3.07.2003

 

Welcome to the new Hose Monster Blog. I hope you enjoy it.

Lots more to say about this, but it's Friday night and I am about to go out, so you will all just have to wait for that until tomorrow.

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3.06.2003

 

Once again, I am reminded of why I have the coolest father in the entire world.

My annual copy of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue arrived from dad today.

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Sometimes I love it when my decisions suddenly make themselves. I know what I am giving up for Lent.

Wednesday night is Darts night here at the Cornfield College of Law, the night we all converge on a local drinking establishment to consume inebriating spirits and through little pointy things at the wall. Beer Darts is a great mid-week release and something to which I look forward every night. I'm a fairly competitive person, so the chance to match skills with my teammates through such physically grueling activity while consuming Bud Light always makes for a happy evening, win or lose.

Last night was a big night, with a basketball game to watch, my girlfriend's team's match at 10 and my team's match at 12. We arrived at the bar at around 9:45, had a beer and watched the end of the hoops game. At about 11 I had another beer, which lasted until about quarter to midnight when my team started congregating around our dart board. We won our match and departed for a local munchies joint at about 12:45. So do some math with me: two beers in about three hours, more or less.

On the way to grab some food, a cop pulled me over for going 38 in a 30 and because I unbeknownst to me had a tail light and a light in my license plate well out. No big deal. However, when the lady noticed our clothing, the late hour and the smell of cigarettes emanating off of us, she probably realized we had been at a bar and asked if I had been drinking. A couple beers, I responded honestly. Which led to her administering a sobriety test on me.

I don't think I did very well in the initial part of things. I had to say the alphabet, but starting at E and ending at R, and for some dumbass reasons, perhaps nerves, perhaps because I always have difficulty performing extremely simple cognitive tasks, I screwed up a little around M or N, but then corrected myself. I then had to count backward from 34 to what I recall being 12 but what my girlfried said was supposed to be 21. I might have kicked the numbers and reversed, I don't really remember. But I did the counting flawlessly. Then I had to do a sensory test, touching each finger to my thumb in rapid succession and in a set pattern. This I performed without problem. She then took my license and insurance back to the squad car to run them and make sure everything was kosher.

What I realize now is that she went back to her car to call for another unit to show up with the camcorder for the drunks.

For a few minutes, I sat in the car joking about things with my girlfriend. I knew I was clearly sober and that everything was fine, but still, in the back of my head I knew I hadn't performed those initial tests with precision. No big deal, I reasoned: I have difficulty performing even basic addition and substraction in my head, and I kick my words all the time. I think I might suffer a little from dyslexia. I don't have a middle ground: either I am extremely articulate or I cannot convey myself to save my life. But for the most part, I felt fine, and wondered when I could go on my merry way and get my burrito at 1 in the morning.

Not for a while, it turned out. Another unit showed up, and my lady cop returned to my door, asked me to step outside into the bitter cold night and walk behind my vehicle, where she informed me that she had some concern after my initial tests and wanted me to perform some more physical functions.

At this point I got a little scared. I knew, without a doubt, that I was not intoxicated nor anywhere remotely close to the .08 limit the state legislature has imposed. But I was tired, cold and extremely nervous. Out of curiosity I have tried walking in a straight line while sober, and I admit that I have some difficulty doing so, even when I have not had a drop of alcohol in days. I started imagining myself getting thrown into the pokey, and I envisioned my law school career disappearing in a flash, my strong career potential dissipating like that, and the HM Blog going into a relatively permanent state of abandonment. Not what I would call, as they say, good times.

So outside I stood in the single digit degree cold, first extending one foot out six inches off the ground, staring at my toe and counting to thirty-one thousand. In a straight line I walked, heel to toe, nine paces up the sidewalk, before planting the foot, turning around and walking nine paces back. On tape the police now have film of me staring at the tip of a pen cap, following it with my eyes, back and forth, up and down. In my mind, I repeated to myself, concentrate, don't screw this up, focus. And then it was over and she sent me back to my car to sit down.

