Sticklers' World

Work in progress...

2011-06-17T19:43:00.001-07:00

Just something I have been drawing for fun!

Standup Paddle Board or Road bike?

2011-06-15T15:56:00.001-07:00

This is the question ladies and gentleman of the blogosphere, also how I'm going to make my return to writing. If both cost exactly the same which would you choose? The workouts using both tools are amazing, so that is non-factor. The road bike would be bring me one step closer to being able to do a Triathlon. The Standup paddle board would solve my summer woes of small waves in front of my house. So which should I choose?

A Brick Wall....

2011-06-14T16:00:00.000-07:00

This summarizes how I feel today.

The one about the cute neighbor...

2010-10-14T19:44:00.000-07:00

Living in Lalaland I have noticed that it is weird to know your neighbors. Driving alone in our cars for hours on end, stuck in heavy traffic has made us antisocial. Where I grew up we had a block call list, block parties during the summer, BBQ's, and events that brought the community together. Here people rush out of their apartments to their cars hoping they don't get mugged and when someone does approach, the other person is freaked out by the interaction. Which brings me to my story...

I'm not sure how long ago it was that the girl moved into the building across the street(Henceforth known as Cute Neighbor). What I am sure about is after she moved in she left a note on my roommates car. All it said was,"

Hey I have seen you walking down the street to play volleyball on the beach. I like to play volleyball and have been looking for people to play with. Here is my number ***-***-**** give me a call. Cute Neighbor."

Now the odd part is my roommate doesn't play volleyball, but our cars are similar and both are parked in front of the apartment so she could have gotten them mixed up. So my roommate, called her and told her he didn't play volleyball but if she ever wanted to get a drink or what not. He of course told me this story three days after the fact and I asked him why he didn't mention that his roommate plays volleyball every weekend.. with all the locals... and in fact there is an email list for the courts so people know when others are playing. He just smiled and said,

"Oh yeah, I didn't think about that."

Time went by, and I forgot all about this random interaction with Cute Neighbor... until today. Now I have noticed Cue Neighbor and her really big sunglasses walking into the apartment every once in awhile. In fact, since I know pretty much everyone who lives around us I have even thought about introducing myself. There really never was a moment when we were walking on the same side of the street, so it just hasn't happened yet. Today, while I was driving down a busy street through the downtown of my beach community I looked over and saw a very cute woman walking in the opposite direction carrying a large heavy bag... She looked familiar but I couldn't place her, so I continued driving to pick up my repaired surfboard.

A little side tangent, I broke my surf board during a huge swell two weeks ago. The fin box got ripped out and I lost one of the fins. When I brought it in to my surf shop, the dude behind the desk told me I'm lucky I didn't break my board in half. The amount of force it takes to rip that out of the board could have not only done worse damage to the board, but screwed me up as well. This also occurred to my new awesome 5'4" Biscuit that I found in perfect condition on a used board rack. I was bummed...Well, it finally came back and 85 dollars later... I guess I'm surfing again this weekend.

Back to the story, about a block past the woman I realized why I felt she was so familiar...it was the giant sunglasses and that woman was in fact Cute Neighbor. Being on a one way street I realized all hope of turning around and offering her a ride to her place was lost. I continued on my way to pick up my board.

When I returned to my place I put my board back in its resting place on the rack in the garage. As I exited the garage and started to walk around the corner to the entrance of my building Cute Neighbor came walking out of her apartment. I looked back at her and she waved and I smiled and we continued on our way.

So my problem...I need to have a conversation with the Cute Neighbor. But how do I go about doing this? As I stated at the beginning, Lalaland is a place of people not approaching each other. How do I approach this woman I have never met on the street and not make it weird? Go ahead Internet community, give me some advice, and make my return to blogdom worth it.

Another Blind Date...

2009-11-08T13:05:00.000-08:00

The blind date... I've always hated blind dates, the whole experience of them. Starting with the awkward set-up all the way to the bitter end of the night when both parties usually question what their friends were thinking. The only saving grace of these truly horrific evenings are the stories that become legend told over beers, various dinner parties, or even wedding speeches for the rest of your life. Not to say their isn't the occasional success story, but most go something like this...

It was just another day at work. Everything was moving steadily along when I was introduced to a very nice older couple who were visiting LA from Texas. He was an older gentleman in his late 40's, distinguished, with a tie and jacket. She was in her early 30's, and cute in a nerdy sort of way, with a nice sun dress. By the looks of them he was rich and she was riding the gravy train. Now whenever we have guests at my job, we give them the star treatment, literally! These people were no exception and as their day with us was winding down the woman turned to me and said, "Stickler, Do you have a girlfriend?" I was a little taken aback by this, I know we had all just spent the day together but are we all really that close? So I answered with a "Not at the moment..." The woman looked to the older gentleman and said, "Why, your such an adorable guy, we know the perfect girl for you." I immediately knew what was happening, I was about to be set up...

The woman reaches into her bag and grabs her cell phone as I stutter, "You know that is ok...I'm kind of getting over somebody..." basically anything to not be set up. The woman goes, "Oh don't be silly, She is a beautiful girl, she is my niece, and her name is A...She just moved to LA...Let me show you a picture." So the woman goes to A's facebook page on her iphone, got to love technology. She forces the phone into my hand and says, "See, she is beautiful!" It was a picture of A on the steps of a sorority with many other girls, I assumed she was the one with the blond streak running through her dark hair. She looked cute from what I could tell. Suddenly the phone was yanked from my hand and the woman is texting A. She turns to me and says, "Ok it is all taken care of I told her about you and she wants to meet so I'm going to give you her phone number. All you have to do is call her!" Next thing I know she is putting A's number into my phone and then they are gone saying goodbye to everyone else.

So I stood there, looking at this number. I guess it couldn't hurt to call, but I needed a plan. Questions were running through my head, What do I say? What should I ask her to do? What if she is a terrible racist? Etc... Well, before I had time to really think on it my boss was yelling at me for something and I was back in the zone of my job.

A couple days passed by and I had a plan...kind of. I was going to call A up during my lunch break and make some sort of witty joke about how crazy her Aunt was...Yeah that would be perfect and then ask her out for drinks. Something simple that I could get out of easily if things turned sour. The clock ticked by and it was my lunch break, I picked up my phone and hit the dial button. The phone rang a couple of times and I got an answering machine. It was sweet sounding voice with no Texas accent. I left a very awkward message that went like this..."Hi A, My name is Stickler and I met your Aunt and Uncle the other day at my work. This is super awkward but they said we might get along so call me back when you get a chance. Hope your having a great day!" I know, I was kind of hoping not to get an answering machine...but again what do you say to someone you know nothing about in a phone message?

Well, regardless later on that night A called me back. She did indeed laugh at what her Aunt had done. And as we talked it turned out randomly that she had gone to the same college as I in Indiana. This made things even easier so I invited her at the end of our conversation to get up super early on Saturday Morning to watch the IU game with me at the Alumni Bar. My thought was if all else fails at least their would be many other people around. Well she didn't show... it turns out she slept in... At least I was at the alumni bar with friends. She did call and we rescheduled for a Tuesday night.

Tuesday night came and I was going to meet her at this certain bar that was known for their brews from around the world. So I'm sitting at the end of the bar waiting...minutes ticking by. Enough of them for me to finish my first beer. When a girl walks in the door. She was totally out of the eighties, Big black hair swirling in all directions held up by product, black stretch pants, little black boots, and a black tight jacket. In my head I thought, I wonder where she parked her Delorian? She then approached me and introduced herself as A. Jokes and jokes and jokes were swimming through my head. I stifled my brain and said, Hi, I'm Stickler. We sat there talking and it became very clear very fast that we had nothing in common. To make matters worse she was just another actress looking for a job. We parted ways and I was even nice enough to invite her to an event my friends were putting on... I mean she did go to my college. She called me the next day and turned me down.

I hate blind dates!

A rant about Tradition...

2009-10-24T01:23:00.001-07:00

I can't sleep... I went to the Doctor thinking it might be something wrong with me. After a few tests he informed me that I was just sleep deprived attributing to the fact that my brain won't stop turning. I guess that is why I'm writing right now. I've tried everything and maybe if I just start typing away again I'll lull myself back to sleep.

I got in a fight last weekend with some friends. See after living in LA for as long as I have some traditions have developed... for example once a month I make the 45 minute drive to "Portillo's" in Buena Park because I'm craving Chicago food or whenever I get out of work early and I'm in Los Feliz I stop by my old roommates place and we go out for Sushi. Well one of the biggest long lasting traditions of my time here has to do with Karaoke. When I first moved to LA one of the first bars that my friends and I came across was a place called "The Brass Monkey" it was a quaint karaoke bar in Korea Town. It was never super crowded and the DJ was fantastic.

My group of friends started going often enough that we became Once a Monthers. See in the Karaoke world; people who frequent a place receive more clout and are able to sing more frequently. Even if this person is really bad, but they show up every Tuesday and Thursday, no matter what they will get to sing and jump the line of newbies ahead of them. As Once a Monthers we developed a brand that we when our group got up to sing we pretty much dominated and made the room a buzz. My repertoire would start with "Come Sail Away," by Styx, then "Strokin" by Clarence Carter, ending with our entire group getting up and singing "Total Eclipse of the Heart" by Bonnie Tyler. Now of course I'm not the only one singing, everyone else had their own list of songs they would sing... and like I said we were all pretty good and knew how to woo the audience. We became known as Jenny's Fan Club...because we would always go on nights our favorite waitress Jenny was working. We would tip her big and get freebies in response.

Well as time went on and I moved out of Hollywood we stopped going as often as we used too. In fact the Brass Monkey has become a Bi-Annual occurrence now. We don't have the same pull as we used too, but at least they remember us when we walk in the front door. This past weekend though new people were along, new friends. And one of the girls actually had the nerve to put in her song as "Total Eclipse of the Heart." I was pissed. That was our song and because we don't get together and sing anymore... when we do it is kind of special. But she didn't care. She didn't care at all. It was infuriating. To the point she got up and sang the song to spite me and her rendition was terrible. My friends all said it wasn't a big deal...but I thought it was because like I said before it was tradition that this group of guys who don't really see that much of each other anymore would get up and sing that song, with the terrible choreography that we made up years ago. Tradition, what happened to it and how could someone be so obtuse to not see that maybe it is important?

When you're on a roll...

2008-08-24T19:24:00.000-07:00

In a sudden spurt of creative energy I have decided yet again to begin writing...

Well it all started with what I like to call the surfing disaster. By no means am I a surfing legend or anything and this was all made perfectly clear to me 3 weeks ago. While flying down a wave with a velocity faster then usual, I had the wave break over me. Flipping my board into me, pushing me to the ocean bottom, and dragging me through the sand.

When I stood up, the pain kind of shot through my body all at once. A pain I had never felt before. So after a couple of days I went to the Docter to find out I had cracked one of my ribs. He chuckled and said, "Well, there isn't much I can do, but it will be painful for about 8 weeks." Now you may ask what is painful? Everything, it hurts to breath, move, talk, sit, lay down, eat, pretty much do anything.

So a lesson, don't crack your rib it isn't worth it.

Speaking of ribs, Whale's have large ribs, so why not go check out a new blog I'm writing with some friends about Moby Dick, and remember it isn't a book club, just a group of people reading a certain amount of chapters of a book each week and then discussing it...

How to explain what I do when I'm not writing...

2008-06-15T10:30:00.000-07:00

A hair stylist on my current project basically put our job, without saying what it was, into a quote that explains why I get so busy and lose track of time...

"It's like the movie, Groundhog Day, in hell!"
- Anonymous

Couldn't have put it better myself!

Stories from the Weekend

2008-06-09T12:54:00.000-07:00

It all began with a peaceful Friday night by myself watching the Cubs/Dodgers game on my enormous HD TV. It was the 8th inning and the cubs had just blown another, when I heard a loud bang outside. I ran to the window to see what had happened and saw a large gold Toyota Tundra backing out of my suddennly smashed in bumper.

I ran out the front door and jumped on the hood of the Toyota as it was pulling away. I yelled at the guy in the car, "Man, you just hit my car!" He responded with, "No I didn't!" I explained that I had seen him hit it and that I was getting off his hood till he got out and gave me all of his information. He conceded and admitted that he had inadvertently run into my parked car.

I was pissed, so my car is in the shop and it is costing about 1500 dollars to fix. Luckily his insurance company is going to pay for all of it, because clearly I had nothing to do with it.

What I cna't believe is that their are some people that actuelly believe they can hot a car and get away with not telling the person or at least leaving a note. I have come to the belief that their really is no comon decency left in the world at all, that people are pretty narcisistic and could really care less about the well being of others. Maybe this is just in LA, but schools really should be teaching children to have respect for others and to take responsibility for their actions, because it seems like US citizens are really lacking in that. What do you think?

Change is inevitable, except from vending machines.

2008-06-03T22:31:00.000-07:00

I could go on and on about how Thrill has been trying to get me to start writing again, but that would be some long drawn out story about getting naked in the streets of San Francisco and possibly doing other acts that could be deemed as arrestable offences. Instead it was a singular moment earlier today that had my head in a whirl. Suddennly nouns, verbs, and sentences were impedeing my vision to the point that if I didn't spill them out onto this piece paper I probably would explode. What was this moment you ask? Well, it was when I saw this...

For those of you that don't know me(probably most of you that religously read my blog, if any of you have stayed by me with my 6 month hiatus from writing)this is the view from the gigantic bay window at the front of my new apartment. or as I have nicknamed it, "Paradise." I looked out to the ocean this morning and saw surfable waves and warm weather. "Summer is here folks!"

I went down to my garage to grab my board and happened to notice the gas price at our corner gas station was $4.29. Gas is getting mighty expenisive, but living at the beach has caused me to drive less. My bicycle has gotten a lot of use!

I headed down to the ocean with my roommate and we went surfing. The swells were great today, it wasn't crowded and they were about 4 foot curls that had a really soft feel to them. But I'm getting away from my story. After our surf session was over, we climbed the hill back to our apartment and I looked to that gas station again. In the course of 2 hours gas prices on regular fuel changed to $4.37. I did a double take and almost got hit by a car while crossing the street.

Change, it happens quickly and sometimes when we least expect it. Kind of the moral of my life right now...but that is a story for another time.

P.S. I'm back baby!

I thought the number would be more!

2007-12-20T23:18:00.001-08:00

Want to be a x ray technician?

On my way home...

2007-12-18T17:59:00.000-08:00

It is raining outside, pretty heavily from the sound of it. I'm sitting in my room trying to decide what to take with me, see I'm heading back to Chicago in the morning for my two week holiday vacation from LALALANd. I'm excited to be back in a world where people care for each other and don't try to stab each other in the back. Where instead of single people clogging up the roadways, family's caravan around the city spreading holiday cheer. Where instead of gloomy 50 degree days with weird rain that creates mudslides, their will be snow for miles and children running around like ait's a peanuts christmas special catching snowflakes in their mouths.

But I'm sitting here packing and I hate packing. I never know what to take with me. Currently trying to figure out where to shove my guitar hero cotroller in my bag so it doesn't get damaged. This year I bought all my presents on the internet and had them shipped home, so no need to worry about space for those. I feel like I need a new wardrobe though when Iay all my clothes out. TOday I went to JCREW just to look, but it was weird. It was like they through colored paint all over the summer line and had it shipped out to LALALAND for the holidays. I bought white t-shirts from target instead.

My flight leaves at 630am. Yeah, it is freaking early. At least I'll get to sleep on the plane. I wonder what it will be like to go home this year? Will their be a certain someone excited for my return to Chicago? Will my Mother watch movies all day and night with me? Will my Father force me to shovel, clean the house, and beat him at scrabble? Will my Brother be happy with what I got him for Christmas? Will my friends all be in town to hang with? Will I be sitting front row for a STYX concert in Waukegan? Will I watch the BLackhawks beat the Kings? Will I go sledding and get hot cocoa afterwards?

Will I figure it all out?

Guess you will all have to wait and see, but I leave you with this link to my favorite Holiday Song!

Fire Fire Everywhere...

2007-10-23T21:19:00.001-07:00

If you have been living in a box you probably have not heard about the state of emergency California is in right now. The fire are raging out of control this year making the sunsets beautiful. During the day though my entire city has been consumed with smoke. Now last week went hiking seen here in the picture. This of course does not exist anymore since the fires raged through this area about 2 days ago. Kind of sad to think about something so beautiful wisked away in flames.

San Diego has gotten the worst of it, The fires are absolutly out of control consuming over 1100 homes already and evacuating over 500,000 people. Kind of scary when you think about it. But the refugees are ok...it turns out that a majority of them have gone to Qualcomm Stadium. where live bands are playing and they are getting catered food. Now for those of you that think FEMA had anything to do with this...well your wrong. See Governer Schwarzeneger and withh all the rich people that were displaced set this up. In fact FEMA isn't even arriving till tomorrow. With President Bush so he can congradulate them on a job well done? Yes...this proves one gigantic point unfortunatly. If you have money these emergencies are taken better care of...especially i the president and FEMA don't step in!

The Price is Wrong...

2007-10-18T13:25:00.000-07:00

I awoke this morning kind of late. See I like to sleep in when I don't have to work. I think this has something to do with not getting to sleep more the 6 hours during the night when I am working. Regardless I always wake up on my days off, flip on the TV, and watch the Price is Right!

Now it use to make my day to see Bob Barker with all his energy making peoples days by shelling out a few thousand in plinko or winning that "new car." but this morning, this morning their was no Joy in "Price is Right" land. No, their was saddness, lack of enthusiasm, and utter boredom. Yes, I got to see an episode of the Price is Right starring Drew Carey.

The Drew Carey show was excellent, but Drew on POR was was awful. This show will never be the same without Bob Barker. The audience was hardly into it, Drew would constantly badger the people to hurry up, and Drew clearly didn't know the games well enough to explain to them to anyone. I was seriously dissapointed. Game shows come and go such as "Press Your Luck." and "Let's Make a Deal." Both they tried to revive and both failed miserably. So why try to keep an icon of Game Shows alive when it could pass into TV memory as something great instead of something that needed to be taken out to pasture and shot.

Blog Action Day...

2007-10-15T13:47:00.001-07:00

Today on October 15th, I guess it is official blog action day. Most of you are probably saying to yourself, "oh look another holiday created by Hallmark, but this time to sell e-cards." Well you are absolutly wrong if you think that, today has officially been marked the day where all of us will speak out on the environment and try to make the world a better place.

In theory this sounds like a great idea, but unfortunatly it won't work and I am here to tell you why.

See, we all read blogs... some of us because they can be funny, some of us so we can debate news, some of us so we can try to make money. But all in all the only things blogs can't do are change things. When all the people who write on them and have no real power to do anything debate them they think they are making people aware. Yes this may be true but again unfortunatly no power to do anything, because the people who are in charge of the decisions to do certain things don't really care, because they have already weighed both sides of this and now you are stuck with their decision.

I'm going to use an example to make this very straight forward for all people to understand. Let us say for a minute that you are a vegetarian. Now you don't like to eat meat and you don't think others should eat meat. So on your blog you write about how you shouldn't eat meat...you show pictures of defenseless lambs being killed, you make a documentary about slaughterhouses. This is great people are watching this, maybe even someone who runs a slaugther house is watching it. But unfortunatly even though you have made the people aware of what they already realize, the guy running the slaughter house goes to himself..."well at least i'm making money so my family can survive." The guy eating the burger probably then goes, "Well I like burgers" and takes a big bite.

See you have no power to actually change anything. So goes it with the environment. I bought a hybrid...I love my car...You all are probably thinking that is great, good job, helping the environment. Well, to be honest I did think of those things...but again to be honest I also thought, this tax year I really need a tax break and I'm going to use less gas so I can save more money. I had other reasons that outweighed the environment in my mind.

Now we are all going to write about the environment but it is all stuff that we have heard before. If you really want car manufacturers to change their ways, everyone has to stop driving cars, COMPLETELY, or they won't care because they are still making money and you have no power to do anything. I'm rambling, but it is clear none of us have the power to do anything, so even if we write about it it won't change anything. Someone who has power has to stop it all and change everything and that is the only way to bring about change. Be it the president or the person in charge of your state, they have to physically do something, because debating about it unfortunatly doesn't do anything.

Again another example. Let's say your making a movie and it is the end of your 12 hour day but you want to shoot for another 2 hours. Well everyone on the set will debate this with you, they will say things like, "Let's just do it tomorrow" or "Yeah overtime." But everyones opinion will be thrown at you. They will debate both possibilities with you. But it won't change your mind, because you have to do what your bosses say, the ones holding the money. And everyone will fall in line because they have to.

So powerless to do anything...

I'm going to go drive my hybrid to work now...good luck to all of you, I hope you win your debates...whatever that actually means.

2007-07-18T23:05:00.000-07:00

This week the greatest and worst thing that could have happened has happened. It was as if the heavens parted and God with his booming voice commanded this most glorious gift to be bestowed unto me. You guessed it. I got cable. 100 over priced channels from which I will probably watch only 2 (if you can guess the two we'll send you an official Sticklers' World blog t-shirt). I fantasized about the moment i would get cable. I imagined five beautiful women with the largest cable boxes this man has ever seen. Sadly to my dismay no women showed up, but a large Mexican named Jose showed up, 8 hours late. However he did have huge cable boxes, and I'm not actually talking about the cable boxes (wink, wink).
Since the cable was installed I have become a slave to it. Like so many strong men with no job for the summer, i have fell victim, but please do not pity me (unless your pity consists of cash) I did this to myself.
Oh yeah happy birthday Sis, sorry I couldn't get in touch with you, I'll call you soon.

Why I am bad at posting...

2007-07-17T10:36:00.000-07:00

The other day I had someone say something about me to another person, it went along these lines:

Person A: I really like Stickler, but have you ever noticed that it takes him 30 words to say something that it would take the average person to say in 3?

Person B: Yes! That is Stickler!

Well it is true, I talk to much. But wouldn't you rather have all the information about something then just a yes or no answer?

Which brings me to why I am bad at posting, nothing interesting happens in my life that is worth mentioning. Nothing at all, I am so boring I don't want to bore you all with having to read about it.

For example; This past weekend I think I said something offensive to the girl my friend has been seeing. See, when I met her I immeadiatly realized that I knew her and walked up to her and said, "Hi Jenny!" Her immediate reaction was, "Who are you?" I was explained that it was me, Stickler, From that job we just did. She played dumb and was like I don't know what your talking about I am a school teacher. I told her that she was mistaken we just worked a job together. She then asked me how I knew her name, which I responded that she just worked a job with me.

At this moment my friend who is seeing the girl interrupted and I tried to explain that I knew this girl and that she was lying to him or has a twin who was seperated at birth with the same name. For the whole night I tried to prove to my friend that this really was the same girl. He doesn't believe me, but my question is why is she lying?

Regardless she can't be good for him, so the next time I hang out with him I am bringing Jenny's phone number and I am going to call her right in front of hima nd show him that she is in fact the girl from work and not a school teacher!

