First of all, thank you Billy for contributing, as promised. I was unaware that you would be a snide D-bag McGee about it, but I'll take "community service" if it makes the blog better. Slowly, ever so slowly, we are inching toward 1,000 hits on the site, so some enthusiasm would be nice, Bills.
Speaking of countdowns, the count now stands at exactly 365 days until I turn 21, in an anticlimactic event that will follow everyone else's big day. Meanwhile, I've prospered greatly from turning 20 (thank you all for the nice wishes), in the form of SIX POUNDS OF GUMMY BEARS. Apparently, some people took my advertisement quite seriously, and I now have one tub of Nesquik, and a stack of gummy bears bigger than the main characters in "Little People, Big World." Seriously, I could manufacture my own life-size gummy bear to play with...but that'd be creepy. The really disgusting part is that there's a high probability of me actually finishing six pounds of gummy bears.
Since the plea for gummy bears and Nesquik worked so well, I'm probably going to have to adjust that box in the top right. I will now be smitten if you provide me with Brooklyn Decker, large sums of cash, or a competent shortstop for the Boston Red Sox.
I have decided to contribute to one of these so-called “blogs” because one of my dearest friends –not to mention future roommate and hopefully future partner-in-crime in Hollywood—Paul, asked me to. I assume that his belief is that getting an established, professional writer with a huge fan base like myself will bring more viewers to his little “blog.” Seeing as how I have done little to no community service in the first two years of college, I feel there is no better time than the present to help a brother out.
I don’t know what blogging is all about. I do know that I watched an interview with Steven Speilberg once and his advice for aspiring filmmakers—and really advice for anyone in the creative field—was to “stick to what you know.” It makes sense. I know how to write columns on stupid topics. I write about drunk dialing, sidewalk solicitors, and sometimes about class crushes. I’ve written about public restrooms, my hatred of Valentine’s Day, and the inner nerd. My writing isn’t Pulitzer Prize worthy, but hopefully it’s blog worthy. All I can write about is what I know.
What I know today is that I can’t stop thinking about the Great Gatsby. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic will always be my favorite book (besides all seven Harry Potter books). Jay Gatsby is one of the coolest, most suave fictional characters in the history of literature. No matter how badass Gatsby is, he can’t ever really get Daisy Buchanan (the girl of his dreams). Gatsby is merely another victim of the topic of this blog. That topic is the always-insufferable jerk-off. The why the fuck is she with him guy. The D-Bag McGee.
Everyone has met a D-Bag McGee. The D-Bag McGee is the guy who gets in between you and the girl you either have a crush on, the girl you like like (as in not just yeah I “like her as a friend,” but “You know, I like like her”), or the girl you have loved your whole life. Mr. McGee is the Tom Buchanan to your Jay Gatsby. I believe that the D-Bag McGees of the world fall into three major categories.
The first and most obvious D-Bag McGee category is the Bradley Cooper from Wedding Crashers type. He is the one-upper. You might have a speedboat to impress your crush on a nice summer day, but Bradley’s got a yacht with a full bar and deckhands. In fact somehow, someway Bradley’s got a story about how his grandfather invented the yacht. You’ve got a story about how your grandpa had a picture of a yacht in his office because he hoped one day his great grandkids could rent one on a nice summer weekend. The D-Bag Bradley is the guy who cheats on your girl habitually. He doesn’t love her—he just loves to beat you at having her.
As much as the Bradley Cooper type sucks, the next group of D-Bag McGees can be more frustrating. Artsy Fartsy is the sophisticated, mature, art aficionado douche. He takes the girl of your dreams to the Art Institute and rambles on and on about Picasso’s work. Artsy sees Vincent Van Gogh’s Starry Night in your crush/love’s eyes. You have taken or would have taken the girl to a Cubs game and bought her a beer. Maybe you saw the green of the ivy on the outfield walls in her eyes or the golden, amber glow of the beer you bought in her hair color. Artsy would turn his nose up at these ridiculous comparisons. You could confidently punch Artsy Fartsy in his upturned nose—unlike the jacked Bradley type—and he’d probably run away crying. So would your girl.
