Caution: Lewd humor ahead. Names have been changed to protect the guilty.

So, G and I went out to dinner at a local man's paradise. No, not a strip club. This place is a fantastic tribute to adult male couch potato sportsters. Pristine fields of green felt (that's pool tables, y'all), dart boards, a hundred foot walk around bar, big screen televisions, acres of arcade games and a very fine full service restaurant. All in one place! The Man Show crew would be proud to dine and play in this establishment. It is a place we know as Dave & Busters.

Anyway, after amusing ourselves for a while we took a break and went over to the restaurant area for the aforementioned dinner. Our very pleasant waitress left menus and took our drink orders (they have an excellent beer selection as well). We hungrily opened the beautifully laminated multipage missives and began poring over the choices. I passed over the desserts (you see why we love this place - the menu starts with desserts), appetizers, chickens and steaks. None of these enticed me as I already had a specific goal - I was targetting an artichoker. No, not an artichoke (that wierd little vegetable that you eat by scraping leaf gunk off its fibrous plates) but an artichoker. A burger so loaded with cholesterol that merely gazing upon its reflection while wearing arc welding glasses can cause instant and violent stoppage in major arteries. Next was the salad page (salad before burgers? yeesh. minus 1 point for Dave & Busters) which was quickly supressed with extreme prejudice before its corruptive influence could harm me. Finally, the Burgers & Sandwiches page. That's page 7 for those of you playing along at home. As I looked down the page, scanning for my target, my eyes did a double take, returning to the top of the page of their own volition. I carefully read the first couple items and then realized what had so ensnared my subconcious attention.

(We now move to the made up conversation portion of this post.)

Things got bad from there and the concerned waitress hurried over to assist G, who had apparently inhaled an ice cube and/or firmly implanted one in his nasal sinuses. Eventually things settled down and we managed to order dinner. Things went well until the actual dinner came, at which time rude things were done to the fish tacos that caused another ice vs. sinus episode.

Ah, Dave & Busters. You've got customers for life.

UPDATE: My editor tells me that nobody will understand the humor here because "fish taco" isn't a very widely used phrase and my teaser in the title (little man in the boat) isn't either. I disagree but never let it be said that I'm uncooperative. Feel free to replace the title with any of the following if it helps you figure out fish taco.

Is that muff warm?
Hair pie a la mode
Bearded clam chowder

UPDATE2: The D&B menu also features "Kumbak Sauce" for the Buster's Cheeseburger. I shudder to think where I could have gone with that one.

Posted by: Jim at 07:22 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Thanks and no thanks to Common Sense & Wonder for finding this article. Thanks because you found it and shared it. No thanks because now I don't know what to do with it! Read and see why:

How do I handle this? What can I do to poke fun at something so moonbat crazy? What can I possibly come up with that is more ridiculous than what the article is already reporting?

I thought about a quick sarcastic quip about how even The Onion or Ridiculopathy Daily couldn't come up with something like this. You know, a "truth is stranger than fiction" angle. That just seemed too dismissive. Something this stupid has earned more snark and ridicule than such a simple repost.

Then I thought of taking each part of this thing and making fun of the individual aspects. Like for the cooking utensils part I'd do something like this: The Jews stole cooking utensils so the Egyptians couldn't pursue them to get their gold back? I've heard that an army moves on its stomach but this takes the cake. This option is rich in opportunity but it still didn't satisfy my need to make fun of the entire concept here.

Then I thought that I should do a serious commentary. Maybe a fisking. Take that utensils part again for an example: So missing cooking utensils prevented the armies of Pharoah from pursuing the Jews? Funny, in the version of the story I heard the armies of the Pharoah had no problem whatsoever pursuing them. Cornered them against a river bank if my recollection serves... But I figured a serious fisking might lend this thing legitimacy. What it really needs is a bit of ribald badinage.

Going with commentary on the overall topic I could go for a hit on the university. Something like: This is coming from the DEAN OF LAW? Where did he study for his degree - the Jerry Springer School? I liked this one but it still seemed to lack a certain something.

