You usually get what you pay for when it's free

This weekend, Margaret and I went to a free preview of "Failure to Launch" and our sights had been set deliberately low, since one of the reviews said "Failure to Entertain." After seeing Matthew McConnahey in "Sahara," we thought this couldn't be any worse. While that's true, it was still a totally predictable string of inplausible scenarios that had us spraining our eye muscles from rolling them so much. For all those Matthew McConnahey fans out there who are dying to see the movie, I'd recommend you wait until it comes out on video, so then you can just watch it while its muted.

Speaking of movies, one time our family went to the movies and, joy of joys, the balcony was open! Normally they never opened it, and to this day I don't know why--probably something to do with people smuggling cats into the theatre and throwing them onto unsuspecting theatre-goers below, but that's just a theory. Anyway we all thought that was the be-all end-all to get to be up there watching a movie--it was quite a thrill to be sitting so far back from the screen that it was reduced in our field of vision to the same size as our tv--that's why it was worth the $3.50 (yes faithful Internets, I can remember when movies only cost THREE DOLLARS!) Unfortunately someone who smelled like they hadn't showered in weeks was also excited about the open balcony because he was sitting right next to us. We were trying to cover our noses and just concentrate on the movie, but that was nigh impossible. Finally, my little brother, who was 6 or 7 at the time, leaned over to us and said, "This guy's got HBO!" We looked at each other and thought what is he TALKING about? How would Jayson know if this guy's got cable tv or not. After a second, he continued, "you know, Horrible Body Odor!" We about died trying not to laugh--it finally got bad enough that we moved to another part of the balcony.

Passive/agressive computing

I don't know what reminded me of this story, and I had some serious reservations about writing it here, given the carefully constructed façade of innocent Mormon farmboy that I've cultivated over the years. But then I thought, "What the hell" and decided to write it. So gather 'round, Internets, for a tale of ire and revenge so horrific that it will hearken back to a Greek tragedy.

It was the summer of 1992--I was an intern in Denver and all was right with the world (well, except for my assigned roommate, who could not pronounce the final "l" in words like "cool," "school," or "tool." My brother told me to ask if he swam in the poo, but being just off my mission, my halo was still pretty shiny, so I didn't) Anyway, during the course of the summer, we were supposed to be working on a major written project, and so as the time began to run out, all us interns were busy in the computer room typing our reports. On the day before the reports were due--and at this point some of the interns hadn't slept in over 24 hours--the organization's lawyer, whom I'll call Marv, not because that was his name, but it sounds like it, came into the room and told everyone they had to leave the room because he had a sensitive document to print out and didn't want anyone to see it. Wha? What ever happened to standing by the printer and just grabbing it as it came out? NO, Marv had to shoo six interns out in the hall so he could print something out. Well, as we were packing up our stuff, a little red Jeremy with horns and a pitchfork appeared on my shoulder. Then I got an idea! An awful idea! JEREMY GOT A WONDERFUL, AWFUL IDEA! I quickly pulled up a directory of documents off the server and found the largest file I could and sent it to the printer as I was leaving the room. I could hear the printer starting up as Marv pushed the last intern out of the room and locked the door. We just sat in the hall, waiting to get back in. After several minutes, Marv comes out of the computer room with a ream of paper in his hands and steam blowing out of his ears and marches over to an employee's office. We can hear him interrogating her about why she would be printing her department's workplans and priorities NOW of all times. The woman was dumbfounded. She had no idea how her project got sent to the printer. She meekly pointed out that she wasn't even working on her computer. It was everything I could to do to keep up my innocent façade. The computer guy finally had to come reset the print job, because it would have taken a LOOOONG time to print the whole thing out. Despite the fact that the original clandestine print job may have taken two minutes and ended up taking a half hour, it was TOTALLY worth it to see Marv knocked down a peg or two. I then promptly repented of my transgression (of having wasted an inordinate amount of paper) and have never committed a sin since.

This morning, I noticed that there was a message on our voicemail, so I played it and it was from my grandmother, only she wasn't talking to leave me a message, she was talking to my aunt about the chicken they were going to have for dinner. Thinking that they were in the middle of a conversation and that they were going to leave a message, I continued to listen... to the entire three minute conversation! I have no idea how that could have happened, but somehow we got included in a three-way call with them, and since we weren't there to answer, it ended up being recorded for posterity on our voicemail. When I called B to tell her about it, she was amazed and we both tried to figure out how it could have happened. I wonder if this is some provision in the Patriot Act where international calls are wiretapped to Homeland Security while dinner plan calls are wiretapped to us. I'll do my patriotic duty when I get the calls to critique the menu options and, with an air of moral superiority, inform people that if they make the pita sandwiches with hummus spread for dinner then the terrorists have won!

