Let's face it, those who believed that aliens had to be gray and skinny with big shiny eyes and tiny little mouths will no doubt be gobsmacked to learn that this is what they really look like.
This picture has been proven to be absolutely real by Glenn's Alien Picture Verification Shop in the Shumley Mall. "I won't soon forget those teeth," shuddered Glenn, "and that round face and those eyes and that nose, the orange muffler, the blackness, I mean, did you see it? That had to be real, right?! Anyway, that's what I'm saying." The now famous photo was taken by the highly sexed Louise Vandergarten while on vacation with her boyfriend Harry. Says Louise, "That's right, I was taking a picture of that big ol' mountain over there after me and Harry just done it when up popped this alien cupcake thingy. Made me mad! The little alien photobombed my damn picture!" When told that the photo was proof that extraterrestrials were here on Earth and was now probably priceless, Louise asked just how much priceless was it. When told at least eight figures, Louise shrieked, "1,000 dollars?! 1,000 freakin' American dollars! Let me be the first to welcome our alien cupcake overlords!" Then she left right away to go tell Harry the good news and have sex again before they had to check out at 11.
December 2, 2012
If you can't allow yourself to believe that your life is self directed and under your control and instead insist on assigning all your good fortune to god and your bad to the devil, then you will continue to sleepwalk through the greatest thing that has ever happened to you - you.
December 3, 2012
Once a week I call a friend in France, not to talk to him but to listen to his answering machine. He changes his message every week and has been doing so for ten years. As he's creative and witty, it's become a small, delicious treat to hear what he comes up with every refresh. He does it just to keep his friends amused. Nice, eh? Vive répondeur Michel! (Long live Michel's answering machine!)
I talked to someone who had just returned from Dollywood, Dolly Parton's theme park in the Smoky Mountains. I asked him how he liked it. He said it was schmaltzy, over the top, pure country corn and he loved every minute of it. He says he rode the Tennessee Tornado roller coaster more than 30 times just so he could ogle the ticket taker, Lorna, "My future wife, though she doesn't know it yet. LOL. That's why I'm going back down in a couple of weeks to have a Smoky Mountain Christmas at Lornawood, er, Dollywood. I don't care if I have to ride that coaster 100 more times and throw up after every one, she's gonna know of my dedication." I told him that baby jesus would be so proud.
December 6, 2012
We had such a wet and warmish November. I've a friend who got his company's D9 bulldozer stuck in mud in a field and it sat there for 10 days before he could get an excavator in there to pull it out. But the excavator threw a track when it tried to pull the D9 off a muddy side hill, so he brought in a lowboy to haul the excavator back to the shop, but the tractor trailer got stuck in the mud after loading the excavator so he had to call a rotator wrecker to lift up and free the tractor trailer. The wrecker was also able to pull the D9 off the side hill and drag it to level ground. My friend said the cost of the downtime for the equipment plus the $800 an hour for the wrecker set his company back a cool $17,000. Jokingly I said, No Christmas bonus for you! But my friend wasn't laughing.
-- Did you see the tree at the base of the monument?
December 8, 2012
I'm visiting an acquaintance when this old guy sitting on the couch says to me, "Does it seem weird to you that you use nitroglycerine for your heart, but you also use it to blow up a mountain?" I asked him if he used nitroglycerine for his heart. "Hell no! You use that shit to blow up mountains! I just got done tellin' you that! My god! Jesus! What the hell's wrong with you? Didn't you hear a damn word I said?! You kids make me sick." Really, the only thing missing was, Get off my lawn!
December 9, 2012
Malamutes! At 3:30 in the morning Sophie wakes me up to be let outside. It's 12 below, snowing and windy as she trudges out into the night. I think to myself how fortunate humans are that we have managed to bring the lavatory inside. 1 minute, 5 minutes, 9 minutes later and she still hasn't returned. I look out the door but can only see a little bit of the yard, and she's not in it. I call her but it's really windy and my words come back at me. Now I'm freezing, fully awake and cursing as I put on a winter coat, toque and snow boots to go out to find her. She is in the open and exposed yard sleeping on her side in the snow like she's on a warm beach in Mexico. I tell her to come in the house. She doesn't budge. I tell her I'm not kidding and that she has to get up right now and come inside. She looks at me as if to say, You're not the boss of me. Malamutes!
