Wednesday, February 04, 2004

that's cool/that sucks After being a human being for a little more than 33 years, I've come to realize that there's only two phrases you need to know to have a conversation with just about anyone on just about any topic.  Those two phrases are: "that's cool!" and "that sucks!" Except for maybe "What's up?" and "See-ya!" These are all the phrases that you need to know for all social interaction. That sucks and that's cool work so well because no one is really that interested in what you have to say anyway.  People mostly just want you to listen to stupid crap that has happened to them or big wonderful things that they hope are going to happen. For example: Dude 1: What's up? Dude 2: What's up? Dude 1:  Aw man, I feel like crap.  I think I'm coming down with the flu or some shit. Dude 2: That sucks. Dude 1: Yeah man.  It really sucks.  I've got this headache and I can't stop snifflin' and I feel like I'm gonna puke.  And then I called my boss and he said I can't take anymore days off and plus I got this paper due tomorrow. Dude 2: That sucks. Dude 1: Tell me about it. But all that shit doesn't matter anyway.  I think I'm going to quit my job and drop my classes.  It's all just bullshit. Dude 2: (no response necessary) Dude 1: Yeah, I've got this friend of mine I'm gonna start a porn site with.  We're gonna make thirty-thousand dollars our first month. Dude 2: That's cool. Dude 1: Yeah, it real fucking cool.  And he knows all these hot chicks that will get naked and do whatever we say.  They'll have to sleep with us just to get the job. Dude 2: That's cool. Dude 1: But my friend's waitin' to get this money from his dad so we can get started.  But his dad won't give it to him cause he's a real asshole. Dude 2:  That sucks. Dude 1: It really, really sucks.  But anyway, I gotta go to my stupid job. Dude 2:  See-ya. Dude 1: See-ya.    9:50:30 PM    comment []

it came from john rocks' pool When I was in middle school I used to go over to my friend John Rocks house all the time to play and goof around.  John Rocks had this swimming pool that was usually a murky green color, so we  didn't swim in it too much. One time John Rocks and I were running around on his wet pool deck and I slipped and fell.  I cringed as I went down, thinking I was going to hit my head on the patio.  But instead I just grazed my side on the cement and splashed into the water.  I got out and dried myself off and then I looked down at my side and saw this red scrape about the size of a silver dollar.  It stung a little bit, but I didn't think that much of it.  I just went back to chasing John Rocks around his pool. A couple weeks later I was lifting weights in my garage and I took a look at my scrape again.  To my surprise there were little white spots that had popped up around it.  I thought the spots were kind of weird but I didn't worry too much about it. But over the next few weeks and months the white spots slowly spread out over my torso and up to my neck and shoulder and arms.  I showed the white spots to my mom and she said I needed to got to a dermatologist. I went to see Dr. Nortstein, a Jewish doctor who was on my mom's HMO plan.  He looked at my white spots and told me that they were a fungus.  He gave me a perscription for some lotion that I was supposed to rub on the spots every night to make them go away. When I first put on the lotion I got this cool, tingly feeling all over, as if I had just rubbed wint-o-green life savers  into my skin.  I left the spot lotion on my skin for a couple of hours and then washed it off just like Dr. Nortstein told me to.  After a few days of this it seemed like my spots started to fade a little, so I stopped rubbing the wint-o-green lotion on them. But when the Florida summer hit and the air got sticky and hot, my spots came back full force.  And this time my spots got all pink and puffy.  They looked and felt horrible and I was all out of the spot lotion. When I called Dr. Norstein he said I could just buy some Selsun Blue and rub that on.  "It has the same active ingredient," he said. "Okay," I said.  So I bought Selsun Blue and rubbed it on my pink puffy spots.  It seemed to work pretty good and the spots faded some and almost went away. But the spots didn't go away.  They stuck with me off and on for almost twenty years, alternating between pink and puffy and faded white. Then one day, when I was about thirty I managed to get this really sexy, Jewish girlfriend named Leona.  He boyfriend left her to go make it as a big shot in Miami Beach and I decided to ask her out and see if she would be my girlfriend and have sex with me. To my surprise, she did go out with me and have sex with me.  I guess she thought the art stuff I did was pretty cool, plus I have muscles, and blue eyes, etc. In the meantime, Leona was just starting to have some success in her acting and modeling career.  After supporting her slacker, bohemian boyfriend with her stripping money for eight years, she was finally making it on her own.  She landed a starring role in an Eckerd Drugs commercial which aired nation wide.  She was becoming a mini-movie star celebrity around town. In the meantime, me and Leona were having lots and lots of hot and sweaty sex.  We would do it for hours and hours in all different positions until we were both drenched in sweat and totally exhausted.  I thought it was pretty great. But then one day I got a call from Leona while I was sitting around my apartment not doing much of anything. "I can't belive it!  I can't belive it, Mark.  I can't belive you would do this to me?" she said. "Do what?" I said. "I have spots!  You gave me your spots!" Leona said. "Are you sure?" I said. "Yes, I'm sure!  They're just like your spots, but now they're on me!" Leona was very upset and angry.  I tried to tell her that they were just harmless little spots, but she wouldn't listen to me.  She told me I needed to go on the internet right then and research how to get rid of the spots.  I tried to tell her that you could just put Selsun Blue on them, but that wasn't good enough for her. A couple days later Leona came over to watch a video at my apartment.  When she sat down on the couch with me, she didn't touch me at all and when I tried to touch her she just sat there frozen.  I knew right then she was going to break up with me. "Mark, I've got something to say," she said.  And then Leona broke up with me.  She had a long list of reasons that she was breaking up with me and the  spots were just the final and biggest reason on the list. Anyway, I don't think Leona's acting career really took off.  I think they yanked her Eckerd Drugs commercial off the air soon after the 911 attacks.  I'm not sure what one has to do with the other, but for some reason they just yanked it.  The last thing I heard about Leona, she was standing behind a booth at a Publix promoting Smirnoff Ice or some such thing.  I think part of the problem Leona had making it as an actress was that she really couldn't act. (Not to mention the spots from John Rock's pool from 20 years ago.) 5:14:55 PM    comment []

what's this? When I was thirty-one I came to the end of my life's rope.  I had no job.  I had no money.  I had no girlfriend.  I had nothing. But instead of blowing my brains out I sat in my apartment for a couple of months and wrote a book about my life.  For the first time ever, I felt like I really had something to say and the words and the stories flew from my fingertips one after the other.  I wrote about relationships.  I wrote about my divorce.  I wrote about being a drunk and getting fucked up on drugs.  I wrote about my dreams and I wrote about my failures. Basically, I wrote about everything that happened to me in my whole life.   When I was finished I felt like I had really done something.  I was so happy and proud I wanted to show the whole world.  I wanted to tell the story of my life. A couple of weeks after I finished my book I went over to my older sister's birthday party.  Other people in my family got her cups, and plates, etc.  But when it was my turn to give a gift, I gave her my book about my life. "What's this?" my sister said. "I wrote a book!" I said. "Hmm.  Interesting," she said.  "What's it about?" "My life!" I said. "Really?" she said.  Then my sister kind of flipped through the pages and put the book aside with the other gifts. That was two years ago and my sister has never breathed a word about my book. 7:59:16 AM    comment []

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