Shudder. I was just in the bathroom here at work and when I went in, I could tell that someone had had asparagus for lunch!!! That makes me so sick--in fact it's why I don't eat it myself anymore--and then to me confronted with someone ELSE'S! And the thought that in order for me to smell that, actual molecules that were just in someone's bladder had to land on the olfactory surface of my nasal capacity makes me sick. Think about THAT the next time you smell something. I wonder how much one of those bubbles the bubble boy lives in costs?

It's now been a year and a half since Margaret and I were in a car accident on the coast. A car ran into us on Hwy 101. I don't know if the minivan was going too fast or just not paying attention (the fact that there were three kids in the car lends itself to the theory that the dad was turned around yelling, "Don't MAKE me turn this van around"), but he crossed the center line and would have hit us head on had I not swerved off the road. As it was, he still t-boned us, whipped our car completely around, and he almost went over the cliff into the Pacific. Both cars were totaled. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but our rear axle was ripped free from the car. The only reason it was still there is the crumpled mass of the car body kept it from going anywhere. We weathered it relatively well--our injuries actually came from the airbags. (Although I'd rather have the injuries that we did rather than a face plant into the windshield!) My arm got kicked back and I elbowed the door hard enough to break the plastic, and Margaret was looking at the oncoming car when the airbag when off and her head was pushed around too far. I still have problems with my elbow in cold weather and Margaret has to wear a night guard for her jaw. We still haven't settled with the insurance company, as my orthopedist said that I would be as healed as much as I'm ever going to by March 2006 and now that that's here, I realize that it's probably something I'll have to live with for the rest of my life. I'm dreading working with the insurance agent, because I have no idea how much to ask for. What is a healthy, functioning elbow and jaw worth? Plus, being Americans, we want to get as much as possible--a house in Tuscany would definitely make dealing with the pain in my elbow bearable! Any thoughts out there, Internets? How much should I ask for?

This weekend, the gang here in Portland gave Margaret a belated birthday bash. It had the theme "Red Velvet," which meant the curtains were hung with, obviously, red velvet, there were red ribbons and streamers, and the coup de grâce was the red velvet ice cream cake. It was frickin' AWESOME--plus, it gave us enough energy to dance until the wee hours of the morning, which is what we did when the party moved downtown. When we were driving some people home, they commented that they couldn't believe that I'd been out on the dance floor the whole evening. It must have been the 96 oz. of Diet Coke I drank before heading to the club.

Which reminds me of a time that Margaret and I were going downtown on the bus and the bus got stopped in a lot of traffic that wasn't moving at all. Finally, we just got off the bus, thinking we'd just walk the rest of the way--only a couple of blocks. Well, we ran into the lesbian parade that was part of gay pride week here in Portland, so we watched that and then went to the concert/dance on the waterfront afterward (which was much better than what we'd gone downtown to do in the first place--stop at The Gap). We had a great time, and the next day, sitting at church singing "I Believe in Christ" we had to laugh at what the other people in the congregation would think if they knew that just 24 hours earlier, we were singing and dancing with a bunch of gay pride revelers. Man I love Portland!

A friend sent me this list and I thought I'd pass it along (since I know you're all DYING to know this stuff, but hey, it's MY blog)

Four jobs I've have had in my life:
1) Home and Automotive department worker at ShopKo--yes, I even mixed paint and answered car questions... ME!
2) Norwegian equivalency exam grader--it was always funny to hear the returned missionaries swear when they ran out of time in the oral section
3) Collect culturally significant plants on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation--and no, none of them glowed
4) Graphic artist for a tribal fish agency--my current employ

Four movies I would watch over and over:
1) Princess Bride--"Stop rhyming, I mean it...Does anyone want a peanut?"
2) Ferris Bueller's Day Off--"YOU'RE the sausage king of Chicago?"
3) Dances With Wolves--"I'm in mooor-ning"
4) The Fifth Element--"bzzzzzz...bzzzzzzzzzzzz"

Four places I have lived:
1) Idaho--on an INDIAN reservation
2) Utah--going to good ol' BYU
3) Norway--the country that swung my politics from right-leaning to "Susan Sarandon, what are YOU doing to my right?"
4) Portland--where our mortgage resides

