VOLUME XV - Kooky Debit Card Hijinks and Other Tales

c. May 12, 2010 Anno Domini

Two days ago I received a powerpoint presentation regarding a small southern municipality's plans to provide wireless internet access to its residents in an e-mail intended for a different J. D. Roberts. Normally I ignore e-mails from people who send things to the wrong address but this one looked like someone might need it for work so as a courtesy I informed the parties involved of the error. The J. D. Roberts who the e-mail was supposed to go to jokingly replied, "Hey Jonathan, so you're that bastard that got to jdroberts@gmail.com before I did," and made a less joking offer to purchase jdroberts@gmail.com from me if I were interested in selling. I considered telling him the tale the coincidence of being in the right place at the right time and the non-coincidence of being in the right place and being awesome that made me the b-st-rd who beat him to it, but I ultimately decided he might not be able to handle so much vexation. Nevertheless, the tale of how I got my e-mail address is one for the ages so, without further adieu, here it is:

Back when Gmail was new, you couldn't just sign up for a Gmail account. You had to first get a "Gmail Invite" from a current Gmail user and users only got "Gmail Invites" to send out approximately once per turn of the Mayan calendar. Combined with the fact that Gmail was the only free e-mail to offer A WHOLE FREAKING GIGABYTE of storage at the time, this led to anyone who was known to have a "Gmail Invite" to be bombarded with messages such as "OMG joo h4v3 4 6M41L 1N\/173? joo R 1337 h4xx0r! c4n 1 h45 6M41L?"* As it were, I was in the habit of perusing the message board at weezer.com back then and some girl on there posted something like, "I have a gmail invite. Send me a message about why I should give it to you and I'll give it to whoever deserves it most." Seeing as the address I was using at the time, jdr5@duke.edu, was about to be repossessed, I sent her the following message, verbatim:

To: (name withheld)
From: Dread Pirate Roberts**
Subject: Why you should give me your gmail invite

Because I'm a bloody pirate.

Obviously, that was the best reason to give someone a "Gmail Invite" ever so she chose me out of the hundreds of applicants. She didn't publicize all the supplications that were inferior to mine, but I assume the rest of them were stupid things like, "Because I'm a bloody ninja," or "Because I'm bloody Rivers Cuomo but don't tell anyone because I don't want people bothering me on here." Anyway, because I got into Gmail so early before it was open to the general population, I was able to stake my claim to the simple, elegant cachet of jdroberts@gmail.com before any of my numerous brethren who share my initials and last name instead of getting stuck with something asinine such as xjdroberts69x@gmail.com and the rest, as they say, was history.

*These pleas were not superimposed over pictures of cats because the internet was not as sophisticated a place back then as it was in later years such as, for example, 2006 Anno Domini.

**Yes, my name on the Weezer message board was Dread Pirate Roberts and I'm proud of it. I could have had dreadpirateroberts@gmail.com but I wanted something professional I could use to apply for jobs and since "Gmail Invites" were so rare you had to get it right on the first try.

c. May 19, 2010 Anno Domini

67 Pa. Code 443 provision 7 prohibits "discharging or shooting of firearms or bows and arrows," in rest areas but does not appear to prohibit the discharging of trebuchets as long as said trebuchets are not used for, "hunting or fishing," (also provision 7), "defacing or damaging buildings or other facilities," (provision 3), "depositing or disposing of refuse or waste," (provision 5), "picking, breaking, damaging or abuse of plants or vegetation or parts thereof," (provision 10) or "sale of a product or conduct of other commercial activity, except in emergencies," (provision 12). While the use of trebuchets as a shipping method to facilitate commerce intrigues me, I can't image what sort of "emergency" would necessitate the sale of a product or other commercial activity. Perhaps a worldwide economic recession? I can see the headlines now... "Economy Dragged Out of Epic Recession by Unexpected Surge in Commercial Activity at Penn. Rest Areas!" Somehow, I don't think that was ever part of President Obama's plans for his stimulus package, but maybe it should have been.

c. May 23, 2010 Anno Domini

In honor of Pac-Man's 30th Anniversary (which Pac-Man will never hear the end of from Ms. Pac-Man and her big mouth if he forgot), here is the Pac-Man Diet: Eat nothing but pills, ghosts and occasionally fruit. When you're not eating the ghosts, let them chase you around. It's good exercise. When you are eating the ghosts, they have no caloric content because they are ethereal. Ingesting a ghost is kind of like ingesting a tapeworm except instead of commandeering everything that comes down your esophagus and making you eat twice as much it makes you projectile vomit ungodly amounts of pea soup. In the supernaturally-aided weight loss community this phenomenon is known as "phantasmagorical bulimia."

The Super Mario Bros. Diet: Eat a mushroom. It will make you grow to double your original size. Actually, some people may consider this an undesirable outcome. Forget I mentioned it.

The Gauntlet/Duke Nukem/Too Many Games to List Here Diet: I'm not sure this will actually result in significant weight loss, but it is my personal favourite. Eat as much as possible. What kind of food you eat doesn't matter as long as you KEEP EATING! The more you eat the better your health gets.

The Morrowind Diet: There isn't much to eat in Morrowind except rat meat, hound meat and a variety of disgusting plants. Surround yourself with unpalatable foods like that and you'll lose weight very quickly. Then again, I recently ingested five 10-pound pieces of raw ebony (valued at 200 septim each) on Morrowind by accidentally pressing the wrong button while trying to stow it away in a chest of drawers and got a message which stated, "Raw ebony has no effect on you." I don't quite know what to make of that, but any game which allows you to swallow 50 pounds of wood (regardless of what effect it has) can't have a very scientific metabolism simulation engine.

The World of Warcraft (WoW) Diet: This consists of sitting in front of your computer playing WoW for days at a time and forgetting to eat until you wither away into near-nothingness. If I were more artistically inclined I would include a color-coded graph of character level vs. time and real-life weight (in pounds) vs. time superimposed over each other based on what WoW race the player was the size of in real-life, e.g. if you start out as a tauren-sized human in real-life you would probably max out your level and still have a long time to go before your level vs. time curve intersected with your weight vs. time curve but if you started out as a gnome-sized human the curves would probably intersect half an hour after you completed the character generation process.

c. May 23, 2010 Anno Domini

Iron Chef: Morrowind Update
Further consumption of non-edible items yielded the following results:

Scrap metal (10 pounds) had no effect on you
Crab meat (0.1 pounds) had no effect on you

c. May 29, 2010 Anno Domini

I once wrote a short story about Gary Coleman, entitled "A Short Story About Gary Coleman (No Pun Intended)" merely as an excuse to use that title. It was as follows:

A Short Story About Gary Coleman (No Pun Intended)
by Jonathan Roberts

Once upon a time, I wrote and recorded an album of songs about Gary Coleman. Not long thereafter, Mr. Coleman called me and said I was a punk for using his image on the album cover without his consent. I told him he should thank his lucky star for anyone using his image because he hadn't done anything worthy of tribute in quite some time and I didn't see anyone else singing his praises. He admitted I kind of had a point there.

THE END

c. June 5, 2010 Anno Domini

I find it extremely difficult to bring myself to kill random non-player characters (NPCs) in video games. Not because I have a generally non-violent personality and have difficulty distinguishing between games and real life, but because I'm paranoid about it coming back to bite me later in the game. I have to play good in Fable because I just know that whatever random townsperson I decapitate will end up being the starting point for a really good side quest or, even worse, somehow figure into the main plot. The more open-ended and non-linear the game is, the worse I am about it. In Morrowind, when the mages' guild sends me to "take care of" someone who is a member of the thieves' guild I look for ways to complete the quest without actually killing the target because you never know what will get you kicked out of the thieves' guild or even start a guild war, and then how am I going to infiltrate House Hlaalu and prevent the Commona Tong from enslaving all the Khajits and Argonians? Aaaaaaah!

It all started with a game called Ultima Underworld. Ultima Underworld was one of the first role-playing games (RPGs) that allowed you to attack, and kill, any NPC in the game. There was a bandit named Bragit near the starting point of the game who gave you some advice about surviving in the Stygian Abyss and gives you directions to an enclave of bandits who might take you in. He was a friendly enough chap, but the first time I played I decided to stab him to death with the badly worn dagger you start off with in the hopes of looting a merely "worn" dagger or even a badly worn shortsword off of him. From that point, I decided it would be interesting to slay everyone I encountered and become the undisputed heavyweight champion of the game world. I naively massacred every last green goblin, grey goblin, mountain man and lizardman in the first three levels of the abyss. Mind you, this game was released in 1992, before the internet became the glorious thing it is today, so if you needed an item called the Wine of Compassion to beat the game the only way to find out which random floor tile in which random room in which level of the abyss the Wine of Compassion was hidden beneath was to talk to Dr. Owl, and Dr. Owl wouldn't tell you unless you rescued his manservant Murgo, and the only way to free Murgo from his cell was to bribe the lizardman guarding him then you were totally screwed if you had murdered that lizardman because, although he could somehow open the portcullis to Murgo's cell... if you killed him his loot did not include the key to the cell. At that point your options were pretty much limited to the following:

1. Systematically click on every floor tile in the entire game
2. Save up your allowance for a month, purchase the strategy guide from the Waldenbooks at the mall (if a strategy guide existed) and hope the information you so desperately needed was in there
3. Hope you had a brother or friend who played through the game in a less maniacally genocidal manner who could tell you where to find the bloody Wine of Compassion
4. Start the game over from the beginning, spare the lizardman, get the Wine of Compassion and then realize you shouldn't have used the recipe for rotworm stew you got from the green goblin chef and eaten the stew because for some reason you could only use the recipe once and you needed the stew to coax something out of a random troll.

