Civil Disobediance

I have problems with authority.
I should probably start a support group, or a biker gang.
It was bad when I was a wee-un.
Respect? For who? Some fat old dude that whistled when he breathed and smelled like unwashed lemming? Call him Mr? For what? Living?
nope.
Obedience? Just because he had a swell uniform and a silly hat? Wait a second, this is the same guy that got us lost and let us throw frozen cans of pork and beans and a can of mosquito repellent in the fire? I am supposed to "obey" him?
right.
Believe? Why? Because she has hygiene issues and a hatred for children? Possibly feel saddened for the fact that her brain was frozen in 1971 and she hasn't learned a damn thing since? But Believe?
death first.
As I have gotten older I would like to say it has gotten better, that I toe the line with the best of them.
OOOOOO I am going to hell for even thinking that.
I have gotten worse.
A lot worse.
It probably started when a rookie cop beat the living shit out of me when I was 12, for walking on the side of the road. Or it could have been the fistfight with a teacher (he won) when I was fourteen. For saying that Reuben didn't throw the hot tamale at his head. (it was Matt, but I wasn't gonna tell him that)
No matter.
Its these fantastic things that form and shape a human, from a wee-un to a not so wee-un, almost a big-un.
I would say that I am all grown up but if you have read any of my blogs or spent more then an hour with me you would spot that lie in Milli-seconds. I dislike Grown-ups. Boring and staid. Concrete brains. Line followers and punctuation Nazis. LIVE A LITTLE people.
or just let me be.
Two years ago I was out with the Fam. Me and the Wife and the numbers 1 and 2.
My number 2 (the wee-un) is a mini-mommy that looks at the world in a way that no human could ever hope to understand. Picasso maybe, or possibly Dali, but they are both a little normal compared to #2.
#1 is perfect. A follower of rules and a respecter of humans. She amazes me.
We had just seen a movie and enjoyed a pizza at the CPK.
Walking back to the car, well, the wife and #1 were walking. #2 and I were having a skipping contest and she was kicking my ass. I may be a rebel but I cant skip for jack turd.
We came to the escalators.
You know. Moving stairs. Fat America HELLO!
So I yelled to #1 "RACE ME DOWN"
The wife and #2 waited for us at the bottom.
#2 yelled "GO" and we goeth. #1 down the down and me down the up.
I mean really, its only fair.
It was a close race. #1 is fleet of foot and stretched out to break the tape milliseconds before me, A photo finish. Phelps and his fingernail could not have been any closer.
We were laughing and just living. Smiling even.
Then Bluto the Fat American security guard had to whip out his wee teenier and pee on our campfire.
"HEY YOU! COME HERE"
He was pointing at me, I gave him my best innocent face (sneer) and said "Fuck that" and grabbing #1s hand sprinted away from the chubby with a star.
Two fine upstanding police officers of the law chose this moment to walk around the corner.
So chubby, winded after his 25 foot sprint/roll wheezed at them "stop that guy!" and pointed his whole fat hand right at me.
I gripped #1s hand and really sprinted. It was hard, I was laughing and she was having hysterics.
as we passed the other 2 who were (wisely) pretending not to know us I underhanded wife the car keys and said "pick us up, bottom level" sotto voice.
The porkers were gaining at this point so we took evasive action, ducking and dodging in between cars and floors and eventually we pulled the old "hide behind this corner and let the flatties run by oblivious" trick.
Its only failed me once.
Not this time.
With my hand over #1s mouth to keep her absolute terror quiet, they ran right on by.
We started doing our best nonchalant walk back up the ramp and wife and #2 pulled up.
At this point I should be able to drop a pithy saying to tie it all together and leave you laughing for the next few minutes.
Sorry, maybe next blog. We were fugitives, and chubby was not going to let us go so easy.
They were stopping cars and shining flashlights into faces.
This may be the understatement of the year when I say I don't Blend in. This night my hair, very long, was loose and I had on a masculine Salmon (BrightFCKNpink) shirt. No blending.
Thinking quick I made #1 take of her lime green tank top thingy that she had on over her shirt and #2 handed over a spare pony (silver and glittery) for me to tie my hair back.
So, dressed to the nines in space traveling transvestite fashion, we passed the inspection.
Tom Cruise magic saved us.
Success!
The gestapo was foiled and we sailed out into freedom.
I laughed all the way home, #1 had absolute hysterics and #2 lamented that she had not been able to trip the police chaps. Wife just smiled and shook her head gently.
Live a bit Today Folks.

