People, listen to your fathers.

My father once said to me "When you're having problems with your car, and you're not sure what's wrong, start with the cheapest part." This is solid advice, advice that I'm shamed to admit that I don't normally follow. Like recently, when I waltzed into the auto parts store and requested the 95 dollar windshield wiper motor.

Had I actually thought about the problem at all, I would have realized that the problem could not be the motor, because the motor drives 2 windshield wipers, and only 1 was not working. Well, now I know that, and I'm glad you can return stuff.

Turns out that my windshield wiper transmission arm got disconnected. If you're wondering what that is, its the part on my car that provoked very many sentences that are too foul for saturday morning tv. Sentences like "Damn rice burning piece of beepity beep beep", or "This is blepity blepping bleepin stupid".

Its still not fixed, my cursing muscles were too sore to continue after a little bit.

Mr Evil Egg Nog Flavored Ice Cream Maker Guy

You gotta sing the title like it was in a bud light commercial. Seriously, egg nog ice cream? How does one pass that by? I mean, I like egg nog, and I like ice cream....sheesh. Curse you flavor maker guy!

My late night reading is affecting my dreams. I've got carl one upped in the crazy dreams department. Last night I had a dream that I was in a department store verbally arguing with a co-worker, which ended with me storming out of the store, finding a dilapidated church, crawling inside and urinating out of a window.

I've got 3 dollars and a cupcake for anyone who can explain that one to me. I think reading time is going to be ending a little earlier than 2 am from now on.

A week in review.

My no-tv experiment is almost a week old. I thought today would be tough, with the football game on and all. I didn't even think twice about going to the ping pong club for the afternoon. Of course, I'd be lying if I said that I didn't immediately check the score of the game when I got home.

I did quite a bit this week with the TV turned off. I practiced cartooning(I still suck, but my stuff is starting to look like people now), I read quite a bit of a book, I went to class on thursday night, played some video games, practiced cartooning some more, Took the Kiga for an extra long hike, and went to the ping pong club.

How does turning the TV off translate into helping people more? Well, anti-antism isn't just no-TV. Its a lot more than that. I'm working out the details of everything else before I blog about it. I decided that I'm not going to blog about "what I want to do", only "what I have done".

I met at least 10 new people this week, between the people in my class, and a couple new people at the ping pong club. Those are 10 people that I never would have met if I was sitting on my couch watching TV.

Tagged By Shayna

A Piece of Art that you Love
Perch is my current favorite. He's the bomb, cause I made him.

A Line in a Song or Line of Poetry that Reaches Your Core
I don't know what I'm living for, I just know I want to live some more.

An Experience in Nature that was Really Special and/or Spiritual
This one time when this magic spirit thing ate my cupcake. It was both magical, and spiritual.

The Movie that Changed the Way you saw the World
Dark City.

A Piece of Music That Makes You Cry
Dude, I don't cry(except in the few documented movie cases)

Meet Perch

Perch is concept art right now. I'm toying with the idea of having a bird as the "teacher" in my games. I dunno, owls seem overdone, but a hip little bird might seem cool to kids. I wanted a wizard, but a wizard wouldn't fit into the "enchanted forest" theme....unless of course he enchanted the forest...hmmmm.

I've decided to go with the "edgy" art style that is so popular in cartoons these days. Simplistic, and rough, it has its own appeal. I plan on doing a tim burtonesque landscape, and I think the edgy art will work well with that, moreso than normal cartoony stuff.

I've also decided that since my characters are supposed to be from a book, that the art itself should look like paper, hence the canvas style of the bird.

Colors might be too bright, I don't know, I'm not that good with colors just yet.

Day 2 of no TV, and Perch is born. He's not much, but i worked on him all night. Practice makes better right?

PS, playing on the Mc-Jukebox right now is "The Mountain Goats". Sounds bluegrass, but really they're not. If you're a "They Might Be Giants", or "Bare Naked Ladies" fan, you might want to give em a listen. I won't guarantee that you'll like em, because I have rather abnormal tastes in music, but you might dig em.

