5 Dates for the Mutually Weird: Installment #1.

By the hammer of Thor... it's been nearly a year since my last post! Where did all the time go?

So much has happened in the past year. Nephews being born, 21st birthdays, 21st birthday vomit, Darth Vader Halloween costumes, flings with giant biochem majors, Christmas, New Year's, The Hobbit's release date, finishing the Eragon books, unemployment, .gif battles, graduations, 22nd birthday vomit, Pinterest till I poop, working in Yellowstone, Batman movies, Batman movie theater shootings, presidential primaries, exploding lady parts with internal bleeding (yes, my own), crappy boyfriends, awesome new boyfriends, and delightfully skanktastic celebrity marriages... and that's just the tip of the skankberg.

Pictured: aforementioned skankberg. Alias Courtney Stodden.

In any case, lots has been going on.

But rather than give my sure-to-be-predictable opinion on Jailbait Vaginaface (pictured above), I'll go for a more relatable topic today.

In light of the "awesome new boyfriends" part, awesome new boyfriend (who will be known henceforth as "Boyfriend") indirectly inspired me to write a new blog post. For those couples out there who feel that they just aren't appealing to their weird side in their relationship, never fear; I practically have a Ph.D. in that shit. As a wise doctor once said, “We are all a little weird and life is a little weird, and when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love.” And, as we all know, mutual weirdness is all you need.

To pander to every great relationship's need for mutual weirdness, you have to dig deeper than just dinner and a movie, flowers and chocolates... even pizza and video games is standard date material these days. In this post I've compiled just a handful of some of my favorite date ideas, the first of which can be attributed to Boyfriend, who, I've delightedly discovered, is every bit as weird as I am.

Here's the first 5. 

More to come!

1. Give blood together.

Giving blood together may sound unusual, perhaps morbid, but doesn't it also sound... well, kind of cute? You're stuck in a scary office or blood van or back alley together with needles in your arms, providing some anonymous future internal bleeding victim with the necessary blood to transfuse them back to health. What could be more romantic than that?


Plus, at the end, they give you blood cookies. An all-around win if you ask me.

2. Go camping in the backyard.

While your backyard campout may not be as ethnic as the one shown, that doesn't mean it has to be any less fun. For those of us who can't always get away to go camping for real, why not do it in your backyard?

And then, once you get that out of your system, you can go camping in your backyard!

In any case, even though it's true that your campout will probably look less like this:

And more like this:

What's important is that you're doing it together. Roasting marshmallows, drinking beer, watching the half-a-dozen stars you can barely make out through all the light pollution... what's not to love?

3. Go ice-skating.

Pictured: the last time I went ice-skating.

When you picture an ice-skating trip (no pun intended), one of several scenarios might come to mind. A romantic, glowing, Christmas-lit Rockefeller Plaza full of wobbly, giggling couples wearing Santa hats? A secluded subalpine lake, covered in a dusting of powdery snow, from which you and your sweet thang can hold hands and watch the glorious Austrian sunset?

Fat chance.

Unless you're willing to travel to Norway or some shit, this is probably the closest approximation of your romantic ice-skating experience this winter:

Most of those people aren't even ice-skating.
They're just standing there yelling for their lost children.

So I say, rather than subject yourself to a bustling outdoor ice rink full of snot-nosed kids and wobbly parents whose perpetually windmilling arms give you no more than a six-inch turning radius on any side, why not go in the summertime?

Indoor ice rinks are open year-round, and depending on the day, they're often nearly empty. It's a fun way to enjoy the ice-skating experience together, without constantly worrying about head-on collisions with strangers. Plus, afterwards, you can go get ice cream! Then you can properly enjoy the unwashed masses in their natural summertime habitat.

4. Go to a roller rink.

Tacky stage lights, sweet 90s music, jarring multi-colored patterned carpeting, roller skates with neon green wheels... and a disco ball? Are you feeling nostalgic yet?

