What day is today...you know what happened.

f.

"Dude, this is boring."

Yesterday I received one of the funniest text messages I've received in a long time. Annalise decided to go to Convocation with her parents to spend a little time with them. At exactly 4:33pm I received a text that said, "Dude, this is boring."

That makes me feel better as someone who did not attend convocation. Doesn't seem like I missed much. Let me send a big shout out to my new college graduate friends, Annalise, Kristin, and Bridget. Welcome to the real world. It sucks, you're gonna love it.

Some are Lucky...others not so much.

It has been several months since my "on notice" list was posted and I am happy to announce that several people are no longer under my radar. However, with the removal of some comes the addition of others. My garbage man, Mark Pollei, Maroon 5 and Jenny have all been removed over the last couple months. Here are the replacements.

1. Ants - These tiny demons of annoyance have recently taken up residence somewhere in my house and I have started finding them in by bathroom, not cool ants.

2. Baby Wipes - Wipes, you clogged my pipes and caused me to have to hear a "what can go down a toilet" speech not once but twice.

3. Suri Cruise - I want to see what you look like, you're on notice until you show your face.

4. L. Ron Hubbard, science fiction author and founder of Scientology, a religion that is frequently perceived as a cult and a pseudoreligion. It should be your job to get Suri to show herself. You need to get on that.

Steve Nash what happened to you?

First things first, I love Steve Nash and I miss him so much, but these pictures make me a little worried about what the Phoenix sun is doing to his brain.

I gotta give GQ props for naming him "baller of the year" because lets face it who wouldn't want that title, but what the hell were they thinking when they shot these photos?! Jenny told me about these a couple weeks ago but I had not seen the ACTUAL shots until today.

WOW! This is a classic example of what happens when the flamboyant GQ staff is set free on an innocent baller. Never in my life would I believe that it was Steve's idea to put on a jacket with a fur collar or blow out his hair and drape it over his forehead like a Beatle/hair band member.At first glance I didn't even believe it was him. Where is the Steve I know and love? I have compiled a Steve Nash montage to show the real balller. Do me a favor Steve, keep kicking Kobe up and down the court because I want to see you and Dirk reunite. But keep in mind when that reunion occurs I will form a temporary hatred towards you.

Destiny

I love it when little things remind you of funny memories. I just finished taking out the trash at work because I lost the "Friday Challenge" again last week. As I was walking back from the asphalt/gravel parking lot I started listening to the sound of the gravel grinding under my feet and was reminded of a time I "worked" for my dad when I was really young, probably around 8. I'm guessing he had run out of stuff for me and my sisters to do because he told us to go outside and sweep the gravel parking lot in front of the office building. Have you ever tried to sweet a gravel parking lot?...it can't be done. To this day my dad still laughs when we bring that up...I'm pretty sure he's laughing because he actually convinced us to sweep a GRAVEL parking lot. Man we were stupid. Thanks Dad.

What happens when you start killing time

Quick study. I was in Bath & Body Works yesterday killing some time and this pushy sales lady made me try this lip plumper. Lucky for me I had my camera in the car which allows me to now conduct a study. One of these lips is supposedly not like the other. We'll call the set on the left "the left one" and the set on the right "the right one." Which one was subjected to the pushy lady? You decide. Good luck.

Happy 80th birthday Queen Elizabeth!

Today England's beloved Queen turns 80. She is so cute! If you want to email her a birthday card you can do that here. I'm sure she would appreciate it. Man, any country that has an entire website devoted to the birthday of their Queen is pretty kick-a. I can't imagine something like that going well for old Bushy. Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth!

I love grill. Grill. Grill. Grill.

All hail the grill. Yesterday felt like summer outside and to celebrate I made an entire meal on a grill. I am a major fan of "los grill" now and plan to grill all week long. So far I've done chicken, corn, and potatoes, and I plan on grilling anything I can think of over the next couple days. Suggestions welcome.

The actual grilling started off a little rocky. When I turned on the gas Jackie didn't quite get the match in the grill to ignite it....and the gas kept going, which made me a little worried. BUT with one rather large poof of flames the week of grilling began. The only other mishap that happened was one of the pieces of chicken fell through the grill, sad but true. I'll be sure to document this week of grilling more thoroughly from now on.

I believe they call this a "bad omen"

Have you ever walked out your front door to be greeted with this? If this isn't a bad omen I don't know what is. As I have told many of you last night I was rudely awoken by the sound of bubbling water coming from my toilet, a place you never want to hear something of that nature. The tub revealed something much worse, sewage. Yes, I said sewage. It went back down but chose to return yesterday afternoon causing me to leave work in a tirade in case my cute house was being defiled by the "s" word.

