Mind in the gutter, part II

Why hello there, friends. Glad to see you on this Tuesday, replete with the requisite Tuesdaica. When I left you yesterday, I was in the middle of telling you about my bowling league and the events of last Thursday night. If it's ok with you, I'd like to continue with that subject matter. Thank you, I appreciate your support.

As I clearly illustrated with the team names in my last post, the league isn't exactly what you would call "run of the mill." Personally, I don't really call anything that, but hey, you're entitled to your own phrases. What we didn't realize until week one of the league was that people didn't even have to have their real names in the system. That very first week, we bowled against "Dr. Jones," "Daddy," and "Gusuavo" (a great nickname for anyone named Gustavo, I must say) for example. You can imagine that I felt a little plain having "Peter Klein" show up for me when I could literally choose anything instead.

Some folks in the league have the type of nickname I'd expect. One team (Pulled Out Early) has Chief and T-Bone, for example. There's a Big Jon, a Tiny, and G-Money as well. All within the realm of what I consider to be normal nicknames. Then we branch out a little. One team has both Tatas and VaGina together. Another has Rambone and Ass-Ass-N bowling back to back. See what I mean?

Then they just get bizarre. There's someone "named" Phe Phe Pheassco, a young woman named Oshikotikimas, and her teammate, Ohnarhasta. Oh yeah, and someone who goes by Scott Baio as well.

There are two teams whose named I approve of for different reasons. First there's the West Canaan Coyotes, named after the high school football team in the movie, "Varsity Blues." While that's cool to begin with, they followed through and each member is named after one of the characters. Even though we didn't have the most pleasant time bowling against them a few weeks ago, I still admire their work there. The other team is the curiously-named Team Pain. The bowlers there are named She Poured, Us Drinks, To Drunk, and We Drunk'em. I think a lot - too much - about names and things like that, yet the thought never crossed my mind to use four bowlers' names together to form a grammatically incorrect sentence. Nicely done.

It makes me wonder what I would've chosen for my name if I had known that we could do that. When I use to bowl recreationally with friends back in the day, I'd sometimes put my name in as Malcolm. That way, when I got a strike, it said "MALCOLM X" on the machine. I ended up being "MALCOM /" sometimes too, but that didn't work as well. I don't think I'd want that for an entire league though. Well, it's something to consider for next time. For now, our four real (and really Jewish) names all stand out like sore thumbs, but we're used to it now.

Back to last Thursday: We were bowling against Team Pain (the sentence guys), and even though I was bowling like shit, we still had a chance that first game. The tenth frame came down to my homey Rockabye versus We Drunk'em, and they took turns going. We Drunk'em got a strike, a six, and then left one. Rockabye picked up his spare, and looking at the screen, we saw that he needed a strike on this last ball for us to tie. The team on the lane next to us started watching, my parents leaned in with anticipation, and I walked up behind Rockabye ready to congratulate him. He took his steps, had a nice follow through (shaking hands with the head pin, of course), and all ten fell down. It was glorious, and even the other team was high-fiving him for his clutch performance. Greg, Rob, and I were all below our averages for the game and yet we tied due to the heroics of Rockabye.

The next game...eh, not so much. Three of us bowled pretty well, but the other team was on fire. We lost by almost one hundred, meaning we needed to win by that much (plus one) in order to take two and a half of the four games. My parents acknowledged that they were bad luck and were about to leave. "Hold on," I said, "Wait for my strike in the first frame before you go." I walked up, let 'er rip, and the ball did what I asked it to for almost the first time all night. The pins exploded, and I walked back making the face that one makes when he says something cocky and then follows through on it. "Maybe we're not bad luck after all," they said. Then Greg bowled a 6, and they bolted. Greg's next three frames were all strikes, and I texted my dad after each one to illustrate how completely the hex was lifted. As the frames went on though, despite two of us having above-average games, we lost by twenty something and therefore only won half a game for the week. That's gonna hurt in the standings.