If you're my age, you remember the days of the roller-skating field trips. You and your whole class would go to the roller rink, usually located in the most grungy part of town, strap on a too-big pair of rollerblades, and do the hokey-pokey and the chicken dance and try not to be the kid who fell down the most.

Now, in roller skates, while it's true that I fantasize that I look like this:

When really I look something like this:

There's no denying that a trip to the roller rink with your sweet thang will unlock childhood memories, impulses, junk food cravings, dancing skills, and skinned knees that you can then share and laugh about later when you're icing your head and/or genitals.

5. Go bowling.

Not unlike the roller rink, there's a 90s feeling you get at the bowling alley that you can't find many places nowadays. Colorfully laced shoes, big neon balls, tacky floor patterns... all that good shit.

But there's one crucial difference between the roller rink and the bowling alley: at the bowling alley, you can drink.

In fact, no trip to the bowling alley is complete without a few pitchers... and, of course, a designated driver. (I'm growing up!)

Delicious brew, sweet kicks, tasty jams, and a little healthy competition? Sounds like a recipe for good old down-to-earth romance if you ask me.

-------------------------------

So, on that note, so ends the first installment of several installments of dates for the mutually weird. Tune in next week (or, at the rate I'm going, next century) for more ideas! In the meantime, keep it spicy.

Michele Bachmann: The Colonel Sanders of Iowa Fried Bullshit.

Caption Not Required

Horrifyingly stupid and misinformed, Michele Bachmann has lately become a prevalent character in my nightmares. Not because of her diarrhea-brains -- a time-share on which she presumably owns with Sarah Palin -- but something far more sinister. Stupidity, though it galls me, I can handle. Palin may have made me pretty uneasy at times, as do most blithering Bumpit-wearing hockey moms in a place of power, but in the end she just became a parody of herself. (A special thanks to Tina Fey for speeding that one up.) When we said "gee, it sure does freak me out that Sarah Palin could become president," at least most of us were half-joking.

"Shakespeare liked to coin new words too, derp."

No no. What scares me the most about Bachmann is her terrifying ability to stay afloat among a sufficiently large following of mouthbreathing lemming-people who I imagine are as prejudiced, idiotic, startlingly oblivious and staggeringly disrespectful as their beloved Queen Bushpig. Even considering her usage of the amply buoyant fart-gas surrounding her brain as a flotation device, it still shocks me. Perhaps it shouldn't, given the all-too-familiar phenomenon of mob mentality we seem to have adopted as a nation. But I suppose I haven't been adequately desensitized yet.

The scary thing about Bachmann is that she possesses a certain degree of coherence that Palin never did; Bachmann -- even with her nightmarish values, opinions, and tragic historical misfires reminiscent of a poorly-studied-for high school history exam's answer sheet -- does not come off as a raving lunatic in her delivery... only in her content. Which, unfortunately, is just not quite ridiculous enough for the American public to shit-can without trepidation.

"NOT ALL CULTURES ARE EQUAL!"

In a nation with a voracious appetite for instant gratification, Michele Bachmann 2012 is an alarmingly feasible notion.

Which brings me to my original point: laughing at her, albeit mostly in horror.

The best part is probably Keith Olbermann's reaction... not to mention his impeccable logic.

Go here for my source of the video (which is number 3 on the list). I encourage you to watch the rest of them as well.

Boredcat is Bored.

It's amazing what you notice in the throes of deep, shitless boredom. The way the details, which would be otherwise overlooked, begin to stick out like sore thumbs when you have nothing else to occupy your time. When your book becomes tedious, StumbleUpon repetitive, and your stores of built-up rainy-day homework virtually exhausted, your senses elevate to animalistic acuity.

