Dear Jackass, Volume 12

So many jackasses, so little time to blog about them all.

Dear Meaningless Phrase-Repeater:

When you constantly pepper your tedious monologues with the repeated phrase, "Know what I'm saying?" I tend to stop focusing on the point you're clumsily trying to make, and instead focus on how it seems like you're using that nonsense phase purely for filler, in the same way a third grader will add extra, bullshit words into a writing assignment to make it longer or seem like more work went into it. I suspect that your 20 minute soliloquy could be whittled down to a (still boring) minute and 45 seconds if we could pull out all the "Know what I'm saying"s. Fortunately it's not much of an issue, since I started tuning you out almost the moment you opened your mouth. I find that the greater the number of times a person is likely to ask, "Know what I'm saying?" the lower the likelihood that anyone will actually know what the hell he's saying. Or care. Know what I'm saying, Jackass?

Dear Cheapskate Homeowner:

You just had to have a big house, didn't you? "Look how big it is! And the price is great!" Good for you. Now that you're all moved in, it's suddenly occurred to you that the bigger the house is, the bigger the heating and cooling bills are. Good job, Genius. Now you spend all winter pretending it's normal to wear seven layers of clothing around the house like a hobo, while your guests sit around visibly shivering because you're too cheap to turn up the heat. Likewise, all summer long you sit stewing in your own sweat, loudly insisting it's not hot in the house in spite of the fact that every time you get up to grab another handful of ice cubes to shove down your pants, you leave a big sweat stain on the couch to mark your spot. Fabulous. Now that you've got a house big enough for entertaining, no one wants to come over lest they die of hypothermia or heatstroke. Have a nice life, Cheapskate, sitting all alone in your big house battling the elements like primitive man. Jackass.

Dear Overly-Excitable Passenger In My Car:

A small request: Do you think you could refrain from shouting, "Oh my God!" while I'm switching lanes at 70 miles per hour? Because although you're really shouting because you just remembered something funny your mom said last week, I will almost certainly always interpret the sudden, hysterical scream of an auto passenger to be a reaction to a runaway Mack truck about to sideswipe me, or a white-tail buck darting in front of me on the highway. By the time you get a chance to explain that, no, you were simply thinking of something cute you wanted to tell me, I will have already panicked and yanked the wheel to the left to avoid the imagined Mack truck or 10-point buck, which will cause us to crash into the guardrail, careen over the embankment and roll 8 times to our fiery death; then you can explain the misunderstanding to me in Hell, where we'll both have a good laugh. Jackass.

My mentor is a hack.

Okay, this is just plain bizarre.

Saturday night we went to dinner with my friend...we'll call him Jim...and his wife. Jim is a great friend of mine, someone I really love and respect. But in the course of our dinner conversation, I discovered something about him that I think qualifies him as stone cold nuts. Tell me if I'm way off base here.

First, a bit of background. Jim is a clean-cut white dude in his early 30s, a fine, upstanding, church-going citizen with a Master's degree in business, and a wife and 2 children. Another friend of mine jokes that Jim is my mentor (inspiring him to repeatedly say, "Your mentor is a hack!") because Jim is the person I call when I have a question about...anything. A cooking question, a math question, a geographical question, a question regarding the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow, etc. I would argue that Jim is perhaps one of the smartest people I know, if you guys wouldn't immediately begin screaming that that's no compliment considering the boobs and morons that I associate with it. So let's just leave it at this: Jim is a smart guy. Which is why what I'm about to tell you is particularly mystifying.

Every morning Jim works out, either by running outside or by using a rowing machine in his house. He gets very sweaty and disgusting, as is appropriate for such a situation. But then! For reasons I can't fathom, no matter how many times I turn it over and over in my brain, this supposedly brainy fellow sheds his sweaty clothes and hangs them up to reuse again the next day. No, not just the shorts, but the whole ensemble, right down to the socks. In fact, in spite of his wife's strenuous objections, he'll wear them for 2 or 3 days in a row. Now, originally he was hanging his filthy, sopping shirt on the bedpost in the master bedroom of his nice, clean, attractive suburban home, but his very normal, sweet, schoolteacher wife put a stop to that on the grounds that it was stinking up the entire bedroom. So now he hangs them up in the garage.

