STOP SMURCHING MY BUZZ

It looks like the knuckleheads over at BP are finally plugging up that underwater oil volcano, which begs the question: come on guys! Judging by the underwater footage of the spew, shot by a team of trustworthy mermaids and his majesty's most elite Octo-Guard, it seems to me that there were a number of solutions they could've at least tried to stop the damn thing:

1. Put a cap on it
2. Attach a big pipe to it and collect in a (some) big (really big) boat(s)
3. Open a gas station for the Gill People
4. Fill it in with mud and sand, which they finally did after a bunch of days, allowing tons of precious oil to be wasted on greedy fish and birds. Eat up fellas, it ain't gonna last forever.



Remember on the Simpsons when Kramer invented a bladder that goes on ships to stop oil leaks when the ships inevitably run into spikes? And you were like, "not bad"? I bet there are so many intelligent men, women and neuters out there with all sorts of ideas on how to stop this particular leak, but the pure bred moneybags who run the oil biz don’t want to hear them because they won’t even entertain the thought of communicating with people who don’t eat champagne sandwiches.

Since I’m riding an airplane on Saturday, I’ve updated my will, finally deciding that my hockey cards should go to my friends and not put in the time capsule along with a bunch of Stars Wars Episode I Pepsi cans, which are there mainly to confuse. Also since I’m riding an airplane on Saturday, I thought about new ways to protect us when a plane crashes. The most logical thing to do would be to outfit every seat with egg-like retractable armour. If the plane is in bad shape, the pilot or whoever runs the plane can push a button and the armour surrounds you. Inside the egg is Styrofoam or maybe that water from the Abyss that you can breathe in. So during impact you’re just a guy in a impenetrable ball. The exterior and the foam will be made from natural materials so you can just eat your way out and be a full Santa until the rescue heroes show up.

Branded schematic

BRING YOUR SEWING MACHINE, WE'RE MAKING CREME BRULEE

Holy cow you craps, my boss (my brain) just released the Victoria Day long weekend audit report, and the numbers are looking good:

100% of all dinners involved beef, 75% with beef and seafood.
100% of days featured an all-star supporting cast of family and friends.
UV rays were set to moderate.
1 new hat out of 7 new hats, 3 new t-shirts out of 6 new shirts fully deployed.
Zero hangovers.
Healthy mix of parties, live stage shows and nature.
56 extra gigantic, dick shaped condoms used, oooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!

To celebrate this, the company (my body) is going to Subway later.

Holy crap you cows, it was seriously a good long weekend. So good that last night I slept for over ten hours. The doctors say that's not so good for you, which I now understand because I can't see straight and when I do see something it's tinted green. Maybe I just have Shrek 4 fever!

Trying to pick highlights out of a weekend of highlights is a rewarding, yet tough job, not unlike being the judge of a tits competition. Here are the creams of the crops:

Seeing Conan O'Brien live
Having a double mom/girlfriend birthday visit/feast
Going to the island, eating hot dogs, playing bocce and watching geese fight

Is it rude to brag like that? The only things missing were BMX bikes.

On Saturday I take off to Italy for two weeks. Now I know how Michael J. Fox felt when he was filming Back to the Future AND Family Ties at the same time, because I'm smack in the middle of "the best my year will get". Can any seers confirm this? If so then I'm going to make the trip worthwhile and steal at least one famous Italian brand shoe, and if not I'm going to vacation like I ride a bike -- cautiously and with a helmet, but not cautious enough that I can't scope wandering chicas.

AGRICULTURAL UPDATE

Back in the old days, herbs used to grow everywhere and were only used by peasants to flavour shoe stews and bark sandwiches. Soon, Kings from sea to sea realized how cool herbs were and they became a regular bourgeois supermarket staple alongside the marshmallows and de-alcoholized beer.

Now, I'm a dream hunk who is not only handsome, but loves to cook, so for awhile I've wanted an herb garden to call "Glenn's Edible Weeds" so I can cook on demand when my chicky pie gets hunger pains for some fresh dishes. On the weekend my mom gave me a little herb garden and I put it on our fire escape, ready to treat it like an aromatic child. But then today I went to check on it and the parsley is already droopin'! I think it's because it's so hot out. Anyway, I'm looking to bounce back big time in time for summer harvest.