Everything is magnified. The way the soft but strident voice of the gregarious old woman next to you grates like pebbles being ground together until your own throat becomes itchy and you feel a compulsive need to clear it. The way the pocket-sized, archetypically gay man with an up-turned nose and a Bluetooth earpiece on your other side periodically turns to passively stare at you and, you suspect, your computer screen, until you are forced to meet his gaze -- perhaps a little too maliciously -- in order to make him avert his scrutinizing eyes. The way the vending machines 20 yards away have begun to emanate a steady high-pitched buzzing noise that you, in your unfortunate youth, can't shake from your ears. The way the squat 30-something woman with unfortunate style, a too-tight ponytail and dark circles around her eyes due to what would appear to be a lifelong lack of makeup is irritably rifling through the waiting room's magazines, pursing and smacking her thin lips, and periodically muttering incredulous curses and not entirely euphemistic oaths under her breath. The way the small, stooping Asian man nearby appears to be alternately cooking an invisible elaborate dish and directing invisible traffic onto a ferry boat, thumbs in the air, all the while with a pained look on his face suggesting a possible searing migraine. The way you could swear everyone around you is intently and judgmentally watching you slowly fill out your Seattle Times crossword puzzle. The way the polite, genteel old man talking loudly on the waiting room wall phone gargles his consonants like mouthwash as he works to spit out English words in his German accent. The way a woman's protein bar wrapper is making so much noise you would bet money that she is crinkling it on purpose.

But perhaps most notable is the way you become aware, as you unwrap your own protein bar, that everyone else is probably thinking the same thing about you. It is at this moment that you regain your sense of self and, unfortunately, your sense of weariness that has nothing to do with physical fatigue... unless you count the high level of energy you have exerted in changing the positions of your legs.

Only four more hours to go.

20 Ways to Get Out of Jury Duty.

So, I have a jury summons for tomorrow. I got it a while ago. Upon receiving my first summons, after getting over my initial amusement at the word "duty," I opted to defer, because I'm in school full time. So I received another summons before too long... and opted to defer a second time. After receiving my third summons, I wanted to defer again, or request an excusal on account of my being a full-time student in a town 80 miles away, but because I a)am in town for the date of my summons and b)neglected to mention the 80 miles away thing, they rejected my request and I'm stuck going to the courthouse at 8:00am. Today's mood: vexed.

Naturally, I started thinking of ways to avoid actually being put on a jury. I've heard a few different theories. Act confident, opinionated, stubborn, and maybe a little racist. Exaggerate your college degree. Or you could do as my mom did, and just... not show up. (She says she forgot... but I'm skeptical.)

In any case, I decided to come up with a few ideas of my own for getting out of jury duty. Personally I think they're surefire ways to avoid being put on a case. If they're not, I question the judicial system.

Here's a list of things I think would work during the voir dire process if, like me, you wish to shamelessly abscond from your civic duty. Haha... I said it again.

Tsssstsstsstsstssss.

1. Say you discriminate against all races. And sexes.
2. Say you have been put under the Imperius curse. By the plaintiff.
3. Pretend to be deaf.
4. Wear sunglasses to the courthouse and refuse to remove them because you are Scott Summers.
5. Fart incessantly.
6. Sing the chorus to Falco's "Amadeus" under your breath between sentences.
7. Assert your belief that gravity is a government conspiracy funded by our tax dollars.
8. Talk in a different accent every two minutes. When they ask you where you're from, say "the future."
9. Show up completely shitfaced.
10. When you walk in, say "boy, I sure hope there aren't any black people in this case."
11. Drink ipecac immediately before entering the courthouse.
12. Say you're nocturnal.
13. KKK hood.
14. Hit on one of the questioning attorneys with gusto.
15. Cry hysterically.
16. Fall asleep every time the attorneys say a trigger word of your choice.
17. When your name is called, firmly state that that is your slave name and that you wish to instead be called "Kichwa Tembo."
18. Begin to breast-feed a fake baby in the middle of the interview.
19. Bring a vehemently racist dummy with you.
20. Be this guy:

Oddly enough, this is what popped up when I googled "jury duty."

I'll keep you posted.

Happy Birthday, Danny.

