Home For The Holidays

Hey there 'Redheads... I hope everyone is having a very merry and a holly jolly. Since the last installment, things for me have been less than cheery. Thankfully, things are on the upswing and I no longer feel like someone has a voodoo doll of me with a pin stuck in the ass. If you'll remember, my car got stolen last week. Well, the most recent dollop of sour cream on that shitburger is that the blower motor on my heating system went kaput on Tuesday night. If you're keeping score (and I do), that's the hassle of a stolen vehicle and the inconvenience and expense of having no heat during the coldest time of the year. Apparently, I have some exotic heating system that uses a motor that was first sketched out on DaVinci's doodle pad...so that has to be special ordered. The repair company has top men working on it right now...top men. I'm subletting my apartment to a family of penguins until everything gets found and fixed. Where am I living in the meantime? Glad you asked...with my parents...in their guest bedroom...on a day bed. I'm lucky they live close. I don't have to worry about a hotel and they don't have to go far to nag me, so it works out for both parties. I've been eating better the last couple of days, too. I had Wheaties this morning. The breakfast of champions...somebody get me a trophy with a couch on it. So, like I said, things are looking up...from a long way down...things got a crick in their collective neck from trying to look up. I got the call on Tuesday that the cops found my car in DC. Something about it trying to throw its brake shoes at the President. It's in a tow yard, awaiting the insurance adjuster to assess the damage. Again, since it's the holidays, that won't be 'til next week. Here's hoping it's not a burnt out husk when we finally do get to it. Who knows? Maybe it'll have more stuff in it than when I left it...like last time. If you'll refer to to the vehicular retrieval post from 3 years ago...

Well, I'm happy to report that all is not lost...not yet. The powers that be recovered my vehicle, with minor damage, in SE DC. Apparently, it was involved in a robbery, then the assailants were nabbed and the perps realized there's no reset button in the real-life version of Grand Theft Auto. I couldn't believe my Jeep was involved in a robbery... I mean, you think you know a car. It's out of my sight for a couple of hours and it turns into Patty Hearst. Alot of the machinery I own have criminal tendencies. My PC is constantly performing "illegal operations"...dealing heroin out of the hard drive.

So, I went to investigate the damage to the Jeep. The ignition: gone...well, not so much gone, but in the cup holder. There was also minimal damage to the driver's side door, where they used the hobo's skeleton key, a screwdriver. When I inventoried the contents of the vehicle, I found that, not only did they not take anything...they left a bunch of stuff. A pile of CD's, a couple packs of children's pajamas, and a Batman playset. I'm petitioning to add this as a Hanukkah Miracle, but the Torah revisionists haven't gotten back to me yet. Armed with this evidence, I've put together a profile of the ruffian who took my car. I was jacked by a narcoleptic toddler with a hero complex and a burnt out subscription to Columbia House.

On the good side, I've had two stellar shows in the past four days. The first was on Sunday at The Birchmere, helping Good For The Jews kick off their "Putting the Ha in Hanukkah" tour. I had a very nervous stomach before that show. The guys did a fine job hiding their disgust while my gut was riffing backstage. My insides sounded like a drunk didgeridoo player. Not sure if it was nerves or if I carry stress in my duodenum, but it was not welcome as I was going over my material before the show. Big thanks to GFTJ and the fine folks at The Birchmere for having me.

The second show was on Christmas Eve at Magooby's Joke House. It was billed as Comedy with Lobster Sauce, four Jewish comics, an all-Jew-can-eat Chinese food buffet, and an open bar...the menorah wasn't the only thing getting lit that night. The inflatable dreidel hung from the ceiling with care, with hopes that our jokes would get more than a stare. I was joined by newcomer Dave Madow, Andy Kline (who looks Jewish, but isn't), and Marc Unger. The place was packed and the crowd was surprisingly non-judgy. Good times.

I'll squeeze another installment in before '08 fizzles out...'til then.

Carma

Hey there 'Redheads... Before I begin this installment, I'd like to draw your attention to a blog a wrote roughly three years ago. I've italicized it, so your attention can't help but be drawn to it...

This blog is for venting... Do not adjust your computer screens...

