have you ever had unprotected sex with a drug user?"
"Have you ever punched someone in the stomach while buying drugs?"

There were others, but you get the point. At the end of it all --because apparently they get lots of liars-- the lady hands me two stickers with bar codes printed on them. She shows me that one sticker means "Use my blood" and the other one means "Throw away my blood." And then she turns away so I can choose the appropriate sticker to put on my answer sheet.

Isn't that somewhat extreme? Oh well, whatever.

Then comes the actual donating of platelets. Whereas donating blood is a 15 minute deal involving one needle, donating platelets is a 90 minute ordeal involving one needle in each arm. Basically, they take blood out of one arm, spin it around to extract the platelets, and feed the remaining blood back into the other arm. I say it's an ordeal not because one extra needle makes a huge difference, but have you ever had to sit perfectly still for 90 minutes? About 2 minutes into the procedure I was already in trouble. I had an itch above my right eyebrow. Fuck.

I moved my right arm to see if scratching would be feasible but I quickly realized that the needle was jabbing me in quite the wrong way when I bent my arm.

It's weird having an itch and not being able to scratch it because it doesn't go away. In fact, it jumped around my face and even multiplied so before long, I had itches on my chin, under my collar, on the tip of my nose, basically everywhere.

I'm still not entirely sure how I managed to get through the whole 90 minutes, but lemme tell you, the instant that the nurse pulled out the first needle from my elbow, I scratched my face so vigorously that I basically clawed my face into pieces. The nurse was horrified. It was almost worth the whole experience to see her face.

Luckily, the nurse quickly grabbed my arm because had broken any skin, I surely would have bled to death seeing as I had just donated all of my platelets. Hah. How ironic would that have been.

Anyway, that was that. I'm not sure this post had a point. But whatever...

Who cares about the Jets. I want to kiss you.

Broadway Joe, on the sidelines in 1968, pimping hos between snaps

Did anyone catch Joe Namath being interviewed on the sidelines during the Pats/Jets games on Sunday Night? Apparently, old Broadway Joe pulled a ham handed, Evil type move on ESPN sideline Reporter, Suzy Kohber. When asked about the Jets and what they needed to do to improve, Ol' Joe Willie started hitting on her.

Click here to read the AP story.

Thankfully, Suzy is not that attractive. Imagine if it had been like Jill Arrington or the other chick that used to be on Monday Night Football, there might have been some full on "lead with the left" Chick-a-bow-a-wow

HITTING THE WALL

For once, I write about hitting the wall and it's not me doing the hitting. Maybe that's a good sign for the upcoming year. Actually, since you've all been good boys and girls this year (HAH!), I have TWO hitting the wall stories to share...

One. On Thursday night, we had our company holiday party. It was great... open bar, the whole thing. You know. The only downside is that people had to come in to work the next day and as you'd expect, everyone was hurting to various degrees. I think the prize for Most Hurting went to this girl...

Girl: You don't know how much I'm hurting today.

Me: Well, we're all hurting.

Girl: No, you don't understand. Have you ever had to take a nap in the shower?

Me: Umm, no.

Girl: I was showering this morning and I realized that I just couldn't get through it. I went and napped in the shower.

Me: Wait. You were lying down in the shower?

Girl: Yeah.

That was great. I was picturing her naked and passed out in the shower. Hot.

Two. On Saturday morning I ran a race in Central Park. It was the "Holiday Run For Kids 4-Miler." I'm not sure what the For Kids element was all about, but there certainly were lots of kids entered in the race.

Shortly after the race started, I ran past a kid and someone who was probably his dad. The kid stopped his stride, threw his hands in the air and then slapped them down on his sides. Then he huffed in exasperation, "A mile is a long way!"

To which his dad responded, "You're not even at a mile yet! C'mon let's go!!!"