Maybe an alternate headlines theme would work: Egypt To Sue Jews Over Exodus Theft. Jews Countersue With Reparations Suit, Threaten Plaque of Frogs.

You see what I mean? Opportunities for mischief like this one are few and far between and there are so many ways to go with it that I'm lost.

Thanks a lot, CS&W!

>:p

Posted by: Jim at 09:57 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Wow! Check this out:

Who would have thought that the United Nations could manage to take an effective step in this matter? And nobody would have predicted that they would admit culpability in the security failure in Baghdad. Nobody with a rational thought process, anyway. It's too bad that we rational folk are generally right - they didn't do any of the above. This Jayson Blairesque piece is from a "what if" session between me and G on the ride into work this morning. Don't actually expect the UN to do anything this intelligent. Ever.

Posted by: Jim at 06:35 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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At great personal expense and peril, Push Button Dreams has come into possession of a security tape from the Oval Office. It was apparently recorded shortly after Ariel Sharon first read the infamous “Roadmap To Peace”. The transcript follows:

On a serious note:

This entry was originally intended as a serious essay attempting to prove my hypothesis that Bush knows exactly what the results of the Roadmap will be and is planning on it. It devolved into this because understanding and cooperation between Bush and Sharon is critical to my theory and I kept imagining the conversations they had to have had.

Anywho, the essential points to my theory are:
1) Bush is not an idiot. I know that many of his detractors like to paint him that way but it simply isn't so. That's the standard lefty caricature of every republican president. Righties do a similar thing with painting democractic presidents as philandering, lying criminals. Oh, wait. I guess Clinton did that himself. Bush speaks relatively slowly. He has an accent. He accentuates his points to an uncommon degree. These are not indications of idiocy. They are indications of being from Texas. (And speaking as a voluntary southerner I can tell y'all that we're pretty sick of that particular stereotype.)
2) Bush's advisors are not idiots. Unlike certain philandering liers under oath, Bush's appointees are fairly well suited for their positions.
3) Ariel Sharon is not an idiot. I don't think that even his detractors advance this theory much but it's important to my summary so I'm stating it in my points.
4) The Roadmap's basic premise is that both sides must work towards a peaceful resolution. Both sides constantly profess that this is their true desire. Israel has consistently proven that this is actually their goal. The PA and the terrorist groups have consistently proven that this is not their goal.

So, given these points, why is there a Roadmap at all? There must be a reason that Bush's advisors would craft it, Bush would advance it and Sharon would endorse it. My belief is that they all know that the Roadmap is not feasible due to the inate inability of the Palestinians to work towards their own best interest. I believe that the Roadmap is being used to once and for all show with incontrovertible proof that the Palestinians cannot govern themselves to peace and to allow Israel enough popular world support to protect themselves from Palestinian terrorist attacks.

Another thing to note is that even though the Hudna was a PR sham (Casualties since Aug 26, 2003) and the terrorists used that slow time to rearm and plan, the IDF made excellent use of it as well. They certainly seem to have been ready for when the terrorists slipped their bit.

Posted by: Jim at 10:36 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Yes, you. Driving in your tricked out dedication to mass produced individuality, slouched low in the seat in unintentional but humorous immitation of a blue haired suburbanite, single hand at the 12:00 position to further degrade your already sabotaged field of view, four busted 15" speakers belching out the cracked baseline of the lastest gangsta turned hipster. You are not a playa. You are a jackass. As you tool through the bucolic streets of Duluth there is not a single person who sees you and buys your pathetic attempt at cultural impersonation. When you pulled up next to me at the stoplight it gave me extreme pleasure to bollux your attempt to race ahead and cut in front of me on our little one lane road. How did it feel to have your lowrider riceburner outclassed by an aging Aerostar?

Posted by: Jim at 11:59 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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There's a man who leads a life of danger
To everyone he meets he stays a stranger

I woke up this morning with this song running through my head.

