one of my favorite pearl jam videos. not like they have a huge catalog to chose from, but still. it was on the yield album and seth mcfarlane, the guy that did all the spawn stuff as well as i think bought mark mcgwire’s record home run ball did a sick video for the song.
anyway…
the last two days, i have been laid up on the couch, sick, at la casa delYerg with some coughing type of bungarutis. really not all that delectable of a situation, so i am not going to use my descriptive prowess to elaborate. but it gave me a chance to take a look at theYerg.com.
now, i have already transferred all the blogs that i did on myspace to this page. and most of those were nonsensical and fun. i really embraced my randomness and a wide open type of thought patterns. it wasn’t necessarily my hey day since with the randomness, i was all over the place. it makes things a little hard to follow. but it was entertaining complaining.
well, yesterday, i remembered my blogger.com days. this was when AD helped me set up the site on blogger.com and i had a screen door on a wacky little website builder program that fed the whole thing. when i originally started, it was to keep my friends and family apprised of my day to day life down here in charlotte so that they wouldn’t worry about me being so far from home. a lot of the blogs were about me going to play volleyball and then going out for a beer or two afterward.
i read the one blog about how i was amazed that i had gone uptown to connolly’s twice in one month! its weird to think about how much i have evolved since then. a couple of weeks back, i ran into greg (whom i used to play volleyball with) at dilworth neighborhood grill when we were having the Five O’clock Shadow party for Beards BeCAUSE. i had seen him every once in awhile since i quit playing ball about a year and a half ago, but those times were just to say hello and exchange well wishes. this time, i was enjoying the quiet before the storm on one of the events. i got there early and was reflecting over how the night was going to go and what it was going to do for the charity. he and i got to talking and at one point he just stopped me. he said, “dude, you aren’t even the same guy i knew two years ago.” i knew he meant it in a good way. and i was flattered.
this next year, i think, is going to be huge for me. as i continue to be more and more comfortable with who i am and what i am capable of doing, things are going to take off. it makes me think about all those times back in school (all levels) when teachers and then of course my parents would lecture me about not living up to my potential. but you will never hear me say that i have wasted the last 20 or so years of my life. the evolution of me has lead to this…

okay, i am not sure what kind of market is out there, but i am willing to start entertaining offers for the first photographic evidence of theYerg’s first born. i am not going to be like one of you silly saps that just simply posts the pictures on my myspace or facebook page so that people can comment on how adorable it is or how happy you are for me and the future missus. not this guy. i am following in the footsteps of all my fellow celebrities (by the time my first spawn hits the world, my star should be on the walk of fame in front of the chinese theater. okay, maybe just in front of a chinese restaurant…).
but i figure with inflation and whatnot, i will easily be able to dwarf the $20 million dollars that brangelina is getting for their twins. wait, for $20 million, are they actually selling the kids or just pictures of them? i mean come on people. i know these people are famous, but they are still just baby pictures!
you cannot tell me that all babies don’t look alike. okay, race aside, all babies look alike. and don’t give me that whole “it has your eyes and her nose” crap. not straight out of the womb. hell, you have to dress them in a certain color clothes just to be able to tell what sex the kid is! heaven forbid you dress the kid in yellow or something and make people guess.
and don’t even get me started on the naming issue. knox and vivenne? sure, that is fine with me. name the kid toejam for all i care. just don’t inundate my yahoo homepage with articles by baby naming experts. first of all, are you kidding me? nowhere do i remember my guidance counselor asking me if i had a pension for naming people. i would have jumped at the chance to go to college to name people’s kids! be at a party when some chick asks me my major… “baby naming. that is right, i am going to pull down the big bucks when i graduate.” i have been a master at giving people nicknames, i would kill to get in on the ground level of someone’s life for a chance to give them the one for life. baby naming expert… get a clue.
secondly, don’t sit there and tell me that the kids’ life is going to turn out a certain way just because of their name. people, these two average $20 million a picture. the kids aren’t going to have any problems. if they are smart, neither will their kids’ kids.
i am still amazed though that some magazine is willing to pay that much for pictures of babies. that means that some of you absolutely insane freaking people out there are willing to shell out the coin for this magazine just to see the baby pictures. why? i mean, are you ever going to meet that kid? are you going to walk up to him ten years from now and say, “oh, i still have your baby pictures from when you were in people magazine. we are so proud of the way you turned out.” maybe frame the picture with captions and all and frame it on your mantle? do i think brad is a good entertainer and that angelina is hot? yes. do i feel the need to hawk over their every move and worship at the tabloid alter? hells no. get a life people.

