Two Posts for the Price of One...Freehundred Dolars

Double play!! Two blog posts in two days. I need to make up for all the weeks I missed.

I visited the Bellevue office for a week in early January and I have to say, it's always a pleasure to go there. They've successfully kept a small company feel that is very refreshing. Some examples below:

These two home-made signs are taped on or above the ancient shredder they have in the office. Why they don't have a newer one, I don't know. Probably because they spent too much time unjamming the shredder after putting 14-16 one-dollar bills through it all at once.

My previous visit to the office was just after Halloween in '08 and the office was adorned with Halloween decorations. During this visit, the office was decorated in non-denominational seasonal decorations (I have them well trained), but they found a way to incorporate the Halloween decorations into the seasonal decorations. I think they were celebrating the hallowed "Decemberween".





And then there was this guy...



This D-bag was walking around departure gate S1 at Sea-Tac yaking away on his B-tooth. He was ripping a strip off of the person on the other end of his mobile device. I heard him say this, "Shut up. No, seriously - you need to stop talking. You're an idiot. He's an idiot. Stop talking. Shut up. I need you to go tell that idiot that it's not going to happen that way..." This style of communication went on and on. I had to shut off every HR valve in my body to keep from giving him a talk about effective communication and the power of patience. I wanted to do this to the dude.



I was pleasantly shocked to find the Vonderful Goot Game of Dutch Blitz in a local game store. I thought it was only for Waterloo Region Mennonites who want to act out their animalistic violent tendencies through alternative cards and those of us who want to be just like them. I love how it's sandwiched between "Malarky" and "The Great Dalmuti". In less classy game stores it would be sandwiched between "Bullshit" and "Vagina Wars".



I don't know what was going on in the picture below, but it made me laugh. I had parked beside this car and something caught my eye as I was walking away. The entire steering wheel was covered in tiny post-it notes. Why? I don't know. Maybe it was a rental and the person renting it was OCD and didn't want to touch the steering wheel because of germs?



So, while we're on the topic of all things South of the border, there are a few things that I've seen grace the tvs in my hotel rooms that I felt were blog-worthy.

First, The Phantom Gourmet. The Phantom Gourmet is a show about food, but it's staged and edited like a sports program. The show chronicles all the best foods in the New England area. Awesome, you say. But wait...it's not all types of foods. It's just fast foods. This show displays food in a way that is so close to pornography, it's kind of disturbing.



Who the heck is Paula Deen??? Is she related to Jimmy Dean? If so, he's probably mad that she's out hawking pork products for another sugar daddy - Smithfield. Watch some of the commercials at the link below and you'll understand why Paula will slip into a pork coma within the next two years. My favourite is "The Birthplace of Bacon".

http://smithfield.com/about/advertising.php

When you were a kid, did you ever meet certain adults and even though you were just a kid, you could tell how sad and lonely the adults were? Seeing them in all their sadness made you plead to the coolness gods to never let you become so reprehensibly creepy? Well, the Hip Hop Magician is one of those adults.

http://www.hiphopmagician.com/

The dead look in his eyes, the mouth slightly agape in most of the pictures - this man is a clown and is clearly treated like one by everyone he meets regardless of their age.

I really shouldn't be so critical when this is what Canadian TV has to offer the world...



Bruce Cockburn probably wrote and performed this song for the Calgary flames to massacre. It's similar to when Marge made Homer a decoy cake to ruin so that he'd stay away from the good cake.

We Will Now Return to Our Regularly Scheduled Programming

Hi everyone.
I went on a short hiatus which involved a busy week, a weekend in Thunder Bay and a week in Seattle. New post coming soon. Stay tuned...

Surprise! I'm Wearing Pantyhose!

Last weekend I canceled all my plans (yes - I had plans. Shocking, but true...Sarah Wolf can vouch for me!) and made an impromptu trip to the North to visit Sean. Earlier in the week, Sean told me an anecdote about how his classmates had been asking if I was going to be attending the NOSM Holiday Party. Sean was sick of telling people about how we're buying/selling a house and that I'll be moving to Thunder Bay in late December or early January, blah, blah, blah, so he gave up and told them that I don't exist. That was my cue to promptly and unexpectedly exist. NOW IN TECHNICOLOUR!!