That's some tough love right there, but I think his dad did the right thing. Kids need to learn what toughness is all about.

conversations I witness

The Bumpasaurus: Is [random comic book title] any good?
Comic Book Girl: I hear it is, but i'm a preacher's daughter
Bump; huh?
CBG: I'm a preacher's daughter and I can't get behind curse words every other dialogue box.
Bump: oh...umm..ok
CBG: 'scuse me for just one second
[CBG goes off and rings something off, Pacey, looks over at me browsing some trade paperbacks and goes back to reviewing his subscription form or something]
CBG: oh, so I haven't finished my story..
Bump: Story?
CBG: 'bout my dad, so he's a minister but the funny part is I was excommunicated...but it's wierd right because I'm not a bad girl, I'm actually a good girl and its wierd that I would be excommunicated [Bump looks over at me and I sign that I'm ready to go. He presents his stack of comics for her to ring up]
I mean I dunno, him and my mom got divorced and what not but still, I never really got a clear reason for why I [Bump walks over to me and brings me back over so we can clearly communicate that we are waiting for her and then will leave...he clearly wants her to end her story] It was wierd. I got a letter in the mail and everything.
Bump: what faith is that?
CBG: Lutheran
Bump: oh...umm...figures...
CBG: 'scuse me [grabs the stack of comics to ring up]. Ugh, I am so sore I can't reach or bend over anymore, I'm still sore from last night...
Bump: [i didn't see it but I assume he gave her the arched eyebrow. I covet the lil' bast*rds forehead dexterity]
CBG:have y'all seen Return of the King yet?
Bump: yeah...earlier
CBG: Don't tell me 'bout it. Normally I like going to the midnight showing...but I can't because I am workin a second job at UPS at nights.
Bump: oh how's that? things must be going crazy
CBG: Yeah, sorta i am supposed to be doing 460 packages a night but I can only do about 3...
Bump: Hey, take care...have a good holiday season

As we leave the shop, Bump turns and asks "did you notice me walking over to you three times." I admitted i was too distracted by the wierdness. I asked if he was her therapist or something?
Bump: It can't be a real religion if they let ministers have kids
me: [shrug]

Evil

CLEARING THE AIR

On Saturday night, I ran out to Bed Bath & Beyond and bought an air purifier. I'm not sure why I had the sudden urge to purify the air around me, but the feeling hit me and it hit me hard. As such, I bought one of those heavy duty HEPA filters. Good stuff.

I was reading the instruction manual and noticed a couple of interesting points:

1. "The HEPA filter removes virtually all airborne particles passing through it." More specifically, it filters out 99.97% of all particles, down to 0.03 microns.

2. "The HEPA filter should be changed every 12 months."

Points 1 and 2 combined has me thinking: When I go to change that filter 12 months from now, HOW SKANKY IS IT GOING TO BE? I mean, that thing will have trapped all sorts of pollen, dirt, house dust, comet dust, dust mites, bed mites, boogers, flu viruses, HIV, airborn cum and dried fecal matter in it over the course of a full year. Will I die instantly once I touch it? I am afraid.

I spent thursday, friday and saturday in close proximty to a number of people of had the "flu". I never stood a chance.

That's my problem with these people. They just don't know how to be sick.
When you're sick. Do the following

(1) Close all your windows and put up heavy blinds. In a pinch, feel free to use heavy blankets
(2) Put on ill fitting sweat pants. Not like wind pants or anything you would wear out to a book store. Sweatpants, the sort of thing that you would put on if you wanted to fit in at wal-mart
(3) lay in bed, all day, with nothing more than a few bottles of water, some boxes of tissues and buckets...many buckets.

What you should not do, is
(1) show up to a group meetings and liberally handle all sorts of calculators, laptops and writing instruments that your classmates might be using.
(2) Do not, show up a party, get ripped and liberally sniffle in front of everyone you talk to
(3) Basically, please just stay away from me.

I am going to go lie down somewhere in the dark....

Things Said to me on Saturday Evening when the worlds collided and EVIL met some of my school friends

(1) "so let me get this straight, none of you are in a relationship. Neither of you are trying to hook up with her? That settles it you and [Evil] are both clearly gay" - my cool, female married friend.
(2) "That's personal and inappropriate." - My friend's wife
(3) "where are all the single women at?" -EVIL
(4) "He's not even vietnamese is he?" - A short vietnamese classmate that EVIL tried to put the move on. I defended him with "He's actually half vietnamese/half Puerto Rican. Jackson Heights Baby"
(5) "did your friend just say he's getting off on the boob rubs as he walks around...ill"
(6) "you can't dance" to which i replied "i'm just drunk"

Here's an exchange EVIL and I had

Me: Gotta admit pretty funny
EVIL: ONly you would think that's funny. That's not funny at all.
ME (not said but thought): I could crush your windpipe right now. That would be funny, you Knee Cutting Bastard


I was pretty ripped towards the end of the evening. Apparently, I thought better of it and bagged the afterparty I idea and jumped in a car going to the East Bay. I did not realize this until we were well over the bridge. When I was asked what exit to take to where I lived I realized that a Trinidadian dude was passed out on my shoulder and the creepy classmate with an asian fixation (CCWAF) were also in the car. The car btw, belonged to my vietnamese classmate, who i had spent the better part of 2 hours positioning EVIL to hit off. I wondered aloud "what am i doing in this car? who are you people?"

