I wake up weird and whiny OR I break for stolen lunches

I've complained a lot about growing up, becoming an adult and getting a real job. I've fought it the whole way but after four months I have to say that being grown up is not so bad. The worst part so far is waking up early.

In college there was always the option of getting late classes or sleeping through classes and getting the notes from an over-achieving friend. There were also tons of holidays, sometimes class got canceled and sometimes I would just pretend that class was canceled.

If it was work that was threatening to wake me up early I could always call in sick to whatever crappy minimum wage college student job I had that I didn't care if I got fired from. Most places that employ college students kind of expect them to be super-flaky anyway and they don't take it too hard when you bail on them.

Unfortunately, those days are in the past. Now I frequently find myself rising before the sun, and just as frequently, I find myself arguing with my alarm clock, which is a silly thing to do seeing how an alarm clock is an inanimate object and can't really be swayed one way or the other.

Alarm clock: Beep beep beep beep beep beep

Me: What?! It can't be 6 already!

Alarm clock: Beep beep beep beep beep beep

Me: But I'm so tired.

Alarm clock: Beep beep beep beep beep beep

Me: I swear I just went to sleep! Honest!

Alarm clock: Beep beep beep beep beep beep

So, having failed to convince my alarm clock to alter the space/time continuum and give me a few extra minutes, I wake up. But just barely.

Working is not so bad because the older I get, the more money I get, but I also lose my youth and my general enthusiasm for living. This principle could best be described in this graph I made in Microsoft Paint:

Working for a living is fraught with temptations, too. Where I work the office refrigerator is like The Garden of Eden. You know what The Garden of Eden is, don't you? God made the earth, saw that it was too clean, peaceful and orderly and decided to create the first man and woman whom he called Adam and Eve, respectively. Then God told them not to eat certain fruit, which of course they did the first chance they got.

Upon questioning Adam blamed Eve and Eve blamed the serpent. The serpent didn't have a leg to stand on. God was so annoyed that he kicked them all out of the pretty garden and they had to start wearing clothes, paying taxes and flossing.

The fridge is in the break room, but some people are too good to store their meals in a community food cooling receptacle, so they have their own small personal fridges in their offices. I can't afford one, and I think that having you own personal fridge in your office is borderline ridiculous, so I am content to stash my bologna sandwiches with everyone else's stuff.

The problem comes when I see what everyone else has for lunch and I am sorely tempted. Would it really be so bad to steal Co-worker's leftovers from Olive Garden? I ask myself. Other Co-worker would probably never miss that fried chicken, I think. Like Adam and Eve, I would definitely be cast out of the break room for eating that forbidden fruit. The main difference is that I'm not naked and God is not really involved, so far as I can tell.

Thank goodness.

Girlfriend gift getting is getting easier

After years and years of championing the cause of single people and just generally smack-talking committed relationships I have decided to take the girlfriend plunge. That's right, ladies. I am off the market. Cry if you must and then you'll just need to get over me.

One night I was hanging out with my brother Brennan. He just got engaged recently, so this story obviously takes place before he got engaged because engaged people evaporate into thin air the instant they become engaged and their friends never see them again. Anyway, I was complaining about how I was broke and needed to figure out how to save money.

“You should just break up with your girlfriend,” Brennan said. “That is the most cost effective thing a man can do.”

He is absolutely right, but it's not like he can really talk because he just shelled out a bunch of money for an engagement ring, which is basically a huge conspiracy. Long ago the world's jewelry retailers came together from all over the world and held a super-secret meeting. They asked each other, "How can we sell more diamonds?" Then a ratlike, shifty-eyed jewelry salesman said, "Let's make it a 'tradition' that when a couple gets engaged the man has to buy the woman a really expensive diamond ring. Then when they get married he has to buy her another one."


Luckily Brennan's fiancee is super cool and only wanted a regular-sized, modest ring. My GF is also awesomely low-maintenance, but dating in general is not cheap. As a man, you have to pay for dinner and basically everything else too. If a man and a woman are out and money is being spent, it is a safe bet that it is coming straight out of the man's wallet.

In a serious relationship you are obligated to buy gifts for birthdays, your anniversary, Christmas/Hanukah/Kwanza/Solstice/whatever, and Valentine's Day. That's four gifts a year minimum. And that's only if nothing else comes up. If she has a kid you have to add Mother's Day and then you also have to get her stuff if she graduates and when you get in trouble.

And so, if you want to keep you girlfriend and not declare bankruptcy a simple solution is to skimp on gifts. Here are a few examples:

The first thing I do is get her something I want and then steal it back. CDs are great for this.

GF: “Stir the Blood by The Bravery? Who the heck is The Bravery? And I don't even like this kind of music.”
Me: “You'll love them. Can I borrow it?”

