Some Parting Shots

And thus the great blog blitz of April the 21st has come to a close. I hope you learned a ton and you are fairly jealous of the little blog show that I've put together. In these latter hours I've gotten a little more caught up in the looking for jobs side of things, so I haven't been able to post as much as I would have liked to.

If I had done a better job I would have come up with something clever to go with this picture (besides making fun of Sean's mustache, too easy).


I like this one because I look like some kind of wise and wistful godfather. I look like I'm saying, "hey, sit down, sit down and pull up a plate of pasta, lets work this thing out."


I just like how incredulous Jess looks in this photo. She's like, "Pardon me while I puke, is that ok with you?" Only she doesn't really mean the courtesy that the question implies—she's being sarcastic. She thinks you're an idiot.

Lunch Time @ Central Command

At last lunch had arrived! I had been blogging away and browsing through so many jobs that I didn't even here the wifey coming. But Gretel began to go off like a dog shot in the face, and so I knew she had arrived!

She's my little movie star! And check this one out, I love that moment right when a person walks through a door:

She only has an hour and it takes 8.2 minutes to get home, so we had to snap into action quick. First things first, dogs!

(Are you kidding me?! I can't rotate the picture? I have
to be able to rotate the picture!)

What comes after dogs? You guessed it (and I'll even give you a wry smile to show you you're onto something).

GRILL!

And we don't go in for any of that lips and hooves nonsense—we do the 100% beef dogs, baby.

Meanwhile Jess decided to snap a picture of my awesome day wear.

But back to the task at hand. If you're going to do a proper wiener roast then you need a proper amount of onions.

My whole philosophy is that if you can see dog, then clearly you don't have enough onions. That onion there is only the first of seven.

I thought I was done taking pictures of the onion situation, but Jess said, "Wait, you have to get the best part, that's when they get diced."

Out on the grill things were coming along pretty well.

But right after this photo, tragedy struck:

The hotdog jumped ship and crashed to the ground. I let out a cry of devastation and quickly picked up the injured, dirtied dog and began to run it towards the kitchen.

"Do not run that under the water!" Bellowed Jessica.

"I'll eat it if you're not going to," she said. She really is my hero—I couldn't have eaten the thing. And so it was restored to it's rightful position on the grill.

And so this became the meal that the Lord had so aptly lain before us:

Jess couldn't wait to dig on in—seriously, I had to scream at her to wait until I had taken the picture.

Jess began to prepare her food.

"I hate the concept of mayonnaise," she said as she spread it on her bun.

Then I took a bite and experienced nirvana.

Then she took a bite and gazed deeply into my eyes.

Then I seriously thought that my hotdog had said something to me.

That's when I think she realized how goofy this would all look on the internet.

Then Gretel saw us and wondered why she wasn't getting any action.

So we gave her action.

Then it was all over much too quickly.

We had finished our meal, and with sad eyes she told me that she must leave.

She asked why it had to be this way. "No one should have to work today," she said.

She's right.

And now she's gone.

Until 6 o'clock, anyway.

I am missing you, my darling.

Just Did Something Awful All Over My Computer

All I can say is don't click on the link below.

I'm still doing cleanup, and I think it's probably going to take at least a few more hours. I haven't puked like this since watching Hairspray.

Like I said, don't click on this, you'll regret it till the day you die.

Please don't click here!
(that was all a lie, click here and check it out!!!)

A Request Granted

Yes it's true that I am incredibly busy, but I had a request come through that I have chosen to honor:

"You are a bad man. ;)
You should post what photo you picked to send with your resume... "

This request came from my wife in regard to the bikini car wash that I applied for.

Wish granted:

I Had An Accident The Other Day

Peeing your pants is not nearly as bad when you're on a stone floor; that's the reason I like half freaked out and half amused.

Scaring My Wife to Death

This happened the other day when I took my shirt off.

Yeah it stung, but who can blame her?

Music of Choice

I am listening to Alanis Morissette during this session of job search. Sometimes it's nice, sometimes it's distracting, but today it's needed to drown out the wailing horns and incessant beat of the Mexican's music blaring from his car in the parking lot.

First Job Of The Day In The Bucket

The truth is that I'm always hopeful for jobs that I apply for, but I guess I am extra hopeful for this one. It's just that I've never been able to express myself in this way before, and It would be nice. Check it out:

http://seattle.craigslist.org/skc/fbh/1132242491.html

Wanna See a Laughing Wayne?

Ok, here you go:

I had just told him my score on the IQ test I had taken earlier that day.

Dispatches From the Edge: Live From Central Command

Hello.

Today is something different. I have setup central command, today it is from my porch in the glorious sunlight, and I will be live-blogging my job search for the next couple of hours. But I never actually just sit down and look for jobs. I have to, you know, fidget. So I'll be posting pictures of me, my friends and family and telling you any secrets that I know about them, and I'll be sharing any insights that I have or breaking news that happens to unfold before me and Gretel's eyes.

Live from Central Command

Please stay tuned for lots of exciting content that I'll be uploading oh so very soon.

And for your viewing pleasure, here is one more of me from Cent. Com.:

I had been chatting with Jesus and he had just ascended,
his light and glory kind of made the picture look washed out.

Award: Coolest Pic of the Day

I am giving todays award for "Coolest Pic of the Day" to a one Allan Gottlieb. Gottlieb gets the award because he was lucky enough to be photographed in front of the following picture in today's Seattle Times:

Today's award is unique because I am not awarding the picture above, but actually the painting contained within the picture. I want it. I want to own these paintings. I'm thinking of stealing them.

