"And Don't Forget To Try Some Of My Fried Chicken! It's Just So Damn Good! Buck Buck Buck Buck!"

Since the three people who check into my mote in the stream of internets related sewage have no doubt been waiting with bated breath for proof of my upper lip related insulation, I now present to you, in place of cute pictures of my growing family, a series of molestery looking men:

(I was going to give this post a moustache related title, but since my mother reads this blog, I decided not to. If you've seen "Super Troopers" you can probably guess what I was going to use as a title!)


The four founding fathers of the moustache club, from left to right: Frank, Cris, B, and Dr. Jones. I like how in this picture Frank, Cris and I look like we're about to head into the studio with our producer, Dr. Jones, to record "Hotel California."


"Get in the van! Come get some candy! Help me find my lost puppy dog!"


Frank "Get Ready For The Money Shot." This is probably my favorite picture.


Cris "Skinny Hulk Hogan." Cris had a velvet suit that fit him like it had been tailored, just waiting in his closet for a "special occasion!" If I had a suit like that, special occasions would include "Tuesday," and "Lunch Hour." It truly was a suit that would make a wolverine cry.


Dr. Jones "The 'Stache Turned Orange Overnight." Bleach on facial hair? Youch! Something about all this made him look like he should be practicing dentistry...


Here's the whole gang. I'm very afraid of flashes.


Jake "King Of The Ring." Looks like he should be fighting it out with some dude for a garish belt, doesn't he?


Hiro "I Have No Cute Nickname But Awesome Grizz Nonetheless."


Alan "Honorable Mention Because A 'Stache Was Already In Place." Also because he reminded me of a big jolly elf.


Ravi "Somebody Needs To Be Reminded That The Moustache Is Supposed To Be The Focal Point."


Wojchiech(?) "Stache Like A Cossack." It really was a great look...


The "competition." The only reason I'm putting this crap picture up is to point out the guy on the right who was, unwillingly, entered at the last moment by his wife and SHOULD have won. We looked like a bunch of cheap ass ABB wanabes, and he looked like he was probably the fill-in bassist during their '72 tour.

Edit: Holy cow! I've written garbage on this bastard 200 times now! Way to hit the 200 mile marker with a post about the awesome staches of the 'dacks!

2nd Edit: For pictures of the kids - go to Cindy's blog!

S.O.S.

As in "Same Ol' Sh...eepdip." Yet again, I won't bother with any of the pictures in my flickr account, I'm just going to go ahead and talk out of my ass some more.

You Know What Pisses Me Off?

I don't generally watch "Entertainment Tonight," E-'Talk" (We get the canuck channels up here - which are often better than the 'Merican channels), "Inside Hollywood," or anything that airs on the "E!" channel. But I know far more about which d-list celebrity is married, engaged, breaking up, currently on drugs, having babies, vomiting in a gutter, selling crack, on crack, showing their crack, whatever than is healthy for anybody. You know why? Media freaking saturation, thanks to the internets and 157 channels on every TV in this glorious nation. Thanks to that, I know who these people and what their "roles" in "society" are:

• K-Fed
• Nicole Richie
• Paris Hilton
• Stavros Nachos
• Any spawn of the unholy Pitt/Jolie union
• Any spawn of the unholier Cruise/Holmes union
• LiLo
• Nick Lachey
• I wish I didn't have more names, but I do...

Why? I HATE that I even know the names of any of these people. The only mention we should have of any of them is if we're flipping past the TV guide channel at 3 am or past E.T. during a Jeopardy commercial break in time to catch a "Celebrity Birthdays" segment. (I never recognized any of the "celebrities" Mary Hart used to give a birthday shout-out too!). Remember the good old days, when this shit didn't happen? Back when pre-D. Bag Sean Penn would punch out anything that appeared to have a camera? I hope that there's a backlash, and we see the rise of the anti-star. Greg Graffin would be a good role model, although most Hollywood types would have to take up some serious book-learnin' to approach that guy's awesomeness. Also, can we get rid of Sean Penn, now that he's an over-exposer, but keep the moustache?

Things To Say Out Loud When You Have People In Your "General Vicinity" That Really Just Need To Get The "Eff" Out

• I am the key master...
• You look like you need a hug
• It's irritations like you that make me want to develop a nasty heroin addiction
• Ever see what happens when someone gets hit in the eye with laser light?
• (Wiggle finger in time) Danny isn't here, Mrs. Torrence.
• So, how 'bout that John Kerry (Or George Bush, Barbara Bush, FDR, or hell, the Mexicans, it doesn't matter)
• Wanna go next door and huff some CO2?