cruefest 2008. my god, just saying that gives me goose bumps. or maybe chills is a more accurate description of the feeling i get. either way, a crew of our own went out to verizon wireless this past weekend to see what the crue had to offer.
as we pulled into the parking lot, a young lady (i am going to try to be as polite as possible) walked past us with knee high boots, a black skirt that appeared to be made out of an ace bandage it was so short, and a black tank top that barely contained her.. ummm… brains. the WOOOO! that she got from passersby might have made it worth all the money the four guys she was walking with may or may not have dropped for her company.
as we filtered into the amphitheater, we all felt over dressed. not clothes that were too nice, but the fact that we still kept ours on. SOOO many different application of the rebel flag. whether it be a silhouette of an eagle tattoo or a bikini top, it was the most popular accessory of the evening. and then there were the skimpy pleather outfits that most women had absolutely NO business wearing whatsoever.
the mullets… oh the mullets. my favorite was the guy who was holding on so tight. he had his business section buzzed ever so evenly as if done with an electric turkey knife. and then the party section was some of the most beautifully permed locks you have ever seen on a man. but the whole thing was truly party since it was bleached blond… ahhhhh….
the people watching left you with a real sense of self. i mean, after hanging in that crowd for the evening, i honestly thought i might have a shot at curing cancer with the ingredients that i might find in my kitchen if just given a day or two to research some oncology. i am really happy with my contribution to society.
but i digress…
they played music there! pretty good music actually. we unfortunately missed sixx AM and trapt, but walked in right during the middle of papa roach’s set. it wasn’t bad. it had all the kids bobbing their heads in rhythm. just MAY have been a tad bit disturbing seeing a father son duo in the crowd singing buckcherry’s crazy bitch to each other. the kid must have on been about eleven…
then there was motley crue…
while they are not the most geriatric band still on the road these days, these guys are no longer spring chickens. hell, people were curious as to how mick mars was going to stand let alone play. and i will admit that i wasn’t the biggest crue fan back in the day. i went to the concert more or less on a whim. but these guys freaking rocked!
from start to finish, it was an awesome show. first headliner in a long time where i wasn’t chomping at the bit to get out the door to beat the traffic. as far as visuals, they went old school and new school. lots of pyrotechnics. and the big screens were flashing crazy shit. the collage of porn mixed with clips of GW bush was insane. almost surreal.
also surreal, the guy that was taking up a stall in the men’s room with his surprisingly attractive girl. on that list of things to do before you die, that guy can check off, oral sex from a hot chick in a bathroom were most people are hitting the urinals and at least forty guys know it is happening. and i can check off going to another kickass rock show…

guys, please realize the protocol as far as which urinal or toilet you are to use when a bathroom is occupied or unoccupied. i was in the bathroom today, alone. pulled up to the very first urinal. that left, to my right, one urinal and two stalls. dude walks in a picks the urinal right next to me. stage fright. now i have to play it off and come back in five minutes. if people just knew what the hell they were supposed to do, i wouldn’t have these problems.
so here is a link for you. take the test. know what the rules are…