Nipples

I used to have normal Nipples.
That sounds so odd doesn't it? I mean, really, Nipples?
Oh for Hell's sake!
Its true though. My nipples used to be normal.
They stood at attention when they got cold and bled if they got cut or twisted off (thank you darling little 9th grade girlfriend) and they even looked fairly normal.
Then I decided to be "fit"
The first time I ran 10 miles they were bleeding. From rubbing against my t-shirt. Two important things I learned from that.
1: Bandaids can be preventive medication
2: Running SUCKS
Scabbed nipples is a very odd experience. At least for me it was. One that I did not care to repeat.
Karma-man hates me.
Enter the triathlon coach.
He was not my coach and never will be. In fact if I ever see him again I am going to twist one of his nipples off.
We were standing next to each other at the Scofield triathlon start. I was having a rough time getting my wet-suit on. Which is typical when the wet-suits are made for little teenier tiny humans that have wee little 34 inch chests and 14 inch biceps. For the love of Paul Bunyan! My forearms are 14 inches, geeez.
Anyways he looks over and seeing me wiggling into my sausage case with extreme difficulty says "You know, it goes on and comes off a lot easier if you don't have any body hair"
Its probably a gift from my Polynesian heritage but I have never had a lot of body hair. Its not very masculine to admit this, but I just havent had much.
No gorilla back or bird nest belly. In fact, the body hair I did have was lightish in color and sparse. Very sparse.
However. I am dumb.
At the next triathlon I decided to be chest hair free.
No razors, I didnt want it growing back in a thatch of black wire.
I discovered this product called NAIR.

Its this sort of horrific acid that you put on hairy spots and it painlessly eats the hair.
No razor burn or cuts or nicks.
Just a smooth wet-suit slipping expanse of hair free chest.
I was so pleased with myself.
I sent the fam out to the pool so I could have some privacy to rid myself of hair the night before the start.
I read the instructions carefully and then carefully spread the goo over my chest from the shoulders down. Waited the proscribed amount of time and then carefully used the little shovel thingy to scrape the goo off.
Still had hair.
So
I ignored the instructions and spread the noxious crap as thickly as I could over the trouble spots. Mainly around my nipples and then I waited. Double the time.
It was itching a little when I scraped it off, but I was hair free.
It felt a little sticky, my chest did, when I put the wetsuit on the next morning. The water was cold enough that I was able to ignore the itching during the swim.
It had slipped on wonderfully.
Getting out of the water I unzipped the back and held out my arms for the yanker (some sweet old fit lady helping us get our sausage cases off) to yank. She yanked.
The wetsuit came off as slick as lard on a cookie sheet.
So did the top sixteen layers of my chest skin.
Nipples included.
I screamed right in her face. Loud. High Pitched and warbling.
We were both surprised.
I finished the triathlon shirtless, and skinless.
They have never been the same.
My Nipples.
They stand up all the time now. No matter what.
I think they might be afraid of what I may try next.
I know I am.

