Gum...

I'm a gum chewer. Some people find this annoying, but I think nothing conveys an air of nonchalance better than chewing a piece of gum. Really, who doesn't want to look nonchalant? Not me. Currently, my gum of choice is:

Orbit.
I like that it's strong initially and maintains its flavor quite well.

Back in the day, like most suburban boys, I wanted to look cool. Obviously, nothing looks cooler than sticking a wad of chewing tobacco in your mouth. Unfortunately, twelve-year-old boys don't always have access to tobacco. Luckily, we DID have:

Big League Chew.

One can only guess how much of a "gateway gum" this became for kids destined for a life full of empty Coke bottles, half-full with dip-juice, and mouth cancer.

Perhaps the suckiest gum of all time was:

Chicklets Tiny Size.
This gum was fucking bogus. You pretty much had to empty the entire contents of the pack into your mouth just to end up with an adequate piece of gum to chew. Plus, it didn't taste all that good and had minimal staying power. Shit was WACK, yo.

Fuck...

This is courtesy of Megan at By & By. Now do you see why I like her so much?

Another Good Movie It Took Me A Long Time To See...

It was recommended that I see "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington". I thought it was excellent. Sure, some of it is a little corny, but much of it is still applicable to today's politics.

For some reason I was under the impression that there was a monkey in this movie.

Avast, Ye Matey...

A few summers ago I began a brief stint as a crew member on a boat competing in a weekly regatta held on my lake. It was a nightmare. I didn't know jack squat about sailboats. The boat I was on was a scow, a very fast boat, but also one prone to tipping over easily. Scows have flat hulls, kind of like a big windsurfer, and "daggerboards", rather than a central keel, that you raise and lower depending on which way you're heeling. There were a few times we tipped due directly to something I fucked up. Luckily the rest of the crew were easy-going and didn't give me too much shit. I decided to surrender my spot to someone else the following summer.

The one thing I did enjoy was brainstorming names for our craft. A few of my suggestions were:

• Miocardial Infarction (three of us were ski patrollers)
• Bloody Stool (I bet there aren't any other boats named this)
  
• Satan's Chariot (sounded intimidating)
• Those Aren't Buoys (Seinfeld reference)
• Harvey Walleye-Banger (there are Walleye on my lake)

They didn't use any of mine. Shocker. But hey, mine beat the shit out of lame-o names like "Liquid Assets" or "Wet & Wild".

Unknown Fruit...

I don't think I've ever had a papaya before.

Are they good? What do they taste like?

Is that caviar in the middle?

What's It Gonna Be?...

You can watch Creed on "The Office" tonight at 8:30 P.M. (Eastern) and laugh your ass off

OR

You can watch Judd Hirsch in "Ordinary People" on HBO, beginning at 6:45 P.M. (Eastern) and cry.

All I Can Say Is Wow...

I never thought he could do it. I was about as dead-set against any sort troop escalation as anyone could be. After last night's landmark speech, however, I see the error of my ways.

He was so "on" last night. He had the charisma of Kennedy, the gravitas of Patton, and the foresight of, um, Grover Cleveland? He made his point cogently and passionately. He asserted that failure in Iraq is not an option. Amazing! I never really thought about that. As far as I'm concerned, any credibility he'd lost these past few years was recaptured last night.

So, I am no longer in the ranks of the freedom-hating. These colors don't run. Love it or leave it. Live free or die. Baghdad, ho! Let's roll!

A Brand New Feature At Some Guy's Blog!...

I think I'll call it "Some Guy Asks You Questions And You Answer Them". It is a way for me to peel back the layers of some of our favorite bloggers and get down to the core - the essence - of who they really are. My first Guinea Pig is:

Our friend, Anne Altman. Anne runs a blog called Two Can Anne. She was one of the very first blogs I started reading. I had the pleasure of spending time with Anne and her cat, Doodle, while in New York City recently. For those of you who follow her, she is pretty much exactly like you'd imagine. I was happy to learn that Anne was willing to answer a few questions. Her answers appear in bold.

-Hi, Anne. How are you?

Eh.

-I have a few questions for you, if you don't mind. I'm curious, what eighties sitcom character can you most relate to and why?

I'm a Golden Girls' Dorothy Petrillo-Sbornak with a Sophia Petrillo rising.