See boring life...now go check out my pics from the part of my life that is not so boring.

birthday wishes

2007-06-27T23:20:00.000-07:00

so, today was my birthday. i turned 24. both of my brothers forgot. it's quite possible i hate them now, and will never forgive them for being such selfish, unloving people.

that's all.

2007-06-21T23:37:00.000-07:00

So, my brother has hounded me once again to begin "blogging"... so, I have succumbed to his endless whining, and here I am, "blogging."

I would like to begin by saying, that in all the times I have found myself a "blogger," if you will, I am generally out of the country and on tour with some silly production, and unable to use my cell phone. This tends to bring out the boredom in me, and well, "blogging" is what I have turned to to keep myself from feeling completely out of the loop.

... so, what shall we discuss this evening...

I was just discussing with a friend how I was "blogging" and it kind of sounded like I was vomiting or something...

So, I am on tour with a very large production of a very well-known, global smash hit, that for anonymities sake, I will refrain from telling you... although, my brother hasn't done a very good job of keeping it a secret.
I understudy one of the "leads". It is very exciting. I went on this evening as said "lead" and it too very exciting.
ALTHOUGH, since I am in Canada... yes, you heard right, Canada, we are at a very high altitude... much higher than I am used to. I would like to tell you how difficult it is to breathe.. let alone how difficult it is to breathe when you are doing a role you don't normally do every night, and how much of an effort it takes not to let how dizzy you are and slightly nauseated get in the way of your performance. It is very exciting... no, exciting isn't the word, it is more intense, scary... I wish I had a bigger vocabulary...

ANYWAY... I had a martini after unsaid #1 global smash hit, and well, it was called a "g-spot" and it was very tasty... I believe it had vanilla vodka, grand marnier and pineapple juice.. maybe.. i dunno, it was good... and I ate a lot of wings... I was hungry, and they were cheap!

I want a bike... I miss my bike... if anyone can tell me where to get one of the fold-able bikes that I could put into my large trunk and travel with me, I would be very happy.

AND, I want a fridge... I am so over the fact that Canada doesn't have my south-beach diet breakfast bars... if you are ever tour, I recommend them... they get the job done and really quench that hunger in the morning... apples are good too...

I have a personal trainer this week... he kicked my ass yesterday... and now i'm afraid to go back tomorrow... I almost puked after we did lunges across the floor... but it felt good to be sore... nothing beats a good after workout soreness...mmmmm....

ok.. I got nothing else..

no wait.. i just finished the second season of Gray's Anatomy.. it is really good.. i cried.. a lot.. mcdreamy is so hot. mcmeredith gets on my nerves... sandra oh is brilliant, and kathrine heigel is a beautiful actress.

if you download tv shows.. watch THE RICHES on FX. it is brilliant, Eddie Izzard and mini Driver and at the top of their games.

ok, really, i'm done rambling.
I'll try to have a more constructive post next time.
I'm tired.

goodnight.

-lil miss stix

Little Miss Stickler has her day...

2007-05-18T09:04:00.000-07:00

So my little Sis has gone and given an interview to her old college towns online newspaper. It is full of wisdom and chili. Go check it out here and it will bring you one step closer to figuring out what show she is in! Thanks to Joan Marcus for taking a picture of the performance I actuelly got to see. Now if only I could get her to write on this thing...

Sink the Biz Rules

2007-05-02T06:00:00.000-07:00

I will fully admit that I have become addicted to my site meter stats! And like all bloggers who look at their stats I'm going to say the same thing that they have all said before me, "Please leave a comment, I don't care how bad it is...Leave a comment …please...Say Hello...If what you say is stupid we will only make fun of you for a day or so! I just want to know who all these random people who stalk me are amnd you all know who you are!"

Anyways the one thing I have come to realize checking my stats is that our site comes up if you google some very inappropriate things. Like "How my sister lost her virginity" or my favorite "70's porno chest hair" Who are these people looking up these things! At least I am not the number one hit on Alia Shawkat... like my friends at the jotel! Regardless the one thing that does pop up most of the time is "Sink The Biz Rules at Nick's English Hut."

Since there is probably no better person then the record holder for Sink the Bizmark, I have decided to set out this post as The Official Rules To Sink the Biz! Hopefully I have said it enough in the above sentences so it will come up at least on the first page when you google it! So a back-story is probably a good place to begin:

When I was a junior in College my roommates and I discovered Nick's English Hut because not only was it a Icon of Indiana University, but it was located 3 blocks from our amazing house. Senior Year we must have spent at least 3 days a week lounging about in the hump room or near the pool tables when we should have been studying. We knew everyone that worked there and befriended a waitress, that at the time, we thought was just the best waitress in the joint...but there is more to her story.

As the year progressed we made ourselves known to the Nicks culture that we were top dogs and our Waitress, Eryn, helped us out in that regard giving us drink discounts, cutting us to the front of the line at the door, and always holding a table for us in her section. She was the one that encouraged us on the night that IU beat Illinois in Basketball, by shooting 17 three pointers, a slam-dunk one may call it, that we should go for the record. With Brian's parent’s credit card at our disposal, the 5 of us set out to hold the record for most alcohol consumed by 5 people in one sitting. Brian, I don't want to hear it! And so began the game…

To Play You Will Need:

A Bucket...Metallic in nature, about the size of 2 pitchers of beer.
A Biz glass... Specially weighted to float in the beer.
Pint Glasses...For pouring into the biz.
Napkins...I would recommend procuring a rack of them from a McDonalds, all will be used.
Beer...And lot's of it. We usually go through a 24 pack in about 15 minutes, better if you had a keg, even better if you play at a bar called Nick's.

The rules:

Sink the Bismarck, known as Sink the Biz, is played with a bucket filled with beer. In the center of this bucket floats a small weighted juice glass. You can buy these things at Nicks...normal juice glasses or shot glasses will not float correctly! Everyone sits around the table with a full pint glass of whatever beer is in the bucket. This is important, because we do not mix beers when playing the game, that is a party foul and you will be banished from the game. I prefer to play with glass pint glasses it adds a certain, how do you say, nobility, but plastic is ok as long as everyone knows not to squeeze the sides to make it easier to pour! Also make sure that everyone has a stack of napkins, it gets messy!

Place the bucket on a plate covered in Napkins and fill the bucket with Roughly two pitchers of beer. Going clockwise, the first person(There is no definitive way to figure out who goes first, whoever puts the bucket down usually just goes!) pours their beer from their pint glass into the Biz glass that is floating in the bucket. Their pour must be a steady stream. The second the stream breaks, their turn is over. You may pour as much or as little in as you wish as long as you don't break the stream! The object is to not sink the Biz(who am I kidding the object is to get drunk so the girl sitting next to you may do more then make fun of you for sucking at this game all night!). Whoever sinks it drinks it!

Now it seems easy in theory, but some rules need to be stated so everyone knows what happens when matters of controversy come up!

-A steady stream, is like when a guy goes to the bathroom after a night of drinking, it is not when a single drop falls out like your 70-year-old grandfather going to the bathroom! If the person pours a drop they must go again!

-The Pint glass must be held above the highest point of the handle to the bucket when being poured or the biz will be sunk and the person pouring automatically must drink it!

-One has the option to count to 5, Mississippi style, before they take their turn. This is in case the biz is floating so close to the edge you think it may sink before your turn!(most people play to 3, that wasn't challenging enough for us and we learned to time out 3 seconds in our pours)

-If the table is kicked and the biz sinks and you can prove it was someone kicking the table on purpose(Chris!) then whoever kicked the table drinks the biz!

-If someone pours any other type of beer into the bucket to play other then the beer being played with, they are banished from the game.

-If the same person sinks the biz three times in a row then they must drink the entire bucket!

-When the Biz is sunk it must be shot like a shot, not poured into an already existing beer!

So those are the official rules, easy to follow, easy to play, and now on to the rest of the story:

So around pitcher number 10 or so I think I got in a fight with all my roommates and left for a couple of pitchers and then came back and apologized. When we reached 17 we decided not to stop but to keep going. Which is how we made it to 27! Brian I don't want to hear it...all of our memories are a little fuzzy! Eryn informed us that we had broken some sort of record, that we were indeed champs. A picture was taken and we left...I'm still not sure how I got home!

The next week, oh yes we went back, Eryn informed us that a space had opened up on the ceiling of Nicks. And that Space was being given to us! We were confused until we found out that our Waitress, Eryn, was related tot he owner of Nicks and when she was asked who the space should go to, she told them about us!

For those of you that don't know to own a bucket from Nick's is not that hard a feat, anyone can buy one...but to have your bucket held at Nicks and hung from the ceiling for all eternity is something to be proud of. Supposedly when Nick's first started the game they would hold peoples buckets for them on their ceiling so you could always play with the same one. Well, sometime during the 50's or 60's they ran out of room and stopped holding buckets.

The only way to get a bucket is if someone dies and they will it to you or someone dies, they don't will their bucket away and a space opens up! I'm not sure who died for us to get our space...but we were bequeathed one. We purchased paint and supplies and on a Saturday morning went to Nicks and painted up "Drunky, the Bucket." The picture was put up on the wall of all of us with Eryn holding our bucket. You can find this picture if you walk from the top of the stairs past the bar on your right and look to the right side of the big entrance into the room with the pool tables. And forever our Bucket is at Nick's waiting for our yearly return to play with it.

So Folks if anyone should be the official rule makers it should be my roommates and I because as you can see we are Champs! For any questions or concerns you can reach me, Stickler, at sticklersworld@gmail.com. If you’re in the LA area you can come play with us anytime!

A very important Question to start off the week...Don't Laugh!

2007-04-30T06:00:00.000-07:00

So if you shave your chest hair...does it grow back thicker and expand to other areas of your body...let's just day the back region for an example?

Curious minds need to know what they may have just gotten themselves into? Not that it was me trying to get rid of that small tuft of hair that pokes up through my shirt that sometimes make me look like I am a reject from a 70's porno! And then tried to even it out...but screwed up and ended up shaving it all off...I swear...just inquiring minds would like to know...soon!

DonauInselFest 2007

2007-04-25T17:31:00.000-07:00

Who is coming with me? Seriously, who is coming with me?

For those of you that have noticed for the last two years I have caught what one might call a major travel bug! And I have decided not to stop with Nepal...instead; last year around June, I found myself in Vienna, Austria. For those of you that were keeping abreast(tee hee) with my amazing adventures for the world cup you may remember one such article on rivalfish.com about the donauinselfest. When The Donau island becomes one of the biggest musical venues in all of Europe for one weekend. Tons of stages, music round the clock, Bad german cover bands, germans, austrians, free food and beer! And not to mention JaegerEnergy! So when I ask who is coming with me...I expect you all to jump! and if that isn't enough to convince you look at the swell picture from last year!

Thought process...

2007-04-24T13:39:00.000-07:00

So I'm currently in Chicago...My lovely sister who refuses to write on the blog (due to her current job) was performing in Iowa as the lead in the such and such Broadway Tour she is on. She was amazing and if this blog wasn't completely confidential I would tell you which one...instead you are all forced to go see all Broadway shows that come to your town! Good Luck!

When I pulled into the driveway of my childhood home the first thing I noticed was the major landscaping work my parents had done on the backyard. It looks completely different. But checking out the plants and trees and stuff that is now everywhere it reminded me of what was missing and this story for all to enjoy.

When I was about 8 years old I had a mulberry tree in my backyard. I know everyone hates them because they drop mulberry's everywhere and dye everything a purplish hue. They are also a lot of fun to throw at people like the great tomato and mulberry fight from 1988, which is a story for another time. But this mulberry tree with its intricately curving branches was the perfect climbing tree. So perfect it held my secret fort as a child.

I will never forget the day Giles fell out of the tree and his mother banned him from climbing it. Well, we engineered a pulley system in the tree that made it possible for someone to lift someone else into the tree without any climbing. Therefore Giles was no longer climbing the tree to get to our fort. His mother didn't buy that BS either, but she did allow him to climb in the tree again. I don't actually think our elevator system worked, it was just for show.

Like I said I was 8 years old and it was a hot summer day. The next-door neighbors were installing one of those above ground pools to ward off the heat! I was excited because that meant an entire summer in the pool, maybe? Well, low and behold when they finished putting in the pool they came over to the house and told us we could swim in it and then informed my parents they had to cut down the mulberry tree because it dropped berries in the pool.

I was pissed, it was my tree no one could cut that down...well actually they could, it turns out their property line extends over where the base of the mulberry tree is and the fence that exists is actually meaningless. So I complained and through a tantrum like any child who was about to lose his beloved tree would do. My parents who I believed cared for me sent me to my room for the night.

The next morning, my parents went to wake me up and could not find me for breakfast. The phone then began to ring; it was our neighbors asking my parents if they could please untie me from the tree because the tree cutters refused to cut the tree down till I moved. My parents looked out the window to see me wrapped in the rope used for our pulley system tied to the tree. My father came outside and saw that I was crying and proceeded to cut the ropes, pick me up, and carry me inside. He then told me it was better that the tree was being cut down because I would get to swim in a pool instead. This just made me angrier, but he grounded me, so I couldn't go outside. Instead I had to watch from my room as my tree was ripped from the ground and cut to pieces.

The next day I asked if I could go swimming in the pool and the response from the neighbors was, "No! Your to small, maybe in a couple years!" I was never allowed to swim in that pool and 3 years later they sold the house and the new people tore the pool out when they moved in!

When I arrived home that was the first thought that went through my head...It would have been cool if that tree from my childhood was still there!

My second thought was of how unsure I have been lately! Work has been crazy but I am not going anywhere...I'm kind of at a stand still. So lately I have been discussing options with my father to return to Grad School and get my MBA. Why? Well, I have this feeling that I could have a better job and could start moving up to a different level in the industry I currently work in. So my question for those of you out there reading this; What is getting your MBA like? And do you think this will help me excel in my career? Or am I just at that point in my life where I am confused and this will in no way help me figure things out?

The Jo-Tel New and Improved

2007-03-20T19:44:00.000-07:00

Just a quick shout out to the guys over at the Jo-Tel. The New Site looks fantastic and with the change in URL it seems they have lost some of their Fans...Please take a look...I heard you can write it off on your taxes!

Damn, all I have are these Nepalese Coins.

2007-03-20T18:31:00.000-07:00

Is it wrong that since my return to the states I carry Nepalese coins in my pocket just so I can use the line from "Something About Mary?"

So when did I leave...Where did I go? Well the answer is for the past two weeks I have been in Nepal. My friend and next door neighbor from my childhood...Giles...has an older brother who got married in this swell country. So as Representation of the Stickler Family I had to go. Trust me there wasn't much decision...Nepal for a wedding...Heck yeah I was in.

So after forking out a majority of my savings to the travel agent and a docter...yes, I had to get a number of shots...still not sure why the doc put that thing in my butt though...anyways I was on my way. I flew from LA to Hong Kong, then to Bangkok, then to Kathmandu. 24 hours of flying and I was exhausted!

Now for anyone who has been to Nepal before you will already know this small amount of background information. Nepal is a 5th World Country...yes they have gone above and beyond to become one of the top 15 poorest countries in the world. The Rupee...hopefully spelled correctly has an exchange rate of about 70 to one US Dollar. When a cab ride costs 50 rupees everything is kind of put into perspective.

Now Kathmandu airport is small. Very small. Were talking remember when you were younger and you and your friends would play hide-and-go-seek and you would find that little shed to hide in. Ok picture what that shed looked like and you basically have Kathmandu Airport. Now after having them take 35 dollars from you for a visa, you exit the airport and are rushed by an onslaught of a thousand Nepalese grabbing for your bags, shouting at you to get in there cab, stay at their hotel, give them your money, etc... I thought I was in the clear not to have to deal with these people since someone had sent a car from the hotel. I was wrong.

As I stepped into the sunlight my bags were quickly pulled from me with force. I pleaded I didn't need any help, but they wanted to be helpful. I saw the sign with my name on it and made my way the 15 feet for the van bound for Dwarika hotel. I turn to the guys with my bags and asked for them. They say sure...20 dollars. What! I exclaimed. Yes, I was taken people...they would not give me my bags back till I gave them 20 dollars each. Then the driver goes, "and 2000 for me because I'm driving you to the hotel or you can find a cab!" So That is how I lost my money when I first came to Nepal.

Now Dwarika is a really nice hotel in the middle of a compound. I felt sheltered from the outside world. On arrival I was taken to my room...which turned out not to be my room but it doesn't matter all the rooms were nice. I waited for my friends to return from Sightseeing. Giles, older brother looked a little stressed on first examination. He definitly was...he was getting married the next day...wouldn't you. They filled me in on the rules and gave me my welcome packet that his wife Jarhna had put together. Getting ahead of myself, Jarhna, is from Nepal and Kathmandu. To make their marriage real they had to get married in her town. Things I read in the welcome packet...an intenirary of my entire stay, rules for being in their country...Don't drink the water!, and a list of places to eat where I hopefuly wouldn't be poisoned. I was excited.

The first night was the beginning of the ceremony with the Shaman coming over to the hotel and blessing Bob and his family. It was really cool and fascinating to watch. this was my first experience with Tika (the red stuff that seems to always be on everyones heads, and also part of their blessings.)and wouldn't be the last! We then all went to a 9 course authentic Nepalese Dinner...which rocked my world and taught me the virtues of the toilet. If your ever in Nepal let me reccommend one thing to you all...Momo's! Trust me they became the staple of our trip and the beginning of a very long story...which I will tell Tomorrow!

An Addition...

2007-02-25T14:31:00.000-08:00

This picture was sent to me with three others and I just figured everyone should see it!

Poop, poop, and more poop!

2007-02-18T13:40:00.000-08:00

I believe the worth of your life is made up of what you do with it and not what job you have. This is why when my job seizes control of my life and leaves me no time for anything I find myself floating into a depressive funk that I can't quite control. I moved to the beach in order to get away from these things that were bringing me down and it turns out I didn't have to move to do it, I needed to switch careers. But moving has been one of the best things for me...for the past couple of weeks I have been entirely too busy to write anything...this having to do with the job I haven't changed yet. So I have a ton of unfinished posts that I just scrapped and am just gonna lay it all down for you folks right here, right now.

A couple of weeks ago I ran a 10K with my roommate, (Her covert name will be MandyM which is an inside joke between her and I, the other one will be referred to as ParisH) So MandyM and I ran this 10K in Redondo Beach before the superbowl. It was one of those get dressed up things, where we got dressed up as matching 70's track stars and when we got there no one was dressed up but us. At the end of the race they had a free Asahi beer garden, because you know the one thing I'm craving after a race is a frosty brew.

Now I'm not in any kind of shape whatsoever, in fact, my muscle mass is probably comparable to that of a three year old. So imagine my surprise that we were able to run it in 52 minutes. HECK Yeah! She has been training for a marathon so it was no surprise that she would do well, but folks I was able to keep up. My legs hurt for days and days and days afterwards. I can't wait for the next one.

The other amazing thing I have been doing lately is cleaning alot of poop. What a surprise it was to find out the health department had stopped by while I was at work one day and informed MandyM and ParisH that if they didn't clean up the poop from the dogs in our backyard we would be fined. So the weekend before the race I must have tossed 9 large garbage bags full of poop, folks I have no problem farting in front of my roommates now that the three of us have smelled the smells of that day.

But since I have moved in it seems like poop has become a large part of my life. Last weekend I woke up bright and early on Saturday and decided to fix the broken dimmer knob in the bathroom. As I was leaving the house to head to Home Depot, I realized that I might as well fix the other things that were in disrepair. So I made a quick list of what I needed and headed off to the depot.

Now I love home depot because it is huge and I can't go there without buying a hundred unnecessary tools! It was no surprise to me that as I was leaving I noticed a ladder on sale for Twenty Dollars. I thought to myself, wow me, if I owned that ladder I could put all those boxes in the overhanging storage area in the garage. So I bought the ladder, after a couple of hours of fixing all the things that needed fixing I walked into the garage to put the boxes away. As I climbed the ladder I came face to face with the top of the storage area. Which was a complete mess with an inch deep layer of Rat poop layered across everything. All the boxes had been turned into a meca of Ratdom. Now we all know my history with rats, so wasn't it a surprise to see the little buggers had yet again found away into my life.

I climbed back down and resolved that the next day I would go back to the home depot, buy cleaning supplies, masks, and all the necessary items to rip out and rebuild the storage area that I am now referring to as the rat layer. And this is what I did, the original storage area had been built with doors as the planks and was very rickity. After fighting off the King rat with a machete I own in case of Zombie Attacks, MandyM and I spent the whole of the next day ripping out wood, the rat layer, and even caught we think the last rat. Then I rebuilt it from scratch better then ever, it is so sturdy you can do pull ups on it. So there you have it busy little bee, I wonder what poop I'm going to find next?

Hell Has Froze over!

2007-01-17T23:22:00.000-08:00

All I want to say is it snowed in LA today. They closed my freeway that I use to get to work. I through snowballs at my co-workers! Global Warming rocks!

A New Year to remember...

2007-01-15T16:48:00.000-08:00

Ladies and Gentleman of the blogosphere, I'm BACK AND BETTER THEN EVER! I know, most of you have left our humble little blog for other flashy blogs and crazy people, but come on you can't be mad at me forever.

I have a story to tell that will absolve me from my unresponsive abscence, it involves moving and living in my car. It's true for the last couple of months I had to live in my car as I had to make a quick retreat from my home, since the new occupants (150 rats) decided that they didn't want us living there. My roommates and I fought the good fight, but in the end the rats had to many troops and our numbers were just not enough. I tried enacting the draft and calling up 20,000 cats to my aid, but to know avail they didn't want to get involved in the suicide bombings the rats were using against us.

So after that little fiasco I went home for the holidays and returned to LaLaLand with new roommates, a new place to live by the beach, and plenty more happy about my situation in life. So go take a look at the pictures of how we rang in the New Year and I'll leave you with the best christmas story I have.

It was 9:00 AM Christmas morning and I awoke to a clatter...it was my father standing over my bead with pot banging on it like a 5 year old with a toy drum. "Awaken," he shouted, "For soon Grandma, and your aunt and uncle will be here!" So I slowly made my way downstairs, my hair sticking in a direction I didn't think was possible. As I turned the corner I saw my sister in a worse off condition then myself and my brother with a scowl on his face. Pretty much a normal Stickler Family Christmas. My family at times can be down right nasty to each other and holidays are no exception to the rule. My brother was yelling at everyone about how he had to work till 3:00 AM and that he needed to go back to bed, my sister was fighting with my Dad aout her rude awakening, and my Mother was angry because yet again no one was getting into the Christmas Spirit.

I had to step in by grabbing the first presents from the tree and forcibly handed them out to everyone to get them to stop shouting at each other. I love Christmas. Everyone relaxed and got into a jovial mood as my mom dished out her homemade bread and butter. We opened gifts and then it happened.

