untitled late night post number nine

I'm writing this last night, which is actually right now, but is also last night. Hooray for TypePad's "publish this later" thingy!

Still with me?

Okay. I have to stay up another 90 minutes or so while my punkin pies cook. I'm taking them to my brother's house for dinner tomorrow. Why did I just put them in the oven at 10:15 PM? I'm glad you asked. Because I didn't realize that I had about a pinch of ground cinnamon in the spice rack. As this is much less than the required two teaspoons, I drove myself to the market, so I could spend thirty-two fucking dollars (american) on four different stupid spices. It was really funny when the checkout lady saw my spices on the belt and said, "Don't even look at the price. Just swipe your card and get back home before you realize how bad you just got screwed." Apparently, I wasn't the only stupid-husband-in-charge-of-pies who had been in there tonight. When I got home, I turned on the oven to pre-heat, and began the process of mixing my thirty-two fucking dollars (american) of spices together. I reached for the required 2 1/2 cups of sugar . . . and discovered that we were entirely out of sugar.

I walked into our bedroom, where Anne was already tucked in and watching TV.

"We're out of sugar," I said, as if telling her this would get her to release some of the vast stores of sugar she'd been hording in a secret root cellar that I'd never seen in the seven years we've lived in our house. This was a repeat of the conversation we'd had twenty minutes earlier, when I walked in and said, "We're out of cinnamon, ginger, and ground cloves."

"Remember when I called you from the store this morning, and asked you to double check, and make sure you had everything you needed to make pies?"

"Uh-huh."

"And remember how you said, 'uh-huh,' and kept watching Battlestar Galactica?"

"Uh-huh."

"Yeah."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Do you need anything from the store?" I said.

"Believe it or not, since the last time you asked me twenty minutes ago, nothing new has come up." She said.

"Okay. I'll be right back." I got the hell out of there, hoping that I could somehow convince her that it was all a dream tomorrow. And by tomorrow, I mean today, but really tomorrow.

I drove to a different market this time, and picked up one pound of sugar. The store was swarming with panicked idiot husbands like myself. The atmosphere was similar to the card aisle in the twenty-four hour drug store around midnight on February 13th.

But the important thing is, I have punkin pies in the oven, now, and I'll have to stay awake for another two hours while they do their thing. So instead of playing poker with Shane and Joanne, I'm writing a little bit, then I'm going to get back to reading Blink, which is a fascinating book that I highly recommend to everyone.

Here are a few random thoughts before I get offline:

Following up on my last post, where the discussion is currently all about music (which makes me really sad, because it entirely misses the point of that story): if you are bored to death with the average radio option out there, and if you find yourself longing for an awesome radio station that plays really great music in a format that completely does not suck, you should really be listening to Egg Radio.

"Before you decide that everyone knows something (or no one does), take a second to realize that you're wrong." -Seth Godin.

Carly lists her top ten cheesy movies, including this turkey (har. har. har.):

8. Anaconda
The true star of this movie is yet to be determined, but it’s a tie between Jon Voight’s facial expressions and the rubber snakes that terrorize the crew. Of course, Ice Cube calling one of them a bitch is high on the list.

Carly's number one on the list has got heat.

I took my cat, Biko, to the vet earlier this week. Biko is Sketch's brother, and is the runt of their litter. He's the only kitty left, and he's the one we thought we'd lose first, for sure. The vet said that he was in perfect health, had even gained a little weight since his last visit, and that all his bloodwoork is normal. He will probably live to be one of those very old cats who is over twenty when he dies. The very next day, Anne found out from her eye doctor that she is incredibly allergic to Biko, and he's giving her some sort of allergic conjunctivitis. She told the doctor that there's no way we're getting rid of him, and he gave her a prescription that costs eight hundred gazillion dollars a week. It's funny and a little sad that she's allergic to him, because they totally love each other -- Biko sleeps on her side of the bed most of the day, and he snuggles up around her side at night. She said, "I love him as much as he loves me, so I'll just deal."

Back in the very early days of The Internets, when it was a big deal to telnet into your friends' machine at school or ftp issues of Phrack to each other, my friends and I would collect and pass around really weird and obscure mix tapes. One of my favorites had Buddy Rich freaking out on the tour bus, a bunch of prank calls to Red (the inspiration for Moe on The Simpsons), tons of pre-CD Jerky Boys, and several clips of Casey Kasem freaking out about moving the time of his show, and a long-distance dedication. I can't believe how hard it was to find some of those Casey clips, but here are two of them: "It's ponderous man. It's fuckin' ponderous." and "The Dead Dog Tape." If anyone reading this has access to other outtakes like these, and you're willing to share them, please let me know. Update: These links seem to be down, probably because the link got WWdN'd. I tried to find contact info to apologize to the hosting site's webmaster, but came up empty. If someone has these files and would like to host them, let me know and I'll change the links.

Last night (tonight) Nolan spent close to two hours reading this book that one of his teachers gave to him, and only put it down when he was too tired to keep reading. He told me, "This is way better than TV." When I went into his room to tell him goodnight, he'd fallen asleep, listening to Audio from Blueman Group.

Okay, it looks like the pies are just about done, which means that I am, too. Happy Thanksgiving to those of you who celebrate this holiday. I hope you get to spend it with people you love.