The worst D-Bag McGee is the guy that you actually get along with. He’s the 2.0 version of you. He has corrected all the wrong things you did with the girl or would have done. Everyone likes him. He’s a nice guy. The only problem with the guy is that he’s with your dream girl—and that’s enough to make you detest him. You find flaws in his perfections. Your friends can’t even back you up as you complain how much of a “show off” he is because he bought everyone drinks. You think that the fact that he likes the same music and sports teams as you makes him a brownnoser. He is an overachiever because he went to UCLA or Harvard and you go to Boston University (never mind the fact that you have no grudge against those schools). There’s little to no chance of proving yourself to be a better suitor than this guy.
There are a lot more D-Bag McGees out there. I only listed the first three that came to mind because I had the strongest examples for them. If you think of more, please let me know. Anyway, this is Paul’s blog. If I rambled on any longer and tried to top my good friend, I wouldn’t be any better than the Bradley Coopers of the world. But, if I want you to take one thing from my first blog it’s that there’s a constant war between the Gatsbys and Tom Buchanans of the world. There are those who look across the lake and see the green light—like Gatsby—and those who ride their yachts in front of the green light. Good luck getting your Daisy.
Billy has agreed to join the blog has an occasional author. You can even see his name up on the contributor list now. This is fantastic news for everyone involved. You, because you don't have to read my stuff all the time, while still getting more material. Me, because I can be lazier. Billy, because he can hone his writing chops for his cushy columnist position with the Daily Free Press.
So now the number of contributors to the blog rises to two, and Billy should have his very first entry up by tomorrow afternoon. I know this because, unlike myself, he can meet a deadline. He's excited. I'm excited. Look at how excited we are (no homo): You're excited.
Also, be on the lookout for more material from us in the fall. There is a short video site in the works, likely connected to this blog, which should hopefully get off the ground once Billy gets back to Boston.
I truly do apologize, as always, for making you wait. There was a period of indecision about whether or not to continue on with the blog, but NOT TO FEAR--the show will go on. I'm now going to start shooting for two posts a week. I think that's reasonable. Also, he doesn't know this yet, but I'm going to attempt to bring in Billy from the Freep for occasional blogging as well (which would necessitate an early name change for the blog). A couple weeks ago, he said he might be willing to do such a thing. Good enough for me. If you are familiar with Billy, make sure to encourage him to join the party. For now, I'm just going to leave his picture, making out with himself, in the "Homo Rodeo" entry until he agrees to participate. I think my problem with regular posting is the fact that this blog serves no purpose but to be mildly entertaining. If funny stuff doesn't happen to me, it's tough to manufacture material. The funniest thing that's happened to me today is that I keep angering the Starbucks employees with my bitch duties. [I have to make the coffee run for work. My bosses send me with university ID's that are not mine. The Starbucks "baristas" notice that I am not female and yell at me for it.] So anywho, when Starbucks becomes a focal point of the blog, I think it's time to branch out a little bit to other worldly happenings.
First Worldly Happening: Gay Rodeo I have to thank my favorite sports blog, Deadspin, for this one. The first thing I see when I go on there this morning is a picture of a guy dressed up as the purple teletubbie (Tinky Winky?), tied to a bull. Sold. Turns out, it stems from a phenomenon unbeknownst to me, Gay Rodeo, which is probably everything you could expect and more. My favorite event, hands down, is "Goat Dressing." Teams of two race to dress up a real-live goat in..........
UNDERPANTS!
I really feel for the goats in this situation. Not only are they forced to wear underpants, but they get the dignity of neither boxers, nor briefs. Strictly tighty whiteys (or whitey tighties) for Mr. Goat. Imagine (not too vividly) two gay men running full-speed at you, forcing themselves upon you, and lifting up your legs as the crowd screams "Go Mark! Give 'em a wedgie!" Yeah, you gotta feel for the goat, but then again, if I were him/her, I'd be okay coming out of the whole experience with just a pair of undies.
