Blogging......unplugged

Going to run this post without any notes. Are you a little scared? Did you just release your bowels a little bit? No? Well I guess this blog is more important to me than it is to you.

Had another weekend up at the Brant Lake Sanitarium. The rowing up there is so awesome. Unfourtunatly, my diet gets shot to shit every time I go up there and I start back at square Zero when I get back weight wise. Thus I may have to stop those trips because they do just as much harm as good. There are some good Clarkey-o-graphs in the link from that weekend. It rained the whole time, but I'm usually not up there for the weather. The good news about that is it keeps the powerboats off the water and leaves it for the psychos to romp on. So I need to get back under my hat, so to speak, and row better and not worry so much about whether I enjoy my days. Life is not as easy as it used to be and I need to heed my own advice about performance. Get back to following my own values instead of just creating them. Thank you doctor, that'll be all for this week. (I'll be damned if I don't sound like a fat John Basedow)

The summer is ending soon. Isn't it funny how the summer is determined by the facist U.S school system? Summer is definitly not over till the end of september, but just because a majority of people have to go back to school in a few days, the summer is "over" to just about everyone. Crock of horse doo-doo if you ask me. Therefore, join me in a revolution of not considering summer over untill the First day of fall, which is on September 23rd.

So they put a starbucks in my grocery store. Normally I would be excited for such a development that allows me to keep my caffiene levels abnormally high in abnormal situations. However, I question the need for one, and apparently, so does the public. Who needs coffee in the 20 mins they spend at the grocery store? Apparently I am not alone since I have never seen anyone at the coffee stand. I think maybe they should advertise outside of the store that there is a full service starbucks inside the store. Anyway, I just feel sorry for the people who work there that are bound to be fired soon unless they attract more customers. Oh well, anyone with the job title of "barista" deserves to have some drama in their life as to employment. Plus, they didn't hire me when I applied for a job in college, so they can go straight to hell with a burning hot coffee enemas for all I care.

This post written while listening to: Boy Kill Boy "Civilian"

It's not a boat, it's a nylon covered WMD

Lets start off by saying that I originally wrote this whole thing on Monday. I put the finishing touches on it, was doing a little editing and adding some fantabulous photos; when the power went out. Of course I didn't save it as a draft but who would know that my 25 year fued with Thomas Edison would bite me in the fantabulous tooshey on that day. Anyway, I'll try to re-create as best I can but, no guarantees.

So I finally got my single up to the family lake-house after 2 years of procrastination. I knew when I first started rowing that the lake would be the perfect place to row. It has everything a rower dreams of: protection from wind, fresh water, 6 miles of water, very few powerboats. Its the sort of place I would like to live with a big scary black man to tell me I sucked and was weak with a some rusty weights and a boat and 400 cans of Tuna and carve myself out of stone. But, I don't know any black people and I hate tuna. In any case, I loaded my suspicious looking boat on top of my car, took out a loan to fill the tank with gas, put my turban on, and pointed her north.

The trip was all I knew it would be, and if you are a rower reading this, I plan on going up there every weekend I can for a little while. Give me a buzz and I'll cart you up for 20 bucks worth of gas money. The house is on the other end of the lake in this photo. I highly suggest that you go on long trips by yourself in a car if you have the means. Its a great way to clear your head. I find myself often reverting to thinking about the unanswerables. Questions like "If I lived in X, would my life be better?" "If I had different parents, how different would I be?" "What is the meaning of life?" "Could I survive in the wilderness if I had to?" "How strange would it be to have kids?" All of those things that have no answers, just random head ramblings that create more questions and even fewer answers. I try to stay away from these thoughts because they make me sleepy and distract me making a mental "top 50 best candy" list in my head.

I hate it when people ask: "Whats the most embarassing thing thats ever happened to you?" I answer that with "When I discussed all the asanine stories that I never want to relive again to people I barely know who will use it to make judgements against me and still doesn't make me feel any better about what happened"

Is there anything more disarming then a naked person? Can you imagine a situation in which you would have no idea what to say or do for about 25 seconds? When I rob a bank and need a place to hide out, I'm going to hi-jack a house naked because that would give me the time to ju-jitsu chop the homeowner and tie him up in the closet.