Antism.

The tiny earth movie thing has been bugging me a bit. Not so much because so many people are so bad off, or that so many people are so well off, but the fact that not enough people do enough to help other people. Once upon a time, I was a pretty good person, I used to help people, but these days...not so much. They say that that comes with age, that you stop being so naive, but I think it comes with exposure. In any case, I made a few decisions that I'm going to try my best to carry out.

First, I'm defining "antism" as the realization that the human race has become nothing more than a collection of nice looking ant colonies(and how nice looking is rather subjective). As we walk down the street, we pass strangers and don't even bother to smile or say hello, we stick with our circle of people we know and trust and we don't stray too often. Interactions with people(be it the person selling you groceries, or the person making your lunch) have become short and superficial. Most don't even bother to say please and thank you anymore, let alone smile and speak full sentences. Most will simply say "4.95", because that is that particular ants job. That ant has to collect your money.

How have we come to this? I've analyzed my own life, and have decided to make some changes.

Today is day 2 without turning on my TV. Soon, I will call my cable company and say the words "I'd like to cancel my cable TV please.", with an emphasis on please. Last night, I forced myself to skip my favorite show. It was extremely difficult, but today, I feel kind of relieved.

Last night, I read 3 chapters of "A spell for chameleon" instead of watching TV. Good book so far, thanks for recommending it Shayna/Carl.

My TV ban extends to football, and no, this isn't me being bitter about the Steelers loosing, its more about me not caring that the Steelers lost. I woke up the next day to the same life, and I will each day.

I'm sick of arguing back and forth with Cincinnati Bengal fans about whether Ben or Carson is better. Do you think Ben or Carson cares who's better? No, they're just happy to be getting paid.

Anti-Antism is the ruleset that I'll use to stop being an ant, and rule 1 is:

Ants repeat the mundane, their actions don't better their abilities, they only stagnate. To be less like an ant, one must always seek to improve themselves.

This is why the "no tv" rule. After an hour of TV, you've gained nothing, not mentally or physically. An hour of reading will at least cause your brain to have to work.

8 months later.

January 29th was my health screening earlier this year. It was the point when I decided that I had to do something about what I had let happen to my body. At that time, my stuff kind of looked like this:

Blood cholestrohol: 217(ouch, yeah thats bad)
Blood pressure: 136/86(not "bad" yet, but very very close)
219 lbs
30% body fat.

Today, we had a "health fair" where we could get some tests done, and these are the results:

Chol: 158(This provoked a "Dude! 158!?" from me, most people will never hit 158 without medication)
Blood pressure: 118/68(slabba jabba, oh heeellls yeah)
Blood Sugar: 95(She said this was good, I asked what it meant, she said "it means your pancreas is doing a good job of producing insulin", of course I responded with "well, I always did have a good pancreas", I don't know what the hell else to say to that, but it must be true, because I had about 90 grams of sugar before this test, which is normally more than I eat in a week)
202.5 lbs
17%BF(around 17 percent anyway, I put on a little body fat while i was trying to gain muscle. I was down to 11.5 not too long ago)

My body still doesn't look as good as I want it to, but on the inside, its a well oiled machine, and I guess that's even more important than all those muscles and stuff that I want.

As a side note, today I'm starting my "anti-antism" campaign. I'll explain more in a later blog, this one is dedicated to my bad ass blood work.

Crappy sundays.

I hate when the steelers don't play on sunday, or when they play night games on sunday. Its crap. I want to roll out of bed, throw on my wrinkled Big Ben jersey and watch some football. Today, I got stuck watching Giants vs Eagles, or Bills vs Dolphins. I could care less about either game.