Don't get me wrong, Ultima Underworld is an amazing game and even now I would highly recommend it but after that experience, you can't really blame me for how I am today. It's enough to make a fellow afraid to stomp a goomba in the original Super Mario Bros. because you never know which goomba is the only one who can give you the Magical Mace of Bowser-Bludgeoning or tell you which castle the princess is actually in so you don't have to rescue that smug ingrate peasant Toad 7,000,000,000 times before you get to her.

c. June 9, 2010 Anno Domini

Facebook is depressing. I don't know what is worse... that the "Recommended Pages" feature suggests that I should like Lady Gaga, or that apparently six of my friends already do.

c. June 24, 2010 Anno Domini

Whenever I use my debit card at a merchant with a debit card machine you have to swipe your own card through and it takes longer than normal it gives me a mental image of a group of clerks sitting around a conference table in a Wachovia office debating the relative merits of approving or declining the transaction while the screen on the machine says "authorization pending." It has nothing to do with being concerned that my account has insufficient funds. I could be holding an up to the minute account statement saying I have one billion dollars in one hand and have just finished typing in my PIN with the other and I would still envision something like this:

Junior Clerk 1: A Mister Jonathan D Roberts has a pending transaction in the amount of $8.73. Should we approve it or decline?
Junior Clerk 2: Well, Mister Roberts appears to have sufficient funds in his account...
Junior Clerk 3: But Mister Roberts seems to be having a swell day. Why don't we "misplace" a few decimal points here and there and "mistakenly" decline the transaction?
JC1: Pish-posh, don't be a bore. Have some imagination! We've already pulled that caper sixty-eight times today.
JC3: We could tell him the fraud department thought it looked suspicious...
JC2: Oh, that's a capital idea! Do continue!
JC3: We declined the transaction and cancelled your debit card to protect you, Mister Roberts. More than half of all fraudulent transactions occur at Target stores within 0.7 miles of the cardholder's home and involve purchases of less than ten dollars, you know.
JC1: It's decided then. Decline it, give 'em the old twenty-two skiddoo... wait.. what the deuce? An electronic mailing from the customer service manager! *prints a hard copy of the "electronic mailing" and tears the strips with the printer sprocket holes off*
JC2: Read it! Read it!
JC1: *reading in an exaggerated, mock-conceited tone* It has come to my attention that the customer service department received sixty-eight calls today in reference to erroneously declined debit card purchases. This increase in call volume has resulted in an average wait time of one hour and thirty-eight minutes for our callers. As you should know, we strive to keep each and every customer on hold for exactly one hour and thirty-six minutes. I demand you cease your shenanigans at once!
JC2: Dash it all! Those nit-witted customer service prigs!
JC3: Always ruining our japes!

c. June 23, 2010 Anno Domini

I know 10 is a special number in soccer, but if Landon Donovan changed his number to 50 he could call himself LD-50 like Andrei Kirilenko of the Utah Jazz is known as AK-47. It would signify how much of a lethal scorer he is and make him sound like a lot more of a "bad mother (shut your mouth) I'm just talking 'bout Landon Donovan."

c. June 24, 2010 Anno Domini

There is an ice cream truck that drives down my street around the time when I get up for work and plays music from Super Mario Bros. 1 and 3. The truck's repertoire includes the song from Toad's House and the background music from when the princess sends you a letter after you defeat one of Bowser's foul spawn in Super Mario Bros. 3 and the classic Super Mario Theme, the underwater theme and the Bowser castle theme from the first Super Mario Bros. I don't know that the target demographic group for ice cream trucks really knows anything about games from the original Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), but I suspect lots of children would be outraged if they ran up to the ice cream truck when it was playing the Bowser theme only to find the driver dressed in a Toad costume telling them, "Sorry kids. Your ice cream is on another truck," or maybe instead of an ice cream truck it is a mushroom truck. That could be an epic disappointment.

VOLUME XIV - Megaman vs. HRman and Other Tales

c. March 7, 2010 Anno Domini

DISCLAIMER: My employer(the Organization) is a tenant of the building in which I work, and is not the sole tenant and is certainly not the owner of the building. As such, I do not believe the Organization is responsible for the below possible violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

The main entrance to the building in which I work consists of a set of double doors. I generally use the handle on the right side door to gain entrance, but there is a button on the left side with the traditional person in a wheelchair handicapped accessible logo which opens the doors. The doors are unlocked during business hours, but after hours a valid identification (ID) badge is required for access. The ID badge sensor is on the right side of the doors. From experience, I know the window of opportunity to open the doors after scanning one's ID badge is fleeting. For an individual in a wheelchair to scan his/her badge on the right side and push the button on the left side before the doors relocked would probably require the individual to align his/her wheelchair parallel to the doorway, scan his/her badge and sprint across the doorway to the button. I don't know how long the door stays open after using the button, but I imagine the hypothetical wheelchair-bound individual would then need to turn around quickly to get through the door or back through it. To increase the challenge rating of this encounter, a column positioned near the badge reader would make getting a wheelchair into position to begin this endeavour a tight squeeze.

The only part of my body which doesn't work inhibits my ability to eat massive quantities of Skittles without dying but doesn't have much effect on my ambulation so I'm not really qualified to say how much difficulty the average wheelchair-using overnight shift communication specialist would experience, but I've seen physical challenges on Super Sloppy Double Dare that appeared less daunting. I do feel qualified to say that it would have been a lot easier to put the door-opening button and the badge reader on the same side of the door, but in defense of whoever hatched the half-brained scheme currently in place I realize not everyone has a B.S. in mechanical engineering like me.

Of course, if I were wheelchair bound, my preferred method of getting in the building at night would be to attach my ID badge to a modified ID badge clip with an 8' retractable string instead of the standard 2-3' retractable string, attach the clip to the cuff of my shirtsleeve, position myself next to the door opening button, fling my badge at the reader like Gambit from X-Men and push the button.

c. March 8, 2010 Anno Domini

This may not make sense to a lot of people because, as I understand it, everyone uses Facebook mobile these days and I'm an old-fashioned geezer who uses an archaic device known as a desktop computer and I have no idea what Facebook looks like on a mobile device. On normal Facebook (or Caveman Facebook for you youngins), there is a "Suggestions" thing in the upper-right corner of the screen in which Facebook suggests you add people as friends, become a fan of things or "re-connect with" your existing Facebook friends. Normally I don't pay much attention to it but recently (as in for the past week and a half) every time I get on Facebook it suggests I "re-connect with" the same person, either by sending him/her a message or posting on his/her wall instead of featuring a different one of my 161 Facebook friends each time. I suspect "re-connecting with" someone that much is known as "stalking" in some circles. I dare say if I sent any one person that many messages or posted on any one person's wall as much as Facebook is suggesting it would end up with a gentleman in a black robe and a white, powdered wig suggesting I leave that person alone for a while.

For now, Facebook's obsession with suggesting I stalk a person is just strange, alternating between suggesting a message or post on his/her wall, but every time I log in I half-expect it to try to kick things up a notch and proffer one of the following ways to "re-connect," none of which I would ever actually do:

-search through his/her trash
-read his/her mail
-obtain several photographs of him/her along with several candles and construct a shrine
-tap his/her phone line
-affix a homing device to his/her car
-submit a request for the FBI's file on him/her through the Freedom of Information Act
-raid his/her boxer/panty drawer
-rent a vacant house across the street from his/her residence and use a telescope to peer through his/her window
-hide his/her body in an old, abandoned river where no one will find it

On the subject of surveilling neighbors through a bedroom window, why do people in movies always use a telescope? Most of them use are very blatant about it, using a freaking huge telescope that could probably be seen by the naked eye from the room they are watching, leading to their discovery. They never seem to think that a decent pair of binoculars would permit far more discretion and still be adequate for their purposes. Nothing good ever comes out of spying on people through a window with a telescope in movies. Either the subject of the surveillance clutches a towel to his/her chest and draws the blinds (if he/she is disrobing) or gives you an evil look and tries to kill you (if he/she is killing someone or hiding a body).

Do not comment to tell me neither or those things happen in American Beauty or so help me, I will put you on limited profile and restricting you from reading my blog from this point forward. That movie traumatized the deuce out of me because of the part in the beginning with Kevin Spacey in the shower. I saw it during my first week as a college freshman, which was also my first week sharing a bathroom (including shower facilities) with a hall full of strangers. Even with sandals, I hating going into the showers for quite some time after that because I was naive and had never imagined the concept of anyone ever having a wank in the shower before I heard Kevin Spacey's voice saying "This is me jacking off in the shower. It's usually the high point of my day." Eww. To make a long story short, I cope by pretending that movie never existed.

c. March 10, 2010 Anno Domini

Top Ten Reasons the &$%@ Water Main in My Neighborhood Broke and I Can't Get Any #*!@ Running Water

10. The neighborhood miscreants who broke into my car and stole my sword cane have moved on to vandalism on a much grander scale
9. The baby crocodiles grew up into adult crocodiles and chewed their way out
8. The water main didn't actually break. It's all a conspiracy by Charlotte-Mecklenburg Utilities to give them an excuse to shut off our water to conceal an alarming water shortage
7. Terrorist activity... the national threat level was yellow, or elevated, on March 8, 2010 when these shenanigans began
6. Some idiot let his 10 year-old kid take command at the water traffic control center
5. The manufacturer designed it to last one day longer than the warranty and the warranty just expired
4. A kid took a bucketfull of those magic capsules that turn into dinosaurs and grow to a bajillion times their original size when immersed in water and flushed them down the toilet
3. The Residence Inn across the street from Stonecrest sabotaged it so all my neighbors and I would have to get rooms there in order to take showers and flush the toilet
2. It somehow got filled with D2O (heavy water) instead of H2O and couldn't handle the additional weight because Deuterium has one neutron instead of zero like normal Hydrogen and therefore weighs twice as much
1. The Mayans were off by two years, and galactic alignment is ripping the Earth apart in 2010, starting with my water main

c. March 10, 2010 Anno Domini

Top Two Reasons Why David Letterman Is On My &%@ List

2. He made the top ten list into a cliche, so if you have anywhere between two and nine decent jokes about the same subject, such as (hypothetically speaking) why your water main broke, and want to present them in the form of a list it makes you look lazy and amateurish. As a result, you have to dilute the quality of your list with weak, groan-inducing tripe filler such as "5. The manufacturer designed it to last one day longer than the warranty and the warranty just expired." There really is no excuse, especially considering Mr. Letterman doesn't even really ever have ten solid items on his lists. I don't watch his show frequently, but I have seen occasions when his viewers and his reputation would have been better served by a top five.