Four TV shows I love to watch:
1) Simpsons--I hardly ever have to think up dialog for myself... I can just quote the Simpsons for any circumstance
2) Star Trek--even though no versions of this are on tv anymore, I still can't help but watch them on reruns
3) My Name is Earl--just too funny
4) Wonderfalls--stupid Fox only aired 4 episodes but released the entire first season on DVD. I still mourn their decision

Four places I have been on vacation:
1) New Orleans--we went for Halloween 2001 and it was AMAZING. I'm glad we got to see it before...you know.
2) Scandinavia--Margaret got so sick of me always referencing Norway that she finally had to see it for herself.
3) Las Vegas--ah, Sin City... good in small doses.
4) New York--this appalled my parents, but Margaret and I would LOVE to live in this amazing city.

Four websites I visit daily:
1) www.apple.com
2) www.uncrate.com
3) news.google.com
4) www.fark.com

Four of my favorite foods:
1) Crustos from Taco Time--cinnamony, sugary goodness
2) Diet Pepsi/Coke--I have a hard time functioning without this foundation of my personal food pyramid
3) Red Robin hamburgers--I love their burgers, and the fact that they have bottomless pop AND fries has, umm, NOTHING to do with me liking them
4) Sacrament bread Devil's food cake--ahh... sacrelicious!

Four places I would rather be right now:
1) At our private Latin American white sand beach
2) At our villa overlooking Lake Como
3) At our cabin on the southern Norwegian coast
4) At the lottery commission's offices, collecting our winnings to pay for the above properties

Phew! After watching too much NBC Olympics coverage (and by Olympics coverage I mean enduring 40 minutes of commercials for every 20 minutes of programming) I was completely burnt out on TV. Yes, I know--JEREMY burnt out on TV. But before you start packing up your bags for Jackson County and the Rapture, rest easy that the desire returned last night when My Name is Earl and The Office were on. I'm still burnt out on TV for a while, but at least I'm not avoiding it like Margaret has been. She finally gave up after seeing the same commercials 50 times.

Speaking of TV, I remember one time on my mission when we found an old TV in the attic that we fiddled with enough to finally were able to get to show a picture. We reveled in the rebelliousness of being able to watch the forbidden fruits of watching Married with Children with Norwegian subtitles. Finally, one of the more straight-laced missionaries broke the TV, thus denying us the escape of bad American TV. Shortly thereafter, at a mission meeting, the mission president's wife told a story about some missionaries who had found a TV in their apartment and started watching it, then moved on to renting a VCR and movies, and then moved on to porn, and then FORNICATED! I remember thinking what a crock and that someone must have mentioned our TV watching to her and she wanted to scare God back into us. Well, the straight-laced missionary later remarked that he KNEW that she had been inspired to tell us that story for our sinful TV watching. Unfortunately for her, that didn't deter me much--at another apartment, there was an old TV and the fact that The Dukes of Hazzard came on during our breakfast hour was a great way to start the day. I know I'm probably going to Hell, but from what I've learned at church, HBO and FOX both broadcast down there, so I'll be all set.

I swear, junk mail makes me so crazy--almost as crazy as spam--and THAT'S saying something. I could have made a papier mâché float with all the refinance deals that are too good to be true, Arby's coupons, and lost child flyers. The worst, however, is an underwear catalog that I don't know how to opt out of. A couple of years ago, I ordered some underwear off Amazon.com--nothing extreme...in fact they were pretty childish--they had fire trucks on them and they made me hearken back to the Underoos days. Anyway, that evidently put me on the mailing list for this men's underwear catalog that looks more like gay porn. I keep hoping they'll notice that I haven't bought anything for several years and get the picture, but one just came last week. I'm afraid that if I contact them, that will keep me on their list for another two years. Help me internets!

Well, what brought up this topic in the first place was yesterday's mail brought us this piece of mail:

You can tell when something is important information for the addressee only when it's posted to "Current Resident!" Why couldn't my church disciplinary hearing notice property tax bill have been addressed to Mr. Current Resident?

FINALLY! Blogger is back up! Don't they know I have an audience to entertain? And I had a gut-bustingly hilarious entry to make when I sat down to post it, but in the interim, have COMPLETELY forgotten what I was going to write about! Hopefully I'll have remembered by tomorrow to post something then.