My Father said, "So I'm going to make mulled cider with a little rum in it, would anyone like some?" I will never forget my sisters reaction to this question for as long as I live. She slowly looked up and said, "With what rum?" My dad replied, "The rum hidden in the basement of course." My sister then laughed and said, "Yeah, Dad...that rum in the basment might be water!" My dad looks at her in astonishment and I just started cracking it up. it turns out 8 years earlie when my sister was about 15 she threw a party at our house while my parents were gone. They drank all the liquor in the basement and then filled the bottles of water so it looked like nothing had been drank.

I've never seen my dad try so hard not to laugh and be mad at the same time. The rest of the break was fun. So stay tuned for more...the hiatus I've been on has been for to long!

To Blog or not to Blog that is the question...

2006-11-01T16:49:00.000-08:00

Well, Lately it seems for me it has been to not blog. What a hellish couple of weeks I have had. To begin I quit my job and came home. I can't tell you why or what it was, just know I'm much happier for doing it. Unfortunatly I came home to my house turning into a mock up of disneyland, real rats included. Yes, ladies and gentleman, it turn out we have a rat infestation. I'm moving, not sure where or when, but it is happening in the next couple of days. I can't sleep listening to them knaw through the walls of my house. Yes, it is disgusting.

Now that I have put that unpleasant thought into your head, forget about it and here is a story to warm the heart.

On halloween I scare myself to death with scary movies and practical jokes on my friends. But ghosts are no laughing matter especially for those of us who have come face to face with them before. I wouldn't ever classify myself as a scifi dork(but come on who didn't play D&D when they were younger?) but I have always believed that ghosts do exist. It all started when I was about 15. I had one of those summer jobs that you love to hate. My friends Giles, Saliny, and Downs; We were all working at this mansion doing restoration for the park district. Basically they thought of us as cheap labor and they were right. There were three other guys working with us as well, Seamus (The guy who dated my dream girlfriend), Hyde, and Frye. We all happened to play Lacrosse together, so we knew each other.

The Cheney Mansion can be found in Oak Park, Illinois and as the story goes was inhabited by Miss Cheney till she died in the early 80's and left her mansion to the park district for use to rent out for special functions. Garden Parties, Weddings, Music recitals, the occasional Bar Mitzvah plagued the weekends of our summer as we would help run security making sure the antique objects in the house were not destroyed. During the week painting, gardening, and other menial tasks were dished out by our slave driving boss, her nickname, the troll.

Our Motto, what the troll didn't know wouldn't hurt her. An average day for us consisted of use getting into work about 9:00am. immeadiatly we would all go to the kitchen and spend an hourmaking cappucino and breakfast for ourselves. Then we would all shuffle off to the various rooms we were painting. Occasionally the troll would leave to run errands and all of us would find a bed and take an hour nap. We were only caught once doing this. Around noon we would take an hour lunch at Tasty Dog or mickeys. My friend Downs is famous at Tasty Dog for creating the Fat Bastard COmbo meal; One Chicken Sandwich, Two Chicago Style Hot Dogs, One order of Cheese Fries, and a coke. Imagine eating that every day for a summer and he wonders why he can't get a date.

Anyways our afternoons consisted of rolling up tape balls and using the extension poles for the paint rollers to play stick ball in the ball room. Occassionally we would sneak outside and play 500 in the backyard. Yeah, we were the opitimy of slackers, but we still managed to paint that whole mansion, have an exquisite garden, and live to regail you all with the story I'm about to share.

There were a couple other parts to our job that none of us dared talk about. Not because we couldn't, but because who would believe us. Every morning when we arrived at work our first task of the day was to drain the free standing antique tub of water. The question that should arise in everyones mind is why was the tub filled with water every morning? Well, we also would like to know that answer since it wasn't connected or even in the same room as any plumbing or faucets. At the end of day we would shut off all the lights to the third floor, but as we exited the building all of them would suddennly go on. The troll would then ask us why we didn't shut the lights off and send us back in to turn them off again. Sometimes it would take us 3 to 4 times before she would say, forget about it. There were nights when I would come home from a party or begin out wiht my friends and we would roll by the house to see weird shadows and the lights on in the third floor bedrooms and ballrooms. We all knew there was a ghost, we all hoped it would leave us alone, and none of us told the people who came to have their wedding there about it.

One night while working a wedding, My friend Downs and I watched as all the windows on the thrid floor unlocked themselves, swung open, and then a minute later closed and relocked themselves. While painting the servant hallways, my friend Saliny kept hearing banging on the door, everytime he went to answer it, no one was there. He went back to painting until suddennly there was banging all around him. He went straight to the troll and said, "I'm done for the day!" The only people allowed int he basement were mansion staff, this basement was huge. It seemed small till you found the tunnell to the secondary basement, where there is a painting of all the original towns elders. There facial expressions change from day to day.

To all of you I know this doesn't sound that scary, but when it happens to you you'll understand. Unfortuantly the troll would never let us stay overnight in the house, it was an insurance risk. For some reason I think there is more to it then that. If you ever find yourself on the west side of Chicago, make sure to stop by the Cheney Mansion and see for yourself, I guarantee something weird will happen while your there!

Montana

2006-10-15T17:17:00.000-07:00

So I'm in Montana doing yet again work I can't talk about. You all probably think I'm a spy or something. and maybe I am?

But it is beautiful here, very rainy but absolutly beautiful. I hope everyone watches the Chicago BEars play Monday night in football and I'll write more later. I have some crazy stories to tell!

Happy 26th to Me!

2006-10-01T21:43:00.000-07:00

It is true, today was my 26th birthday. The most anticlimatic of all birthdays. I remember the rush of turning 16 and getting my drivers license or how when I turned 18 I could vote in the elections. Even 21 when I could finally drink that beer for the first time. 25 when I could finally rent a car, without paying extra money for being under age. But now 26... all I see is myself getting closer to 30. Don't get me wrong that sounds exciting, but I'm starting to feel old. To celebrate, my friends Dylan and PETE took me to a party. I don't remember much due to 8 tequila shots and a 13 second Keg stand. So Happy Birthday to me!

I haven't had anything of value to talk about lately and work has retaken over my life. I could tell you all about the pains of my job, but honestly, my job right now would bore you and the ramblings of someone burned out just lead to trouble. So instead I am putting up this picture for my favorite blogger friend Steph. I have a wedding to go to in Chicago next weekend and I needed new black shoes, cool huh?

Challenge this...

2006-09-18T22:19:00.000-07:00

The Lexus; ingenuity, design, function at its best, with class and style to put you at the top. But what did we care, it wasn't our car! Chris, my roommate from college, the guy who stole my car once, had it break down while driving it to Ohio, then have it towed back to our apartment completely unbeknownst to me. Only to have me try to start it a day later, to find it not working and still he never said a thing. Until I caught him IMing his friend in Ohio about the fantastic weekend they had driving my car. His answer when I questioned him, "You said I could take it to the store, the store just happened to be in Ohio!"

Alone he caused mayhem, but after our friendship survived that bump, together our Hijinks were legendary. Be it the day we stole a life size Brittany Spears cutout from Mcdonalds or maybe how to this day our next door neighbors at IU still don't know what happened to their duck! So when the two of us are put together in a room expect complete and utter stupidity. So as I was saying, The Lexus, Jared, our other roommate from College, his baby. We were driving it into the city of Chicago to pick him up from work and then go directly to the Styx; Foreigner concert.

He told us to be their at 5:30 PM, so I figured we should leave at 4:30 PM because of rush hour traffic. When we arrived downtown it was 5PM, we had a half hour to kill and it isn't like you can park your car downtown for free anywhere. We would have to circle the block and wait. We accidently took a wrong turn and ended up on this very small street between the NBC building and the Sheraton hotel. What is unique about this street is it is only one half of a city block long. At one end is a giant circler drive in fron tof the hotel, then a median that takes you along the building till you approach a small circle that is about 20 feet in diameter o turn around and circle back to the hotel in the opposite direction. What is unique about this circle is that you can do a full revolution around it if you so choose. And this where the story truly begins.

When Chris and I came to the circle we had 15 minutes left of waiting and we started going around it. After the first 10 times I was getting a little dizzy. When we hit the number 20, I rolled down all the windows and opened the sun roof. When we hit the 21st revolution I stood up out of the sun roof and screamed, "Twenty-One." Chris made another circle and I screamed, "Twenty-Two". Chris started to get into it and we both started screaming together after we would pass a certain point in the sidewalk. And just for your information it took us about 20 seconds to make a loop. So we kept screaming. Around loop number 29 all the people exiting NBC tower from work started to take notice. SOme girls stopped and stood on the sidewalk and started to count along with us. At loop 37 the crowd started forming, young people in buisness suits and dresses yelling along as we circled the loop. As we passed number 49, I again stood up out of the sun roof and screamed "Fifty" at the top of my lungs. Tot he deafening roar of the crowd. We had done it was had made fifty loops and now had to go pick up Jared.

As we drove to pick him up, all I could think about is how we hold the record. How we should have you-tubed it and played it in fast motion for everyone. How maybe this could be in the Guinness Book of World of Records. When we picked up Jared we took him to the loop and subjected him to 10 more as we laughed hysterically. His first question is how much had we been drinking. When we answered "Nothing!" He replied,"You guys have to be the stupidist people on earth." I think he was just jealous he doesn't hold the record with us. So I put it to you, the people of the blogosphere, who can beat us in revolutions over by NBC tower, Because I don't think anyone has the balls to challenge us? Or at least who can top that story of stupidity?

I remember on this day.

2006-09-05T14:04:00.000-07:00

I have found myself longing for the past lately. The naitivity of being a child and not having to take on the worries of the grown up world. I recently started a new job and some of the people I'm working with grew up in my hometown and even attended my highschool!! I know I thought it was crazy too, but when I started talking with them memories started flooding my head and I just wished I could be back, but not as an adult, as a child.

So I booked my ticket for home about a week ago. I'm gonna spend a long weekend at home and see some friends, drink a little beer at my old haunts, and go to a Styx concert with my roommates from college. I think it is what I need and I haven't seen my parents since last thanksgiving. When I called home my mother was very excited. She began telling me about the block party they were planning. Again memories of my childhood; water fights, riding bikes, The food, etc... Flooded my head.

This week has been hard for me, which is why the lack of writing. Not to mention the insane hours at my job, but something very important to my life took place this last week. It all begins at the beginning of sophomore year of highschool in 1996. I was part of something revolutionary. It was a TV station at my highschool called newscene. Through this group I made 6 of the best friends a guy could ask for. All of us from completely different group or cliques as some people call them. Never hanging out socially but putting together a weekly news program that won the best news program in the state of Illinois every year we ran it.

These guys became my best friends and senior year we started becoming our own sort of clique that let everyone in, threw some amazing parties that our parents still do not know happened to this day and came out with stories that would shock and amaze you. Our name was simple, Gafferland. We all shared one thing in common other then our love for this program, we loved a girl. Her name was Suzanne. One day Suzanne started dating this real a$$hole named Seamus. None of us ever had a chance with suzanne, she was the most amazing beautiful girl ever, and I have had a crush on her since she moved to the OP in 3rd grade. So on this day we came up with a motto and we made T-shirts and we wore them to school. The girls all wanted to know what the anagram meant on our shirts, but we didn't tell. We were hence forward known as the green shirt guys. But all of this is just back story and has nothing to do with what I am writing about.

On August 28, 2001 I was a senior in college and some friends of mine came running up to me in class. They told me my friend Dan from highschool had opened some e-mail that had made him burst into tears and go running from class. As his friend they wanted to know if I knew anything about it. I said, "No" Then another one of our friends said that Dan had gone back to the OP because a friend died. Immeadiatly my head started spinning, if a friend of Dan's died then a friend of mine died. So I sent an e-mail to the men of Gafferland asking if someone from OP had passed away.

It wasn't until late that same night when my friend Nate, AMMO of Gafferland(yeah we have titles, I was the messenger long story) called me. In a distraught voice he said, "Stickler, Matt killed himself." In what I would call a surreal moment we both broke down crying. Matt was our friend and the General of Gafferland. I had just seen him 3 weeks earlier and he seemed happy. Then Nate explained how I had to call all the guys and tell them because he couldn't. So for the next 2 hours I called Giles, PETE, Matranga, and Merrick. I had to listen as one by one they all broke down on the phone. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done and all I wanted to do was go home and cry. Eventually I got that oppurtunity and I went home for the funeral. It was sad. And so this past week was the 5th anniversary of one of my best friends passing. I wasn't at home and had to deal with it by myself. I miss him and our group hasn't been the same since. So I just wanted to say Matt, if somehow you can read this, I miss you buddy. Here is a Busch for you! And now that I'm out of my funk, tomorrow I will be writing "The Labors of Laborday"

The Porch

2006-08-27T19:41:00.000-07:00

Since I have been gone most of the summer, I wasn't able to fully take advantage of my back porch. Over the past couple of years this porch has been the home of many nights of drunken debauchery, barbecues, and the occasional midnight rendezvous. So being the last weekend of the summer months, I had to throw a summer of backporch fun into one night.

Ditching my friends AFC party, which I heard later on was full of it's own Drunken tales that will be told for years to come, I stayed home with the roommates and their friends. It all started as usual; Costume Girl got on her phone and called her friend Reny, not to be confused with Renee, unfortunately that is what she did. She called yelled into the phone when the person picked up, "Why aren't you here and where is our beer." Then proceeds into a long diatribe about getting his ass in gear, gossip, etc... But then her face went white as a ghost. Realizing she was not talking to her friend Reny, but her Agent Renee. Yes, she had made a large party foul and the night hadn't even started yet. The question stood out like a Large elephant hovering thirty feet in the air defecating all over the onlookers; Would Costume girl be getting anymore work from her agent after that call?

It was debated most of the night and decided that when confronted with the question of what happened, she would play the "have no memory of the phone call" card. Eventually Reny and his friend Diane showed up. We all sat on the porch discussing the size of midget penis. I never knew it actually was the same length of one of their legs and in fact could be mistaken as a "Third Leg." Reliable sources came into play to learn that useless fact.

So on the night went, never one of us moving from the porch. Till I had the grandiose idea that I would teach my roommates how to play the classic drinking game from Indiana, Sink The Biz. I may have told stories of Sink the Biz from my college days, how my bucket resides on the ceiling of Nicks because of a drinking record my roommates from college and I hold, or the night I was seduced by one of my students while playing the the game, or maybe even the tale of my 21st birthday when this small bucket of beer caused me to be thrown out of the Bar that I hold so close to my heart.

Anyways I ran upstairs and came back with the bucket that was bequeathed to me on graduation day from the most lovely waitress Eryn. In my most excited voice I exclaimed, "This is Sink the Biz." Everyone looked at me confused and I explained the rules of a bucket full of beer with a small weighted glass floating in the center. Everyone has a glass of beer and pours their beer into the glass floating in the center(the biz). Whoever sinks it, Drinks it. I then ran to the store realizing one case of beer would not be enough and purchased two more cases to help in the cause.

***Update: For the actual Rules to Sink the Biz Click Here!***

When I returned they all looked at me like I was nuts. They didn't understand how a game where you were trying not to drink could be fun? Well after we went through one case of beer in the first 20 minutes of play, everyone kind of understood. The drunkenness got worse and worse, still no one moving from the porch. Slowly but surely people started to pass out, weird unexplainable things started to happen, and to be honest it all is a little blurry. Don't worry I didn't make out with my roommates, but I'm pretty sure at naked running was discussed. All in all it turned into some great roommate bonding and now I think they understand a little bit more about the drinking culture in Indiana.

Today was tough, waking up with a hangover. But It didn't stop me from trying on a kilt. Yeah, I was kind of molested by a giant, possibly gay, man in a kilt, who took my pants off and put a kilt on me. Trust me it makes as little sense to me as well, but I got to admit wearing a dress sure was nice in this heat!

Did you know ants...

2006-08-20T13:24:00.000-07:00

are the most annoying of all the bugs I have come across in my lifetime. I know what your all thinking, there are plenty of other bugs that cause more drama then the ant. Well, when your house suddennly becomes infested with them, then you'll understand why the ant is the bane of my existence.

I awoke to see ten of the little buggers forming a conga line across my chest leaving bite marks. I pushed them away and looked up to see them forming a village on my desk, with a pipeline system leading to my waste basket. With one fell swoop I knocked them all into the trash and then ran like the wind with the trash can outsteched in my arms. I threw everything into our large trash can and left my wastebasket on the back porch, as I reentered the house I stopped in awe of what our kitchen looked like. Thousands of ants crawling this way and that. It looked as if they had settled on new planet, too bad it was my kitchen. I could think of only one person who could help me with my dilemma, so I called my mother. She gave the long explanation of how I should be more tidy and then she explained about the ant hotel. They are little white disks with holes in them, the ants think of them as the Cancun style resort of antdom. You know topless young ants, free buffet, all night partying with drugs. But what they don't realize is it all is poison and in the end, they die, a terrible death, bwhahahaaaaa. And kill all their ant mates in the process. I love it. So I bought some of these hotels and now I'm sitting and waiting. We'll see who gets the last laugh.

Today I went ice skating to take my mind off the ants, I also figured if any had stowed away in my clothes they would die from the cold. My roommates, some friends of ours, and I went to this ice skating rink in the valley. Tattoo guy and his friend were having trouble with the skating, they were more or less stumbling around the ice rink. It didn't help that small children were zooming around them at hundreds of miles an hour, in my mind, trying to knock them over on purpose. But an unsual event took place at the ice rink.

The new Stickler, the guy who tries to have a social life and work at the same time. A chance to test this became available at the rink. As I was skating I passed by a cute girl. Don't get me wrong their were lots of girls at the skate rink, but I try not to flirt with 12 year olds unless I know in 6 years she will be smoking hot! This girl was older and with her friends, but see she looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place it. I skated over to Tattoo guy and Sleeps On Our Couch girl and said, "I think I know that girl?" and pointed in their direction. Tattoo guy then said, "Oh the girl who has been checking you out since we got here?" I had no idea about that. Tattoo guy told me to go talk to her, but I didn't want to approach her with, "Hey have we met somewhere before?" It just kind of sounds stupid, and she was skating with 4 other girls, I was scared. Tattoo guy said, "Is this how the new Stickler acts?" Anyways my friends got off the ice, and with my expert skating ability I stayed and did a couple more laps. Eventually I found myself right behind the cute girl. Her friends had all skated ahead, so I came up right behind her and said, "Do I know you from somewhere?" And she replies, "Yeah I was thinking the same thing." It turns out 7 years ago we both were part of a club in college that we kind of ran together. She had changed though, alot, and was alot more attractive then I remember. So I did the only thing a guy in my situation can do, I skated with her for about a half hour, we caught up, and then I asked for her number. So hooray for the new Stickler, because the old one would have never approached her in the first place.

And last but not least, I never, ever, click on the Blogs of Note at the top of blogger. But today as I was signing in to write all this, the blog of note was called Tripping On Words. What an unusual name and it was so catchy I clicked on it. When the blog came up it seemed like my computer froze due to a flash image on the page, eventually a pop up came up saying I could disable the nonworking flash image and once I got past it the blog was well worth the wait. So it is a blog about Claire and Lara who write travel books while traveling around the world. They are somewhere near day 130 of their trip, I went back and read every post. One of the most fascinating Blogs I've found in awhile and I think you should all go take a look at it. But don't take my word for it, this is when we cut to small children talking about their favorite books ala Reading Rainbow, instead you'll have to click here and read for yourself.

Also I apologize for my lack of writing lately, I'm back in the swing of things now. Work has been killing me, but the new Stickler makes time for the things that he enjoys!

Flying on a Courier Ticket

2006-08-16T22:47:00.000-07:00

So, this is short, I'm busy right now. So just a question. DOes anyone know anything about flying as a courier? I know it is cheaper, but what does it entail?

The Big Wedding Debacle

2006-08-08T21:29:00.000-07:00

I have a slight problem. I have too many weddings to go too. I know this doesn't sound like a problem, but it is. For all of you that have gone to weddings in the past you know how big of a problem this actuelly is. It all starts with me selfishly taking a trip to Europe which has made me poor. Now not only do I need to buy wedding gifts for 3 weddings, I have to buy plane tickets for three weddings. Then I have to find hotel rooms for three weddings, and lastly buy some sort of different tie for all three weddings, since the same people may be at all the weddings. This adds up monetarily, and I will be poor.

But to be honest money isn't really the problem. The date issue is the problem. See none of these weddings are in Los Angeles. Only one is in my hometown. The other two, do I go stag? Do I really want to go to a wedding all by myself in some remote part of the country and not bring someone with me? So you all see the problem. So I need your help, I have a wedding I really want to go to in Arizona, Pheonix to be exact. I need a date, it is one of my good friends from college, but to be honest I don't know any of his friends. Not a single one, but I want to go, because it is important. So I need a date, who can help me out? As you can see from the pictures I'm not that bad looking of a guy, sometimes! And free booze is always fun!

Lesbioke?

2006-08-06T16:26:00.000-07:00

What a Saturday, for a day that really was not eventful some crazy weird things happened. Let's begin with surfing...

I got out early on Saturday morning and much to my dismay the wax started falling off my board and new wax would not stick. I caught a couple waves and then headed to my local surf shop for some advice. Still being relatively new to this I had no idea what was going on. I walked into the store and asked the first clerk "Why is the wax falling off my board?" He explained that I had to peel all the wax off my board and then clean the surface with this stuff called asitane(sp?). Then reapply all the wax from the beginning. He then proceeded to try to sell me a 20 dollar scraper. I told him that I was just going to use one of those junk credit cards that come in the mail. I knew those things would come in handy eventually! He then started telling me how the credit cards will brake, but the scraper, thats forever! I told him no thanks, I'll chance it.

So I got home and started scraping the wax off. This took forever and I have a nice impression of a line going up the center of my hand from scraping with the cards.
Which incidently didn't brake and worked like magic! So finally I had a really clean board. It looked so nice I didn't want to put new wax on it. But in order for the surfing to continue I had too. Just a lazy Saturday, Till...

Dylan called. He wanted to know what I was up too. Him being one of my three remaining friends in LA because of some drama that occurred before I left, I told him nothing. He wanted to hang out and have an adventure. Since I still can't drink because of the antibiotics, I made the suggestion of bowling!

We bowl at this place called Eagle Rock Lanes. By no means is it close, but on Saturday nights they have Karaoke but it is usually empty. We both decided this would be a chill night, till everything went wrong. We started in lane 6, bowled about one half of a game and then the ball return stopped working. Every time we would bowl from hence forth our balls would get stuck and I would have to have the manager come out and fix it. Game one took about 45 minutes to complete. I asked the manager to switch our lanes so he sent us to lane 1. Guess what? As soon as we started bowling lane 1 ball return stopped working. I complained again telling them I was tired of bowling and that I wanted a refund. They wouldn't give it to us, instead they moved us to Lane 12, which for some reason they couldn't turn the power on for it. So then they moved us to Lane 14. The ball return broke in that lane as well. I walked up the manager and told him, "I don't want to play I want a refund!" He kept telling me that was impossible, we fought about it. Eventually another manager came out and told us he would refund our money, but not for the shoes. Because technically we wore them the whole time. Bull$*&! I was pissed, but I gave in. Taking our refund; Dylan and I walked into the bar to Karaoke. And we saw an unusual sight...