At this point I knew everything was fine. She would have had me return to my vehicle if she had wanted to haul my ass of to jail. But as I sat down and learned that my girlfriend was halfway to calling her father the attorney to tell him how bogus this was and ask him what to do, I couldn't stop shaking. I was cold yeah, but I suddenly had all this nervous tension in my body that had to work itself out. Meanwhile, not wanting to look like a complete ass, I'm trying to be cool and laugh about how I performed the tasks flawlessly and that I was so sober that this whole thing was crazy. Anyway, the cop finally came up to my window, informed me that I demonstrated some impairment but not so much that she wanted to throw me in jail, returned my license and insurance to me, and issued me a verbal warning (for what, she never said, I don't know) and told me to change the lights on my car. Then I drove the remaining 150 yards to the eatery to meet my friends. Yup, all this happened within 150 yards of my destination.

All through the meal I tried to downplay things and laugh about it, probably some macho thing about not wanting to look asinine in front of my friends (who were wondering if they were going to have to make a trip to the ATM to bail me out), but I feel no shame in admitting that I was damn scared and I didn't know what to do about it.

I don't begrudge the cop anything for stopping me. Yeah, 8 miles over the limit is a little sad, and the lights being out is sort of dumb, but they are legitimate reasons for stopping me, and I honestly believe they were not pretextual reasons for stopping me. I refuse to believe that she suspected me of driving under the influence and pulled me over for that reason. Moreover, while I specifically told her I had consumed 2 beers, I bet you she hears that all the time, and therefore I think she had adequate justification to conduct the intial screening on me, which I admit to performing on a level less than stellar, though not because of any alcoholic impairment but simply because I am an idiot. That she seemed to feel I had some impairment seems, to me, a little questionable, but oh well, nothing came of it, so I'll leave it at that.

The thing I am more concerned with is the way my mind shifted into overdrive when I started to fear that I would suck at the tests for one reason or another. No more law school, arrest record, potential criminal trial, stimatized, etc. Not things I want. I slept beyond poorly last night because I dreamed all night about getting thrown into the clink and all the horrible things attached to that, how I would have to confront throwing away my promising future, watching my relationships fizzle, and of course, the dreaded line from my parents of "we're so disappointed in you." I'm exhausted today. But at least I feel like it's over.

Anyway, relating this back to Lent. I'm giving up drinking anything alcoholic on Wednesday nights. I can throw little pointy things without enjoying Bud Light. Although I was fine last night, on previous occasions I have had more than two beers and might really have screwed things up had I gotten pulled over. But Wednesdays only come once a week, so I don't feel like I'm giving up anything substantial. So here's the second part: anytime I'm going out and I drive (if not a Wednesday), I will not have more than one drink that night. Period.

Regardless of what I may write up here, I don't have a drinking problem, nor am I stupid enough to think that I can drive soundly after drinking lots of alcohol. Driving under the influence is something I take seriously, and while I will admit to one night last semester when I absolutely should not have driven myself home, I do not make a practice of it and I mentally accosted myself the morning after for being so dumb as to get behind the wheel the night before. So perhaps I'm overreacting a little bit.

But honestly, something about last night really scared me, and justified or not, I really never want to find myself in that situation again. So a little overreaction here and there won't hurt me, right?

And besides, it's Lent. I can pass it of that way too.

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And the award for the most brilliant post of the day goes to...

Ryan at The Ward. Some great stuff.

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3.05.2003

 

I'm really not a religious person at all. My first Ash Wednesay out here in the Midwest, I saw some guy with some muck on his forehead and stopped him to tell him he had something on his head. He muttered "asshole" and walked away. Of course, after seeing about three other people with black marks on their forehead, I figured out that something must be happening. But it wasn't until later that afternoon, when a friend of mine was talking about Lent, than I realized it was Ash Wednesday.

Lent has never been anything of a big deal for me. It's never even been a deal. I was raised as a Methodist, and either the good disciples of John Wesley don't care much about the season or my parents never made me make a mid-week trip to church, smear something on my forehead and give up stuff for forty days and forty nights.

But anyway, we're into the Lent season, and everyone around me is plotting what they are going to give up until Easter, so I sort of feel like I should also give up something. But the real question is what. A few potentials and my thoughts on them:

• In the library today I briefly thought about giving up sex. That thought lasted all of four seconds.
  
  
• I considered giving up swearing. But then I realized that when you give up something for Lent, it's supposed to be something you want to have back, that you'll miss. I should just try and reduce the swearing because it's a good thing to do.
  