… thou doth protesteth too much.
so, yesterday afternoon outside the BofA building downtown there was a group of protesters that were upset, i believe, with the BofA acquisition of a company that didn’t have the greenest of histories. as a matter of fact the company was involved with mountain top mining for coal. ouch. not pretty.
there was about a dozen of these protesters with there well crafted, obviously visited kinkos for the larger posters, banners and posters which displayed their discontent. there was one guy i think that probably came in at the last minute with his poster board and sharpie. he must have been trying to hook up with one of the protesters. i am half tempted to just lump them into a pachouli stinking granola eating tree huggers, but that wouldn’t be fair. some of them looked like they partook of more than just granola…
here was (one of) the part(s) that irritated me… these people were screaming at people just walking out of the building for their lunch break. innocent cube dwellers like myself. dude comes out of his hole to get some fresh air on a nice day. wants to just readjust his eyes beyond his computer screen. he walks out the door and… “you are the cause of global warming!” what the fuck?!
this comes back to one of the major problems with people who protest. they don’t research. maybe one of the pack does. he feeds them all the quaint little slogans and gives them pamphlets to hand out. the rest of the people are just people that he smokes pot with.
and i am all for being heard. i think that these freedoms are what makes this country great. the right to assemble peacefully. it even sounds nice. makes you feel like your government has your back.
here is the thing though. there really aren’t any governments anymore. yeah, those fat pudgy bastards in washington can sit there and make laws all the live long day, but what does it really amount to? not much without some sort of corporate backing. because, let’s be honest, corporations are what rule the world anymore.
think i am wrong? wait for the summer olympics.
all the assaulting of poor people who went through some sort of rigor or trauma or had a special achievement so that they could be one of the torchbearers for the olympics isn’t doing a thing. again, like the poor guy walking out of his office, your statement is misdirected. you want to put a stop to the olympics because of the social injustices in china? talk to coca-cola. talk to mcdonald’s. talk to chevrolet. those are the ones that have the clout. not your senator. and certainly not some poor lady or guy that felt honored to carry a torch that has been a symbol of peace and sportsmanship longer than you have been sucking air.
oh, and by the way, what did you do before assaulting that torchbearer? i mean, you have had eight years or so to prepare your protest and the best you could come up with is, “i think i will knock the torch out of the hands of somebody when they run close to me. yeah, that will stop what is going on in china.”
another hot button for me lately is the people protesting the building of coal fired power plants. yes, there are alternative power generating sources out there. you can power your calculator with a solar panel. now lets think of the size of a solar panel that is going to generate enough power to fulfill the needs of a city the size of maybe charlotte, NC. and you there with the picket sign, do you have solar panels on your house? do you have a windmill in your backyard to generate electricity? no? hmmm…
if you read a little more, you would find out that what these power companies are doing is actually putting in units that are at least ten times cleaner than the ones that are currently powering your home thanks to the standards that are being set for carbon capture. we could go nuclear. but you would protest that too huh? because with all the smart people on this case, none of them have fingered out that whole crazy nuclear thing since three mile island huh? seriously people.
oh, and by the way, these greedy power companies are just trying to keep you from dealing with same style rolling blackouts that california went through. (side note: i am all for cutting down on emission with hybrid cars. but do you know where your electric cars are going to be powered? that is right, off the power grid provided by your local power plant.)
and then there is the absolutely ridiculous. the guy here in charlotte that doesn’t want the city to build a baseball stadium for the triple A team because he thinks it is short sighted and we could get a major league team. this guy has the legal system involved which means his stupidity is costing me tax dollars.
let us take a snap shot of charlotte sports over the last ten years. you have a minor league baseball team that plays in rock hill, SC… the CHARLOTTE knights. must be a reason they play down there. hmm. then you had the charlotte hornets. they are in new orleans. the charlotte sting? folded. the charlotte bobcats? continually struggling and i am not quite sure, but they are not really setting attendance records. the carolina panthers? by midseason, you can you can usually get tickets for two dollars and a jawbreaker. the charlotte checkers? okay little hockey club.
and so you want to bring a major league baseball team to THIS town. dude, shut up and let the knights have their stadium so that i can drive less than forty five minutes to have a beer and a dog at a ballgame.
people, i have nothing wrong with fighting for a cause. but please realize your audience. i am not heartless and i am both social and environmental conscious. but i have never seen a whale in real life. i have seen polar bears at the zoo, on discovery channel, and animated in coke commercials. show me how it impacts my life. show me something that i can feel either empathetic or sympathetic for. cancer research, domestic violence, education, helping disabled veterans, assisting physically or mentally challenged people, AIDS research, all causes i have gotten behind in the past and will do so again. know your stuff before you take up my time…