Not a great turnout for what is supposedly the most popular Gay Rodeo event, but maybe it just needs a little promotion.
Aside from Goat Dressing, the rodeo events seem relatively normal, just with flair! The only other noteworthy event in the "Homo Rodeo" is "Wild Drag Race," in which a man or woman, dressed in drag, must ride a steer across a finish line, with the help of two partners. Essentially, three people drag a cow across the line, and then a dude in a dress jumps on it to claim victory.
Am I the only one that is thoroughly entertained by this? Maybe it's just the music in the background. Lord knows the music at the Gay Rodeo is better than the music one of my bosses subjected me to the other day, which he classified as "Angry Lesbian Music." The first verse to "I Gotta" by Trina: I got a, fat p&*%$ for a c#$#*&@$& I got a, hideout for a cop ducker I got a, condo for a baller n&@*# I got a, gay friend you can call her n**@#$ Certainly one of the foulest things I have ever listened to. I'll stick with happy lesbians putting underwear on goats.
The great Chicago experience is over. I’m now sitting in the delightful Cincinnati, Ohio airport, right in front of a half-metal-pig, half-airplane statue. I don’t know what this signifies, but it is titled “The Spirit of Pigcinnati.” Apparently Ohio supports shiny pigs that dabble in aviation, or something like that.
Anyways, I know I didn’t finish days three and four of the trip, mostly due to my lack of sleep, and the considerable time required to provide an accurate account of everything that happened. So, I’m just going to give you the full story of what happened between the hours of 1:00 and 6:00 AM on Friday morning: **Mom, and any other adult who holds me in high regard, this story might make you cry a little bit on the inside (or outside), for a variety of reasons. Just a warning.
Our Thursday night didn’t begin until the next morning for three reasons: 1. Our softball game didn’t finish until 10:30. 2. Our intended destination was a fine drinking establishment, The Keg, apparently notorious for its very underage customers. We wanted to get there after curfew. 3. We needed to wait for the fourth member of our wolf pack, Mike, to join us. I reference The Hangover here because after all the events of the night had unfolded, new-found-friends Tommy, Mike, and I decided to assign ourselves characters from the movie. We unanimously decided that Billy would be Doug (the good guy who only gets about 20 minutes of screen time), while the rest of us were all Bradley Cooper.
I won’t spend too much time describing The Keg. We got there at 1:00 AM and left at 3:00. There were neither people, nor events of consequence in this story. However, The Keg did feature large, cheap beverages. Fast forward to 3:00. We go outside to get a cab. At this point, we had decided just to head back home, but then the turning point struck: Mike (to the driver): “Oh my god! Are you Lawrence??” Driver: “Hell yeah, I’m Lawrence!” Mike: “Lawrence! We had you last Thursday! I’ve got your number!” Lawrence: “Yeahh!!!” Lawrence must have had some sort of powerful aura of debauchery, because, without any sort of segue, the next directions that were screamed from the backseat were “Strip club!!!!” There wasn’t even any sort of conferencing on the subject. Billy/Doug (the ringleader) gave his consent. Lawrence: “Hell yeah we goin’ to the strip club!”
The cab ride consisted of lots of screaming with Lawrence. We chanted his self-proclaimed nickname (Homerun Hittah). He did too. We counted down to each green light. He did too. We clapped. He danced. Shit yeah, Lawrence. Lawrence liked us so much that he offered to pick us up afterward in his “own personal vehicle,” regardless of the time. We liked this idea.
