He must be Irish cause this is stupid... Go eat some Lucky Charms." --my mom
this statement was immediately followed by: "don't twitter that, the leprechauns will come and steal my cat."
although i'm sure this tag is in a t-shirt from an über-hip thread shop like busted tees or threadless, i'm sure it wasn't meant to be noticed. and if by some chance you have no life and happen to read your t-shirt's care tag, it's placed there in hopes of putting a smile on your face, if only for one second, before you go off on some feminist rant.
this was posted on failblog this morning and has a very special meaning to me. growing up i lived in a house with two older sisters, a mom and a grandma, so it was a rare occurrence that i ever had to do my own laundry. that was, until one day after watching an episode of sally jessy raphael about chauvinist asswipes, i was STUPID enough to say out loud, presumably after being asked to put the load of wash that was in the washer into the dryer, that "LAUNDRY WAS WOMEN'S WORK." needless to say, i've been doing my own laundry since about the third grade...
[photo via failblog]
--Walter Kirn
i sent this article from salon to my mom:
Just in case you thought Sarah Palin only hated polar bears, wolves and moose, she's now suing the federal government to stop it from protecting the Cook Inlet beluga whales as an endangered species.to which she so eloquently responded:
"She's a fucking idiot... They ought to make it open season on Palins."Read more...
1- i've recently discovered that hearing people eat cereal makes me want to punch them in the face. the slurp/crunch combo kills me.
2- i have zero tolerance/compassion for sick people. and by sick, i mean cold, flu, headache, etc.; i'm not talking gravely ill. when i'm sick, i may be in a bitchy mood, but you won't hear me complaining about it.
3- i haven't had a cellphone in almost 2 years. as much as i love not having one, i've realized that it's the only way to keep in touch with some people. i'm currently in the final stages of breaking down to purchase a new one.
4- i'm totally one of those stubborn/loyal people that finds a product or service that works, and i never stray. some examples as of late: cough drops- fisherman's friend (they may taste like ass chalk, but they work like a charm), cold remedy- theraflu (because it's jersey born and raised, just like me), chapstick- blistex clear advance (well, i used to be loyal, until those asshats discontinued it. now i'm a carmex man).
5- totally opposite of #4, some things i couldn't care less about. exhibit a: toilet paper. i don't care if it's silk or 80 grit, if it keeps my hand clean and wipes the crack, it's fine by me.
6- i was less than legitimately employed for the first 11 months of 2008.
7- i thoroughly enjoy personal time, and i get bitchy when i don't have any.
8- some of my best blogging in the past 2 months has happened on the i95 corridor.
9- i enjoy drinking the juice out of jars of banana pepper rings.
10- lately i've had heartburn like a 90 year old and have been chewing zantac like pez. this can most likely be attributed to actions such as #9.
11- i really want to do undercover police work. i think i'd be great at it. nobody in their right mind would ever suspect me. ever.
12- i would kill a praying mantis for a spicy tuna handroll and a bowl of kimchee right about now.
13- even though i think i would be a great undercover agent, i would also really like to be the person that chooses the music to go in movies and tv shows. and i would be the fcuking cool musical director (if that's what they're called) because i wouldn't just use all the been-around-way-too-long-bands that get used in every damn movie. hey, mtv, call me.
14- that i can count, there are 6 people in my life that i refer to as "my future ex-wife." my girlfriend is not one of them.
15- ...but i don't ever want to get married, so hopefully that'll never happen. though i do want kids, and a 'wife,' just not marriage so much. goldie hawn and kurt russell did it and are living happily ever after, so why can't i?
16- i know that money doesn't fix everything, but $250,000 sure would be nice right about now. when i drive back and forth between virginia and new jersey, every time i see a lottery sign, i daydream about all the things that i would do if i won that money.
17- my current job requires me to talk on the phone for 8 hours a day. almost once a day, someone tells me that i have a sexy phone voice. today i have a sore throat and a stuffy nose, and 4, count them, 4 people said it today. and the last one was a dude that said i "gave him the chills."
18- i'm only going to say this once: i love watching the real world brooklyn. don't judge me.
19- i have the uncanny ability to not only draw strange connections between otherwise unrelated objects/places/smells/tastes/etc., but also to remember them. forever. i.e. whenever i drink dr. pepper, i immediately visualize the break room at leewards, where my mom used to work when i was 10. whenever i smell wet hay, it reminds me of the jaycees carnival at borough field in my hometown. i could go on forever...
20- facebook requires way to much effort on my part. i wish the world would realize that although myspace is juvenile, at least it tells you when somebody talks shit about you. on facebook you have to continuously stalk people to see who's talking smack. i don't have that kind of time.
21- for as stressed out as i feel all the time, i've realized that compared to most people i know, i'm a pretty laid back and easy going guy.
22- i hate that when i'm freezing my balls off i think to myself, "i'd rather be sweating my ass off." and when i'm sweating my ass off i think to myself, "i'd rather be freezing my balls off." because really, i'd rather be doing neither.
23- new words that i hate: truncate, lavage, piquant, meme, quixotic.