Let me remind you, I love Jim, and my instinct is to always be on his side. I immediately struggled to find a way to jump to his defense here, so I quickly ran down a list of clarifying questions:

1) Did their washer and dryer break long ago, and thanks to a series of bad investments or possibly a chronic, expensive illness in one or both of the children, they couldn't afford to fix or replace it?

Nope. Both washer and dryer are relatively new, and in good working condition.

2) Does Jim suffer from some kind of strange skin condition, in which freshly washed clothing irritates his skin and causes him great discomfort and an unsightly rash?

Nope. His skin has no adverse reactions to common detergents and/or water additives.

3) Is their laundry room a prohibitive distance from the main part of the house--perhaps in a shed at the far end of an enormous backyard, or up 3 flights of stairs in a cramped attic crawlspace?

Nope. Their washer and dryer is in an incredibly handy, central location.

4) Does Jim only have an unusually limited workout wardrobe--say, 1 shirt, 1 pair of shorts, and 2 pairs of socks--making it difficult or impossible to wear a fresh outfit every day, and, thanks to a well-hidden gambling problem or burgeoning methamphetamine addiction, find himself without sufficient funding to expand his inadequate wardrobe?

Nope. He has plenty of clothes, and has enough money to buy more, if needed.

When I pressed him with the most distressing question, in my opinion: "Why not wash your clothes every day? What's the point of wearing dirty ones?" his reaction could best be described as bafflement. He seemed to feel that it just didn't make sense not to wear the clothes two or three days in a row, since he works out alone and therefore no one is around to be offended by the smell. We sort of stared blankly at each other for a moment before I sputtered, "But...you have clean clothes nearby! Wouldn't you rather put on clean ones than dirty ones?" Again he seemed baffled by this. He felt that, logically, there was just no need to wear clean clothes if he was just going to get sweaty again anyway. How do you explain the value of hygiene to a grown man?

The whole thing is made even more vexing in light of a confession Jim made to me a few years ago. He told me that he has an odd fear of running out of deodorant, and that because of that, he keeps not just one can of deodorant at his house at all times, but several. He doesn't feel protected unless he knows he has two or three backups in place. At the time, this seemed odd and obsessive-compulsive to me, but also made me think Jim was just a clean guy who was paranoid about being seen as anything less than clean by others. Now that I know he not only wears filthy, stinking clothes to exercise in every morning, but more importantly, is wholly unashamed of this and is genuinely mystified as to why it might be seen as objectionable to anyone, I realize that Jim is, above all else, stone cold nuts. And a hack as a mentor.

Which brings me to the next issue: The position of mentor is now open. If there's anyone out there who feels suited to the task, please submit your qualifications and experience. Applicants must be intelligent, well-versed in a variety of common subjects as well as in useless trivia, and have a normal, healthy appreciation for hygiene.

I am a philosophical observer of life

Being wise and observant, I am often able to spot things that are just plain wrong in the world.

What is wrong with this trash can?

I recently had the joy of using a restroom in a Fort Worth restaurant that had this informative sign taped to the trash can:

What's more bothersome about this sign: The fact that it has turned an unsettling yellow, clearly either having been peed on one too many times, or possibly left out in the rain since 1942--or the fact that it asks you to put "personal items" in it? Should I store my purse in there? My jacket? And why are all these diapers in here? I think the more common term "feminine products" would have been more appropriate. Another extremely bothersome fact is the absence of a foot pedal to open it. I would have to put my delicate hand on this disgusting lid in order to open it and stuff it with the hundreds of feminine products I regularly have in my possession--and no way am I touching that trash can. In fact, as I remember it, I don't think I was even able to pee in this particular restroom. I walked in and became so hypnotized by this disgusting little plastic trash can that I forgot I had a bladder.

What is wrong with this shit heap?

I took this photo yesterday as I sat at a traffic light. Notice the unfortunate fellow pushing his jalopy to the gas station after it shuddered to its demise halfway through the intersection.