Its well documented how much I hate guys named "Manning", but I learned something else about myself today. I hate Eli Manning, yes this is true, and I hate Tom Coughlin even more, yup, that's true too, I also have a strong dislike of Jeremy Shockey, and Plaxico Burress. The point is, that as a whole, I REALLY dislike the giants team(other than Tiki Barber, who is a stand up guy).

So, I asked myself, why, when the Eagles were absolutely dominating the giants, was I rooting for the giants to win? The answer? I don't like the eagles even more than I don't like the giants. Maybe its because I live around all these smug ass eagle fans who think Donovan Mcnabb is the best thing since sugar free brownies. Maybe its because the eagles coach is a fat ass who looks like he wouldn't know the first thing about conditioning an athlete. Maybe its because they don't run the ball when they have 17 point leads in the 3rd quarter. I dunno why, but I don't like the eagles, not even a little.

Haha eagles, you suck, I'm glad you lost. Next time, learn to run the ball when you're up by 17 and get some time off that clock.

Argh!

I had my "YEAH BABY PITT IS 3-0" blog all ready to go, but that was back when they were up 10-0 in the first quarter. Stinking bums wouldn't score another point until it no longer mattered and they were loosing 38-23.

I hope monday ends better. Oh well, maybe Penn State will loose today and make me feel better.

Got Junk

I have to blog a shameless plug for 1-800-got-junk. Hopefully the millions of people who read my blog will see it and consider using them.

The guys show up, you point at stuff and say "take that stuff away", and they tell you how much it will cost and then they take it away.

Now, they were more expensive than a rolloff dumpster by about 100 bucks, but I didn't have to get a permit, or have a dumpster sitting in front of my house for a week, or have to worry about having other people toss their stuff in my dumpster, and I didn't have to do any work(I helped a little, but I didn't have to if I didn't want to).

If you got junk, and you got the coin, then call 1-800=got=junk.

Age Happens.

So I believe that my general grumpy smurf attitude toward the effects of aging is a direct result of the gym I go to. Most of the guys there are old, and I don't want their problems. One guy today was telling me how bad his arthritis was. Explaining about how it would cripple him if he stood still for too long. It seems like all the old peeps in the world have arthritis, and it doesn't sound like fun. I haven't known many old people in my life, or at least not the kind that complain a lot. I think I can count on my fingers how many old people I actually know, or have known in my life. Anyway, the "in your face" reality of seeing the old people every day is a bit too much.

I'm hoping that by taking very good care of my body and mind by eating right and exercising daily, that I can avoid some of the effects of aging. Hopefully I'm starting early enough to make a difference.

So now that my birthday slump is over, thanks to everyone who wished me a happy birthday.

A legacy top 4.

Top 4 reasons not to get old:
4) When you're bowling, you might accidentally hit your colostomy(sp?) bag with your bowling ball and send a turd flying down the lane.(yep, this actually happened at the bowling league I was in a few years back)

3) By the time you are old, you have accumlated soooo much useless knowledge that you actually take up all the room in your brain that is used for reason and logic. This causes the adverse effect of believing that your useless knowledge in actually useful. So daily, you feel the need to ask guys in the locker room questions like "Do you know how many atoms are in a cubic inch of air?". For the record, I wasn't paying attention to the answer, so I can't tell you, but if I ever need to know, I'll google it.

2) When your old, you find a "comfort zone" in which it is perfectly acceptable to wear speedos to the gym pool. Lets get something strait guys, first off, there is absolutely NO acceptable time to wear a speedo, unless you're a competition swimmer....secondly old people, swimarobics don't count as competition swimming.

1) For some reason, old people can remember how many atoms are in a cubic inch of air, and history of brewing tea, or a million other things that I don't care about, but they can't seem to remember that they already told me that story a couple days ago.

NFL Network

NFL Network is quickly turning out to be the best thing ever created. Between the airing of pre-season games, to the NFL Replay, its a NFL lovers dream. I just watched the replay of thursday's game, followed by the game of the week edition of the game. I won't get to see the bengals game in my area on sunday, so I'm hoping that it will be on replay on tuesday or wednesday. I'm sure it will be.

