Driving through Redondo Beach, I saw a horde. Four new mothers in workout garb complete with strollers were crossing the street to meet a group of five other mothers in similar attire. I did see a couple of fanny packs, a pair of Gucci sunglasses, some spandex and some lingering pregnancy weight.

While I admire these mothers for their desire to remain active while tending to their new bundles of joy, it is quite an apocalyptic sight. Just close your eyes and picture it….

I think what made it scary for me was wondering if these women were friends before their decision to have a child. If so, did they get together 18 months ago and coordinate their conceptions? It would be a gathering filled with pinot grigio or white zinfandel as they cackled on and on about how great it would be if all of their kids could grow up together. The coffee table they surround has a potpourri centerpiece with recent issues of Martha Stewart Living, InStyle and People magazines in perfect place.

I’m sure there’s one woman in that group who, tried as she might, just couldn’t conceive so right now she’s going through fertilization treatments while being shunned by the other yentas.

“She just didn’t try hard enough,” Yenta A said.

“I hear her husband’s sperm is defective,” Yenta B said.

Terrifying, huh? This is why I am scared of heterosexuals.

According to my Last.fm profile, I have listened to the same amount of Lady Gaga and Slayer songs in the last six months: 34.

Cigarette Count – Tue., May 10, 2011: 5

Image swiped from here.

What I have here is actual photographic evidence of this double chin thing. What is also very evident here is that I need to do something with that mop up on my head. Oh, and I shaved the ridiculousness that was on my face.

I dragged by ever expanding ass to the gym today and did an hour of cardio. The treadmill section is completely flanked with mirrors. Much to my pleasure as I look at my reflection I see that I have a long elegant neck with no double chin. I come home and find that the double chin is still there. I chalk this up to the fact that since I’m tall I tend to have to look down which creates that double chin. If I were to keep staring ahead like I do at the gym, I have a pretty strong chin. Yes I’m vain.

So people whom I talk to regularly: if you are shorter than me please do me the favor and step on a platform of some sort so that you are either my height or taller than me. I will no longer look down to talk to people.

Currently I have an iPod playlist set on shuffle for the following songs:

1. Annie – Two of Hearts
2. Atari Teenage Riot – Sick to Death
3. Death from above 1979 – Blood on Our Hands
4. Fad Gadget – Ricky’s Hand
5. The Faint – Worked Up So Sexual
6. Front Line Assembly – Circuitry
7. Gravy Train!!!! – Titties Bounce
8. The Jesus and Mary Chain – Head On
9. Lady Gaga – Bad Romance
10. Ladytron – Destroy Everything You Touch
11. Milemarker – New Lexicon
12. Ministry – Just One Fix
13. Nine Inch Nails – March of the Pigs
14. Peaches – Fuck the Pain Away
15. Skinny Puppy – Empte
16. Soft Cell – Sex Dwarf

I’m getting a little tired of it, so what should I put to help keep my heart rate up?

I really do like to think of myself as an erudite snob who fills his days reading Guy Debord, Michel Foucault, Marcel Proust and other pretentious shit who uses my well-read wealth of knowledge to go to sporting events and write about them. I thumb my nose at all of this reality television nonsense and mourn for the days when programming had more substance.

Well all of that is bullshit. Television has always been an empty passive experience bereft of any substance. And the snob that I liken myself to be is actually a letter off – I’m a slovenly slob who does fall prey to these abhorrent displays of false reality.

When the Real Housewives of Orange County first started in 2006, I told myself to avoid it like the plague. Nothing good could come of it. So I did. I blissfully restrained my reality television viewing vices to Project Runway and America’s Next Top Model.* Week after week went by and blogs would recap the goings on at Coto and gossip about Lauri’s kids and what not, and I was blissfully unaware.

But then on an idle weekend afternoon I went through the channels and was saw that Bravo was doing a Real Housewives Marathon. And for some reason – whether it be a broken thumb, a brain aneurysm, a broken television – my television stayed on Bravo. And for hours I just sat there like a man whose life support was about to be pulled complete with the drool.

End result: a wasted day, fatter ass and a couple of dead brain cells.

Each ensuing season I vowed to ignore the show. And inevitably I would get sucked into one of those ridiculous marathons. This is exactly what happened on Sunday. The characters are different, but the stories are essentially them same. This housewife hates the other housewife; they get put into a situation where they are forced to interact; hilarity ensues.

And there I stare gawking at all of this as the sun passes through the sky (but I wouldn’t know it since I’m watching Tamra talk about her lesbian kiss with Francesca or whatever her name is.) And I just feel dirtier as each second ticks by as if I was tied to a bed being pissed on by a big burly 50 year old whose screen name is “fistnpiss4u.”

So not only do I have no will power – as also evidenced by my inability to stop smoking – but I am a delusional pretentious fucker. How does anyone associate themselves with me?**

*If anyone had any doubt to my homosexuality, this should quell any doubts.

**This is a rhetorical question you fuckers.

Cigarette Count – Mon., May 9, 2011: 4.

I had some very pressing questions for Catherine the other day on IM. And because I vaguely follow men’s fashion thanks to Arena Homme +, I just needed to know these things. Such as:

1. Why do I not own any short shorts that are in style this season?
2. Why do I not have the tan necessary to not look like a complete idiot in short shorts?
3. Why do I not have the body to pull off short shorts?

The answers….

1. I’m poor. I’m a student with no regular income so going to Dolce & Gabbana is just out of the question. I guess I could go to H&M, but that gets addressed in question 3.

2. I don’t have the time to lay out at the beach to get the proper coloring. And it’s not professional to be at Dodger Stadium when it’s 90 degrees wearing shorts especially with the blindingly pasty legs that are my own. Granted some players are pastier and have horrid farmers’ tans than I do, but still. It’s just not proper.

