At least you didn't have to switch faces with John Travolta

The best way to make someone feel better when they're down about something is to point out all the ways it could have been worse.*

*this is actually the worst approach possible

Specifically, I think it's best to point out all the movie plots that could have happened to them but didn't. Then they'll gain some perspective because ummmm, you think YOU'RE having a bad day?! How do you think those guys in the K-19 Widowmaker felt when Harrison Ford kept making them get radiation poisoning??? Yeah, now you feel like a jerk for ever complaining.

When someone Is sick:

 

 

 

 

Hell yeah you're lucky! That movie did NOT have a happy ending!

When someone is having minor surgery:

Going to the hospital always sucks. It is usually expensive, boring, takes time away from your regular life, and usually means you're feeling like shit, too.

But -- if your minor surgery seems bad, just remember --

Neither one of these faces would be particularly flattering on my body, actually.

Also, can we just talk about that movie again for a minute? Nic Cage gets his face stolen, and he wakes up alone in a room and is like "wait, where's my face?!" but luckily there is John Travolta's face sitting nearby so he grabs it and sews it onto himself and then he goes and lives with John Travolta's wife and she doesn't even notice?

Then I see on the news that the first successful full face transplant just happened this year. Well, what the hell took them so long? What a bunch of idiots those doctors must have been. A full team of doctors takes hours and hours to do this complicated surgery when Nic Cage was able to just sew someone else's face onto his own face-hole in a few minutes MAX and boom, he's right as rain.

If Nic Cage can do it, it can't be that hard.
 

When someone gets their credit card stolen:

 

 

HACKERS CAN MAKE YOU A PROSTITUTE, GUYS. I SEEN IT.

 

I SEEN IT.

 

When someone gets a speeding ticket:

LOOK ON THE MOTHERF**KING BRIGHT SIDE, YO.

Any other possible situation:

Yeah. I think that movie even tops the American Dad episode where Roger is an evil villain trying to make the whole world cry to death with a movie about a retarded Jewish boy during the Holocaust who gets a puppy but then the puppy dies of cancer and so he becomes an alcoholic until they are all murdered by the Nazis. The movie was titled "Oscar Gold." It's like they could smell Precious coming.

Patent's Friday Poundings: Doctor Who and having a married Christmas

Friday again! Time for another quick roundup of some of the thoughts that crossed my mind this week:

-- I wanted to write a post about Doctor Who, which I have also never seen. But then I realized that I actually know NOTHING about that show -- not the plot, not the characters, not the reason everyone seems to love it so damn much. All I have gathered is that there is a Doctor whose name no one seems to know, and that he time travels to the dinosaurs using a retard machine. So ... there you have it. Doctor Who. Guess I should do a little more research before writing a full post about that one.

This is the time travel device. R.E.T.A.R.D seems to be some sort of acronym.

-- This was Jesse's and my first married Christmas, and I gotta say, Christmas is kinda weird when you're married. Our joint financial situation makes the whole gift-buying thing completely different. All we're really doing is deciding how much money the other is authorized to spend on themselves. I mean, since the money we spend kind of belongs to both of us anyway, a really generous gift will probably just piss the other person off. Like if I bought Jesse a car for Christmas, it isn't really like I "bought him a car" -- it's more like I "forced him to buy himself a car." Because you know those car payments aren't going to be coming out of my personal spending money each month -- hell no. It's like, "this Christmas, I gave you the obligation to spend $400 every month on a car that you didn't even get to pick out! ISN'T SANTA THE BEST?!?!?" 

Even if you don't combine any finances, you're still playing for the same team financially so you both benefit from saving instead of spending ... which means there's still really no motivation to go out and buy a bunch of crap for each other. What Jesse and I should do every year is just give each other a box with a piece of paper in it that says "I authorize you to buy yourself $XXXX worth of crap on the joint credit card. Merry effing Christmas."

Actually, that's a hell of an idea.

-- Meanwhile, I think I've got my New Year's Resolutions figured out. I always like to have two: one more specific concrete goal, and one more abstract goal that I think will help make me a better person.

