EDIT: I haven’t gotten all the trim back up yet but…

Who’s my home improvement bitch now!

HUMILIATION, YOUR NAME IS HOME DEPOT

Most men are born with a fear of doing home improvement projects that are outside their scope of ability…sane men anyway.  I was born without this fear and so far it has only caused us to be homeless on three occasions.

Several years ago I built a deck and recessed a hot tub into it. I even ran the electrical service to the hot tub. Only one person has been electrocuted so far, so I’ve always considered the project to be a success.  Typical of most males, one successful project has me convinced that I can tackle any job. Of course, since that time I have fallen through my ceiling, off a ladder, and sacrificed many pints of blood to the construction gods, but I remain undaunted.

I have plans to paint my house this summer. We picked out colors at the paint store and I decided to start by painting my front door an “accent” color. It looked “burgundy” on the paint chip. In real life, it came out more of a “popsicle purple.” This has caused most of our neighbors to think we’ve lost our minds.

The obvious thing to do would be to repaint the front door, but that’s much, much too simple. Instead, we decided to replace the front door with a nice wood grain door with some stained glass in it. I was convinced I could handle installing a pre-hung front door so off we went to Home Depot.

When I got the door home and unloaded it, I immediately noticed a problem.

Did you know that doors can swing open either to the right or to the left?

I didn’t! So, of course, the door had the hardware on the opposite side of where it is on our current door. If I had gone ahead and installed this door it would have meant that people entering our house would walk immediately into a wall. I strongly considered this as a possible alternative to having to suffer the humiliation of taking the door back, but I finally sucked it up and hauled it back to the store.

I came home with the new door and began taking the trim off on both sides of the existing door. I got it all taken off to the point at which wind can now blow through the front wall of our house strong enough to blow magazines off the coffee table. I got ready to take the old jamb out…and I noticed a problem.

Did you know that doors come in different jamb widths?

I didn’t! The jamb on the door I bought was two inches narrower than the jamb on our existing door. I considered suicide rather than having to go back to Home Depot, but I finally tucked my tail between my legs and crawled back.

The man at Home Depot explained to me that I could go ahead and use the last door I purchased as long I built a custom jamb extension to fill the gap. He explained this to me like he was talking to a sixth grader that hadn’t quite grasp toilet training yet.

I’ll take a picture of the front door once I finish getting it installed.

Unless I decide to sell the house as is, and move so I don’t have to make another trip back to Home Depot.

AND ON BEHALF OF THE ALMIGHTY, JUST LET ME SAY…

I passed by a church marquee today that advertised the following sermon title for Sunday: “What would God say to Donald Trump?”

I imagine God would say “lose the cheesy comb-over dude” but I’m not really sure.

I was told by someone who is familiar with this church that this sermon is part of an entire series; all of which speculate on what God might say to particular celebrities. While I never cease to be amazed by people who feel they can speak directly on behalf of God (subject for another post), I do think this sermon series is a brilliant idea and I’d like to offer my own contributions:

To Geraldo Rivera: “Man, you should have asked; I would have told you there wasn’t anything in the vault.”

To over-paid professional athletes: “Stop it! I had nothing to do with you winning the game.”

To Cher: “For someone who is older than I am, you still look pretty good.”

To Hugh Grant: “Just because her name was ‘Divine’ doesn’t mean she was sent from me.”

To Don Imus: “I giveth, and CBS taketh away.”

To George Bush: “Please, please…stop telling people you know me.”

Ok…Ok…I know that putting words in God’s mouth might seem a little sacrilegious. Since I am on a church staff part time, I would never intentionally do anything that had even the remote appearance of being religiously inappropriate. As proof, I offer the following photo of me in the pulpit leading music (which was taken and then photo-shopped by a friend who holds my same convictions regarding the absolute and unshakeable austerity of the ministry):

NOT HOLDING MY BREATH

I’ve been out of town on a business trip and in meetings so I’m way behind “news-wise” on the Virginia Tech tragedy. I’ve been trying to catch up this morning.

When I first heard that the student was a South Korean here on a student visa, my first thought was that the Rush Limbaughs and Ann Coulters of the world would immediately make this about immigration. I hope that doesn’t end up being the case, but I’m not holding my breath.

I did read that many South Korean students are fearful of reprisals, and that makes an unimaginable, horrific event that much sadder.  History has proven time and time again that deranged, deluded, homicidal people come in every age, religion, and ethnic background.  I hope that everyone can stay focused on the needs of the families who tragically lost loved ones, and on the fellow students and faculty that have suffered through such a horrible, life-altering event…

…and not on the color of the shooter’s skin or where he came from.