Side note, I can't wait for the "Manning Bowl". See, I have a confession to make, I hate guys named Manning. Archie, Eli, Peyton, Bubba, Corky, I don't care, I hate Mannings. This is a sure-fire loss for a Manning, and that makes me happy, because one of the mannings MUST loose. The NFL should do this more often, because I love when Mannings loose(Even if it means a Manning has to win). I hope Eli wins, cause I REALLY hate Peyton a lot, and Eli doesn't have much of a shot this season anyway.

It gonna be a good football year.

The steelers open with a win, but just as important...

UPitt is off to a 2-0 record so far! I might be the only guy in a 300 mile radius who is a Pitt fan, and oh boy did I get some shit last season. I want to know how Dave Wandstadt took a top 25 team and turned them into garbage last year. Well, this year is off to a better start, and I'm happy, because I really want Wanny to work out for Pitt. He's a Pittsburgh guy, coaching his college team, in his hometown city. Its the kind of story you love to hear, but last year seemed like it might turn out to be a disaster.

I know that this Pitt squad is a decent ball club. They were top 25 just 2 years ago, and thats pretty good. Now their opponents so far this year have been Cincinatti, and Virginia, so its not like they've faced a tremendous challenge just yet, but they started off strong, and that's good enough for now.

Joey Porter

Man, Joey Porter is playing with a chip "the size o london" on his shoulder. He blew last nights game wide open with 2 sacks, and an int, plus a bunch of hurries and a couple of solo tackles. I think he's going to blow up this year(even more so than the past), which means that next year he probably won't be a steeler any more. Too many big names to keep around for much longer. Troy and Ben need contract extensions, and they just paid out tons of cash for Ike Taylor and Willie Parker. I think Joey might be the odd man out, which is sad because he's a true Steeler, and the heart and soul of the defense.

If he keeps playing like he did last night, he might just leave town with 2 rings.

Damn Holidays.

I missed my regularly scheduled workout today becaue my gym closed at 12:00. Eff holidays. I have a schedule to keep. Just one more indicator that I need to get a weight set for home and do away with my dependancy on the gym being open. Especially since I'm coming up on the fall season and there are a TON of jewish holidays in the fall, which means my gym will be closed a lot. I swear, I want to convert to Jewishness(what is the word for Jewish, Judism? I dunno, Jewishness works for me) just so I can take advantage of the 289 holidays that they have in a year.

In lieu of my normal workout, I took the Kiga for an extra long, and extra rough walk(hike) today. We left the beaten path that we normally travel, and we climbed a mountain, there we're several parts where I had to help the kiga(she's no mountain goat). So I would cling to a rock, and sling the kiga up to the next safest spot where she'd wait for me to catch up, and then I'd do it again until we finally reached the top.

When we got to the top, we sat down for a minute to see what we could see. The world is truly breathtaking if you stop to take a look once in a while. I can't wait until fall, when the leaves are changing.

After that, we decided that we'd pick a direction and wander that way, and we did. We found a canyon that was about 20ft across, and 30-40 ft deep, and of course we couldn't cross it, so we walked along it for a while, until we found a way across. Finally, we came to a shale bank that dropped about 50ft back to the normal path that we walk. The Kiga said she was up for it, so we climbed(slid) down the shale back to the path. The whole trip was probably 5-7 miles. It was nice.

It was nice being out in the woods today, just kind of walking around without any destination. Everyone meditates in their own way, and I seem to meditate best when I'm walking in the forest with just the kiga to keep me company.

Lemons and Lemonade!

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade! That's a decent saying, but I found myself thinking today: "what about when life gives you a steaming pile of fecal matter?"

I guess you bag it, light it on fire and stick it on someone's porch. At least that's what I'd do.

I don't know why crap like this pops into my head, it just does.

Have a nice day!