For this year's concrete goal, I am going to cook something new from a recipe once a week. I never use recipes when I cook -- at most, I will look at a recipe and get the gist of it, then freestyle the food. The result is that while the things I make taste good, they always have a certain sameness about them. So if I start cooking with more and different recipes, we'll get to eat lots of unique and interesting things.

And for this year's "be a better person" goal, I am going to stop laughing at babies with enormous heads. Yes, they are funny. Yes, they look ridiculous. But laughing at them is bad for my karma, and next thing you know I'm going to have a baby that looks like this:

 

And it'll split me in half and all my friends will have to stifle a laugh when they look at it, and I'll have no one to blame but myself.

 

But just to have one last giggle, I googled pictures of babies with big heads. And I found this one. Tee hee.

 

This baby is awesome.

So, y'know, wish me luck.

I can still giggle at that baby right up until 2013, right?

Because I'm definitely going to.

Okay okay okay, I'm done. I'm done.

Okay ONE MORE.

 

 

UPDATED: I had to add one more. I'm sorry.

 

I'm sure you understand.

 

 

Things you (apparently) learn in college

Whenever Jesse doesn't know something, he blames it on the fact that he didn't go to college. Now, this would be fair if I were saying things like "what do you MEAN you don't know how to write a business plan!?!?!?" ... but that's never the case. He's always shouting about college when I discover that he put towels in a different closet than the designated linen closet, or that he didn't clean out his pockets before putting his pants in the wash.

It is always ridiculous and hilarious, and I really have no comeback when he feeds me the "I didn't go to college!" line, so I thought I would share with you all a few of the things that are apparently taught in college, according to Jesse:


Vocabulary

I've always been a voracious reader, so I'd say I have a pretty broad vocabulary and I love using the exact right word for the exact right situation. This results in my sometimes using fancy words that don't exactly get tossed around a lot in regular conversation. So one time I was talking about the dichotomy between some shit and some other shit (see those fancy words in action!) and Jesse was all "a dike-a-what now?! Quit using words like that; you know I never went to college!"

And then I started to laugh because can you imagine what a dickhead someone would be if they'd majored in Vocabulary in college?! Those grammar-correcting English majors are bad enough.

 

I had to look up every single one of those words in a thesaurus to make that sentence sound like such an asshole.

I think this would actually be a pretty appropriate reaction.

Sidebar:
I did actually have a professor in college who may have majored in Vocabulary. He was a great professor and had written a book that I wanted to read, so I bought it and got to work.

There were fifteen words I had never seen before ON THE FIRST PAGE ALONE. That's right; I couldn't even make it through the foreword without a bloody dictionary. I quit at around page 3 and cursed that professor for the completely unnecessary use of fancy words for no other reason than to scream "LOOK HOW SMART I AM! I BET YOU AREN'T EVEN SMART ENOUGH TO READ THIS BOOK!"

Touché, professor. You are a modern-day Immanuel Kant -- your writing is so impossible to read that only the truly persistent assholes with something to prove will actually be able to learn what you're trying to teach. Which ... kind of defeats the purpose of writing a book, no? Dickhead.


Setting the Table

You probably don't remember this class, but I can assure you, you took it. It was probably second semester freshman year, aka "the semester you don't remember because you were drunk 24/7." In this class, you learned that when you set a table, the knife goes on the right-hand side with the blade facing inward, and the fork goes on the left.

Folding Laundry

Jesse is not allowed to fold my laundry. He can fold his own clothes, but under no circumstances is he to assist in the folding of mine. Because he sucks at it. He was officially banned after I caught him trying to fold a thong into eighths.

So now imagine your 19-year-old is home for Christmas break and of course they're at that phase where they think they know EVERYTHING:

If this ever actually happens to me, that's it -- I'm killing myself.