3. I’ve determined I’m not straight-fat, but I am most definitely gay fat. Meaning if I were straight, girls wouldn’t mind the softness that is my torso. In fact because I have some sort of personality it might even be endearing. After all isn’t that the message we get from awful shows like Still Standing and that Kevin James sitcom?

But no I am a queer man and a body fat percentage that is over eight is not acceptable. Not to mention my legs are somewhat hairy, and I have absolutely no desire to shave, wax or do any depilatory activities to them. So there are a couple of strikes against me.

And going back to question 1, I do not have the proper body type to shop at H&M as much as I would like to. Perhaps I should go on the Karl Lagerfeld diet that he went through so he could fit in Hedi Slimane suits?

Image yoinked from here.

As most people know I’m a smoker, have been since I was 16 – half of my life. I smoked a cigarette yesterday morning and decided I was going to stop. Just like that.

And it wasn’t all bad yesterday. Sure I had the cravings, but it wasn’t like I was pulling my hair out. I just went about my day and evening as if I had never smoked, even though I don’t really remember my life before cigarettes.

When I woke up this morning it wasn’t too bad either. I walked to my car, and of course my mind was on cigarettes, but still I could withstand. Then it happened.

Every other time I tried to stop smoking there came a point about 24 hours after when the real withdrawal symptoms started. That’s when my skin starts crawling and it feels like ants are crawling all over me. Granted my hair is a bit scraggy and I haven’t shaved in a while, but the itching, the sensation. It’s all like an acid trip.

So I broke down and bought a pack and with trembling hands that everyone would associate with a nic freak, I put the cigarette in my mouth, started the lighter and took a deep breath letting the smoke envelop my body. At once the itching stopped and the light-headedness started. It’s a great sensation that every smoker hopes to emulate each time they light up. And because it had been 24 hours, it was there.

With the nic fit crisis averted the subsequent wave of depression and failure came. Those are feelings I am very much used to. Like a worn comforter I am used to these sort of feelings. So I do what I do best: I smoke another cigarette.

Edit: I have a whole string of other fails going on in my life which I will probably write about in the coming days. But this is the one that is currently pissing me off.

Image stolen from here

Too lazy to write today. My first ever video blog. Topics include feeling cheap after writing up last night’s Dodger game, the weirdness of the game, it’s fucking hot, my awful hockey playoff ‘stache and some token swearing.

This dude on DList had this in his profile:

Likes: confidence, maturity, intellect, muscle, abs, sporty, adventurous.

I DO NOT LIKE- fat, ugly, butter faces, blacks & asians, old, hairy, obese, midgets, queens, fag hags, fruity, guys who wear underwear with designs or prints, guys who like to sniff underwear or jockstraps, creepy, skinny, pale, bald, blondes, squinty eyes, bad teeth, poor hygiene, long hair, jewelry, lots of piercings, cockrings, slings, leather, daddies, bears and so on….. this does NOT make me a racist nor hater…. i simply KNOW what i like, and what i cleary DONT like, so if you dont like it, then shut the fuck up and dont send me an email… cause i dont give a shit.

This makes me wonder what in fact he really likes. I’m confused.

This picture is a good illustration of my ability to play right field: I got none.

I had a dream a couple of weeks ago that the Dodgers were playing the Angels at Dodger Stadium. In the middle of the game the Angels find out they’re out of outfielders so Manager Mike Scioscia tells me to go out on the field. Before I can protest that I have no baseball-playing abilities I’m being pushed out on the field in my everyday clothes, not an Angels uniform.

You see there is only one sport I can play with any sort of competency: tennis. I can’t catch. I can’t hit a ball with a baseball bat. I throw like a girl. I can’t skate. I have little or no hand-eye coordination.

So there I am in right field at Dodger Stadium. I don’t know who’s at the plate, but thwap! The line drive comes screaming at me. I try to judge the trajectory perfectly and stand right where I think the ball will drop in my glove. So of course it drops a foot over my head.

The next batter hits a bouncing single to right field. I bend down to get the ball to my glove, but I have Bill Buckner moment – the ball goes under my glove and between my legs. E9 and a run scores. I feel the glare of the other outfielders as I hang my head in my ineptitude.

Next batter: a ball comes to me. At this point all the hitters are deliberately targeting my horrible defense. This repeats itself with less and less detail until I wake up.

Moral of the story? Don’t play baseball or be anywhere near a situation where I can be inserted into a game.

I decided to take the Colorgenics test. Here’s what it spit out:

You are tending to pursue your objectives with concentrated intensity and it would seem that whatever obstacles may come into your path, you will stick to your guns and will not allow yourself to be deflected from your purpose. You are striving to achieve recognition and what is more – you deserve it.

You ‘need to be needed’. As an idealist you are intolerant of anything short of special consideration from those close to you. If you do not get what you seek you are apt to become reclusive and you will close the doors on all those within your sphere of influence.

You wear your heart on your sleeve and since you are an emotional person you are apt to give your all – heart and soul – to all those that show you a little affection; but take care – it would appear that you have been extremely hurt in the past and you keep leaving yourself wide open for punishment.

Recent disappointment has led you to become truly introverted. You are becoming suspicious of everybody and consequently you now feel that you are unable to trust anybody. Unfortunately it would appear that you are curbing your natural enthusiasm and imaginative nature – perhaps this is because you are fearful that you may become over enthused and find that you could possibly be carried away by wishful thinking. You are keeping your distance to see whether attitudes towards you are sincere – but this watchfulness could easily develop into suspicion and distrust.

You really would like to be completely uninhibited – to let your hair down – but you are held back by your sense of logic and rationalilty, since you realise that by simple stupidity you could lose everything – whatever that may be.