When I got home my roommate was asleep on the couch. I woke his ass up and we continued drinking. He was discussing some problem he had with a significant other. I encouraged him repeatedly (occasionally with shoves towards the door) that it was a problem that needed to be resolved right that second, by driving to South Bay at 4am (while drunk)!!!

Later I passed out on the rug.

Proof that EVIL is in fact evil...
EVIL"are you going to try to stab you cool married, friend's husband in the back? I think you are"
X-Tian "that thought had not even crossed my mind. What's wrong with you?"
EVIL"oh...um...nothing...hahaha"

Evil

The snow storm kept me from getting back to New York this weekend, which was great because I stayed in the Bay Area an extra day and got to hang with X-TIAN at a party in SoMa. The party was in a packed lounge and it took all of 30 seconds for X-TIAN and EVIL to revive our two-man pickup routine from the mid-to-late 90's. Our act is not like The Eagles or The Rolling Stones, where the material stands up to the test of time. Come to think of it, I'm not sure that we got much success (err, ANY success) of out the act during its orginal run, but hey. I think we're much more like Whitesnake because as Saturday night proved yet again, when the team of X-TIAN and EVIL work a bar scene, things are sure to go down in flames.

The night's festivities started with me driving from South Bay up to the city. In amazing defiance of the odds, there were three accidents on US-101 between Mountain View and San Francisco and none of them involved ME! Bay area people are SO not tough, it's embarrassing. Granted, a torrential downpour left the roads wet and obsured some visibility, but bay area people just freak out and start crashing into medians. Crazy stuff. Being the tough Northeasterner that I am, I cruised up to the city unscathed, ready for an evening of partying or clownery, whichever came first.

I bop in to the lounge with my tall Chinese friend in tow. I have this theory that being seen with a spectacularly tall Chinese girl will bring me more cred when I work the scene, but somehow that hasn't panned out. We grab drinks and go look for a Giant Head in the crowd. That takes only a few seconds.

X-TIAN and I break into some banter that involves making fun of these two blonde girls who are right behind us. They get up and leave and throw disgusted glances in our direction. That's the old magic working right there. We haven't lost a thing, lemme tell you.

Basically, repeat the part about grabbing drinks and receiving disgusted looks and that pretty much sums up the evening. A good time was had by all!

By the way, I should mention that I almost got a bit of the ol' Sex that evening. Yes, it's true. The place was so packed that were it not for the fact that I was wearing pants, I'm pretty sure I would have scored. Sure, it would have been Sex via Incidental Contact, but hey, no one needs to get all technical on me. I did get rubbed by boobage from a dozen different girls, so that was cool too. Yes, I have the mentality of an 8th grader.

All in all, this makes me think that we should bring Team Rachel back together for the traditional President's Day weekend in Vegas. ("Traditional" meaning that we did it once and X-TIAN wasn't even there. HAH.) This time though, being older and wiser and because Mr. Shoulders and Kentaro make more money than they know what to do with, we will raise the stakes. I am proposing that we get our hands on some cocaine and hire a hooker so that Mr. Shoulders can re-enact the infamous scene from Gia where a coked-up hooker get punched in the stomach while trying to score her next fix. That's classic stuff. Real classic stuff.

Evil

FIGHTING THE WRONG FIGHTS

I have a bruise on my head. My left ribs are sore. I am fighting the wrong fights.

The car door did it to me. You see, I am in California this week and the lady at the car rental place gave me a brand new car. It's a less than dynamic Chevy Cavalier with all of 6 miles on it. The engine isn't quite broken in so the ride is not great, but I sort of expected that. What I didn't expect was that the doors would have super f'ing strong springy hinges. Or that each door weighs 67 pounds. Combine those two things and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out I've been getting battered by a car door all week long. (For all you rocket scientists in the audience: we're talking a force of 1.69 x 10^9 Newtons. Yes, that's some serious shit.) This is what happens every time I try to get out of the car:

1. Evil shuts off car engine and swings door open.
2. Evil moves body (160 pounds) toward outside of car.
3. Car door (67 pounds) swings out and springs back in with amazing force.
4. Freak collision.