Did my parents jinx us? I don't think so. My lovely wife doesn't think things work this way, but I take the blame for not wearing my special bowling boxers. We've lost all four before while I've worn them, but the fates seemed to be especially against us this time. I already washed them for this week, so we should be cool.

I keep trying to think of cool team names for upcoming years in which we can have personal names that match, a la the West Canaan Coyotes. We could be Kiss and fight over who gets to be Gene Simmons. We could be the Durham Bulls and have Crash Davis, Nuke LaLoosh, and two other guys. Hmmm, I have to think more about that. Any suggestions, gentle readers? Here's a suggestion: have a great day. I'll see you back here tomorrow.

Mind in the gutter

Hello everyone, and I hope you're all doing well on this Mondanic morning. I'm trying out the adjective forms of the days of the week, but I haven't decided what I want to use yet. Do you like "Mondanic," "Mondaish," or "Mondayen" most? I think there's a real need for these adjectives, and while some might just jump to "Monday-like," I think that's a cop out. "The book was exciting, and the final chapters had a real Fridanic feel to them," for example. "Lionel Richie? Oh yeah, he's Sundanic." Who's with me on this?

Anyway, that aside came out of nowhere, and it's not what I think I'm writing about today. Instead, I wish to tell a story from just a few days ago. That doesn't happen often here at UOPTA, but hey, let's live a little.

As I've documented a couple of times in this space, I joined a Thursday night bowling league with three friends. It doesn't start until 9pm, and the league is called "Party Animals." Before signing up, I asked what that meant, and the guy on the phone said that it's just a little louder than the other leagues. I was concerned that getting a strike meant you had to do a tab of acid off someone's ass crack or something, so I was relieved to be wrong.

The alley is between three and five minutes away from my house, depending on how many of the lights I make. Being hyperpunctual though, I can't help but leave at 8:30 to get there. I know that's ridiculous, but my friends are usually there not too long after me, and it gives me the opportunity to check out the standings, change shoes, and stand there looking at my watch every ten seconds. Last Thursday (which was not feeling very Thursdanic by the way since I'd been out of town earlier that week), I left at 8:25 because I was having trouble waiting for more minutes to pass. I hit play on a cd in my car, and I pulled into the alley's parking lot before the first song ended.

My very first thought as I pulled into the lot was, "It looks a little more empty than normal; maybe the league before us had the night off." My second thought was, "There's a spot right there near a car that looks like my dad's." And my third thought was, "That's my dad's license plate on that car that looks like my dad's." It only took me about five seconds to realize that those facts meant that they'd come to watch me bowl as a surprise. I quickly picked up my cell phone and called my dad's cell. It went right to voicemail, and I left this message: "Hey guys, it's me. I know it would kinda be a late night for you, but if you guys aren't doing anything tonight, I thought maybe you'd want to come watch us bowl. Anyway, let me know. Love you."

I walked into the bowling alley, and I could see the backs of my parents looking around for a familiar face. Right then it hit me: they were even earlier than I was. No wonder I'm so messed up with that kind of thing. I caught up to them, and we talked for a little while before getting over to where my team would be that evening. My mom didn't tell me they were coming on the off chance that I'd say I didn't want them to. Here's the weird thing about my relationship with my parents though: I enjoy their company. I may have been the first person in the history of the Party Animals league to have his or her parents there watching, but it didn't bother me one bit.

We looked at the standings together, and they were shocked and amazed by the team names and the fake names of the bowlers themselves. "Why haven't you talked about this for a blog post?" my mom asked. Good question, Mom. Of the 19 team names, I'd say 9 of them are overtly sexual. Unless you count "Team 17," that is. We are Hip Hop Anonymous, which is a quote from "Big Daddy" starring Adam Sandler. Some of the sexual names are puns or attempted puns having to do with bowling. For example, there are the "Gutter Sluts," clearly using bowling terminolgy (with the 'gutter' part, you crazy readers). Not quite as true to form but right up there are "Two Fingers Deep," and the one that made my mom most uncomfortable, "Split Lickers." I guess "Oversized Jocks" is a sports pun as well, if you consider bowling a sport (which I absolutely do).