MEET MARKET

Lust, sweat, throbbing rhythms...chaps. Now that I have your attention I thought I'd tell you about my weekend, which involved all of those...sort of.

My wife and I went out on the town with three other couples. We had a nice dinner at P. F. Chang’s where one of the guys in our group consumed so much beer that he began to wear the lettuce wraps on his head like little green yarmulkes. Obviously, more alcohol was in order, so we proceeded from there to a new bar in Tulsa called the “Wild Horse Saloon.” 

Since there is an average of six cowboy bars per square mile in Tulsa, one would assume a “Wild Horse Saloon” would be redundant.  But apparently, the “Tin Dog Saloon,” the “Dead Horse Tavern,” “Tumbleweeds Dance Hall,” and “The Caravan Cattle Company” (I’m not making those names up) are not adequate to cover the demands of drunken people with gun racks in their pickup trucks, so Wild Horse Saloon opened it’s doors.

I haven’t been to a cowboy bar in a long time. I immediately noticed that we were not dressed appropriately. The correct dress for men is Wranglers, boots, a big ass belt buckle with a big ass hat to match, and a starched plaid shirt.

The correct dress for women is Wranglers, boots, a big ass belt buckle with a big ass hat to match, and any top that displays a copious amount of cleavage.

A lower lip full of Skoal is optional for either sex (If you don’t know what Skoal is, you’ve obviously never been to Oklahoma).

You would never make fun of this type of dress while at the bar. While at least 80% of the people there are posers who make their livings as accountants, convenience store clerks, and Indian Casino workers; in a place like Tulsa, about 20% are likely to be actual cowboys. An actual cowboy would immediately kick your ass for making fun of their attire, and that goes for both the men and the women.

I was surprised that the music being played was not all country. The obligatory George Strait ballads were interspersed with Techno, Rock, and Rap. The problem with this is that the people on the dance floor were two-stepping regardless of what was being played. Watching someone two-step to the Black Eyed Peas’ “My Humps” will really twist your head around.

It’s also fun to watch the mating rituals of the Native Oklahoma Cowboy. The male of the species will spot a female with the most visible cleavage or the one who’s Wranglers are cutting off all circulation to the top half of their bodies and approach them with a gentlemanly “may I have this dance Miss?”  The female will then proceed onto the dance floor and present her back side to the male. The male will then spend the next three minutes attempting to mount the female while holding on to her like he’s riding a bull at the rodeo if you get my drift.

If no males have asked a particular female to dance, she will dance with a girlfriend while the cowboys stand at the bar and engage in lesbian cowgirl fantasies.

Mostly, the experience made me glad that I’m no longer out there trying to meet someone (or “meat” someone, as the case may be).

I’m quite happy to stay at home with my wife and have my own little rodeo.

  BEEMER BIMBOS

After only 30,000 glorious miles of wind in my hair and bugs in my teeth, I’ve decided to sell the mid-life-crisis car. There are several reasons behind my decision, but the primary issue is that the car just didn’t live up to the hype. For example - at no time did my car cause the clothes to simply fall off of a super model and incite her to beg me to have my way with her…so really, what’s the use?  Another reason is that four new tires and a front end alignment recently set me back $1,800.00. That’s a case of the dealership having their way with me, and trust me, it was better for them than it was for me.

Truth be told, my personality is really more “Ford Escort” anyway. I used to make fun of people who drove cars like mine, and then…I became one. I sold out to “the man” and I’m deeply ashamed. Ok, I’m not really ashamed, but it sounded very politically correct to say that, so I thought I would.

While I was driving the mid-life-crisis-mobile, I did find that I was more aware of who was behind the wheel of other sports cars I encountered on the road and I have a few observations to make.

Everyone knows that guys who drive cars like mine tend to fall into one of two categories: they are either old, fat guys, or they are guys who have tiny little stick-shifts and they are trying to compensate. I fall firmly into both categories so it was inevitable that I would buy a sports car. But what about the women who drive them? I have noticed that women in sports cars tend to drive convertibles and I can come close to guessing who might be behind the wheel just by seeing the car. Here are a few examples:

Miata or Mustang Convertible: Sorority Chick. Has daddy’s credit card locked firmly between her fake nails. Shows her distain for the remainder of humanity by the way she flicks her hair and checks her make up in the review mirror while she’s driving.

Beemer Convertible (325C or Z4): 24 yrs old. Blond (obviously). Husband is a Dentist in his second marriage. On her way to the tanning salon and to pick up his bratty kid from school.

Mercedes SLK 500: 27 yrs old. Blond (again). Used to stand in front of cars like the one she’s driving now at the Boat, Sport, and Travel Show in a low-cut top. Husband is a personal injury attorney. There’s more plastic in her than there is in the car.