so i have commented a few times on various internet pursuits about my inability to catch up on the cleaning of la casa delYerg. its pretty much started since the transplant bunny day which destroyed the joint. i still keep finding mini bottles throughout the house. and practically every piece of flatware, tableware, stemware, and underwear (okay maybe not the drawers) was dirty and in the kitchen. and to make matters worse, the dishwasher couldn’t really handle it. i washed the same load of dishes four times and they just wouldn’t come clean! everything just kept having these spots all over them. the irony? i just started using jet dry as a rinsing agent. for those not in the know, its ironic because i also take part in a website called jetdrytacos.com. but after some passing time, the stench eminating from the ktichen started to become unbearable.
so last night i take all the uncooperative dishes out of the dishwasher, take apart everything that i can without breaking something and cleaned some of the pieces. the new load of dishes went in and came out without a hitch. i know, my handyman talents are insane. so now my house doesn’t stink and i have my kitchen back… totally over my three week easter kitchen hangover.
so tonight, i decide to cook myself a gourmet dinner. you know, fish sticks and instant alfredo noodles. mmm, mmm good. i fire up the old oven to the preheat temperature. another nasty smell. this time its of the inflamed genre. at this point, you should have picked up on the fact that i don’t cook a lot what with the tongue in cheek comment about the gourmet fish sticks. so, inside my oven was the last place that i looked after easter. easter that was over two weeks ago. so when i found ted and rachael’s egg souffle’ in the oven, i was more than a little surprised.
the fun part was that i had the windows open to air out the kitchen a little bit. forgetting that, my neighbors probably heard me when i shouted i was glad my fucking fish sticks were finally done. yes, i live alone and talk/sing/shout to myself…
lets just say that the next shindig at la casa delYerg shall be an outdoor only gig. that is, if i can find someone with mowing tractor and a bailer…

ah, the ultimate day of the year for the jokers out there! the day of the year that you can lie through your teeth as long as you finalize your conversation with, “april fools!” fantastic!
my step mom sal tries to get me every year. she has in past years only because she practices the number one rule in pulling off april fool’s gags… you gotta get ‘em early. catch them off guard. people are still unsuspecting until you get busted the first time.
i pulled off or helped pull off a few good ones today. first and foremost, i appreciate all of you that expressed concern and sadness toward my declared exodus back above the mason-dixon line. i posted in the status of both my facebook and myspace pages that i had enough and that i was moving back to pennsylvania. april fool’s my friends. i am not going anywhere. the CLT cannot get rid of me that easily and like one friend said, i still have a lot to do in this town…
i got a few co-workers with the quick hit by walking in their office/cubicle and telling them that it was nice working with them, but this was going to be my last day. a few priceless looks came from that one…
but the best one of the day was a coordinated effort with my buddy brian tuthill at work. my friend sherron is more than just a little gullible and i love her to pieces for it. b-hill and i discussed it all last night and coordinated a quick plan. we seriously came up with this idea in about five minutes. i had to take the MINI into the shop this morning to get the dent taken out of the front fender, but sherron didn’t know that, so that left us a perfect opening for a crazy reason for why i was not at work.
i set the alarm on my phone to call b-hill around 715am. the message, paraphrased, went something like this…
“hey there brian. i am not even sure how to go about this. this is so freaking embarassing. i need your help. i cannot call my family. i cannot call any of my other friends. my god, this is so embarassing. i was driving back from the bar last night after having a few and i saw this girl that i thought was in distress on the side of the road. i picked her up and next thing i know there are cop cars everywhere. i don’t remember discussing anything about price, but they are charging me with soliciting a prostitute. i have been here all night. i just need your help getting bail and keeping this quiet at the office. god this embarassing. help me out if you can brian…”
i had the shaky voice and everything. it was a good performance if i do say so. so brian plays this for sherron telling her he got it this morning. she doubts the authenticity of the call, but he immediately comes right back over the top with, “i called the courthouse and am going down to get him at 930 since they impounded his car.” the awesome part was that b-hill had a dentist appointment at 930 that he HAD to leave for.
she bought it. hook, line, and sinker. she even came into his cube a few times to talk to B about how crazy it was and how worried she was. so when i got into the office a few minutes before B did from his dentist appointment, i tried to lay low. she asked where i was and i old her that i wasn’t allowed to talk about the case.
when we finally let the cat out of the bag, she was floored. absolutely hysterical. best april fool’s i have participated in in a long time…