School

I have a really hard time making my kids go to school.
School is dumb.
Bad Dad.
I know.
Its just that I am not impressed with teachers.
Never have been.
I had some good ones, even a couple of great ones.
but mostly, some really weird people end up as teachers.
Its a thankless, monotonous, painful job.
And its 99 percent bullshit.
I flunked out of middle school
A lot of people wondered why I went to Jordan instead of Hillcrest, Its no mystery.
It was either that or detention.
Hillcrest would not take me.
Perhaps blowing up the chemistry lab had something to do with that.....
It really was an accident. Sort of.
Or maybe it was when Roger and I launched a model Rocket engine equipped Derby car down the hall.
No one was in any danger, the school was evacuated at the time for a gas leak. A real gas leak, but I had NOTHING to do with that.
Geez, that Frau Doctor Schmidt (may she burn in Nazi Hell) had NO sense of humor.
I admit freely that I was a terrible student. I never paid attention in class, I refused to do homework and if it got too bad, I would just leave.
Stand up in class and walk out.
Walk down the halls and out the door.
Then walkabout for a bit.
Walk down the road to the elementary school and visit my Brother, Hang out inside the giant tire and read a few library books.
Adults are so oblivious.
I would disappear in the middle of the day and show up, you know, whenever.
After a while I didn't even bother to hide it. Just walk out. Do my own thing.
Caught a snake one day.
Walking along the side of the canal.
Just glanced down and saw its head and thought about leaving it in my Brothers lunch-box.
  SUPRISE!
Oh the cleverness of me!
 I was already chuckling at the look on his face.
To think is to act, So, quick as thought I reached down and grabbed it. Right behind its neck.
It wrapped around my arm so fast I almost did not notice the rattles at the end.
God loves morons.

By pure blind luck I had grabbed so close behind its head that it couldn't bite me.
five rattles.
Fangs.
Then it peed on me, and pooped. And it smelled and felt awful.
But even at the young age of 13 I was pretty sure dying would be worse.
So I hung on, arm as straight as I could make it, getting those fangs and creepy wicked looking tongue as far away from me as possible.
Sat down on the banks of the canal and had a good PMC.
(poor me cry)
Then I smashed its head with a rock and threw its body as far as I could.
Walked home.
Did I learn my lesson? See the underlying moral fable in my encounter with the serpent while I was supposed to be in school gaining invaluable knowledge and perhaps unlocking the mysteries of math?
Knowledge that may have been valuable later in life? Important life altering things. Like the difference between a TSP and a TBSP?
nope.
Bad teachers.
What do we expect? We don't pay enough for good ones.

MATH it does a body good

The very first word of anything is always the hardest for me. It will either catch an audience or turn them away. Whether it is writing, speaking or singing it’s all the same. It’s that very first word that matters.

That’s why I grunt so much.

I finish triathlons, I would love to say that I “Race” or that I “Compete” but compared to the wee little elves that actually do these things, I am a scary oversized puffing and slobbering Troll.

They actually have a special class for guys like me.

Just like in school.

They call it Clydesdale.

For Hell's sake!

I would prefer Hercules or Goliath or even Ogre.

Nope, Clydesdale.

It used to be anything over 200 lbs., so I dieted until I thought I was going to blow away in the wind and the powers that be changed it to 195 lbs.

And

They had a weigh in.

198 pounds.

Then they write it on your leg.

So all the little gazelles that pass me know, Fat Ass.

I can hear them smirking at me as they bounce by with their effortless strides, gravity hardly pulling at them at all. I used to throw rocks at them. But I had a really difficult time hiding the body of the last one.

So now I just yell “OH YEAH!!!!!!” in a really mean voice.

It’s all I got.

My nephew (a gazelle) started finishing them with me. I could beat him by a few minutes but only because he couldn’t swim.

Bobbing along in the current dog-paddling does not make for an excellent swim time.

But man, the kid can run. Averaging a 5 ½ minute mile. That’s after the swim and the bike.

Then he beat me. By 8 minutes.

Desperate times etc etc.

I read an article that ascertained that for every pound you dropped you could shave one minute off your finishing times. He had beaten me by 8 minutes, so I did the math and discovered that I needed to lose 12 pounds. (Really bad at math)

Then I read another article, in another  magazine. It’s far too disgusting to ever repeat in any sort of English speaking company.

If you have a weak stomach stop HERE.

Colon Cleansing.

Apparently all of us carry all sorts of vile and unspeakable things about in our colons. Old food, Plaque, Bugs and yucky stuff of all description.

