Brady’s Blog

i am the one geek in the world who didn’t play dungeons and dragons growing up..

it wasn’t allowed in our house..

i’m pretty sure my folks thought anyone who played that game was going to grow up to be a satan worshiper..

turns out their logic was way off..

because even though all satan worshipers have certainly played d&d, not all of the people who have ever been d&d players worship satan..

some of them just admire satan..

which brings me to pokemon..

my kids want to play pokemon and watch pokemon and trade pokemon cards..

pokemon has spells and hit points and all that stuff just like d&d..

if i let them play pokemon, are my kids going to start worshiping satan?

and will they still play with the ouija board and real human skull i got them for christmas or is that just money down the drain?

i took this picture two days ago..

and i love it..

i love it because it reveals so much to us..

first of all, we know someone took a dump in one of these urinals..

i think that’s safe to say..

i really doubt this message is intended as a preventative measure against the possibility of someone someday maybe dropping one in the urinal..

“just in case.. let’s put a sign up in two languages that says ‘don’t poop in the urinals’”..

kinda doubt that..

and the bilingual effect is nice too..

because it says to the latino community “hey.. we’re not saying it was a mexican who pooped in here, but we’re not ruling you out.. now we don’t know how you do things south of the border, but up here.. these things are for peein’!”

the only thing that could have been better with the translation would have been if it was in some other more minority language.. like russian..

so the one russian guy that comes in there knows they have him pegged as the urinal bomber..

notice also that the translation is not exact..

this tells us the author and the translator are likely two separate individuals..

so someone wrote the first note..

and then handed it to someone who speaks spanish and said “write that in spanish and hang it below this..”

but instead of saying “do not poop here” as it is put forth in the english version, the translator simply says “the urinals are for urinating only”..

in literary terms this is known as the implied poop..

so anyway.. that’s a funny picture..

i thought you’d like it..

reminded me of another picture i took..

in mexico..

hmm..

the city of los angeles is imposing a one year ban on new fast food restaurants in poor neighborhoods..

allow me to trace through this logic for you..

i’ll think you’ll agree it makes perfect sense..

fat people are poor and poor people are fat and the only way to keep each from becoming more and more of the other is for the government to step in and tell these people what to eat..

brilliant..

it’s a nearly perfect plan..

slightly backwards, however..

instead of banning fast food restaurants they should just have the restaurants manage the flow of these obviously deadly menu items..

cigarettes are expensive and bad for you - but we don’t ban them.. we just manage who is allowed to buy them..

same should work for fast food..

each person who comes in the door should be weighed and put through a financial assessment study..

anyone found to be obese or broke is handed a low-fat, expensive menu while the rich skinny folks can eat whatever they want for $3 a meal..

sensible..

i hope this legislation passes nationwide soon..

i can’t wait to get in on the ground floor of the popeye’s black market..

i’ll be filling the trunk of my racing coupe with chicken fingers and jambalaya and making runs in and out of all the fat, poor neighborhoods..

east bound and down and all that..

it’ll be just like i’m back in grade school selling leftover lunch items to kids on diets..

my mom and my wife went with another girl to see mama mia..

while they offered no formal review, they did note that it might well have been enjoyable had they not been thinking how much i would have hated it and how much i would have been making fun of it..

and that’s just how it should be..

because there’s no accounting for taste, but if i can ruin stuff for people without even having to show up in person, i think my taste is just where i want it to be..

one problem in this case, however..

it turns out mama mia might have slipped into that category of movie which is so bad it circles the globe backwards and becomes enjoyable again..

just like some zombie movies i won’t mention..

in fact, tom scharpling himself said it was by far the worst movie he ever enjoyed..

and i happen to know he’s seen one or two zombie movies as well..

so.. i think i’m going to go see mama mia..

i might wear a dress..

i haven’t decided..

one of the favorite lake activities for our children is something called “tubing”

it is called “tubing” because it once involved a “tube” - the inner tube of a tractor or large truck tire generally..