FUCK FUCK FUCKITY FUCKFUCKFUCK

My car was stolen today. Right in front of Stately Stern Manor. And if I wasn't such a ball of sloth, it could've been avoided. Apparently, a guy had stolen another car... The engine started smoking, so he decided to dump that car. He did so in my parking lot, and my car was the next most available means of conveyance. FUCK.
I was inside all day, either watching football or playing it on PS2 (Go Skins in both mediums, btw). My parents are out of town for the week, on a vacation that was designed so they would be incommunicado and not have to deal with bullshit like this. If I had gotten off my ass to go feed their fish at an earlier point, this might never have happened... Some other poor shnook would've been out of luck on Hanukkah Eve. Or, I would've been in the vicinity of my car when this guy was trying to steal it. FUCK.
Luckily, aside from a couple CD's (and if my insurance company is reading this: my golf clubs, my laptop, my plasma tv, and my bag of gold bullion), nothing terribly valuable was in the car. It's just a big headache. FUCK.
The next entry will be funny and insightful... We now return you to your regularly scheduled whatever the hell you were doing...

So, apparently, one of my loyal readers really liked that blog, and decided to celebrate it's third anniversary by staging a reenactment. Yep, my car was stolen...again. And things were going moderately well this week, too. I won a poker tournament, went to a fancy schmancy holiday party with a sundae bar, and got the high score on my iPod Tetris game. Now, this aggravation has brought all that semi-decent mojo to a grinding halt. Reduced to a pile of tinted glass shards on the pavement where my car used to be. That'd be almost poetic if it weren't so aggravating. If it ends up playing out like it did three years ago, the cops'll find it in SE DC with minor damage and with the abandoned spoils of a low rent crime spree inside. Here's hoping.

But don't cry for me, Argentina. I'm no charity case. Here's a cause that everybody should get behind...speaking of theft...

Remember, for all of your ribald Hanukkah celebration needs, there's a great show at the Birchmere this Sunday. The merry mensches,Good For The Jews, will be lighting things up and your friendly neighborhood bloggerino is opening for them. Click the links for tix and info.

See you there...

Home Stretch

Hey hey, 'Redheads... Long time, no type...what else is new? Actually, I only recently awakened from my Thanksgiving food coma. I hope everyone had a trytophantastic Turkey Day. We had turducken at our feast. For those unfamiliar, that's a turkey stuffed with a duck stuffed with a chicken. If you ever get the chance to eat an animal with two other animals stuffed into it, treat yourself. It's as delicious as a triple murder gets. But, hardly an excuse to keep you guys waiting two weeks for another helping of this corn and tripe casserole.

Big news for all of you who've been clamoring to see me live on a local stage. I got word today that I've been asked back to open for Good For The Jews at The Birchmere. The show is Sunday, the 21st, the first night of Hanukkah. Click the links to get an idea of what you're in for. Let's light this menorah...

Once again, I've started the cycle of frittering away five bucks worth of false hope on the ever growing lottery jackpot. In these tough times, it's just about as reliable as the stock market. I think it's somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 million smackers. I've gone with my usual fortune cookie numbers. And they hit. Five dollars worth of tickets won me seven bucks. I'm in the black and I'm letting it ride. Here's hoping I'll be having my manservant, Punjab, type the next installment while I dictate to him from atop a pile of money and hookers.

I took in some college b-ball last week at the BB&T Classic and watched the Terps knock George Washington's wooden teeth down their throat in a 30 point blowout. One of the sponsors of the night's game was the U.S. Navy, who's logo flashed up on the jumbotron with the slogan: Defending freedom for 200 years. Does the Navy need a slogan? It's not like they're selling something...if we don't like what they're selling, we're not going to take our business elsewhere. Here are some other completely unnecessary slogans...

Food: What's in your mouth?
Oxygen: It's in every breath you take.
Gravity: Keeping you grounded.

I had a pretty funny conversation with one of my co-workers the other day. He wanted to know what I thought of some of the new movies that had come out on DVD. The talk turned to the recent Indiana Jones opus. Some of you readers may remember I had some pretty strong opinions about that flick. You can click on the link for the long version (scroll down), but I told him that I thought it was a badly told story with a bunch of rehashed chase scenes. I qualified it with, "but this is coming from a guy who considers the first three classics." To which he replied, "Well, you're talking to a guy who saw White Chicks twice..." Touche.

Speaking of classic videos, here's a musical gem that'll stick with you...

Kinda reminds me of the dream I had after eating that turducken.

See ya soon...