The room was packed with about 50 women, all of which had one trait in common. They had mullets. We looked at each other and realized at the same time that every women in the bar must be a lesbian or it was 80's night. We were confirmed of our suspicions when two of the girls got up on the stage and screamed, "Lesbian birthday party!" and everyone cheered. Yeah, we were definitly out of place. Dylan and I signed up for our songs and realized that we were about to go down in flames and their was no way either of us would be meeting any girls tonight. Dylan got up first and sang "Funke Cold Medina" by Tone Loc, which got the lesbians going. We had both decided to go with what we knew, this was not the night to experiment.

I got up and sang "Come Sail Away" by Styx. As I approached the stage, Dylan in his drunken stupor told the lesbians that I had self esteem issues and they should cheer loudly. Well that is what they did. The Lesbians kind of inducted us into their group, kind of. They gave us cake! One of the Lesbians started flirting with Dylan, Her significant other was not happy with this. And she was forcibly pulled away from us. We got up and sang "Total Eclipse of the Heart" doing all of our most gay dance moves we could think of, such as; singing to each other, Dylan tried to hump my leg, we almost kissed but didn't, etc... The Lesbians couldn't get enough of it. We then exited the stage and left. One random question I pondered on the way home...Do Lesbians hang out with only big groups of lesbians? Is it a big orgy at the end of the night?

Not really exciting, but definitly a night that I won't forget for awhile.

Took the day off or not allowed to go to work!

2006-08-03T16:10:00.000-07:00

Yeah, so I've had this cough for 4 weeks. Not one of those, Zoolander;"Cough cough I think I'm getting a Black Lung" It's more like a Hacking cough where phlegm goes flying this way and that, sometimes coating entire peoples faces. Which reminds me of that porn I was looking at last night. Were talking one nasty cough.

So Tuesday I was told not to come to work and go see the docter. Yeah!! a day of no pay. I'm not really excited about not making any money, but I guess my health is more important then being able to pay my rent. So I went to the docter, now it is important to note tha in my 4 years of living in LaLaLand I have never been to a docter for two reasons. One, I didn't have insurance for awhile, then I learned why one should have insurance and everything changed. Two I didn't want to try to find a docter out here, because how was I suppossed to know that the Docter was real and he wasn't just playing one on TV?

Anyways I found a docter, and He gave me a thurogh examination. I was told that I had a wonderful Bacterial Infection in my lung. I acted all tough in front of the docter, saying it must have been all that makin gout with girls in Europe. But really, how bad does that sound. This seriously can not be a good thing. The docter came back into the room and handed me a brown paper bag. I felt like I was in the middle of some surreal drug deal in a docter office, especially since their were technically drugs in the bag. So now I am on some great antibiotics for the next week and a half. They make me dizzy for 20 minutes! As well, as an inhaler, that I have to use twice a day that shoots a powder like coke into my throat. Must be why it came in a brown paper bag.

Now i'm back at work and this morning for the first time ever in my life my alarm didnt go off. I was sound asleep when for some reason I turned over and looked at my clock. It said 5:36 AM, And I turned back over completely relaxed and thought, ahhh 5:36 AM. Then suddennly I bolt upright realizing I had to be at work at 6:00 AM. I jumped out of bed, threw on a shirt, forgot my pants and scared my next door neighbor when she saw certain things that her old eyes couldn't handle. Had to come back in the house for them but had no keys. Luckily the back door was open! and then drove faster then the last time I ran from the cops in a high speen car chase. I made it exactly on time, which in LaLaland, driving 10 miles in 15 minutes is really tough, especially at the beginning of rush hour. I caught my breath at the trailer. I took a big breath of fresh air, then realized I smelled pretty bad and proceeded to have a wonderful day of causing little children to turn away from me in disgust. I really hope tomorrow is better!

Earth Angel...

2006-07-30T15:18:00.000-07:00

Earth Angel, won't you be mine. My darling dear, love you all the time, Because I'm just a fool, a fool in love with you.

Embarrassment.

I don't think most people can know the full scope of embarrassment; till during a highschool graduation party, Your parents walk out on stage as the band. But that was the past. When my father cut off our phone call earlier tonight because he was in a rush to get to a "gig." It got me thinking about where did it all start, where did the obscession come from. I know full well my mother and father will be reading this, so I'll just start out by saying that Stuck in The 50's is a great doo wop band and I commend my father and the other fathers on making the decision that embarrassment for their children was a small price to pay for happiness. Only now I realize that I had nothing to be embarrassed about, now I can appreciate that having parents that live life is way better then having parents who don't know how to live.

It all began ages ago when a number of families from a small suburb on the west side of Chicago attended a summer camp together. Camp Brosius, the small but peaceful camp located in Elkhart Lake Wisconsin, is like no other summer camp in the world because it is meant for families. Grandmas, Grandpas, Moms, Dads, Uncles, Aunts, and kids of all ages and size would spend one week up at this camp each summer, playing in the sun at tournaments and games or just relaxing. But even though during the day the kids were sent off to group activites at night everyone would be back together in their cabin for some good ole time with the family. A unique experience to say the least.

As years passed these families from the west side of Chicago became a well known group of campers, an elite group. But what the people of Camp Brosius didn't know is that every year on tuesday night of camp all these families would sit around Rose End(the biggest cabin at Camp Brosius) and play a game called "Encore." This is a game where the group would split into teams, usually of two. Then a card would be pulled and a word would be announced. Then back and forth across the table each group would have to sing at least eight words to a song that contained said word. These families were extremely musical, so rounds would go on for 10 minutes sometimes. There were many controversies like in all games, such as Frank, who was one of the fathers, had knowledge of so many songs from the 40's and 50's that most times none of us could tell if he was making them up or singing something real. But it was fun, always fun.

Then one year when I was about 10, they themed the end of camp as a doo wop night. When we recieved the letter in the mail before camp had started, I could see my father's brain turning. Little did I know that this is where the Brosius Family Singers would be born. The last day of camp came and with my Mother at the Keyboard, everyone decked out in poodle skirts, lether jackets, doo rags; The Schwerin's, The Stickler's, and The Schwartz's all got up and sang the night away for the people of camp. Hits such as Rock Around the Clock, In the still of the Night, Sixteen Candles, and well Earth Angel. The Brosius Family Singers only had one performance, but I believe that this was the beginning of Stuck in the 50's at least in my memory.

So now that I'm grown up a little, not embarrassed by my parents(at least not all the time), I want everyone to know about Stuck in the 50's. So if your ever in the Chicago area, go see them perform. If your from the era it will be a great blast from the past, if not then you'll have more fun then you've had in a long time with your parents. So to Mom, Dad, Frank, Steve, Don, Peggy, Michael, John, Bill, and Bill keep on rockin the night away and know that us kids miss it even though we never say it.

The Conclusion of "The Best Europe Story Ever"

2006-07-24T05:40:00.000-07:00

To begin if you did not read the last post click here first and then come back and read the rest of the story!

So you all are pissed I didn't finish my tale! Well now you know how I felt for 2 months not knowing what was going to happen when I returned home. Many people along the way asked me, isn't someone collecting your mail? Couldn't you call home and ask? Let me ask you this, would you call home and ask your roommates to check if an envelope with Ten Thousand Pounds in it came to the house? Yeah I didn't think so.

So when I arrived home after my flight, I burst through the front door to see my roommate "Costume Girl" sitting at her desk. I said, "Costume Girl where is my mail?"

She replied, "What no Hi, how are you? or Hug hello?"

I gave her a hug and told her the story. She informed me that my other roommate "Tattoo Guy" had been keeping my mail for me and she had no idea where it was. But he would be home in about 4 hours. So we sat on the back porch drinking beers and I told her about my trip.

When Tattoo Guy walked into the house I ran up to him and said, "Where is my mail?!" He looked at me and just like Costume Girl asked, "What no hug hello?" We are all very close!

Anyways I sat him down and told him the story. At the end he said, "I can't believe you just told me that whole story before going through the mail!" I said that was because I didn't know where it was. So Tattoo Guy took me over to a drawer in our dining room where he had been putting all the mail. I lifted out the large stack and both of us hurridly went through the multitudes of junk mail. Unfortunatly there was no letter at first glance.

But then somthing unusual caught my eye. It was a Post Card that had a picture of London on the front of it. I picked it up, flipped it over, and read:

Hello Stickler,

Greeting from London to you and your beautiful family.

Edward sends his best wishes!

Love Diana and Edward

I was stunned, I read it over and over again. But there was nothing else to it, no return address, nothing, no money stapled to the outside. So you all may be wondering, who is Diana? Well that is a secret for Edward and I. And even though I never got the money I wouldn't betray his trust by telling that inconsiquential story that he releated to me while walking to Buckingham palace. So in the end, it was the most anticlimatic conclusion to the tale, but the post card gave me hope. Edward knew I wasn't going to be home for 2 months, so maybe, just maybe that letter is still destined to find its way to my home. Becuase if not, I just told the story of how I got conned out of two hundred dollars in London.

The Best Europe Story You Will Ever Read!

2006-07-19T23:20:00.000-07:00

It wasn't the beginning, but it was the one event that will always stick out in my mind as the beginning. I had been in London for less then 24 hours and I was on my way to Buckingham Palace. Now Buckingham Palace is rather large and their is a rather long walk up a street with a grassy median to get there. They call this area "the mall". When royalty or nobles would come to visit the King and Queen, the mall would be lined with crowds of people and trumpets cheering on the coaches as they traveled the kilometer to the gate.

I was at the beginning of the one kilometer walk down the mall to the palace when an old man hobbled up next to me. He asked in a thick Australian accent, "Excuse me is this the way to Buckingham Palace?" and he motioned in the way we were walking with his cane. I looked at him and noticed he was wearing a Fedora, a brown trench coat, and clasped an old cane in his right hand.

I then said, "Yep, It's straight forward about a kilometer."

He smiled and said, "Your not British, where are you from?"

"The U.S."

"Well you look British, why aren't you from England?" he asked.

"Because I'm not." I said.

"Well my name is Edward and I am from Melbourne Australia!"
He then went on to talk about how he was an antiques dealer and started asking me questions about what I did for a living, why i was in europe, about my family? and in return I asked of him the same. I found out he was going to be traveling to Los Angeles soon, so I gave him some advice on where to go and what to see.

We were about half way down the length of the mall by this point and Edward changed the subject to world politics. He asked me, "So your president he is in office for 5 years, correct?"

"No,"I said,"He is in office for 4 years"

"Really, you think so?"

"Yes, it is 4 years, I'm positive!"

"Well In Australia it is 5 years and I could have sworn yours was 5 years as well."

"No it is definitly 4 years, because I can't wait to vote for a new president!"
Then he said something odd, "Really, you think so. Do you want to make a wager?"
I replied, "No, I don't want to make a wager, I don't want to take your money. It is definitly 4 years."

"Oh, Ok."he says and then changes the subject to something else that is going on in the world. For the rest of our conversation about the world, the economy of countries, etc.. whenever I would disagree with him about something he would ask,

"Really, you think so. Do you want to make a wager?" and each time I replied, "No I don't want to make a wager."

Eventually we came to Buckingham Palace and Edward asked me his final question, "So how many people do you think live in the United States?"

I said, "About two hundred and fifty million."

"Really that is alot of people, are you sure there are that many? Because in Australia there are only nineteen million people and Australia has to be close to the same size as the U.S."

I said, "No I don't think it is close to the same size, there are definitly somewhere around two hundred and fifty million people living in the U.S."

"Really," he says, "that seems like an awfully big number."

"Well, there are at least nine million living in Los Angeles alone, so I'm pretty sure it is around two hundred and fifty million."

Then he says, "Well do you want to make a wager?"

I replied, "No I do not want to make a wager, but why do you keep asking me if I want to make a wager?" And then this happened.

Out of his back pocket he pulled one hundred thousand pounds in bills wrapped ina rubber band. He related to me how for the last week he had been staying at a casino and every night he would go the casino and win money, which brought his grand total in winnings to one hundred thousand pounds. I told him to put the money away before someone robbed him and he agreed and shoved it back into his pocket. Then he explained how tonight was his last night in London and he needed to lose a bet or he would go back to the casino and gamble away his fortune. And what a better person to lose money to then a young man who had spent the morning talking and walking with him.

I stared at him awestruck and said, "I'm a poor backpacker, I don't have a one hundred thousand pounds to gamble with."

He laughed and said, "No not for one hundred thousand pounds, for something much smaller like two hundred pounds."

Again I said, "No, I can't that is like four hundred U.S. Dollars and I am at the beginning of my trip, I can't afford to lose that much."

"Ok, Ok." He says, "I'll make a deal with you. If you win I'll pay you two hundred pounds, but if I win you only have to pay me one hundred pounds."

I looked at him and said, "What is the wager?"

He says, "Two Hundred and Fifty million, Do you think higher or lower living in the U.S.?"

So I took the bet. I chose lower because I totally second guessed myself and shook his hand. We then spent the next forty five minutes wandering around London asking every police officer and taxi driver we came across where we could find a book store. We eventually found one and I walked inside and picked up a 2006 almanac. Before I could open it, Edward stopped me and said, "Wait, Look up Australia first." So I looked up Australia and their are ninteen million three hundred and thiry thousand people living there. Then I flipped it open to the U.S. and read that there are two hundred and ninty three million people living there. I was forty three million people off and I had lost.

I said, "I can't believe I lost"

Edward said, "Your not suppossed to lose, your suppossed to win, now I'm going to go to the casino tonight and gamble my money away."

"Well,"I said,"I guess I owe you one hundred pounds."

"Yes, you do!"

"Well,I don't carry that kind of money on me, so we have to find an ATM." With that Edward and I walked down the street about one block till we came to an ATM.

I said, "Wait here and I am going to go stand in the queue and get your money."

Edward, motioning to a bench said, "Ok, I'll be sitting over there on a bench." I then stood in the queue for the ATM and got his money. When I turned around, Edward was not sitting on the bench where he had motioned before, instead he had crossed a street and a small park and was sitting far away waving his arms in the air to get my attention. So, frustrated that I had to walk so far, I trudged across the street and the park till I came upon him sitting on the bench. He says, "What are you doing here? Why didn't you run away? I walked all the way over here hoping you would just run away"

I stared at him and said, "That would have been a good idea, I wish I had thought of it, but I lost a bet, so here is your one hundred pounds." and I held th emoney out to him.

He then said, "Wow, Stickler that is so honerable of you, no one would come over here and actuelly pay the money. Your going to come out of this better then if you had won the bet."

And then this happened, and I still can't believe that this happened. Out of his briefcase he pulled an envelope and asked me to write my name and address on it. So i did, then he asked me to put the one hundred pounds in the envelope. So I did. Then from his back pocket he pulled out the giant wad of quid and pulled off ten thousand pounds and shoved it into the envelope. He then says to me, "When you get home expect to find this surprise in the mail, today you made an old mans day because no one ever pays attention to an old man." He then asked when my next Holiday was and I told him next May, he then tells me that he is going to send me a plane ticket for Melbourne, Australia to be his guest so I can start my backpacking trip next year. And with that he stood up, shook my hand, thanked me for a wonderful morning and walked off.

Throughout my travels I told everyone I met along the way this story, everyone has there own theory of what I would find in the mail when I returned home. Be it nothing to everything I would want to find. So Ladies and Gentleman what do you all think I found in the mail two months later when I returned to the states? But regardless of the outcome it is a just a great story!

Rain in California?

2006-07-17T23:22:00.000-07:00

This morning I awoke at 4:00AM to go to work. I thought my alarm had been the culprit of the jarring beginning to my day, but there was no music playing. I looked outside to see multiple bright streaks in the sky. Yep folks, Lighting. Now in the midwest we call it heat lightning, but you never see lightning out west during the dead heat of summer. We live in a desert, duh! So imagine my surprise when not only was there lightning, but it started pouring down rain! The weather is royally screwed up if were getting rain in California during July.

Today was uneventful, except my last posting finally went up at Rivalfish.com for the Worldcup. It took them long enough! So click here and enjoy. I'm proud of this one! ALso since returning I have made some site modifications i think everyone will find interesting. First there is a new picture on the side bar of my brother and I drunk in Barcelona. Remember that night little Bro? Also I have included links at the bottom of the sidebar for all the Stickler's World of Euro Yodeling Stories that appeared on Rivalfish.com. And last but not least I have added some new blogs that people should check out to the sidebar! And don't worry I didn't forget about the story, tomorrow I have the day off, so I will write it while I am doing laundry. It's a Doozy!

What not to do when your jet lagged

2006-07-16T21:42:00.000-07:00

Work...Yes, Ladies and Gentleman I made a huge mistake and the day after I returned to the states I went straight back to work. I have to make back all that money that I have been spending friviously for the last 2 months.

But it was a little too soon and I pretty much exhausted myself to the point where this weekend became a sleepfest. Well that would have been nice, but then I had to help my two best friends move all day saturday into their new apartment. So what does one do when they work themselves silly for two days straight, well he wakes up early and goes surfing.

Thats right, this morning for the first time this summer I took my board and ventured back to my old haunt in Santa Monica. I got to the water at about 6:30 AM and the breaks looked so clean. The beach was empty which meant they were all mine. I rode the waves, splashed around with my dolphin pals from the summer before and was out of there before the walls of water started to roll in about 9:00 AM. Then in an extrodinary move, I used the rest of my savings and bought an XBOX 360. SO that leaves me with a 5:00AM call time tomorrow and too many e-mails still to write to alert the people I met along the way that I have pictures up from the trip. So if you feel like looking at some amazing pictures from my europe trip click here. If not go see "You, Me, And Dupree" and try to find my cameo! Till next time when I'm going to tell the mother of all stories because I won't be tired.

I'm Back

2006-07-14T07:54:00.000-07:00

After the most amazing adventure of my life I am back. Unfortuantly I have had to go straight back to work because of an urgent call that was made to me yesterday. So until the weekend when I cna properly e-mail everyone i met along the way here is the link for the pictures of my trip. Just click on the side where it says Europe 06 after clicking on this link. I had a blast and I want to thank everyone I met along the way for making it an experience I will never forget!

Á long long time ago when I could still remember....

2006-07-01T07:49:00.000-07:00

SO yeah, it´s been awhile since last i posted on my site. It seems that life has really taken off right from under me. Well, if you have been reading the postings at Rival Fish.com, then you all know part of the story. Currently I ´m getting close to the tailend of my trip which means soon I´ll be back in the good ole USA, surfing and singing kareoke on the weekends like I had never left. But for now, I´ve got a couple things to write about.

One, I finally made it to Germany. It has been amazing because i met the coolest Germans in Vienna, Austria who happen to live in Muncih and have been showing me a great time! But right now I´m kind of bummed, I went and toured a concentration camp today and it really has kind of affeted me. Just the stillness of everything and how cold it felt. I really don´t know how to explain it better then that right now, but it has put me currently in a state of depression. Hopefully once the first World Cup game is over today i´ll be inebriated enough to pas throguh this funk.

Which brings me number 2. Yep here we go, It´s world cup time. Ever since my Australian Dark Horses got their butts whipped by a call that made the whole wrold sigh in despair, I´ve been rooting for germany. And let me tell you, being in Germany when the germans win a huge game really makes it worth it. So with that i leave to watch the england game, eat some wings, drink some beer, and hopefully forget for a little while what i saw today!

Twins (Mom don't read this)

2006-06-29T20:41:00.000-07:00

I finally have the internet in my new apartment so I finally have the opportunity to write about the lengendary adventure I had with my brother in Europe.
Our story begins in Madrid at a party in a hostel. I had convinced my brother to go out even though he was still recovering from a cold. He agreed to one drink. When we got to the bar we were a little worried because we didn't see to many people there until one of the guys working there told us drinks were down stairs. We got down there and the place was packed.
We got our drinks and went upstairs and watched a little soccer. This whole time my brother had a plan, which he did not tell me. He had spotted to gorgeous twins and when I was about to get up and talk to them my brother told me to wait. Since we were the only two guys at the bar not trying to talk to them they came over and talked to us. Stickler was on fire, I had know idea he had the perfect opening game plan. We tried as hard as we could to keep them from leaving, Stickler talked about his life in the movie biz and I talked about my slightly exagerated career as a musician. Stickler was growing tired and was beginning to give up hope. What he didn't know was that I was sealing the deal for the two of us. But it was too late Stickler didn't want to go to a club and all ready said his good byes when I started making out with the other twin. All was lost because of a lack of communication. The one girl couldn't stay with me and leave her sister so I told her to meet me at my hostel later in the night. I left with my brother and told him how we both could have had twins if hadn't called it a night, I was the perfect wing man and Stickler had know idea that I was capable of this skill.
The girl showed up at 3:30 in the morning and we went up to the roof of the hostel where things began to get, well you know. During the fun she began moaning my name. Now remember it's very early in the moring and my memory wasn't working too well. I had forgotten her name completely and thus I pulled a Sienfeld by saying "ohh you". She stopped and looked at me and said "you don't remember my name?" I replied "Mulva?" I thought what I had said was so funny I couldn't stop laughing in her face. She left, but I at least have a good story.

So currently i'm in Florence...

2006-06-14T07:13:00.000-07:00

Like I said florence, I don't have much time to tell some riveting tale, but I ended up in Rome and had possibly the best time of my life. It is so old and amazing. I also had the italian experince of kissing a girl at midnight at Trevi fountain, the steps of the colleseum, many other places in the middle of night around Rome. The sistine Chapel basically stunned me for about a half hour, I'm still trying to figure out how long it took for them to complete some of those rooms in the Vatican museum. But for more riveting tales and pictures of my sky diving click here!

Skydiving Swiss Style

2006-06-13T02:39:00.000-07:00

I don't know where to start other then to say, I jumped out of a plane in switzerland. I even have pictures to prove it. Alot has happened since last time I wrote. I went to Interlaken Switzerland and stayed in a hostel called Balmers. If you are traveling in Europe my only reccomendation other then going to the guiness factory in Dublin, Ireland. Is to go to Balmer's in Interlaken. I met some amazing people from Australia, Canada, and even a girl who happens to live 2 blocks away from in LA. Seriously two blocks, she lives on the street where my old apartment is. Kevin if your reading she lives in the white one at the end of the block that looks like Ours! But I can't really put into words what it is like to jump out of a plane. Really there is no way to describe the rush or the feelings. The rest of the day afterwards just ends up being a blur of excitement while you try to calm yourself down. I lvoe sky diving and i may do this as a career, in fact i have been thinking about moving back to switzerland and possibly teaching ice climbing or something like that.

