Last night, after watching a great episode of Veronica Mars (seriously, if you're not watching this show by now, you're retarded. Go watch War at Home and play in traffic!), I drove home from a friend's house and put the radio on the local classic rock station. It's a good station to listen to while driving fast, and I felt like risking a ticket and getting it up to about 85 on roads that have speed limits of 40-50.

So, I'm driving with the windows down, sunroof open, music blaring, really enjoying the classic rock, when . . .

(I don't know if I can write this. It's too overwhelming and emotional.)

(I can! I have the strength to bare my soul here.)

When, all of a sudden, U2 comes on. On the fucking classic rock station. Which plays CLASSIC rock. Classic means old!

How can U2 be considered classic rock? They can't be, because I listened to them in high school. How can any band that was popular when I was in high school be considered classic- OH FUCKING GOD ON TOAST! I'M OLD!

I pulled over and sobbed for hours. My life is over.

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I had a dream last night that I was on 24. And instead of trying to describe it, I thought I'd draw it. Of course, click to view the large version.

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We spent this weekend going through our various receipts and bills for 2006 to gather everything that needs to be tabulated for our taxes this year. Home office deductions, charities, corporate loss, my second company's profit and loss - it all needs to be registered so that we can figure out what type of refund we'll get. And we will get a refund, because after a scare a few years ago when we almost had to pay $3,000 in April, my wife has had an extra few hundred dollars withheld from every paycheck, guaranteeing some type of refund.

But, looking over the last year, I cannot believe some of the money we spent! Here, for your voyeuristic pleasure, is a sampling of our expenses:

1. $2,376.00 on Internet and Television
2. $6,684.00 on Electricity
3. $9,610.00 on Comic Books
4. $7,380.00 on paying other people to take care of our things (pool, lawn, housecleaning, etc.)
5. $2,492.00 on Fast Food
6. $1,430.00 on Diet Coke
7. $15,600.00 on Dining out at nice restaurants
8. $24,380.00 on Amazon.com
9. $2,998.00 on Razors
10. $1,112.00 on Anal Sex Toys
11. $31,456.00 on Underage Thai Prostitutes
12. $1.00 on Deodorant
13. $10,049.00 on Novelty Gag Gifts
14. $6,969.00 on Miniature Pony Statues
15. $134,998.00 on Ebay Items that look like Jesus (toast, a piece of drywall, a skid mark, a glass of Alka Seltzer)
16. $45,800.00 on all of Britney Spears's hair (vaginal, facial, and head)
17. $1,011.00 on Nipple Clamps
18. $4.50 on Men's Clothing
19. $1,390.00 on Women's Clothing
20. $44,399.00 on Professional Art Classes

In retrospect, seems like money well spent.

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Saw this at Dave's and Tracy's.

THE BOOK MEME!

Science Fiction, Fantasy or Horror? I enjoy all three in certain doses. I find fantasy to be the most obnoxious genre, and scifi can get old quickly, but when they're good, they're really good.

Hardback or Trade Paperback or Mass Market Paperback? I prefer Hardcovers. Except a 400+ page book really makes my legs fall asleep when I read it on the throne.

Amazon or Brick and Mortar? Amazon.com all the way. I order from them a few times a month. Since I buy books based on authors, I'm not much of a browser, so bookstores hold no appeal.

Barnes & Noble or Borders? If I had to choose, probably B&N.

Hitchhiker or Discworld? Douglas Adams all the way. I've never laughed so hard reading a series.

Bookmark or Dogear? I don't borrow books - I only buy them, so I dogear pages. It's my fucking book. If it's a hardcover with a jacket, I'll use the jacket as a bookmark.

Asimov’s Science Fiction or Fantasy & Science Fiction? Neither.

Alphabetize by author, Alphabetize by title, or random? Alphabetize by author, then by title among the same author. At least, that's my desire. It ends up just being a random stack unless I'm very diligent.

Keep, Throw Away or Sell? I'd never throw away a book, and I'd only sell a bad book. Everything else I keep.