That's another good thing that happened on the weekend -- I got herbs.

ON DEMAND IS TV JUKEBOX I THINK

Click to make it bigger then click to make it bigger. Unless you don't want to see it at all, in which case head over the Internet Movie Database and do some research on Brian Doyle Murray.

WHAT'S THAT PART IN THE BIBLE ABOUT SEGA GENESIS?

I wish I could tell you that I went to UPS guns blazing, walking past the front desk and into the anus of the enormous distribution facility, personally tracking down my package, leaving a trail of my best farts behind and exiting to the applause of the other disgruntled customers, but I can't. I guess I did just tell you, but sister it ain't true and I'm no bad boy Pinocchio. It was all fairly uneventful. I didn't even have to raise my voice, although every other customer there seemed to be severely pre-menstrual toward the organization and its practices. Did you know that the drivers don't even carry company phones and will never use their personal phones to contact a would-be package recipient? Who do they think they are, 1992?

I consider the UPS saga the end of my worries for at least three weeks as I have a long weekend coming up as well as a lavish Italian vacation in my sights, starring relaxation, stunning vistas, food, and some of the world's most sought after babes. Because of this heightened sense of hakuna matata, any little thing that sucks in the next few weeks is going to be magnified. Take last night for example:

Me and my date went to go see IRON MAN 2, the new superhero movie about a suit and the man who inhabits it. The show was supposed to start at 10:00pm, but for some reason it didn't, which is strange for a movie theatre but common for puppet shows. 10:15 rolled around and we were still waiting, waiting being my number one pet peeve of all time, and Liv's number 8 pet peeve behind things like modern plumbing (she's an old soul), unpicked scabs and the Kenner Corporation out of Cincinnati. Because she was seated closer to the exit, she went to go find an employee to complain to, but realized that the screen beside ours was also playing IRON MAN 2 at 10:00 and was just about through the previews, so we pulled the old "go to the theatre next to the one you're at because the one you're at isn't playing the movie" and began watching.

Right away these buttheads behind us starting talking and wouldn't shut up so Liv gave them one of these:



But they kept talking so she gave a bigger one of those and they stopped for awhile. They talked off and on and it was so damn frustrating because I really needed to hear why the iron man was so sad.

I was too scared to confront these people who I think were South Americans in their early 30s because I don't like confrontation and I assume that most people carry knives.

I had my artist whip up this dramatic re-enactment. He really fucked up the look of the chairs though.

We got home, calmed down and ate some Tostitos Con Queso dip with Tostitos bite sized rounds, one of my favourite snacks and then I went to bed and didn't dream about Iron Man.

PIRATES PROBABLY INVENTED SURFING, THINK ABOUT IT

Every day I strive to add items to my list of things that are good and cool, but some days I can't help but wade through a bog of horseshit and ultimately end up adding to my list of things that I hate. Today is one of those days. The thing? Couriers.

This guy's company stinks, and his family should not be proud of the work he does.

If you're a lifelong fan of this website you may remember me having trouble with FedEx a couple of times. Because of these barfy experiences I was very weary when I ordered a jersey club jersey for a friend and found out it would be shipped via UPS, a service similar to FedEx. But UPS has good commercials and their trucks are poo brown, so I thought maybe, just maybe this experience would be delightful. I was wrong. It's been terrible. I'm stressed man.

PRIMER

They attempt to deliver the package three times. If you're not home after three times they hold it and then eventually send it back to the sender or something. I don't really know because UPS' website and phone service are so unhelpful that they make Wikipedia look like Dewey Decimal System. Keep in mind, you have no say in when the package will get delivered (something I learned late in the process). You basically have to be home all day or just get lucky and happen to be home when they come.

Attempt 1

Having had such horrible experiences before, I tracked this package diligently via the Internet and saw it was to arrive on May 12, which was perfect because Liv was home sick that day so she could answer the door and the package would be mine. Tracking the package the afternoon of May 12 just for interest's sake, I saw that they had been to my place but claimed no one was home, leaving behind a UPS note thing on the door saying they'd be back tomorrow etc. I'll give them a pass on this one because we live above a restaurant and our doorbell is kind of hard to find. Also, even if Liv had answered the door, the note they left informed me I owed them $23.98 that would have to pay via certified cheque or money order, which Liv obviously didn't have at her disposal because no one told me I needed to pay them. Why no one bothered to tell me of this BEFORE the delivery is a mystery that even Batman would shit his pants over.