The other sexual names are not puns but rather just there for one's reading enjoyment. Let's take "Pulled Out Early" for example. I guess they just like the way it sounds or something. Same goes for "Tease the Tip" and my personal favorite, "Hookers and Blow." H&B have team shirts, and I have to admit that I was a bit jealous when I first saw them. That's a quality team name there, and I tip my hat to them.

Hey, you know what? I have more to write about this league and the events of that evening, so I'm going to stop here for now. Are you going to be ok with that? I figure it's better to spread things out a little, ya know? So meet me here tomorrow, gentle readers, and I'll tell you a little more about this crazy little league we've got going on and the events of last Thursday. Have a good day, and I hope it's less Mondanic than most Mondays. Shaloha.

FUF #34

Good morning and buenos dias, mis amigos y amigos de amigos. As the wise Beatles once sang, "Treasure these few words til we're together/Keep all my love forever/P.S. I FUF you. You you you!" At least I think that's what they said. Disirregardless, it's another Follow Up Friday. As custom dictates, I shall now proceed to ramble moderately-coherently about topics related to previous posts, new things that both strike and tickle my fancy, and then amaze you with another gratifying installment of Car Watch. What's that? Setting the bar too high? Damn.

Earlier this week, I wrote a post about band names and remembered a little story that didn't fit there. Back in high school, the song "Breakfast at Tiffany's" came out and was a smash hit. Anytime there's a song about a couple maybe staying together because they "both kinda like" a movie, you just know it's gonna top the charts. In any case, I remember hearing it while sitting in the backseat of one of my parent's cars. "Do you know who sings this?" I asked. They didn't. "I'll give you a hint," I continued, "It's Deep Blue...something." They spent the next couple of minutes guess everything from the obvious (ocean, sky, etc.) to the bizarre (month, squirrel, etc.). Finally they gave up. "It's actually Deep Blue Something," I proudly revealed, noting that my hint was a really good one. Meanwhile, a dozen years later, the same thing just worked on my co-worker Rob a week or two ago. Man I'm good with the band name trickery.

Around the same time, there were a bunch of weird band names that were making the rounds. They sound fairly normal to me now, but Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, Green Day, and Toad the Wet Sprocket were all really bizarre at first. My favorite brother suggested that they may just be pointing in the dictionary blindly to pick a name, so we tried it. I'm not sure why both words were so close to the beginning of the dictionary, but we ended up with The Cozy Bob. Not too shabby, eh? They could open for Blind Melon and no one would bat an eye.

I heard a Ford commercial on the radio that said their new truck "is like a well-oiled machine." Maybe I'm nitpicking here, but why is "like" in there at all? Unless they don't come close to properly caring for their vehicles, it should be well-oiled (and it's certainly a machine). They're like stupid. I hate people sometimes.

I wrote the word "renown" recently (probably in some tongue-in-cheek egotistical statement about my greatness). Shortly thereafter, I realized that I don't know many nown things. I looked at the etymology of the word, and the root surprised me. I would've bet that it came from "know," but it's actually coming from Latin nominare or name. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, fellow armchair etymologists.

I know It's not a popular position to take, but I wanna go on the record and say I'm pro histamine. That camp's been losing the battle for a long time, and someone needs to stand up for the rights of histamines everywhere.

Whew, look at the time. We've already arrived at the Car Watch, boys and girls. On a scale of 1 to 10, how palpable is the excitement right now? Oh yeah? Well what if 1 is "very palpable," tough guy?

My Bratty Kid Sister wrote me saying that she spotted a license plate that read, "L8RISNW." I was going to try to figure it out, but I decided that putting it off was a better option.

My lovely wife saw a bumper sticker proudly proclaiming, "50% Greek." How do you think the driver's non-Greek parent feels? That's gotta sting just a little.

I also got a license plate report from my pops. "SURFSLT," it said. Does that mean that she gives it up to every wave she comes across? Was she upset that "SURF HO" was taken?