  
• I thought giving up posting Victoria's Secret pictures on HM would be a really good one, but then I got all these visitors coming here today because someone linked me for having Vicky's pictures up, and I realized that no one really comes here to read, just to drool, so pulling the rug out from under my readership didn't sound so good either.
  
  
• As much as my liver would like me to, I simply am not giving up booze. Spring break occurs during Lent, for heaven's sake.
  
  
• I could stop talking to inanimate objects, but then people might think I'm normal, and we simply cannot have that.
  
  
• Not playing on the Internet during class would be a really good one and probably beneficial to my academic performance, but then I might go comatose in Civil Procedure.

Anyway, having never giving up anything for Lent before, I find myself having a hard time to come up with something. Everything is either impossible or something that will simply not work.

If anyone has a suggestion, let me know.

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I can tell you already, at 9:15 in the morning, that today will be a record day at HM, thanks to one link over at How Appealing. Amazing how that happens. Anyway, welcome new visitors and stick around; I promise I'll continue posting Victoria's Secret pictures.

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3.04.2003

 

Querido Hose Monster, amor de mi vida, hidalgo de mis sueños, ¡cómo te he echado de menos!

¿Qué tal van las cosas contigo, Penélope Cruz?

Mejor ahora que estás conmigo. Pero ¿no me devuelves los setimientos de amor y alegría?

Penélope, aunque seas tan bruta, y la devoción tuya me hace soñar despierto, no me puedes apaciguar con palabras de amor y declaraciones así.

¿Por verme no sientas nada? ¿No te pongo cachondo?

Un solo pensamiento de ti basta para ponerme cachondo, ya los sabes. Te ves cada día en el espejo, entiendes cómo bruta eres.

Pues, no te entiendo. ¿Por qué detecto un sentido de hostilidad ahora?

Porque sigues con ese idiota de hombre mientras me echas palabras de cariño.

¿Quién, Tom?

Evidentemente él. ¿Quién más?

Vale, él. Lo mantengo para conveniencia y para satisfacer mis deseos "básicos." Lo dejaría el momento que declarases que eres mío para siempre.Tú eres el hombre para mí.

No te creo. Y encima, es evidente que estás loca por estar con él. Ese idiotadejó una de las mujeres más increíbles en el mundo y sus dos chavales adoptados para huir contigo. En serio, ¿quién dejaría a Nicole Kidman?

Ésa es una puta como nadie.

Dice lo mismo en cuanto a ti.

Exactamente la razón por qué la llamo puta. Y ¿cómo lo sabes esto? ¿Sois amigos?

No seas celosa, guapa. Además de ti, las famosas bellas nunca tienen nada que ver conmigo.

En este aspecto tienes razón. Y así debes entender por qué somos destinados a ser juntos. Me doy cuenta de lo especial que eres, del tamaño increíble de tu polla, de tu capacidad para satisfacer las mujeres en la cama.

Eso lo debo a mi dedo de sex.

Ji ji, eso lo recuerdo.

Pero volviendo al tema. Sigues con este chico con que compartes un apellido. Eso no me indica que quieras dejarlo para estar conmigo.

Pienses lo que pienses, te cuento la verdad. Eres mi único, el conquistador de mi corazón, él que me da orgasmo tras orgasmo.

Me halagas...

Huye conmigo.

No puedo.

¿Por que tienes esa novia?

Cuidado con lo que digas.

Podemos desaparecer sin que ella se entere de lo que ha pasado. No tienes que contárselo.

A ella eso no le gustaría y yo no soy ese tipo de hombre.

Pues, ¿qué hago yo?

Espérame en tus sueños, donde siempre ha existido lo nuestro.

Hasta el fin del mundo lo haré.

Bueno, te veré entonces.

Que duermas bien, amor.

Lo mismo a ti, mona.

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How did I miss this one? A somewhat reprehensible oversight, given that I'm a law student a and clear fan of everyone's favorite underwear catalog.

Everyone give thanks for How Appealing.

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Well, it appears that the goose is somewhat out of the pen, so to speak. A certain other blogger, who deserves my great admiration, asked an important question:

Say, I noticed your blog is now ad-free. You wouldn't happen to be planning a site redesign, would you?

So yeah, HM is currently undergoing a little overhaul, appearance wise. When I started this blog, I threw up whatever template looked the best to me on that day. Not being the most HTML-savvy person out there (though I must confess I've taught myself a lot more than I ever expected to know a year ago), I never really made any major modifications to the design of this site and just resigned myself to having a butt-ugly blog.