But i got off the point. Currently i am in Rome. Yeah, it's a long story. I'm still not sure how I managed to get here. It has a lot to do with missing a train, running into some people I met in Interlaken and on a whim going someplace else. The life of a traveler. YOu got to love it. Last night I watched the most amazing football game. Australia scroed all three goals to win in the last 10 minutes. Iw atched the US show why they aren't suppossed to be in this tournament, and I cheered on Italy with too many italians as the won there match. Actuelly i spent most of the game talking with a girl I met from edminton who of course is an oilers fan. But the game was on in the background. OK so there you go today I'm going to the vatican, I'm excited. SO with that were at the half way mark, one more month to go. Oh and youngest stickler, when are you going to post the story about your trip?

Did I just write that!

2006-06-08T03:37:00.000-07:00

So I´m shoving off today for switzerland, maybe Italy. I haven´t decided yet! I love this trip and the randomness. Well the Youngest Stickler left this morning To head back to the states. We had a great time when we weren´t bickering like we were in grade school. But I´m gonna let him tell the story. I just wanted to say before I lose internet connectivity again for a few days go to Rivalfish.com. My articles will hopefully begin showing there little heads since the World Cup starts tomorrow! So to everyone let me end by saying Go USA, but if they get knocked out Early...Go Australia my favorite dark horse team!

Sick In Paris

2006-06-05T02:10:00.000-07:00

When describing my experience in France to everyone, I can sum it up in pretty much one word. Sick! Yep, I got sick with a sore throat when I made it to Paris. Why? Well that has to do with a little thing called it being unseasonably cold and rainy, everywhere I go. It also didn´t help that it took me exactly 2 full days to get to PAris from Ireland. I´m not complaining though...No in fact it is a rather magical story of murder, intrigue, romance, and phlem. It all begins in Cork, Ireland where I was suppossed to catch a ferry to Rosscoff, France. Due to weather difficulties the Ferry was totally booked up and I had to take a 6 hour bus ride across Ireñand to the other port of enty in Rosslear to catch a different ferry. On arriving at this ferry, I was shown to seats in the very bottom of the ferry wher it was very cold. I sat there with my bag and then realized I was not going to sit in the cold for 17 hours. I then heard american voices coming fom a distant corner of the ship. I slowly walked over to them and said, Hello! This is how I met Tara and Nikki and my crazy adventure aboard the Irish ferry began.

I convinced the two girls to watch my stuff while I searched the boat for a place to store all our bags safely. Especially since I didn´t have a room or anything and who wants to be carrying around a giant bag on what most peoplehave formerly termed a "Booz Cruise." So I found a locker area, we stored our bags and hit the bar. I was smart and brought beer with me. The girls on the other hand purchased a large bottle of vodka and juice. We then met more americas who were from Texas, very young and very naive. These two girls left us and went off with some of the sketchiest polish guys I had ever met. Anywaysthe three of us wre drinking, I watched Nikki officially put every guy I know to shame drinking when she consumed a good 2/3 of the bottle leaving the rest for Tara to polish off. I drank my two beers and in my sarcastic way gained there trust.

So Nikki passed out, and TAra and I played Soduku in the bar. It was kind of funny and playful SOduku, at one point she thought we should add a drinking element to the game, I looked at my watch, 15 more hours on the boat why not. As we were getting to know each other, one of the girls from Texas stumbles up to the table clearly drunker then that homeless man that sits in my gutter in front of my house. She explains how she lost her friend, how her friend passed out and took the polish guys carried her away.

Springing into action was super Stickler. Actualy Tara informed me I had no choice but to find her and bring her back to our table in the bar. After searching high and low I found her passed out in the back corner of the boat with the sketchy polish guys crouched around her salavating. Seriousl I have saved many a person in my day, but this was the hardest. I walked over to the guys and informed them I was going to take her back to her friend and bed. They of course didn´t speak english, but did try to stop me. Thank god Tara came walking up behind me and grabbed the girl from the floor. We then carrid her back to the table, mae her drink water and eat sandwiches till she sobered up. Good work for Super STickler.

And in the end, yes, I got the girl. But I do not kiss and tell, unless it is something good. Instead i will just say a very cold ferry ride became one that was more balmy then anything.

I´m currently trveling with the youngest Stickler through spain, Ihave gotten over the illness, and last night the two of us met twins at a bar! Your asumptions of what probabñy happened are correct. But these are stories for another time. Buenos Noches!

for Stickler

2006-06-04T19:35:00.000-07:00

Stickler wanted me to inform all of you avid readers that he is having a wonderful time in europe and that he is terribly apologetic for his lack of posts recently. he is going to try and email me his posts so i can put them up because unfortunately whatever he was attempting wasn't working.. at all.. So, never fear though, he is not dead, or lost, and hasn't been taken captive by any irish folk. infact, he is currently in spain with our little brother enjoying himself and meeting lots of people and experiencing the cultures, blablahblah.. his actual posts will be much more interesting than this one. So, as soon as he emails me something, i will hop to it and get all his wacky and wild sticklerized stories up for your enjoyment. sorry for the inconvenience.

It costs me €1 for 15 minutes on the computer!

2006-05-25T13:21:00.000-07:00

Ok, I'm pissed because I have sent three posts and today I was finally somewhere I could check the page and none of them were up! So to summarize...So much has happened. So many stories. But to sum it all up I love European Women! Love them! The girls I have met in Ireland especially. I love Ireland and have had a blast. Currently, I'm in Cork. I was in Dublin for the last couple of days, it was fantastic. I went ona pub crawl, went to St. James brewery and had guiness straight from the source. Ran into Bono at a bar! Life has been Good. But like I said this is way too expensive and since none of the stories I sent for the last couple of days have shown, Let's just say, tomorrow I'm gonna find a cheap place would good keyboard! Hope everyone is having a good week!

--
http://www.sticklersworld.blogspot.com/

I have arrived!

2006-05-19T11:29:00.000-07:00

First off I just want to say that Virgin Atlantic is the best damn
air-o-plane that exists. I knew it was going to be good when after I
stepped past the 10 beautiful female stewardess's, there was a huge bar in
the center of the plane. Also they served me 2 meals, I could watch movies
on my own personal TV, and all the free booze I could drink. It made the
ten and a half hours go bye so quickly.

I'm currently staying in a hostel in London called "the generator." I knew
this place was going to rock, when the first thing I saw was a large sign
stating that tonight was kareoke night in the bar. Asthe avid singer of
kareoke I was not about to miss out on an oppurtunity to show up mass
amounts of foriegners. I got to my room and took a 2 hour power nap. by
this time it was 5:00 in the PM. I was still extremely tired from not
sleeping well on the plane, but I refued to be badly jet lagged.

I went to a pub down the street called "the goose." I was so tired the
bartender and me had trouble understanding each other. He finally says,
"find a table, sit down, and then come back and order." The place was of
course packed. So remembering what dave had told me before I left. Step
out of your comfort zone! I approached two guys who had an open seat at
there table. This is how I met Troy and Andrew from Victoria Falls
Oztralia, and had one of the best first evenings one could have in a foreign
land. but that is a story for my next post. By the way I am really
jet-lagged, or maybe hungover. Both kind of feel the same!

Leaving on a jet plane!

2006-05-17T11:29:00.000-07:00

I packed everything, realized I had to much, got rid of half of that stuff. Repacked again. I still have too much stuff! I'm going for 2 months!!! I have enough stuff to go two weeks without laundry! But it is too much stuff! My plane leaves in exactly 5 hours and I'm still not done! So I am going to live with having too much stuff, my bag isn't that heavy. Maybe I'm just scared to leave? Well, next time I write I will be into the trip. Thanks for the kind words everyone, if you want post cards send me an address at sticklersworld@gmail.com

Good Bye

Stickler

This is a Test!

2006-05-16T13:36:00.000-07:00

This is a test of the emailing capability of my blogger account. If you are all reading this, then be excited, for tomorrow I leave for Europe. I am about to embark on one of the greatest adventures of my life, and all of you are going to come along for the ride. RivalFish.com will also be posting all of my writings pertaining to the World Cup. So if your a sports nut go there and read about my World Cup journey, if your a fan of our blog read here about my journey pertaining to the sights and the mischief I am sure to get in! Either way please comment because I would love to know who is reading this stuff! Just say hello, I don't bite...well not enought to draw blood! For those of you whose blogs I read and comment on, I am taking a 2 month hiatus from reading your blogs, I'll catch up when I get back. And know that I still love you all! Also my sister and brother will be taking over control of the blog for 2 months...I apologize in advance for the inconvience. They will be answering comments, etc... I will try whenever I get a chance to answer all comments but I may be too busy! And finally for those of you that keep googling "Lose Viriginity to Brother" and this site comes up...know that my sister accidently used the word "Brother" in one her posts yelling at me about how I told everyone how she lost her virginity to a certain guy that will remain nameless. This is not that kind of site! I'm definitly going to miss my addiction to sitemeter! So with all of this being said, Goodbye everyone...Goodbye...goodbye...goodbye...goodbye...goodbye...I'm not saying goodbye to you...goodbye...goodbye...and goodbye. See ya July 12th!

World Cup Friday!

2006-05-12T11:49:00.000-07:00

Yep, it has been three weeks since the last time I posted something on Rivalfish.com. So go read about why no one should miss the World Cup this year!

If sports humor doesn't float your boat then how about the funniest razor ad I have ever seen. Not only has it made me spend my morning searching out this tool of men, I can now boldly say my whole body is smoother then a babies bottom! Thanks to The Cali Thais for linking it on there page!

Have wonderful weekend and if your in the LA area, Brass Monkey, Karaoke, Saturday night!

Less Then a Week Till I'm Gone!

2006-05-10T23:57:00.000-07:00

So the countdown has officially begun, in less then one week I head off to Europe for 2 months. British Ladies beware, because I'm coming for all of you first. I'm actuelly rather nervous and little scared right now. I have never in my life done anything remotely like this unless you count the time I took a greyhound bus from Indiana to Chicago in the middle of the night. I still have nightmares about the the large woman who picked a fight with the driver. I'm glad they booted her from the bus in the middle of nowhere and I'm sure some coyotes were fed well that night.

But now to my problem. I don't have a place to stay whilst I am travelling in germany. So if anyone knows anyone, or if any germans are reading this, I need a place to crash. Everything has been booked for months because of the world cup. And although I do like the rare cardboard box to sleep in, I would rather not be staying in the alley whilst vising your country. So if anyone knows someone, or has a friend, or maybe knows a rich old lady that may need sexual favors in exchange for a place to stay; I'm Game!

2006-05-10T19:26:00.000-07:00

just to respond to some of your comments about my last post.. i will most likely NOT be commenting on any of your blogs while my brother is in europe, don't take offense please, it's not that i don't care about what you have to say, it's more that i just don't care what you have to say. so with that, i leave you with a riddle:

two coins add up to thirty cents, one of them is not a nickle.. what are these two coins?

i heart sudoku

2006-05-08T19:53:00.000-07:00

so, i was speaking to my big brother the other day via cellphone, whilst i was sitting peacefully in central park and attempting to do a 'hard' sudoku, because the 'easy's' had proven too easy the 'medium's' too hard, so i figured i'd just dive right into the 'hard's' and spend my afternoon tearing my brain into tiny pieces and numbers.... SO ANYWAY.. back to my story. i was speaking to my older bro, and he tells me it is my job to keep track of this blog while he is gone away in europe for a month or two or whatever he decides to do, i'm guessing it's going to be closer to a week, cuz knowing how much of a puss he can be.. he'll probably get there, see a sign with giant boobs, faint, and end up in a hospital and then right back in the states. SO, he was telling me it was my sworn duty to make sure that his pride and joy, that being this blog, does not fall apart in any way while he is off gallivanting in the unknown that is europe. well, i thought about this long and hard, and about a half second later, told him perhaps i was not the properly equipped person to take on such a responsible duty, then proceeded to mention that i believe they have the 'internet' in europe and that it would probably be much easier for him to stop into a cyber cafe or whatever and just update this thing himself. (it's the simple things, he just doesn't quite get)... Plus, i'm kinda shy... and well, i don't particularly like spilling my guts on the world wide web... all of this i of course mentioned to my dear brother. so he tells me that i just have to check it to make sure that everything looks proper, and maybe add in pictures if necessary, ya know, the simple stuff..... i have no fucking clue how to add a picture. So, he tells me i can just go on and make fun of him.. so i guess that's what i'm doing here. but then i thought to myself, what if my brother actually stays in europe as long as he plans? i mean, thats a lot of making fun of him.. and i'msure i'll run out of shit to tell you about.. but for right now, i have a pretty great story.. i guess it's not really a story, it's more just something cute and funny that he did when he was younger, something that our dad LOVES to bring up everytime we all end up sitting at the dinner table and aren't yelling eachother and actually enjoying eachother's company... so here's goes:

oh shit.. i forgot what it was.. haha.. i guess it wasn't really all that important, but i sure built it up pretty big.. oops.. anyway.. i'll have to think of more stuff.. i'm sure there are good stories in there somewhere.

i think the story had something to do with a sugar cup or a sugar bowl... boys? can you fill me in on this one?? i know you remember.... it was kind of the beginning of the stickler-izations if you will...

ok, done wasting time here..

My Disney Crush

2006-05-07T19:43:00.000-07:00

Driving down any street in LA will sometimes yield some surprising sights and today was no different! While driving down from the grocery store, I crested down my usual shortcut across Hollywood and I saw in my rear view mirror vibrant colors. My car was put to a halt by a stop light giving me enough time to stare at the rainbow as at drew up next to me. It was a woman dressed head to toe in a Snow White costume.

Immeadiatly my head felt light from recalling all the childhood memories of watching Snow White because of my small crush on her. And now sitting in traffic directly next to me, the figmant had become reality. I couldn't help but stare and let my mouth drop a little lower then it probably should have. I was captured by this womans beauty, her black hair tyed above her head and her skin that was deifnitly a little more tan then the drawn charecter, she was beautiful. She turned and smiled at me and started to pull away.

I was awoken from my daze by the light changing and a number of loud honks. My foot jumped immeadiatly to the gas and I took off. I tried to keep up with her and to my luck I was stopped right next to her at the next light. Her window was down and I could hear that she was listening to the same classic rock station in her car. It was like an omen when at that instance STYX, "Lady" came blaring out of the radio. I turned down my volume and reached into the grocery bag sitting in my car seat. I then popped up and looked over into her car. She looked back and smiled again.

And I said, "Excuse me Snow White, how about an apple?" As I held an apple out to her between the cars.

Her reply as she cracked a smile and giggled, "How do I know it isn't one of the poisnous kind that puts me into a deep sleep."

I replied, "If it is, I'll be right here to kiss you and wake you up." and I lobbed the apple into her car, which she caught. She laughed, smiled, took a bite.

And then the honking began. The light had changed and all the peple behind me were visibly pissed. We both took off, unfortunatly she turned left at the next street never to be seen again. She probably had to get back to her 7 dwarfs, I heard they can be troublesome.

Working Hard or Hardly Working?

2006-05-03T20:30:00.000-07:00

For the last couple of days, I have been working. Not at a job, that happens tomorrow. No I have been working at being a man! A man-ly man. I have been doing home repairs.

I always assumed that everyone knew how to repair loose boards, re-wire outlets, and install cable underneath the floor, but I guess I was wrong. I was talking with my ex-roommate from old apartment, I refer to him as Cat Guy. he had a cat, it is maybe the coolest cat I have ever met. So anyone I was talking to Cat guy and his exact quote after I had told him what I had been doing, "It's good to know that there are some people out there that still know how to do these things, and don't rely on hiring others to do menial jobs."

I never really thought about it in this way before. And then I remembered hearing the same thing on the news the other day during the Illegal Immigrant walk-out. I am pretty sure it was Lou Dobbs on CNN who said, "When did Americans get so lazy?" And I started to think, where did I learn all these Man-ly traits that I take for granted? How did I learn to rip the electrical outlet out of the wall, as well as remove the box it sits in, then ground such a box, and swith the non-grounded plug for one that is grounded? I know I lost all of you in that sentence. I am making a point, someone taught me this and I retained the information.

And I realized my Father and Mother somewhere along the way bestowed upon me common sense. It was always a fight, but when my Dad would wake me up at 6AM screaming at the top of his lungs that I had to rake the lawn, there was a lesson being learned. I remember fondly turning over and going back to sleep, to have my father return to my room and take all my covers leaving me laying there cold. But still i would fight him and go back to sleep. He would then come in my room pick me up, I was to tired to struggle, throw me outside and lock the door. I would then yell for about a half hour at him outside of the door. Then at some point I would be really cold, so I would beg him to let me in so I could change and do the work. Really this was all a con because I would run back into my room and go back to sleep. Only to have him come barreling in the room with a bucket of water which he would pour on me. At some point I would cecede to my father and rake the lawn. Usually it was getting dark by that time, But still he would never let up, knowing full well that later in life these lessons would be important. Be it raking the lawn, cleaning the gutters, mowing the lawn, cleaning the windows, doing the dishes, setting the table, building a bookcase, servicing the car, etc...

But I'm thankful, because now I can take care of myself. So where am I going with all of this, well I'm getting to that. Even though I always felt like this work was some sort of punishment, I know now that it was just teaching me how to be a better person. And I think in some way writing about it will make the ladies want me more!

"The worst thing you can do to a child is ignore them!"

2006-05-02T06:00:00.000-07:00

That quote is from my first camp boss. Ben Schwartz, he sat us all in a circle the first night we arrived at camp and told us if there is anything we should take away from this experience, this may be the most important. I will never forget him for opening me up as a person.

So anonymous got me thinking, what happened that very first summer of being a camp counslor? What did I learn? How did I change? Well, Camp B was the very first time I jotted down the crazy thoughts that go through my head. So to answer these questions I searched through mounds of books, and then through boxes, till I remembered that this one special journal I hid in a drawer under my clothes so I could reread things I had written when I was feeling glum. I dusted off the cobwebs and opened the first journal I have ever written in. It was astonishing reliving all those memories in my mind and has given me some good blog fodder for the week. Now I could just copy the entire thing for you folks, but instead I want to quote for you what I wrote on the last day of camp. This is a direct quote from a journal I have never read to anyone, so please let me know what you think!

This is for myself to read 50 years from now, or for whoever finds this book after I am long gone; so here goes:

Even though at this point in my life I have only lived 18(almost 19) long years. I feel I have learned some absolute truths about myself and living in general this past summer.

First; Always take on everything you do with the best attitude. Everyone who has ever known me was amazed at how happy a person I am, but the best part is...this happiness spreads and when people are around me they become happy!

Second; Have fun. In school who cares what you study, just have fun aand somehow if your enjoying yourself, you'll always succeed in what you do.

These two absolute truths I always want to remember and I hope that I realize that I have lived them. Well, thats it for camp, for tomorrow starts the next chapter of my epic life

Well I have to admit, wise words from a youngin'. I have actuelly lived my life this way, except I did work my butt off in college. It wasn't all fun and partying. But I have always been happy and found it to be contagious! Now what else did I find in this magical journal. Well Lots of boring stuff about how fun camp was, crushes on girls, sneaking to bars, skinny dipping, fun games, wicked pranks I pulled etc...

But the best was the poem I found about the summer love that broke my heart. So Ladies and Gentleman of the blogosphere, my world debut of really bad poetry. I promise this is the only one, but I had to share, because it really is, well I'll just let you all be the judge! And if you could see the journal entry there is a duck drawn above the poem, Why? I don't know!

To My Love

Now a fairy tale this may not be,
But tis a story of a Boy named Me.
Everyone has heard nursery rhymes
And many tales from different times.
But never a love story like this before,
Which robs men of all that they were.

Now me was a lad, who that of late
Had never been on a real date.
And then out of nowhere came a beauty, of to speak,
Her eyes were aflame, and his heart became weak.
Was true love at first sight
He couldn't wait to see her again that night.

They talked and they chatted about things long lost.
They had more in common and from this is would cost,
His heart, he would give,But in silent reprimand
She would smite him and would feel as though damned.
Sinking to that place where only darkness dwell
Lost within the soundless pits where no one can tell.

And there is a picture, an image so still
Of the soverign young beauty he met long ago on a hill.
Forever in anguish he will have to live
Thinking of sweetness in a place, where he can't even give
To himself a pleasure to know he has survived.
Even though that lovely beast that has not died
Within his mind and not even to depart
The lovely sound has stolen his heart.

And now with no place to turn,
He dwells where a picture of beauty can not burn.
In the depths of a cavern where he can't see or touch.
The mind ever wandering back to this hutch.
Still ever looking for some sort of key
Sits the heart broken soul of a boy named Me.

-Stickler, September 21st, 1999.

Wow, she really hurt me, but to love and loss is better then to have not love at all. The story of what happened to this girl is kind of funny too. She ended up dating another guy back at school after the summer. I never met the guy till one day seven years later I was in a bar in LA and this girl from Indiana stumbles in. It turns out the guy that she went off with was one of my good friends in LA. Weird!

The ring? Unca Lou... You know I hate boxing!

2006-05-01T00:14:00.000-07:00

The weather is starting to get warmer. Warm enough where I have been surfing in the morning. This can mean only one thing, summer is approaching! When I think of summer I think of three things in this order...girls in bikinis, summer romances, and camp. I was a camp counselor once. I know what your all thinking, who in their right mind would leave me alone with a bunch of kids. Well, a small summer camp in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin put that trust in me and it turned out I was one of the best. So good that my second year of doing this, instead of giving me an age group they were forced to give all the age groups a half a day with me! That's what happens when you have children of all age groups sneaking into your activites. There is nothing like trying to pry a 7 year old off of your head because he/she would rather hang out with you then there group! My parents always thought I should be a teacher because of the natural responsivness kids had towards me. They thought I was a good role model, I just figured it was because I acted like a kid. Either way you look at it; children and me would go hand in hand, sometimes me carrying them piggy back.

As I was saying summer makes me think of summer camp. Summer camp makes me think of entirely too many stories, so I will start with my favorite one. It was June of 2000, my second year of working at camp. I knew the in's and out's of the camp from my status as a long time camper second year staffer. I also knew that this year I was going to hold the honor of being the King of Shreck's. For those of you that do not know what a Shreck is you should rent Indian Summer. But I will explain so you don't need to leave midstory, rent a movie, watch it, and then come back.

A shreck in it's simplest terms is a practical joke done at summer camp, that you never ever admit to being the perpatrator of. The King of Shrecks is the person who pulls off the best shrecks during the summer; who everyone suspects, but no one has the evidence to prove it was him or her.

So what made me the King of Shrecks? Good question and thanks for playing. Like I said before it was June of 2000. Camp B hadn't officially opened yet. The staff comes 2 weeks early so we can all bond and clean up the camp. They have to pay us for something! They put me and two other guys to work ripping out a chain link fence that had been on the property for longer then I care to remember. Where as all the girls got to clean out the costume room(fair? I think not). We were hot and sweaty, taking a drink of water, hiding from the whips that would lay into our backs if they found us resting when the idea popped into my head. I turned to the guys and said, "Do you guys want to pull the greatest shreck of all time?" They both wiped their brows and nodded in agreement. And so began the Historical Shreck I call "The Great Fence In of 2000."