1. He masterminded the dastardly plot to break my water main.

c. March 12, 2010 Anno Domini

Airman: Go to your position and pace back and forth. You haven't been meeting your pacing quota lately.
Mata-saborou: Whatever you say, boss.
Airman: And if some hardcore little blue robot punk with a cannon for an arm comes in here looking for me, tell him I called in sick today and won't be available for a week.
Mata-saborou: Ummm, ok boss.
Airman: if he insists, you'll have to fight him. He'll most likely kill you, but try to knock at least three bars off his life meter before you die. We all have to sacrifice for the team to succeed. Our world domination is down 12.5 percent since Bubble Man was defeated. *points to a graph of world domination vs. time, indicating a recent 12.5 percent decrease*
Mata-saborou: Sure thing, boss.
Airman: Meanwhile, I'll be in my office, resting in power-saver mode cowering behind two sets of doors. See to it that no one disturbs me so I don't have to do anything like a boss fight.
Mata-saborou: Ummm... ok, boss. But before I go there is one little thing I wanted to talk about. It's really cold out there on the floor and some of us were wondering if we could shut off some of the absurdly large fans that serve no apparent purpose. Not all of them. Just one or two, you know?
Airman: No! Me like big useless fans. Now go!

Jakob Collins: Hahaha I think you shouldve added that bit that you told me lol or you could always add:

Mata-Saborou: *mumbles under breath* You'd think it'd be warmer in here with all the hot air coming out you...
Jonathan Roberts: Mata-Saborou: *mumbles under breath* You're so full of **** I'd hate to be here when it hits one of those absurdly large, utterly pointless fans...
JC: Brilliant!
JR: As are you, sir.
Richard Brijalba: LOL! I don't think Mega Man's attire is suitable for the workplace either. I think his attire would fall under the "underwear as outerwear" category.
JR: Having a cannon in place of a hand is also a violation of company policy regarding weapons in the workplace. I think severe disciplinary action is in order.
RB: He also steals all the other bosses weaponary. Sounds like a theft report should also be filed.
RB: In 20XX, Mega Man physically assaulted Air Man and then stole his "Tornado Blast" gun...
JC: The Caller reported Mata-sabarou as a possible witness, as he/she overheard Mata-sabarou say, "Who cares about the theft of Air Man's weapon? He was a blowhard anyway." In addition, the Caller heard (first name unknown) Wiley say, "I regretted making Air Man immediately after I set him loose. The only one more asinine than that -ss hat is Bubble Man. They both blow." The Caller declined to provide additional details at this time and said he/she would call back at a later time.
RB: The Caller said Mega Man stole Air Man's weapon in order to inflict "massive damage" to Crash Man and because Air Man is a "punk -ss b-tch."
JR: Mega Man said he needed to inflict massive damage to Crash Man in self-defense, because Crash Man plans to retaliate against Mega Man for informing management that Crash Man was the anonymous caller who phoned in a bomb threat last week.
JR: And don't even get me started on Flash Man's misconduct.
JC: Hahahahaha
JR: We would like to thank Flash Man and Wood Man for their contributions to Dr. Wily's evil plot to subjugate the world, and wish them the best in their future endeavors. That being said, please do not emulate their conduct. Yes, Hard Man from Mega Man 3, I am talking to you.
Rich Gamis: ive enjoyed this surreal conversation more than watching Alice while o 'shrooms.
JR: Just don't play Mega Man 3 while on 'shrooms. It's bad enough that we have to put up with Needle Man's habitual substance abuse.

c. March 25, 2010 Anno Domini

It's hard to be a mild-mannered (job title withheld) by day / vigilante superhero by night when your work schedule requires you to actually be the mild-mannered (job title withheld) by night. You can't accomplish much vigilantism during a 60-minute meal periiod and even if you did, when would you eat? You can't reverse things and be a mild-mannered (job title withheld) by night / vigilante superhero by day because dispensing vigiliante justice under cover of... daylight... just isn't the same. You can't use an intimidating nocturnal alter-ego like Batman. I suppose you could be Diurnal Batman, which would be really freaky because nothing is quite as creepy as nocturnal creatures going about their business in broad daylight. They're unpredictable. You never know what some outcast from the fringes of nocturnal society is going to do next. Also, even with a shift differential, it's not easy to find a job on the overnight shift that pays well enough to finance an arsenal of high-tech Batmanesque crimefighting gadgetry. Perhaps Wayne Enterprises needs an overnight CEO to attend pointless 2 a.m. board meetings while Bruce is out carousing in his pajamas with Ms. Selina Kyle.

If you had enough sick time (for example, 83.02 hours), you could use a bit here and there to be a part-time Batman, or if you lived in a city with a name which could also be a person's name you could tell your employer you had a dependant by that name. Then you could tell your employer, "Hey, Charlotte isn't well. I have to take care of her for a while," and take up to 12 weeks of FMLA leave per year. Of course, FMLA leave is unpaid but that's ok. Ridding the streets of scum is its own reward.

c. March 29, 2010

Apparently Amazon.com reads my blog. Back in December 2009, I wote a note about how absurd it was that a merchant from whom I purchased an item online sent the item out from their facility on December 4 to be delivered to the shipper but it didn't get to the shipper's facility (in the same city as the manufacturer) until December 16. Late last week, I ordered a book from Amazon and the package tracking information is as follows (bolding mine):

March 25, 2010 03:19:10 PM Lexington KY US Shipment has left seller facility and is in transit
March 25, 2010 02:59:00 PM Lexington KY US Shipment received by carrier
March 25 - 29 Various Cities US Etc.
March 29, 2010 04:50:00 AM Charlotte NC US Arrival Scan

Of course, now that they have raised the bar I'm wondering why they couldn't go back in time 20 days instead of a mere 20 minutes and 10 seconds. Maybe because I only selected standared (free) shipping. This merits further investigation.

c. April 3, 2010 Anno Domini

I Had a Lovecraftianly Horrifying Nightmare. A few nights ago, I dreamed that my left front tire exploded on Ballantyne Commons Parkway whilst I was driving to work. As a result, I was unable to arrive at work in a timely manner and had to use unscheduled time off (sick leave). I woke up thinking, "Son of a cr-p! That's my second occurrence of unscheduled time off in one week, after only having one such occurrence in my first two years with the company. I'm b-gg-r-d." It was terrifying. My understanding of company policy is that employees are permitted three occurrences of unscheduled time off per quarter, and the fourth occurrence will result in termination of employment unless the employee provides a physician's documentation of a doggone good excuse.

I don't know why I had a nightmare about using sick time. I certainly have not discussed it with management or HR, nor did I thank myself for having the dream or receive a nightmare identification number.

c. May 4, 2010 Anno Domini

I played an epic game of Munchkin at Amelie's tonight. Forsyth took a bit of ribbing for being a Bard with a Flaming Spiked Codpiece and a Buckler of Swashing (and possibly something else I can't recall.) I concocted a new house rule stating that we would have waived the usual restrictions and let him use the Catboi Hireling if he got the card, but alas, it was not to be. In his defense, he never got the Spandex Chainmail (worn instead by Jacob), the Singing and Dancing Sword (wielded by me), the Freudian Slippers (discarded by Jacob), the Spiky Top (worn by Julia) or the Giant Hamster Steed (unfortunately not drawn by anyone) and he did defeat us all in the end.

I wore my 20-sided die shirt (with the caption "That's how I roll,") and an employee initiated the following conversation as we were exiting the premises:

Employee: Dungeons and Dragons... do people get hurt playing that?
Me: Usually not, unless you make someone mad and he throws a fistfull of dice at you.
Employee: Fistfull of dice, my -ss. I know how you roll... you hack each other's limbs off with massive battle axes and stab each other in the spleen with poison-coated switchblade bastard swords while wearing chain mail loincloths and probably going commando underneath. Don't lie to me, boy.*
Me: It's really not a violent game. You just sit around a table rolling dice and talking.
Employee: It's a very violent game.

Of course, he assumed I know everything there is to know about injury rates amongst D&D players because I was wearing a shirt with a d20 on it. Maybe next time I'll tell him I have no idea what the deuce he's talking about and claim to have a d20 shirt because my friends and I play extreme craps using 20-sided dice (the more numbers there are on the dice the more extreme it is) and that we had an extreme roulette wheel with seven colours that went up to ninety-nine and even made up our own byzantine version of poker played with Magic: the Gathering cards that required a massive rule book full of charts and tables and we called it Shire Hold 'Em. Because, you know, not everyone who rolls with 20-sided dice is a D&D nerd.

*He didn't actually verbally say this but I could tell he was thinking it from the way his eyes were shooting daggers +1 at me.