Keep dust-jacket or toss it? Why would you throw it away? Unless you're a fucking retard, that is.

Read with dustjacket or remove it? I use it as a bookmark, so definitely leave it on.

Short story or novel? I love novels and short stories, but I can only read short stories when they're in collections. By themselves, they don't give enough satisfaction.

Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket? I find the Harry Potter books to be a bit predictable, but I enjoy them. They're definitely better than the movies. I haven't yet read the Lemony Snicket books.

Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks? If I'm tired, I read until the next chapter break. Unless it's really good, and then I turn on my speed reading ability and finish the book at lightning speed.

"It was a dark and stormy night" or "Once upon a time?" Who thinks up these stupid fucking questions?

Buy or Borrow? When I was a kid, I'd take out 50 books every two weeks from the library. Now I buy, because I like to add to my personal library.

Buying choice: Book Reviews, Recommendation or Browse? Well, I'll get a recommendation from someone whose opinion I trust on an author. I'll try one book by that author, and if it's good, I'll buy every book ever written by that person and then read them all in order. I've got a nice list of authors now and whenever they have a new book out, I'm always on the pre-order list on Amazon for it.

Lewis or Tolkien? CS Lewis, all the way. The Narnia books were great as a kid and just as great as an adult. Tolkien, on the other hand, was pompous and overblown and I've never read such tripe in my life. I think Peter Jackson's a fucking hack, too, just in case you were wondering.

Collection (short stories by the same author) or Anthology (short stories by different authors)? Depends on the subject matter. There are some Hellboy anthologies that I like because you get to see different perspectives on a character I like, and then there are collections by my favorite authors that I absolutely love.

Tidy ending or Cliffhanger? I don't think a book should really have a cliffhanger, except in cases like the Dark Tower series or Harry Potter - a set number of books with a definite ending. The Alex Cross novels that Dave mentioned by James Patterson pissed me off with a cliffhanger ending where one didn't belong.

Morning reading, Afternoon reading or Nighttime reading? Whenever I have time and I'm not killing someone, eating, showering, masturbating, or working.

Standalone or Series? Series. I love a good character, and if a writer can maintain the momentum and keep proper characterization, it's like a TV series. Some of my favorites (some are no longer being written) are Spenser (and Hawk) (Robert B. Parker), Lucas Davenport (John Sandford), Stephanie Plum (Janet Evanovich), Will Lee (Stuart Woods), Roland (Stephen King), Myron Bolitar (Harlan Coben), the Precinct (Ed McBain), Archy McNally (Lawrence Sanders), Fletch (Gregory MacDonald), Captain Edward X. Delaney (Lawrence Sanders), Jack Ryan (Tom Clancy), Lestat (Anne Rice), Elvis Cole (Robert Crais), Anita Blake (Laurell K. Hamilton), and Dirk Pitt (Clive Cussler)

New or used? Definitely new - that new book smell and the crack of the spine are favorite sensations.

Favorite book of which nobody else has heard? Blood of the Lamb, by Thomas Monteleone. A priest in New York finds out that he's actually a clone of Jesus's blood from the Shroud of Turin and slowly becomes the Antichrist. Great read, although I just ruined the ending for you. It's still worth reading, though.

Top 5 favorite genre books of all time? I don't know what this means. I read all different genres, and trying to choose five among them would be very difficult.

Favorite genre series? I'll have to just pick my favorite series, and I'll go with the Dark Tower series by Stephen King. The Vampire Chronicles would be a close second, as long as I stop counting any books past Memnoch.

Currently Reading? I'm reading Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. Thanks to Miss Misery for the recommendation and to Beth for buying it for me for my birthday!

And for those of you Neanderthals who don't read books, here are two little tidbits for you to tide you over during the weekend:

1. Naked picture of Jennifer Aniston from her most recent movie. It has been proven to be real because she's suing Perez Hilton for posting it.

2. Video of a woman pleasuring a horse.

Enjoy!