My favorite brother called me with a plate as well, meaning that my mom's the only slacker of my immediate family. "IMPCH W," it said. I normally stay away from overtly political stuff in this space, but I have to admire that person's commitment. In a few months, the plate won't make any sense, and the driver knew that it would only be topical for a finite amount of time. No matter, it was important to him or her, and I admire it.

Dusty wrote in after knowing that I would be pleasantly confused by this bumper sticker: "I'm only speeding because I have to poop." It also had a picture of a steaming turd pile, he said. Part of me wonders how often that's accurate, but most of me just wants to make a bad pun about gas.

My turn! I saw a bumper sticker that said, "Power Probe" on it. Here's the thing: the car wasn't a Probe. Therefore, I'm hoping it's just a weird band name and nothing more.

Lastly, I got a trifecta of Car Watch items from my homey Rockabye. There was a bumper sticker (not actually on a bumper, but "car sticker" sounds like it's on a lot or something) that read, "If you start out depressed, everything is kind of a pleasant surprise." Um, not if you stay depressed, right? That's some very faulty logic there, sir or madam. He saw a plate that stated, "IM 5FT3." I'm guessing she's tired of people asking how short she is, but that's still a bit extreme, don't you think? And then, there's this license plate frame: "My other toy has tits." You can't teach classy, folks.

Alrighty everyone, have a superfantastacular weekend. I'll see you back here on Monday, but feel free to write to ptklein@gmail.com in the meantime with anything at all that you feel like sharing.

Planely speaking

Hello and welcome to another installment of the blog that's sweeping the nation (of my friends and family), UOPTA. I wonder why Swiffer or some other similar product hasn't used "Sweeping the Nation" as their tagline yet. Wouldn't that make perfect sense for them? Swiffer folks, if you're reading this and planning on stealing my idea, you can send the thank you e-card to ptklein@gmail.com. So you know what today is? It's 10/4, good buddy. Man, I've been waiting all year to use that one.

I have great news: I figured out a way to extend my blogging. If I just fly somewhere every day, I'll have an unlimited supply of things about which I can write. Last time, it was Misty the model/travel agent who redefined some boundaries of ditziness. This time was different, but definitely something worth sharing with you all.

I flew on Southwest, and if you're unfamiliar with their boarding procedures, there are no assigned seats and people just get on in groups. We were flying into Burbank, and knowing that they deplane (deplane! deplane!) from the front and rear of the aircraft at that airport, I took a window seat near the very back. After a couple of minutes, a cool-looking guy came up and plopped down in the aisle seat. I nodded hello to him, and he immediately started taking magazines out of the center pouch and putting them on that seat. "I want to save this seat for a friend of mine; she should be coming soon," he said with a British accent. "Ok," I said in my American one, although I had kind of been hoping for an empty seat next to me for the short flight. He called out, "Yvonne!" a few times, but I couldn't see to whom he was shouting.

A flight attendant made an announcement: "Please don't put items on the center seats; we have a full flight, and we ask you not to save any seats for anyone." One second later, the dude stood up and said, "Watch these for a minute, ok?" Before I had a chance to remind him of the clearly-stipulated rules, he was on his way toward the front of the plane. Thankfully, he returned just a minute later with a pretty young lady wearing what looked like a black bra with a black mesh thingy over it and some fancy shmancy jeans. The guy put the magazines back in the pouch, but Yvonne quickly took one out and started flipping through it. "Oh geez," he said, "You're not going to show me more pictures of you, are you?" "No, stupid, I'm not in the Southwest magazine. I need alcohol. Where do they list the drinks?"

They chatted for a minute, and I surmised that she was a model and he was a photographer. That's because she was saying things like, "I'm really good at taking direction, especially during quick shoots where it's all like 'Stand here, stand there' and stuff," while he said that he once did an entire photo series called "Me as a Cloud" with some models. Mercifully, the flight attendant came around and asked about drinks. He got "a Finlandia and cranberry," and she got a Heineken. I looked up from my sudoku and asked for an apple juice. "I feel so boring," I confessed. "It's all good," Yvonne replied, but I could tell that she agreed with my assessment.