-What's the most you'd pay for a haircut?

$30. If I could trim it myself with a cigarette lighter, I would.

-I understand you live in Manhattan. What's with all the urine?

The city runs on it.

-My brother sat next to E! Channel personality, Giuliana De Pandi on a
recent flight from LA to Chicago.

Shoot me when I recognize that name, please.

-Switching to politics, what is your take on North Dakota's recent threat to
secede from the union?

Bye!

-Can you spell the word "verisimilitude"?

Yes.

-Finally, Yellow snow. Eat it? Don't? Where do you stand?

What's with all the urine questions? Never say never. Ever see "Alive?"

Thanks, Anne! If any of you would like to be a featured interviewee, please leave a note in the comments. I will tailor my questions to each individual.

Great Movie Lines Throughout History, Part 1...

"Bitches leave!"

Clarence Boddicker, Robocop.

Sorry, ladies...

This Is The Biggest Speech Of His Life Tonight...

Thus sayeth the punditry in TalkingHeadLand.

I say: *yawn* (cough cough) *YAWN*



Dumb fucking dummy.

America Thanks You...

Let me be the first to thank the two of you. You are doing this country a great service. Thanks to your childish antics, we have been spared from having to pay attention to all the other bad shit going down in the world right now. It gets old watching the news these day, what with all the death and suffering. Your public spat has given us some respite from this. I, for one, beg you to keep it up. The longer you two drag this out, the better we'll feel, the longer Fox News can go without relaying how bad Iraq is, and the richer you'll ultimately become. Surely there are more physical attributes each of you possess that the other could make fun of. I could help out with a few. Who would've ever thought that your pettiness and incivility could be such an asset as we fight this Global War Against Violent Extremism? God bless both your fevered egos. The same egos that are tainting our collective unconscious and making us pay a higher cosmic price than we ever imagined (credit: Bill Hicks).

A Momentous Occassion...

Sometime between last night and this morning, this blog eclipsed the 10,000 visit mark.

My sincerest apologies to all those I had to crush on my journey to the top. No hard feelings?

Something New...

This weekend my dad called me and told me he was engaged.

That's something that's never happened before.

Congrats to he and his new fiance!

P.S.- Rad orange-tinted glasses, dude.

My Memory Is Hazy...

Were there ever any episodes of CHiPs that didn't have scenes of people engaged in roller disco?

Sounds About Right...

From today's "A Word A Day":

malkin (MO-kin, MAL-kin) noun

1. An untidy woman; a slattern.

2. A scarecrow or a grotesque effigy.

3. A mop made of a bundle or rags fastened to a stick.

4. A cat.

5. A hare.

Fun Things To Do In Boyne City, Michigan...

I am always trying to boost the tourism of Northern Michigan, especially Boyne City. Here are a few suggestions to help you plan your next trip:

- You could test the bearing capacity of the ice on Lake Charlevoix like this guy did with his brand new snowmobile:
Or this guy and his ice-fishing shanty:
Chances are, it'll get you on the local news.

-In the spring, we have the Boyne City Mushroom Festival. Yeah, it's not THOSE kinds of mushrooms, unfortunately, although I think whoever is wearing this get-up might have to ingest a few before putting it on:
Reminds me of the Ween classic, "Mushroom Festival In Hell". Great tune. Sad costume.

- You can also bear witness to the time-honored tradition of fudgemaking (just like every other tourist up here). Check it out. Quite a log this guy's working on, huh?
Do not get this confused with the fudgePACKING demonstrations. Those are just plain depressing.

-Finally, cap off your visit with a tour of the nearby East Jordan Iron Works. Haven't you ever wondered where all those great fire hydrants and manhole covers come from? I knew you did! Now's your chance to find out.
Wow, red AND yellow! What will they think of next!?

See, who needs Disney World? Fuck those fuckers and come to God's Country instead!

On Architecture...

I realized I don't spend a lot of time on this blog discussing my profession - architecture. I knew I wanted to be an architect since I was little, maybe fourth or fifth grade. I've always had an appreciation for beautiful buildings and I credit a lot of it to growing up near Chicago - home to lots of great architecture.

