Something A Bit More Serious Than Usual

I guess this is more an issue for our American readers but it is really something that everyone should go and take a look at. It never hurts to be a little bit more educated and a little bit more open-minded.

PunkVoter.com is a site that has been set up for Punk Rock fans (or anyone really willing to acknowledge that a change is necessary) to have a voice throughout the process of the American election. It raises a lot of interesting points on the fact that the youth of the world has, in large part, lost interest in politics and how devastating that has been.

If you are going to go and check it out, I would strongly suggest that you start at The About Section which outlines the idea of the site and you can decide for yourself from there pretty much whether or not you’re going to agree or disagree and whether you want to ocntinue exploring the site. There are some touchy things said there and if you are a large Bush supporter, you may not be impressed but even if you are, you can’t argue some of the points made.

Across the punk rock world (and youth in general) there are political views spanning rom the farrest right wing to the farrest left wing and even some who believe that governemtn itself needs to be abolished. All those opinions are welcome as the site focuses simply on the need for change from what we have right now.

Here’s a few lines directly from the site.

” These are drastic times and today’s youth are not voting.

The US is waging wars on false pretenses.

Kids under our country’s legal drinking age are fighting overseas and dying.

Unemployment has reached nine-year highs.

Every state has budget deficits and is actively passing these burdens
on to future generations – that means you.

An estimated 60% of the 2003 graduates will have to move back in
with their parents because of the lack of jobs.

The 18 to 24-year-old voter demographic dropped
to an all time low of only 38% in 2000.”

If those points/stats don’t tell you that something is wrong than I’m not really sure what to say. Maybe umm, read it again or something.

Again, this is largely for Americans I suppose but it will never hurt you to be more educated and more informed. Don’t watch CNN and assume you’re getting the complete truth. Be informed. Be smart. If after that you still believe that good ol’ G. W. is the right answer, than good for you. But don’t do it because he told you what a great job he was doing in his press conference. Do it because you took some time and got real facts.

Some of you may comment about sharing my political views on a site like this… but I don’t think I really have. All I’ve done is given you just one more way to be informed. Besides, if I wanted to tell you my views I could. This is my page after all.

With that, I’m gone. Have a lovely “COUGHCOUGHDON’TVOTEFORBUSHCOUGHCOUGH” day.

So Uninspired

So I’ve pretty much neglected this place for the last 2 weeks or so. I have no excuse. Aside from the long weekend I have done nothing different, I have no family crisis, I have no work problems. I am just lazy and uninspired. Truth be told, it’s not my laziness to post that is the problem. It is my laziness to go out and do anything aside from work and gain some inspiration for a post. I mean, there’s only so many times you can post about the guy next to you at work farting and things you saw on tv when you got home from work. I’m just in one of those ruts that everyone goes through where you don’t feel like doing much and apparently writing here falls in to the same thing. And now with Steve’s computer issues posts may be few and far between. Perhaps I’ll get up to something this weekend that will give me something relevant to post about.

But hey, look at that. My lack of posting and inspiration gave me something to post…

I Hate Computers

I’m not sure when all of you will be hearing from me next for a couple of reasons. First of all, I’ve got a busy few days coming up so there probably won’t be much time for posting. But more than that, tonight my computer decided to take the biggest dump on the earth and now it won’t boot up properly so until I can get somebody in here to fix it, I’m pretty much fucked. You can probably imagine how thrilled I am about this situation. I’ll say this, imagine how pissed off you think I am and then multiply that by about 27 and you might get close. So I’ll talk to you all sometime, either when I can snag time on the other computer in the house or when I get my own machine working again and get some time to post.

In the meantime you can feel free to post comments and email me things if you so desire, I can still check mail from time to time.

So I’ll talk to you all hopefully very soon, the sooner the better in fact.

The Gentlemen Quiz

Here’s a quick quiz for “Gentlemen”….