I surprised Sean at the holiday party. When he saw me, he yelled, "you ass!!" Love you too, barf face. I met the med school crew, danced with the med school crew and was crucified by the karaoke stylings of the med school crew. They seemed like a good group of folks who love to have a good time. Sean noted that med school students tend to study hard and then party hard at periodic intervals.

We had a great night with a little drinking, a little dancing and a moderate amount of prancing. We got home really late - like 12am. We're so wild.

On Saturday we did exciting things, such as signing our mortgage papers, trying in vain to find a BB USB cord and test-driving Hondas. Saturday night we went to a get together that was full of Sean's friends from highschool. It was nice to meet some of the people that Sean has told me so much about.

As mentioned earlier, we test drove some Hondas. We were going to test drive a Honda Fit because we figured we could buy something small to toot around town in. Unfortunately, Sean's usual compact car issue befell us - the dreaded centre console. Horror!!!
Because of Sean's gigantism, not all cars are appropriate for him. Kind of like that tall guy that gives Nelson his comeuppance in that one episode of the Simpsons.



Some compact cars are very uncomfortable for hime because they render his arms as useless as T.Rex's (the King of Dinosaurs, not King of Glam Rock). In a car that's too small for Sean, his arms end up being pinned to his chest by the steering wheel because his knees are nestled violently on either side of his shoulders.



The Honda Fit, for some reason, has an unnecessary outcropping on the centre console. It's like a corner where no corner really needs to be. Why, oh why? He got in the car and immediately said "well, this won't work", understandibly.

See the corner below.



See the corner sticking into Sean's knee.



After we failed to test drive the Fit, we tried a CR-V. We both liked it, but it's a bit pricey. Keep your eyes peeled for used CR-Vs!

Look at how cute Sean looks in his CR-V.



Note the centre console isn't ideal, but we've dealt with worse.



I really liked the fact that the temperature control was on the passenger side, which means that since Sean does most of the driving, I would be in a position to surruptitiously turn up the heat.



I liked the secret compartment. I'm like a raven...very distracted by shiny things. This fact is the reason why I trust Sean to make all the major purchase decisions.






We drove by our house to be. Sean wouldn't stop to let me peek inside. He said it was creepy. I thought I could be stealthy enough to not attract suspicion, but Sean did not trust my Bond-girl-like moves.



Note the trailer on the back of the truck. That's right...get your stuff out of our house (although, you can leave the pineapple mirror).



I gave the house the thumbs up.

We took the CR-V back to the dealership and while Sean and the dealer talked shop, I perused the dealership for interesting, shiny distractions. I found a whole car full of them.
The dealership was having a toy drive for Christmas and there was a CR-V that was just full of toys. In it, I found this toy, which I immediately found intriguing.



Under the part that says "Glamm", it says, "The Extra Ordinary Girls". Now, I would have thought that if a toy was intended to be extra ordinary, the legs of the doll wouldn't be about five times the length of the torso, unless this is a doll representing me in grade 9. Trust me, I was extra ordinary.

On Sunday, I departed.

The trip was short and sweet.

Hey, Sean! No more test-driving! I found our perfect vehicle at the airport!



Has anyone seen the cops on these at the airport? These are even nerdier than Segways. I think this is part of the results of the inquest into corruption in the Peel Police dept. They need to ride these lame scooters until the ranks are free from drug-fueled corruption.

What Would Joan Jetta Do?

Joan Jetta would totally smash into the back of your truck if you don't yield the right of way, bitches!
I may have mentioned to a few of you that I was thinking of rolling Joanie off a cliff to put her out of her misery. Well, the mountain came to Mohamed. Joanie smashed into a truck last night and man, she is banged up worse than the paparazzi when they messed with Tobey Maguire.

Long-story-short, I was traveling northbound on King Street in Waterloo and some kid who was traveling southbound did not notice the steady stream of oncoming traffic cruising through the green light and decided that he should make a very dangerous left-hand turn. Clearly not the best decision he would make in his short 20-year stint of time here at this gig called "Earth".

Luckily, I saw the guy in the truck start to turn left when it was clearly unsafe to do so, so I had time to brace myself against the steering wheel so that I wouldn't go face first into the steering wheel or get whiplash. No one was hurt, thank goodness.