In college, I was really intrigued by deconstructivist architecture. It was the hot thing at the time. The buildings looked so different from anything I'd ever seen. I was interested in the work of Coop Himmelblau after seeing an exhibit at the Pompidou Center in Paris. I also liked the buildings of Zaha Hadid and, although he's probably not considered deconstructivist, I really love the buildings and bridges of Santiago Calatrava. I admired all the rule-breaking. In college, most of the buildings I was interested in were the ones that stuck out - that looked different from anything else or tried something new. That's one of the reasons I loved Gaudi's buildings in Barcelona (pictured above) - very sculptural and organic and unlike the other buildings of the time.

Nowadays, I am more focused on the area of architecture that I've always had the most interest in - residences. It's also the area with the least notoriety. That's fine with me. I used to work at firms that did large-scale commercial or educational projects. I didn't like the impersonality of it. I'd much rather work with a family and give them something they truly love than deal with school boards or faceless corporations. I have mellowed out quite a bit from my deconstructivist days. Now, I prefer nice, innovative details, intimate spaces, and quality materials. I prefer small homes. I'm a big fan of log construction and fine craftsmanship.

Here are a few architectural links for you: Sketches I did while in Europe and pictures of buildings I saw. There are also a few pics of buildings I worked on here, but the page is woefully incomplete right now.

What are some of your favorite buildings?

Time To Start Saving Lives...

Up here in Northern Michigan, we have not been blessed with a white winter. We got some good dumpage at the beginning of December, but thanks to warm weather and rain, that has been reduced to a few rare, sooty plow-pile remnants. Despite this, the area where I ski patrol has notoriously good snowmaking abilities. They crank the shit out like crazy any time there are temps below 28 degrees. The consistency of manmade snow has improved dramatically over the years, to the point where it's hard to tell the difference once it's all groomed out.

So, tomorrow will be my first day on duty for the season. My cold kept me from going today. Let's hope I don't have to use any of that AED training I got in the off-season.

Let Me Just Wipe Up That Last Post...

Sorry about that. I didn't come into work yesterday. I didn't want to flood my office with mucus.

The snot post did remind me of something from my childhood. On the block where I grew up in suburban Chicago, I had a friend named Chris. He was a couple years younger than me. To keep things straight, I was known on our block as "Big Chris" and he was "Little Chris", despite the fact that I wasn't all that big. At any rate, anytime Little Chris would sneeze, without fail, he would be left with this super-long green booger dangling from his nose. The damn thing seriously reached down to his knees. Every time! All us other kids thought it was hilarious and I sensed he took great pride in being able to amuse us.

Anybody Need Some Snot?...

I've got quite a surplus of it at the moment.
I could ship it to you.
No charge.

Documentary Film Of The Day - Sherman's March...

I haven't done one of these for a long time and I know they don't generate a big response, but I really love documentaries and like to promote good ones when I can. The actual title for this film is Sherman's March: A Mediation to the Possibility of Romantic Love in the South During an Era of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation. Kinda cool, huh? It was made by one of my favorite documentary filmmakers, Ross McElwee. I'd actually recommend his entire catalog of films, but I'll focus on this one - the first of his I saw. Ross has a unique style. He films all of his own shit, including conversations he's having with others. It's surprising how much honesty he can elicit this way. His films are introspective and personal. He also does some narration in a very soothing, subtle southern drawl. This movie began as a project to retrace the steps of General Sherman during the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression, for my southern readers). It becomes something much different. He sort of changes the scope of the project midstream (or perhaps it was his intent all along?) and focuses on his series of troubled female relationships and the pressure he feels from his proper southern family to find a wife and settle down. If you have Netflix, try this one out and see what you think. If nothing else, it's different than the films you normally see.

O.K., Democrats...

...it's your turn. We gave you both houses. Whatcha gonna do now?

My guess is not much. Sorry to be so cynical. With just a one vote advantage in the Senate and the president's veto pen at the ready (which, by the way, still has PLENTY of ink left), I doubt you'll be able to make the sweeping changes you'd like and we deserve. My one hope is that you at least stop being whipping boys and girls for those bully Repubs. Fuck them. They were wrong. Many of you were right. On a lot of shit. Don't forget that. Keep in mind, the media is licking their chops, waiting for you to fuck something up. In this "Fair And Balanced" world, they need to beat up on the other party for a while to somehow prove their objectivity. It's bogus, yes, but it's the how they roll.