1. In the company of feminists, coitus should be referred to as

a) Lovemaking
b) Screwing
c) The pigskin bus pulling into tuna town

2. You should make love to a woman for the first time only after you’ve both shared:

a) Your views about what you expect from a sexual relationship
b) Your blood-test results
c) Five tequila slammers

3. You time your orgasm so that:

a) Your partner climaxes first
b) You both climax simultaneously
c) You don’t miss SportsCenter

4. Passionate, spontaneous sex on the kitchen floor is:

a) Healthy, creative love-play
b) Not the sort of thing your wife/girlfriend would ever agree to doing
c) Not the sort of thing your wife/girlfriend need ever find out about

5. Spending the whole night cuddling a woman you’ve just had sex with is:

a) The best part of the experience
b) The second best part of the experience
c) $100 extra

6. Your girlfriend says she’s gained five pounds in weight in the last month. You tell her that it is:

a) No concern of yours
b) Not a problem – she can join your gym
c) A conservative estimate

7. You think today’s sensitive, caring man is:

A) A myth
b) An oxymoron
c) A moron

8. Foreplay is to sex as:

a) Appetizer is to entree
b) Priming is to painting
c) A queue is to an amusement park ride

9. Which of the following are you most likely to find yourself saying at the end of a relationship?

a) “I hope we can still be friends.”
b) “I’m not in right now. Please leave a message after the tone….”
c) “Welcome to Dumpsville. Population: You.”

10. A woman who is uncomfortable watching you masturbate:

a) Probably needs a little more time before she can cope with that sort of intimacy
b) Is uptight and a waste of time
c) Shouldn’t have sat next to you on the bus in the first place

If you answered ‘A’ more than 7 times, check your pants to make sure you really are a man.

If you answered ‘B’ more than 7 times, check into therapy, you’re still a little confused.

If you answered ‘C’ more than 7 times, call me up. Let’s go drinking.

Why Some Of You Are Here

It’s been a little while since I’ve done this and a few of these have just recently caught my eye so here we go with another exciting episode of Stuff People Searched For.

For anybody who is new to the site who might not know how this works, it’s pretty simple. Our hit counter can tell where people came from if they clicked here through a link from another site. This includes the added bonus of logging what search terms that person used if they got here through a search engine like Google or Yahoo. Some of these things are weird to say the least, and we get so many of them that there are actually ones we don’t even bother with anymore, like searches for Randy Orton’s penis or the size thereof, both of which are listed in the list of the last 20 search requests. So here for your amusement are some of the ways that some of your fellow readers found the site. I always wonder how many of these guys stick around to watch me make fun of them or even become regular readers. I’d ask you to comment but I’m sure that you’d never speak up. Don’t worry, if I were some of you I wouldn’t either.

07 May, Fri, 20:01:51
Google:
little teen extreme humiliated vomit

I’m not sure what kind of porn this person was looking for, but count me out.

19 May, Wed, 16:19:57
Google:
oringal six nhl hockey teams

Hey buddy, here’s a tip for you. Maybe before we worry about the hockey trivia we should work on the spelling a little bit first. But I’m thinking that since you still managed to find your way here that it was probably one of Matt’s posts that triggered the result. Way to go Matt, your creative use of the English language is helping the site grow, one tard at a time.

Sticking with the hockey theme, it seems that the person with the Matt Stajan obsession has decided to go about things a little bit differently.

22 May, Sat, 00:24:32
Google:
matt stajan + girlfriend

Smart thinking there. Probably best to not be so forward with the whole nudity thing and make sure that he’s single and available first.

21 May, Fri, 08:15:31
Google:
kevin smith dolphin molester

This one cracked me up, and it was my favourite until I saw this one.

22 May, Sat, 09:49:40
Google:
batman cooked midget erection

I submitted this one to the What The Fuck Department and not even they could tell me what in hell this person could have possibly been looking for. Whatever it is I hope he hasn’t found it yet since the world will be a lot safer with guys like that inside the house on a search engine rather than out walking the streets with the rest of us.