With every move he makes another chance he takes
Odds are he won't live to see tomorrow

And it just won't leave!

Secret agent man, secret agent man
They've given you a number and taken away your name

That refrain especially just keeps knocking back and forth rising to my stream of conciousness at the most inappropriate time.

Beware of pretty faces that you find
A pretty face can hide an evil mind

Damn it, Johnny Rivers! GET OUT OF MY HEAD!!

Ah, be careful what you say
Or you'll give yourself away
Odds are you won't live to see tomorrow

You know there's only one reliable way to get rid of a song in your head. That's to firmly implant it in somebody else's head.

Swingin' on the Riviera one day
And then layin' in the Bombay alley next day

You're providing the head for this particular song exorcism. Sorry to do this to you. Normally I'd walk over and lay this on G but he's still on vacation.

Oh no, you let the wrong word slip
While kissing persuasive lips
The odds are you won't live to see tomorrow

Feel free to bitch at me for this unwarranted and evil thing I have done to you. You may freely curse my name each time the devilish refrain pops unbided into your thoughts throughout the day.

Secret agent man, secret agent man
They've given you a number and taken away your name

Ahhh...freedom.

Posted by: Jim at 09:21 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I went to bed pissed last night. It was partly because of what happened to Kate and partly because a simple oil change and tire rotation on the family truckster ended in a quote for a grand to fix things that we just fixed last year. Predictably, I had a dream that reflected my somnolent attitude. Unpredictably, I remembered it and it's another doozy.

I'm standing in front of a desk in a big room, like a cafeteria. Old Old Boss is sitting behind the desk in his oh-so-comfy big ass executive leather chair. Now this is Old Old Boss, not Old Boss. That is, he's from the company I left in Buffalo to come down to Atlanta. In real life we had parted on good terms and, though we haven't stayed in close contact, the few times we've spoke or written have been very cordial. Dream Old Old Boss was like that - friendly and smiling. Decent start for a dream.

He talks for a little while about how great it is to have me working there and then just sort of stops talking. This is where the dream starts to go downhill. It's obvious to me that the conversation is over but he hasn't really ended it. It would be disrespectful for me to just leave so I stand there expectantly waiting for him to continue or conclude. The silence gets uncomfortable so I take the initiative and offer a hand for shaking and say something like "Thanks, it's great working here. I guess I'll see you later." He smiles and shakes my hand. As I'm turning to go he calls me back, says "You'll need this" and hands me a short report.

I walk out the door into the hallway. The hallway is odd - like in a high school with lockers lining the walls. There are lots of people walking to and fro. I look at the report and suddenly understand that I was just in my review. That silence from his was just him waiting for me to ask for a raise. I blew it! No raise! Sonofabeetch!

I turn around to go back and talk to him again. Maybe I can explain that I was confused or something and bring up the raise. As I walk back I start reading the report. The first item is Product Quality and has a rating of 2.4. The written explanation for the rating is "Software hangs. Too many bugs." I look at other items and most of them have ratings in the 3.6 to 3.9 area. I go to the back page and see that the scale is from 2 to 4.

I stop walking. I was not a software analyst at that job, I was the Executive Assistant. I did most of the custom programming but it was well outside my job description - not an item that would be number one on my review. Then I realize that this review is for my current job. Old Old Boss just did a job review for my position in software QA! I've received a review with a rating of almost as absolutely low as you can get in my primary area of responsibility.

Now I'm pissed. First of all Old Old Boss, nice as he could be, was not what you would call a technofile. He knew his industry backwards and forwards and he knew people well but he was not kin to the computer. How the hell could he possibly review my work in a pure technology field? Second, I do damn fine work. Since I took over QA on my product line the incidence of reported bugs has gone way down, customer satisfaction with new releases is way up and (most telling) the overall incidence of bugs found in new release features is at an all time low.

