The Stories and Novels By Derek Ward
I listen to a lot of podcasts. A lot of podcasts. In order to get through the backlog of episodes, I was listening to them at 2x. Now, I’m using 3x for most of them.
For the record, Godsmack’s Voodoo sounds hilarious at 3x, but at least I can understand all of the lyrics.
Or at least, the podcast, since, y’know, I don’t have cable tv.
I enjoyed the parent who was upset during all of this that the Christian perspective wasn’t taught in the class. I would kind of thinking living in Texas handles that.
Andy Levy, during the Redeye Halftime segment on 2/27/13, talking about a school that had girls trying on burkhas.
This just made me giggle.
The title of the post says it all.
I’ve been trying to get my family that live north of JAX to understand this for years. I usually just get blank stares.
I really wonder about the etymology of how that term came to be used for a group of ferrets.
Yesterday, my brother, a couple of his co-workers, and I went out to lunch at Q’doba. We likes the nachos. Like most places during this part of the year, they had their sign out advertising gift cards.
I don’t know if I was just tired from a couple of intense weeks at work or what, but my mind sees that sign and says “Hammer and Sickle? Is this the new Che? What the fuck? Oh wait, that’s just a stylized Q.”
I’m not casting any aspersions on the graphic designer. I have no reason to believe that he/she/they were trying to harken back to the Soviet Union with their little Q. I just found it amazing how old symbols from my childhood still can evoke visceral responses.
And for those of you who bought Che merchandising, fuck you very much.
I took my nephew to Cub Scouts last night because his dad was sick. NBD, I’ve done that plenty of times before. As we’re leaving, Nephew starts singing “The Star Spangled Banner.” Badly off-key and losing a lot of the words. So, being the uncle and having access to modern technology, I make him listen to one of the best renditions of our national anthem.
I’m speaking, of course, of Madison Rising’s rendition. I think I felt a little ill when the kid said it was only “Okay.”
Now, the song is stuck in my head and I must burn it out. Thankfully, most of my co-workers are vets, and they still smile when the song is played. Even in good, hard rock style.
The Brother’s Coworker (reading the local rag): This lady got into a car accident after getting addicted to Xanax
The Brother: Better than getting addicted to car accidents after taking a Xanax
Me: What would the support group for that be like?
The Brother: Those are called demolition derbies.
I’m a little behind on this because I missed a couple weeks of Squirrel Report. The call-in question for the Oct. 18 show was the most spectacular pest eradication. Mine isn’t spectacular, but my friends thought it was funny.
About once a month, I have my friends over for a “smoking party.” Basically, I smoke a piece of meat, usually with the assistancey of one of my friends. We smoke the meat, smoke tobacco, and bullshit. These are usually day-long affairs that usually leave me kind of exhausted.
A few months ago, I kicked out my last two friends and then dragged myself into the shower. After a few minutes soaking in the streams of hot water, I turned, looked up, and then screamed like a little girl. Hanging on the ceiling was a spider maybe six to ten inches across. Big. Damn. Spider.
I leapt out of the shower and grabbed my glasses. Seeing clearly didn’t help things. Big. Damn. Spider. Normally, I try to be rational about things. Insects and spiders (especially large ones) will deactivate my rationality and activate “must kill because of terror” parts of my brain.
This is why my first response was to grab a bottle of roach killer. I aimed and sprayed, expecting the BDS to drop into the shower stall, fidget, and die. No, it decided to charge the spray along the ceiling. I continued to hose the BDS (I think I was screaming obscenities, but I can’t remember). The BDS finally got enough spray and dropped into the bathroom trash can. Hurray serendipity!
The BDS was still moving in the trash can. Rationality was still turned off. Must kill was still turned on. In that state of mind, I came up with a brilliant idea. I use scented candles in the bathroom. The candle had been burning for a while. The jar was half-full of melted wax. New weapon!
The BDS finally curled up and died when a half-jar of melted wax hit it like burning oil on storming peasants. Hurray, victory is mine!
The BDS is still at the bottom of the trash can, encased in hardened, scented wax. Even knowing it’s dead, I can’t bring myself to scrape it out. Maybe the BDS had a small victory in death.
This last Friday (Oct. 26) the freezer stopped freezing at my mom’s place, which is being currently rented out by my other brother and sister-in-law. They called Courtesy Appliance & Refrigeration Experts of Tampa, FL. The tech came out and replaced the compressor on the freezer. Normal suburban stuff. Here’s the fun part.
Saturday (the next day) the freezer was still not working. So, my sister-in-law calls Courtesy Appliance & Refrigeration Experts back. They say they will have a tech out between 12 and 2. Between 2:15 and 2:30 (not sure of the exact time), my sister-in-law calls back and gets the owner of this firm. She asks when the tech is going to come out because they have melting food. His response: his tech will be out there and “quit your fucking bitching,” followed by a hang-up.
This is the point that my brother (not her husband) calls back and confronts the owner. The owner says he didn’t use “fucking,” but everything else was correct. Brother proceeds to inform owner that such language is totally inappropriate. Escalation occurs. Owner’s final response is that he is going to come to the house, yank out his part, give back the money, and to top it all off, bring a deputy to ensure that he is not locked out of the house.
End of story, he never showed back up and we stopped payment on the check. After consulting another firm, it was decided to just purchase another freezer.
So, if this experience is indicative of how that company runs, please do not call Courtesy Appliance & Refrigeration Experts of Tampa FL for your service needs.
So, I picked up a new pocketknife, mostly because:
A) I got a raise and
B) I like spending money on sharp pointy things made of metal
So I picked up a CRKT 6803Z. I’d been carrying a CRKT M16Z for almost a year. I was surprised how much heftier the new one is.
So, I’m showing my new knife to The Brother.
The Brother (looking at the blade): Huh, Cricket?
Me: CRKT.
The Brother: Like I said, Cricket.
Me: This is going up on the blog.