Sadly that brings us to the end of our fun for another day. But don’t worry, for as long as the world has search engines and the Vomit Comet, we will live to play again very soon.

So until next time remember that…ahh shit, I can’t think of one. Forget it, just keep searching for things so I can keep this bit going.

I’m A Sad Panda

A couple of nights ago I was going through some of my old things and I decided to dig out the old recording that one of the bands I used to be in made. Why I wanted to do this I’m really not sure because to be quite honest, that tape fucking sucks and in the 6 or so years since it’s creation I haven’t ever played it for anybody close to me. Sure others have heard it but remember, there were 3 other people in the band and they for the most part seemed to be far more pleased with this auditory atrocity than I was.

Right from the first time I heard it, and I’m talking about from the mixing stage right through to the finished product, I absolutely hated this thing. It was way too rushed and we didn’t have the time to fix a lot of small mistakes or to do some of the things that we could have done to make things a lot better. Not only that, but my voice sucked back then a lot worse than it does now. Why anybody thought I deserved to sing in a band at that point was beyond me but I was happy to do it and I’d do it again. It’s not even like I was all that horrible, I wasn’t. I was vocally competent, it’s just that I’m miles beyond that point now and thinking back on it I almost feel bad for inflicting that era of my vocal abilities on people.

But ok, now that I’ve gone way off point, I’ll stop rambling about how much I sucked and go back to how much I hated this tape.

I was so ashamed of it that I took the 2 copies of it that I had and pretty much locked them away, never to be heard by anybody. My family, my best friends, girlfriends, none of them have ever heard it. Beyond the few initial listens I took to it, I didn’t listen to it either. I had actually put it pretty far from my mind, only talking about it when the subject of suck ass recordings came up with friends. Then about a month or so ago, all of that changed.

I was having a conversation with a friend who insists constantly that she’s really bad at playing her musical instrument of choice and that I never want to hear her play it because I’d probably laugh at her. I really wanted to hear her play so I thought of the only thing that could possibly be worse than anything she could inflict on me, that old tape. I made sure to tell her of the significance of what I was offering her here, the chance to hear something so bad that I wouldn’t even use it to make fun of myself in public. Something so horrible that I hadn’t even played it for people I love out of fear that they would disown me. I even went so far as to mention that this for me was one of the ultimate signs of trust because I thought enough of her to unhide my shame and share one of my lowest points with her.

She didn’t bite on the offer, but for some reason that didn’t stop me from wanting to hear the tapes again. Were they really as bad as I remembered? Did I really suck that hard? Were the mistakes that the other guys made really that noticeable? I had to hear it again just to make sure, so the other night I dug it out of hiding and prepared for the worst. What ended up happening though was even worse than the worst that I had planned for.

Slowly and carefully I put one of the tapes into the stereo and pressed play. Nothing happened. Thinking I might have had the wrong side, I flipped it over and tried again. Nothing, and then something weird happened, the tape stopped and auto-reversed itself. As somebody with a bit of experience repairing tapes, this profoundly pissed me off because they’re not supposed to do that in the middle of a side.

I took it out and looked at it and my worst fears were confirmed, the tape was pretty much fucked. It would only play for a second or 2 and then stop. I played around with it trying to fix it to no avail before giving up on that one and trying out the other copy I snagged just in case this happened. Much to my shock and surprise, this one did the exact same things, right down to the same side of the reel being messed up in the exact same way.

I’ve never heard of a tape going bad because of under-use, that’s just weird. And why of all the tapes I own did it have to be those 2? It’s not fair. I could even understand if 1 copy went screwy, but both of them? Somebody hates me, and I’d be willing to bet that it’s probably somebody who’s heard that tape.

So now I want to ask some questions of the people reading this.