Once the drinks came, I chuckled to myself about how incredibly square I must've looked with my numbers and juice. It was mainly because of the stark contrast my situation had with their conversation. I had my iPod going but still heard every word, as did probably a third of the plane. They were those people. Normally that wouldn't be that big of a problem, but I'm pretty sure not everyone wanted to hear those specific conversations. For example, a good ten minutes were spent loudly outing fellow photographers and male models. "Oh yeah, I was at a shoot with him and he had all of these little Hispanic boy toys around," Yvonne proudly disclosed. The guy was talking about all of the men he'd been with, and I almost choked on my juice when he ended the discussion with, "But I try to keep those things private."

Then they had a fantastic parallel conversation, in which they took turns saying what turns them on looks-wise while never acknowledging the other's statements. She likes musicians; he likes dark skin; she doesn't normally like blonds, etc. Eventually their conversations synched up when a particular guy came up. "He looked like he'd be big," the guy said. With a little coy nod and then a guffaw, Yvonne said, "Yeah, he was, but it...well, I wasn't too impressed." A minute later, I heard her say, "Yeah, they're kinda small, but they're up here and nice and squishy." Yeah, she was talking about her boobs. Meanwhile by the window seat, Peter realized that an 8 and only an 8 could go in that box.

Naturally, their conversation turned to drugs. They talked about Ecstasy, GHB, and some things I probably have heard of by textbook names but not the ones they used. Apparently she has someone deliver pot to her at her place, and he was excited until he learned that that's all the guy had. She agreed that it kinda sucked. He started talking about some fashion show he put on after a few lines of coke and how all the queens were trying to steal the spotlight from him. And I wish I could remember the circumstances that led to this quote, but all I remember is cocaine was involved: "You know the parallel bars in the Olympics? Well normally it's fun and easy because you land on soft stuff, but this was on wood and I was in high heels." Like my Grandma Mu always told me when I was a kid, "Cocaine, wood floors, high heels, and parallel bars don't mix." I always thought it was a metaphor.

Just before landing, they turned off their overhead lights and then pretended to make out for a second before laughing hysterically. They looked over at me, and I fake whistled and twiddled my thumbs. "You want some? Hahahaha," Yvonne said. "From me or from you? Hahahaha," he chimed in. That led to a wonderful story about him and some guy getting caught joining the Mile High Club years ago, leading to him getting deported back to London. Honestly, I don't think I could make this shit up.

We finally landed, and I started to put away the pen and inconspicuously rip out the magazine page on which I'd jotted down key points of their conversation. Ya know, like "Deported for mile high club," for example. Hey, you can't spell "deported" without Peter! In fact, it's an anagram of "odd Peter" if I'm not mistaken. Cool. In any case, I had to jot down that he made some joke about dual entry which made her laugh and then proclaim that she needed a cigarette. I honestly don't know if that was an after sex joke or just a nicotine craving.

And so we parted ways. I called my lovely wife to tell her I was en route to the baggage claim and that I had a new blog post waiting. I assure you that I left stuff out, and this only a 50 minute flight. Good times, good times. Speaking of which, have a good time doing whatever you're doing tonight, and don't let any queens steal your spotlight. I'll see you tomorrow for another Follow Up Friday.

A bunch of crap

Good morning! The sun is shining, the grass is green, and the water is as cool and refreshing as really cool and refreshing water. Why is the world such a cheery place today? Duh: it's Wacky Wordy Wednesday, Wotherwuckers! Wait, it is Wednesday, right? Leaving and returning to town always gets me a-jumbled in the head when it comes to days of the week. Well, maybe I'll see some white pants to confirm the day and feel more settled.

Speaking of "wotherwuckers," (and man, that's a transition I've never written before) I love how "motherfucker" is almost every celebrity's favorite curse word on "Inside the Actor's Studio." Because of that show and the questions it always asks at the end, I feel like I've seen a couple dozen stars of the silver screen use that expletive. It's almost expected to be their favorite one at this point, and I'm sometimes shocked to hear one of them opt for the simpler "fuck" by itself or some British slang instead.