See pics below:

The point of impact - the other side was pretty smashed up too. It's hard to see from the picture, but the front plane of the car is no longer bumper and grill and hood, it's a vertical plane of bumpergrillhood. I think that the VW symbol on the front of my car vaporized on impact. I couldn't find it anywhere. Maybe that was Joanie's soul and it's now in heaven with Tercela (my first car)?



Both airbags blew and my whole car was shrouded in this mystical airbag mist that will probably give me cancer of the miscelaneous body part. The windshield was smashed, but didn't shatter into pieces (thank goodness). I prefer my eyes to not be filled with shards of glass. I know, I know. I'm a total princess.



Check out the insides of my bitchin' stereo!! I wonder if this is a safety feature of some sort...the stereo/radio is a designated crumple point to absorb impact.



I truly loved my Joanie, but I'm afraid she's not going to be salvageable, except by salvagers who will strip her down and sell her for parts, kind of like that new Paris Hilton movie, which looks like a garbage pile in a failure bowl (starring none other than Giles from Buffy - note, I'm on a Buffy kick right now).

I'm now driving a rented Kia Rio, and because I name all my cars, she has been dubbed "Rosie", and no - it's not because the car is cheap and it's had sex with Tom Arnold. At first I was calling her Kia Farrow, which then led to Rosemary's Baby and now it's just Rosie. If you need a name for your car, just let me know. Previous car names have included:

Joseph Stallin'
Michigan J. Frog
Stally Jesse Raphael
Tercela the Tercel
Paul Walker's Scrotum

Ok - that last one wasn't a name I made up for a car. It's a name I made up for Paul Walker's scrotum.

When I got home last night, I had to call Economical insurance to make my claim. I'm not sure if their system was overloaded or if it was just not working right, but I kept on getting cut off when I was on hold waiting for an agent, so I had to call back a few times. At least I had a nice song to keep me occupied and calm while I was waiting to get service (or waiting to get cut off again). Please excuse my poor song lyrics recall in this video. I was still a bit shaken up from the accident.



Every time I called in, Africa was the waiting music. I wonder if that's how Economical measures their customer service? Instead of dropped calls or customer satisfaction rates, they measure how many Africas the customer has to listen to before they get the service they were calling in for.

Boss: Bradley - could you come into my office for a minute?
Bradley: Sure thing, Mr Corriander.
Boss: Bradley, I'd like to talk to you about your call response times. Our metrics tell us that your customers listen to at least one and a half Africas before their calls are answered. This is far longer than service excellence objective of answering all calls before the lead singer of Toto stops the old man and asks for some old forgotten words or ancient melodies. What do you have to say for yourself?
Bradley: I'll try harder from now on.
Boss: Well I hope that next time you take some time to do the things you never had.

Grammar, Toto. Grammar!!

Did you know...

...that the head vampire from the first season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is no other than...
Da-da-da-da!
The mean and yelly dad from the Twisted Sister videos!



The first minute of this is pure, twisted familial gold.

If you liked "We're Not Gonna Take It", you'll like this too.



I remember being so excited when these videos graced the TV screen when I was a kid. I not-so-secretly wished that the next time I was bullied, I'd say the magic words ("I wanna rock") and my comrades and I would suddenly turn into the love children of Jem & the Holograms and Guns 'n' Roses. That's a shock and awe tactic unto itself.

Juns & the Rosograms also had another famous child

"Creeeeeeeole lady mama-lahhhhhd"

The mean, yelly dad from the Twisted Sister videos is actually named Mark Metcalf and he's kind of like Ron Howard's brother. You know him from lots of things, but do you really know him? Do you know that he owns a restaurant in Milwaukee? Do you know that his wife's name is Libby? Do you know that he wrote a poem about AIDS? Well, he did. And he put it on the internet. You should stop taking from the internet and start giving to the internet like me, Mark Metcalf and one of our other gifts from God, Tina Chen. I highly recommend you listen to her song about Missouri, the state she lives in (that God created) and "Not Like Any Other" which gets really awesome, really early in the song. If you prefer electronic music to a Capella, I suggest you listen to the version of "Missouri" in the link below. This has inspired me to write a song about my state, Ontario.