and when i was a kid what we would do with that tube is hang onto it for fear of certain death as the very people who were supposed to be watching out for us in this world, the “adults”, slung us around behind boats at approximately six times the speed of sound..

today’s tubing is a little different..

because the tube is different..

in fact, the one we use the most is not a tube at all..

it’s a very well built nylon and rubber raft.. with two seats in it..

oh and one more key feature that would not have made much sense to incorporate into the design of a tube destined for the “inner” of a tractor tire but would have been profoundly appreciated..

handles..

the only handles you had when we were kids were the ears and ankles of the kid riding next to you or the knot where the rope went around the tube..

the latter of those seemed like a decent place to find purchase until the first time the thing went a little sideways or flipped over and ripped your shoulder out of joint..

so our kids have it pretty easy with the seats and the handles..

but don’t worry.. we make sure it’s still plenty dangerous..

in fact, if i didn’t think i would be gathering evidence for my own manslaughter trial, i’d grab some video of this and show you how dangerous it is..

you see, people my age are forced into coddling our kids - we can’t do all the things our parents and aunts and uncles did to try to kill us - we can’t smoke around our kids, we can’t drive around town with them in the back window of the car, we can’t even let them ride a bike without six layers of bubble wrap and four helmets on..

so when we finally get to put some kids through the ringer, we do it up..

in the case of tubing, we do that with speed..

just like our folks used to do.. only we have to go a little faster since someone put those sissy handles on everything..

i don’t like to scare them too much though..

so if i’m driving i always ask any pair of riders before we take off whether they would like to go suicide fast or homicide fast..

most kids choose homicide fast for some reason - probably because they don’t know what that word means..

anyway, we did some tubing today..

and davis had one of the most amazing crashes ever..

he got bounced out of the thing and went flying into the air..

when we got around to pick him up he had this to say..

“oh man! i went high! when i went up i looked down and only saw water..

that was awesome!”

you already know about the heath ledger running joke that i have going with a friend of mine..

it is despicable..

i know..

but he has managed to take it a step farther down the dark road..

with this poster..

the “HA” is part of the production poster..

the “BRB” (short for be right back) and the “JK” (just kidding) were his post-production work..

that’s him in the picture there..

just in case you want to know who to be mad at..

in case this kind of thing does anger or upset you, you should know we make plenty of jokes every day that are in far worse taste than this..

oh.. and if you happen to know us or something, and you’re disturbed by all of this, you might not want to mention it to us..

because believe me, it will only make it worse..

i’ve seen it happen..

the following is my speech to a two-legged dog like the ones you see on youtube..

“listen lucky..

first of all, i’ll tell you what my momma told me when i was little..

life is NOT fair..

whoever told you life is fair was lying to you..

so if you’re going to sit around and whine and mope because all the other dogs have four legs and you only have two..

well.. that’s your decision..

you can do that..

you can sit.. ok.. lay on your side right there and feel sorry for yourself and wait around for some human to come along with some magic wheels to put on you to replace your missing legs but–what’s that? they already did that? oh.. those wheels right there–oh i see.. so.. yeah.. whoa!

so you just slip into that thing there.. and wow - look at you go buddy..

nice..

so anyway.. um.. yeah.. the other thing i was going to tell you is this..

the puke eating and the butt sniffing you guys do.. you dogs..

seriously.. that is not helping you at all..

i don’t care how many legs you have, that kind of behavior is just way outside the mainstream in this day and age..

i know you guys pride yourselves on being so “human” and everything..

when is the last time you saw one of us just puke up a pile and eat it back down again?

oh har har!

not counting fear factor smart aleck!

look.. just spread the word lucky.. let’s clean it up a little bit..

that’s all i’m saying..

so that’s two things..

so far we have “life ain’t fair” and “clean it up dogs”..

now for the third and final point i think it’s best we go right back to the second point..