So, I'd say take the gloves off! Go for broke! You've tried the mild, milquetoast approach. Take it to 'em this round. Remind them whose side the truth is on. And for god's sake, keep your wieners out of the pages and your hands out of crooked lobbyist's pockets. Think you can do that? Yeah, who am I kidding?

Time For A Q-Tip Party!...

-Does anyone else get a tingly sensation when they use a Q-tip? It's somewhat similar to a "piss shiver".

-Q-tips are one of a few things I refuse to buy generic. Non-Q-tip brand Q-tips always seem to suck ass.

-Some people try to tell you using Q-tips to clean your ears is dangerous and unhealthy. Whatever.

The Best Christmas Ever...

I like to avoid flowery posts where I talk about how great my life is, much like those obnoxious Christmas cards I bitched about a few posts back. However, this particular Christmas was so fucking incredible that I'm afraid you're just going to have to suffer or else stop reading now. This is also a post I'm very nervous about writing (kind of like THIS ONE). It will reveal some private shit about me that I've kept out of my blog thus far.

First, the benign stuff. As I mentioned briefly, I had been having communication problems with my brother. We hadn't spoken since August. Fortunately, these problems seem to have resolved themselves for the time being and we got along great. I truly hope that things between us will continue to improve. I also got to spend considerable time with my cutie-pie niece. She has a minimal recognition of me, which about makes me melt. It was nice to spend more time with my dad and his girlfriend as well. As usual, my mom - the emotional anchor of my family - created a pleasant atmosphere with plenty of laughs. I also got to spend the Friday before Christmas with some of my closest friends. So far, so good, right? It gets better.

From the day after Christmas until Saturday, I got to enjoy the company of a beautiful woman. I know. Shocking.

Here's the thing: I know I've spent a lot of blog space lamenting my ineffectiveness when it comes to attracting women. However, I've never really opened up about just how deep this ineffectiveness runs. You see - and this is a huge closet I'm exiting now - I have never in my 34 years had a proper girlfriend. You can't imagine how tough and embarassing this is for me to admit. I've gone on dates, had drunken make-out sessions, even had a brief courtship with a female member of one of my bike tours, but I've never been able to say "I'd like you to meet my girlfriend." I've had numerous unrequited crushes on women who I felt, at the time, may have been interested in me, but never were. It is something that has been a drag on my self-esteem ever since I was young and started noticing girls not noticing me. Let's face it, to be my age and in this situation is pretty weird. Trust me, no one knows this more than me. While I am shy, I'm not a complete social misfit. I can carry on coherent conversations with members of the opposite sex without sweating profusely or stammering. I'm not grossly disfigured, but I always assumed there was something physically unappealing about me, because I always felt confident that I was funny and intelligent and, most of all, a nice guy. After a while, I started losing interest in even trying to date, kind of like Andy in "The 40-Year-Old Virgin". Luckily for me, I have a great group of friends that never made me feel strange about any of this. They accepted me regardless. Even so, I've always felt abnormal as a result.

Anyway, the four days after Christmas were magical. Without going into a lot of detail, I got to do a lot of the things most of you would probably take for granted. Things like taking walks arm-in-arm or hand-in-hand. I got to be romantic for the first time - a side of me that has had to lie in wait, lo these many years. I got to eat in a cozy restaurant and gaze into my companion's eyes and just feel happy. I got to share a bottle of decent champagne and Godiva chocolates. I got to steal kisses in elevators until other people got on. Most of all, I got to spend time with someone I'm crazy about and someone that seems to like me as well, even knowing all the stuff about me I've just told you.

I hope this post didn't make you grab for your barf bag. For those of you reading that are still hoping to find someone special, don't give up hope. If I can find it, anyone can. I also hope I haven't ruined my rep as a foul-mouthed dork with liberal tendencies. I'm still the same guy you've come to know and like. I'm just a little (well, a lot) happier. I promise not to let it affect the high-quality snark I strive to provide here at Some Guy's Blog.

Iceland...

I noticed on my SiteMeter that I just had my first ever visitor from Iceland. I've always wanted to visit Iceland. It looks cool as shit and not nearly as icy as one might imagine.

So, anonymous visitor from Iceland, if you're still there, I guess I'm asking if it's OK if I stay with you when I come to Iceland? I'll bring beer.