Woe is me

I think I'm finally getting over this sickness... I'd better be. Fever, body aches, headaches for five full days straight. The light at the end of the tunnel came early this morning when I woke up in a full-on sweat. I felt and looked like a freshly glazed Krispy Kreme. Needless to say, Steph washed our bed sheets today.

Caption this picture

My wife took this picture of our daughter the other day. When she takes a shower she usually puts Makenna in her exer-saucer to keep her out of trouble. Feel free to post your captions.

If people treated their houses...

I came up with this idea yesterday for some reason. Probably because I'm weird. Enjoy!

If people treated their houses like they do their web sites...

• The front lawn contains an obnoxious yellow and purple sign with ridiculously large font that reads, "Welcome to our house. We hope you like your visit. Please browse around and sign the guestbook next to the front door. Come back and visit soon."
  
• The mailbox has wings on it and would rotate 24/7.
  
• You are forced to stand on the front porch and watch a short, flashy presentation announcing whose house you're entering. Once the presentation is done the front door appears.
  
• There is a turnstile at the front door that counts the number of people entering the house. A sign next to the front door reads, "You are visitor number 63 since October 10, 1998"
  
• The carpet is bright blue and tiled with pictures of whatever your favorite hobby is. Or, your carpet is jet black and all your furniture is red and yellow.
  
• Anything attached to the walls inside your house including picture frames, lighting, and window treatments would move constantly.
  
• Everything in your house would be contained in one single room that is 150 feet long and 18 feet wide.
  
• Strobe lights hang from your ceiling in the amount of 1 for every 25 square feet of space.
  
• If it is a Christian household, there are brochures all over the house telling each visitor they're going to hell.
  
• A musak version of "Eye of the Tiger" is played from an old cassette player in the corner that you can't shut off.
  
• One wall is filled with every picture the family owns. There is a caption underneath each picture.
  
• Another wall contains the addresses of and directions to everybody we know and other houses we like.
  
• All paintings look like 3rd grade art projects.
  
• Everytime something inside or outside of the house is changed, a signed in the corner is updated: "This house was modified on May 19, 2004."
  
• There are advertisements, catalogs, and flyers all over the place because anytime someone orders something the homeowner gets .001% of your purchase.
  
• When you ask a resident of the house a question they respond by yelling, "JAVASCRIPT ERROR!" and force you to leave the house, watch the presentation, and come back in.

Shopping excitement

Went shopping this evening to return some pants I bought last week. It turns out I'm not allowed to shop on my own anymore if it has anything to do with clothes except if it's underwear or socks or something like that.

Anyway, we walked out of the mall with two new pairs of pants from the Gap and I officially have my own cell phone now! Thanks, TJ, for hookin' me up with some digits. Now I'm cool like all my other cool friends who have cell phones. I wasn't so cool when I had to explain that I had to borrow my wife's cell phone when I needed to use it. Now, if there's some way I can get another CR-V...

Pop Top 5

1. Pepsi

2. Ruby Red Squirt

3. A&W

4. Vernor's

5. Vanilla Coke/Dr. Pepper (tie)

Reason #2 to Not Buy a House

The next door neighbor's house has termites which means my house could be infested. $1800 treatment. If the freakin' ark would have been made out of steel or plastic we probably wouldn't have this problem.

Coined word update

You guys are fortunate to visit this blog since this is the only web site on the planet using the word I created. [Bookie scratches head] It hasn't taken off yet but I suspect it will gain popularity in the coming months.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=decapotatoes

Bookie's Most Outrageous Moments #4

My friend and I were walking around our college town at around 1:00 AM and were approached by a couple young college girls in a red corvette. They propisitioned us for sex and even offered to pay. Since I was "dating" another girl I turned down the once-in-a-lifetime offer. My friend wouldn't let me live that down. Did I mention we were fourteen years old?

No more free lunches

Alas, today is the last day of free lunches until the students return in August. It will be tough but I think I'll make it through.

Things I'll miss not eating at the campus cafeteria for the summer...