December 10, 2012
A courier truck got stuck in our driveway. He was hopping mad. He screamed at me for not plowing our driveway. He said he had a schedule to meet. He said this was the worst possible time for this to happen. He cursed his company for not having 4 wheel drive trucks. He was literally shaking with Christmas delivery rage. I told him to calm down, he was getting on my nerves, I would pull him out with the tractor, relax. The whole affair took no more than 10 minutes. He fled like his pants were on fire. Ah, the holidays.
I got a sanctimonious e-mail from a self-anointed "Guru of Morals". He basically accused me of corrupting his mind with thoughts of a foreign nature, though that's me paraphrasing his grunting and whining about the fact that I didn't think like he did. The "Guru of Morals" professed to speak for all the morals no matter how small or petty (oh goody), and he said he had a bone to pick with me. But I've been around crazy before. These things must be nipped in the bud. I wrote back and told him I died over the weekend and instead of sending flowers he can contribute to my favorite charities, and I listed them. I know, I know, this posting is rather macabre, but there's nothing funny about crushing the dreams of people with titles.
December 13, 2012
I was buying something with a debit card and as the cash was being electronically transferred I had a vision of the money leaving my account, zipping through the wires and arriving in theirs. Emotionally, it was like losing a friend. As I removed my debit card from the machine I dabbed away a tear, told the saleslady I had something in my eye, walked out of the store a little less pleased with my purchase.
December 14, 2012
I was lied to by someone I didn't respect. It was a big lie and it changed many things. My esteem for that person was already dragging its knuckles on the ground, so where does one go from there? I was left with but one course of action, well two, if you count killing them, but I chose to cut bait, jump ship, flee the scene - for good. You see, as of this moment, I am officially done with this person. This is my public posting and as such, should any legal proceedings arise as a result of my declaration, now that you have read this, you may be called as a material witness. Thank you, thank you very much.
I had an uncle who played winter golf; red balls, 4 wheel drive cart, flagon of rum. He had snow boots with spikes in them, hand warmer gloves and tees that were 6 inches long. Sadly, he died chipping onto the 7th green at Tully's Oceanside 18 during a brutal winter back in '65. One of his foursome wanted to bury him in the bunker "like he would have wanted", one wanted to strap him to the back of the golf cart and finish the round, and one wanted to give him a proper burial at sea, though he was neither sailor nor swimmer, later admitting that the water seemed like a good place to get rid of a body. In the end they stayed at the 7th and toasted my uncle until the rum ran out at which point the bunker burial seemed more and more like a good idea. He was found in the spring by the greenskeeper. Everyone agreed it was great that our uncle died doing something he loved because frankly, the burial part was kind of a nightmare.
December 16, 2012
"Go on, put your name in." I'm talking with Pastor Jim, who was having problems with his super religious, ultra pious website and asked me if I would take a look. On the home page he has a generator that will give you the meaning of your name and he was most anxious for me to use it. "Go on, put your name in."
And that was the end of that.
December 17, 2012
I'm taking today off. Later, my sweets.
December 18, 2012
Last night I was in town and passed a guy and a gal walking in the snow eating ice cream cones. Brrrrr. Even though they appeared to be enjoying themselves, it looked all kinds of wrong. And where can you even buy ice cream cones at night at the end of December in Canada? I figured there must be something up with this couple, something definitely worth investigating and I was determined to spend some quality time figuring out just what was going on until I got distracted by some Christmas lights. Ooh look, so pretty!
December 19, 2012
Two days until the world ends or it doesn't. I'm feeling darned good either way. I've had an awesome life if it's over on Friday, and I have a few more things I can easily do if it isn't. Me, I'm covered for the coming apocalypse or not. Say, how about you?
December 20, 2012
I was driving down the valley, which is dotted with farms, and in one straight stretch I had a long range view of two front end loaders dismantling a barn. Oddly, they were driving right through one wall and out the other side of this 70 foot building, with the inevitable coming after the second or third go-through when the barn collapsed with one of the loaders still in it. My last sight before passing the scene (at 60 miles an hour) was the other loader operator - a kid, like a 14 year old kid - jumping off his machine and running toward the barn.
December 21, 2012
Missed a phone call from a buddy in Adelaide. His message was simply, "Still here. You?"
There is going to be an absence at the close of this year - me. I'm leaving tomorrow for a five day trip that will take moi out of the country. There will be no updates during that time. But then I'll be back and it will seem like I never left. Will too.
