The Slog Golden Rule?

Why it's: If I haven't been blogging, my life is probably interesting.

In case anyone still checks here, I will be opening a show tomorrow. It's called Saints in Strange Places, and was written by one of the staff writers on Weeds.

My part? A gay, Jewish (Hasidic, to be precise) pedophile. Who happens to be Satan.

Once again, I have been typecast.

You can find out the info on that here. The most important info? It's at Strawdog Theatre, 3829 N Broadway in Chicago from July 11th-August 9th on Fridays and Saturdays only. Tickets are available at www.strawdog.org.

Oh, and get this: both My Dog Sparky and My Significant Other are also in the show. So it's a Slog THREE-FER!

No. Seriously. Spend your money and watch me make an ass out of myself. You won't regret it.

What the hell is wrong with Turkmenistan?

Or, "Damn you, Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov!"

Ok, time to dust off the "Back From Indefinite Hiatus" tag. Sorry for the delay, but I've had a lot of things go down in the past few weeks, any of a number of which might have made interesting blogs, had I been so inclined. Here's a quick little bulleted list for those of you keeping score at home:

• I went to Disneyworld with my girlfriend and her family, where we were whisked around like royalty, getting in front of every line in the place (take that Make A Wish kids!).
• I got a nice little promotion at my job, making it entirely possible that I'm not underemployed anymore.
• I'll probably be in a show this summer. HamletMachine. More on that later.
• I watched the Cubs become an official Major League Baseball Team by putting up the best beginning of a season since--roughly--the Bronze Age.
• I battled the almighty, planet devouring Galactus to a standstill, finally getting him to agree to leave the Earth permanently.¹ No thanks to that damn Watcher.
• I have shown that I have the willpower to avoid murdering Sparky, despite the fact that he now barks nonstop for the duration of any meal I attempt to eat in the apartment.
• I have yet to destroy any other household appliances.
• Ali and I have managed to empty our storage locker, thus saving us literally 1.09 hundreds of dollars a month.
• I continued to not write about The Goonies.
• I have edged ever closer to my goal of winning the Presidency in 2012 on the back of my "Where's My Jetson's Shit" platform.²

But none of that matters, because Turkmenistan is turning its back on 90% of it's Gross Domestic Product: sheer lunatic leadership.

Apparently, per the BBC, new President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov has decided to undo the hard work that Slog favorite Saparmurat Niyazov performed to make Turkmenistan the wackiest Former Soviet Republic around. "Names of months and days have to comply with international standards," said Berdymukhamedov,³ thus ending the former Turkmenbashi's tradition of naming months after, well, whatever he damn well felt like calling them.

What's next, Kurbanguly?⁴ No more using the national treasury to make gold statues of The Father of Turkmen? No more compulsory reading of Niyazov's poetry in schools? No more "Free McRib Tuesdays?"⁵ I suppose you think you're going to be a respected world leader if you give in to peer pressure and run your country like every other central Asian state? Hardly. Turkmenbashi put you on the map⁶, pal. Without him, you're paractically Uzbekistan.

I mourn for you, Saparmurat.⁷ In your absence, the world is a colder, saner place.

---

1. I may be confusing myself with the Fantastic Four.
2. The Future of Yesterday...Tomorrow!
3. Turkmen for "Killjoy."
4. Turkmen for "Total Doucheface."
5. Ok. That one is mine. But he'd have done it. He was cool like that.
6. Which, of course, no American can use.
7. Turkmen for "Totally Fucking Rad."

Mandatory Addendum: Kvetching

How the hell could I write a Miscellany and not bitch about something? I must be slipping from lack of practice. Here's a couple of whinges for you, just so you feel complete:

Bitch the First

Monday morning, I realized I lost my CTA farecard, which means I have to use cash to ride the bus to and from work until my replacement card is mailed to me. That's annoying, but I'm not going to bitch about that in a blog (indeed, I haven't until today).

The weather outside is currently a "wintry mix" of sleet and snow. This is Chicago, so expecting it to warm up just because it's spring is asinine, so I won't bitch.