Lets All Go To The Movies

You know how there's certain movies that you remember for all time, some of which really sucked, and some that you just forget about even if you really liked them? One of the movies I had forgotten about is "Lean On Me." Good movie. But check out the quotes, and try to read them without putting any kind of context in your head, and they are A LAUGH RIOT. I am going to hell.

Seriously?

Is anyone, anywhere, really buying Jack Black as a leading man in a romantic comedy? Are you kidding me? Who's Hollywood trying to sell this shit to anyway? It's cool though. I'd rather set my nuts on fire then see a movie with that premise anyway.

Things You Don't Want Your Eight Year Old Son To Say At The Border Crossing When You're Coming Back From Montreal

• Dad, I can't hear that man you let ride in the trunk thumping around anymore. Do you think he needs some air?
• My tummy hurts. I think it's from all of those balloons you made me swallow.
• That was a great weekend. When can we come back and hang out with all those guys that gave us those free guns and white blocks again?
• Remember how you killed that drifter when we were walking back to the hotel after dinner? That was awesome!
  

I know damned well that not much of this was very funny. But one has to stay entertained while one is stuck in a dark corner all day, tending their fantastic machine, with an umbilical cord connecting them to a computer. What else am I supposed to do? Meth?

Feel Good Hit Of The Summer Winter

I'd be remiss if I didn't share this song, by the Greenskeepers, with my similar minded-friends out there. Song is genius. Video is geniuser. I'd go so far as to say that it's the best song of the last ten years - catchy, meaningful, funny. You'll see!

LOTION!


BTW - there's some swearing, gore(duh) and the video ends with the infamous tuck...So don't watch this with the kids in the room!

The Welsh Sex Machine

I don't have much to talk about, but since I'm about bored out of my skull, I'm going to anyway. Prepare to be educated.

Tom Jones, of course, is a god among men. No, the rest of us don't even rate as men. Among small woodland creatures.

Massive Attack's "Mezzanine" is a damn good album. If you're half the audiophile that I am, you already knew that.

I'd bet a five-spot that in real life, if you met Tony Danza, you'd walk away from the experience saying to yourself "That guy's a bit of an asshole."

Cobra troops are great at rapping. But why is Legolas hiding out in the background with some biker that's got frightening bulge?



I think the word "palindrome" should itself be a palindrome - maybe "emordadrome" or "palindrordnilap." Where can I go to have this idea brought to the masses?

Why in the hell did I spend $50 to get the LOTR DVD's that come in the fancy boxed four disk sets? Why wasn't there additions that cost $35, came in smaller boxes, and only have the two discs that I give a damn about in them? This is bullshit, man. Bullshit.

When will Bryan compile pictures of Bob Saget and Taylor Hicks so he can do a dramatic retelling of the night he ran into Danny Tanner at Dante's?

This is a picture of my dog before he was my dog. Isn't that wierd?

Without a doubt, one of the finest video games ever.



We should still be afraid of the Russians, but for different reasons.

The single greatest thing about being the prowd owner of a moustache is that I now smile every single time I pass by a mirror.

We should probably also fear the Japanese.




The one thing that having kids has driven me to that I can't properly explain is watching NFL football. I used to watch 20 minutes of it a year. Now I spend good portions of my Sunday watching teams I care less about than the "local" (or previously local) hooligans battle it out. Can someone explain this to me?

Cindy says that my moustache makes me look gay. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I keep trying to remember what the name of cniderians "harpoon cells" are, but I can't for the life of me remember.

Hey Bryan, remember how that one irritating lady that we used to work with would always tell me "You're so random!" Man, how that pissed me off. But I'll be damned if she wasn't right.

"You come out with stink like that. Poop! You poop mouth. Get all that poop out of your mouth."

The Boob Tube

I watch TV. It's fact - probably too much lately. It's hard to do much else when you have a toddler around who won't sleep, won't allow you to sleep (or do much else), and would be more than happy to get the knives/flaming things/poisons/shocky things out to play with if you turn your back for a second. So, TV as background noise, all the time, to avoid insanity.

One show I have never - and will never - watch, is "The OC." But I'm curious to know if any of my friends out there do. Okay, okay, one time I paused while flipping past, and I actually walked away from the experience knowing how to pronounce "Gnocchi." Like most things that have some popularity, there's a decent amount of media saturation of that damned show, so I haven't been able to avoid the TV and radio spots that fill me in on what I've missed. And I want to know some things.