VOLUME XIII - The Cost of Entertainment and Other Tales

c. November 26, 2009 Anno Domini

It sounds like there is someone choking or asphyxiating in the trunk of my car, which is kind of a long story. Bella was Darth Vader for Halloween, and part of her costume was a device with a speaker which plays the sound of Darth Vader breathing whenever the user presses a button. The device ended up in Melanie's car, which got totaled, and Melanie and I emptied a lot of stuff (including the Darth Vader Device) from her car into my trunk. While driving to work tonight, I heard what sounded like someone tied up in my trunk attempting to gulp down one (or several) final breaths prior to expiring. After a bit of contemplation, I realized the contents of my trunk must have been sliding around and frequently pressing the button on the Darth Vader Device. The effect is particularly creepy at a stoplight when something lands in such a manner that it is holding the button down and it sounds like someone really struggling to breathe through a gag. I'm praying to all that is holy that I don't get pulled over because, especially on a foggy evening such as tonight, I can see the officer saying, "Sure its a Darth Vader Device from a Halloween costume in your trunk. Like I haven't heard that one before. Where were you going to dump the body?"

c. December 10, 2009 Anno Domini

On December 9, National Football League Commissioner Roger Goodell sent Dallas Cowboys lineman Flozell Adams to bed without supper for Adams' illegal hit against Justin Tuck after the whistle at the end of the first half of the Cowboys game against the New York Giants. Goodell, who previously fined Adams a total of $20,000 for kicking Tuck, Osi Umenyiora and the Carolina Panthers Julius Peppers warned future infractions may force him to result to more severe punishments, including grounding Adams, taking away Adams' Nintendo Wii and "putting him over [Goodell's] knee and giving him a whooping." Goodell said, "Obviously we haven't gotten to the point of suspending him yet, but fines aren't getting through to Flozell and we just have to keep trying other methods until the message gets through. You can't go around kicking opposing players and taking cheap shots after the whistle just because they're beating you on every play." Adams told reporters, "It's so unfair. I didn't do anything. That crybaby Tuck is such a tattletale. Everyone is always picking on me."

Oft-disciplined Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Chad Ochocinco advised Adams, "The thing you have to understand is that if Goodell says he's going to do something, he does it. You just have to get with the program and do what he says or decide the punishment is worth it and do what you're going to do. And if he disciplines you, you'll hear it from me first on OCNN." Goodell immediatley fined Ochocinco $50,000 for illegally celebrating the virtues of his new enterprise, the Ocho Cinco News Network.

c. December 18, 2009 Anno Domini

I ordered a Christmas gift for Melanie online and it is shipping from a merchant in Cerritos, California. The following is an actual excerpt from the package tracking.

December 4, 2009 12:35:55 AM US Shipment has left seller facility and is in transit
December 16, 2009 07:31:00 PM Cerritos CA US Shipment received by carrier

I can't imagine any plausible explanation for such a delay unless some employee of the merchant left the merchant's facility with the package, realized he didn't know how to get to the UPS store, went to Wal-Mart to buy a GPS unit to get directions, pulled a Brett Favre agonizing over which unit to purchase, read the user manual cover to cover and drove halfway to Reno before realizing the GPS unit was wack and gave him completely messed up directions. Then he went back to Wal-Mart, waited in line at customer service forever to return it, didn't have the receipt and had to run out to his car to get the receipt and wait in line again. Then, despondent over how much he sucked at delivering packages, he went to a tavern, got himself highly intoxicated, tried to resume the delivery process, totaled his car and suffered injuries resulting in a lengthy hospital visit. After getting out of the hospital, he filed an insurance claim on the vehicle but lost the check from the insurance company and had to request a replacement. He used the replacement check to purchase a ghetto DeLorean with no reverse gear and looked up directions to the UPS store the way we did when I was your age before Mapquest was invented, by using 28.8k dial-up tin can with a string connected to a Rand McNally atlas on the other end. Unfortunately, he accidentally skipped the DeLorean two days forward in time and couldn't go back due to the lack of a reverse gear. Our hero then gave up on the DeLorean, and wandered the Earth until randomly encountering a UPS drop-off box and dropped off the package only to discover he accidentally dropped it in the USPS drop-off box so he had to scrounge around the coin return on a bunch of Coke machines to get change to buy a sticky hand thing from a grocery store toy machine and then spent all day using the sticky hand to get the package back out of the USPS box and put it in the UPS box like he should have in the first place. Even if all that happened, that still leaves about two hours and thirteen seconds unaccounted for and the moral of the story is that I am boycotting Amazon.com until they include Pony Express as a shipping option because when I was your age the freaking Pony Express was always on time.

c. December 23, 2009 Anno Domini

Features I Demand On Next Year's Madden

1. The option to use performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) in superstar mode to increase your player's ratings, along with a drug test mini-game. If you use PEDs and fail the mini-game you get busted, resulting in penalties such as suspensions, loss of influence and endorsements, negative ego points and a negative effect on your chances of being inducted into the hall of fame upon retirement.

2. A kick button, so you can pull off Flozell Adams moves. Obviously, imprudent usage of it would lead to penalties and fines, but it would increase your odds of injuring opposing players and probably wouldn't result in a suspension.

3. Belicek-esque cheats in franchise mode, such as filming the opposing team's defensive signals, jamming the opposing team's radio frequency so they can't get their play calls in to the QB, kicking the ball one or two yards up/downfield between plays and hoping the ref doesn't notice, and sending blankets infected with smallpox to upcoming opponents in the weeks leading up to a game.

4. Commissioner mode, in which you replace Roger Goodell and view replays of dirty on-field incidents, news reports of off-field violations of the league's conduct policy and players' tweets, then bring some sort of rationality to the NFL's disciplinary code by deciding what actions the league should take in response.

c. December 26, 2009 Anno Domini

At 2:30 a.m., on December 24, Santa Claus was robbed by two armed suspects on the roof of a home in St. Louis, Missouri. Both suspects were 3'6"-4'0" tall and were wearing ski masks. One suspect ordered Santa to toss sacks of presents over the edge of the roof into a Radio Flyer wagon while the other held a gun to Rudolph's head and said, "Do as he says or red-nose here gets it." As a result, millions of children did not receive the anticipated gifts they behaved well all year to earn. A North Pole spokeself released a statement early today indicating Santa will implement new security measures, including training elven security guards to accompany him on future trips. An anonymous source quoted Claus himself as saying, "All future deliveries will be escorted by elven snipers with Red Rider BB Guns, and if anyone tries a stunt like this again we'll put their eye out." Top elven engineers are also working around the clock on modifications to an armored courier vehicle, including replacing the wheels with sleigh runners and attaching a harness for Santa's reindeer. Between jiu-jitsu and submission wrestling classes and sniper training, the elves are working overtime to craft replacements for the stolen gifts and Santa expects to be ready for a make-up delivery in mid-March. Local law enforcement officials have not yet identified or apprehended the perpetrators, but Santa said, "Believe me, they will be on the naughty list for years to come."

c. January 1, 2010 Anno Domini

Earlier tonight on CNN there was a picture of a football player (wearing the number seven) lowering a shoulder toward a pile of unmarked, nonsequential bills with the title "Tackling the Economy." As anyone who knows anything about football knows, single digit numbers such as seven are reserved for quarterbacks and kickers, neither of whom are renowned for their tackling skills. The obvious implication is that our money is shredding our defense, running untouched out of our wallets and into the end zone of financial ruination while a horrified populace looks on, stockbrokers hurl themselves from the rafters and Chris Berman shouts "AND HE COULD. GO. ALL. THE. WAY!," and the only thing keeping us from a second Great Depression is a scrawny, 130 pound placekicker who probably hasn't made a tackle in his life, thanks to the financial equivalents of Jim Zorn and Daniel Snyder. I would feel a lot more confident in the security of my financial future if someone at CNN had called Mean Joe Greene to pose for a picture, or at least could have been bothered to find a stock photograph of some guy wearing a number in the fifties.

c. January 3, 2010 Anno Domini

I bought a pair of Swiss Army shoes yesterday. They even have the Swiss Army Knife logo, but I'm having the darndest time trying to figure out how to get all the knife blades and other utility implements out. So far I haven't found any of them, and the shoes didn't come with a user's guide. I should have rifled through all the other shoeboxes and ganked a user's guide from another pair, but I suppose I was doing the stereotypical male "I don't need no instructions. Now shut up, woman, and get back in the kitchen and make me a sandwich and have me a baby and leave all the manly stuff like activating butt-kicking shoe knives to me" thing. I'm really regretting that now, because the whole appeal of Swiss army shoes (other than the fact that I always have to have red in my shoes and they were the only shoes at Target with any red in them) is activating butt-kicking shoes knives and kickstabbing would-be ninja assassins in back-alleys. Due to the lack of a fully-illustrated instruction manual, I don't even know what random utility implements my shoes have aside from the aforementioned butt-kicking knives, let alone how to activate them. The best I can do is make a list of the utility implements I would include if I were to design Swiss Army shoes myself, so with minimal ado here it is:

1. butt-kicking switchblade knives
2. a screwdriver
3. scissors
4. a glucometer
5. a towel
6. an American Express card
7. one hundred dollars in gold
8. one hundred dollars in rubles
9. one issue prophylactics
10. one miniature combination Bible and Russian phrasebook
11. a protocol droid
12. a pair of loaded dice
13. a cyanide pill
14. a 1-Up mushroom
15. one unit of type O positive plasma
16. Elven lembas bread
17. rope
18. a health potion
19. a mana potion
20. Felix Felicis
21. an invisibility cloak
22. Neville Longbottom
23. a hippopotamus
24. a Republican
25. a portable hole
26. a Wand of Magic Missiles
27. an Apparatus of Qwalish
28. a Vorpal Holy Avenger of Throwing +5
29. Munchkin
30. a phaser set to stun
31. a phaser set to kill
32. a phaser set to decapitate
33. a high-tech glass eye capable of fooling all but the most
sophisticated retina scanners
34. a USB flash drive containing nuclear launch codes
35. a beard trimmer
36.all the documentation necessary to establish a false identity, such as a fake passport, social security card, birth certificate, etc.
37. one of those disguises with glasses and a fake nose
38. a hanglider
39. the Necronomicon
40. a spare (dry) pair of socks
41. the bloody user's guide
42. the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything

c. January 29, 2010 Anno Domini

A Scholarly Cost Benefit Analysis of Forms of Entertainment Common Amongst 21-35 Year Old Males (With References!)