I haven't yet confirmed if they were created to go as a set, or if Gottlieb happened to put this arrangment together of his own accord, but I will let you know as soon as I am able to confirm.

Dispatches From the Edge: Fort Wars!

Day 64:

I can't believe it's been over two months and it has taken me till now to get to this day. When I was a kid I would whip out a fort like it was a toy pistol, but I guess in these latter years I have gotten lazy. A fort is the ultimate escape from the harsh cold and indifference of present day realities.

The idea had occurred to me about a week ago, but was not fully conceived and given birth to until today.

Today I had a fort war.

I didn't wake up this morning intending to fight a war, but I'm sure that's the same way that Dwight Eisenhower felt the morning of D-Day. Some men are born great, and some men thrust themselves awkwardly towards greatness...such were the events of the day.

I had to take this,

And turn it into a fully functional war machine. So the first thing I did was strip the room for parts,

And I went to work. Six and a half hours later and I had constructed Fort Shangri La (FSL):

That's me climbing in for the inaugural christening for FSL. And here's a side-view of FSL,

Notice the fully functioning pillboxes, complete with civil war style bayonettes and pineapple grenades.

Anyway, Gretel and I were just settling in for a day of drills, reality-based war mockups and situationals, some of which are pictured here,

Practicing hand-to-hand combat.


General spy technique.

Anyway, such were our goings on when we heard the knock at the door that would forever change the soul of the Wedgewood Condo Manor.

Gretel had heard the knock first as it was her hour to stand watch,

"Jason, it's Phil."

Phil Donahue is our neighbor. A lot of people think that's strange, but if you knew Phil like I knew him, then you'd think it more of an awful inconvenience. He is always poking around, asking for a cup of sugar when we know damn well he's got a whole bag, or peaking in our window to see which local news broadcast we like to watch.

Anyway, I popped out to see what he wanted,

"What's up Phil—what do you want?"

"Jason, did you build a fort today?"

Uh, oh. This was a big problem. Look, there is a long back story that I really don't want to get in to, but Phil has been unemployed for a hell of a lot longer than I have. Naturally in our conversations talk about making a fort had come up. The talks have intensified ever since I lost my job, and he has always said that his one request is that when I finally decide to do it I needed to include him.

But like I said, he gets on my nerves, plus I feel like I've been neglecting Gretel lately, so I wanted me and her to get some quality time in. So no, I hadn't invited him. And of course he had been peaking through the window, so he had saw that I had completed construction on FSL.

I don't have like a full-on good memory of everything that happened after that. A concussion the size of the one that we endured will do a lot of things to your brain, and not many of those things are good.

There were a lot of threats, I remember that's how it started. Donahue became very flammable very quickly and started cursing me in Yiddish. I told him that was offensive as he is not Jewish, and that only inflamed his passion further. There were a lot of "How could you's?" and "there will be significant and commensurate payback's" and things of that nature.

I became rather scared because Phil is a very unstable guy, and I retreated to the safety and relative comfort of my fort.

That's when the pounding started. I could hear nail after nail being driven into plywood. At certain times I could hear the definite scream of a skill saw. There was the flash of blowtorch that also echoed down our shared walkway, and I knew that it was on: he was preparing a battle-ready fort so that we could war.

Were we scared? Yes, I believe you could say that,

I knew that FSL would be able to withstand heavy damage, but I also knew that Donahue had access to many more funds and resources than I could ever hope for.

Gretel and I kicked strategy around for awhile. She said I could hide in the bathroom and she could pretend to sleep, but keep her eyes open just a crack, so that maybe Donahue would let down his guard, she even demonstrated:

I told Gretel that I really appreciated her idea, but that we had to think a little bigger than that. As happens so many times in the heat of battle, that set off a little tiff among allies. She tried to get up in my grill and maddog me,

So I shoved her back in order to initiate dominance,

She was still bucking my authority so I went for her jugular,

And after that she evacuated her bladder and began to whimper.

So it was good that that situation was resolved, but then Donahue began to text me.

"I take u down 2 Chinatown. 2nite baby."

"howz about this 4 a match, your face and my a$$."

I knew that these were run of the mill psy-ops and I tried not to let them faze me,

But like I said, I new that he had superior equipment to mine, and I couldn't stomach the idea of the total decimation of FSL.

So there I was, trying to cope and trying to cope, and that was when Donahue stepped over the line.

His last text message:

"Your wife's cooking tastes like old shoe."

Yes, I know that he had never actually tasted my wife's cooking, but I didn't really care. All I new was that Gretel and me were not happy,

You don't go there with me—you don't even get close!—and Donahue knew that. I started to get a little shaky because I have never actually called in an airstrike, but if there was ever a time...

Could I acutally do it? Could I assert my will over my neighbor Donahue?

And the kicker is that in some ways he is actually a decent guy. Decisions decisions, I was at a real impasse,

But then Gretel looked up at me,

and said, "You only live once, and FSL was supposed to be forever, just go for it."

That was all I needed.

Like I said, the concussion from the blast threw me against the wall and I took a terrible bump to the head.

It turns out that Donahue is fine. It was his plan to set me off with that text, he knew it would do the trick, and after he hit the send button on his phone he closed the lid of his lead-lined 1940's style freezer that he was laying in and waited for the, as he called them, "fireworks."

The airstrike cost me about $13 million dollars, so Jess is pretty pissed at me for dropping that kind of jack while unemployed.

But Fort Shangri La still stands, so if you ask me, even with the having to sell myself into slavery as a down payment, it was worth it.