Is it serious? As in "Are you f&$%&*n' kidding me?" One of the commercials for the show had the skinny kid as an apparently successful cage fighter. What? Back when I was skinny, I tried my hand at cage fighting, and it didn't work out quite like that.

Are the writers former drug addicts, mental patients, and street people? On my drive to work this morning I heard one female character explain to another "Men for me are like drinking for you. Either way, I wind up upside down on a chandelier." How in the hell is that even possible? "Hide the Scotch and the Stepladders, (Insert generic teenager from the OC's name here)'s mother is coming over."

Ah, entertainment of the modern age.

The Things You're Forced To Sit Through

I won't go into details, as lord only knows who reads my piece of Internet flotsam, but I recently attended a talk that was far from interesting. But how the presenter tried - "funny" pictures, corny jokes, blah. The whole time said presenter kept reassuring us that it was okay to laugh. Yeah. Okay to laugh. We get it - we're adults. You have to say or do something funny first. Blah.

It's Cold And Flu Season

So watch this. I had to watch this at yet another presentation that I attended.

Stars

Bono has the blood of African children on his hands?

I Now Hate Bluegrass Music

Remember how in college, hump night could be a big deal (depending on your class load)? Apparently I live in a town peopled by adults that still takes it seriously. Well, they may go hit it every night for all I would know, not exactly my thing anymore. I had a meeting for the rugby club last night at a local watering hole - I know, I know. But I behaved myself out of respect for preggo wife. The place was packed - there was some serious drinking going on. You know there's something up with that when the rugby crowd is the best behaved, soberest group in attendance. The taps were running out of beer (and taking their sweet time getting the freaking hot wings out to boot)! Anyhow, there was also a small, not too shabby, bluegrass trio playing in one corner. Naturally, since we were there to have a meeting, we chose the opposite end of the building, in another room entirely, to sit and do our thing. Which was great, until the fat bastards moved in right next to us! And then proceeded to play their (acoustic, mind you) instruments louder and louder, until I couldn't even here what was being said by people at the other end of the table. I no longer find the banjo as fascinating as I used to.

Q: How Do You Know So Much About "Oops, I Crapped MY Pants" Brand Adult Diapers?

A: Because I'm wearing them, and I just did!

I'm only writing out a blog post because of how excited I am about this, but I'll talk about some other excrement as well.

Fine, watch this video, too. G'on, take a minute, I'll wait.


A-ight. The only exciting news that I have now is that, in starting the week off with a bang after a few days vacation, I trimmed the moustache into shape for the competition we're having here at work. Then, because of the extra chromosome, mostly, I had a clipper related mishap and wound up mostly bald instead of just short haired like a wanted. So now I look like a circus strongman. Or a redneck. Or Fifi from Mad Max. Or Davram Bashere. If you know who those last two are - welcome to my Nerd Kingdom™! I tried to find pictures of Fifi and circus strongmen, but in further reinforcement to my realization that the internets are a scary place, found many inappropriate images instead. Ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous. A lot of people out their have got a lot of growing up to do, I'll tell you that much.

Oh, and don't congratulate me for Cindy's current knocked-up-hood. I was only integral for the fun part of things. Congratulate her - she'll be the one doing the watermelon through a garden hose bit.

"There's To Be No More Throwing Of Feces In The Classroom."

Peter sent me links to watch the most recent episode of South Park, which is most excellent, but now there's someone else in my lab (haven't looked over my shoulder to see who) and, not being one who likes to offend people I don't know, can't finish watching it. Very funny so far. I just saw a cartoon person emulate a monkey by crapping in his hand and throwing it. Not funny? Well, then, you sir, have no imagination.


Feel their shame.

I wanted to dress Cooper up as Darth Vader for Halloween, but he objected when I tried to burn him to give the outfit some authenticity.


Haven't listened. Cool name. Cool cover art.

Now that there's a heavy metal band named after every cool villain (and some heroes) from my childhood, what will I name my act? Here's some other that are already taken - Atreyu, Harkonnen, okay, can't remember any more. But now "Skeletor?" Granted they must have had to change the spelling...Maybe "StarScream" hasn't been taken?


Seen these?

I think some of those might be falling from the sky right now.

Finally, the reason I've brought you all here is this:

I guess you could say that you're looking at a picture of my wife's naughty bits. "Hey, nice U-tee-ris!"