So, if my previous statement/guess was accurate, then today is indeed Wednesday and I'm pleased to throw down some word-related words for your viewing enjoyment. More specifically, I'm going to see if I can stretch my initial theme this morning of curse words into an entire post of its own. That's weird, I don't think I call them "curse words," but I just did. I think I usually just call them "bad words" or "swear words," but I'm not sure. I usually say, "My mom swears like a sailor" and not, "My mom cusses like a sailor." Did "cuss" come from mispronouncing "curse?" It must've right? I don't think I've really written "cuss" before, and it looks funny to me. Hey, custard sounds like it could be "cuss-turd." That's a serendipitous discovery in the midst of my rambling. I don't think I'll ever think of that food in quite the same way.

Ok, so follow me here: much has been made in the past over the unbelievable number of uses the word "fuck" has, and I have to say that I share in the amazement. Personally, I truly enjoyed when James Caan used it as a noun in "Misery," as he shoved paper into psycho beeotch Kathy Bates' mouth and said, "You want it? You want it? Eat it! Eat it, you sick, twisted fuck!" Good times. Like I said though, many before me have espoused the virtue of the flexibility of "fuck."

However, "shit" doesn't get the glory, and I'm here to give some major props to some major shit. Allow me to explain, por favor. To begin with, it's a fantastic expletive. Don't get me wrong, the f word is king of that category, but when it comes to more subtly being dismayed by something, shit beats fuck like rock beats scissors (i.e. every single time).

And oh, it is versatile in its own right as well. It can take the place of so many things in sentences, and I'm happy to ponder this for a minute so you don't have to. In the sentence, "I have a lot of shit to do," it stands for "things that are not entirely desirable but need to be done nonetheless." On the other hand, it can also be positive: "Aw man, we did all sorts of crazy shit last night," sounds pretty positive to me. Flipping it back to the bad, "What's up with that shit?" has our word of the day taking the place of "actions or activity to which I choose not to subscribe." And yet - yet! - when something is "the shiznit," you know it's good.

That brings be directly to our next topic under the Virtues of Shit umbrella. The word has its own spinoffs, for Pete's sake. You know what spinoff fuck has? F. That's it. It's a good one, and believe me, I use it frequently, but shiznit took the world by storm. "Shiznit" begat "shizzle," and the snowball effect continued. One can also say "shyte" in deference to our pals across the pond, and I choose to use that with some pretty regular frequency. (Afterthought: I'm willing to concede that "frickin" came from the f word as well, and I use that a great deal too.)

I realize that this could get a little lengthy, so I'm going to disjointedly get the other great things about shit off my chest. "Great Things About Shit Off My Chest," incidentally, is the name of my first book. Here goes: "Shitty" is a great adjective, able to convey that something isn't up to standard beautifully. Next, if we listen to Chris Tucker in "Rush Hour," it can also mean a part of the body. "I think I broke my shit!" he exclaims, and we clearly understand that it means...something. For Chris Tucker speech, knowing that it means something is a step up. Also, shit is closing in on fuck. (That's the name of my second book, by the way.) Why do I say that? Well, the question, "What the shit?" is getting more and more popular, and if fuck isn't careful, we may start using shit for copulation. Lastly, but extremely importantly, it helps distinguish what is in fact not Shinola.

Shit isn't there yet, friends. I still first think of feces with a lot of these phrases while a lot of the fuck phrases don't lead me to think about sex. You know, for the four seconds of each minute that men don't already think about sex.

Ok, I'm outa here. Have a great Wednesday, and I'll see you back here tomorrow for another Sorry Honey It's Thursday (which seems incredibly timely, don't you think?). Please remember to write to ptklein@gmail.com with anything about anything.

Choose wisely

Hello, Ruby Tuesday. I bet you don't get that too often. Yep, that's the kind of fresh thinking that I bring to the table. So here I am in Vegas again, heading back to the greater Los Angeles area this evening. I'm so glad I don't live in the worse Los Angeles area. In any case, I can't think of anything to write about, so I found a post I started a couple of months ago but got sidetracked by some larger-than-average tangent.