Attempt 2

I woke up early and grabbed a money order from a sleepy, dick-faced teller at Scotiabank beside my house. That's a whole other story that just makes this whole process even more laughable that I'd prefer not to get into at this juncture.

Anyway, I left a note on my door that morning assuring UPS I was home and explaining where the doorbell is located. I even included my phone number just in case. When it came time for me to go to work I left detailed instructions for Liv, who would be leaving 2 hours after me, on what to do with the money order and providing her a SECOND note to put on the door after she left. This note said I wasn't home and to please come back the next day before 1:30pm or to just deliver it to my work address, which my brother and Liv later informed me was a ridiculous expectation.

Unfortunately, they didn't show up before Liv left and sure enough, tracking the package later on, I saw they showed up again and no one was home, so they left another slip saying they'd return on Friday for the final attempt, hopefully before 1:30 as I'd instructed.

Attempt 3 - The Final Attempt

Today I decided that if they didn't show up before Liv and I left that I'd leave ANOTHER note saying to deliver it to the restaurant, the idea being that I'd give the money order to the restaurant, they'd sign off on the package and everything would be fine. Unfortunately, I never got that far. Tracking the package when I woke up, I was greeted with this message:

May 13 9:56 pm

RECEIVER WAS UNAVAILABLE TO SIGN ON 3RD DELIVERY

ATTEMPT / A POSTCARD HAS BEEN SENT TO THE

RECIPIENT REQUESTING THAT THEY CONTACT UPS.

A phantom "3rd attempt". Just what I needed. This is the kind of bullshit that went down when I dealt with FedEx. I have no idea what this means, especially because it happened at 9:56 P.M. They only tried to deliver it twice. I immediately went about calling a human at UPS, which in this day in age is like trying to catch a cheetah with a pair of tweezers. I finally got a hold of a nice lady who couldn't explain why anything happened or what anything meant, but did provide me with the option to just pick up the damn thing at their distribution centre by York University, or schedule another attempt. Even though the D.C. is disgustingly out of the way for me to get to, I'm not leaving another delivery up to chance.

Pick up prediction

I predict I'm going to get to the place and there's going to be a huge lineup of people like me. When I finally get to the front of the line, they're going to tell me that I either owe them more than $23.98 OR that the jersey has already been sent back to the supplier. I'll fill you guys in on Monday after my adventure.

Conclusion

On a final note, as I was riding my bike to work today I passed a guy wearing the exact jersey I had purchased, and it's not the kind of jersey you see all over the place. This is the hardest God has laughed at me in a while.

So eat shit UPS. I consider myself a very reasonable and responsible person, and if you and your cousins over at FedEx have given me this much trouble in my young life, I conclude that you are the asshole and not me. I'll see you in person on Monday and if you give me shit, I'm going to graffiti your bathroom with as many pro-Purolator slogans as I can muster.

NO FAIR, YOU USED YOUR TITS

First of all, please give yourself an early Christmas orange and come see this show that me and my friends are putting on. It's got everything going for it - it's on Friday (the creamiest day), it's on kind of late (just like your favourite prom) and it features some of the funniest jokers around (just like the Liberal caucus!). The best part is that if you're a loud-mouthed bozo you're actually encouraged to be loud-mouthed and bozotic, as opposed to the other shows you talk during where you receive non-confrontational backward glances from comedians who don't know how to fight (present company included).

"Present Company Exclusives" would be a ssssssssssssssssssssssafe name for a store that sells ssssssssssssssssssssick gifts. I bought my dear mother a nice book on baking for Mother's Day and she loved it so much that she immediately baked me my favourite dessert: Sugar Raped Tart.



Because it was Mother's Day my siblings and I headed down the Quey Double You to our home hive to see the queen bee and her husband Don. I had a chance to look through some of my old stuff and in the dim candlelight, wrapped in our family's ancient quilt, crafted by the witch on my father' s side, I wept reflecting on a life well-lived and a future as yet undecided.