24- flashback to #16- people that cannot hold a conversation about anything, without mentioning the cost of something make me want to drink cod liver oil. money does not equal true happiness.
25- sometimes, i wish that i did, indeed, sweat actual butter. then i could rub toast in my armpits.
**BONUS** i bet after this, no one ever posts a 'note' on facebook ever again. and for the asswipe facebook inventor that started this meme, congratulations! now everyone knows about another useless function that facebook has to offer. thank you for providing mind numbing entertainment for half the country. next time just send an email chain letter, it's easier to forward. thanks.
both of my sisters, unlike myself, seldom speak of their political affiliations. that is until this morning when my sister aurora posted this on her blog:
you go ro!
[via wildaurora]
...the lyrics speak of grasping special times in our lives and not letting their opportunities slip away...when we are young it is so hard to really understand that...someday today will be a long, long time ago.
God doesn't give you the people you want... He gives you the people you NEED... to help you, to hurt you, to leave you, to love you... and to make you into the person that you were meant to be.
i always believed it was the things you don't choose that make you who you are... your city. your neighborhood. your family. people take pride in these things like it was something they'd accomplished... the bodies around their souls... the cities wrapped around those..." --patrick kenzie
they look like they were dressed from a goodwill store in italy."
***in an attempt to not offend anyone close to me, the subjects of this quote shall remain nameless.
screw 'a christmas story,' if i had to name three christmas movies that remind me of christmas, in more than just theme, i'd have to go with 'white christmas' with bing crosby & danny kaye, 'national lampoon's christmas vacation,' and this movie, that still surprises me to this day that so many children of the 80's have no idea what it is, 'emmet otter's jug-band christmas.' a clip, for your enjoyment...
what a fcuking cute coincidence that these cheapo's last name is 'economides.' WORLD, meet steve and annette economides. they are raising a family of 7 in arizona on an annual income of about $44,000.
the today show, which featured the economides family in a segment, seemed astounded that a family could get by wearing nice clothes and living in a large home — without buying on credit.
breaking down their budget into 19 categories, they paid off their first house in nine years on an average income of $33,000 a year. their second home, which they estimate to be worth more than $700,000, was purchased for more than $200,000 and is almost paid off.
they plan every meal before going to the grocery store, building their menu around specials and coupons. the monthly bill to feed a family of seven is $350. (for seven people? i call bullshit. unless they eat a dickload of ramen noodles.)
they don’t buy on credit. they buy late-model used cars with cash. they also budget cash reserves for auto and home repairs so they never have to dip into reserves.
now the economides are turning their frugal habits into another source of income. they have a new york times bestselling book called "america's cheapest family," and a website. it's easier than you think!
[todayshow via consumerist]
though i humbly prefer a snifter or two (or ten) of grand marnier to a christmas foo-foo drink, i also know that they have their place at family gatherings. because as my family has always said, "a family that drinks together, stays together." then again, come to think of it, judging by the fact that three of the five of us will each be alone on seeming opposite ends of the earth this christmas, i'd have to question the legitamacy of that statement... but i digress. a few of you buttersweaters have asked me for some recipes for the holidays and such, to which i am happy to oblige, and to which i add a bonus gift. almost like the fourth jonas brother, only this one'll get you drunk. but a bonus nonetheless. eight recipes to help you fondly remember or quickly forget this holiday season, depending on your consumption of course. cheers to a merry christmas!
1. The Grinch
2. Candy Cane Martini
3. AJ's Orange Christmas Punch
4. Christmas Cosmopolitan
5. Christmas Cookie Concoction
6. Deck the Halls Shooter aka "The I Don't To Talk To My In-Laws Shooter"
7. The Three Wise Men aka "The I Don't Want To Talk To Anyone Shooter"
8. White Christmas
being away from new york city has no advantages for a city boy like myself. for me, it just promotes longing. growing up so close in jersey, it just seemed normal to care about what was going on in the big apple, even though i wasn't actually there. you get used to the way new york does things, and like riding a bike, they're ingrained in you forever. a few examples:
- the "tri-state area" will always be ny/nj/ct, no matter where i live.and so, as i watched the tree lighting last night, i felt as if i was a world away down here in virginia. virginians don't care much for the city's tree, (they cut the televised broadcast to an hour so they could show reruns of deal or no deal). i tivo'd it so that i can watch it over and over again and feel like i'm there. it was so nice being an $8 tunnel ride away... nyc during the holidays, is what christmas means to me.
- i will always refer to the following networks simply by their new york station numbers, cbs/2, nbc/4, fox/5, abc/7, no matter where i live. (i get caught up in this on a daily basis)
- i never say "the city" unless i'm talking about new york city.
- the only tree lighting at christmas, as far as i always knew, was in rockefeller center.
Humble Beginnings - Today it's a multimillion-dollar extravaganza that attracts thousands of tourists every year, but the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree hasn't always been so glamorous. On Christmas Eve 1931, with the nation mired in the Great Depression, a group of construction workers erected a 20-foot tree on the muddy site of what would become one of the city's greatest architectural and commercial monuments. Despite their grim faces, the men had cause to celebrate. Unlike most of their colleagues, they were about to get paid. (Notice the wooden crate at the foot of the tree and the clerk behind it dispensing checks). Two years later, a Rockefeller Center publicist organized the first official tree-lighting ceremony.