The boss of the children's programming, she was my target. The year before she had played a schreck on me right as we were closing camp and I had never gotten the chance to thoroughly pay her back.

My alarm went off at 3:30 AM. It was dark, no one was around. I proceeded to T and P's rooms to wake them. After I had jumped on each to get them out of bed, we put on dark clothes and slowly made our way to the "Boss's" cabin. Underneath one of the cabins we had stashed the entire roll of chain link fence from earlier in the day.

Earlier, after we had finished taking down the fence, P distracted our Boss while T and I hammered nails around the cabin so they could be bent upwards after we hung the fence on them. Ever so quietly we unrolled the fence and hung it around the outside of the cabin. Then T dropped a hammer. It made the loudest bang I have ever heard. We all stopped and stood perfectly motionless just listening to the sounds of crickets. Luckily no one awoke from the clatter. We continued hanging and bending back nails. Until finally the entire cabin was wrapped and securly fastened with chain link fence. As a final touch we wrote on a piece of poster board, "Good Morning You've Been Shrecked!" and hung it in front of her door. See the doors opened inward so she would be able to open the door and come face to face with chain link fence and sign. I'm laughing just remembering this! We then all snuck off and went straight back to sleep, no one was the wiser!

Morning came and we awoke when we started hearing the shouts and screams coming from top side by the girls cabins. We ran upstairs to find our "Boss" screaming bloody murder about how if she finds out who did this, "Heads will roll." All the girl staffers were taking pictures, it was excellent. After she busted down the chain link we all had to sit in a meeting about safety in our staff lounge. It was well worth it. And to this day no one knows it was me, The King Of Shrecks!

2006-04-29T16:27:00.000-07:00

The old man sent me this I thought it was interesting.

Try to read this. I'm sure you can....very interesting.


fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too

Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe can.

i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was
rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a
rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht
oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit
and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses
and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the
huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a
wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was
pmorantt!

What happens when...

2006-04-27T17:06:00.000-07:00

I eat an entire container of peanut butter in one sitting.

Well, today folks I answered that question. I sat down at breakfast and instead of putting jam on my toast I opened up the container of peanut butter. It's not that I didn't want the strawberry jam, I just couldn't find it. Which led me to believe that I had eaten it all on a previous occasion.

I don't deal well with the chuncky peanut butter, I like it soft and smooth. There is something about chunks being in my food that is kind of upsetting. You take a bite and even though there is that smoothness to the peanut butter, there is something more there and it makes me wonder if those chunks really are peanuts or something else? I feel the same way about pulpy orange juice...but come on chunky liquid! The only other chunky liquid I know is puke, ok this thought process is getting a little out of hand!

So after breakfast, I had some work to do and I got hungry again. I then made some banana boats out of peanut butter and bananas. They were so good I decided to go to the store and buy more bananas. Which suddennly gave me the idea that maybe I should find other things to dip into the peanut butter jar. And all of you sickos out there I did not dip that into the peanut butter jar. But it does remind me of this story once where a girl put peanut butter down there so her dog would lick it off. Talk about chunky peanut butter!

Anyways, I bought:

Bananas - Take two pieces of bread, slather them with peanut butter, then cut one banana in half and roll the bread around the banana. The Banana Boat.
Colby Cheese- This is one I learned on a trek through the wilderness of Northern Minnesota. It is really tasty! Dip it straight into the container or take a knife and put it on the cheese.
Bagels - There is nothing like a bagel sandwich with just peanut butter, but add cream cheese too for a delightful surprise.
Celery - Just put peanut butter on your celery, it is awsome. Try adding raisin to this!
Chocolate - For those of you with a sweet tooth.
Apples - Again this is just awsome!
Cheerios - Melt Peanut Butter and pour on top of Cheerios. UM UM Good!

I'm sure I missed some combinations, but these are the ones I grew up with so thanks MA! What did I learn...well I'm stuffed, I need to use the restroom, one can never have have enough milk when eating peanut butter, I really should find some work because these days off are killing me!

Maybe tomorrow I'll try to eat a whole watermelon?

Karaoke, Buffet, and a Premiere!

2006-04-24T22:34:00.000-07:00

So let's just say my weekend was crazy, maybe not Animal House crazy, but still crazy! It all began with a friday night, where all my friends ditched me. But one of my oldest friends, PETE, he rescued me from the solitude and drove me to have one of the more memorable weekends I have had in awhile.

I had spent the day Rock Climbing, so I was already tired. But a call from PETE and the overzealousness to sing got me going again and I ventured off to my favorite Kareoke Haunt. The Brass Monkey, the Funky Monkey, a place of excessive drinking and kareokeing is where my tale shall begin. I arrived early, because at the Brass Monkey if you want to sing you had better get there before the sunsets in Japan or a thousand people will have beaten you to putting there songs in. As I entered the bar alone, the air around me seemed to sizzle with energy, I could feel that this night was going to be different. And trust me it had nothing to do with what happened last time I was there, I am already over that escapade.

The place was a ruckus with laughter and singing. After being greeted by my favorite waitress Jenny, I looked around and noticed the whole place was packed with people I knew, well not really knew, but "Regulars." The Die Hards, the men and women that come on wednesdays to try out new material for there regular night. It turns out that it was one of the regulars birthdays, so everyone came out to sing. It was utter craziness because they were the only ones able to get there songs in. My friend PETE hadn't arrived yet, so I went over to talk to some that I knew. I befriended all and the DJ bumped one of my songs up earlier, being that the crowd remembered me from my once-a-monther status. Unfortunatly I was alone and didn't have the usual members with me. The night was filled with good cheer though, as I sang the Styx classic, "Come Sail Away." PETE eventually showed up with his new roommate. I watched him boogey down on the dance floor with one of the drunkest girls in the bar, I saw a fight break out between two guys over a beautiful girl, who I proceeded to talk to while the guys were fighting. I made new friends and at the end of the night brought the house down when I sang the last song, "Total Eclipse of the Heart" with this guy who sings higher then a man with his balls cut off, "The Chad." It may have been the best performance sans my friends I have had in a long time!

I went to bed happy, and awoke early for the trouble that was my Saturday. PETE actually woke me with a phone call. We were going to see Buffet! I have never been to a Buffet concert before, making me a "Virgin Margarita!" For my first one I have to admit I learned alot. Our friend Fuller met us in the OC and the three of us got lost trying to find the venue. After zigzagging all over the freeways, a quick stop for food at Carl's Jr, we finally found a sign pointing us in the right direction. The parking lot was packed with RV's, grills, utter mayhem and drinking, and this blow up doll that was also a beer bong. It was awsome! We drank Coronas, watched some guys get busted by the cops and then scalped tickets for the show. I even got flashed by a bunch of girls! Our seats were all in different sections, but it didn't matter we were going to stay together no matter what. the first thing we saw as we entered the arena was a sign that said

PETE found the letters "ARR" on the ground and kept jumping in front of people shouting "ARRGGHHH" while flashing the letters. It was pretty funny. When we got into the stadium, they wouldn't let me into the lower section because I had a lawn seating ticket. Fuller very slyly passed me his ticket over the wall and then I got in that way. We ended up having great seats, especially since it started downpouring. So the place emptied out pretty quickly. All in all next time I will be getting a RV for the Buffet concert.

After it was over we drove to my friend who lives in the OC's house and stayed with her. We awoke early the next morning for our drive back to LALALAnd. It was 9:30 AM when I saw the sign for the Beach Blvd. exit. I turned to PETE who was half asleep and said, "You know there is a Portillo's in Buena Park right off that exit. Do you think it is open?" PETE's response,"Stickler I'm not going to stop you if you take me there!" So I quickly swerved off the freeway and we ended up at a closed Portillo's. See were both from Chicago and miss our food, and one never misses out on a oppurtunity to eat some. Which is why we waited the hour for it to open. While waiting we found a Walmart. In this Walmart was a bulk bin of DVD's. All of the DVD's on top were in spanish, but after digging to the bottom we found the motherload of great DVD's that no one had bothered to search for. All priced at less then 4 dollars. It rocked! I came away with Labyrinth and Clue. We then ate the most scrumtuous Chicago food I have had in awhile.

When I got home I slept for 1 hour, then awoke, got showered and all dressed up! I was going to a premiere for Hot Tamale and then an afterparty on a boat! The movie was better then I expected! So I recommend you all see it if you get the chance. Hopefully it will come out on DVD, but who knows maybe in the theaters too? So there you have it, jam packed, exciting weekend!

So if you gave up reading and have skipped down to the last paragraph to see where this story went, here is the summary...I had too eventful of a weekend and now I am going to bed. But before I do if your bored at work I reccommend touching balls! Try to beat my high score of 143 balls touched(or 16288 points)! I'm proud of my ball touching skills and you should be too!

Pass Me Another Beer...

2006-04-21T09:14:00.000-07:00

It has happened again...you guessed it another sports article for Rivalfish.com. Please feel free to comment as much as you like. The issue I have touched on is definitly a problem for the College and University system.

Do Not Press The Big Red Button!

2006-04-20T15:55:00.000-07:00

I have become addicted to Myspace. Really I only have myself to blame for this, I joined because it was the cool thing to do. Recently I found this in someones comments section. I wanted to share it with all of you. So I repeat do not Press The Big Red Button!

Reesheefeeshee Thursday.

2006-04-20T10:33:00.000-07:00

Happy Holidays everyone, today is the greatest holiday of all, and if you don't know what I'm talking about ask your local hippie.

World Traveler...you'll just have to wait and see!

2006-04-18T10:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a big day. Not only did I attend the Cubs victory over the Dodgers (that should be enough for anyone), but I officially started booking things for my two month trip to Europe. Yes, for those of you who don't know, in less then a month I am leaving for Europe. No, its not for work, yes, its for pure enjoyment and understanding of the world. A break from the reality that I have finally come to grips with that is my life.

And it gets even better, my little brother is going to come with me for the first leg of it. I think this adds a delightful twist on the whole situatuion. I have never had the chance to bond with my youngest sibling, mostly because he is 6 years younger then me. During the time of my life when we have actually had things in common, I have lived on the otherside of the world. I am excited and I hope he is too.

So what do I do...I'm going to start in London. We have family there, who hopefully are still there. My brother and I will bum around town for 5 or 6 days, then hop on a ferry to Ireland. We will spend two luxurious days in Dublin, drinking beer, fraternizing with the ladies, and reeking havoc upon this country. Then my little bro will shove off. From there I will jump either on the ferry back to london, or take a direct flight to Amsterdam and join up with a tour group. Which brings me to my question of the day ladies and gentleman of the blogosphere. The place I went to get my International Student ID tried to sell me a tour package through Contiki. I said I would have to think about it, because originally the plan was to just rail around by myself, but after looking at allt hese tours, I could just join one for a part of my trip and at the end continue to travel? Has anyone ever done one of these before? Also any advice on what I should see, where I should go? Should I just get a eurail pass and let the wind take me places, or should I join one of these tours??? Answers people I need answers. Also for the Aussie contingent that reads these posts, I'm sorry I'm not coming to Australia, but maybe next year!

uh oh, stickler's teaching kids.

2006-04-15T09:00:00.000-07:00

Today I taught my first trumpet lessons. I was at an education meeting at a Buddist temple and I was asked by a brother if I could work with the small music workshop they have. When I got there it was two trumpet players, two kids playing bass drum and a flutest whom was running the group. The flute player didn't know what she was doing and had no teaching expirience or any kind of a music education so it was basically up to me to take over. I started with the trumpet players naturally, and I was not entirely sure where I should start with them because they were at such a low level and so much had to be done. So I though for moment about how i only have an hour with these kids so I better leave them with somthing that can enrich them musically and somthing they can practice to help lay a strong foundation for there playing in the future. I thought fundamentals, so told them to put there horns down and I did breathing excersises with them, and showed them the correct way to breath. The next obstical was rythm. Rythm has allways come very naturally so coming up with different ways for them to visualize how to count correctly was difficult. I used the old Rhodes method of having them pulse the rythm while they play with there air. Of course I had to sit down and teach them the concepts of rythm first but that was the easy part. Next was to instruct them to stop thinking linearly with there playing. I told them that when playing higher on the trumpet your not blowing higher your blowing faster, so I had them visualize blowing to reach a distance to try and illiminate tension and give them the concept that will stay with them the rest of there lives. I told one of the kids to try and knock over the wall when he played a high G. There was instant improvement in there playing. There's a lot of shit I wish I could have done better with them but I think I did a pretty good job for my first time.

It's the end of the week as we know it...and I feel fine!

2006-04-14T15:46:00.000-07:00

So it's Friday, hooray for Friday! And it's not any ordinary Friday, it's Good Friday! So hopefully everyone is enjoying themselves and prepping for Easter or if your like me starving to death because of Passover. Gotta love Matza!

But since everyone will be busy with Family or activities, I figured I would lighten the mood a little. So when you get bored and need an escape from the reality that is "The Holidays" come to our blog and ask yourselves these questions.

Why is this Blog different from all other Blogs? In our sidebar you can read our "Best of Our Blog!" Taking you back through the history of our site with letters from my sister and me ranting about the ladies.

What is that you say, you've been a loyal follower of this blog for sometime and have already read all those? Well then why don't you scroll down to the bottom of our sidebar and check out "Stickler's Funny Posts" which are things I have written not for this site!

Wait, you have already done that? Ok then below that is "My Friends Funny Posts" things my friends have written. Always there to add a little hilarity into ones day.

Wait, wait...You have read all those too and your wondering why you wasted your time? Well, I'm gonna guess it's because you find me sexy and wanted to learn more about me!

Oh, that's incorrect? You just were trying to figure out where to send hate mail too? I'm hurt, I have even shed a single tear, but you can send that to sticklersworld@gmail.com.

So everyone have a wonderful weekend, if our site doesn't have what your looking for, then move on or click here for The Urban Dictionary. Hours of time wasting stuff, but it's never to late to add to one's vocabulary.

Now where did I hide that Afikomen?

"I'm going back in time!" (Part 2)

2006-04-13T18:56:00.000-07:00

It was a bright and sunny day in Las Vegas. The pimps were pimping their hoes, the crack dealers were laying in the gutter, Old people were dying(literally) to hit that jackpot on the ten million dollar slot and all the visitors were drunker then Tom Cruise's love for Katie Holmes(shudder)! I was even at the craps table, when my cell rang.

"Stickler!"
"yeah. who is this!"
"It's your father!"
"Oh hey Dad, I just lost some money!"
"Well forget about that, I got some tickets to see some comedy tonight, so let's go get sushi and go see these standups!"

And that is what we did. It was funny. If any of you remember Jimmy "J.J." Walker from "Good Times", that is who we went to see! Jimmy is old, I'm sorry to say, and he spent most of the time making fun of the mexicans sitting at the tables around him. It was funny, but I really wonder how many of them were waiting out back for him after the show? We had a good time and I met some of my Dad's clients. They were nice guys, getting up their in age, but nice! It was at this point I realized that everyone around me was kind of older, ok who am I kidding, surpassing me by 20 years!

I had fun though hanging with my Dad, we talked, I filled him in on my life and he did the same back to me! The next day my father awoke early, I awoke late. He was gone the whole day at meetings. So I spent the day relaxing. I started at the wave pool. It would have been fun if I had my surf board and it was kind of cold out. I then took a leisurely stroll down the strip. I gambled a little and learned the pain of watching my money dissapear. It was a weekday so Vegas was kind of empty of people my age, no action for Stickler, but I was here to see my Dad. When my Father got done, he called me and informed me that I should meet him back at the room. We were going to go to dinner and a concert with some of his friends.

I was excited. When we got to the dinner there were about 3000 people there. All of them older and kind of dorky. They are software people what did I expect. We had a nice meal, where my father showed me off and worked the room. It was amazing to watch my Father talk to all these people. I have never actuelly seen him do work before, but I understand why he is successful. We couldn't go four feet without someone screaming out his name. I was proud to be his son.

Then everyone exited the dinner at once to go to this special concert that was being put on for the convention. "Huey Lewis and The News." I got to admit, Huey Lewis totally rocked out. So did all the old folks. I asked all the people around me what the last conert they had seen was, there answers were disturbing, especially since I wasn't alive in the 70's. But watching old people jump around like kids is always a fun time, and seeing my Dad groove out gave me something to use against him the future.

Best Comment of the night my Father made, "So Stickler, cute girl your hitting on."
My answer, "Dad, I wasn't hitting on her, she has a son my age and wanted to know if he would like the music!"
Gotta love Cougars!

All in all it was great to see my father, I got to see him in his element which was new for me. I also got to lose money in Vegas. Who could ask for anything more?

"I'm going back in time!" (Part 1)

2006-04-12T14:07:00.000-07:00

I've been missing in action. I apologize to all my readers, it was one of those spur of the moment things. So to begin by the end of this post you will know who said that quote, so read closely their will be a quiz.

Work over the weekend was long, very long. On Saturday I recieved a call from my father which went along the lines of this.

"Stickler, I'm in Vegas on buisness, come meet me at Mandalay Bay!"

I was really excited; Vegas Baby, Vegas! My unemployment was about to start on Monday and I would be on my way to Vegas to see my father! Who could ask for anything more. Monday morning I got up really early after working relatively late. I jumped in my car after I had run some errands and proceeded to take "The 15" to Las Vegas. My fingers were twitching in excitement of holding a pair of craps die again. I was also excited to see my father, it has been 6 months since our last meeting. All was going according to plan when in the middle of the Mojave desert, miles from anything including an off ramp, all traffic slowed to a stop. A dead stop in the middle of nowhere. Unusual I pondered to myself. After 20 minutes at a dead stop, I got out of my car and looked at all the people playing frisbee on the side of the road. What was going on I started to question, so I turned to my trusty radio.

According to some radio DJ whom I have never heard of; a garbage truck overturned on the freeway, caught on fire, blew up, and sent toxic gas into the air. "The 15" was officially closed until further notice. I swear the desert heat started to ge tto me after the first hour. I had run out of water and I was halucinating. I know this because of the pink elephants on parade that were going by my car. After hour two the urge to pee was so strong I dove behind my car and Pee'd to realize a little to late an old mexican couple was watching me the whole time.

At some point int he next half hour traffic started to move at a crawl. According to the news it was backed up for 50 miles in either direction. It made my thirst for Vegas even stronger as I crawled along at 2 miles per hour. It didn't help that there was also road construction going on in the affected area, causing all traffic to merge to one lane. 7 hours later I arrived, tired, late, ready to gamble. I sat down at the craps table and with a roll of the dice I won 340 dollars. But I got greedy, the wear and tear of the trip had made me want more, had me want to win it all. This is when I lost all my winnings.

The story continues and gets better I promise, but you all will have to wait till tomorrow night for the next chapter!

What to do for a bachelor party?

2006-04-06T00:11:00.000-07:00

Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam...
And wuv, tru wuv, will fowow you foweva...
So tweasure your wuv.

-The Impressive Clergyman (The Princess Bride, 1987)

That movie and all its quotes make me laugh. If you, a loved one, maybe just a complete stranger you just met off the street has not see it, rent it, and watch it now!

As I get older I have started to see major events start occuring more frequently to my friends. Mawage seems to be the one that happens the most. But with marriage comes the night that all guys look forward too. I am talking about the event known as the Bachelor Party. Yes, Ladies I am excluding you from this, it's not that females don't have the all elusive bachelorette party. But from what I have heard of them; they really aren't fun, have something to do with tea and presents, and some fight over someones shoes breaks it up. Please ladies feel free to comment though!

Throughout history, every man has gone through the final moments of worry and angst before forming the unbreakable bond with his lady friend. These are eliviated though by the simple act of all of his friends taking him out, getting him blitzed. So he can have that one last great night of adventure with the guys before he is under house arrest for what seems to be the rest of his life or her life whichever comes first.

The Bachelor Party is no easy undertaking. It must be planned and scrutinized behind the grooms back for months before the actual date. It is hard work, but that is why he has best men. Now having seen many of my good friends get married, I have also been to many bachelor partys. None of which have failed, because whenever you get a group of guys together for a ruckus, your bound to have some fun. The realization that must be made by everyone involved is that the reason for this is to show him the best night possible. Leave all drama at the door, your here for him and maybe have some fun along the way. This event is where it is totally acceptable to act like a a Jack A$$ as much as possible and you will get away with it like your still living int he dorms in college. One where anything that does or does not happen never leaves the group, ever punishable by exclusion by all friends. Unless it is so damn funny it needs to be used against said friend for all eternity. There is always a backdoor in these things(Longly get you head out of the gutter).

Which leads me to my dilemma, my friends and I are stuck for what to do for a bachelor party for a close friend of ours. We know that it will include beer, but what else? What is going to make it special and memorable? The ones I have been to in the past have been amazing, and they didn't even include strippers! I know I should be ashamed of myself. But seriously people I need some help, because I care for my friend and I want to give him one hell of a time to send him on to the rest of his life. And if you met the girl he was marrying you would totally understand(I'm just kidding I love his wife(seriosuly he is screwed(no I really like her(ok maybe when I was 10 I spit in her face but it was totally called for, she pushed me off my bike and poured bucket of water on me!(seriously she is great))))). So that is where I stand I need some help and want some advice?

Note: I am really not a chauvenistic pig, I just play one on TV!

Do you know...

2006-04-03T23:07:00.000-07:00

The Muffin Man?

That was not funny, but since I don't have time to write here is some information everyone should know!!!!

On Wednesday of this week, at two minutes and three seconds after
1:00 in the morning, the time and date will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.

That won't ever happen again in our lifetime!

I know what your thinking, Your all excited to set you alarm, take a picture, so you can tell your kids where you were!

I will be telling my kids(when I meet a girl and have some someday) I was asleep!

End of the week post or is it?

2006-03-31T11:56:00.000-08:00

It's Friday and I have found it very hard to write on Fridays. Maybe it is the end of the week and my mind is wondering? Maybe it is the fact that I just ate a rather large burrito and am feeling kind of gassy? Who really knows?

Either way, I would like to tell you all about something that is way overdue. My friends for the past 3 years have been working steadfastly on getting their company, Rivalfish.com, up and running. I am proud of them and have tried to help them any way I can. Their success lately has been astounding and for some odd reason they let me post an article every once in awhile on their site. So please go read it before they realize the horrible mistake of letting me spout my views and "click and drag me to the trash." And by the way the fish make the greatest pets.

The Fight of the Ages

2006-03-30T16:44:00.000-08:00

Note: Homelessness is a real issue that we all should be trying to fix. This is in no way to make fun of that issue.