At 3:30 on a Thursday morning, we were obviously in some good company at the strip club. We got to share the front-row seats with a couple Samoan dudes with ponytails, a lesbian, and some nerdy guy with glasses that made it rain singles on one lucky lady. I’m not sure whether or not this made us cool by default. The girls weren’t important so much as the overall experience. Mike was the only one well-versed in strip-club etiquette, so Tommy, Billy, and I all got to learn the ropes. What I learned: a. Dollar bills are to be folded in half the long way, and stood up on the stage. Naturally, all cash transactions for the rest of the weekend were made in this manner (between each other, at Subway, etc.). b. If a stripper tells you that she’s 19 and trying to pay her way through Columbia, she’s lying. c. Each girl gets one song for her performance. Do not put a dollar down near the end of the song. She will thieve it and run off stage. d. Even a stripper will notice if you’re not enjoying yourself. Billy, who is clearly the good guy of every group, had this pained expression on his face for much of the night (pretty much every time a pair of strange boobies ended up in front of his face). It was worth the price of admission just to see his reaction to the whole experience. Finally, one girl actually told him to lighten up and smile. He did.
The night concluded with lap dances for everyone involved, because that was the agreement. I got the shaft on that one. One crazy Asian named Tracey kept insisting that she give me a lap dance. I suggested that she do it for free. She disagreed. It’s 5:30 in the morning, and Billy and Tommy (who is off in the VIP section) have successfully procured strippers. Mike is calling Lawrence. Tracey returns. “Now I dance for you???” Fine. For ten bucks, Tracey spends the next five minutes slapping her ass like a cymbal monkey, and not much else. Not amused.
At 5:45, we all finally wandered out of the club. We didn’t account for tinted windows, and were astonished to find that it was bright as freakin’ mid-day outside. A white Corolla rolls up to the curb, blasting music. Lawrence woke up, and truly did come in his personal vehicle, just to get us. He even brought the [blatantly] most cracker-ish mix tape he owned. 6:00 AM in God-knows-where Chicago: Lawrence (on two hours of sleep) speeding through early-morning traffic, car packed with four white guys, reeking of stripper musk, singing and pretending to know every single word to “New Shoes.”
I know I’ve been slacking on the blog lately, and as expected, readership has been down. But let’s get at least 38 people to read this one, shall we? In my mind, it will make up for the 38 singles I lost.
Day 1 I’m off to Chicago for the rest of the week. In fact, I’m writing this from somewhere over what looks to be a Great Lake. Luckily, for my entertainment and yours (mostly mine), this post will be an ongoing work of progress from the city of wind, beer, and underachieving sports teams. This is a big moment in my life, as it is my first trip west of New York state—really. A quick wrap up of my trip thus far: • Today I decided to wear my favorite shorts, which just happen to lack a button (foreshadowing). Normally, this is not a problem, since I have a scrawny ass and always rely on a very tight belt to keep my pants up. In security at Logan, it was a problem. After removing my belt, I went waddling through the metal detector, holding my shorts up with one hand. “Arms at your side, please.” Shorts at my ankles, please. I tried to save myself with a strategic hip thrust, but my scrawny ass doesn’t catch well. The large woman at the metal detector: “Yeah, I’m not impressed. Pick ‘em up, you’re fine.” • I’ve only been on a plane three times in my life, so I wasn’t really familiar with seating etiquette. When I boarded, there was a screaming toddler in my designated seat. Not seeing any significantly more desirable seats in my lowly economy class, I took the liberty to upgrade myself to “Economy Plus,” which I declined to pay $39 more for during check-in. Well, no one said anything, so now I’m living the good life of the sweet-ass dude who has $39 to throw around. Stickin’ it to the man. AND I get five extra inches of leg room. According to the security guard lady, I won’t be needing the five extra inches for anything else. Oh, and the screaming toddler is now walking up and down the aisle, all cute and smiling, saying “Hi!” to whoever will listen. We’ll call it a draw, kid.