Nothing new or remarkable about this scene--unless you look closely. I doubt my behind-the-wheel, across-the-median photography will have enough detail for you to read the windshield, but go ahead and try:

Can you read it? It says, "$600. Runs good." Perhaps the only thing more humiliating than having to push your beater car through a busy intersection is doing so while the window falsely advertises that the car "runs good."

What is wrong with this marketing scheme?

Taco Cabana, in case you've never been there, is absolutely the worst, most tasteless so-called Mexican restaurant on the planet. The food is bland and horrible. The drinks are watered-down and gross. The restaurant totally lacks personality. Up til recently, I felt the only redeeming thing about it was the fact that going there allowed me the opportunity to sing "At the Taco, Taco Cabana" to the tune of Copacabana over and over to annoy my husband. But recently, meeting my inlaws there for a forgettable meal, I discovered there is one other upside. You can buy roofies there for $1.99. They may be small ones, but you can't argue that the price is a fair one.

What is wrong with Marion Barry's mother?

Recently I purchased a big bag of yummy frozen berries from Costco. Since I was just going to use them in milkshakes at home, I didn't really care what kind of berries they were, so I didn't bother to read the bag til I got home. Upon idle inspection while my blender whirred away, I spotted this on the front of the bag:

Some of you know-it-alls are going to call me a big dum-dum for having never heard of anything called a marionberry, but I swear this is my first time seeing that word. I've always wondered why Marion Barry's mom would be so cruel as to name her son Marion, and I assumed it was either because she never wanted kids in the first place, or because she simply had a natural, healthy hatred for men. Now I realize she was simply a great lover of berries, and felt that naming a child Rasp Barry would be too unconventional. Little did she know what an unconventional mayor he was going to turn out to be. (Or would it be fairer to say he was an unconventional crack addict? Either way.)


What is wrong with this toilet?

I demand to know who thought of this design. The little flusher thing is a big, extremely hard-to-push button on the top of the tank.


This is the last thing a germaphobe wants to see in a public bathroom (well, okay--maybe the last thing after a partially decomposed corpse, a sizable pool of vomit, or George Michael looking amorous). As I've pointed out before, I go to acrobatic lengths to make it in and out of public restrooms without having to touch one single surface with my hands. This generally means flushing the toilet with my foot...which is impossible with the poorly designed fixture pictured above. In fact, because the button must be pushed way down into the uh, button-holder thing, rather than simply tapped, you can't even flush with an elbow--even a bony elbow like mine. Nor is it possible--because I've tried--to use an inkpen or something similar to push the button, because these buttons are a bitch to push down--the pen would break before the button would depress even the tiniest amount. There is no alternative but to stick your finger on the filthy thing. And sure, you can grab a paper towel and wrap it around said finger for a flimsy layer of protection, but still, I find this to be a bad, bad design. And because there's no Department of Toilet Design for me to call and lodge a formal complaint, I'll have to express my dissatisfaction in creative ways. Therefore, every time I see one of these ridiculous button-flusher toilets in a public restroom, I will silently protest by leaving a sizable pool of vomit, a partially decomposed corpse, and George Michael in the restroom when I leave.

How Beastiality Saved My Marriage

Have you ever thought of a really great title for a paper, an essay, a short story or a blog post, but then slowly realized the cumbersome burden of then having to find a way to create a story deserving of such a great title? Such is the case with this particular blog post.

There's no question the title is a solid 10 on a 10-scale. "How Beastiality Saved My Marriage." That's the kind of title that moves copy, my friend! But finding a way to justify the title with a worthy post is the difficult part.

Mr. Fabulous recently complained that my blog was lacking in beastiality references. Such stinging criticism is hard to take, but after several painful hours of honest introspection, I had to admit the little prick had a point. Make no mistake--there are beastiality references. I can think of at least two, here and here. But that's certainly, by anyone's standards, not nearly enough. Not by a long shot.

A peek at my Statcounter account proves it. I see queries for poop jacuzzi, picture crabs vagina and too fat to fit through, but shockingly few for subjects dealing with beastiality. People seek me out for tampon removal pictures, but it's becoming painfully obvious to me that when readers have questions about the tender intimacy that can sometimes occur between man and squirrel, they do not come to Karlababble.