Then I got really excited because it says that the “average person” has about ten pounds of vile in their colon at any given time.

SHAZAM!

Problem solved. I am not average. So I figured 12 pounds was as good as gone.

 The Cleanse

It sounds really ominous. Say it out loud in a raspy breathy Darth Vader voice and it sounds exactly like I felt going into it.

THE CLEEAANNSSSE

It wasn’t that bad.

It was just a seven day deal. I didn’t eat anything at all for seven days. I had to drink this magic potion to help speed things along, but it really was not that bad.

Juice of two lemons

One tbsp. of grade B maple syrup

Cheyenne pepper to taste.

In a Nalgene bottle of Distilled water.

For seven days.

Day 8 was the Kicker. And day nine was the race.

God made the world in 6 days, I made a lot of ahem poo.

It’s amazing actually. I wasn’t eating anything and I was still producing poundage.

It’s the magic poo potion that does it.

Day Seven.

The cleanse instructions said to mix 2.5 TSPs of non-iodized salt with one gallon of warm water and drink the whole thing.

No problem.

Wait!

I failed Home Economics. Stitched my finger to my sachet and caught the oven thingy on fire somehow, Failed with an F. And Math? Who needs Math? That’s why God invented calculators. (Really, I am horrible at Math)

FYI: 1 tablespoon (tbsp) equals 3 teaspoons (tsp)

A TSP is apparently 

different from a TBSP!

Who knew?

So, two giant heaping TBSPs of salt, then a level One cause I couldn’t just fill it half way. Mixed in a gallon of warm water and guzzled. Gagging, coughing, groaning and retching. But I swallered it all. And I kept it down.

God created the world in 6 days then took a day off to sleep.

I created poo for seven days. Then I exploded.

The instructions read something like “After completing the seven day pre-cleanse you will be ready for a gentle salt laxative. This will clean the walls of your colon and finish your cleanse”

Slap me with a giant roasted buffalo.

Gentle?

I thought I was pretty much empty by this point. I had lost ten pounds of vile and was sitting at 196, fighting weight. I figured with the “gentle cleanse” I would expel those last two pounds and slaughter the nephew come day nine.

Shit. And more shit.

Then things that I don’t even like to think about. Then my appendix and I am pretty sure my other tonsil. Bugs critters and stuff that was supposed to stay in came out.

For 14 very long hours.

I lost the weight.

183 lbs. morning of race.

I finished the triathlon. Not dead last. Just dead.

The nephew dog paddled and sprinted his way to beating me by 16 minutes.

Boy,  was I clean.

AMBIEN

I don’t sleep much.

 Not really.  5-6 hours a night is more than enough for me to function semi-normally. Semi only because I could sleep for a year or two and still not behave “normally”

I read an article in the 8^th Grade about how much of our lives we spend in bed, sleeping.

It’s A LOT.

It had a profound effect on me.

 I just quit sleeping. I would go go go until I pretty much passed out from exhaustion.  Or I would just sleep during school. I figured why not? It’s not like I was doing anything important. Life is pretty short, too short to sleep through.

Fast forward a dozen years or so, and suddenly the habit of not sleeping becomes a concern and a problem.  One of those things that seem normal to me but all of a sudden it seems to the people around me that something is “wrong”.   like all of us are bombarded constantly by things that tell us we are sick, we need drugs, we want to be normal we want to be normal. Billboards, commercials and advertisements selling wellness. 

What a crock of shit.

Anyways.

I fell for it. Hard. Went to five different doctors to find out what was “wrong” with me and they all got a chance to practice their witch doctor hoodoo voodoo on me.  All I got out of all of it was a sense of panic and a prescription for AMBIEN. It’s a sleep drug, helps you sleep. They say. Knocks your ass out is what it does.

It works really really well.

Then I started having weirdness.

Waking up in strange places. It wasn’t every day, but it was strange.

I woke up at 330 am in my truck at short term parking in the airport. I woke up walking down the street by my house holding a dog leash with no dog.  I woke up on the sidewalk in front of my old best friends house with truck keys in my hand and no truck in sight.