I wrote a post about Encyclopedia Brown and said I wanted to continue with a discourse on children's books. I then failed to pick up what I was putting down. Here I am to pick it up again. When I think about my reading habits around the time of Encyclopedia Brown and his possibly-lesbionic pal Sally foiling Bugs Meaney's plans, I also think of another series. So does my co-worker Rob, incidentally. "You're going to write about 'Choose Your Own Adventure' next, aren't you?" he asked me back after the EB post. Damn skippy.

I think it's fair to assume that most of my gentle readers are already well-acquainted with CYOA, but in case you're not, here's a brief rundown: There's a story going on, and some pivotal decision comes up. For example, something like "Do you go through that door or continue down the hallway?" If you go through it, you turn to page X to continue your journey; if not, page Y. Variables are fun. Inevitably, one of the choices leads to certain death and you have to go back to the previous choice. It's not always immediate though, and you might choose three or four paths before the character dies and then start back somewhere else. Great concept, and I had fun reading a great number of those books.

I did have a little problem reading them though. I'm sure I'm not the only kid with this problem, but I can hardly think of CYOA without it. I'd choose a way to move the story along, but then I'd be afraid that I hadn't made the right choice. Therefore, I'd keep a finger on that first page so that if death awaited the character, I could easily go back. Usually, that page I'd choose would lead me to another choice and then another, so I'd end up simultaneously saving five or six spots in the book. This led to some serious hand-contorting to the point that I probably resembled Richard III to any passers-by.

Meanwhile, as I was busy doing that crazy hand jive with my reading material, the pre-teen version of my lovely wife took a different approach: she created her own version of the book. I don't think she still has it or even remembers the content too much, and that's a shame. When I learned what she had done several years ago, my first thought was, "Hey, why didn't I do that?" I still don't know why my childhood self never made the leap to penning my own. I know how it would've gone down. I would've had choices like, "Do you want to stand in the pit of fire or eat a cheeseburger?" The pit of fire would end up being a hologram and the cheeseburger would've been a grenade or rat poison or something. Then I probably would've had some awful decisions to force my reader to make: "Do you hack off your pinky toe or watch your parents doing it?" I think both would cause the character to die. The fun would've been seemingly endless.

Recently, I saw another thing having to do with CYOA that made me wonder why I had never thought of it: a fully interactive DVD version of the books. Those magnificent bastards. They took CYOA #1 ("The Abominable Snowman") and made a CGI animated feature in which the viewer selects the path that the plot takes. They created every scene, so kids (or I) can watch it over and over and have it end differently based on what was chosen. Not only that, they got William H. Macy, Felicity Huffman, Frankie "Stop Calling Me Malcolm" Muniz, Lacey Chabert, and...Mark Hamill. How frickin' sweet is that action? Very, friends, the answer is very.

I admit I'm kind of rambling here, but I really like the whole "interactive DVD" category of things. I remember when the first VCR games came out, and you had to keep pausing it every few minutes to play the necessary supplemental board game part of it. Now with the nature of DVDs, we have board games like "Scene It," "Quip It," and others that not only are different every time, but they can keep score as well. For board game geeks like several of my friends (and me, of course), that's revolutionary.

Ok, I shall cease le rambling for now and bid you all a fond adieu. Oui oui, it's true. Ha, I just said "wee wee." Have a good Tuesday, and I'll be posting from my familiar home tomorrow. Meanwhile, email ptklein@gmail.com with anything at all please; I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel here and might not make it to my one year anniversary of bloggery. It doesn't need to be anything fabulous, but any thoughts you have might help me connect some abstract ones I have here into an entire post. Thanks in advance, and I'll see you here tomorrow.

Groups in groups

Hello and good morning from the fine city of Las Vegas. It's like Santa's Village, but instead of fun, forest, and fantasy all rolled into one, it's smoke, hookers, and gambling. Both have a petting zoo though. In any case, I'm here and ready to dispense my thoughts.