Visiting the Cinema

An average adult ticket to the cinema costs $10.00 USD¹ and the average moviegoer spends $3.00 USD at the concession stand¹. This results in an average cost of $13.00 USD to an individual moviegoer. Two hours is a generous estimate of the average length of a feature film¹, therefore the average cost of entertainment to a gentleman visiting the cinema is $6.50 USD per hour if he goes stag, $13.00 USD per hour if he is a smooth ladies' man and $72.50 per hour for pimp daddies such as Eric Forsyth.

Attending a Professional Sporting Event

A ticket to see the Charlotte Bobcats play NBA basketball can be purchased for as little as $10.00 USD² and a round-trip ticket on the LYNX Blue Line, which drops passengers off at the front door of Time Warner Cable Arena, is only $3.00 USD³. The prices of a large soda and a footlong hot dog are $6.00 USD and $5.00 USD, respectively⁴. The estimated cost for a gentleman to attend a game is $24.00 USD, and if the length of the game is 2.5 hours the cost of entertainment is $9.60 per hour.

An Evening at the Pub
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a typical drinking binge for an American male consists of five drinks consumed over the course of a two-hour period, resulting in a blood alcohol content (BAC) of 0.08 or more⁵. Assuming an average alcohol metabolization rate of 0.015 per hour⁶, a gentleman engaging in such pursuits will return to a state of full sobriety (a BAC of 0.00) 5 hours and 20 minutes after consuming his final drink, for a total elapsed intoxication duration of 7 hours and 20 minutes. If the drinking binge occurs on $2 PBR night, and the gentleman resists the temptation to buy a drink for any resident ladies, he will incur a cost of entertainment of $1.36 per hour. The actual cost of entertainment may be significantly higher depending on the gentleman's drink of choice and desperation for female companionship. That being said, if the gentleman in question looks like Eric Forsyth the cost of entertainment may be negative because hordes of ladies fall over themselves to buy him drinks and proceed to stuff his drawers so full of C-notes that zombie John Dillinger⁷ comes back from beyond the grave with a tommy gun and demands he drop his trousers.

Blowing $#*! Up

The blue book value of a 1985 Honda Civic in fair condition with a manual transmission is $1,185.00 USD⁸, fifty pounds of dynamite could be purchased in New York City for $10.00 USD circa 1903 Anno Domini⁹ which is equal to $236.67 in 2008 Anno Domini dollars, and a reasonable estimate for the cost of medical care for a serious burn is $70,000.00¹¹ so one can expect the total costs associated with blowing the &%@! out of a piece of junk car to be $71421.61 USD. Assuming the duration of the explosion to be two seconds, and disregarding the entertainment value of recovering from a burn injury, the cost of entertainment of blowing up a 1985 Honda Civic (and oneself in the process) is $1,285,590,069.00 per hour. Depending on the laws of your municipality, the actual cost may be higher.

Fornicating With Prostitutes
The Bunny Ranch in Carson City, Nevada claims to be unable to post prices on their web site due to local statutes, but in New York, the going rate for a high-class prostitute is $4,300.00 USD¹². For seventy-five percent of all males, coitus fails to exceed two minutes in duration¹³. This results in a cost of entertainment of $129,000.00 USD per hour, which is more expensive than taking ten reputable ladies to the cinema even if you buy them all popcorn, lattes and Raisinettes.

Video Games
The price of a pre-ordered copy of Final Fantasy XIII for the Playstation 3 is $59.99 USD¹⁴. A player intent upon experiencing all that Final Fantasy XII has to offer could play through it in 100-150 hours¹⁵. If Final Fantasy XIII has as much content as Final Fantasy XII (which I believe to be a reasonable assumption), Final Fantasy XIII's cost of entertainment is between $0.40 and $0.59 USD per hour.

Conclusion

Entertaining oneself by playing video games, particularly the Final Fantasy series, is far more cost-effective than attending professional sporting events, frequenting the pub, the senseless destruction of motor vehicles and picking up hookers.

¹ My nightmarish career in the employment of Regal Entertainment Group (REG)
² NBA.com
³ CATS official web site
⁴ These prices are based entirely on my own admittedly imperfect recollections because neither Time Warner Cable Area nor Levy Restaurants posts their concession prices online. They have that in common with REG.
⁵ The CDC binge drinking page
⁶ Bill Ferrer of the Detroit Tigers Weblog
⁷ I'm sorely disappointed that Google image search doesn't have a picture of this anywhere in the first ten pages of search results.
⁸ Kelley Blue Book
⁹ Our source was the New York Times.
¹⁰ The Inflation Calculator
¹¹ Baumgartner Law Firm
¹² NY Daily News
¹³ The Kinsey Institute
¹⁴ Best Buy
¹⁵ WikiAnswers: How long does it take to beat Final Fantasy 12?

c. February 4, 2010 Anno Domini

Ten Awesome Uses of Work ID Badges (and the Attached Clippy Things) Outside the Workplace

1. Sneak up behind a ninja and use the retractable string on the clippy thing as a garrote
2. File an edge of the ID badge until it is sharp and use it as a shiv
3. Use the string as a makeshift tourniquet to stop the bleeding after you sharpen the card for use as a shiv and accidentally slice through your cartoid artery
4. Present it to a cashier at the Pro Image Sports at Carolina Place Mall in lieu of a driver's license to prove your identity when making a credit or debit card purchase because there is no way someone could steal your debit card and print out a homemade work ID badge with your name, their picture and a made-up company (I actually did this once)
5. Gain access to all sorts of restricted areas by acting confident, showing your badge to anyone who questions you and generally walking around like you own the place and have every God-given right to be there
6. Safely rappel down perilous three-foot drops during covert operations by clipping the clippy thing to your belt while a trusted accomplice holds onto the badge
7. Amuse yourself by pulling the badge as far out as it will go and watching it snap back
8. Impress the opposite sex by telling them you are on a secret mission for Starfleet Command and the employer listed on the card is just a cover story in case the Romulans want to know why you're always skulking around their twin homeworlds of Romulus and Remus. Double points if you explain away the unattractiveness of your photo by saying you disguise yourself as a Cardassian when going undercover.
9. Melt it down and re-mold the plastic in the shape of a dwarven battlerager for use as a D&D miniature
10. Write a "1" with a circle around it in the upper right corner, the words "Summon B-d-ss Hardcore Facemelting M-th-rf-ck-r" on the left side immediately below your picture and "250/250" in the lower right corner, then surreptitiously slip it into your Magic: the Gathering deck.

c. February 23, 2010 Anno Domini

Some jerk in a black Ford Mustang GT convertible with a license plate stating "5-PNT-O" cut me off on interstate 485 today as I was returning from a round of disc golf but, unlike Vanilla Ice, he did not have the ragtop down so his hair could blow. He got off at the same exit as I but unfortunately I did not get a chance to pull up next to him at a red light and insist he roll down his window so I could ask him, "Sir, I couldn't help but notice you are rollin' in your five point oh. Why is the ragtop not down so your hair can blow?" I was really hoping to do so. No word on whether or not the girlies were on standby waiting just to say hi or, if so, whether he stopped or just drove by.

VOLUME XII - Deleted Scenes From Previous Volumes

c. October 17, 2004 Anno Domini

ObiJuanShinobi1: laser tag is better than female companionship anyway
ObiJuanShinobi1: seriously
(name withheld): possibly
ObiJuanShinobi1: yeah
(name withheld): depends on the "companionship"
(name withheld): hehehe
ObiJuanShinobi1: well i guess if you can get a girl to play laser tag with you that would rule
ObiJuanShinobi1: or mario kart, either one
(name withheld): hehehe
ObiJuanShinobi1: yeah girls never want to do rad stuff like that unless they have ulterior motives
(name withheld): yep
ObiJuanShinobi1: like they want to talk to you about feelings and stuff :(
(name withheld): oo feelings
(name withheld): i see
ObiJuanShinobi1: yeah
(name withheld): that coudl be a problem for a 1337 sumo pirate like yerself
(name withheld): or a sir wolfman the zombie slayer knight like me
ObiJuanShinobi1: they make you think its all cool because they play mario kart with you and then BAM '"does that dress make princess toadstool look fat? who is prettier, her or me?" and then you're dead
ObiJuanShinobi1: its like a red shell to the brain and a lightning bolt at the same time
ObiJuanShinobi1: i'm sure you have had your share of experiences with that
(name withheld): acutally
(name withheld): yes
(name withheld): but
(name withheld): ive found that the simple answers are the best
(name withheld): either
(name withheld): idunno
(name withheld): yes
(name withheld): or no
(name withheld): to the fat dress
(name withheld): idunno
(name withheld): to am i prettier?
(name withheld): its always the real girl
ObiJuanShinobi1: well i assure you that "shut up i'm trying to shake the &$%# gopher off my kart" is not a good answer
(name withheld): always
(name withheld): no matter what
(name withheld): hehehehehe
ObiJuanShinobi1: anyway i'm not so smooth with the ladies

c. February 1, 2005 Anno Domini

I wore a skeleton mask tonight and tried to scare people with it. At one point, a couple of young maidens came out of an auditorium and saw me and let out shrieks of fear. The conversation was as follows:

Young Maidens: Oh sh*t!
Me: I'm sorry, I hope I didn't scare you too badly
Young Maidens: *scream*
Me: I'm terribly sorry!
Young Maiden #1: We don't like masks
Me: *dramatically removes mask, revealing actual face upon which is my most dashing smile* But my real face is even scarier, isn't it?
Young Maidens: *shriek & make a mad dash for the ladies' room*

I think that was their way of agreeing with my last statement.

c. February 20, 2005 Anno Domini

I was kind of thinking today that it would be cool to walk around projection with a super soaker and take misbehaving patrons out sniper-style from the port glass window as a sort of chastisment.