And then.

I woke up naked on a bench in a strange gym.

At 3 in the morning.

This was something that most certainly was not covered in the boy scouts handbook.

So.

I searched the lockers until I found an abandoned towel, I was hoping for my clothes or keys or phone but no such luck.

 A towel is what I got.

  Clad thusly in towel I ventured out into the gym. It was mostly empty, a few fellow insomniacs (pre-Ambien) working out and a pretty little girl at the desk.

 With really big startled looking eyes.

 I approached her a little warily; she was looking at me kind of funny. The conversation went something like this.

Naked but for a towel me: HI!

Desk Girl with Big Startled Eyes:

Nbfatm: um, did you see me come in?

DGwBSE: a nod

Nbfatm: Great! Um, did I have clothes on?

DGwBSE: a nod

Nbfatm: Excellent! Did you notice if I had a bag?

DGwBSE: a nod, then a point

With a rapid turn I followed her finger direction and saw Child #1s school bag leaned against a wall. Snatching it up I discovered a padlock key and my shirt inside. I went back into the locker room and found the little pink heart padlock that matched the key and discovered some clothes, my keys, my phone and a DVD.

Two problems.

No pants, and I had never seen the DVD before. “Bad Boys 2” was not really on my must see list.

I put on the clothes I had and clad in my (it was mine now) towel and wearing a child’s backpack strode confidently (right) out to the desk again.

Partially Clad me: Hi

DGwBSE:

PCm: Um, by any chance did I take my pants off out here?

DGwBSE: Huge emphatic nod and another point.

I followed the point and found my pants. Safe and sound folded neatly on the leg press.

Three things.

 I never have been back to that Gym, I quit Ambien cold turkey, insomnia is FUN. Oh, and the movie?

 Really sucks.

Fights is Fun

Before reading further be warned.

If you are a pacifist, peace-loving,turn the other cheek or Amish person. THIS WILL OFFEND YOU.

Moving right along. I think fights is fun.

Yelling back and forth at one another, trading verbal jabs and saying snide things. That is not a fight.

That is arguing. It can escalate to a fight, but mostly in todays oh so modern and peacified society everyone seems to think it is perfectly ok to yell at other people.

Its not.

Yelling is not fighting, its yelling. Saying shitty spiteful things to people is not fighting, its shitty. Goading someone into physical violence does not show how awesome you are. Rather, it shows that Darwin was right. Only in todays land of make believe we protect the weak little smart-asses that would have been beaten to death as children in a real world. 

Before litigation and the outlawing of fistcuffs, people were exceedingly polite to each other. Really, you had to be. Even in the 40s and 50s a punch in the mouth was something a wise-ass could expect. 

People were nicer.

All that being said, lets talk about fights.

A fight is when two folks get together and air out their differences by smacking each other with available body parts. Fists, hands, Heads, Knees and Feets are all legitiment tactics.

Training in a fighting style is also perfectly legal in Tom-land.

Its a fight as long as you get the chance to do as much damage to your opponent as he gets to do to you.

On a side note.

Yes, women can fight. I prefer that they do not but I am very liberal in this respect. However I will never hit a women or allow any man in my vicinity to do so.

Its in my Blood. 

Even hearing about a man roughing up a women gets me nigh unto berserker rage.
onwards then.

One of the best fights I ever got in I lost. 

I was in line to go to a haunted house, along with hundreds of other people all jostling each other.

I jostled up against a Samoan guy about my size, he gave me the stink eye so I stink eyed right back.

No words were exchanged, he just pushed my chest with his open hand so I popped him on the eye. I would love to say that I won, I really would. But I hit that guy as many times and as hard as I could, in the head in the face in the stomach and chest and he just took it, waited, then cracked me on the forehead. 

Son of a brother celibate nun! 

That hurt. I slowed down a bit but I kept hitting him, then he cracked me on the forehead again!

The celibate nun was tap dancing in my head.

So i put everything I had into a flying super-human strength monster punch to the face. Pulled my fist right out of orbit and dropped it on him like a meteor.