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Well, my throat wasn't cut by an inexperienced knuckle-dragger who got his barber's license in a Cracker Jack box. I survived and actually enjoyed the experience. The guy cutting my hair was this little tiny wiry guy from New York who had been cutting hair for 25 years.

When I walked in to the shop, I looked like this:

Click on that for a larger version to truly get the full impact of my appearance. I looked like the unholy love child if Bigfoot and Ted Kaczynski fucked.

After running for the door thinking I was a bear foraging for food, the barber calmed down after he realized that most bears don't wear shoes. He sat me down in the chair and asked me what I wanted.

"Shave it all off. Use a #2 on the head. Shave the beard but leave a goatee with a line along my jawline."

With a thick New York/Puerto Rican accent, he explained that shaving my head was beneath him. He is a barber and he had been barbering for many years. My head was just a sculpture that needed to be let out, and he was the artiste to do so.

So I let him do his thing, and after I said no to the afro, the bouffant, and the pigtails, we came up with a nice clean hairstyle that felt nice and wasn't as extreme as a total buzzcut. As a married man, I'm great at telling someone that they're right, so I thanked him for doing what was best for me and told him he clearly was the expert here.

Then it came time for the shave. He makes you put your feet up and elevates you, completely prone on your back. It's actually quite a vulnerable position and makes me more empathetic to how women feel at the ob/gyn and how mobsters feel at the barber's right before they get shot in the face in their chair.

He does the whole thing with steam and hot towels and lather and lube and probing. Then he used an electric razor to trim the beard down. I think he had to change razors two or three times because my beard was so thick it kept burning out the razor motors. Next is a Gillette Mach 3 to do one shave. Since I had a hot towel on my upper face, covering my eyes, I'm not sure how many blades he went through, but I'm sure it was at least four. I think he might have used a blowtorch, a chisel, a sander, and steel wool, as well.

After all this pre-shaving shaving, we got down to the nitty gritty. Out comes the straight razor. The very first thing he does is go right for the jugular and I start spraying blood all over the place. Actually, I barely even felt a thing. The only difference is that a straight razor feels much, much sharper when it's being run across your face when compared to a Mach 3. The barber had this method of shaving a little at a time, and then smoothing with his hand that made it feel like he wasn't shaving at all. I almost feel asleep, it was so soothing, but I didn't. With my luck, I'd start snoring and he'd slit my throat just to get me to shut the fuck up. I know my wife would like to do that some nights.

When he was done (2 hours later) he said, "My God, that was like shaving a bear. I can't believe how stubborn the hairs on your face were - I've never had to shave someone five times before just to get it somewhat smooth!" I laughed because I knew that it would be stubble again by the time I walked out the door. That's the curse of being related to Captain Caveman, I guess. This is the first time in my entire life, though, that my face has felt smooth when I run my hand both up and down! It's like the time I set my pubes on fire instead of trimming them - now that was smooth skin!

So I gladly paid him the money and even signed up for a monthly membership. Unlimited haircuts and shaves for $55/month. Seems like a deal to me - I might even start going once a week. I wonder if they give happy endings?

Oh yeah, and here's the final product:

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Wednesday is usually a good day, because I get my weekly order of comic books. That means that I'll get between 20-40 new comic books that will occupy my free time and my time in the "throne room" for the next two or three days.

It also usually means that I have an episode of Veronica Mars recorded from last night that I can watch today when I eat my lunch, and that always makes me happy.

I'm also finally going to shave my head and get rid of this beard, so that will be nice. While I enjoy being able to frighten away small children (and adults) just by scowling, the constant attack of birds trying to nest on my head or my chin just gets annoying.

I'm thinking of going to this new barbershop called "Carr's". They do old-school barbering including shaving with an actual blade. I don't know if I'm going to go for that, but if I do, here in the land of retards (Orlando), there's a high chance my throat will accidentally get cut. So if I don't post anything tomorrow, you'll know that I slowly died in a pool of my own blood in a barber's chair while some pimple-faced teenager ran around with a bloody razor squealing "Oh my God" in a squeaky pubescent voice. My wife will automatically be a millionaire, so any of you men (or women) who think you're worthy can give her a call. Toodles!