c. October 28, 2005 Anno Domini

ObiJuanShinobi1: vanilla ice has been the cause of 34548433 relationships being ruined since 1993
ObiJuanShinobi1: 34538432 of them were his own
pineconewench7: hahaha
pineconewench7: who was the other one?
ObiJuanShinobi1: ummmm
ObiJuanShinobi1: ben affleck and jennifer lopez
pineconewench7: okay i didn't expect that
ObiJuanShinobi1: ben affleck made the mistake of saying vanilla ice was a more credible musical artist than jennifer lopez
ObiJuanShinobi1: so she broke up with him
pineconewench7: too bad i agree with ben
ObiJuanShinobi1: that ben affleck was 100% correct in his statement is not the point
pineconewench7: haha
ObiJuanShinobi1: its true
pineconewench7: haha ice ice baby
ObiJuanShinobi1: that is a good song

VOLUME XI: The Bittersweet Ballad of My Benevolent Blood Brother and Bestest Bosom Buddy Mr. Salam Abdul

c. 5:00 p.m., July 20, 2009 Anno Domini
from: abdusalam220@hotmail.fr
to: abdusalam220@hotmail.fr
subject: ASSALAM ALAIKUM/YOUR URGENT REPLY CONFIDENTIAL PLEASE

I’m Mr Salam Abdul the manager of auditing and accounting department of BANK
OF AFRICA (B.O.A) here in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. In my department we discovered
an abandoned sum $30 million us dollars in an account that belongs to one of
our foreign customer (Mr. George Brumley) who died along with his entire family
on 21th July 2003 in a plane crash.Since we got information about his death,
we have been expecting his next of kin to come over and claim his money because
we can not release it unless some body applies for it as next of kin or relation
to the deceased custormer. unfortunately i learnt that all his supposed next
of kin or relation died alongside with him at the plane crash leaving nobody
behind for the claim. It is therefore upon this discovery that I now decided
to make this business proposal to you,so that the money can be release to you
as the next of kin.upon your reply I will send you full details on how the business
will be executed, send me your contact information. 1.Age.(2)Residential adress(3)
occupation(4)private telephone.Waiting to hear from you,My Regards. Reply me
with this email;(abdusalam220@hotmail.fr) http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/07/20/kenya.crash/index.html

c. 6:44 p.m., July 20, 2009 Anno Domini
from: Jonathan Roberts <jdroberts@gmail.com>
to: abdusalam220@hotmail.fr
subject: Re: ASSALAM ALAIKUM/YOUR URGENT REPLY CONFIDENTIAL PLEASE

Dear Mr. Abdul,

I believe you are mistaken. I am not familiar with Mr. George
Brumley. As my name is quite common, I often erroneously receive
e-mails intended for other individuals with similar names or even the
same name as myself. It is possible Mr. Brumley was acquainted with
another J. D. Roberts through his philanthropic activities and that is
the individual who you intended to reach. Unfortunately, I do not
have any contact information for that J. D. Roberts, or any other
known associates of either that Mr. Roberts or Mr. Brumley. I will
take it upon myself to notify local authorities and the United States
Social Security Administration so they may assist you to locate Mr.
Roberts or any other relatives of Mr. Brumley. If I can be of further
assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me at this e-mail
address.

c. 6:44 p.m., July 21, 2009 Anno Domini
from: abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
to: jdroberts@gmail.com
subject: RE: ASSALAM ALAIKUM/YOUR URGENT REPLY CONFIDENTIAL PLEASE

Dear Friend,

Thanks for your willingness to assist me in this transaction and also to know more how we are going to get this fund transferred into your account.I want to assure you that this business is 100% risk free. I give you my words and we are going to conclude this transaction in Good Faith and share the fund peacefully. You don't have to be worried because I will ensure that this fund is transferred into your account without having any problem. I need your account particulars where the money indomant account will be transfered,I'm living in Ouagadougou Burkina Faso West Africa.
I state my details as follows:I m Mr Abdul Salam the director of the account & auditing dept,at the bank of Africa (B.O.A).I'm married with three children. My residence address no:18 avenue dela charles Degaulle sect: 21. Box Postal: 01 bp 5256 Ouagadogou Burkina Faso.

My Private Telephone No is .00226 76914804. What you have to do is to listen to my guide line until the fund is transferred into your account then I will come over for the disbursement of the fund .You are entitled of 40% for you,50% for me and 10% for any expenses you and I may incure telephone bills and taxes your bank will request when the fund is transfered. I am looking for a reliable person I will do this business with though I did not know much of you.
I strongly believe that we will work together as partners and get this fund out from the bank and transferred into your account peacefully I want to assure you that this business will not cause anykind of problem to you because we are going to do it legally. When this fund is transferred there will be some cover up document's my bank will issue you to show your bank that this fund is legally acquired. I tend to invest some part of this fund in hotel business and also import some agricultural machine's back to Burkina-Faso which I will use to set up mechanised farming. We can join together to set up all this investment if you wish but if it is not ok by you then you have to collect your own share and do any thing you want to do with it. This business will take us about 14 working days to mature. You have to give me the benefit of the doubt and give me all the support I need in this business and I assure you that we will all smile at the end of the day, Insha Allah.

Concerning what I need from you about this transaction. Although based on mutual trust and understanding .As you will led me in establishment over in your country. Concerning the transaction at hand, as this cannot be done by email alone. Meanwhile, I would want to detail you a little on the fund to be transfered to your account. This is not a stolen money rather, a discovered abandoned money belonging to one of our late customers by name Mr. George Brumley from germany who died eight years ago in a plane crash together with his entire family living behind his contract sum unclaimed in our bank.
According to one of our banking policies which stipulate that after eight to nine years of unclaimed fund, the fund will automatically go into the treasury of our bank and that's why I want to use you as next of kin to the deceased customer and claim out the fund. Importantly and as I discoverd, my bank does not know that Mr.George Brumley has no next of kin which makes it more easier for you to stand in as next of kin to the deceased person. It's only me and my colleagues who knew that Mr.George Brumley has no next of kin.
There is no risk about this for it's 100% risk free as I will provide you with some vital information related to the contract sum of Mr.George Brumley and a text of application which you will send to bank management, introducing you as next of kin to George Brumley and also instructing the paying bank to effect the transfer of the inheritance fund of Mr.George Brumley into any bank account which you will provide and submit to the bank.
I need your declaration of interest and willingness to co-operate with assurance that you will not sit on this money when it gets into your account and promise not to implicate me in this business, I will furnish you with above information that will enable this fund to transfer into your bank account, Could you please call me on the above phone number immediately you receive this email, I will be waiting.Eagerly waiting for your urgent response.Bellow are the informations i request to enable me to send you the text of application which you will fill and send to the bank for the claim.

(1)Your full names
(2)Your telephone number
(3)Your full home address
(4)Your scanned photograph to enable me to know you fully well as
the transaction commence.
Thanks,
Mr Abdul Salam

c. 1:24 p.m., July 22, 2009 Anno Domini
from: Jonathan Roberts <jdroberts@gmail.com>
to: abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
subject: Re: ASSALAM ALAIKUM/YOUR URGENT REPLY CONFIDENTIAL PLEASE

Dear Mr. Salam,

I believe there may be a miscommunication between us. Am I correct in
understanding that you are aware I have no relation to Mr. George
Brumley, but wish to represent me as his next of kin? I have no doubt
you are acting in Good Faith, and wish to comply with all laws and
regulations of Burkina Faso. Unfortunately, the plan which you
describe would require me to violate several laws particular to my
jurisdiction. My current employment prevents me from relocating to Burkina Faso,
where I would be able to assist you and complete the transaction in a
100% legal manner.

c. 9:03 a.m., July 23, 2009 Anno Domini
from:abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
to: jdroberts@gmail.com
subject: Fill the text of application and send it to the bank immediately

Dear friend,

How are you and your family?hope all is moving fine with you, if so splendid to almighty Allah,

I m happy to recieve your repply today,Please quickly re-type this application below and send it to our foreign remittance department director Bank Of Africa (BOA) by mail to the office of our remittance director on this e-mail address ( admin@boabankofafrica-bf.net ) also indicate to the bank to always contact you through your fax or email address,
any of them which is more confidential, do not forget to get me informed as soon you send this application to the bank.
Below is the application form,fill it and sign it and send it to the bank.
I am waiting for your response.
Thanks,
Abdul Salam .

**********************************************************************************************
Dear ,

APPLICATION AS NEXT OF KIN TO ACCOUNT HOLDER N0 :0036101101. ROUTING N0: 91002211

I, Mr. ………………………………………………………………………, humbly apply to your bank as next of kin to your deceased customer, Mr late George W.Brumley a America National ,holder of account no:0036101101,routing no:91002211,who died in a plane crash.
I humbly apply and put claim over his balance with the bank, which is valued at USD$30.000.000 million,(thirty million, U.S.dollars) , left in his account still unclaimed, Until his sudden death , we have been business associates in exportation and buying of Gold and Diamond. The funds were transferred into his account through FORTES BANK AMESTERDAM-HOLLAND, for purchase of Gold and Diamond from the Burkina-Faso Mining Co-operation.
I wish to be intimated on the processes involved in having this fund transferred to my bank account as stated below:

Account Name:....................................
Bank Name:.......................................
Bank address: ....................................
Fax N0:..........................................
Swift N0: .......................................
Account N0:......................................
My private phone no:.............................
My private email address...................
My private fax no:...............................
AGE.................................................
OCUPATION...................................