War on Christmas? - In 1942, Rockefeller Center unveiled three small trees dedicated to the war effort — each trimmed in either red, white or blue. Though it wasn't the first time more than one Christmas tree stood there (two were erected in 1936 to celebrate the opening of the skating rink), it was the first time organizers announced that the trees would be replanted after the holiday season. In 1944, in keeping with wartime black-out regulations, the trees remained unlit, as did every other outdoor Christmas tree in the city that year. After the war's end in 1945, organizers more than made up for the previous years of darkness by using six ultraviolet light projectors to make all 700 fluorescent globes on that year's tree appear to glow in the dark.
Television Debut - In 1951, NBC televised its first tree lighting on The Kate Smith Show, hosted by the "first lady of radio" herself (above). From 1953 to 1955, children across America watched the ceremony on Howdy Doody. Since then, the tree lighting has featured a number of famous personalities — Barbara Walters in 1972, Bob Hope in 1982, Lily Tomlin in 1985 and Liza Minnelli in 1990. This year, Miss Piggy and Stephen Colbert will be in attendance. 
Christmas Conservation - Spurred by the growing environmental movement, Rockefeller Center recycled its first Christmas tree in 1971, turning it into 30 three-bushel bags of mulch for the nature trails of upper Manhattan. Other organizations to later benefit from the leftover lumber include the Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts and, most recently, Habitat for Humanity, which in 2005 used the wood to make door frames for homes in New York, Louisiana, India and Brazil.
Adornments & Ornaments - The tree's decorations have come a long way since 1931, when tin cans and scrap paper replaced garland and glass. In 1934, organizers festooned that year's evergreen with 1,200 colored lights and ornaments shaped like dogs, horses, giraffes, sailboats and stars. A public-address system also piped in holiday tunes, creating the effect of a "singing tree." The 1950s saw a white spray-painted tree, the return of garlands made of cranberries and popcorn (or at least, plastic balls that resembled them) and 10-foot-long aluminum icicles that turned treacherous in high winds. In 1954, Saks Fifth Avenue inadvertently created midtown traffic jams with its 32-foot-high display of aluminum angels floating along the building's facade (above). And for a few brief minutes in 1980, a human body adorned the tree before police could arrest the man who had unsuccessfully tried scaling it.
The Great Hunt - Nowadays, finding the perfect tree is a daunting task reserved for Rockefeller Center's garden manager. But this has not always been the case. In 1956, a polite (or perhaps proud) New Hampshire man presented a 65-foot White Spruce to the state's Governor, who in turn offered it to Rockefeller Center as a gift from New York's neighbor to the north. Ten years later, Canada delivered a 64-foot White spruce in honor of its 100th birthday — the first Rockefeller Christmas Tree raised out of the U.S. Today, a helicopter is used to scour New England for the perfect specimen. This year, the winning evergreen is a 72-foot-tall Norway spruce from New Jersey. Its owner, Bill Varanyak, dubbed it "the miracle tree," telling local reporters that his late mother always predicted it would one day stand at Rockefeller Center. Varanyak's parents had planted the tree in 1931, the very year the tradition began.
A Star Is Born - Last month, pop star Fergie unveiled the 550-pound Swarovski Star, created for the Rockefeller Christmas Tree by German artist Michael Hammers for the 100-year-old Austrian company. Standing 10 feet tall and composed of 25,000 crystals with a total of 1 million facets, it is the largest star to ever top the tree and the first to represent a corporate sponsor. Neither the crystal maker nor Rockefeller Center will disclose how much money changed hands, but some speculate Swarovski paid as much as $1.5 million for the rights to the tree's crown. Either way, it is a far cry from the 4-foot plastic star used during the 1950s and 60s or the fiberglass, gold-leaf star that adorned the tree during the late 1990s. 
Let There Be Light - New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg had the honor of flipping the switch during the 2007 tree-lighting ceremony, illuminating the more than 30,000 energy-saving LEDs that were part of NBC's latest attempt to go green. Compared to the tree's old incandescent bulbs, the new light-emitting diodes used 1,200 kilowatt hours less electricity per day, enough to power a 2,000-square-foot home for a month. Even so, the new lights did not win universal praise; some complained the tiny lights weren't as appealing as old-fashioned incandescents, while others decried NBC's glowing coverage, so to speak, of the eco-friendly move — noting that NBC's parent company, General Electric, manufactured the bulbs.
the virtual wife, a new japanese cell phone service, ensures that busy japanese businessmen eat nutritiously even when their wife isn't there to remind them. the free service sends four text messages to a subscriber per day encouraging him to watch his calorie intake and avoid unhealthy foods. men can choose from four wives, a professional woman, a "kind, pretty" housewife, a young "sporty" trendsetter, and a maid. coincidentally, no "virtual husbands" are available.
[inventorspot]
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