sometimes, it just better to let things be. as a kid, you had that skinned knee that scabbed over. and you just couldn’t leave it alone. you had to pick at it. it gets a little worse and then you eventually get a scar because you didn’t let it heal right. idiot.
anyone that has been to la casa delYerg has seen that cool spiderweb effect of paint peeling in the living room. it kind of bubbled off of the wall and looked intentional, even though it was just paint that really didn’t feel like sticking. well, last night i was sitting there thinking that if i just peeled one of the pieces away that was basically hanging there, it would look badass.
i was wrong. not only was i wrong, but it didn’t really stop with just that one little piece. i now have about a four foot by two foot space scraped off. and its just the tip of the iceberg. so it looks like either the glitzy gold might be gone altogether, or i am going to have to get another gallon. either way, i have some painting to do…

i just got done watching “into the wild,” the story of chris mccandless. he totally dropped off the grid in pursuit of happiness without worldly belongings in the early 90s. it was amazing how enlightened he was, but at the same time, a little scary with the passion that he chased it. eventually, he became trapped in the wild and died.
it leaves me sitting here and wondering a few different things…
what if i dropped out of society like that? i would do it differently maybe. sell everything i owned and lived off of that. i know there is a sizeable handful of people that would miss me. and that i would miss. but there has to be some sort of cleansing that comes with that kind of journey. an empowerment. to an extent, i can say that i have made that kind of journey with the move that i made down here to charlotte seven years ago. i left a lot of people that i love back in pennsylvania. a few of those relationships have washed away in the distance i feel at times. other times, i can feel the distance pulling us closer and realizing the time we spend together is so sacred.
could i survive on my own out in the wild like that? i highly doubt that. i would probably give myself two weeks out in the wild. nevermind the fact that even a short time with nothing but my thoughts to keep me company and i would go stir crazy inside my head. its odd how sometimes i need to be left alone in order to clear my head and other times i need the interaction so that i can stop what goes on in my mind.
i know i wouldn’t be able to let go of the technology. sitting here and pounding this blog out on the keyboard of my laptop with a wifi connection, i am surrounded by three remotes, an ipod, and my cell phone. all within arms length.
the other thing that i am curious about is how i will be remembered. i know it sounds morbid, but if i were to pass, what thoughts and feelings would people be left with. i know that recent philanthropic pursuits have left me with a warmer feeling in my heart with the impression that i have left on the world. but a realistic look at things leads me to believe that it would just be a bunch of drinking stories with memories that are diluted by the very alcohol that fueled them. maybe there would be some funny stories or a handful of stupid blogs that nobody ever read on here and other online pursuits.
i don’t know. you should really see the movie.

i love a good juke joint. a place that you can go in and leaf through the selections to find some classics. some pearl jam ten, some old beasties, a little johnny cash. the essentials. but with al gore and his invention of the internet, it was only a matter of time before someone hooked a jukebox up to the internet where people could pay to download songs for everyone to hear. kind of nice to have that kind of catalog at your fingertips, but it also opens you up to anyone’s taste. which isn’t always good.
a few weeks ago i joined a bowling league. good times on a thursday night. its a lot of us twenty to thirty somethings just tossing back a few beers and chucking the bowling ball down the lane in between. just a nice night of the week to blow off some steam. but then it starts…
one man’s mission to torture the masses with his poor taste in music. actually, they were middle of the road songs. songs that if they came on the radio, you might not change it, but by no means do they make your top 25 on your ipod. and its also that he plays the same songs every week. not just that, but he plays “sultans of swing” by dire straights four times a night. i wish i was kidding. the level of douchebaggery associated with such a move is immeasureable.
people like this guy do not understand that not everyone shares the amusement with such situations. the thing about jukeboxes is that they are in public. where strangers usually intermingle. that being the case, not everyone knows everybody. so not everyone knows that you are maybe trying to be funny. or that not everyone knows of your tone deafness. or not everyone knows that you are missing the gene for good taste. or not everyone knows that you live in your own little world.
i was once in a bar where someone thought that it was funny to play every song by michael jackson that was downloadable on the jukebox. when i was in fifth grade, i would have been overjoyed. sitting there with my thriller trading cards and screaming out a “who!” along with the king of pop. but then he turned white and his life became a multi-million dollar after school special and i was no longer in awe of his musical catalog.
so let’s treat this unorganized and questionably retarded diatribe as a public service announcement. when you drop the quarter in the machine, look around the room and realize your audience.