Wishing my application will be given an urgent attention, as I wish the balance be released, and transferred into my account .
Accept my apology for the late application, it was due to some logistic problems, which has been just settled.
Thanking you for your anticipated co-operation .
Yours Sincerely
signed and stamped………………………………………

c. 10:47 a.m., July 23, 2009 Anno Domini
from: Jonathan Roberts <jdroberts@gmail.com>
to: abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
subject: Re: Fill the text of application and send it to the bank immediately

Dear Mr. Abdul,

Perhaps I was not sufficiently clear in my last communication.
Representing myself as a former business associate of Mr. George
Brumley, like representing myself as his next of kin, is illegal in my
jurisdiction. I have never been involved in the exportation of Gold
and Diamond, and have never had any dealings with either FORTES BANK
AMESTERDAM-HOLLAND or the Burkina-Faso Mining Co-operation. Making
any claim to the contrary, for the purpose of claiming funds to which
I am not entitled, would likely lead to my incarceration. I have
given you the benefit of the doubt thus far and assumed you have dealt
with me only in the best of faith. However, further efforts on your
part to incite me to me to commit fraudulent, criminal acts will force
me to conclude beyond any shadow of doubt that you are a villain and a
rogue. I assure you that I will report any such shenanigans on your
part to the Bank of Africa, FORTES BANK AMESTERDAM-HOLLAND, the ACME
Detective Agency, law enforcement authorities in the United States,
Burkina Faso and the Netherlands and INTERPOL.

c. 6:39 a.m., July 27, 2009 at 6:39 AM
from: abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
to: jdroberts@gmail.com
subject: Brother do the needfull for our own good and benefit

Dear Brother,
How are you and your family doing today?
My brother, the bank does not know that Mr. George Brumley our late business customer has no next of kin that make it more easier for us. Any foreigner can stand as a next of kin as the bank management has been looking for the next of kin for long.
You can stand as the business partner to the late George Brunley as the information which i am going to provide to you will be the accurate information which the bank management needs to transfer the fund to his next of kin.
As you know that i am still working in this same bank, i will provide to you all the necessary information for this $30M to be transfer into your account before two weeks if you follow up my instructions accordingly.
I have make all the necessary arrangement for this $30M to be transfer into your account, all you need to do is to follow up my instructions accordingly, i assure you that if you follow up my instruction before two weeks this $30M will be transfer into your account.
This is not a stollen money, it's a discoverred abandoned fund which belong to our late deceased customer. According to one of our banking rules and regulation which stipulates that after some years of unclaimed fund, if nobody come up for the claim the fund will be transfer into the bank treasure as an unclaimed fund with our bank.
I don't want this $30M to go into the bank treasure that was why i contacted you, my bank wants to hold an audit meeting for the half year and after the meeting this $30M will be transfer into the bank treasure as an unclaimed fund.
Finally my good brother, i will advice you to fill the application and send it to the bank immediately so that the bank management can start processing the application with your name for payment.
I will be waiting to hear from you soon that you have done that for our own good and benefit.
Thanks
Mr Abdul Salam

c. 5:42 p.m, July 27, 2009 Anno Domini
from: Jonathan Roberts <jdroberts@gmail.com>
to: abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
subject: Re: Brother do the needfull for our own good and benefit

My family is quite well. I, however, am exceedingly displeased by
your lack of integrity. I have made it perfectly clear that I do not
wish to participate in your dastardly, fraudulent activities yet you
persist in seeking my assistance. I have no interest in defrauding
your employer of the funds, held in Mr. George Brumley's account, to
which it is entitled under the laws of the soverign state of Burkina
Faso. I stated in my last communication that any continued attempts
to recruit me as an accessory to your devious, criminal scheme would
force me to charactarize you as a villain and a rogue, and so it is.
I have notified the parties and law enforcement agencies listed in
that communication. Upon your next contact with me, I will write
letters to the Honorable Senator Richard Burr, the Honorable Senator
Kay Hagan, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (who you may be
familiar with through his appearance in feature films such as the
Terminator series and The Running Man), Captain America and Secretary
of the Treasury Timothy Geithner in order to encourage them to
petition His Eminence, Mr. President Barack Hussein Obama to authorize
a pre-emptive tactical nuclear strike against your office. Such a
strike would result in the obliteration of your office, along with the
deaths of several innocent civilians and the destruction of Mr.
Brumley's $30 million USD as collateral damage. I assume you would
find the destruction of Mr. Brumley's cash most regrettable. After
sending the letters, I will immediately pursue legal action against
you in order to recoup the exorbitant postage fees I will inevitably
incur plus punitive damages of $30 million USD. In order to save me
the inconvenience of such a drastic, but necessary and morally
acceptable, response I must request you kindly
bugger off.

c. 8:01 a.m., August 1, 2009 Anno Domini
from: abbdul salam <abdusalam220@hotmail.fr>
to: jdroberts@gmail.com
subject: Reason with me and do the needfull

Dear Brother,
Don't be ignorant of everything in life because i have alreday disclosed the secret of this transaction to you that was why you are using it as a threat.
I did not contact you in this transaction for child's play. I contacted you for both of us to become very rich in life like other men.
You have nothing to regreat of doing this business with me which will benefit both of our family in life.
Reason with me as responsible man which i take you to be by filling the application and send it to the bank so that the bank management can start processing the application with your name for payment.
This transaction is going to benefit both of our family, you should not take as a child's play. I have been working with the bank for long now without good achievement that is why when i discovered this great opportunity, i decided to contact you so that we can use this opportunity to inherit this $30M into your account for our own good and benefit.
I want you to bear this in mind that you have nothing to regreat of been part of this transaction ratherly you will have Almighty Allah to thank at last of making you part of this great success.
I will be waiting to hear from you soon that you have done that for our own good and benefit.
Thanks
Mr Abdul Salam.

VOLUME X - The Country Inn and Suites Conspiracy and Other Tales

Mere, Puling Status Update ( MPSU) c. March 6, 2009 Anno Domini

Jonathan is acknowledging the existence of facebook due to pressure from co-workers.

MPSU c. April 3, 2009 Anno Domini

Jonathan wanted the Goblin King to come and take all the customers at Salad Creations away like in Labyrinth so he could get a salad before work. He said the words but it didn't happen

c. April 23, 2009 Anno Domini

A few years ago when I still worked at the movie theater, Regal Entertainment Group sent me to a corporate training and/or brainwashing program known as Regal Entertainment University (REU) in Knoxville, TN. The program lasted five days, and the company provided accommodations at a hotel known as Country Inn & Suites. The program officially ended at 5:30 p.m. on Friday, but the company graciously permitted participants to stay at the hotel on Friday night on the company dime rather than kicking us out and making us all drive home immediately. The other participants told me they were all staying in the hotel and drinking that night and invited me to their soiree. I, however, drove myself back to Charlotte without pausing long enough to determine whether they would be drinking alcohol or Kool-Aid.

During the fall of 2008, Melanie, Bella and I took a vacation to Boone, NC, in part so Melanie could get away from the infernal fetidness that is Regal Entertainment Group and not think about that place for a few days. We stayed at the Boone Country Inn & Suites. Much to our dismay, we were given a room with a scenic view of the Boone Regal Cinemas 7. Needless to say, the second night of our visit was spent in a room on the opposite side of the hotel with a view of the parking lot.

In April 2009, Melanie, Bella and I went to Wilmington, NC to give Melanie's sister a ride back to school and turned it into a short vacation. After dropping Vicki off, we checked into the Wilmington Country Inn & Suites, dropped off our luggage and made a quick visit to the pool. Upon our return to the room, Melanie set a towel down on a chair and a small piece of paper fluttered onto the floor. Upon further inspection the piece of paper revealed itself to be a ticket stub from a movie at the local Regal Cinemas.

I think Melanie and I shall never return to a Country Inn & Suites as long as we both shall live.

c. May 15, 2009 Anno Domini

The people who live across the street from me never talk to any of the neighbors. My parents have lived in their hours for about ten years and these people have been there for nine. They ignore everyone else. I think there is a mother, father, son and daughter there but for all I know the mother could be a young-looking grandma, the son could actually be the daughter's boyfriend, the father could be some homeless guy they took in or whatever. I can't even say for certain that they don't have a massive subterranean compound beneath their house with an entrance/exit five miles away and only use the front entrance enough to avoid arousing too much suspicion.

A few weeks ago Melanie worked late and came over to meet me to go hang out at about 3 a.m. As we were leaving, a car started following us, flashing its lights and laying on the horn all the way down my street. Mel and I were a bit concerned about the intentions of the vehicle's occupants and didn't care to stop, so I ignored the shenanigans until I came to the stop sign at the exit of my neighborhood. When I stopped at the sign, the other vehicle rolled up to me (in the wrong lane). The reclusive family's son (or daughter's boyfriend, pool boy, live-in nanny or whatever) rolled down the window and asked "Do you have any bud?" I told him I did not. He asked, "Are you sure?," and I told I most certainly was. He drove off, most likely never to be heard from again.

c. May 20, 2009 Anno Domini

I went out to pick up breakfast for Melanie, John and myself after a hard night of carousing, wearing my New York Giants Super Bowl XLII Champions hat. An obnoxious New England Patriots fan took offense and proceeded to make an ass of himself.

Patriots Fan: They won't win it again this year. We got Brady back.
Me: Last time New England played the Giants with Brady on the field it didn't work out to well for them.
Patriots Fan: Eli Manning didn't win that game. It was that kid with the weird name...

At this point, Patriot's fan said something unintelligible. It sounded like he was trying to say Kiwanuka (who missed the Super Bowl due to an injury) but I think he was actually referring to Osi Umenyiora. Either way, Eli did win the game. Not singlehandedly, but football is a team sport. If the fact that Eli's teammates contributed more where Brady's teammates (particularly his offensive line) let him down helps Patriots Fan sleep at night so be it. If so, he's more of a Brady fan than an actual Patriots fan but I didn't see a need to point that out to him. Perhaps I should have pointed out that Randy Moss didn't help out his quarterback by making the catch of the century on a poorly thrown ball on third and long, just to hear him tell me Moss never had the opportunity because Tom Brady doesn't make poor throws. Ha.

c. May 24, 2009 Anno Domini

I went through the drive-through at the establishment bearing her name on my break tonight and ordered, amongst other things, a double cheeseburger. Instead of the double cheeseburger, they provided me with a single chicken sandwich. No first hamburger patty. No second hamburger patty. No cheese. Even a single cheeseburger, or a double chicken sandwich with cheese would have been closer to what I actually ordered. If I hadn't had more important things to do at the time I would have gone back to the restaurant all Samuel L. Jackson style and asked the staff, "WHERE'S THE BEEF, M-TH-RF-CK-R?" That place has really gone downhill since Dave Thomas shuffled off this mortal coil.