seriously.. dogs are gross..

i know this is redundant but i think it is that important..

you guys are just nasty..

did you know there were some ancient spanish tribes that washed their teeth with urine?

yup.. that’s true..

but guess what?

they dropped that when they discovered the romans considered them barbarians because of it..

sure.. it’s also possible they just slowly came to recognize pee is not for the mouth.. sure..

but what i am saying is “when in ROME” man.. you know?

so.. yeah.. thanks for listening..

and um..

well..

good boy and all that..”

and now i will tell you about the time i drove through a pile of chicken guts..

i was driving my mom’s car..

this was about 14 or 15 years ago..

i was in bentonville, ar..

i don’t remember what i was doing that day, but i think if you read on you’ll conclude i wasn’t in bentonville grading mensa exams..

i pulled onto the on ramp of the freeway and the truck in front of me was hauling chicken guts..

some kind of mix of chicken blood, fat, and i don’t know.. just guts.. best i could tell..

something very close to liquid chicken in my estimation..

anyway, just as i pulled in behind this truck, the rear gate came open just a few inches and spilled this muck all over the road in front of me..

nothing i could do..

just drove right through it..

sliding all over the place..

nasty..

as i recall it was about 99 degrees that day..

so i went immediately to the car wash, cleaned it up, and lived happily ever after..

or..

i went straight back to mom’s, pulled into the garage, and put the door down..

and if i close my eyes right now, i can still smell what that garage smelled like about 4 hours later..

just delightful..

i’ve already made fun of tattoos..

but i saw one today that takes the cake..

in fact, i’m pretty sure this tattoo loaded up the cake in the back of a pickup and dumped the cake off down the hill by the river behind a trailer park..

i would describe it for you..

if i didn’t have a picture of it..

but i do..

well.. not an actual picture picture..

i tried that.. but the elevator was too crowded..

but this is what it was..

you know..

except it had been inked into someone’s skin..

with ink..

like.. in her skin..

ink..

it was on the back of her redneck..

just dazzling..

very ladylike..

and very professional..

is this what it has come to now?

one can’t simply hang one’s diploma on the wall or simply carry one’s nursing registration card in one’s wallet?

one is compelled to have one’s credential’s embedded into one’s skin in ink?

did one graduate from the witch doctor school of nursing?

i mean.. seriously..

that’s how you have to tell people you’re a nurse?

why not just get your nose pierced and wear a thermometer through it..

by the way..

if i ever see that..

i promise to get a picture of it even if i have to pull the emergency switch on the elevator and pin someone to the floor..

tattoo

i drive a jeep..

my jeep is a 1997 wrangler..

also known as a tj..

and i don’t mean to brag here, but my tj is one of the most amazingly paid for jeeps ever made..

it is soooo completely owned!

you just wouldn’t even believe how mine this thing is..

and even though the officer who pulled me over the other day for having a .0067 ounce brain said to me “obviously this isn’t your daily driver..”, my jeep is in decent shape..

and it is my daily driver..

the manifold i replaced not long after i bought it is cracked again..

and the gas tank leaks if you fill it up too high..

and i’ve only washed it once..

but other than that.. well..

did i mention it’s paid for?

anyway, the first thing you learn when you get a jeep is the wave..

jeep people wave to jeep people..

not always..

some people are jerks..

but the rest of us realize what an enormously important connection we established with all the other jeep owners when we went out and purchased that particular vehicle..

we know about arbitrary brotherhood based on product consumption..

two jeep people waving at each other makes about as much sense as random people high-fiving at arby’s and yelling “yes! you like arby’s TOO! RIGHT ON!!”

but we do it anyway..

we wave..

it’s called the tj wave..

and it’s called that because some tj people are snobby and will not wave at a cj or a yj..

and there is certainly no waving at all involving the zj or xj..

what’s that?

the kj?

HA!

wave at a kj?

that is RICH!