This is where the addition of straws gave my personal metaphorical camel a bulging disc: I have to transfer on my way home. Because I'm not made of money, I decide to walk from my job to Michigan Avenue (about a 10 minute jaunt, and not that unpleasant on most days - the bus ride takes all of 2-3 minutes without traffic). A ten minute jaunt through "wintry mix" (which is not as pleasant as it sounds - I imagine some sort of Chex mix with dried cranberries or something) by the lake in Chicago is roughly akin to spending 16 days in Dante's Third Circle of Hell. Especially when all you're wearing for warmth is a cable knit sweater (yeah, I look like the Old Spice Guy) and a light corduroy jacket.

Bitch the Second

So, I make it home in one piece, and upon entering the door, IMMEDIATELY smell piss. Sparky looks guilty. I do a slow burn. Then I look over and see it's on the "puppy pad." Sweet. No biggie, I'll just throw that out and---

Oh for crying out loud, Sparky.

He got about half of it on the pad. The rest? On the surprisingly hard to clean linoleum.

Welcome home, Jon.

Well, I should go...I now have to clean a chincilla and rabbit hutch. I leave you with the question rattling around in my head like a BB in a coffee can:

At what point did my life actually start revolving around the waste of small mammals?

EDIT: I just realized I totally pissed and moaned about the Carbon/Silicon show in the earlier blog, thus rendering the central premise of this blog a lie. Oh well, what are you gonna do, huh?

How My Back Ruined My FOUR Day Weekend

Or, Even I Can't Blame the Dog For This One¹

Greetings from the Slogosphere! Though I have never yet gotten to the point of writing The Slog Manifesto, there is a reason for this blog's title. And it's hints are in the definitions on the corner of the page, and how they relate direct to My Sad Little Life.

Even barring the surprisingly common occurrance of Unauthorized Canine Fecal Matter in my apartment,² I am not known as either

• A particularly lucky person
• A particularly level-headed³ person when my luck is bad

In other words, bad shit⁴ happens me to a lot, and I like to complain about it.

I suppose I should "man up" and take charge of my own destiny. But no. In the case of my back, I think it's entirely fair to whine and moan like an 11-year-old that's just been told she can't get tickets to see Hannah Montana.⁵

As eagle-eyed Slogophiles might well be aware, I am 31 years of age. When I was about 26 or so⁶, I developed sciatica. Your mid-to-late-twenties is always a fantastic time to develop a lower back problem. Because, since youth is wasted on the young, why not just take it away from them, and give them a disorder that makes them feel like they're 78 years old?

Honestly, "sciatica" sounds like something your Granpappy complained about just before Mom and Dad made the so-called "tough decision" to ship him to some raisin ranch with a name like Sandpiper Estates or Pleasant Hill Cove. Maybe we could come up with a more "youth-oriented" or "Xtreme" name for it? Or name it after someone kinda cool? I'd much rather tell people I had "David Cross Syndrome" or "a Bulging Chiklis."

Where was I? Oh yeah.

Pain.

I has it.

Anyway, my sciatica has been an on-again, off-again phenomenon since then. Mostly off, as one of my Top Three Deadly Sins to commit is Sloth,⁷ so it's usually easy for me to follow doctor's orders and lay off lifting more than 20 pounds at a time. However, there comes a time in a man's life when he's sick of paying 108 bucks a month to store his excess crap. So Teh Aly-Baerz⁸ and I went on a trip to Public Storage this weekend, and sorted through the Lion's Share of Wolter's Library.

Other facts about me that I could share right now:

• I am a compulsive book reader
• I am a compulsive book buyer
• I am a compulsive book hoarder
• This makes me a jackass

So, I had to sort through roughly 700 pounds of Assorted Printed Material, deciding what to keep and what to give away to Goodwill. I managed to actually give away something like two boxes worth, which is a serious victory in My War on My Compulsions.⁹ However, the specific gravity of paper is high. Oh, so very high.

Before anyone says anything: I (mostly) lifted with my legs, I swear. The problem with that? Oh, the next day, when my legs were killing me and we had to move the boxes into our apartment. Because I then favored my legs. At the expense of...well, I think I've spelled that out enough.

Anyway, yesterday, I couldn't walk, and wasted some Paid Time Off to rest it off. I basically spent the whole day in or around the bed, pestering La Alejandra del Hombre Bueno and complaining. I was moderately better this morning, so I decided to cut off what was rapidly becoming The Worst Unplanned Vacation in History. And since you can't get heroin over the counter, in order to rejoin the work¹¹ force I had to take (to paraphrase Bill Hicks paraphrasing someone else) An Heroic Dose of ibuprofen this morning.