A man is currently here attempting to rectify this sewage situation and has decided to do so from the roof. Let me tell you I am just as confused as you. I was under the impression that water pipes lived underground deep beneath our feet not aloft. My audio post, while totally inaudible, (which I realize) is documentation of what can only be described as a Wizard of Oz like witch crushing tornado, big mamba jomba pipe ass kicking. It pretty much sounds like my house is about to fall down.

After three hours of cleaning our pipes I received TWO lectures, one from my landlord and another from the rooter dude about what can and cannot go down a toilet. During both lectures I was advised not to put paper towels down the crapper. Who does that?! As it turns out the previous tenant put all of her baby wipes in the john, ergo, my night of literal crappiness.

Does this seem unnatural to anyone else?

Ask a Ninja

Quick post. Dane has introduced me to Ask a Ninja, a podcast everyone should experience at least once. Enjoy.

"about to get taken to a dream world of magic"

Happy late Easter everyone. Hope everyone's day was filled with chocolate bunnies and marshmallow peeps.

I spent a lot of the day cleaning and then went for a sweet bike ride with Jackie. We encountered a little problem when the trail ended, but we pulled through. I enjoy going in bike rides on trails, however I do not like going under those bridges with the tiny dark tunnels. Having to yell "coming down" as you’re heading into a dark wet slippery tunnel is not too fun if you ask me. Every time I do it I think of Erin Reading and how she ended up in a body cast when she went for a bike ride down one of those in Plano and slipped on the rising water. Perhaps I should explore another trail to prevent this.

Later I ate some grub with the Cumming's twins. I gotta say those two are pretty funny. They take me back to the days of high school when we would do stupid things like steal construction signs and place them in front yards. Or when we took the Jack antenna ball from someone (have no idea who that was anymore) and turned it into a flower before returning it to the pimped out man truck it was attached to. Good times.

Jackie and I also got our Narnia on last night. That movie is freaking amazing! The only thing that would have made it better was a couple cup cakes, some Mr. Pibb and a tub of red vines. Everyone should revisit that one and soon. Hope everyone's Easter was as kick-a as mine.

Is it just me or does it look like this rabbit is giving a "Heil Hitler"?

Bushism

"I want to thank my friend, Senator Bill Frist, for joining us today. . . He married a Texas girl, I want you to know. Karyn is with us. A West Texas girl, just like me."
-Nashville, Tennessee May 27, 2004

Shutter

Here are a couple of my favorite pictures I have taken this past month. I realize this post kind of sucks, but I've been really busy. Hope you enjoy anyway.

I took this picture to document Jenny's amazing parking job for one of our weekly 24 nights.

This is what happens when I'm home alone and really bored with a camera.

Annalise loves popcorn and curry. I love this one.

I never get mail...unless it's bills, so I took this picture out of despiration. It's blurry, but I like it.

Pary 1 of My 5 Part Series

Over the coming weeks I will be bringing you, my readership a 5 part series entitled:

"things in Provo that scare the bejesus out of me"

I decided to start this series a while back but it never got off the ground, so I guess today is the day. Keep in mind that these things are in no particular order due to the fact that they are all SO creepy that no ranking can be made.

Item one is Gunnies Sporting Goods and Westernwear Store. Ok, a place with GUN in the title followed by -ies deserves this title. Have you ever driven past this place at night? It's creepy; there are enough bars, locks and grates to keep the military out of that place. I understand that this is probably a good thing, otherwise people like this:

would be breaking in and guarding their 200 square foot houses with free shot guns, but any place that needs that kind of security system is pretty freaking scary. I decided to visit the Gunnies Homepage to do a little research about this place and couldn't get past page one due to the gun and knife that are hovering on the page without any sort of drop shadow to ground them. Yet another creep thing about Gunnies. And that is why Gunnies Sporting Goods and Westernwear "scares the bejesus out of me."

Worry

Ok, I'm officially getting worried. Two weeks ago when we went to Guster we saw a dude around this sizewearing theseToday on my way back to work after lunch I saw a dude that looked like this

wearing the same pants.

Is this a leopard print stretch pant epidemic....pandemic? In a couple months will everyone be wearing these? Should I go out and get a pair now? I'm buying mine tonight, here is where everyone else can "Find Cool Clothes".

Cubicle

Short post, Jenny, the song from that sweet Apple commercial is called Cubicle by French electronic duo Rinôçérôse. Enjoy!

ps. the download says explicit, but I downloaded it and have no idea why.