The next trick is to make her something because girls eat that up. A “homemade” card is pure frugal genius. If you put a poem in there – no matter how shocking or awful – you are set for life. If your girlfriend doesn't like the free gifts then she is probably a gold digger and you need to tell her to take that poem and hit the bricks. Homemade gifts save money and weed out losers!

If you own a guitar, that is a money saving device! And if you don't have one, buy one. It will easily pay for itself after 1-2 gift-requiring days. Songs are an awesome free present, and they don't even have to be good. Just throw in a few metaphors (“I love you like salmonella loves improperly cooked chicken”) and something about “true love.” The perfect gift for any occasion for only $FREE.99!


You can also substitute cheap stuff for expensive stuff. Instead of buying my GF perfume I get her fried chicken because that is a smell I really get excited about.

More thought on Halloween OR Don't send your ill-mannered kids to my house asking for candy ever again

Another Halloween has come and gone and I find myself in a reflective mood. I've decided that when it comes to dressing up there are two types of people: those who LOVE to dress up and those who can really do without it.

I am, of course, the latter. I love Halloween but not costumes. I love pumpkins, fall weather and, most importantly, candy, but weird outfits are not my cup of tea, ok? Little kids dressing up = cute, adults dressing up = annoying.

The “thrive on dressing up” group, on the other hand, starts planning their costume for next year the day after Halloween. And the weeks before Halloween they are always saying what they are going to be. These people might even go so far as to make a costume. Goodness gracious me.

The two groups cannot communicate either. The pro-costumers can't understand why other grown people don't get as excited about playing dress-up as they do. Don't get me wrong. If you like to dress up, by all means, dress up. Just don't make me do it too. I want to save my money for candy.

The main problem is costume selection is tricky. This year I thought about buying a bald cap and shaving my beard into a goatee and going to work as my office manager for Halloween. I figured this would either be a huge hit and he would be flattered or it would be a huge bomb and I would be on his crap list forever. I decided the risk was too big to take for a new-ish employee.

When dressing up on Halloween in an office setting you run the risk that no one else will come in costume and you will look like huge fool. Nothing ventured nothing gained, right? If this is the case you can just show how confident you are and proudly strut around the office, flaunting your Halloween spirit and youthful exuberance. Or you can call somebody to bring you a change of clothes and change in the bathroom partway through the day.

Some people did dress up. We had several very serious meetings that day and I had the hardest time keeping a straight face when discussing serious child welfare matters with Little Bo Peep, a French maid and a giant whoopee cushion.

On Halloween night I was passing out candy and a little kid came to my door. When I threw the candy into his pillowcase he said, “Ugh, I don't want to eat that.”

What?! Have you ever heard that “Beggars can't be choosers,” punk? Pretty sure what you're doing right now qualifies as begging, so get the heck off my porch!

Last blog I smack talked white people for not giving out very much candy to trick-or-treaters, so I had to put my money where my mouth is and buy a grip of candy.

I poured all my candy into a bowl and when the kids would come by I would hold the bowl out to them and let them reach out some candy. That was a stupid way to do it, but I was laboring under the false impression that little children are innocent and sweet. Little kids are greedy, if you didn't already know. I didn't. Some of those kids pulled out ridiculous amounts of candy in just one little fist. Other kids weren't shy at all and grabbed with both hands, or took several handfuls.

By the end of the night I was having to ration the candy, one piece per trick-or-treater.

Darn those stingy white people.


PS - Hooray for November! November is an awesome month for the following reasons:
1. "Tony Hillerman Week" is November 1-8. If you haven't read his stuff, you should.
2. Movember. I will be growing a mustache to benefit testicular and prostate cancer. Expect lots of pictures.
3. NaNoWriMo. I started writing a 50,000 word novel on November 1 and I intend on finishing it by November 30. I'll let you know how it goes.

Sugar and more sugar to the rescue

In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. Fortunately in the fall – after he has wasted a few perfectly good seasons on love – a young man's fancy lightly turns to much more awesome thoughts of Halloween. Well, I guess I can't speak for every young man and their fancies, but I can say that my fancy turns to thoughts of Halloween, specifically the candy. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

I know Halloween is coming because everyone in my office building has caught the Halloween spirit and have covered the halls and offices in skeletons, ghosts and pumpkins. One of the units has gotten really enthusiastic and their hall is way more Halloween-y than ours and they make fun of us.

Rival unit: “Hey when are you going to decorate your hallway? Oh, you already did? That's funny. It's not very scary. It looks like a baby's nursery or something. Frankly, the men's restroom is more scary than that.”