Interesting fact about ibuprofen: it's not a miracle pill.

So, the Slog Status Report for March 18th, 2008:

• I am in excruciating pain
• It is largely my own damn fault
• I have tried and failed to blame The Spark
• In retaliation, he will no doubt crap on something I love while I am at work
• I will be powerless to clean it up, as it took me over 5 minutes to put on a shoe yesterday.

Hope you liked this bitter, largely unfunny rant about My Defective Body. Next one will be less self-centered and have more Synthpop Stars and Mogwai Feeding Tips.

---

1. But Lord how I tried. I really did.
2. Located in stately Slog Towers ("You don't have to be Section 8 to live here, but it helps.")
3. I was going to put sanguine, but I suddenly remembered that I can't remember if sanguine means calm or belligerent. If only I had some way to look up words and their meanings. Oh well, back to writing about myself on the internet.
4. I still can't believe he shat the bed. THE BED!!!
5. I'm not sure who this is. But I'm following the time-honored old-guy tradition of making an attempt to appeal to the youth demographic ('cause kids love reading blogs where 30-somethings rant about how much Citizen Kane could have been improved by adding a scene with a young Bea Arthur and a Talking Rhino singing a show tune [and you KNOW it would have been]. Or at least they do when you mention some pop star and/or actress they like).
6. It might have been 27. I honestly can't remember much that happened in my life before last Tuesday or so. Every now and then I have to consult this blog just to remember what I'm mad at lately.
7. The other two? Gluttony and Wrath. I would have put in Lust, but honestly, thinking of Lust just makes me commit either Envy or Pride, depending on my current status. And Greed is pretty awesome as well. Really, all of the Deadly Sins are pretty good. But I try to stick with my Top Three for most occassions.
8. See my new line of "Loljew" merchandise, soon to be available at a cafepress store near you.
9. Up next: I tackle My Irritating Need To Put Footnotes In Blog Entries¹⁰
10. And after that? Randomly Capitalized Terms.
11. I admittedly use that term loosely (see "Seven Deadly Sins, My Top Three" above)

How My Dog...Addendum

So, yeah. I figured that post was the last I'd need to make.

But this afternoon, Sparky shat the bed.

Not metaphorically, like he inherited some baserunners and gave up the winning run.

Literally.

He. Shat. The. Bed.

That is all.

How My Dog Has Already Ruined My Three Day Weekend

Howdy, folks looking for pictures of the lead singer of Dead or Alive. I've decided to interrupt my long, slow descent into madness to spend 5 minutes talking about my night:

I'm taking tomorrow off from work to spend a delightful day with the official Slog Girlfriend,¹ Alexandra J. Bear, Esq. Which makes this my Friday, sort of. But I've got less exciting plans than usual today, mostly consisting of getting laundry done, and cleaning the floor of our "apartment."² I'm doing this solo tonight, because Ali has a special dinner planned with her family, deferred all the way from last Valentines. Somewhere out there, she is dressed to the nines, beautiful, and having fun. I am so glad for her that she was not here.

The floor needs cleaning largely because there are seven mammals living here.³ Two (our rats, Dante and Wilson) are safely housed in an aquarium. Two (our Rabbit, Blue and Chinchilla, McGreevey) are in hutches that are roughly the size of my old Lincoln Square "apartment."⁴ These hutches have cage gates, enabling both Rabbit and Chinchilla to hurl bedding, hay, food pellets, and feces upwards of 4 feet away from their homes. ⁵ Two are humans; our feces is usually confined to the proper receptacle.

The final mammal is our Class Five Free Floating Vapor,⁶ Sparky. The Spark is...well, he's my dog. I love him. He is not 100% house-trained. But he tries. Lord how he tries.

Anywhoo, after a particularly frustrating day and a particularly frustrating commute, I finally get home. I'm delighted to see fresh urine and feces⁷ on the puppy pad.⁸ Good dog, Sparky! Here's a treat! I throw out the pad.