And I was rated 2.4 on a scale of 2 to 4?! Now I was furious and stormed back into the room ready to rant and rave. I get in the cafeteria sized room and it's now a bloody cafeteria with tables, serving line and lots of people eating their lunches. I stand there fuming. No Old Old Boss to confront over the unfair review, no recourse possible, I'm helpless to combat the situation at all.

Then I woke up. Pissed. Anybody care to conjecture just what the heck is going on with my id and ego here?

I just realized something odd. Maybe it isn't so unpredictable that I remembered this dream. I picked the name for this blog from a conversation I had with G. He was late for our car pool and said he was waylaid by a snooze button dream. That was the first time I'd heard the term and it really tickled me so I used it here as my title. Since I started this blog I have remembered more dreams than any other time in my life. The couple I've written about and quite a few others that haven't made the cut. Maybe because I have an outlet to share them so there is a value to remembering them? Maybe just because the word 'dream' is in my face several times a day? Maybe just because I'm writing again each day so the creative juices are flowing? I don't know but I'd be interested in finding out.

Posted by: Jim at 07:15 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Promethazine, promethazine,
lovely cherry flavor.
How you make my days float
and entertain my dreams.
Awake or asleep there is no difference
as the burden of my conciousness is lifted
by sweet, sweet promethazine.

I've got a bad chest cold. It came on like a freight train last night after tickling me with threats the whole day. Taking some lovely syrup which allows me to breath at will without disgorging a lung but I'm feeling a bit loopy. Don't expect much coherence from me this day.

Posted by: Jim at 01:45 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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De's having a problem with arsehole neighbors. Not the "borrow your weed eater and never return it because they accidentally dropped it in the pool and it is so fubar that the guy at Home Depot actually laughed when they asked him if it was fixable and there's no way these people are going to buy a weed eater themselves that's why they borrowed yours to begin with and they're especially not going to pay good money to buy somebody else a weed eater despite the fact that they damn well owe you a freaking weed eater but then they start giving excuses why they still haven't returned it and then start avoiding you until you finally corner them and they admit they broke it and promise to replace it 'soon' but never do and then they really avoid you like the plague until you are finally forced to urinate in their air conditioner unit in retaliation" type. No, definitely not that type. Hers are the loud and obnoxious arguer type.

I was in a similar situation once. I lived in the upper apartment of a duplex house and the people in the downstairs apartment alternated between psychotic caterwaling arguments and 70's screaming porno sex. Always starting after midnight and lasting just a few minutes short of eternity. The arguing that is, the screaming porno sex was generally blessedly short. Go figure.

So I was in a situation and saw 4 ways to resolve it:
1) Grab my ankles and take it.
2) Call the cops.
3) Talk to them.
4) Get creative.

Number 1 was right out. I take my hobbies seriously and sleeping is my number one hobby. For a successful night's sleep I need a minimum of 4.5 hours of uninterupted somnolent repose. The timing of their activities prevented this necessary component of acceptable sleep.

I was hesitant to try number 2 for the same reason DeAnna is. Namely, I didn't want to be one of "those people" that call the cops on a neighbor because they're irritating you. Don't get me wrong, if one of their battle royales had ended in a high pitched scream and sudden silence I would have called down a pork attack on their domicile in a heartbeat. It just seemed wrong to do it for what realistically amounts to just a bit of annoyance.

I tried number 3. In a duplex you share the basement and I would bump into Madam Screamer there on occasion while doing laundry. On one such incident I hinted strongly that their nocturnal actions were unacceptably disturbing. I don't remember exactly what I said but it was along the lines of "You guys are so freaking loud with your murderous rampages and brain-screwing-outing that I wake up each night in cold sweats and a mild heart attack. If you had air conditioning I would be seriously considering urinating into it." That quieted things down for a blessed two weeks. Then the vocal assault picked up again sporadically until settling into its familiar mind shattering routine.

I tried number 3 again. This time it was Mister Screamer I spoke with, telling him something like "I have no problem with you verbally assaulting your significant other or attempting a craniectomy via vaginal insertion but your timing makes it impossible for me to get a decent night's sleep. I am seriously considering buying you an air conditioner so I can urinate in it." Peace lasted almost 3 weeks this time until a drunken brawl broke the ice and the nocturnal assault came back in full force.