At times like this, I have to hang my head and wonder if it's all been for nothing. I've slaved here at this computer, week after week since June of 2005, baring my soul in my struggle to come up with words of wisdom and beauty to inspire the masses--and the sudden, difficult realization that I've missed the mark by such a wide berth is...well, disheartening, to say the least.

The small consolation that now, after this post, I should get quite a few internet search hits for beastiality (having repeated the word just enough times to catch Google's attention), still seems like a case of 'too little too late.' Maybe I should just stop the madness and give up blogging altogether. I mean, what's the point? I don't know. Have you ever have one of those days when you just feel like nothing you do is good enough? Maybe I should see a therapist. It appears I've reached a crossroads in my life, and it may do me some good to talk to someone, or perhaps get a boatload of medication prescribed to me, or at the very least, have a sordid, degrading affair with the therapist. And if all that fails, maybe dabbling in beastiality will prove to be just the elixer I need to soothe my shattered soul.

Do any of you out there have a particularly attractive pet you could send me a photo of? A pit bull with some muscular shoulders, or a parakeet with a nice, tidy set of tail feathers? I've had my eye on Anonymous Coworker's cats for some time now. He parades provocative photos of them across the internet, showing those felines off like the eye candy they are, making me think he knows exactly what kind of amorous feelings he's inciting in some of his love-starved readers. I may have to give those furry little sluts just what they've been asking for.

For God's sake, I'm a prim and proper lady.

Sometimes I'm misunderstood.

My sense of humor can be so vulgar and offensive at times that people who first meet me tend to think that absolutely anything goes. Not so. Although there are admittedly few things I don't find funny, they do indeed exist.

The list of things I do find funnier is far longer. Supposedly off-limits subjects that I manage to crowbar into jokes on a regular basis:

-Murder
-Rape
-Alcohol and drug dependence/rehab
-Religion
-Abortion
-Black market babies
-Terminal illness
-Physical and mental handicaps
-Infidelity
-Kidnapping
-Fatal accidents
-Trading one's sister for 2 live chickens and a quart of tequila

Don't get me wrong--none of these things are funny where they actually exist. But joking about them existing where they don't is, in my opinion, good for a chortle. For instance, it's never funny when someone says, "My aunt Betty has been diagnosed with brain cancer." But when someone says (and they do, all the time) that if given a choice, they'd rather have brain cancer than be forced to read Assclownopolis, that's good stuff.

Zing! I kill me.

Things that are not at all funny to me include:

-Potty humor
-Knock-knock jokes
-Morning radio teams that call themselves "The Zoo"
-Jenna Elfman
-Anything that requires me saying the P word for a woman's private parts. (Oh, don't play dumb, you know what word. The one that rhymes with...um...scrussy?) I don't want to be so tedious as to refer to it repeatedly throughout this post as "the P word," so from here on out I'll give it the code name 'barrymanilow.'

Don't ask me why so many women are squeamish about saying barrymanilow. I think it's just inherent in the female makeup that most of us find it hard to utter that word. In fact, I never use the C word for a woman's private parts, either. Well, okay, that's not entirely true. Once, when my son was less than a year old and had a fever of over 100, I called our pediatrician's nighttime answering service. The surly bitch who answered the phone must have been in the middle of something very, very important--probably involving a metric ton of Twinkies and a bathtub full of Ben & Jerry's ice cream--judging by her level of irritation at being disturbed by my silly little phone call. Long story short, I was eventually forced--forced!--to call her the C word. I didn't want to do it, but the lady was begging for it, and I can only take so much begging before I cave. My always proper and polite husband stood nearby gaping at me in horror, and when he tried calmly to ask me what the hell I was thinking, I very nearly called him the C word, as well. As he backed away slowly, all I could think of in my defense was that a burning hot, screaming infant can cause a woman with an already-disagreeable personality to turn flat-out wolverine-like.

But in general, without the provocation of a bitter, hateful sow bent on impeding my ability to keep my son alive and healthy, I refrain from using either of those distasteful words. In fact, let that be a New Year's resolution of mine for 2007: The next time I have an encounter with someone as miserable and as deliberately difficult as that answering service trollop, I will refrain from calling her the C word, instead opting perhaps to call her a fucking whore, or maybe a disease-riddled crotchwaffle.