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I've been dealing with random power outages for the last four days. Our main circuit breaker on the outside of our house has a bad connection and keeps tripping any time the power coming from it is too much.

Until the fuckwit electricians can get the permit and come fix it (hopefully by tomorrow), we have to limit our electrical use or risk it turning off yet again. This means we can't use the heat, the dishwasher, the washer or dryer, the stove, the oven, the coffeepot, or half of the other shit that we pretty much need to use on a daily basis. When this is compounded with the fact that my business is run out of my house, it means that my phone system, all of our computers and printers, and other random office machinery are all affected every time the power goes out.

Oh, and since the previous owners jury-rigged the control panel to accept the pool pump wiring instead of installing a brand-new control panel, our home warranty won't cover it. So I get to spend almost $800 to have everything done.

I'm about ready to send everyone home for the day and just sit here in the dark.

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All weekend, I did nothing. I didn't work. I didn't go out. I played Legend of Zelda for the Wii all weekend long. Is it really Monday already? Damn. I need a new weekend.

Update: If you read me through Bloglines, you may have to resubscribe to the feed thanks to fucking Blogger Beta.

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So, the Federal government has decided to fuck with Daylight Savings Time because of some stupid shit that I don't care about, which then screwed up every computer on Earth which meant that Microsoft and Apple had to create fixes to make everyone's computer correct. How ridiculous is that?

I wish the government would do useful things, like rename the days of the week to get us free things. Like, for example, Friday should become "Fry Day", and every fast food place should be federally mandated to give out free french fries! Some other suggestions:

"Fry Day" - see above

"Tater Day" - Free Tater Tots from the grocery store.

"Bun Day" - Free hot dogs at every outside vendor.

"Moon(pie) Day" - Free Moon Pies!

"Tits Day" - Women have to, on request, flash their boobs.

"Weed, Nuts Day" - You can smoke up without repercussion, or get a jar of free nuts. Your choice.

"Words Day" - Make up any word that you want, with a definition, and it will be added to the English lexicon. I'm pretty avitaporated about this day!

Think about where you could go with this. We could have months that are federally mandated to give us goodies, too:

"Man No Hairy" - The first month of the year when everyone can get free haircuts, pube trims, anything related to hair.

"Fib if you're Married" - February will now become a month when spouses (and any couple) can lie and cheat on each other without repercussion. This will also mean no more Valentine's Day!

"Munch" - Eat all you want, what you want. The government won't let you gain an ounce, guaranteed.

"Lay full" - Since you spent all of Munch eating, this month you can sleep and lay around all day around, digesting all your food.

"Gay" - Everybody's happy per federal mandate.

"Loon" - During this summer month, go as crazy as you want. Run around naked, speak in tongues, have sex with sheep, paint your toes purple, scratch the spiders that are crawling under your skin. You have carte blanche to go absolutely loony without worrying about being locked up.

"To Fly!" - Everyone can fly. Just make sure you're on the ground by midnight, To Fly 31st.

"Bloggest" - Bloggers are considered the best people in the world. They get to run the country for a month, including declaring any wars they want, mooning heads of state, and enacting legislature.

"Strep-tember" - Worst month of the year. Everyone has strep throat. The pharmaceutical company lobby convinced the gov't to do this one.

"Cock-tober" - Everyone has a 14 inch penis, women included, for a month. Finally we'll all know what it feels like to be a part of the well-endowed, dark-skinned minority.

"Goo-vember" - Just the unfortunate aftermath of everyone having 14-inch cocks.

"Whee-cember" - The month of roller coasters and fun. Carnivals are required to be in every county in the United States, running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, all month.

I think I'm a fucking genius!

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Well, I didn't go out on any fancy dates last night. In fact, we stayed in, watched TV, and ate chocolate. What could be nicer than that? But I thought you might like to see an artist's rendition of what I look like when I'm dressed to the nines and ready to go out on the town.

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