That's right. Cindy and I, apparently being the two most fertile people on the face of the earth (or at least within a 2ft radius) are going to have another child. Whether it's a boy or a girl awaits to be seen - I think we will wait until about three weeks after it's born this time - either way we've decided we're going to name it "Fugganon." She's mostly through the first trimester - I apologize for keeping it under wraps for so long, but we wanted to wait to tell everyone until it was more of a sure thing. I was going to write a long humorous post about how the life and times of little Fugganon will turn out to be, but after looking up pictures of a few ugly kids, I started to worry that I might put a curse on the little fetus and s/he'd be born retarded or with a nasty cleft palate or as a true s/he.

Of Course I Know Better Than You Do

Since I've been, as I mentioned last post, a mostly lab sequestered, ill tempered, warmly dressed jerk the last several days, I thought I'd play the part of pretentious blogger with a stubborn belief than someone other than friends who are in on all my jokes reads this crap and share my poorly conceived opinions on a couple of things.

Music:
Listen to the latest CDs from Muse and Sigur Ros. They're both brilliant. I won't link anything, because I'm lazy, but I'll say a few things. I burned out on Muse's first (US) CD pretty quick - if you have it, listen for the gasping microphonic breathing between lyrical stanzas. Once you it's there, it'll drive you nuts - even though it has some of the finest rock guitar and bass in the last ten years. But the latest is great. It's got several Queen-like moments with three and four part harmonies, a lot of rocking, a touch of electronica, and more than one appropriate use of symphony orchestra. Sigur Ros might not be for everyone. They're an Icelandic band that doesn't sing in English - or Icelandic - it's a made up language. It's cool, atmospheric music. The singer/guitarist bows his instrument. Cindy and I had Sigur Ros' "( )" playing in the background when we were fake married for our families (I'll explain that if anyone doesn't get it).

Arts:
Here. Here. And here. Eye party, on.

Grumpy B:
I won't say much here. Suffice to say, if you're reading this blog it's not about you. Instead, here's some pictures of donkeys and ill tempered female dogs instead of my well thought out meditations on why and how certain people and things drive me to anear murderous rage. As I'm writing this, even.

Edit: In my irritation over something going on in my lab while writing earlier, I forgot a couple of things. Funny here. And I forgot to mention that I made a four foot ethanol geyser in my lab earlier this week. I have nylon connectores that I use to attach fluid and waste tanks to my sorter. Well, they snap off pretty nicely when you wack them with your foot or anything else, and it seems that the larger diameter valves - which is currently all I've got - don't have the strength that the smaller ones do. So I replaced the valve on the tank I use to hold the 70% lab-hooch that I sterilize the machine with each morning. Flipped on the pressure to the machine and suddenly, from clear behind it, I could see a spout of fluid rising into the air - I'd just filled the tank with about a gallon of the stuff and it emptied in about two seconds. It looked kind of cool, was over and done with before I could even get out of the chair to respond, and I couldn't help but sit and luagh like a maniac for a few seconds before I got up and fixed it. And my whole week has been like that!

Bitchalot!

Oh, I've had a cold all week that's made the whole front half of my head feel like it's all swollen out from the rest of my face n'junk. It's also swallowed up my abilities to think straight, do anything above and beyond duty, and "function." And all that with-out the powerful cold medicines that allow the rest of you to float through your day in a pleasant haze whilst ill. Right now it's leaving my head and settling firmly in my chest so that I have a nice healthy rattle when I breathe deep. It could be worse. It could be settling into my testes (Rutager and Django) so that I have a nice healthy rattle whenever I walk.

The weather's cooled down, and we've had a-lots of snow. Okay, it's snowed for prolonged periods of time, but it only stuck last Friday and Saturday, and now even though it's cold and snowing, the ground's still bare. Did I mention I have a cold? Maybe it's pneumonia...

Even though I have nothing to do with that picture (stolen, graciously, from the Daily Enterprise' website) it's still cool, no?

The big news at work is that a bunch of us in the under-35 crowd are having a moustache growing contest. A lot of the guys are going to grow outlandish looking facial hair, but I think I'll stick with a good, solid Burt Reynolds man-stache. I'll have to wait until after I do a couple of things that require me to not look like a complete jackass until I can shave the current crop of griz into the glorious representation of virility that my upper lip shall be.

Old people can get away with wearing the coolest shit. Just look at those glasses.