My 2006 New Year's resolutions: The review.

I made some resolutions last year, as you may recall. Of course, some of you weren't readers of this blog back then, and those who were are mostly drunks and lunatics, so the chances that you remember who you were sleeping with this time last year, much less my little New Year's blog post, are slim to none. No problem. I'll refresh your memory.

Here are my 2006 resolutions, with an update letting you know how I fared in keeping them:

1. I will not scale Mt. Fuji. This one was a unmitigated success. I scaled many things--2 prison walls, the homes of four hypersensitive people who unfairly refer to me as a "stalker," 3 closed liquor stores, and approximately 4,332 goldfish--but not one mountain.

2. I will eat only edible food, and drink only potable water. Do goldfish count as food? I think they do, and if so, this one was a success as well.

3. I will wear a bra when out in public. Usually my own. This one is iffy. I did indeed wear a bra consistently, and they were technically mine, if possession is nine-tenths of the law. But since I stole most of them from the locker room at my health club, many of them were sweaty and ill-fitting. Still, that counts.

4. I will speak English primarily. I aced this one, although my words of wisdom were, as usual, largely lost on fools and asshats, not to mention a few angry, braless women screaming after me as I raced out of the locker room at my gym.

5. I will do all I can do prevent flies from breeding in my car. I was doing really great on this one til the body of a hitchhiker that I left in the back seat started to decompose. Lesson learned: Next time I won't dawdle so long before chopping them up and mailing the parts to my negative blog commenters. Speaking of which, some of you guys should be getting a package from me in about a week.

6. I will use the phrase "gutless swine" in a sentence at least once in 2006. A rousing success here. I made it my new pet name for my husband, and that covered me rather nicely on this one.

7. I will not kill anyone with a machete. I'm a little embarrassed to admit defeat on this one. But I defy any one of you to stand in line at the Department of Motor Vehicles for 30 minutes without gutting someone like a pig. And as for that incident at the kid's play area at the mall, I stand by my actions. That 3-year old snotnose deliberately pushed my son.

8. I will drink more in 2006. While everyone else is promising to drink less, I will take the path less traveled, and I will drink more. One of my finest achievements to date. At first I thought this one might be a bit of a challenge due to my already impressive alcohol intake in 2005. However, I discovered that with determination, any goal can be reached. I found that drinking in the shower and while driving Jake to his Mother's Day Out class gave me the edge I needed to increase my intake 20% over my 2005 numbers.

9. I will not sleep with any dictators this year. I think I met this goal, but I can't be entirely sure since I was less than diligent about noting the names and/or occupations of some people. But none of them had goatees, smoked Cuban cigars or wore turbans, I think I can safely assume there were no dictators in the bunch, although a few were needlessly violent.

10. I will read great works of literature to sharpen my intellect and help develop my analytical thinking. This was a misguided goal. I did indeed keep up with the reading of that particular blog for a time, but I found that it actually decreased my intelligence at a rather alarming rate. Luckily, I was able to get back up to my previous IQ, and then double that, by going back through my own archives are reading over my previous posts.

11. I will wipe front to back. This was an easy one to keep. I faithfully followed the front-to-back method all through 2006, although it did get a bit boring by June or so. In 2007 I intend to spice things up by wiping in the shape of a different letter of the alphabet each day. Also this year, I'm going to use toilet paper, or at least something more than just my bare hand. 2006 was a messy year.

12. I will steadfastly refuse to participate in any plots to overthrow the government. And this year I mean it. Not only was I successful on this count, but I'm so proud of the restraint I showed here that I'm including this last item on all future resumes under the heading, "Past Accomplishments."

So there you have it. Twelve resolutions: 7 successes, 3 failures, and 2 undecided. All in all, I think my 2006 resolutions did what every New Year's Resolution is intended to: Serve to make me a better person. I toyed with the idea of making resolutions for 2007, but frankly, I don't see how I can improve over the current level of perfection. However, I'm willing to consider your ideas for resolutions I should make. Please keep them short, concise, and devoid of profanity or accompanying photos of sexual positions. Bear in mind I still have a few of those "packages" I can send out to deserving commenters.