I was about 7:15 am and I was walking down a hallway in a decrepit hotel in a sketchy part of town. In front of me there was an elevator. As I approached it, proabably still about 100 feet away, a greying, skinny, homeless man wearing a long yellow rain coat and a miner's helmet with a broken light on it popped out of the elevator. He slowly ambled towards me shouting all type of vulgarities in my direction. I kept moving forward though, I had places to be. And he was just old and crazy.

As he approached me he looked up and says, "Oh I'm sorry, I thought you were a police officer."

"Ok" I said, totally confused by this statement.

He then says, "You may go about your business."

So I continued on my path outside of this building. Now if you think this is weird, it's gets so much better. As I exited the hotel to head back to our trailers for the shoot I was on I came across a homeless woman laying half in the gutter, half on the sidewalk. She was rather large, had no shoes but a single sock, and a very large bucket of powdered doughnuts. I assume the doughnuts were how she got so large. She was completely passed out and had remininents of powder doughnut all over her face and hands. It was quite the image and I really wish I had a camera. I left her laying their, because I had work to do and she wasn't bothering anyone yet.

When I came back later I found the old homeless man in a phone booth of the lobby of the hotel. He had the phone in his hand and he was banging it as hard as he could against the glass of the phone booth yet again screaming vulgarities at no one in particuler. I walked outside past the homeless women and was probably about 200 feet away from her when I heard a shreek from behind me.

As I whipped around I saw the homeless man had stolen the big container of powdered doughnuts from the homeless woman. He was shoving them one by one into his mouth as the homeless woman looked on in horror. She then starts screaming at him about how they are hers. He starts calling her a "bitch" and flinging doughnuts at her head. She tried to catch them, succeded in only one, which she hastily shoved into her mouth and then ran straight at him. She lept at him but he side stepped her and she went banging into one of our trucks. He then continued to throw doughnuts at her. All of a sudden she is back in action and grabs him by the waist and takes him to the ground. The fight lasted all of 30 seconds with her on top of him slapping him and then shoving a doughnut in her mouth. When finally the police came and pulled them both off each other. The old homeless man started throwing doughnuts at the cops, they finally threw them both in the back of the police car and drove away.

I'm not sure who won the fight, but it really made for an exciting morning at work.

The 100th Post...Cats and Dogs Living Together, Mass Hysteria!

2006-03-27T08:00:00.000-08:00

So to everyone in the theBlogosphere, we made it. We have hit our 100th birthday and I'm pretty psyched about it. Now don't worry were not gonna quit writing now that we have made this elitest benchmark, instead were going to start improving. So feel free to give us any advice on where you would like to see the blog go, so when we hit 200 you can say you had a little part in it.

Now as I was saying with 100 it is time to tell the mother of all stories, it is relevant because I really want to tell you all about what happened this weekend, but to understand you need a little history. So here goes:

When I was 13, I was at boyscout camp in Wisconsin. It was early evening and a light drizzle had begun to fall. I was riding in a van with a couple of other scouts and one of our leaders was driving. We were the back most van in the caravan. As I remember it I was watching the coutryside go by, when I blinked. When I opened my eyes I was no longer in the van but in a room. Everything was white but it was dark, so it all had an eerie glow to it. I was confused, so I went to stand up. At this moment an alarm went off, a red light started flashing, and the most excruciating pain I have ever felt in my life went screaming through my body. I then passed out.

What felt like 24 hours later, but who really knows, I awoke again to a docter and my parents leaning over me. The docter explained that I had been in a car accident. My head had been lacerated(for you lamen, scalped), I had recieved a broken pelvis(which meant relearning to walk), and a punctured lung(it hurt to breathe, laugh, and talk). Not to mention that I had just now awoken from a coma that I had been in for 2 1/2 days.

Yeah life sucked for me, now I really had no idea what was going on, but about 2 minutes later I passed out. Everyone thinks the back wheel of the van spun out on a puddle, sending the van spinning into a tree. The car, from the pictures I saw, was a total wreck. The story the guys in the car with me told was that when the car hit the tree the side of the car ripped off. Everyone was thrown from the vehicle because they weren't wearing their seat belts. Except for me, because I was wearing mine, so I was in the car when it sustained more damage. When the first boy awoke he went running for a farm house to get help, but passed out midway through a field from a deep cut on his leg. At this moment another boy awoke, saw that one pass out and so he made it to the farm house and was able to call for help.

6 months, alot of therapy, in patient and out, a wheel chair, crutches, lastly a cane, and then nothing, I was back to my good old self. Except for the simple fact that 8th grade was a little blurry in the memory department. Kids in math class freshman year would poke me on the top of my head during class, because I had no feeling. So I never knew until the teacher would yell at them. It was great to be a freshman in highschool. Favorite quote that I heard entirely too many times on the first day of school: "Hey, aren't you suppossed to be dead?"

Anyways, I don't think on it alot anymore, other then I have different respect for life, am willing to take some big chances from time to time, and am not afraid of death at all. But this weekend I got a little freaked out. I was with a whole bunch of people I didn't know very well, playing poker. Someone brought up the constitution test they had to take in 8th grade. Since a couple of these people were from Chicago they knew all about it. When they asked me if I took it, I said I don't remember it. Now none of them know about the accident, or have ever questioned me on the giant scar on my forehead. So they kept saying things like, "You didnt take it, everyone took it, you must of taken it, can't you remember?" They just kept going on a and on about it and I got extremely uncomfortable, because honestly I don't remember and I really had no idea their was a constitiuation test. It would have been alot easier for me to tell them all about the accident but I didn't want too. So I just sat there, uncomfortable, because this is the first time, that I really couldn't remember something and no matter how hard I tried to jog my memory it just isn't there.

I know I shouldn't care, but it is something that I will always live with, the year I don't remember. The most distinct memory I have after the accident, is sitting in the hospital with a docter asking me to name all my 8th grade teachers. I then rattled off a couple of my 7th grade teachers and my mother told me that I had the wrong year. So I tried to remember, but their wasn't any memory of them. I really wonder what actuelly happened that year?

trains, planes and automobiles

2006-03-25T20:46:00.000-08:00

i stepped onto the train today at 42nd street, sat down, looked up, and realized there was puke all over the floor across from me. only after i noticed it did i realize how terrible it smelled and how everyone else in the train car had noticed it already and started to migrate to the other side of the train car. it was gross, so i, too, got up and moved to the other side of the train car. i gave up my completely empty bench to sit with some random guy in a two seater because the smell was so bad and the puke so horrific looking. then i got off at 14th street and went on my merry way.

then on my way home, they started the construction early, so i waited for about 20 minutes for the local train to show up at 14th street and then it took about another half hour to go between 14th and 72nd, a ride that would normally take 5 minutes if i had gotten a local train. it was unfortunate. what was worse, is that i had to stand the whole time. i hate relying on public transportation.

the moral of these stories: the train is gross and slow... nothing else.

THE END!!

Scientology. I'm scared, You should be too!

2006-03-24T08:00:00.000-08:00

For those that read this Blog you should all know I dislike scientologists. I live in LA blocks from their Church and I truly wish they would go away. Right now I think everyone should go the Jo-tel and read what my friend Hip E. wrote about the scandal between Southpark and Scientology. It is interesting and it shows how a corrupt form of religion thinks it has the power to control what everyone thinks, but we can fight back.

On to my awsome crazy Scientology story. For those readers of the Jo-tel I actuelly published this in the comment's section like a year ago, so you may have heard it before. Anyways, about 3 years ago I was at a street fair in my neighborhood. It is really kind of cool they close an extremely busy street with cool shops and have this big fair with great food, music, and games for the kids.(or me as an adult that tends to act like a kid.) Well, I walked by many booths, but at one in particuler I will never forget what occured there. Oh yeah, you guessed it, the Scientology booth. So this is what happened:

This actor guy, (if you have ever seen the sand lot, it was the chunky kid with red hair) pulls me over and says, " Hey you look stressed out? Why don't you come over and take this stress test." I sat down and he starts telling me to think of anything, and While I was thinking he would watch this meter and then ask what I was thinking of when it spiked. So I sat their closed my eyes and thought about how stupid this is.

The meter spiked and he asks, "What are you thinking of?"

I said, "That time I hit the ball into the next door neighbors yard and my friends and I were to scared of the dog to go get it. So we built this machine out of..."

He cut me off and said "don't be a smart ass."

I replyed, "at least I don't follow a religion created to win a bet." I stood up and left him looking at me with mouth agape. I think I should move, I think I am on the scientology hit list now. The big church is only 6 blocks away and I swear they have a telescope pointed at my house.

tv,dvd,limewire....

2006-03-23T09:09:00.000-08:00

so, i don't watch tv anymore. but, rather, i've taken an extreme liking to downloading television shows and watching them obsessively. needless to say, when people ask me if i watch tv, i still reply with a big fat 'no', cuz technically, i don't... i hate television. i hate commercials, i hate that i have to wait to watch something at a specific time and on a specific channel, all of which i have none of.. channels that is. i think paying for cable is ridiculous, so i download and buy dvd's.

But, i'm not really going to complain about the over priced cable bills, and how much i hate television, rather, i want to praise a few new shows that i have discovered through the wonders of limewire downloads.

ENTOURAGE: this is the most amazing show. ben and i watched the entire two seasons of this show in less than two weeks. it's only a half hour, and simply jam packed with amazingness. ok, i'm not very good at giving reviews, my comments tend to be vague, but if you haven't gotten into this show yet, i recommend it if not for the plot, but at least for jeremy piven who happens to be brilliant and give an awesome portrayal of the asshole agent, who sorta holds a sweetspot in my heart!!

NEXT,

WEEDS: this show deals with drugs, lots of them. it basically says, everyone smokes pot, and now we are going to show you on televisions that you are not alone out there, everyone else does it too, even rich white folk from the subarbs!!! not only is the topic of the show a fantastic idea for a television show, the cast is amazing. Mary Louise Parker is a remarkable actress, and it's good to see that she is getting the kind of attention she deserves. She plays a subarban housewife with two kids who just lost her husband to a heartattack, and has taken to selling pot to the town. the show discusses how she expands her business and the the difficulties of being a subarban housemom drugdealer. its an awesome show, if you haven't gotten into this, i recommend doing it soon before season 2 starts, which will hopefully be soon, cuz i just finished season 1 and i can't wait much longer for more!!!

oh.. and here's a given:

SOPRANOS!!! i love this show.. and i don't really want to talk about it, cuz you probably love it too!!

ok. i'm done here.. are you happy josh? i wrote something again for your silly blog!!!
-cas

The weekend of whatever...

2006-03-20T22:12:00.000-08:00

My weekend was not "The Best Ever..." I wish it had been, but you can't always have the best ever weekend. This is just an exerpt.

There are people everywhere that feel they are better then other people, that the normal rules of society they do not need to follow due to their size and clout. I believe that in order for all of us to co-exist with some sort of peace of mind that some rules need to be followed. They are common courtesy. They do not need the established please and thank you, they just are!

So what happened! Ok, it all begins with a line to the bathroom. I had just watched IU lose in the second round of the NCAA tournament. I was upset, but more of a heart broken upset from seeing my team lose. When I arrived at the line for the bathroom it was rather large. Their happened to be an event (Which was kind of like a Frat party gone terribly wrong) being held at the bar where I watch the games. Do to the amout of Y Chromosomes that occupied the bar the line for the men's room was comparable to that of the line for the women's room at a Broadway Musical. I like most people got in line and waited.

After about 10 minutes I had finally made my way to the front of the line. I was at the doorway waiting for it to open so I could enter the place and relieve myself of the pressure that was building in my lower hemisphere. When I glanced over my should to see a guy, about the size of a linebacker for the Colts, pushing his way through the line. As he approached me he put his hand on the door to open it. I turned full around and put my hand to his chest and said,

"Hey buddy, where do you think your going, the line starts back there." Wher I pointed down the long stretch of people.

He then looks at me and says, "So." In a low voice and began again to push past me.

Now mind you I'm not the biggest guy in the world, my friends will tell you I'm kind of like Rudy from that classic movie, "Rudy." And just like Rudy I have a lot of heart, and sometimes think I am much bigger then I am. I also was at a point in my night where I had a couple, ok many beers in me, and I wasn't happy with the way my team played. I looked at everyone in lines faces at this moment to see how none of them cared either way if this guy cut them. And looking at his shirt I could see he was a big shot from a company that will remain nameless, meaning these people were ok with this guy cutting them!

F&*$ that I thought to myself. So I said as he tried to push past me.

"Open that door and I will drop you right here!"

He stopped and looked at me as I continued, "First I will rip out your juggular and if you think I'm kidding test me A-Hole! This is not the night you want to F&*$ with me!

The whole time I looked him square in the eyes. He then backed up, shrugged his shoulders and walked all the way to the ack of the line. I then entered the bathroom. The people behind me in line started telling me about how that guy was a big wig over at this company and that he can do whatever he pleases. I told them, "F&*$ that, their are rules in a civilized society and he can follow them like everyone else, because I don't care who the F&*$ he is."

I relieved myself and went back to the bar where I proved to my friend I had ultra super vision. Which is another a story for another night, when I don't have to be up at 4:42AM. But I leave you all with this; No matter how big or small you are, you live in a world with all the rest of us, so try to have some common courtesy and don't be a Jack A$$.

A Tribute to St. Paddy's Day

2006-03-17T10:43:00.000-08:00

So I awoke this morning and walked down stairs to watch, what else, basketball. I will not be talking about the NCAA tourny here folks, if you want to read about sports go to rivalfish.com(I'll be writing about it there!). I will say before it is too late, what a game last night for IU. They have to start winning by greater margins so I don't have a heart attack before I turn 26.

But as I was saying this morning I awoke with a major jump start to the day. I walked downstairs and grabbed a cup of coffee. But on this day, we do not just drink our coffee black. No, on this day we pour Baily's into it. So I am feeling a little dapper right now, having consumed 4 glasses of this tasty beverage all in appreciation of St. Paddy's Day!

When I think of St. Patricks Day one thing comes to my mind...

McDonald's...You all thought I was going to say beer didn't you. Come on don't deny it, alcohol is a major part of today and it is what you are all thinking of; how later on today you will be so blitzed that you can't remember your name, let alone realize that you are making out with a dog(an actual dog!)at the bar. But for me St. Patricks's day brings with it the most tasty of all concoctions. The only reason to ever go to McDonald's(unless your on a really long road trip or just need something fast).

THE SHAMROCK SHAKE!

Oh yes, that green tinged shake that tastes a little bit minty but alot like pure heaven. I wait year round for the three weeks when I can buy one of these babies so I can hoard as much of it as possible. Honestly I think I gain weight during this time period only because of the creamy goodness. I go to the bar with shake in hand listening to the ooh's and aah's of the crowd. They part for me realizing the splendor I hold in front of them. Suddennly I am double fisting Guinness to my left and good ole' SHAMROCK SHAKE to my right. Decked fully in green(I know I shouldn;t have bought those green designer jeans, but what the hell) I jump on top of the bar, beholding the crowd like a giant green Uncle O' Grimacy. In a drunken bliss I consume both and scream:

Happy St. Paddy's Day Everyone And To All A Goodnight!

Passing out into the arms of all. So everyone, Join hands, make a love train, and go to Mickey D's and get yourself a SHAMROCK SHAKE. Your not truly celebrating this day until you have!

2006-03-16T07:51:00.000-08:00

So, mom was in town the past few days visiting. when telling her students that she'd be venturing to the big apple to spend time with her daughter they all exclaimed, 'oh, we'll be there too, maybe we'll run into you!! how fun would that be??!?!?' to which my mother replied, 'oh dear god...'

My mother is the kind of woman who wakes up at 6 am, goes walking through central park, drinks her coffee , has her oatmeal and reads the TImes at the same little cafe every morning and then some how makes it to the Reebok store to buy new shoes and Colony records to buy new music all before 10am. the energy on that woman never ceases to amaze me. So, having arrived monday and leaving in about an hour, my mother and i just about conquered the world in the three days that she was here.
Immediately upon arrival, my mother took a walk to Lincoln Center to pick up her tickets for some russian symphony she was going to see that night. since ben and i had tickets for Forbidden broadway to see the new segment they'd created on Sweeney, my mother had made other plans for herself. My mother has taken a liking to the fact that i've moved uptown. she has found herself a nice little hotel a block away from my apartment on the upper west side, and enjoys the fact that it only takes her about 10 minutes to walk to lincoln center from there. Letting my mother loose on lincoln center is like letting a child free to run around a candy store with a one hundred dollar bill. My mother can't go into the Juilliard bookstore without dropping her jaw and squeeling with excitement, because really 'you just can't get this kind of stuff in chicago!!' she goes to Tower records and buys all the new musicals that she's only heard about, but must own. she goes to barnes and noble just cuz it's there.. So, on this beautiful 60 degree Monday, ben, my mom, and i had dinner at a nice little italian place in teh neighborhood we stumbled upon and then went to our respective shows.
Tuesday: i decided 2 o'clock was probably a good time to meet up.. give her a chance to explore a little, waste some of that excess energy, before meeting up with her. I decide to go walk with ben to meet his sister at Lenny's, a little deli near the apartment, that ben has actually never been to before ever. as we are walking i call my mother to see where she is so we can meet up.. as the planets would have it, my mother is sitting in Lenny's drinking her coffee, eating her oatmeal and reading a book. i mean, of course she would be at Lenny's, of course Lenny's would be my mother's favorite place on the planet to go in the morning, and of course that was where we happened to be headed.. i mean, why would it happen any other way. so we meet up with ben's sister and her baby, say hello, and then my mum and i quickly bolt out so i can take her with me to bed bath and beyond. i mean, what are mothers good for if they can't spend money on you while they are visiting, right??? this part of the story gets kind of boring, we shop alittle, buy some stuff.. my mother freaks out a few times when i step out into the middle of the street just as the light is turning green.. but other than that, boring.
That night we go to see Jaques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, at the Zipper theatre. a little offbroadway house that has made the inside of the theatre look kind of like something out of RENT.. the seats are all old movie theatre seats and car bucket seats.. its cute and quaint, my mother absolutely adored it. oh i left out the part where we decided to buy up the Godiva store.. so we are currently at this point in time, carrying around about 5 pounds of chocolate. my mother, like me, has never learned the value of savoring something and not eating it all at once, so while we waited for the show to start, we stuffed our faces with all the dark chocolate we could get our hands on. unfortuantely, the best part of the show was the chocolate. to my mother's dissapointment this production was nothing like the show she had seen so many years ago and reminisced about so fondly.
WEDNESDAY: this entire day was devoted to seeing theatre. we saw Color Purple in the afternoon and Light In the Piazza in the evening. Unfortunately, (and i was much more dissapointed about this than my mother) LaChanze was out during the matinee performance, and she is kind of the REASON you go to see COlor Purple, but, lo, the show was fun, my mom liked it, and we had really great orchestra seats right in the middle, row m. then we had dinner with ben and giles at ruby foos in times square. a friend of ben and mine was working, so we got free dessert.. picture a piece of cake about the size of my 5 foot tall mother! my mother was so ecstatic to be having dinner with the three of us! she said we were the three people she loved the most in new york, adn was so honored to be spending time with us.. my mother gets very dramatic when she gets excited, but this is why we love her. oh right before dinner we stopped at urban outfitters to buy a bag for me. taking my mom into urban outfitters as a teenager always embarrased me, but now, i just kinda get a kick out of it. the uber hip sales people don't really know how to handle her, she runs around, criticizing everything, and finding some cute stuff, saying she had things like that when she was younger, my favorite was when she picked up a bag made out of a carpet and told me how she had one just like it, but they fall apart too easily so she wouldn't let me get it. ANYWAY, so we went to see light in the piazza after we were done with dinner and taking loads of pictures so my mom could remember her favorite dinner ever! unfortunately, another dissapointement for me, victoria clark was out that night, and we saw her understudy, who was also very good.. but whatever.. my mother still enjoyed it. i felt bad, cuz two things i took her to see had understudies.. i guess that's what you get for going to see broadway shows on wednesday!!!
so, after the show, i walked my mother to her hotel and said goodbye. she gave me a slew of encouraging words, telling me i needed a mantra, and that i need to keep positive, life is hard, but i need confindence adn i'll be fine. she really is a wonderful person at knowing how to keep your spirits up. i look up to my mother, i only hope that as i age, my spirits will stay as shiney as hers. that everyday is a new adventure and find all the excitement in everything, even buying a new book of music!
so, the supershuttle has no doubt picked her up by now, and she is headed to newark to catch her flight back to chicago. i know she is so happy to have had a wonderful time visiting, it makes me glad to know that it doesn't take a lot to please her, and i think this week just about made her life!

Leap of Faith

2006-03-15T17:10:00.000-08:00

All day long I have been working. Working, working, working... And at my computer no less. So when I procastinate I start reading peoples blogs. I'm a fiend for them. After reading people I know well and people I don't know well I have determined everyone has the same problem. No one can sleep and everyone is dwelling on something they need to change in their life and they don't know how.

As I write this I am listening to Rent on my computer. Yeah, I like musicals, I'm a guy, and I don't play for the other team. It is just what happens when your sister and your mother are musical fanatics. Well I'm listening to Rent and the song "Over the Moon." Leap of Faith ladies n' gentleman. That is the moral. We need to get out their, get out of our comfort zone, take a leap of faith and make a change in our lives. Now it doesn't need to be a drastic change, it just needs to be a change. It could be wearing a color shirt you never wear, or maybe going to that restaurant you always pass by, maybe it is quitting your job and trying something new, taking a trip, walking up to a stranger, telling someone that your falling for them. Whatever it is, whatever that something your not telling people what it is that is keeping you up it's going to take a leap of faith to get through it.

So what am I going to do your probably asking? Well, for those of you that know me also know that over the last month I have been wrestling with the problem of having to move. It has really been bothering me, because I love where I live. Everything for a moment started to fall into place. Because of a leap of faith I took, by talking to the people who came to look at my house to rent it(yeah I was the scary guy for a moment) I have become their third roommate and get to stay!!! Because of this the money I saved for moving is just accruing interest. I am using it to take a trip, someplace far away. Western Europe to be exact. I'm going to travel for a month or two by myself. I have never done this before but I figured why not. A leap of Faith to see if I can make sense of this world by leaving my comfort zone and going someplace else.

So good luck to all, damn my posts are getting too serious. I have to start writing something funny, but first enough with the procastination back to work!

Julian Krupa, the man, the legend!

2006-03-13T08:03:00.000-08:00

While looking for an apartment and starting to take some steps I think in the right direction of figuring out what to do with my life; I was reminded that many people (all people) have made these steps before me. My roommate reminded me that I should look at my past and see how the people who mean the most to me moved through their lives. One of these people was my Grandfather. He died when I was 10 years old, but the memory of him will always be with me.