Comments

[Harlan]

Happy Thanksgiving to you too Wil, and to everyone else reading WWdN:iX - American or not. We all something to be thankful for. I'm glad you finally got your pies done. I'm going over to a friends house this afternoon, since my girlfriend is at her Mom's place. Enjoy your family. Harlan...

[Vic]

mmmmmmm, pumpkin pieeee!

great story.

happy turkey day

[Kevin Gamin]

For those of you who haven't heard Buddy Rich go postal...

Buddy Rich, World's Greatest Drummer

[whenigodeaf]

This is an outtake of Paul Anka raging at his band. It goes on for quite awhile.

[VeronicaRobinson]

God above, I am so going to cry. I have to work today and don't get to go ANYWHERE. Brilliant idea for the "family" store to be open on a day when "family" and being with "family" is the point. Yes, I speak of WAL-MART. (greedy s.o.b's. if you ask me)

What's going to happen with Binko? Do you have someone to take him?

Uh-huh. The husband's word. A husband invented it. Cave-wife asked cave-husband if he had skinned the rabit for the stew. Instead of actually listening to her and answering the question, he said "Uh-huh". His favorite cave-rockball team was on and they were playing their rivals. The rockball team from across the big river. There was no stew that night and who got all the blame?

Has Nolan just discovered the joys of reading or is this a normal thing? Most men have no idea the worlds you can go to contained in a book. Most men, like Trevor, have read only two books in his life (other than school books) and those two books were assigned by English teachers. He HAD to read them. Me? I would line every wall we have with bookshelves and fill them to bursting if I could. That would be my dream room. One of those HUGE libraries that you would imagine in some old-England manor house with a massive fireplace and losts of overstuffed chairs. And a rug for my cats to sleep on.

Why do you call it, The Internets? I've heard several of your kind (geeks) call it that.

Well, I have but a short while before I must be enslaved behind a cash register, begging God to not let me cry in front of everyone and Trevor's on his way out the door to spend the day with his family.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours, Your Highness.

*wink*

[Anna Trueblood]

If you use brown sugar instead of white, no one will ever know the difference. For Next Year.

[Kevin Gamin]

Veronica,

If it makes you feel any better, I, too, am at work today. The difference is that I am all by myself in the building, basically waiting for a server to crash or, in a real worst case scenario, the building to catch on fire.

I hope you don't have to work tomorrow! That would be grounds for kicking somebody's ass.

[Ruth]

punkin pie is sweet

happy t-day

[Brock Haywood]

I would love to hear those casey casem quotes but, alas, the links are forbidden. Think you could serve those files for those interested?

[iWan]

I wonder how many americans will be eating tofurkey this year.

[Anne S.]

been there, done that with the late night panicked shopping for Thanksgiving... but dude? pumpkin pies are SO not worth that angst... dutch apple, yeah, but next time, grab 2 Mrs Smiths and no one will know the difference....

[RobAP]

I had a bunch of those old Red ("you rat bastard..."), Jerky Boys & Casey Kasem tapes in college. They really made the rounds. I haven't seen or heard them since college. Probably got lost in the move.

[RobAP]

PS- Happy Thanksgiving. Hope your pies came out ok.

[amyv]

Happy Thanksgiving Wil. Hope the pies were worth the trouble! You didn't like Anaconda? You prefer maybe Pythons? :)

[Sawabloom]

Hope the pies came out okay, Wil! I just saw you on VH1's "I love the Holidays" and you were great--and seriously funny. Great work! Hope you have a wonderful holiday with your family :)

[kayaksoup]

Happy Thanksgiving.
I apologise for laughing out loud at your pie trauma.

[mirkrim]

I didn't miss your point :(

Happy thanksgiving, Wil.

[carthies]

turkey isnt even all that great. but time with the family is awsome.
happy thanksgiving everyone!

hheehh heehh last minute shopper hhe hheeh.

[LolaGabanna]

Oh my... The pumpkin pie story made me laugh out loud. :oD Poor Wil. And don't worry... I didn't miss the point of what you said in your last post. I just commented on the music because I was incredibly tired and couldn't think much past that. (Not that MY comment is the one you mean, but "just so you know," you know?) I hope your Thanksgiving went wonderfully, and the pies (and everything else) were yummy! :o)

[VeronicaRobinson]

Kevin-
It just so happens that I do have to work tomorrow. 11am to 8pm. The very first person to harp at me because something wasn't the price they thought it was is going to get the I-Worked-On-Fucking-Thanksgiving-And-Didn't-Get-Overtime-Or-Even-Fed Veronica. Incase you haven't met her, she's a total bitch.

Now, I'm off to eat my cold mashed potato's that my awesome husband brought home for me.

[tanyak]

What was the book from the teacher?

[Rook]

This year I only had to make three trips to the supermarket. Thankfully I did not run out of anything. But then, I didn't have to make any pies.

Happy Thanksgiving Wil!

[eaglenest608]

Happy Turkey Day to you as well!!

[VineyardDawg]

BlueMan is... freakin'... awesome!

Happy Thanksgiving, Wil! :-)

[mainja]

"as if telling her this would get her to release some of the vast stores of sugar she'd been hording in a secret root cellar that I'd never seen in the seven years we've lived in our house."

one of the best things i've read in days. funny, my partner things i have a similar thing, only mine is not specifically a root cellar, simply a hidden room that holds things like books, cds, paper towels, things like that.