In real life I just sorted though some stuff on the floor and froze my walnuts off because basements are cold. Looking back on my scholastic career only confirmed suspicions that I haven't changed much over the years. I still like sports and writing stories and I still hate homework and math. My handwriting and drawing skills haven't improved and my old school journals showed me that much like today, my weekends are spent with movies and video games.

So what now? So far, being the same guy my whole life has landed me a leggy brunette and a penthouse apartment in Toronto's hottest area code. Professionally speaking, I'm still not the head president of anything, but I still know how to party and occasionally get the paying public to laugh live. So if I stay the course I'll end up something close to Danny DeVito as Jack the Bear in Jack the Bear.

I'VE HEARD OF GYROS BUT I'VE ONLY TASTED THEM IN MY DREAMS

Hear about that beaver dam that can be seen from space? I'm fine with the aliens thinking we're a planet of beavers. When they get here armed with specially designed plastic anti-beav weaponry, we'll be hiding in our best tanks with our best machine guns ready for a good fight.

Hear about the volcano erupting in Iceland that you can see from space? I got no problem with aliens thinking our planet is covered in fire mountains. Come on in boys, but I hope you brought your pick axes and heat suits.

Hear about the big oil spill that you can see from space? I got no problem with luring the aliens here with precious oil and when they get here, we show them a good time in our most exotic locales, then use their technology to clean it all up.

Hear about the NYC car bomb? Only in New York!

WINGY PHIPPS HERE, IS YOUR GRANDMA HOME, I'VE FOUND HER WIG

Every so often I feel the need to analyze my life and share it on the Internet so when they make the movie of my life, the actor playing me will be able to get into the role a whole lot easier. Dear actor playing me - just stay loose, refer to everyone as "dude" or "man" or "guys" and when you go down to the lake at lunch, stare longingly into the horizon hoping that someone will look at you and think "that man is important" when you're really just trying to put the Eek the Cat theme song together in your head. Anyway, if you're not interested in me being me, feel free to skip to the bottom where you'll find a picture of a girl in a bikini holding machine guns.



DEAR YOU

My goal for 2010 was stay confident and positive, because in 2009 it dawned on me that I wasn't a cool teenager anymore, but a real man who needed to get his act together, which scared the pants onto me. To go with this new attitude I needed new clothes (still got so many grade 11 shirts), and a new work ethic that would make Barack Obama seem like Couch Potato Archetype. So far I've been fairly successful at this -- I bought some new shirts with my own money that have sent the city's most voluptuous women into a tizzy and me and the guys rented that office (tiny room with slanted roof) as a place to write, order Chinese Food and watch Chappelle's show and go on the Internet.

ALTHOUGH

Sometimes the odd bout of feeling like an old bag of gum that no one wants anymore hits me and I react by frowning, lying down and consider becoming a chef. Sometimes I get in such a bad mood that I think there's something wrong with me, but then I saw a documentary on Ricky Williams and how he got depressed, quit football, got way into weed, yoga, natural medicine and being an absentee father, and decided that I'm not in bad shape. Compared to him and other manic depressives with social anxiety, I'm just a crybaby who sometimes gets tricked into believing that life's not fair even though I rationally have nothing to complain about (except taxes!).

SO

I look forward to watching Survivor every Thursday and just keep plugging away at various projects. My biggest problem is thinking that I'm not working hard enough because I know that to be good at writing and stuff, you need to do it all the time and since I'm still a TV loving, Internet addicted floppy walrus with the attention span of Blur from Transformers, I have trouble staying on task sometimes. But slowly, like the chili in the slow cooker of a single woman who can't cook, I'm getting things done and one day a time lord will come into my life and show me that things turn out just fine.

"Hi big boy, give me all your love or I'll shoot. I mean gloves. Give me your gloves. Those priceless ones covered in DaVinci's paint. Seriously, I'll kill you."

REMOTE CONTROLLED BLADDER

I wish we would take the end of the day more seriously.