Last week in the realm of UOPTA, I wrote a whole bunch about music. Well guess what: it's not all out of my system yet. (Random side note: Dusty recently wrote me and asked if it bothered me that people put a question mark after "Guess what." He had a point since it is a command and not a question, and I shutter to think how many times I've made that mistake. If you catch me doing that in this space, you should totally call me on it. I hate doing things that I should hate.) There's a large sub-category under the umbrella of music that I haven't touched on yet, and it's one that I expect to have a lot of reader comments on as well. That means you, ya know. The topic: band names.

I'm going to break this down into three categories. First off, I want to discuss band names that may have been better suited before the age of the internets. What do I mean by that? Well, the names were kinda already taken. Let's use The Postal Service as example number one. I'm not doing any research on this at all or even attempting to prove my points with a little legwork, but I imagine a Google search for that band might come up with some other stuff first. Ya know, like the Postal Service. The same thing goes for Presidents of the United States of America. I mean, they must have chosen to name their band that just so it would be weird and confusing, and they succeeded. Their songs are also weird and confusing, so at least they're sticking with their theme. They combat that confusion by going by PUSA to fans, and that's fun to say. In this same category, we find the band Interpol. I don't know why anyone would name their band after an international crime fighting organization...oh wait, yeah I do. That's totally cool. I think that's worth the potential confusion.

To a lesser extent but still in this category, I would like to submit Cake and Barenaked Ladies. I think the tell-tale sign for bands in this category is whether or not they can just have www and .com bookending their band name for a website. Cake had to go with "cakemusic" because I guess the regular cake one was taken, and Barenaked Ladies went with "bnlmusic." I'm not going to check out exactly why they couldn't just use their band name because it could warp my fragile little mind.

Category number two is in the reference section. I applaud these band names, and I just know there are many more out there of which I'm currently unaware. These are bands that take their names from some previously established piece of work. When executed properly, they make a segment of the population say, "Hey, that's great!" I was in that segment when I first heard of the band Save Ferris. "Hey, that's great!" I said, and I immediately pictured the high school student going around collecting money to save Mr. Bueller from his life-threatening illness. "Save Ferris?" the student said to everyone passing by. Good catch, you guys. On a side note, what kind of name is Ferris? I haven't heard of anyone else named that before or since. Hmmm, honey, I may have another name to add to the "future children's names" list.

Also in this category are four bands I don't know any music by. First, I once saw an album about a dozen years ago by a band that called themselves "DoublePlusGood." If you're not familiar with Orwell's 1984, then that reference to the language they speak in that world is undoubtedly lost on you. I caught it though, and I was tempted to buy it sight unseen (or sound unheard, I guess) because I approved of the name so much. The other three are Atreu, undoubtedly named after the boy hero in The Neverending Story, Rufio, which I imagine has to be named after a horrendously-acted part in the movie "Hook," and The Boo Radleys, taken from the character in "To Kill a Mockingbird."

The third and final category of which I'll write is comprised of the names so bizarre or silly that it makes you shake your head and wonder, "What the hell were they thinking?" This dates back a long time, so you're not off the hook, Strawberry Alarm Clock. Two of the groups in this category actually got me to buy their music (it helps that they were $1 or less each). The first was a tape from a British group called Half Man Half Biscuit. That tape probably deserves its own post for being so oddly awesome. The other was a cd that my friend Greg and I saw from a band called Anus the Menace. The album was appropriately titled "Number Two." It was gloriously awful, and I think I need to pull it out of its case again sometime soon.

Here's where you all come in. There is a shit/butt/crapload of band names that fit each of these three categories. I'd like to read what you can come up with in the comments section. Personally, I don't think that's too much to ask. Especially with the third category, you should be able to pull several of these out of the recesses of your brain with the greatest of ease. What do you say, gentle readers? Ready to share with the rest of the class?

Have a great Monday, mis amigos, and I'll see you back here tomorrow with another post through the smoke and overall whorishness of Las Vegas. And before I go, I wish to wish a Happy birthday to long-time and loyal reader Sue. She's known me since I was 0 years old, so I think that merits a public acknowledgement. Sue, I hope you (and the rest of you) have a wonderful day filled with the spirit of shaloha. See you all back here tomorrow.