Organizing the Pantry

Have you ever looked in your pantry and had to search and search for that pack of noodles you KNOW you bought, but you can't find them anywhere because they're not with the other packs of differently-shaped noodles ... but then you finally find them and they're on the top shelf behind a bag of leftover Halloween candy and you're like "what the hell kind of a moron puts a pack of noodles on the top shelf behind Halloween candy instead of putting them with all the other noodles?!"

Yep.


But things are about to start changing around our house, yes they are. Because Jesse is getting started on taking some college classes.

Let's hope for all our sakes that his class schedule looks something like this:

And then he's planning on getting a Master's degree, which is something I don't have.

I can't wait.

The many masks of Santa

I was the standard age of around 7 or 8 when I found out that Santa isn't real (t was my sister's fault -- she had located the stash of "Santa" gifts under our parents' bed and showed them to me). We pretended for a few more years after that so that my little brother could make it to at least age 5 thinking it was Santa who brought him that original Playstation console ... and then the jig was up, and from then on we always knew it was our parents who bought us all those sweet presents year after year.

Mom, however, just wouldn't let the whole Santa thing die. She refused. And so every year, it seemed that more and more of the presents under the tree were from Santa ... and every year, we seemed to be visited by more and more specific Santas, as if there were a whole fleet of Santas traveling the Earth each Christmas Eve, dropping off socks or shoes or grilling supplies or whatever certain item that one Santa specialized in.

This is an artist's rendering of "Sock Santa," a frequent visitor to our home.

As the years passed, Mom's overly-specific Santafying became more and more insane. "Sock Santa" and "Grilling Santa" gave way to such madness as "WSU Clothing Santa" (gee, i wonder what could be in there?!), "Roll It Out Santa" (this gift turned out to be a massage roller), and "Knife Set Santa."

Knife Set Santa is not as popular with the children.

Things had officially gone too far when she started switching the order of the words so that now, it wasn't Sock Santa coming to the house, but Santa Sock -- as if "Santa" were his title and "Sock" is his given name. Imagine my brother-in-law's surprise when he saw a gift under the tree with this tag on it:

And what did Santa Clamp bring him??

If you guessed "a hat!" ... then you, sir, are an idiot ... because Santa Clamp brought Chris the clamp tool he'd been eyeing!

This is what I assume Santa Clamp looks like.

But, all joking aside, it was a wonderful Christmas with my wonderful family, made even more amazing by a visit from Santa Chip:

He brought us ... chips.

Hope the fleet of Santas brought you everything you wanted this year! And if "Size 9 Black Leather Boot Santa" skipped your house this year, don't worry -- Santa Amazon.com works year-round :-)

A series of amazingly-executed Santa pictures

It's Christmas! Woop woop!!! If all went according to plan, I'm playing with all my toys right now. I really hope I got that play kitchen I've had my eye on.

To celebrate the joys of the season, here are some amazing pictures of Santa doing what he does best!

We'll start out with ...

DRUNK SANTA:

Haha he's spilling it all over his beard! Looks like SOMEONE is glad to be done delivering gifts for the year.

However, you know tomorrow's gonna suck, when he wakes up and realizes he's turned into ...

 

HUNGOVER SANTA:

Filled with regret, Santa wishes he had at least drank some more water before passing out half in and half out of the pantry.

But hungover Santa ain't got shit on everyone's least favorite ...

DOUCHEBAG SANTA:

 

This Santa is all neckbeard. Look at him there, in his ugly plaid scarf, glancing upwards and thinking deep thoughts about deep things, like whether or not making fun of Nickelback is overdone and he needs to choose another mainstream band to be the target of his half-cocked anger.

 

This next picture is of ...

 

SANTA RIDING AN OVERBURDENED DONKEY!

 

Look at that poor donkey! He's all, "Santa, you fat f**k, GET THE HELL OFF!" Oh man that's funny.

 

Next,we have ...

SANTA RIDING A SEGWAY WITH NO HANDS!

 

THAT'S VERY DANGEROUS, SANTA.

 

 

And then, of course,

 

SANTA RIDING AN INEXPLICABLY ENORMOUS DUCK!

 

 

It's a Christmas miracle!