12:30am, August 1st. So ends the 14th birthday of my little brother Danny. He's gone from this innocent cherub-faced OshKosh B'Gosh cereal box baby:

To this, the self-proclaimed ancient Norse deity and future bane of the existence of stupid people everywhere: 

Happy birthday, Danny boy.

The Life of Cragmore, My Little Brother's Alter Ego.

My 13-year-old brother Danny has always been smart. Like, weirdly smart. The kind of smart that has a dark side. Not only does he have a vocabulary and conversational ability that outclasses most college students, I'm pretty sure he's been aware of his own mortality since he started teething.

"Apricot flavor, carrot flavor... either way, I'm still just a blip on the radar of an infinite universe."

Currently, Danny is in the 7th grade. Last year, a little girl he's friends with asked him out. Rather than become awkward, or stick out his tongue and run away, or throw cookies at her, or blush and pee his pants, or whatever it is normal 13-year-old boys do when girls talk to them, he simply declined politely. It's not this that baffles me, though; it's the reason he gave for declining, which was: "Seriously? We're in the sixth grade, we're too young to date."

Several months later Danny's friend -- let's call him McGillicutty -- entered what I'm calling the "Spike the bulldog" phase of his pubescence, named for the shoulders-up, fists-clenched, brow-furrowed and jaw-thrust-forward way McGillicutty had apparently started walking in an attempt to look tough at school.

Pictured: McGillicutty demanding a cat's lunch money.

According to Danny, McGillicutty had made a habit of talking down to him when other kids were around, and once when Danny called McGillicutty asking him if he wanted to come over, McGillicutty answered "Why would I want to do that?" ...But, when I offered to fill McGillicutty's backpack with dead squid to take him down a peg, Danny only answered: "No, he's just trying to seem tough, it's just a phase. He'll get over it." And he turned back to the computer, which he was using to learn how to speak Russian... for fun.

What kind of sixth-grader is so acutely aware of his adolescence that he knows how ridiculous it is for kids his age to date? What kind of 13-year-old kid is so worldly, he knows that his stupid friend is just going through a phase? Don't most 13-year-old kids dread that kind of shit? I thought that's what was supposed to happen in middle school, wasn't it? That it was supposed to damage you, make you a cynic at an early age?

Danny's friend McGillicutty helped to plant that seed of cynicism, no doubt about that, but not by making Danny feel crappy about himself; it was by corroborating his pre-existing suspicions of how stupid other people have the capacity to be!


But I digress.


The lighter side to Danny's intelligence is a... well, let's call it a unique sense of humor. He enjoys farts as much as the next person, sure, but he also has an uncanny flair for bizarre, but inexplicably intelligent, comedic timing.

Know what I mean?

A couple of years ago, Danny got in the habit of making these deep croaking noises in the back of his throat whenever our other brother Tommy was eating or drinking, after Danny had discovered how hard it made Tommy laugh. (I should mention that there is no easier thing on this earth than to make Tommy laugh when he's trying to eat or drink... but that's not important.) Eventually, the croaking noises turned into words, and then into full sentences. (Think of someone burping, then think of someone burping the ABC's, and then think of someone burping entire song lyrics. It was kinda like that, but a lot funnier.)

Eventually, he decided that this "old man voice" of his was actually the voice of his alter ego... and so, Cragmore was born.

Cragmore is distrustful, inquisitive and constantly frustrated by the stupidity of those around him. We also discovered that he has some disturbing intentions, especially towards Tommy. Cragmore's favorite activity, while he's not making noises and remarks under his breath in order to render Tommy incapable of eating, is to threaten him in creative ways.

Before long I had a substantial list of things Cragmore had said. I decided they should be compiled somehow, especially after realizing that he was funnier than any internet meme I had thus far encountered... so, I did it. I went there. I decided the internet didn't have enough drivel on it, and made the Cragmore Meme.

Enjoy your meal.

More to come. Remember the Alamo.