Bentley Continental:  42 yrs old. Got the car in the divorce when she caught her stock broker husband with the chick in the Mercedes SLK 500. Uses it for long road trips between her apartment in the city and her beach front condo. There’s a 26 year old male underwear model in the passenger seat.

You might find my observations patently sexist. “Why couldn’t an intelligent, successful woman purchase an upscale convertible if she wanted too?” I hear you ask. Well…Intelligent, successful women are much to smart to invest their hard earned money in something that loses half it’s value when you drive it off the lot (only men are that stupid). The smart, successful women are driving two year old SAAB’s and investing the difference in mutual funds.

So, for me, it’s bye-bye Beemer.  It was fun while it lasted. I purchased a 1997 Grand Am to replace it for not much more than the cost of a single payment on the mid-life-crisis-mobile (no, I’m not kidding).

It won’t blow the clothes off of a super model, but my wife is the only super model I need.

(I may be stupid enough to buy an overpriced sports car, but I’m smart enough to know when it’s appropriate to suck up.)

XANGA GUILT

As if there isn’t enough in my life to feel guilty about already! There was that unfortunate incident in Las Vegas involving a woman who spoke Portuguese and a Llama. Then there was the entire period from 1976 to 79 that I don’t really remember, and, of course, my last 12 income tax returns. And now, on top of all of that, I find that I’m experiencing Xanga guilt.

I try to update twice a week. I also make a concerted effort to leave regular comments for everyone on my subscription list AND to leave return comments for everyone who comments on my site. 

I’m behind….way behind, and I feel guilty about it.

I was introduced to Xanga by my son who used it to keep us updated when he was an exchange student in Russia. I thought “I’ll give this a try,” and I became immediately addicted. Since that time, my son got married, started grad school, and began brewing beer in his bathtub. He hasn’t updated since last September and it doesn’t bother him a bit. This is because he is well adjusted and I’m not.

I even went to see Melvin my shrink to discuss my guilt and ended up telling him to leave my mother out of it. Actually, he had the audacity to suggest that I at least entertain the idea that no one even notices if I comment on their site or not, and that maybe…just maybe, I’m not as important in the Xanga universe as I seem to think I am.

What a quack!

The truth is that I’ve been letting trivial things get in the way of my Xanga time like employment, time with my wife, and showering.

I promise to do better…I really do.

IT NEVER RAINS IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

(But it does drizzle all day, and in March it’s colder than a witch’s tit)

I’m sorry I haven’t updated or been around to everyone’s site in a while. My wife had to attend a dental conference in Huntington Beach, CA and I went along for the ride. I didn’t go online during the trip because the hotel charged for internet service and I am a cheap bastard.

Now that I’m back at the office, I thought I’d blow off all the work that’s pilled on my desk and do a photo blog of the trip.

As I mentioned, we were in Huntington Beach, officially known as “Surf City, USA.”  Here’s a photo of the famous pier:

The temperature was in the 50’s most of the time we were there. Here is a picture of crazy people so desperate for sun that they are lying out on the beach in their swimsuits next to people in coats:

While my wife was attending her conference I spent most of the day sitting in an Irish pub next to the beach, drinking Baileys on the rocks, and people watching. I did notice that the fashionable trend in beach wear for young women is to cover a dental floss bikini with a pair of Daisy Duke cut off jeans. Then they undo the fly and roll down the sides of the shorts to display the bikini bottoms underneath. I found this display to be innapropriately provocative and morally reprehensible…and I stayed in the pub for an additional four hours just to make absolutely sure that I was truly outraged.

Once the conference was over we did some legitimate site seeing. We drove down to Newport Beach where anyone driving a car that costs less than $100,000.00 is only allowed in the city limits with a police escort and went on a whale and dolphin watching tour.  Here is a picture of a very friendly dolphin that followed our boat waiting on the locals to drop some of their breakfast caviar overboard:

We drove from there up to Long Beach where anyone not wearing gang colors needs a police escort to see the Queen Mary (which, if it had two more smoke stacks, would make a great Cingular “Raising the Bar” commercial):

The Queen Mary is supposedly haunted. We took the “Ghost Tour” during which they took us through sections of the ship in which paranormal sightings have occurred. Here is a photo of a series of staterooms where apparitions have been seen:

In this completely un-retouched photo of the same staterooms only moments later you can see that their claims may have some credibility:

While on the “Queen Mary” my wife took a picture of me next to a giant photo of my hero the “Queen Liberace”:

“How could Liberace possibly be your hero?” I hear you ask. Anyone who can play the piano that well while wearing all that jewelry, a feather boa, and a bra and panties is a hero in my book. I’ve tried the same thing many times and it’s not nearly as easy as it looks.