...not having to spend money on lunch
...passing up grilled cheese for a salad and a sandwich
...having an excuse to get away from my desk for an hour or so
...flaunting the fact that I'm not wearing a tie
...finding opportunities to show my tattoo
...watching people scrape pieces of waffle out of the waffle maker because they can't figure out how the thing works
...passing up a weird casserole for a salad and a bowl of soup
...walking through 18 inches of snow in March in order to eat questionable food
...eight flavors of ice cream and twelve different cereals
...Andrew G. yelling, "BOOK!"
...discussions about vasectomies
...passing up stir fry for a bowl of soup and a sandwich
...writing or putting things on Scott's car on the way to lunch
...turning a simple plate of french fries into a culinary masterpiece
...not having to wonder if it's veal or chicken
...trying to make people laugh at my joke about smiley fries/decapotatoes
...watching today's ham become tomorrow's ham and potato casserole
...watching today's ham and potato casserole become tomorrow's ham and potato soup
...watching today's ham and potato soup become tomorrow's potato and cheese soup once all the ham is gone and they add cheese

Bookie's Most Outrageous Moments #3

Breaking My Arms
I grew up going to "church camp", a Christian camp for kids from age 9 up through high school. I had gone there at least once a year until I started working there after my sophomore year in high school. My job was washing the dishes but most of my time was spent flirting with the girls that worked in the kitchen and the campers who, incidentally, were only 1-2 years younger than me.

All those working there for the summer arrived on Thursday for orientation. The campers arrived on Monday. On Tuesday evening, five days after I arrived, I was messing around on the basketball court. You see, despite my not-so-tall stature, I can (used to, anyway) jump pretty high. I was dunking and touching the rim. The last time, for some strange reason, I grabbed onto the rim and didn't let go making my body swing high up into the air. My sweaty hand couldn't hold onto the rim and I flew through the air facing up toward the sky. Right before I hit the ground I was able to turn my body over and land face down. Unfortunately, I landed with such force that I broke both of my arms: my left wrist and my right elbow. The camp was on an island in Lake Erie and by this time in the evening the ferry service to the mainland had stopped until morning. I had to wait in agony until the next day to go to the hospital.

Bookie's Most Outrageous Moments #2

The Lawn
As a new homeowner, I wanted to take care of the lawn and make it look nice and green. The couple we purchased the house from left us with some nice landscaping around the house. I thought it would be a good idea to complement the landscaping with a groomed lawn.

My first idea was to put fertilizer on the grass so it would get lush and green. I had purchased the fertilizer but I didn't have a spreader. I knew my co-worker had a broadcast spreader but he wasn't available at the moment and I wanted to take care of the lawn right away. My only option was to borrow my neighbor's drop spreader. What a mistake. When you're used to a broadcast spreader, a drop spreader is just torture. Based on the size of my lawn, I would only need a half of a bag of fertilizer for the entire lawn. Well, I set the spreader wrong and dropped half of what I was going to use on the whole lawn in one small area in the backyard. To top it off, I left huge gaps between each of my rows. Realizing I used too much fertilizer, I hooked up the sprinkler and soaked down the yard so I wouldn't kill my grass. What I ended up with was an evenly-striped backyard with lush, green grass and pale, weedy grass.

It doesn't stop there. A week or so later I decided I wanted to kill the big weeds around the yard with some weed killer. I bought some stuff that would take care of the job and walked around spraying and killing every weed I could find. After I was done and satisfied that the weeds were adequately annihilated, I read the label on the spray bottle. The product I was using to kill the weeds was also designed to kill grass and any other plant life. Every location I sprayed for weeds left about a 6 inch brown spot of dead grass and weeds. We had a heavily striped and pokadotted backyard for the entire summer.

Bookie's Most Outrageous Moments #1

In no particular order...

Van Halen From the Bell Tower
A sophomore at Baptist Bible College, I was asked to play my keyboard for the freshman in the bell tower of the main building. While I was setting up, I was encouraged to play something to test out the equipment. So, I turned up my amp about halfway and proceeded to play Jump by Van Halen. During my performance, the incoming freshmen were sitting around the grounds of the campus talking about the rules of dorm living and specifically the music policy. My amp is roughly the size of a small automobile and has enough power, evidently, to project the sweet sounds of Van Halen into every dorm room around campus (so I'm told). I walked away with a "point" and a long-lasting reputation of being "the guy who played Van Halen from the bell tower."