 

And for our final shot of the day, we have:

 

SANTA AND RUDOLPH STARRING IN A LOVABLE HOLIDAY MOVIE FULL OF HILARIOUS HIJINKS!

 

 

Is that Santa riding Rudolph who happens to be wearing rollerblades??

 

YOU BET YOUR ASS IT IS.

 

Merry Christmas everyone! Enjoy your kitchen play sets!!!!!

 

YEAHHHHHHHH AWESOME!!!!!!

Passive-aggressive Christmas presents

Actual quote from coworker the other day:

“I hate my brother’s kids. They are the absolute worst human beings I have ever met. I don’t want to get them anything for Christmas – they don’t deserve it. They’re such little shits, the only thing I could give them that would actually be useful would be a set of butt plugs to help prepare them for their future incarceration.”

 

Every once in a while, you have to buy a gift for someone you truly can’t stand. How do you express your feelings for them in a way that really makes it clear but also leaves you blameless? Here are a few ideas.

1

Gun Rack

Have you got one of those “friends” whose only approved conversational topic is politics? You know, those people who ruin what would be a perfectly good lunch hour by turning it into a debate nobody can win, day after day after day? Those people suck. What better way to say “I haven’t listened to a single f**king word you’ve ever said” than to get a gun rack for someone who’s spent the last week going on and on about gun control?

Don’t worry; your little Junior Rush Limbaugh coworker’s got his thing coming too:

However, in the case of the gun rack, it’s important to also have an Amazon gift card in your pocket in case the recipient starts reciting lines from Wayne’s World. Anyone who has that part of the movie memorized can’t be all bad. Maybe you just need to reward them for talking about movies instead of politics, training them like a dog.

 

2

2000-piece puzzle

The next gift is for that “friend” who constantly complains about their life while doing absolutely nothing to change it. They’re upset because they’ve gained weight, but all they do is bitch about it while stuffing their face with ice cream sandwiches. They hate their job but make no attempt to find a new job. They claim they have no friends, which is true because they’re so negative and caustic that it takes all your willpower not to punch them in the face on a minutely basis.

So they open the box and find a 2000 piece puzzle – the kind of thing that will take MONTHS of CONSTANT work to finish. It’s a nice sly way of saying “change your attitude or YOU WILL HAVE TIME FOR THIS.”

Extra points if you announce “I hate puzzles” when you hand it over, so they know you have no intention of helping them complete it.

3

Daily newspaper subscription

Yeah, I know you can read all that sh*t online. But isn’t it better when you have to run out in the rain every morning to pick the goddamned newspaper up off the ground and throw it away? What fun!!!!

4

Non-fancy bath stuff

I think every human shares the subtle fear that despite our best efforts, we don’t smell good. It’s a scary thing, facing the possibility that our foul odor repels people. Any time I catch a whiff of something gross, my first thought is “omigod I hope that’s not coming from me.”

So what better way to subtly knock that one cocky jerk off her pedestal than to give her a selection of grocery store Suave bath products for Christmas? The kind of thing that doesn’t say “I thought you’d like to pamper yourself” but instead says “I thought you’d like to bathe every once in a while. You know, because you stink.”

She’ll be overcome with self-consciousness from there on out, and hopefully that will make things a little better for you.

5

 

Self-help book

 

This one goes to the person in your life who is constantly giving you unsolicited advice. Whether that's your sister, your mother-in-law, or your cubicle-mate, it's time for them to get a little taste of their own medicine. Guess who likes unsolicited advice on every topic under the sun, guys?

Answer: no one.

Once again, extra points for choosing a book written by a well-known crackpot like Dr. Laura, who isn't even a doctor and thinks that a gay son is the worst thing that could happen to a parent.

There you go, guys -- a few ideas to really stick it to someone this Christmas. If you hurry, you can still pick up one of these amazing gems at the local Wal-mart! Meanwhile, stay tuned for tomorrow, when there will be some really atrocious Santa pictures in the spirit of the Thanksgiving post!

Merry Christmas to those that celebrate it, and Happy Chinese Food Day to those that don't!