He blinked twice. Shook his head a little bit,and started laughing.

So I held up my hand and said ok ok ok.

Still Laughing he said . "That was a pretty good shot" and hugged me. 

His name is Raymond Latului, we got to be really good friends. 

Strange.

But thats what fights is.

You win some and you lose some.

You learn to be polite really quickly around guys that will break your nose for an insult.

Pavlov and his freaking Dogs.

Todays society has created the super asshole. These weasely guys that whine and yelll and complain about everything. They bluster and threaten and intimidate. They yell and curse and make obscene gestures from the safety of their cars.

They believe that they are immune to physical violence. They have the law and society firmly in their corner.

I hope for the sake of the rest of us that one day they run into a Neanderthal like me.

Its fair, they can fight back and win. Maybe they can back their mouth with fists of fury.

I doubt it.

But they get the chance.

Rememory

Everywhere I have ever been has a "Mountain View" street.

Even in Georgia, I stood on a street called Mountain View and strained my eyes looking for even a large hill, let alone a mountain.
They still had the street.
I get this feeling that a lot of names get reused like this, take for instance "Widow Maker" if everything that bore that name actually caused some sad and lonely women to minus a husband.......
There would be a lot more cougar activity at the local bar scenes.
Ok, bad joke.
But really, Widow Maker? A thing that kills husbands, usually a steep hill or mountain that men, presumably husbands try and ride motorcycles/cars/dune buggies/pogo sticks and all other manner of loco-motion up.
I assume it makes sense.

right.
This post has nothing whatsoever to do with going up a mountain.
Well, we did have to hike back up after, but this memory has nothing to do with going up.
It has everything to do with going down.
And the hill was named "Widow Maker".
The whole "How it got started?" is fuzzy to me, I remember Mark (his real name) picking me up in his two wheel drive truck and making two stops.

The costume/wardrobe closet at the high school he was attending and that I had recently been kicked out of. (graduated) To stock up on ridiculous coats. His was a bright plaid and mine was lime-ish greenish.

K mart, where we pooled our money and bought a sled. 4 dollars.

It was orange and plastic.
It rocked.





Then we drove down south to the "Point of the Mountain". back in these, Ye olde days, there were no homes out there. People still wanted to live on flat ground and not perched up on cliffs like the Anasazi.
I digress.
We drove to the top of the local "Widow Maker" Being unmarried we knew we were safe.
Walked to the edge and looked down.
Holy narking frozen shit balls.
Straight down about sums it up.
So, we braced the sled on the edge, I got in first and braced my feet to either side, Mark said something witty and got in the front.
I would like to point out at this time for you  to remember "Its only Gay if you make eye contact"
We balanced on the edge and.....
I lifted up my feet
ZHP!
we were at the bottom.
That fast.
I had frozen tears blown back from my eyes and a faint recollection of speed. Our manly screams were still echoing from the surrounding peaks.
It took us an hour and a half to hike back up.
Our second run was even faster.
The tree didn't even slow us down.
It was a spindly little thing, only about ten feet tall and 8 inches around at the base.
We hit it dead center near the bottom of the mountain.
Snapped it clean off at the base and went right over it.
Our super manly screams of terror turned into relieved laughter as we heard it snap.
2 hours this time. All the way to the top and fading light lent us speed.
Entering our supersonic kick-ass sled contrivance Mark said "Hey, I think there is a drop off down there"
I glanced down, It did indeed appear that the mountain fell away into a crevice near the bottom, but being wise in the ways of distance and mirage in fading light I growled "optical illusion" and clambered aboard.
Once again, the brace, the balance, the lifting of the feet and.....
Unreal speed.
Barely able to see I glimpsed the mirage coming up.
I have mentioned that I am dumb? Right?
We sailed out into open air, 20, 30, 40 feet in a blink.
We did not launch, the mountain just dropped away under us.
We flew.
Important safety tip.
Sleds do not fly well, they land worse.
It was a very very long hike back to the truck.