While you're waiting for the internet debut of my song about Ontario, here's Robo's latest contribution to the Internet. I traveled to Seattle for work last week and Robo decided to have one of his famous wee-hours shrieking matches with one of the neighborhood cats. How cute! Especially because I had to be up at 330 to catch a 4am limo. By the time I got to him, the shrieking had stopped, but there was still some howling to be done. He's so cute, but he's equal parts cute and disruptive.

This Apology is Brought to You By Joe Camel

I received an anonymous comment on one of my posts (The Ladybug's Picnic Totally Sucked - posted 2008/10/26). I am truly sorry if any offense was taken regarding my comments about baby formula. My comments were not meant to be a slight against those who use baby formula (parents and babies alike) or formula itself, but instead was meant to draw attention to the absurdity and duplicity of the ad campaign featuring Ty Pennington. Once again, my apologies if any offense was taken.

I've outlined my point a little better below. This is not meant to be in defense of any comments that were offensive. If you were offended, that's that. I offended someone. I won't try to un-offend you or try to convince you that you shouldn't have been offended. That in itself is offensive. It's just a better explanation of where the motivation for my comments was coming from.

From my point of view, Ty Pennington is to Similac baby formula as Joe Camel was to Camel Cigarettes. A highly attractive character sent to prey on our human tendencies to gravitate toward that which is attractive or desired. Ad campaigns of this nature usually have little to do with the product itself, it has to do with getting closer to a lifestyle or something/someone that is highly desirable, hence the popularity and effectiveness of celebrity endorsements. The reality is that the product is no better or worse just because a celebrity endorses it. I've fallen prey to this...everyone has. That's why celebrity endorsements prevail. The problem in the case of Ty Pennington and Similac is that there is a mismatch between the endorser, the endorsed and the target market.



Baby formula is something that could mean the difference between a healthy baby and failure to thrive. Who could argue with that?

Nobody.

Do I think they could have picked a more credible spokesperson to make their product seem more desirable than its competitors' products?

Yes.

Do I think that Similac will lose credibility due to this ad campaign?

Yes.

That's the explicit version of the judgment I was making.

So now while I'm on the topic of judgment, I'll judge hard on the cigarette companies by posting the pictures/ads below. This is directed toward the cigarette companies, not the smokers out there. I know it's a complex issue and that the taxes from cigarettes are a revenue stream for our government and I know they sponsor the arts, etc, etc, but you have to admit...these ads are a bit over the top.

This one says "Now Taste America" in Czech


Wow - a lady-doctor. What were they thinking in 1946? If you get out your magnifying glass and you can make out what they're saying about the "T-zone" in the bottom of the ad, it's worth the squinting.


"I can't quit you..."


I think this is my fave. In the one on the left, is the mother going to scold the baby for its bad taste in hats?

Hoose

It's official. We bought a house in Thunder Bay - the land of Mooseburger Trees and the fabled Moonicorn (the one-antlered moose, who incidentally has many chiropractic issues). Look - here's a picture of a mooseburger tree sprouting in the rocky tundra. Magical, isn't it?




Here are some pictures of our new place.

Front of the house. The tree in front of the window has got to go.


Back of the house. Deck with seats built in!!


This is where the magic happens.




Living room - yes - that is a wood-burning fire place



Two people independently asked if we get to keep the pineapple mirror, but sadly, I don't think it will be included in the deal.



Dining area



Kitchen - Over the range microwave. Hollllaaaa!!



Master bedroom ensuite - two sinks!!



Area off the kitchen/dining area



Bedroom 1



Bedroom 2



Bedroom 3



Bathroom for regular people - one sink



Nursery



Check out what I turned up while searching (fruitlessly, I must add) for some pictures of the Moonicorn. For some yet-to-be-explained-to-me reason, some dude painted two paintings of Barack Obama on a unicorn. Did I mention that he's naked in both? I was hesitant about putting these on the blog, because I'm afraid that these are actually offensive and I just don't know the meaning behind them. Well, the second part of that sentence is definitely true - I have no idea what these mean, even after searching the web for answers. If the former part of the sentence is also true, will someone let me know? I don't want to be that one member of the cyber-neighborhood that doesn't know it's inappropriate to have a statue of a little boy of a certain skin colour fishing off the front porch.



The artist who did these also does portraits of other political leaders and celebrities with pancakes on their heads (complete with a lovely pat of melting butter). Once again, not sure if they are in celebration of the absurd or whether they have a meaning that no web search can uncover.