Here I am doing my best “Captain Ahab” impersonation:

Finally, here we are back at our hotel with my gorgeous wife standing in front of some ceramic lions whose breakfast apparently did not agree with them:

It was a great trip, but I’m glad to be back in Oklahoma where there is actually sunshine and 80 degree weather. I think I’m going to slip on my bikini and short-shorts, and head off to the lake.

AMERICAN CREEPY

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that Phil Stacey on American Idol looks like Nosferatu?

CAUSTIC CHRISTIANITY

As I’ve talked about many times before, I grew up Southern Baptist, I attended a Southern Baptist College, I attended a Southern Baptist Seminary, and I spent 17 years on the staffs of Southern Baptist Churches. I can recite the “Baptist Faith and Message” cover to cover. I own 32 double breasted suits and I used to use more hair spray than Donald Trump does to secure his comb-over in a hurricane. I can do a Billy Graham preaching impersonation that Billy himself would be jealous of. (I realize that now days I write about Airport Porn but that’s a whole other story).

In other words, I can speak “Christianeese” as well as any doe-eyed evangelist on the circuit but I choose not too. You wanna know why? Because it’s really, really offensive.

Don’t send hate mail! I don’t have anything against Southern Baptists. It’s a fabulous denomination that believes fervently in what they are doing. They do as much or more for disaster relief than the Red Cross does, and when you give money to the Southern Baptist Convention for hunger relief, not a single penny of it goes to administration. Many other main stream Protestant denominations do things just as noble and important, as does Catholic Charities, the largest private social services network in the world.

But I do want to make a suggestion: you need to change the way you talk.

Let me give you an example. I was reading the blog of a person who happens to be an atheist. A comment was left on their site from a Christian who stated that they pitied the person for their lack of faith in God. Did the person who left this comment intend to be offensive? No - they feel that their faith in God has given them fulfillment and purpose in life, and they truly want others to experience the same thing. Was what they said offensive? You’re damn straight it was, and it made me physically cringe when I read it.

I don’t know a great deal about the writer for whom the comment was left. I do know from reading their entries that they are an intelligent and thoughtful person. I also know they are a news producer which sounds like a job that requires a great deal of talent to me. I also know they have an autistic child that they write about with such joy and passion that it has jumped off the page and choked me up on more than one occasion.

Pity is something you have on a wounded animal. The blog writer I’m referring too does not deserve pity; they deserve the utmost respect and nothing less.

So…Christians everywhere…if you want to do more good than damage, please think about the words you use when you talk about your faith. Much of “Christianeese” comes off sounding as hateful, arrogant, and condescending as the “pity” comment did. Jesus never talked down to people, he talked too them.

Those of you on the other side - don’t get pompous. There was great exchange of lines on my favorite TV show at the moment…Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.  One of the characters who happens to be a liberal was talking to another character on the show who is a Christian conservative. The character said “Christians hate liberals because you think, we think, you’re stupid, and we hate Christians because we think you’re stupid.” Arrogance and condescension are abundant in every ideology.

I’m really not one of those people who is big on everything being “politically correct” because it’s trite and dishonest and doesn’t foster real communication, but neither does using language that makes you come off looking like a prick.

I don’t quote many Bible verses so hold on to your hat, but here’s one for all of us Christians to think about: “May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength and redeemer.”  Psalms 19:14

THE EVOLUTION OF POST-MODERN MAN

Men are often the victims of gender stereotyping. We are perceived as being over-sexed, insensitive, sophomoric frat boys despite our ages or our stations in life. When referring to our cognitive abilities it’s often said that our minds are perpetually in the gutter and that we think mostly with our “little heads.”

Is this stereotyping justified, or has post-modern man risen above this terminal state of pubescent angst?  I propose an in-depth, double-blind scientific study. However, until that study is finished, an exchange that happened a few moments ago at my place of business may shed some light on this controversial subject.

I was sitting in one of our conference rooms near the front of our building with all of the other salesmen in our office. We were pretending to be deep into developing sales strategies but as I’m sure you can guess, the only thing we were actually deep into was bullshit.

Our new FedEx delivery person came into the building and everyone immediately noticed that it happened to be a very attractive young woman; probably in her late twenties. With sly grins, the following comments were made just out of earshot of Miss FedEx:

Salesman #1 – Hey baby, I got your package right here.

Salesman #2 – And it’s marked for “special delivery.”

Salesman #3 – And it’s is definitely going out “overnight.”

Salesman #4 – But you’d better be careful, because it’s probably over your size limit.

Salesman #5 – Maybe you need some help getting my package into your trunk…I’m mean truck.

So, do men deserve to be labeled as crass Neanderthals, and sexist pigs?

Yeah...pretty much.