So, I sit down to catch my breath for a second. After about 4-5 minutes of checking email, I take a trip to the restroom. Just as I get out, my brother calls me to ask a question about which season of Arrested Development he watched when he visited me a while back. We chat for 2-3 minutes, while I try to remember the answer (I think it's one, but I'm not sure). I'm a pacer, so I've trotted all over the house. In mid-conversation, I start to smell something. Is that...no, can't be...he just went on the pad. I must smell the garbage. Better take the bag...

Oh holy crap. Gotta go, Jarrod.

The dog, all seven-point-two pounds of him, has crapped...

EVERYWHERE

I mean...seriously, in five distinct places.

This was not here before my bathroom trip. But it is now.

And that isn't even counting where I STEPPED IN IT AND TRACKED IT ALL OVER THE ROOM.

My lazy Thursday night was transformed to a Lovecraftian Scene of Canine Fecal Horror.⁹ And, of course, Sparky picks now to try to run around the house. AUUUUGH!

I chase him back to the bed, whereupon he yelps like I'm beating him, even though I'm standing 10 feet away. That little fucker is trying to make the neighbors think I'm abusing him. Jokes on him, though. I live next to transplanted trailer trash. Probably couldn't hear us over the sound of beating his trashy, boozed up wife.

So, I spend roughly 25 minutes on my hands and knees scrubbing Dog Waste out of out Increasingly Worthless Carpet. I was hoping to be done with laundry by now, but it's still in the dryer. The Spark? Asleep. We made up. He licked my face with his oyster breath and I swore that I would still feed him tomorrow.

Anyway, I should wrap up this blog. I just needed to vent. I have about 15 minutes left on the laundry, and that's probably just enough time to see if Dr. Scotch can stop by and do some lab work.

Excelsior!

'Nuff Said.

---

1. Okay, that sounds horrifying. But Slog Co-Habitator is worse, and Mrs. Slog is a little premature.
2. I am required by law to put quotes around this, as "broom closet" would be more accurate.
3. That I know of.
4. I am required by law to put quotes around this, as "Vietnamese POW Tiger Cage" would be more accurate.
5. Or, halfway across the "apartment."
6. A real nasty one, too.
7. Did I REALLY just say "delighted to see fresh urine and feces?" Let me check. Oh God. I did. Pray for me.
8. Puppy is a misnomer. The Spark is actually almost four. He is middle aged. And he still pisses on the floor. I'm 31, and it's probably been 2-3 years since I pissed on my carpet.
9. Technically, this is probably closer to Kafkaesque, but I have the label, and I'm gonna use it.
   

MySpace Archive: Using Antisemitism To Flirt With Jews

In an attempt to beef up this blog's appearance before I actually tell anyone about its existence, and also to relive some of my wacky antics over on MySpace, I am archiving all of my old posts over here at The Slog.

Let me fill you in on some backstory: This post dates from a time when I was single, but was in the midst of a long, drawn-out, both-parties-in-denial flirtation with my current girlfriend, who is a Red Sea Pedestrian (and who I should not mock, as there is a good chance she's the only person that actually reads this blog). I was raised by Southern Baptists.¹ It's like Random Sitcom Situation #37! Her MySpace screen name at the time was Ali Blue-Backpack, if that helps contextualize the beginning for all zero of my non-Ali readers.

Anywhoo, looking back, I think I was using the time-honored fourth grade flirting technique of "hitting someone and then running away." Only I added a modern twist!²

I was surprisingly happy at that point in my life,³ and therefore not complaining. And as anyone who knows me well knows, I'm not happy unless I'm not happy. With nothing to complain about, I had nothing really to say (which has, admittedly, never stopped me before).

Note, I am switching my "new commentary" over to footnotes. This is largely because I finally looked up the HTML code for it.

[Orignally posted on Friday, February 16, 2007]

Well, I have this friend...

...let's call her (for the sake of this thought excercise) "Jewy Blue-Backpack" or "Jewy" for short.

Jewy has a problem with my frequency of blog posts. She thinks that because she is pouring out all of the intimate details of her shattered Semitic psyche⁴ onto the metaphorical floor of the blogosphere, then I should too.

But, my life is going really well right now. I'm reasonably happy with my job⁵, my standard of living, my ability to cope, my lack of malignant tumors of the lung, and my hair (except at work, but I don't want to go on about how I'm forced to style it like a young Hitler there - on account of the whole "Jewy" nickname I might come off a little too hateful and Amon Goerth-y for my taste)⁶.