This is true. The men's restroom is pretty scary, but that's neither here nor there. The point is that it is getting kind of creepy around the office. Just the other day I was fixing my lunch in the break room and out of the corner of my eye I saw someone lurking in the shadows, watching me. It gave me the jibblies. What creepo is watching me microwave my frozen burrito? I thought, trying to quickly make a plan. Brandishing my burrito like a weapon I whirled, ready to fight. To my chagrin I had almost jumped a cardboard witch cutout that someone had put up without my noticing. Luckily, no one else was in the break room to see my burrito ninja moves.

To add to the holiday cheer a bunch of kids are coming to our office to go trick-or-treating on October 30, which is a pretty sweet deal. I figure there are at least 50 offices, the equivalent of at least two streets. The kids only have to walk a few feet between offices, which will be way quicker than if they actually went door-to-door. That is a lot of candy-per-minute, plus it's a day before Halloween so they can go out and get more loot the next day. Kids these days. So spoiled.

I feel bad giving kids a bunch of candy and sending them back to their parents all hyper and full of cavities, so I was toying with the idea of giving out something healthy, like apples or sugar-free gum or floss. Then I remembered people like the dentist that lived in the neighborhood and gave out toothbrushes embossed with his office number and I realized everybody hates that guy. When you are inventorying your stash that toothbrush goes straight into the trash, along with those black and orange peanut butter things.

This brings back all the memories of trick-or-treating as a kid, when we would try and go to the rich neighborhood because there were houses that were fabled to give out whole candy bars and dollar bills. One of my friends and I went out one year and we had been knocking doors for a while when he said, “You know, white people don't give out very much candy.”

It was true! We kept track the rest of the night and, sure enough, the people who gave out the least candy were European Americans/Anglos/caucasians/politically correct term of your choice.

“Nice. One roll of Smarties. Thanks, Mr. Johnson.”

Everybody else fairly threw candy at us. It was quite a phenomenon.

Love can wait until spring. Right now I'm glad it is the season for candy.

PS - In your experience, who gives out the most/least candy? Comment if you want.

My friends are good at being bad

My friends are all liars. That sounds harsh but it's totally true. Sure, they are liars with good hearts and wonderful intentions, but liars just the same.

Basically they tell me what I want to hear, because they are really good friends. Or are they? They mean well, but I can never tell what my friends are giving me: the truth, or the truth watered down a lot so it won't hurt my feelings.

For example: I was dating a girl named So-and-so and I thought she was great. Coincidentally, my friends all thought she was great too. She had a bunch of weird, red flags popping out all over the place but I couldn't see them because I was totally enamored with her and enamored with being enamored. My friends didn't say a word. Why do they let me run headlong into girls who are train wrecks? Because they don't want to hurt my feelings, those jerks!

I started to figure it out when the lovely, sweet So-and-so and I would break up. Curiously, the same friends who agreed with me when I thought she was wonderful and flawless were now agreeing with me when I would grumble, cry and moan about how terrible she was. “Yeah, she was totally wrong for you,” they would say. Why didn't they tell me sooner? Oh yeah, my feelings. I don't think I would freak out and yell at them, but I can't be sure because no one has ever told me the truth.

But now I have friends I can trust, or rather I have friends that I've had long enough to know when they're lying.

Me: “Oh, man. So-and-so is really great, you know?”

Friend: “Yeah, she's, um, unique.”

Right here is where, in the past, I would've charged on ahead and raved about So-and-so, blissfully unaware that my friend does not approve but doesn't want to poop on my puppy love party. But now I'm older, and, I daresay, wiser. Here are a few euphemisms that my friends use to avoid telling the truth:

“unique” = weird
“nice” = ugly
“spunky” = bossy
“confident” = mean
“earthy” = dumpy
“she knows what she wants” = high maintenance

So forth and so on. Dating itself is kind of just one big lie, isn't it? A first date is essentially a lying contest to see who can get the other to believe a bunch of lies.

What you say: “For fun I like to run, bike, swim, kayak and climb mountains. My hobbies include vaccinating orphans with dirty faces in third world countries, neutering abandoned kittens at the local animal shelter and knitting scarves and woolen mittens for elderly people with bad circulation."

What you mean: “For fun I usually watch a whole season of The Office on DVD in one sitting, only getting off the couch when I run out of 'Chunky Monkey.' And that's about it.”

I'd like to say I'd never lied on a first date but it's not true. One time I was trying find some kind of common ground with a girl who I had absolutely nothing in common with. The tricky part was she was super attractive, so I wanted desperately to have something in common with her.

She started talking about music and I though to myself, “I'm saved! I love music!” Then she said, “I really like the band Chicago. I think their music is really great. Do you like Chicago?”

I won't tell you what I said, but the next time you Peter Cetera croon “You're the feeling in my life, you're the inspiration” try not to think about what a liar I am.

PS - Please comment!