My most distinct memories of my grandfather take place within his little house on the southwest side of Chicago in a little town called Summit. I was sitting in his house and Grampa Julian yells out, "Stickler, come here I want to teach you something." I ran into his drawing studio that he had set up in one of the backrooms of the house. He sat me down in a chair next to the giant drawing table he had set up. The room was a caucophony of drawing materials. Charcoal in one corner, A giant tower of colored pencils in another, and a huge light that illuminated his work space. He looked at me and asked, "Stickler, what do you want me to teach you to draw?" Being only 7 years old, my mind worked rapidly and I yelled out, "A piano... ... ... Dropping on someone's head!" I burst out in giggles. He turned towards his pad and I watched intently as he grabbed a pencil from his stack and started drawing. His eyes never waivering as he took simple lines and shapes and turning them into a large grand piano. Then he drew a small man underneath it looking up in fright.

Julian Krupa was an artist and a musician. Extremely talented at his crafts and always working to better himself. He was a violinist, playing with the A & P Gypsy's at the Chicago's World Fair. He also worked for Ziff Davis as one of their Illustrators. He did cover art work and illustrations for many pulp comics and magazines including the pulp comic "Amazing Stories." Years after his death my family was at "The Museum of Science and Industry" in Chicago for the pulp comic exhibit they were showing. It was an amazing exhibit with some fantastic art work. The highlight was seeing some of my grandfathers illustraions in a kind of renewed spirit hung up on the walls. My mother's highlight was finding a lunch box that had the same cover art on it as the original painting that still is on display in our house.

According to my Mother, my Grandfather attended the Bauhaus School of Design. One of the most prominint art schools in the world at the time. He was forced to leave when World War 2 broke out and was sent back to the states where he joined the marines. According to my Mother he was injured in the war and sent back home where he reclaimed his old job at Ziff Davis. He also had a radio show out of his basement where he played timeless music and did a kind of variety show. He then left Ziff Davis to work for Wilding Picture Productions, where he did contracts for the U.S. government. My Grandfather did all the illustrations for the training films for the first Nuclear Submarines and was a friend to Admiral Rickover. And then continued to do early training films for NASA. After Wilding was bought out, my Grandfather ended his career by working for Radio Shack, doing marketing on sound recording equipment until he retired still doing illustrations.

Knowing that someone can accomplish so much in their life gives me hope that maybe my life will turn out the same way. If I just keep setting goals and living life to it's fullest. I'm not sure what he would say to me now, I wonder if he would aprove of allt he choices I have made so far? Regardless I will always remember him sitting in his living room playing his violin or be it sitting at his desk sketching another masterpiece. These memories I will always have with me.

Some things you all should know...

2006-03-10T14:31:00.000-08:00

I have been reading this blog for the last couple of weeks...Much ado about somthin! It rocks, read it!

IU beat Wisconsin this morning in the first round of the Big Ten Tourney! I know I am amazed too! But go IU finally playing with some prowess! Read my article about it at Rivalfish.com. Also buy some rivalry merchandise, the fish make great pets!

The girl from last weekend didn't call me back! I know, none of you remember what happened to me last weekend, but I met a cute girl. I'm a nice guy, I may have been drunk! But what could I have possibly done to cause her not to call me back. She gave me her number. I called her! I left a message.What could I have done wrong? Should I call her again?

If you haven't read the comments section on the Jo-tel I reccommend it! It is better then the blog this month!

Ok I have apartments to look at now! Have a great weekend everybody!

Chuck Norris Facts you don't want to miss!

2006-03-09T14:59:00.000-08:00

When I opened my e-mail this morning I was greeted by the same plethora of e-mails I recieve everyday. They are always funny and keep me on my toes, that is what happens when you have really funny friends who want to be writers. Today I got one from my friend Colin, who is a teacher at a University somewhere.

"Chuck Norris does not go hunting because the word hunting implies the probability of failure. Chuck Norris goes killing." One of my students just wrote this on the board and walked out of class after finishing his midterm exam. Is it from a movie or standup routine to anyones knowledge?

That is classic! That guy must have balls-of-steel to put that up on the board. I mean everyone knows that Chuck Norris is an amazing man, but to put that on the board after an exam, Awsome! I just hope that kid aced his midterm.

I started thinking about it though, what crazy things did I do when I was in college? Which brings me to the story of the day ladies and gentleman. Does anyone remember when Brittany Spears was huge? I'm not talking obese like now, more like when she No. 1. Yeah it's hard for me too. Well, McDonald's at that point in time was giving out something pertaining to her, for all I know it was a replica doll or something. My roomate from College Chris and I were moving into our new house and stopped their for lunch.

Now when your in College your kind of a clepto. Seriously all you people who attended a University will agree with me that if it was something you couldn't buy and wasn't nailed down(well, sometimes nailed down), but would make your house or apartment that much cooler, you would just take it. I know you all did, try to prove me wrong? For example; beer signs in bars, street signs, those straw dispensers, etc...

Anywho while taking all of our stuff out of storage we stopped across the street at a Mickey D's. Chris had his monster truck with him(it was really just a normal pickup). While waiting in line we both noticed the scantaly clad Britany Spears card board cutout next to the register. Well, Chris remarked, "Stickler I need to have that, it would look great in the new place." We both sat down at a table in a empty McDonald's and ate our lunch, Chris eyeing the cut out the whole time. Seriously it was starting to freak me out, his mind turning while looking at it so intently. As we got up to leave Chris throws the key's to his truck at me and says, "Hey, I gotta use the restroom. Go start the car and pull it up to the door!" I catch them midflight and say, "Ok!" I could tell something was about to go down. Roommates have that bond where they can read each other's minds at moments of great peril.

As I get into the truck I realize that it is stick and I don't know how to drive it. I start it though. All of a sudden Chris comes crashing out of the door with a large cardboard cut out of Brittany flailing in the wind over his head. I have never seen him hall more ass then in this instant. He is screaming something as he lofts her into the truck bed and jumps in the drivers seat. He then asks out of breath, "Dude! Why didn't you pull the truck around?" I say, "I don't know how to drive stick, are they chasing you?" We both look at the door to the restaurant, but no one has followed yet. Chris speeds off and get's stuck in traffic directly in front of the store. No one came after us though and for 2 years we shared our living room with Brittany!

Depression, you pray on us, when we sleep.

2006-03-09T10:27:00.000-08:00

Ok, maybe Ben Harper sang the song a little differently. Regardless I have never been this depressed in my life. I feel like the world just crumbled around me. So I came up with a way to get out of it. For a long time now I have been considering taking a trip, out of the country, to see the world. So that is what I am going to do, but honestly I have no idea where to go. So people of the blogosphere, where should I go? What should I see? Who should I meet? Anyone got a couch they want to let me sleep on?

I know this sounds like I am running away, but I am not. If I was running away then right now I would be flying to Chicago, back to where I came from. In reality all I need is a change of pace. I need to figure out what makes me happy and live a little life while I still have some time to live and am still young enough to enjoy it.

But this is only one step in the process of making me happy. The second step is changing my job. I am 25 and I realized that the goal I set out a long time ago to get to in my career I will actuelly succeed in reaching. Great you say, well I also have realized that I don't really want to get there anymore. In fact I really don't even want to do this job anymore, I want a change. I have been thinking about the military. My family does not want me to do this. Why you ask? Well because they, like all my friends, see this as a way of getting killed for a cause that is not worth it. I see it as the way for me to serve the country and give back to a place that I dearly love. I may not agree with the president, but I do agree with what we are doing over there. It is our fault and we have to fix it. Unfortunatly the one thing I don't want to do is make my parents scared for my life, so this probably won't happen. Maybe I'll become a helicopter pilot, I find the machines fascinating. I've been seriously looking into the FBI as well. Well, anyone got any comments to help me in my time of need. I put it to you people of the blogosphere, where do I go next?

OPRF alumni invasion or let's go break some kneecaps!

2006-03-06T08:36:00.000-08:00

Our past is what defines us, makes us unique, seperates us from the the schmucks and nobody's of the world. Our past is something to treasure and hold on to which brings me to the story of my weekend!

The guys I grew up with in highschool are some of my oldest friends. Guys who will always be their through any heartache or strife I encounter. It was a huge surprise for me when 5 of them all for different reasons showed up at my doorstep this weekend. The group consisted of Tello and Jonah; they were in town for a buisness meeting for the company they are starting. It continued to get better when the next day; I get a call midday from my friend PETE; he was in town for an interview to be a staff writer on a blog. Then while eating lunch we get a call from Eddie; who happened to be in town for a buisness meeting and was looking for something to do. Well since there were this many people we called Fuller; he lives in San Diego and had him drive up to meet us.

We started drinking about 4pm. We all have grown and matured, but the one constant in our lives is when you get this many guys from OP togeher, everyone has a tendency to drink out of control. Kind of like we are throwing a party in the woods back in highschool. Only nice part is we are old enough not to get busted by the cops. At least not for underage drinking.

We drank a lot and told stories of the past, conversations picked up right where they were left off years ago. My friends are uproarously funny and have a tendency to create more drama then most, but I still love them. After making fun of each other for foibles of the past, we headed to the bar a block away from my house for a drink and dinner. We were all drunk by this time, and it wasn't even 7PM. Nothing really happened at the bar other then some pitchers, burgers, and wings. We then took off to the fabled, "Brass Monkey" for kareoke and merriment. This is where everything starts to get hazy but I will do my best to recount the events as accuratly as possible. Someone has to for histories sake!

We arrived at the Monkey around 9:00 PM and were seated at a table in the center of the big room. The place was already crowded which is unusual for the Brass Monkey so early in the night. We got up and drunkingly sang. We kind of took over and then things started to get a little sour when the DJ cut me off just as one of my songs started. He did this for no apparant reason at all except to tell me, "Stickler, you have sung enough!" Then we ended up kind of barging in on songs that a birthday party was singing. This is when PETE accussed me of cock blocking him. But as I remember it her friend told me too! Then Fuller and Tello dissapeared. According to everyone they went home, which made no sense because they didn't even know where I lived? Then we got our bill which was a whopping $460 dollars and consisted of tons of drinks that we never got and ended up having to pay for. In turn Eddie got pissed because it was all on his card and started screaming at everyone at the top of his lungs, "I'm breaking Kneecaps, I'm pissed off!" Then I had to pull everyone outside while they were pissed at the whole situation to get a cab. Now this is when Eddie starts getting really pissed, Jonah and PETE were trying to calm him down but he starts stomping around. There was a guy puking against the side of the bar who turns towards Eddie's tirade and says, "Excuse me, but could I get some privacy!" In which Eddie replied, "F&*# your privacy, I just got screwed, do you want your knee caps broken!" Eventually we get a cab, and it takes us back to my place where we find Tello and Fuller passed out on my couch. I ask Fuller how they got home and he says, "Well, see I passed out outside of the bar and Tello found me. Then a cab passed by and we decided we were in no shape to stay so we got in it. To be honest I have no idea how we were able to get back here. I think we just kept pointing out landmarks to the cabby?" Then Eddie continued to scream about breaking kneecaps for money. And then passed out on the floor. Everyone went to bed for the moment at about 3:00 AM.

I awoke at 7:00 AM to my alarm; I went downstairs and woke PETE for his interview for the blog job. Yeah, he was hungover and had to go to an interview. Eddie had crawled into my bed and everyone decided they would make the cross town trek with me to Brentwood. Hungover, badly in need of sleep we drove the 40 minutes to Brentwood sans Eddie. We pull up at a mansion, where their are lots of cars. PETE turns to all of us and says, "Oh my god, look at all the cars. I'm screwed." then steps out of my car shaking his head.

I turn to everyone and ask what they want to do while we wait. We get breakfast and then end up renting those three wheel trikes on the beach. We raced them up and down the bicycle path. At one point we had a race in a beach parking lot, it consisted of Fuller flipping over and Jonah's chain breaking. Then Tello and I had to tow him back to a bike guy to fix it. We then picked up PETE and headed back to my place. Where everyone proceeded to sit down and have the conversation in the post below.

All in all it was an exciting weekend. Insane, but fun. I miss all those guys and I am still trying to figure out how come we didn't get in anymore trouble then that, I guess were all just getting old.

Capture a Moment in Time

2006-03-05T08:59:00.000-08:00

In Stickler's Living Room sat Stickler, Tello, PETE, Fuller, Jonah, Eddie, and The Captain!

Jonah: Tello? Would you rather have a retarded father or a really smart chimp taking care of your baby?

Tello: It depends on if the chimp was trained!

In the midst of a 10 minute debate about would you rather have a retarded father or seeing eye dog take care of your baby. Seeing eye dog won becuase it can lead and pickup things with it's mouth.

Boyfriends, Sushi, and Debbie!

2006-03-01T22:56:00.000-08:00

So today I had this girl at work, the same one who has been on set on three different occassions flirting with me. Well, at least I thought she was flirting with me, so I'll let you decide. She would come over and stand around me and make small talk. She kept making fun of me and she kept looking at me when I wasn't near her and then turn her head quickly when I would catch her. To me these are sure fire signs that someone is interested. So I would flirt back! I finally towards the middle of the day asked her if she had any plans for the weekend. Her answer was, No, nothing at all. I said, "Well why not?" Her answer, Her boyfriend that she lived in a one bedroom apartment with was not making any money so she was supporting the both of them.

Now back up a minute, Key word: Boyfriend!

So someone explain to me, someone please explain to me, why was she flirting with me? Especially if she had a boyfriend? I don't get it folks? And while your at it, why does every female that I am attracted to, already taken?

So Debbie and I had gone out a few times and then I got a gig on a tv show that took over my life. 6 months to be exact, great job, taught me everything I know, but killed my social life. The whole time I only talked to Debbie on the phone, but we really became just good friends. So when the show was over, I called her up and said, "Debbie, It's been forever what are you doing tonight?" She was meeting two of her friends in Westwood for dinner and invited me along. I had no idea that this was about to be one of the craziest nights I have ever had in Lalaland.

I met her and this guy, let's call him Jason, in Westwood. We got cookies and ice cream at this awsome place, and then kind of went walking around playing with things in stores. I was wondering if she was dating Jason, till her friend Tim ran into us in one of the stores. He was gay and Jason started making passes at him. So yeah, she was definitly not with Jason and to my knowledge single. Now the thing about Debbie is she was really outgoing, but very closed with her emotions. So it was always really hard to get a reading on how she felt in a certain situation. The two guys walked to one side of the store we were in andshe pulls me over into the corner and says, "Oh my god, they both like each other, we have to take them someplace else and see if we can hook them up.

Now loyal readers, I have never hooked two guys up, but I guess this is something Debbie does all the time. All that was running through my mind at this point was, wow, Debbie looks beautiful tonight, I really need to hang out with her more. And then all of a sudden we are all standing in the center of the room and she is explaining how two weeks ago she ran into this guy on the street. His name was Howard. Well, Howard invited her to his birthday party. It was at this place called, "White Lotus" in Hollywood. Now none of us had heard of this place since it officially wouldn't open for another 6 months. But somehow this guy Howard had invited her to this place for his birthday. Well I wasn't about to let her get away, so I figured why not, I'll help hook up her gay friends with each other and maybe score some points with Debbie.

Now is when things began to get really weird. We pulled up at the White Lotus, which looked entirely empty. All of us in t-shirts and jeans. We actuelly all looked pretty sloppy, well Debbie could never look bad. Anyways she walks up to the maitre D' and says, Hi, I'm Debbie and these are my friends. I know were early but were here for Howards Birthday Party!" the woman looked at us and said, "well ok, umm, we don't have the guest list out yet, but you can come in and sit at the bar." So we walked in and started drinking free alcohol in an empty bar. We started joking around, and I think they forgot about us at the front because all of a sudden people started arriving. We kept drinking and suddennly platters and platters of free sushi were being brought out. We started talking to all the people who were really dressed up for this party. We were so out of place.

Now the entire time the two gay guys were hitting on every single woman who walked into the bar trying to get more girls then the other one. It was impressive, I had no idea gay guys can score so much. I spent the entire time hitting on Debbie, falling for her every second. Then all of a sudden we were approached by a guy with glasses. He walked up to Debbie and asked who she was, She said, "I'm Debbie, were friends of Howards, the birthday boy." The guy looks at her and says, "Oh, Hi I'm Howard, the birthday boy!" By this time we had consumed roughly 500 dollars in sushi and probably 100 dollars in free drinks. So what a surprise that we had all crashed Howard Balaban (The owner of Paramount) Birthday. Howard liked us though, becuase we wern't like his other guests so he let us stay. So Debbie started talking to him and then went off to sit at Howard's Table. The two gay guys sat down next to me and said, "So you really like her?" I answered "Yeah, I wish I had persued this better when I first met her." That is when they informed me that Debbie was hard to read and I shouldn't give up. The guys kept drinking margaritas with me and then left me by myself. They went to the bathroom together and didn't come back for a half hour, I'll let you use your imagination. Debbie came back over to find me sitting by myself. She looked at me and told me she had alot of fun with me that night. But she was going home, she had to wake up early. She gave me a hug, kissed me on the cheek and walked away. That was the last time I ever saw Debbie.

So you ask, why didn't I tell her I liked her. I don't know probably becuase I figured a girl like her wouldn't like a guy like me. When she went off with Howard I figured I had no chance. So I made a mistake and I regret it. So now whenever I eat sushi I think of Debbie, because she was the person that I had the best free sushi I have ever had with. I think of how if I hadn't been striving for the stupid career that I am still striving for maybe something would have started between us. Maybe that night I would have had the balls to say something. That maybe now I wouldn't be stuck in the state of conufusion that I find myself in now. If only I could go back to when I first moved here and change it all.

The end of February!

2006-02-28T22:44:00.000-08:00

Today is the end of February, which means rent checks. I am looking forward to March and my next great adventure, finding a new place to live. One month and counting let the great apartment hunt begin!

n185600074_30002318_7252

2006-02-28T17:50:00.000-08:00

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Originally uploaded by stickpot.

Crazy gig at bar

Sometimes funny things happen...

2006-02-27T23:13:00.000-08:00

Today I had a rather funny thing happen. At work, we had sushi for lunch. I love sushi, it is so good, especially when it is all free. My boss B was sitting across from me. The guy who had gotten both of us the jobs on the show were currently working on walks over eating a piece of shrimp. Now he is a really small guy who thinks he is the big man of the show, when really he isn't. In fact he can be kind of annoying sometimes, but regardless he got me the job and I do respect him for that.

He looks at us, stops, and takes the tail of the shrimp out of his mouth and asks, "Is this trash" simultaniously throwing the tail on top of B's food. She just kind of looks in awe as he doesn't even wait for a reply and walks away. B then looks at me and says, "Was that a drive by shrimping?" I laughed realizing her play on words and said, "yes that is exactly what that was." I then cracked up, she looked at me and says, "what?" I said, "what you didn't even get your joke?" Then she laughes and says, I didn't even realize I said that. Life is funny that way sometimes.

Sushi always reminds of me of a particular chain of moments in my life. I'm sure all people react the same way to certain objects, tastes, smells, etc... In fact this quote my mother sent me on a card today pretty much sums that up,

we do not remember days...

we remember moments.

-cesare pavese

But sushi reminds me of Debbie. Now to fully understand Debbie, I have to explain how we met. Even my best friends don't know about Debbie, so this story will probably be new to alot of you.

When I first moved to LaLaLand, I really didn't know anyone. I was living with my roommate from colleges Sister and her Fiance to save them on their rent while they saved for their wedding. One day I was talking to one of my friends, let's call her Meredith. She was one of my best friends from college, we met freshman year and had stayed close ever since. She starts telling me all about how she has this friend in LA who I need to meet. How we would hit it off and be perfect for each other. She then informed me that she would give me her phone number and I should just call her out of the blue. I said to Meredith, "Are you kidding, if you want me to meet Debbie, you need to do this, I am not calling her up and explaining how you gave me her number because since were both friends with you we should be friends."

Meredith said ok, and the next morning in my e-mail inbox, was a message addressed to Debbie and I from Meredith. It said this:

To my two best friends,

Hey guys, I just wanted to write and tell you both how much I miss you. Also since you are both my best friends and the greatest people I know I think you should meet since you both live in LA. So here is each others contact info now be friends and who knows maybe you will hit it off.

Meredith

Yes, I deleted three sentences with contact info in it, but seriously who does that? So I read this e-mail again and then my phone rings. Seriously it rang and I picked up my phone and guess what it was Debbie. I was surprised and I think I stuttered on the phone. She seemed like a normal girl and it turns out Debbie and I had the same conversation with Meredith about how we were not going to call the other out of the blue. But since she figured I would never have the guts to call she would call first. I could tell immeadiatly that Debbie was someone I wanted to get to know because she flat out called me out before she even knew me.

Now our conversation turned into how we should meet. I told her that this guy I know was performing at an Open Mic at a bar called Dublin's in Hollywood(Note: this is the old Dublin's before it closed and moved into the center of Hollywood). I asked her if she would like to go with me to it, since like I said before I really didn't know many people. So in 3 days on a Tueday night we had planned to meet in front of Dublin's, where she would call me on my phone when she arrived.

So for the next three days the guys I was working with at the time started saying things like, "Wow Stickler, going on a blind date?" "Aren't you scared she will be a dawg." Yes, I know terrible, but guys have a tendency to think this way when they don't know what is coming. I started to get worried, what had I gotten myself into? Did Meredith know what she was doing? Does she even know what type of girls I like? Was this a date?

Well, Tuesday came. I'm waiting in front of Dublin's, I was nervous, even more nervous then when I had to meet the school bully after school. I was shaking nervous. I calmed myself and my cell phone rang. It was Debbie, she was walking up the driveway. Suddennly time started to slow down as I turned my head. There in the driveway was a girl who must have easily weighed 500 pounds. She was rolling towards me, becuase there is no way anything that large could support it's weight on its legs. I was scared! Questions started flying through my head, what should I do? Damn you Meredith what were you thinking? Now realize, I'm a small guy. I'm not mean I would have made the best of the situation, I would have been a gentleman. But you all know the exact same thing would have been going through your head too.

As the behemoth started to get closer and closer I could feel the sweat pouring down my back. And then all of a sudden the large mound of flesh turned left. And behind her, masked from view was the most beautiful girl I have ever laid my eyes on. She had jet black, long hair. Sparkling blue eyes, and a smile that sent me to a state of bliss. She walked forwards gave me a hug and introduced herself as Debbie.

That night couldn't have gone better. If I didn't mention before my comedian friend is Dane Cook. So I took her to an awsome show where she got to meet and hang out with some amazing comedians. We got to talk and have a few drinks. We had a ton in common. It was a great night. The next day before I even had a chance to comprehend what happened the night before, she called me to tell me she had a wonderful time and how we should go to dinner on friday night. And that is how I met Debbie. Why does sushi remind me of Debbie you ask? Well, that is a story for another night folks, and I promise it is a good one.

Sis Read This!

2006-02-27T22:33:00.000-08:00

Please write about Sweeney Todd!!!!! I got the CD from Mom, awsome! Tell Ben Awsome, tell him that he should tell Lauren I still think she is cute and eventually I will be back in NY so we can continue the flirting we started on the street.