Day 2 I was forced to go see the Harry Potter midnight premiere last night. I wish that I had some better stories from it, but there were a minimal number of costumes, and the count of "Har-ry Pot-ter" chants peaked at two. The movie wasn't even that bad, even though I didn't know what was going on. The most interesting part, as far as this blog is concerned, was probably the guy sitting behind Billy (the friend whom I'm visiting). He was pretty tall, and apparently Billy's chair was hitting his legs, since he asked Billy to "move his [stationary movie theater] seat" up. Here's the kicker--the guy was paralyzed. So for like an hour, Billy attempted not to lean back, in order not to touch the legs of the man who couldn't even feel them.
Photographic evidence that Day 2 occurred: Wrigley Field, home of the Cubs. It would have been a lot more interesting had the team been in town, but a tranny did ask Billy to take its picture in front of this sign, and McD's was selling cheeseburgers for 59 cents. We got to see the tranny there, too. The 7 Eleven across from Wrigley sells liquor. Even as a New Hampshirite(?), this surprised me. I'm not sure whether this is a cause or effect of the nature of Cubs fans, but I love it. Our Chicago skyline boat cruise on Lake Michigan, a.k.a. see how many complimentary beers we can drink in 45 minutes while learning about Chicago from Billy's friend.
Day 3 Today, I take on 16-inch softball(a standard softball is 12 inches). Played just like normal softball, except guys don't get to wear gloves. Apparently, this is the manly thing to do in Chi-city--you know, the manly thing where you catch balls with your bare hands.
Update on softball (before cutting to the Strip Club Story): 16-inch softball is difficult. I promptly dropped my first fly ball in center, but recovered to catch the next three. However, our team got smoked, prompting the considerable beverage consumption that leads to the next story...
To follow up on the Paul's Adult Playground idea, I've got another genius brainchild. And when I say genius, I don't mean "Proud Parent of an Honor Roll Student." I mean "My Kid Can Beat Up Your Honor Roll Student." Street smart and badass--those are my brain babies.
Since the summer has started, I've noticed a drastic change in my bathroom supplies, mostly due to the fact that I now have to share my bathroom with a GIRL (ewwy). This has created a standoff of epic proportions in my shower. It's Nivea for MEN Body Wash and Suave MEN Shampoo versus Botanical Fusion, Shower Soufflé, and Elizabeth Grady Premium Blend. I don't even know what kind of products these are. In my mind: Botanical = flowers. Fusion = nuclear power. Nuclear flowers in your hair = radiation. And now let's get to the Shower Soufflé, because it brings me to my point. I call shenanigans on that as well. Soufflé is food, not soap. But wait (cue brainchild #2). Maybe the Shower Soufflé people are on to something. What if there were actually food inspired soaps and perfumes for women? I did do my research on this one; they already have exactly this sort of perfume. The first one I came across was Sugar Cookie. However, if you're a girl, and you're going to wear this, I don't want you to have subtle, singular scents of sugar cookie. I want you to actually smell like a sugar cookie, because they're delicious. Or a steak.
To the best of my limited psychology knowledge, the mental reward mechanisms for food, sex, and drugs/alcohol are pretty similar, if not the same, which is why you can become addicted to all three. So, let's think about this logically: Food perfume could trigger the desire for two rewards, not just one. Wouldn't that make it more of a turn-on? I'll be honest, regular perfume has never gotten me all hopped up like Joe Swanson.
But come on--ladies, if you're not averse to smelling like food, you'd be getting all the fellas. It'd be just like that Taco Bell commercial, except better. Ooh, baby, is that bacon double cheeseburger? Come here girl.
ospered greatly from turning 20 (thank you all for the nice wishes), in the form of SIX POUNDS OF GUMMY BEARS. Apparently, some people took my advertisement quite seriously, and I now have one tub of Nesquik, and a stack of gummy bears bigger than the main characters in "Little People, Big World." Seriously, I could manufacture my own life-size gummy bear to play with...but that'd be creepy. The really disgusting part is that there's a high probability of me actually finishing six pounds of gummy bears.