1. Do any of you know how to repair cassettes and would you be nice enough to give me some tips on how I might be able to fix these things without taking them apart? That’s one aspect of tape repair that I’ve never been all that good at, I usually end up messing things up more than they were in the first place so if I can avoid doing that I’d love to know how.

2. I know that some of the people who read this site know me personally and probably knew me and the other 3 guys in the band back when we made this tape. If I can’t fix either of my copies and any of you folks happen to own one, can I have it, or at least a really good quality dub of it? I’d even pay for shipping if you wanted, I’d just really like to have a functioning copy of the thing, bad as it is. It’s still part of my personal history and lots of people don’t ever get a chance to do something like that so it’s one of those things that I’d really like to get back if possible.

Thanks for reading this thing all the way to the end and if anybody out there can help me, feel free to email me or post a comment.

This Is Not How I Wanted To Start My Long Weekend

I swear to you people right now if the guy at the desk beside me doesn’t stop dropping these silent, stinking, lingering bombs I’m going to snap.

And dammit, man. Stop looking around as if you’re trying to find the guilty party when the full magnitude of what you’ve done hits you two and you realize I’m going to notice. We’re the only 2 in this area and so you’re probably not going to fool me in to think it was, in fact, me.

Dammit!

Some People Need Work Instilling Confidence

I had a bit of an argument with a bus driver today on my way home from the radio station. Well maybe it wasn’t exactly an argument, but he thought I was lying about something and me and another guy had to prove him wrong so I’ll call it an argument anyway. The funny thing is that it was an argument that he should have easily been able to win considering that his job is driving. the conversation went something like this.

Steve: “Can you let me know when we get to Water Street?”
Driver: “Where?”
Steve: “Water Street.”
Driver: Where is that?”
Steve: “You don’t know where Water street is?”
Driver: “Never heard of it, are you sure you’ve got the name right?”
Steve: “Yeah, I either get on or off of a bus there several times a week.”
Driver: “Well I’ve never heard of that…”
Random Other Guy: “He’s right, it’s down by the river.”
Driver: “No, that street is called something else.”
Steve and Some Random Other guy at the same time: “No it isn’t!”

The conversation ends there until we get to the spot I wanted at which point I hear something I was hoping I wouldn’t.

Driver: “Hey, this is your stop, but wait, I’m curious about what the name of the street is.”
Driver looks around thoughtfully while Steve stands there waiting for him to say something.
Driver: “Wow, I guess it is Water Street. I never realized that there was a street there before.”

Steve exits the bus, cholking on a combination of laughter and terror.

He didn’t realize there was a street there? How can you not realize that there’s a street there, it has it’s own stoplight for crying out loud! And if he’s capable of being oblivious to an entire street, what else is he missing? I’m glad I got off that bus when I did, that’s for sure.

But as I was walking the rest of the way home I had another thought. Maybe all of those people that I see wandering aimlessly around the city all the time aren’t really homeless at all, they’re just lost thanks to the directions of some accident waiting to happen bus driver.

Tragic

If you’re wondering why I haven’t been around much in the last while, it’s because I’ve been dealing with the tragic loss of a dear friend and at the same time allowing the full impact of a very important life lesson to sink in.

In all seriousness folks, I don’t like to use this space to talk about things like this, but sometimes it just has to be done so I hope you don’t mind letting me get something off my chest in the form of a little bit of advice to you all.

Whatever you do, don’t listen to condom companies when they say that their products will keep you safe. It’s not true. In fact, that’s one of the biggest bullshit claims going, right up there with “I’ll pull out in time honey, I promise.” Trust me, I know what I’m talking about here. Remember the tragic loss I mentioned earlier? It was directly related to what I just said.

You see, the other day my dear friend Jim was out walking in the city where he lived as he did a great deal of the time. It was one of his favourite things to do. As it happened he was wearing a condom at the time, but yet, when he crossed the street, he still managed to get hit by a bus and die.

So like I said, don’t trust condoms or the companies who make them. Those things aren’t as safe as they appear.