This is bad. I'm going to go cry now. Bye.

The Simple Life

Couple of points I came up with:
(1) Pretty, rich girls are pretty boring
(2) Ugly, rich girls are mind numbingly so
(3) Hicks, being poor, probably under-educated, and probably beaten by life, are just not funny
(4) Just because you go to Regis, doesn't mean you're smart. Evil, who went to Stuy, has probably believed this for quite some time.
(5) Paris like Jessica Simpson before her, is pretty dumb, but unlike JS, she is someone that's really easy to hate.
(6) Paris is really pretty but has an unattractive ass, because its so flat. She has a pretty face but man her legs are like bow-legged

I am thru watching until someone double teams a farm hand or a farm animal!

Evil

THANKSGIVING AND MY FAMILY (Part 2 of 2)

Over dinner, my dad and I had somewhat of an awkward conversation. Not that we were discussing an uncomfortable topic or anything… it's just that all our conversations are awkward. We are not a socially graceful crew. This reminds me of the time that I saw my dad hold his grandson (my nephew) for the first time. He looked so awkward that I thought to myself, "That man has never held a baby before." But then I realized that he had 3 kids himself and must have held at least one of us at least once, right?

When we do talk, my dad often surprises me with how much he actually knows or how utterly stupid he is. It's weird. There's usually no middle ground. He was at both ends of the spectrum over Thanksgiving dinner. It went something like this:

Dad: So how's your new job going?

Evil: It's good. Beats my last job by a lot.

Dad: What do you do there?

Evil: You know, sales.

Dad: You're selling advertising now?

Mind you, I work at a search engine company. I bet at least 99% of the people who have heard of it know it as a search engine company. Frankly, before I started working there, I hardly had a clue how they were making money. But for some reason, it appears that my dad is familiar with the company's business model. Crazy! Anyway, the conversation continues like this…

Evil: Well no. I don't personally sell anything. I work on sales strategy in general.

Dad: I see. Have you ever thought of getting a federal job?

Evil: What?

Dad: You know, work for the government. They're always looking for people to do networking or programming or whatever.

Now, what's this crap all about? I have a cushy sales strategy job at pre-IPO search engine company that's so hot it receives over 1000 resumes a day and my dad is suggesting that I try to get job coding HTML for the Housing and Urban Development website or something. As if we were still living in Confucian times (that's 500 BC to you westerners) and the most noble occupation in all of The Middle Kingdom is to serve as an official of the state.

All in all though, I'm glad I had Thanksgiving with family this year. In previous years, I've gone around telling people that I'm an orphan and guilt-tripping them into inviting me over for Thanksgiving dinner. Boy, I gotta say, those meals were great. But someone once told me, "You jackass, Thanksgiving is for family," He was right of course. Even though I had to spend time with my crazy uncles and my brilliant / retarded dad, I was glad I did it.

Evil

You know how sometimes you're drunk and you'll say a bunch of stuff that you don't really mean? Or you'll email someone a bunch of stuff and in the morning wish you hadn't? Well, I had that type of moment the other night. I hopped on Friendster and wrote a drunked Testimonial for our old friend, Columbia. You can check it out on the site, of you can just read below, you lazy ass.

Well well well, Columbia. Funny that we should run into each other here. You look good. Really, you do. It's been what, over 5 years now. Is that right? Wow, it's been that long. Hey, I couldn't help but notice that you're now #11 on U.S. News and World report for undergraduate universities. What ranking were you when we met, Columbia? Number 7 or 8 and headed for Top 5, wasn't that right? Anyway, who pays attention to those rankings? I still remember you fondly, Columbia... Like the night that I explored your tunnels for the first time. Wow, I was really drunk that night, but I recall that you not only took me, but 4 of my friends as well. I learned a lot when we were together. You know that. You know you made me a better person. You know that, right? Columbia, OK, I'll won't beat around the bush. I'll just say it: I want us to be together again. Think about that. How great would that be? Take me back, Columbia. Take me back for business school. Think about two more years together. It'll be like old times again, except that we'll both be a little smarter and wiser. I have more money now! More for you to take! C'mon, what do you say? Call me, Columbia. Better yet, send me a big, thick envelope and include all the details of our rekindled relationship. Write me soon!