But the day has come when HM will look a little less abrasive and its appearance will better mirror its content.* The new design will look smoother and more suitable to the things I put up here. I'm hoping you like it, because I do.

You will probably see the new look sometime this week, so wait for it impatiently and celebrate its arrival with copious amounts of alcohol when it appears.

*Not through any of my own efforts, mind you. Like I said, I'm mostly HTML and other computer language inept.

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3.03.2003

 

Commenting on blogs, here at HM and around the Blogosphere, strikes me as such a strange organism sometimes.

Sometimes the strangest things generate comments, stuff that you would never anticipate receiving much of a response. Sometimes stuff that seems controversial to you and certain to ignite passions out there generates little more than a whimper among readers. And sometimes your readers show their generosity and tell you good things when you put your nuts on the block and bare some difficult thoughts and revelations.

I love getting comments, even if I'm usually receiving them from the same ten people. I appreciate that they not only come here to digest what I'm thinking but take the time to weigh in on matters, offer a light-hearted anecdote, encourage, constructively criticize, direct me to the identity of extremely hot women, or do anything else that adds another reason why I love writing HM to the plethora of personal reasons I already have.

Sometimes I know when something I write will generate no response. Sometimes I think I might get a few notes and I do. Sometimes I think I might get four or five comments and I get less than that. I am always pleasantly surprised when that number exceeds five or six. But now and again I'll write something that I think might approach that level and nothing happens.

I just don't get it sometimes.

Another thing I don't really understand is the massive amount of feedback Moxie always seems to land on her site. Certainly her much larger readership has a lot to do with that. And the way that she writes probably has a lot more to do with that. She wears her life and her emotions on her sleeve all the time, and while I do not claim that she writes fishing for comments, I know that a lot of the topics she treats tend to provoke an emotional and sympathetic response from her readers. I understand why this sort of thing might generate comments. But I'm confounded by how her reporting on reality TV shows, in particular The Bachelor franchise and Joe Millionaire, topics which she clearly enjoys writing about, generate so much feedback. Yes, the media assault for these phenomena put such topics in the realm of general knowledge, encouraging us to feel like we have something to say. But even so, I am perplexed as to how talking about television can result in 30 to 50 comments. Just astounding.

Then people like Jeff Cooper, who is extremely articulate and a great daily read (and the first blog I read every day) have a string of brilliant posts with no comments whatsoever. Cooped Up engages me intellectually and really gets me thinking about events occurring outside my knowledge and how they affect me. What Jeff writes always gets me thinking, which on some level makes me want to respond and articulate my thoughts. And certainly I'm not the only person who praises Cooped Up, so many other readers must want to respond to what he has to say.

And yet I don't recall having ever left a comment on Cooped Up. Which makes me think that I don't even understand myself when it comes to this stuff.

People fish for comments, beg for comments, threaten to discontinue blogging if people don't start reacting to what they write. To some extent I don't really like it when people do that because I have always said that keeping a blog is an intensely selfish and self-fulfilling action. It takes a slight arrogance to think that you have something to say such that other people will want to read it. Therefore, the writing of the blog should serve as all the impetus authors need. On the other hand, having experienced the delight that comes with every new comment and interacting with other people because of what they have written here, I understand the desire to try and generate as many comments as possible. It's a toss up.

Anyway, no real point to this post. Just sort of thinking out loud.

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3.02.2003

 

Arena rock is not dead.

I know this because I fulfilled a years-long goal last night and saw Bon Jovi in concert. And to pen a line after my pal Alfred, they fukn rocked.

Things you say about most bands don't apply to Bon Jovi. They don't have a fresh sound or light up the crowd with kick-ass dance moves (in fact, Jon Bon Jovi might be the most awkward "dancer" I can recall seeing in quite some time). You have to lump Bon Jovi with bands like U2 and maybe REM, bands that keep kicking, selling records and filling arenas twenty-two years after they hit the music world. The difference between Bon Jovi and U2 and other bands like that is that Bon Jovi hasn't really evolved musically. If anything, they've toned themselves down as they age.

But that don't mean they fail to rock the hell out of a crowd with their old stuff and even get people going with the new stuff.