Talking obviously wasn't working so I decided to go for number 4. I'm not especially creative but this situation put me in an inspired state. At that time I didn't have a wife or kids. What I did have was one fantastically loud sound system on the old Gateway computer. I also had a brother who was an electronics junkie who let me borrow some very nice reel to reel recording equipment.

You can probably see where this is going. You see I worked early in the morning. They slept in until God only knows when. I started recording their vociferous spats and their ferocious copulation. These audio captures then went onto a wave file and were replayed at considerable amplitude for the enjoyment of my inconsiderate neighbors when I left for work at 5:30. Each time they rowed or screwed in assaultive fashion I saved it and also added it to the Big Ass Wave File of Guaranteed Sleeplessness. I would then play the most recent attack followed by the complete collection when I left for work.

This worked much better than talking had. At first there was little reaction besides foul looks when I ran into them, as if my actually proving that there was no avoiding their nocturnal cacophanies was an invasion of their privacy. But after the third or fourth retaliatory strike the incidence of attack diminished to only an occasional outburst.

Note that this exchange of audio barrages did not make us the friendliest of neighbors. Then again there was no real loss there as they were already suck ass neighbors in any case. They moved out a couple of months later when their lease expired and as far as I know they've been happily making their neighbors' lives miserable ever since. Hmmm...Deanna, your trouble couple wouldn't happen to be named Larry and Stacey, would they?

My one regret is that the ol' Gateway suffered hard drive meltdown. I bet that wave file would be an instant classic if I could post it here.

Posted by: Jim at 07:41 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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So I'm out back having a smoke break with a couple of my coworkers and (as often happens) talk turns to the situation in Iraq. At one point I mentioned that I hadn't voted for Bush but I was now very happy that he had won the election. Anonymous Coworker #1 replied with "I didn't vote at all 'cause I didn't like any of the candidates." Now this is a coworker who is well read and stays fairly current on world affairs and local happenings. I must have had a pretty interesting look on my face because conversation died at that point and both coworkers tossed their butts and went back to work. If I hadn't been so stunned by this admission of idiocy the conversation would not have stopped. It would have gone something like this:

Me: You didn't vote?

Anonymous Coworker #1: Nope. Like I said, I didn't like any of the candidates.

Me: You mean the presidential candidates?

AC1: Yeah. I didn't think any of them should have been in office.

Me: So you didn't vote because there wasn't a presidential candidate that you supported?

AC1: Yup.

Me: You are a dumbass.

AC1: What?!

Me: You are a dumbass. An idiot. An imbecile.

AC1: What the hell's your problem?

Me: You just told me that you didn't vote simply because there wasn't a presidential candidate that you supported. Your entire reason for not voting revolved around the presidency.

AC1: Yeah. So what?

Me: Did you know that there was also an election for Senators?

AC1: Well, yeah.

Me: Did you know that we also elected Congressmen?

AC1: Um, yeah.

Me: And that we also elected Public Service Commissioners, State Senators, State Representatives, District Attorneys, Court of Appeals Judges, and Superior Court Judges and a Governor and Lieutenant Governor?

AC1: Ah...I didn't realize there were so many but yeah, I knew there were state positions too.

Me: That's just the half of it. Did you know that there were votes on 7 amendments and 4 referendums and an official question that will affect how we vote in the future?

AC1: I, uh, heard something about those, yeah.

Me: Our local government was also elected at that time. Positions like Commissioner of Agriculture, Superintendant of Schools, Attorney General, Commissioner of Insurance and Commissioner of Labor to name a few.

AC1: (subdued) Yeah. I guess I did.

Me: Did you know that a significant number of those polls swung by 1000 votes or less?

AC1: (very subdued) Yeah, I heard that on the news.

Me: Dumbass.

Posted by: Jim at 08:13 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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