When midnight rolls around most people are too concerned with werewolves, bedtime and convincing someone to have sex with them to savour the last few moments of a complete day. Instead of setting an alarm to wake me up in the morning, I set mine for 11:55pm every night so I can pay my respects to Father Time and his wife the Sandman. How I pay my respects varies depending on how things went that day:

When I have a good day, I sit in front of my favourite clock and when it strikes 12 I light a cigarillo, recite the Lord's prayer, pat myself on the back, and write down my goals for the next day. My default goal is to win a contest.

Father Time arrives home and doesn't even get a chance to ask if there's any Coke in the fridge before his kid snaps a rather unflattering shot of him not even wearing his beanie.

If I have a bad day I sit in front of my favourite clock and when it strikes 12 I light a cigarillo, do 30 sit-ups and think about how I can combine certain chores to save myself time in the future. At 12:01 I set a mousetrap off with my tongue to ensure that the day will only get better. If the day gets worse then I do the same routine at midnight, except instead of the mousetrap I just go and eat some garbage and listen to Chris Cornell. Once I vomit, I save it and if the next day is even worse I eat the my puke and then stick my tongue in a mousetrap.

My goals for tomorrow are to get a haircut and do some laundry, but with my hectic schedule it's going to be tough to complete both. Every laundromat should be next to either a barbershop or an arcade. Is there some way we can use the Internet to make this happen? Whatever happens to you tomorrow, just remember that everything goes on sale eventually, so you'll be able to afford those suspenders one of these days.

I'M SO STUPID I THINK LEATHER COMES FROM TREES

Fearing another wasted weekend day, I woke up this morning, tied up my pants, waxed my nose, grabbed my girl by the hair and was off to the AGO to check out King Tut on his last day in town. It was a pretty good experience because I love ancient things, but it was a bit crowded and everyone was moving slow.

Here are some thoughts on Egypt:

Every time you see something about Egypt and the Pharaohs, it's always very mysterious and mystical and there's all this spine tingling music and statements like "the Egyptians were a mysterious and mystical people". I bet if you went back in time though, you'd find them all pretty silly. The music that plays in your head would be more like Yakety Sax. People praying to cats, people not knowing what the sun is, people who don't even know about outer space, people who think farts are sacred... the list goes on. The only trouble is that murder wasn't as bad back then because they had way more excuses, so you would probably get killed pretty quick because you talk different and you keep asking dumb questions. Your murderer would get away scot-free because he'd just say he did it because Anubis came to him in a dream, dreams being the most trusted source of knowledge back then as well as legal tender.


I also think that the Ancient Egyptians didn't have a lot of fun. They spent their lives having kids, praying, and carving things all damn day. The only fun they ever had was probably swimming and maybe playing games that we'd think are total shit. But that's not their fault, and I'm sure they still knew how to party, except instead of music and DJs they'd get the best and most sacred cats together and just listen to the purs and meows while drinking alcoholic mud drinks and smoking old fur.

We got some grilled cheese at the Grilled Cheese after, and I was disappointed to find out that they had no soup on today. You guys don't even know how much I love soup. That's half the reason I even wanted to go the damn place. Anyway, the grilled cheese was good but didn't really make my ears flap all that much. I gotta have soup with my grilled cheese. It was like going to Hooters and having a boy serve you, am I right hetero males?

VICEROY CONTENT

Okay, I'm having a damn mental breakdown right now guys, holy crow. It's Saturday, right? So like, I'm supposed be all relaxed and have all sorts of urban activities stored in my smartphone's scheduler app, you know? Well first off, I don't even have a smartphone, so like, what the hell? Second, I want to play tennis, the original extreme sport, but like, there's rain? This isn't London, England, it's Toronto, Upper Canada, the nation's sunniest hamlet! So I need my exercise but there's a Fresh Meat 2 marathon on MTV, which is a show about 20-something psychos wrestling and having sex for money, so, like, my brain is flip flopping like a stunt clown. Breakfast is over, so I don't have to worry about that, but lunch is on the horizon and I don't have anything thawed.


This has been an exagerated account of what has happened to me so far on Saturday, May 1, 2010. If I get kidnapped this afternoon, the police will be able to use the above in their investigation and I will allow it to be re-printed in all major newspapers and the hottest gossip sites on the web.