MPSU c. June 19, 2009

Jonathan forgot what day it was, dressed for work as if it were Casual Friday, and almost left the house without rectifying his error

c. July 30, 2009 Anno Domini

Specifically in the form of the following:

If Car A leaves Topeka at 2:30 p.m., traveling east with a speed of 55 mph and Car B leaves Baltimore at 4 p.m., traveling west with a speed of 70 mph:

a) where will Car A and Car B meet?

b) if Car A and Car B meet at a four-way stop, for Pete's sake whose turn is it to go first? Come on, people. Its not that freaking hard.

c) If Henry Ford had been aware of how many people would struggle to answer b), would he have still created the modern assembly line and made the automobile accessible to the common people? I think not. And if he did, I'd be tempted to go back in time and bust a cap in his rabblerousing posterior after my commute this morning.

c. August 20, 2009 Anno Domini

On my first night in Myrtle Beach I ate at a seafood restaurant named The Sea Captain's House Restaurant, and seeing as how I don't eat seafood I ordered a chef salad because it was one of the few non-seafood items available. It turned out to be by far the best salad I have ever eaten in my life. If it was on an RPG and your character ate it your hit points would immediately be restored to full and you would gain enough experience points to go up eight levels at once. The ham was so delicious and fresh they could have had a live hog in the kitchen and sliced off flesh from it as needed for all I know. My waiter said he has worked at that establishment for five years and has never seen anyone other than me finish the entire salad, and I don't doubt him. It was so massive I was surprised it didn't have smaller satellite side salads caught in its gravitational field in elliptical orbits. I cannot possibly say enough about this salad.

A few nights after consuming the salad (because it probably wasn't safe to swim for at least 24 hours after consuming it), I intentionally "accidentally" fell into the pool with my clothes on for Bella's amusement. I lost my glasses in the process but didn't realize it until after I had already dried off and changed into dry clothing, necessitating a return trip to dive into the pool and retrieve them. The second time I almost forgot to take my insulin pump off, and probably would have jumped in with it if Melanie hadn't reminded me. All of this occurred around 2:30 a.m., more than four hours after the pool closed, but somehow escaped the notice of the security guard on duty. I told Bella when her second grade class talks about what they did over the summer she better say she saw me fall in the pool with my clothes on and that it was the most hilarious thing ever. The same security guard failed to notice "Operation Steal Bella's Shorts Back" the night before, which entailed skulking around the pool area at about the same hour the night before because Bella left the pair of shorts she had been wearing over her bathing suit during another after-hours trip to the pool.

The hotel at which we stayed had some sort of Hall of Heroes, which I never looked into, so I don't know exactly what it entails or how one becomes inducted. I told Bella I should be enshrined there for eating the massive chef salad at Sea Captain's House. She said, "No. All you did was eat a salad. That isn't very hero-ish."

MPSU c. August 27, 2009 Anno Domini

Jonathan had to run a red light and almost got into accidents on two separate occasions within the last 24 hours due to asinine drivers following too closely and not paying attention. If it happens again he may affix a moderate number of large titanium spikes and rotating diamond saw blades to the back of his car

MPSU c. September 3, 2009 Anno Domini

Jonathan would be the sort of criminal who held people at gunpoint and told them to spell words like "bourgeoise" as if their life depended on it, and asked them to recite scientific, mathematical and historical facts in a similar vein. Not that Jonathan Roberts would ever be a criminal.

c. September 19, 2009 Anno Domini

I opened a pack of Pez candy which included five smaller packs of the size used to fill up one standard Pez dispenser. The external packaging stated each pack included 9 grams of sugar, but the wrappers on the smaller packs state the net weight of each pack is 8.5 grams. This raises two points, one which irks me and one which vexes me.

The irksome point is that grams are a unit of mass, not weight so the wrapper should state the net mass is 8.5 grams. The vexatious point is that for each pack to contain 9 grams of sugar but have a mass of only 8.5 grams there must also be 0.5 grams of antimatter in each pack... but I have observed no matter-antimatter reactions. It is also worth noting that no matter how the good people at the Pez Corporation managed to get matter and antimatter to coexist the logical form for the antimatter in question to take is antisugar and the medical community has done surprisingly little research into the effects on antisugar on blood glucose levels of those afflicted with diabetes.

c. September 21, 2009 Anno Domini

Flozell Adams should sign an endorsement deal with someone like Dove or Irish Spring. He could make a commercial and say their soap was so good it can make even him a clean player. It would, of course, be a bald-faced lie but that should pose no problem because Mr. Adams is a man of less than impeccable character as anyone who watched the Giants-Cowboys game last night knows.

At this point I wouldn't be more than mildly surprised if Flozell Adams brought a shiv onto the field and stabbed an opposing player in the face. He would literally have to hack an opposing lineman's limb off with a machete to do much more than raise an eyebrow.

I really wish I could find a video of his bush league cheap shot hatchet job on Justin Tuck from last night. I wonder why it hasn't shown up on Youtube yet.

MPSU c. October 19, 2009 Anno Domini

Jonathan wore a musical tie to work and only failed not to inadvertently activate it on two occasions.

MPSU c. October 24, 2009 Anno Domini

Jonathan has many talents, but roasting a hot dog over a fire on a metal skewer and eating said hot dog straight from the skewer without burning his tongue on the skewer apparently isn't one of them. Who knew?

c. November 13, 2009 Anno Domini

In his recently published book, "The Book of Basketball," Bill Simmons writes that Spencer Haywood hired a mafia hit man to take out Paul Westhead after Westhead benched him during the 1980 NBA finals, but changed his mind before the deed was done. Mr. Simmons dedicates an entire chapter of the same book to analysis of the 33 most intriguing what-if scenarios in the history of the NBA, but somehow manages to leave out, "What if Spencer Haywood hadn't changed his mind about hiring a professional killer to off his coach?" How negative would the effect the assassination of Paul Westhead on the reputation of the league have been? Regardless of Magic and Bird coming along the next year, would the NBA have survived? How positive would the effect have been on the reputation of Latrell Sprewell? Compared to the contract killing of a coach, one paltry choking during practice is rather pedestrian. Would Scottie Pippen have followed suit and put out a hit on Phil Jackson instead of merely refusing to take the court for 1.8 seconds in the 1994 playoffs? Would the incident become the proverbial giant elephant in the room during future broadcasts or would Charles Barkley joke about it every time a starter got benched during crunch time? Would Kenny Smith laugh with Charles or exchange awkward "Are you sure this guy didn't come here with you? He's not with me, I don't even know him," glances behind Charles's back with Ernie Johnson every time it happened? I'm tempted to e-mail this to Mr. Simmons to see if he has the courage to man up, print it in his next mailbag column and admit how badly he dropped the ball on this one.

c. November 20, 2009 Anno Domini

I. When I was your age the closest thing we had to Facebook was LiveJournal

A. It had no status updates, only blog entries

B. We had to walk uphill both ways in the snow to use it

1. It was always 107 degrees outside

2. It was also hailing

3. Dinosaurs still roamed the Earth so there was always a risk of being eaten

C. We had to use dial-up to get online

1. Modems consisted of two tin cans joined by a string

2. You got disconnected every time an incoming call came in on the tin can phone, which happened a lot because no one used cell phones back then

3. 404 errors due to the string not being long enough were common if you tried to access web sites from far away places

II. Notes don't have character limits

A. Character limits inhibit in-depth writing

B. Character limits encourage the use of a monosyllabic vocabulary to avoid getting cut off mid-sentence

C. Character limits encourage asinine abbreviations and punctuation

1. U instead of you

2. 2nite instead of tonight

3. That one my former manager at Regal used to do that irked me and made all her text messages sound inappropriate for the workplace

D. Character limits in the forms of communication used by kids these days are a metaphor for the limits of their moral character

III. The status update format is not conducive to archival

A. I'm don't want Volume X or possibly even Volume XI of The Archives to be a bunch of one-line status updates

1. Status updates are rarely worthy of inclusion in The Archives

2. I don't want to go back and read all my old status updates to find the ones which merit inclusion

B. I don't know if Facebook even saves status updates more than one week old

c. November 21, 2009 Anno Domini

If I were a vampire I would do the following things:

1. Spend my first thousand years of undeath building up an immunity to sunlight through an excruciating process of incrementally increasing exposure.

2. Do the same thing with running water, starting by hopping over a running garden hose and completing my training by swimming across the Amazon River.

3. I know I sound repetitive, but I'd do the same with wooden stakes, beginning by poking myself in the chest with a toothpick. And then I'd make myself immune to garlic.

4. Write a series of best-selling novels portraying vampires as creatures who are always irresistibly attractive, aren't really all that bad and, despite their immortality, enjoy romantic liaisons with high school students out of only the purist of motivations. The fact that I can't imagine myself feigning interest in the banality of adolescence at 28 years of age, let alone 280 or 2828 is entirely beside the point. They're easy prey.

5. Start the following rumours:
-It is entirely outside the realm of possibility for vampires to develop immunities to sunlight or other traditional vampiral weaknesses
-All the cool kids are getting bitten by vampires. It doesn't hurt as much as they tell you it will.
-Vampires want to be your friend, and would never hurt you. In fact, they don't even really drink blood. They prefer Diet RC Cola.
-If you let a vampire bite you he will show his gratitude by giving you an adorable puppy. Or a kitten or an ipod or whatever the #$*& kids these days want but can't convince their parents to buy for them.

6. Sneak up on people looking at themselves in the mirror (because that would never get old)

7. Gorge myself on the feeble, misinformed masses