You can tell in certain moments that the men of Bon Jovi are not the same leather-clad long-haired rockers, really the only 80's arena hair band to come out of that era and still make new and good records, they once were. Jon cannot hit the high notes the way he once could; on Livin' on a Prayer he lets the crowd take over those notes, on Always he drops a couple of the high notes down a bit. Richie doesn't move around a whole bit, though he can still play the hell of the guitar, and Tico still looks like he's just kicking it waiting for the bus to come. But I tell you, if I still have half the rock those guys do at age 40, I'll be a happy man.

At the end of You Give Love a Bad Name, when the entire crowd was belting out the lyrics and Jon & Co. were kicking back and loving it, Jon said into the mike, "I'd like to see Britney Spears do that." And we went nuts. On Raise Your Hands, you would have thought James Brown was doing the show -- everyone's hand shooting up in the air in sync with Jon singing. And right before they left the stage for the first time, Jon gave this whole line about he couldn't be responsible for what he was about to do, asked if there was a doctor in the thouse, and then launched into Bad Medicine. And throughout the night, the crowd simply boiled over with energy. We sang the entire first verse of Dead or Alive while the guys sat back and just had a "DAMN" look on their face. Sounds pretty goofy, I'm sure, but it absolutely rocked for those lucky enough to be there.

But in all honesty, they probably do that sort of thing every night. But we got something special last night. The Jon Bon Jovi birthday celebration.

A few people in the crowd had Happy Birthday signs, and people down on the floor threw a variety of birthday cards onto the stage. At one point Jon picked one up, opened it and started reading it silently to himself. Richie walked over, peeped over Jon's shoulder and then said, so that every could hear, "she says she LUUVVES you!" Absolutely priceless delivery. For the first encore, everyone but Jon came out in either a gold or silver jacket and top hat, started playing the Beatles' Happy Birthday for Jon, who walked out in the middle of it all. The roadies then wheeled a big cake onto the stage, out of which jumped a Marilyn Monroe lookalike. She then proceeded to do her very best sexy "Happy Birthday" for the whole crowd, smooched Jon a few times, and then Richie had us all sing again. And just to celebrate a little more, we got the extra special second encore, a rarity these days, with the boys playing a variety of upbeat cover songs.

Just an awesome performance. The most fun I've had at a concert in a long time. And I felt all this from about seven rows down from the very top of the United Center.

The crowd at the show was a wholly other source of enjoyment. I have never seen a more ecletic group. Normally I feel old sometimes at concerts because it appears that a number of my favorite performers have a strong local high school following (it's kind of embarrassing, to tell you the truth), but last night, man. Fifty year-olds, forty year-old yuppies, thirty year-old former sororiety sisters, mulleted men in acid washed jeans and denim jackets, one guy with six tattoos and a Judas Priest t-shirt: the whole thing just blew my mind. I could have sat out in the lobby and watched people go by all night.

Goo Goo Dolls did an admirable job as an opening act.

Anyway, it's late, I'm exhausted, but I finally got to see Bon Jovi. Richie was amazing, Tico was Tico (if I could ever have one Bon Jovi souvenir, I would want an authentic pair of Tico Torres drumming gloves), the keyboard-player name Hugh with the same hair as the actor from "Greatest American Hero" did a great job as the anonymous band member, and Jon was... a living legend. How to describe JBJ: back and forth the whole night, shadow-boxing in his really tight pants, repeatedly just sticking his arms up in the air and staring at the sky, rocking it out and singing all our old favorites while mixing in the right amount of new stuff.

I go to bed happy tonight because my life feels just a little more complete than it did when the weekend started.

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Eric McErlain issues some excellent guidelines for commenting on blogs. Anonymous comments are annoying; people lashing out without considering that everyone's opinion is usually valid and accepting that people simply disagree sometimes is downright exasperating.

And I've been quoted for the very first time on another blog. That it happened at Cooped Up is quite an honor for me. Three cheers for the HM Blog.

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I'm extremely pleased to welcome a wonderful writer and thinker, and one of the best friends I ever hope to have, the the blogging world. My pal Adam, who has left quite a number of great comments with the HM, made his very first post to a group blog. Not much of a post mind you, but it is a first effort, and I'll be the first to admit my first efforts, or for that matter my first couple months of effort, didn't really have a whole lot to say either. And no jokes from the peanut gallery about how I have nothing to say now either.

Anyway, welcome Adam. We're enriched to have you.

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