The End is Near!

I don’t mean to be one of those doomsday “the end is near” kind of people, but two signs that humanity is drawing to a close have to be people watching videos of people playing video games and this website I heard about this morning called “Fake a vacation.com” because not wanting to go through the arduous task of playing video games or taking a vacation is laziness on another level. And what the heck happens when people ask about it? I have a tough enough time remember what actually happened and now I have to patch together this picture of paradise when I’m asked about my aptly named Facebook folder “Lying in St. Lucia.”

The Adventures of Don T. Dye

Yesterday I watched a documentary about free solo climbing which is when someone takes like 5 shots of tequila, gets on a unicycle with a few bowling pins and juggles their way up a 90 degree angled smooth slab of granite that someone has taken a fireman’s hose and a sander to. I am over the absence of athleticism in my life and no longer get angry watching football or basketball thinking “that could have been me! Climbing is something I felt was attainable until last night. As I went up to bed afterwards I was HEAVILY dependent on the handrail and making very labored progress up the stairs.

A journal entry from inept explorer, Don T. Dye:

Day 11 on The Stairwell and my coffee has worn off and my electricity bill is due next week so I have to move quickly if I want to make it to The Slumber Rock in time

Lovestruck

I had to go get some lab work today. And that is just a soft way of saying I needed to get blood drawn, but the former terminology gets people like me to wander into the doctors office like “What are we doing, a baking soda volcano?!” So instead of handing the desk my insurance card, I handed them a Buffalo Wild Wings gift card out of my wallet and as the girl was bringing me back to the torture chamber we had a good laugh about that because if someone is going to be sticking me with a needle I like to try to talk them out of it or at least get on their good side. The girl was around my age so we are chatting about getting kicked off our parents insurance and Toys R Us closing down. We go back there and I handle the whole thing like a big boy and she’s labeling a vile as I hop off the seat and she goes “Uh oh, you’re going to hate me.” I said “I understand it’s your job to stab me, it’s not your fault.” And she says “I put the sample in the wrong color vile so we have to do it again.” Because apparently blue is for Smurfs and members of Eiffel 65, purple is for dinosaurs and Prince fans and red is for Taylor Swift and Bruce Willis. So she fills up the second vile and we continue talking and I don’t know if it was the result of a loss of blood or falling in love, but I start getting lightheaded. So she’s apologizing profusely and as I leave I had a thought that can only be classified as unwarranted arrogance or straight up stupidity that no one should ever have about someone who has unnecessarily stabbed them twice  ....”Should I have asked her out?”

Dive Bar Exam

Whenever I go out to eat, I can scour the menu for 20 minutes like I’m cramming for the dive bar exam and have my sides and main course memorized and I’m ready to articulate exactly how I want everything cooked, but apparently I had a hunger hypnosis placed on me as a child and the trigger phrase is “and for you.....” because I instantly turn into Patrick Star in line at the Krusty Krab like “Ummmmmm.” Thank goodness the test is always open book

New Years Resignation

January 1st: Statistically speaking this is going to be the busiest day of the year at your local gym, so do your part to thin the herd just a little bit and make the lives of the exercise enthusiast employees a little easier. Don’t be a part of that First Quarter spike that crowds up the CrossFit class! While people are piling into Planet Fitness, park yourself at P F Chang’s Chinese buffet! Why worry the staff at Workout World with a whirlwind of wannabes when you can work your way to the front of the line at Wendy’s in a matter of seconds! And thousands of meatheaded Midases will be headed to Gold’s Gym this morning,  leaving the gateway to Golden Corral wide open!

Happy New Year everyone!

Gingerdead Man

Today on the radio I heard some DJ say "Up next, we will be discussing how you choose to eat a gingerbread man and what that says about your personality."

And none of the digestive diagnoses were good either. The woman was like "If you go right for the head it means your abrasive and impatient. If you eat the limbs first it means you have self esteem issues and feel unworthy to lead and if you go straight for the buttons you are meticulous and annoying."

Can I ask a question? Is there any aspect of life that can remain unexamined?! Does every activity need to have some underlying epiphany attached to it? Seriously, I'm all for self-reflection, but do I really need to be made aware of what Aristotle thinks about my eating habits? I know my waistline is held together by borrowed time thanks to my lifestyle and lineage and I'm at a point in my life where I fit too comfortably into outfits and elevators to be self-conscious about the way I eat, so can't I just enjoy that a little longer?! Eating a gingerbread man is already weird enough partaking in this candy coated cannibalism of consuming something with four limbs and a face. For me, every first bite is accompanied with a fear that I'm going to hear it shout "NOT THE GUMDROP BUTTONS!!!" can we just leave it there?

I Am Fantasy

I take my dog out around 5 a.m. every morning. Which typically means that the only active things in my neighborhood at that time are he and I and the streetlights. It is quiet and peaceful and also has given me inspiration for a movie about a man and his dog struggling to survive in post apocalyptic Nashua, New Hampshire. The film was accidentally released with what was meant to be a joke title, “I Am Fantasy.” While he is indoors, Sammy has the ambition of a Saturday morning adolescent at 8 a.m. However, on walks I tend to let Sammy roam around a bit. A while back he started to walk toward a seemingly harmless, small shadowy figure. As I got closer, I noticed the creature was black with a single white stripe, a skunk! All inquisitive little Sammy was thinking was “We’re Going to be Friends” (as much as I hate to explain jokes, I put that in quotes because that is a song by The White Stripes.....HA! Get it?! My sincerest apologies to anyone who already got the reference 😔) I scooped him up like a loose football and guided him back towards the house. Needless to say, but I almost didn’t even need a morning coffee after that stinky scare. Lastly, I’d like to address that I am absolutely onboard with the irony here of grabbing Sammy away from a skunk and rushing him into my house given the overwhelmingly negative response that the Yankee Candle people got following the release of this years holiday scent, Bachelor Pad.