So, since Simon left and my workload insta-tripled, my caffeine consumption has shot through the roof - it's the only thing that keeps me going. It's bad enough that I get headaches on Saturday mornings when I wake up and don't make coffee. I've had to switch to tea with the cold, but my good tea travel cup-cum-mini French press also acts as a very nice dribble glass, so in the last week I've been wandering around in my sickened haze with a stained shirt. Yay!

Lately, I've been suffering from a chronic inabililty to get much exercise because, now that the weather's turned, treadmill's the word and I have a two year old that would me more than happy to jam a fist into the moving bits. So the immune system suffers, as does the ol' waist line. You have no idea how painful it was to do a GIS for pictures of fat men. The internets are a strange and horrifying place.

Heed the teachings of meerkat Buddha!

Would you go and see this comedy duo? While this picture was not, in fact, taken in TL (I can't remember which website I ganked it from), it does represent the caliber of entertainment I would expect to find locally.

Here's a draw-ring of some Marvel characters that I'm not familiar with.

Does anyone want to form a metal band with me? I can tell you this - our stage show (and any in-band backyard barbecues) would have very ambitious pyrotechnic displays.

Arggh!

I had a huge post with lots of pictures that blogger beta completely ruined.

YOU SUCK BLOGGER!

Maybe I'll post it Monday.

Go here and buy me this poster, the explanation was in the original post.

YOU SUCK BLOGGER!

Recovered?

This is the post I was going to toss up on Friday that Blogger beta ruined for me - if Blogger beta was a person, I would punch him/her in the throat!

I'm going to go ahead and apologize now if any of the images I'm about to slap up here are a bit crap. It's been a long shortened week (yeah, us Easterners get Columbo Day off, in honor of Peter Falk, suck it! Man!), and I can't be bothered to edit at all. So if you could just go ahead and deal, that'd be great. Mmkay?

ROCKTOBERFEST!!!???

One of many odd and unusual things that were found in the house when we moved in was this gem in the garage:

I would gladly attend something called "Rocktoberfest."

Wait a tick...that fat bastard looks familiar!

Could it be? Really? No way...

It is! It's my uncle Les!

"FALL?"

The air is crisp (It's tried to snow last night and at lunch time today, brrr), hunting seasons are opening (Ducks 2, Brandon 0), but I'll get one of the delicious little shits sooner or later), and the leaves are turning - they didn't last year, so it's nice to see how pretty it can be back here. I tried to take some pictures and failed:

This is our giant "Backyardrock©" with leaves on it, taken with a flash to blandify all the pretty colors.

Same thing, no flash, see the colors, enjoy the murk.

This is what drew me outside in the first place- the sun setting through the trees. Beautiful to behold. Taken through a digital pocket camera that's five years old? Not so pretty.

A bit better, still murky...

...And, just as the color-washing flash went off, I was attacked by a bear! Honest! That's why it's blurry, I was running for my life!

The most significant crop we had this year. There's some tomatoes chilling on the windowsill in the kitchen, waiting to taste like dirt, too.

BATTLE OF THE BOXES

Do you know why it sucks so bad around your house? It's because you don't have two squirts who are more than happy to dive into a couple of boxes and raise some hell. Knick Knacks be damned, the kids are here!

This was actually towards the end - Connor had invaded the "fort."

Yep.

Yep.

This is sort of where it all started - boxes in the kitchen, baby disappears repeated muffled shouts of "Hello" heard from boxes, hilarity.

What you can't see? Ethan suffocating.

Yup.

More of the disappearing two year old (I posted all of these for you, mom!)

Yes, we did get new Wolfgang Puck cookware whilst at the Club of Sam's.

This must be the where the actual battle started.

Guh-rimace...

When I try to take a picture of the dog, he gets all nervous and runs away. When I try to take a picture of the kids, he comes out of nowhere and plops down, front and center.

This is what initially prompted me to grab the camera - little skinny legs sticking out of the bottom of a box.

Dog, again.

CONNOR'S FIRST INK
THAT YOU CAN'T SEE

Here's a picture that looks great on the back litscreen of the camera. The little one got a tattoo..With some candy or something. When I put it on him and tried to take a picture, he insisted on the hat.

Too bad the picture sucks...

THE VIDEOT

Yes indeedy, our kids love the ol' TV!

WHA!!!???

I found this on e-bay, and nearly impulse bought it to throw up behind my guitar amp since mine is all but roont. But I shouldn't. One of you can have it sent to me, though...

C'mon. I'll compose a song about how bad the Germans suck becausethey only invented "Oktoberfest" when they had the opportunity to invent "Rocktoberfest" for you!