And a life that's going well makes for really dull blog posts. I'm at my most entertaining when I'm miserable. And, sorry Jewy: I'm not miserable. I'm content.

I suppose I could complain that my little dog has worms in his colon right now. But he's kind of a douchebag, and probably deserved it⁷. Besides, I have already dropped 3 and a half C-notes on meds and tests for for the little bastard, and it turns out he's probably gonna be fine in a few weeks. The Spark is a resiliant little turd. Just like his old man...

Actually, for the sake of honesty, I should admit that Jewy actually put that on her credit card for me- but I'm writing her a check today (as I just got paid).

Hell, I just got paid! There's another reason to be happy! I have money in the bank! My power and my phone won't be cut off! I can buy food! I can get a CD copy of Zeppelin IV⁸ (dude, I gotta get When the Levee Breaks⁹ out of my system)! I can get really drunk this weekend and waste it all!

Anywhoo. In conclusion: Life is good. My dog is sick, but he'll improve. I have no reason to complain. My friend has been Chosen by YHWH.¹⁰

The end.

And, after this I didn't post again for two months (which you will note is a frequent pattern). Until I was drawn into The Dark Underbelly of the 80s.

---

Notes

1. I'm no longer a Southern Baptist, as I stopped believing in fairy tales, especially nasty ones, as a teenager.

2. That twist: random bigotry.

3. Especially surprising, given that I lived in a what amounted to a shoebox with a stove and, like now, earned a paycheck by getting essentially yelled at by People with More Money Than Brains.

4. I will admit that this technique is actually cheaper than therapy. And probably about as effective. On a side note, The People With More Money Than Brains often use me as a sort of ad hoc therapist. If I responded to their complaints with "And how does that make you feel," I could probably get away with charging $125 an hour.

5. Liar!

6. My hair still kind of sucks, but I've never been altogether pleased with that aspect (or any aspect, really) of my head.

7. Time has not changed my opinion on this one whit.

8. I actually never did. Truth-in-blogging.

9. What a kickass song. Seriously. I spent years hating Zep because punks are supposed to. But damn that song beats the hell out of anything Screeching Weasel ever did.

10. Number of times I went for a Pointless Jew Joke in original post alone: 8

MySpace Archive: The Unemployment Saga, Part the Third

In an attempt to beef up this blog's appearance before I actually tell anyone about its existence, and also to relive some of my wacky antics over on MySpace, I am archiving all of my old posts over here at The Slog.

This is the third (well fourth, but I'm not picky) post from the dark days of my own personal unemployment hell. Not to be confused with my own current personal employment hell. It includes a naked and blatant appeal for cash - something I do less of than one might think. It also includes a naked and blatant Chihuahua-esque creature - my hideous little dog Sparky . I think it's also his first appearance of many in the Wolter-related blogosphere, but I'm too lazy to double-check that.

[Originally Posted on 10/18/06]

Well, I'm about to interview (Save MY house, not Screech's)

At a temping agency. How great is my life?

I need some money real fast. November is right around the corner, and I have precisely Jack + Squat to give the landlord. Which could put me and my delightful little dog-like animal buddy Sparky out on the mean streets of Lincoln Square.

Anyone out there feel the need to just mail random checks to a guy in Chicago? Or hell, I could get a paypal account, if that's easier. Actually, I already have a paypal account...I think...I should check on that.

You don't want poor little Sparky out on the streets. He's at least 3/4 chihuahua, and is balding, twitchy, and irritable as is. If he's cold as well, I'm going to be nursing ankle scars for the rest of my life.

And unlike Screech, if you save my house, I promise you DON'T have to hear my crappy stand-up.

Remember that "Screech House" debacle? That sure dates this piece. Man, if Dustin Diamond were beaten to death with a tire iron, would the world be a better place? Probably not by much. But, it's worth a try.

By the way, I actually got an offer from an "online friend" of mine in Germany of a little financial assistance. I actually turned it down, but I was touched to know that, barring some unpleasantness c. 1933-1945, there are some mightly decent folk in the Fatherland.

It turns out I do have an active Paypal account, so if anyone still wants to send me money for no reason (really, I'm fine now - I have a job that makes decent money), feel free to let me know.

The Jobless Insanity continues soon!