I think its great that Jason Giambi is growing a dirty little mustache. I can see no negatives to this development. If there is anyone on that team that needs one, its the Giambino. They only thing that could make it better is if the dugout camera spots him and Sal Fasano eating pizza in the dugout, wearing their hats backwards, and giving wedgies to Melky Cabrera.

If you are taking long drives and you start to feel sleepy, I have a solution for you. I call it the "Stay Awake Shake". This entails shaking your head back and forth horizontally in small arcs as fast as you can for about 20-30 seconds. Think of shaking your head to signifify the "no" response. The small arcs allow you to keep your eyes on the road, and will rattle your brain enough to get you to the next rest stop for red bulls and 50 jumping jacks.

On this weekend's trip, I saw an Alaska license plate. I wish I still had my travel book from when I was 10, that sucker would have been worth like 50 points.

This Post written while listening to: Depeche Mode "Music for the Masses"

Look under the rock; thats where I am.

Ah yes, the not-so graceful return. Truthfully, I've been hiding ever since the Floyd Landis debacle blew up in my face. Oh well, I'm not that ashamed. How was I supposed to know right? Apparently, Floyd didn't even know. Thus, the world of cycling rears its ugly head again, and hits me when I am down. I gotta admit, I'm surprised that it happened in the way it happened and that it was for testosterone. All this strangeness keeps my eye on it. I've been the first one to believe Lance Armstrong doping rumors and I can't make an exception for Floyd. In sports these days, doping works on the where there is smoke there is fire principle.

Enough about the cruel loss of innocence for my sporting hero's, lets talk about some real hero's: Sonny Crockett, Rico Tubbs, and Ricky Bobby! Both movies were good and I recommend seeing if you got some spare dough laying around. Miami Vice was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be even though Colin Farrell is 0-10 on proving he can act. The movie was too different from the show in order to really classify it as ruining the mood. It was more like an action flick that happened to be called Miami Vice with same-named characters. It did not feature re-made songs like I thought it would, and actually had some awesome new jams from one of my fav bands Audioslave which makes me heavily anticipate the release of that album in early September. Lots of cool cars, gun fights, boats, and exotic scenary. Don't rush to see it, but if you're stuck in the mall with a few spare hours to kill, you're not wasting money.

Vrrrrrooooooom!...............F!. Ha, a little inside joke for those of you who know the webpage, but not for Talladega Nights. It was a very funny movie featuring plenty of racing inspired humor. Not nearly as over-rated/over-done Blue Collar TV-esque, as I thought it would be. I wish I could remember some of the jokes, but it came at me in flurry a little too much for my vintage 1981 processor to handle. I can easily see this being my next Anchorman debacle in which I live a couple weeks in automated Talladega Nights response mode. I just have to see it like 3 more times. If you are a person who races other people in anything, you'll like Talladega Nights. If you close your eyes, you hear the exact same voice that Will Ferrell would use for George Bush back in the SNL days.

Gym Rules: Hey Ari, workout at home if you need to be instantly available 24/7. I forgot the very obvious, no cell phones rule. This is so obvious, that it took me a good 6 posts to remember. I don't know what else there is to say on this. I think people who do this know they are douchebags so its not like I convince them otherwise. Just understand that when I hock a protein rich loughey at you, you deserve it and must say "Thank you sir, may I have another"

ATTENNNNNNTION!....Poser! If you are not in the military currently, served in the past, or part of a body combat instructional group (meliss), or going way over the line in a paintball match.....No camo or dog tags allowed. You are not a soldier of fortune, a soldier of pain, or a soldier of anything by wearing military garb. You like the army?, then join and offer to get your head blown off for your country. Otherwise you look like a wanna-be punk defacing the value of your more dedicated countrymen.


PS: its peanutbutta jelly time, peanutbutta jelly time, peanutbutta jelly time


This post written while listening to: The Pretenders "The Singles"