Paper Things

So far this weekend has been pretty sweet, nothing has really happened per say, but it has been good. Khaki and I went to dinner at Outback Steakhouse last night which ended up being the longest wait of our lives, but in the end the grub was good so it was ok. There's nothing worse than going to a restaurant and hearing that the wait is over an hour long...and then after and hour and a half you are still sitting in the waiting area while the hostesses are dinking around their little stand making small talk with the waiters. LAME!

While we were waiting we got to watch these two kids hitting their parents with those paper things you get at birthday parties. You know, those long strips of paper that are wrapped around a stick and you can propel the paper in a long joust-type shape. I tried to find a picture of this thing online, but I had no idea what to call it. Google did not produce any credible sources for the search "paper wrapped around stick". All it was able to come up with was sticky paper places or wrapping paper. Anyway, around the time one of the kids was screaming and the other was hitting his father with the paper thing I started believing I wasn't cut out to have little monsters or children as some call them. We'll see.

Thinking of the Airport

Today I had a moment of jealousy. It happened when I was checking the status of the package I sent to my friend David Dean McDornbee. I came to the realization that my package had reached Stansted Airport and was now officially in England. As soon as I read the words I was relieved and jealous at the same time. It's not too often that I have that feeling towards a non-living thing.

As soon as I read the words this thought came to my head, "my package is in Stansted Airport, and I'm sitting in a window-less office in Provo, Utah."

Sad but true. Lucky for me I've got my readership to keep me entertained day in and day out. Thanks guys.

Jordan plays ball. Charlie Manson kills people. I talk.

Thank YOU for Smoking! Good hell this was a good movie. It has been a long time since I have laughed that hard and that often in a movie. I tried really hard to make a mental note of this amazing line at the beginning of the movie, but my brain couldn't hold on to it what with all the other amazing lines that were being thrown at me.

If this movie ever manages to achieve wide release in this state (a hard thing to do) I will go with each and every one of you. Here are a couple more choice lines from the movie. Let me just tell you this is only the beginning. Enjoy.

Joey Naylor: Dad, why is the American government the best government?
Nick Naylor: Because of our endless appeals system.

Nick Naylor: You know the guy who can get any girl he wants? I'm that guy, on crack.

Thank You For Smoking

I feel pressure to blog daily...mostly this pressure is placed on myself, by myself. However, today I have nothing to say. I do have a particularly long story involving The Letterbox, my local postal place which has decided to screw me over twice, however that story is too long to explain in this blog without getting a complaint from Jenny about it being too long or other people saying I am complaining or being annoying. That was a horribly long sentence, but oh well. Tonight I am going to see Thank You for Smoking, here's a little teaser:

Jeff Megall: Sony has a futuristic sci-fi movie they're looking to make.
Nick Naylor: Cigarettes in space?
Jeff Megall: It's the final frontier, Nick.
Nick Naylor: But wouldn't they blow up in an all oxygen environment?
Jeff Megall: Probably. But it's an easy fix. One line of dialogue. 'Thank God we invented the... ' you know, whatever device.

I'll give a full report tomorrow.

I Want to Be Part of the Royal Year

Something truly shocking happened last night. After 24 everyone had left except Michon and we got to talking about all kinds of crap. Her advertising project, shopping trips, cereal, Darren's Dance Moves...ok, we didn't talk about that, but I wish we had.

She mentioned the time change and started to say you won't believe what I watched on Saturday night...this struck a cord in my brain because I too watched something somewhat embarrassing that same night.

After Annalise and I watched 9 hours of Arrested Development she left and I was alone, wide awake and sitting on my couch with a remote in my warm alive fingers. So I turned off the DVD player and started flipping through the guide.

As usual the last channel that was on could be viewed in the upper right hand corner as I flipped through the list of programs. A couple words and images caught my eye and before I knew it I said screw the program list, I'm watching Windsor Castle "A Royal Year". This show was AMAZING! Who knew so many cool things went on there! The dude that takes care of all the clocks at the estate has to take 17 hours to change the time during daylight savings and whatever the other one is called! That is insane!

I sat through an entire years worth of events at Windsor, everything from horse racing, to the staff caroling for the Queen on Christmas Eve. By the end I was so close to buying the program on DVD...which I realize would have been ridiculous, but I couldn't resist. I actually spent some time yesterday using the National Rail website to route out a trip from Chichster to Windsor, I can't wait! Needless to say Michon had too watched this show, I am still in shock about this. Amazing!

A Perfect Day

Jenny once said that she loves how after you go to a concert you have a renewed love for the band you went to see. Amen to that. I am officially declaring today Guster Day.

Three favorite facts from their bios:
Adam: was featured in a math book...that is amazing
Ryan: from Texas
Brian: used to be in a band called Toejamb...wow