Damn You, Bourdain!

Let me talk about how much I hate the food selection around me. As a young kid, you don’t really take into account that all the major chain restaurants are boring as hell after a while. They all serve the same food and I’m almost certain that most of what’s being served is just microwaved. Sure, it’s probably a few steps above fast food, but I don’t think it’s that much higher up. This is all coming from someone who has spent less than 5 hours in the restaurant industry. For all I know, I’m completely wrong and someone reading this is a line cook at one of these lovely establishments. One thing that’s for sure is that if I ever really voiced any of these concerns in person, I’d probably get spit on my food. It’s probably on there anyway.

Watching Anthony Bourdain’s adventures on the Travel Channel doesn’t make me feel any better. I look at the amazing places he visits around the world and only dream that I could eat there. Everything looks incredible and I’m filled with rage. I look at my refrigerator and am completely disgusted with it. Where’s the suckling pig? Does it hold any science crafted foods that are taking the culinary world by storm? Hell, can it produce for me the tastiest burger I’ve bitten into in years? The answer is always no. I know I’m being too harsh on my fridge and this speaks more about my skill as a cook than it does about the contents of my fridge. I’m sorry fridge; you’re awesome. You keep my food nice and cool and my cold drinks at the perfect temperature. I’m the lazy guy who doesn’t take time to prepare his dinners. It’s also the reason why I know most of the chain restaurants suck.

But, every once in a while, there are those local places that pop out and have you keep coming back. Places that you think are a secret to everyone else. You’re even afraid to say its name out loud because that would garner enough attention from your friends, and they’ll tell their friends, and so on until you have to call three weeks in advance for a reservation at the place you hung out at before it was cool. It’s honestly the same way I feel about music. Does that make me a restaurant hipster snob? Probably.

One of my new favorite places is Barrique in Babylon. Even writing about it here is going against my whisper rule. As a Long Islander, it’s tough to find a good restaurant. If you live here, you know it’s overrun with all those chains and Italian restaurants. This place was a breath of fresh air. Completely rustic looking, it feels out of place on this island. The side entrance and the alley it hides in makes me feel like I’m not here anymore; like I’ve been transported to France for the night. There’s also the amazing wine selection and the great ways the staff figures out which one would suit you best. Let’s not forget their cheese selection. Holy crap, I never thought I could love cheese, ever, but that aged gouda got me hooked and nothing else will do.

That’s enough about my new favorite restaurant. I won’t tell you about the other’s that I love. The wait at Barrique is already long enough. Good thing I know the bartender. Go out and find a new place to eat.

Dig Dug Toot.

Picking your nose; scratching the inside of your ear; digging for something stuck in your teeth; letting one rip; belching out a loud one. We’re all guilty of doing it. Sometimes, we’re completely unaware that we’re doing it. You’re just going about your day when you let out a little toot and level the crowd of people walking behind you.

For a long time, I was a fan of picking my nose while I drove my car. This was especially true when I would drive home from work late at night. The next time you’re out and about at night, take a second to look at the cars coming your way. Can’t see the driver because the headlights are blinding you? Well, that’s the perfect situation to pick one out that’s been bugging you. But like I said at the beginning of this paragraph, I was a fan. This all ended the night I was driving home and “dug” a little too deep. 

Before I knew it, my finger was covered in blood. It’s a pretty big shock when you’re doing 45mph down the side streets of your town. I couldn’t believe this was happening as I reached into my glove box and searched for napkins to stop the flood of crimson coming out of my nose. Thankfully, I made it home without a drop on my clothes nor the seats of my car. As I’m staring into my reflection, with toilet paper plugging my nose, I vowed to stop doing it. I also promised myself to make an effort to become aware of the things I was doing.

See, up until the nosebleed happened, I wasn’t really aware that I was picking my nose. It had become so habitual, that I didn’t think twice about it. Then I had a conversation with a friend who claimed to do the same thing. We had just started doing things without realizing that maybe we should keep it to ourselves. He came clean that his big thing was farting in the bar. Who could blame him, though? You drink enough beer and you’re bound to let out some gas. For me, it’s burping while I’m there. A few times, I had belched out some loud ones and when I realized I was doing it, I would ask people if they heard it and I apologized. Another friend had become so used to my burping that he could pick out when it was me just by the smell. Gross, I know.

But, nothing beats going to the local bar on Thanksgiving night. I heard my bartender friend tell me it was the worst smelling night of the year. Not remembering what he said, I walked into the bar two Thanksgivings ago; he was totally right. It was absolutely rank in that place. It seems that everyone was letting out a fart here and there and thought no one would notice. That might be true when you’re there on a normal night, but not when everyone you’re surrounded by is doing the same exact thing. Had there been flowers in the place, you’d probably see them cry.

So, what keeps us doing this? Most of us were brought up better than that. I know my mom would hit me if she saw me burping in public. I don’t even want to think of what she would do if she ever knew I picked my nose in front of others. But I guess that’s what you deal with when you have a son. Are girls a different story? Everyone knows they’re the “gentler gender” and they half expect guys to be gross. But do they burp in the middle of a crowd? Are they tearing it up with their farts and blaming guys? I certainly hope not and if you’re a girl reading this, please don’t shatter that thought for me. We all know girls are crazy, but if you add any of the bad habits discussed in this post, I might never take a girlfriend.

You’re Gonna Be A Star, Kid.

So, the main reason I started this blog was to get the creative juices flowing to write what I really enjoy; Comedy. Ever since I can remember, I’ve always enjoyed making people laugh. My sister was my first audience member, but she didn’t really have a choice. I had the bad habit of being the older brother who would get his sister upset. The waterworks would start and I would immediately feel guilty for what I’d done, never really thinking about what I might be doing to hurt her feelings. As soon as I would feel that way, I went out of my way to make her feel better by trying to bring a smile to her face. Sometimes it involved saying funny lines from movies (usually Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) or whatever slapstick a little kid’s mind could come up with. 

Sure, there were also tons of influences around me. There were movies, TV shows, and Mad Magazine. My dad worked the graveyard shift at a 7-11 for a brief moment in time and he would bring me the old issues of Mad that would find their way to the garbage. The movie spoofs were my absolute favorite. I loved seeing popular things made fun of. Then it hit me; I wanted to be in comedy. Too bad it took me this long to listen to my “inner child” and act on it.

The earliest movie that made me really want to make other’s laugh was Dumb & Dumber. Seeing that movie in the theater changed my life forever. Sure, I might not have gotten all the jokes when I first saw it, but I knew the theater was laughing and I wanted that kind of attention for myself. Yes, it’s a very selfish act, but who doesn’t love the limelight? From that moment on, I made it a point to make everyone around me an audience and I wanted to make them smile.

A good friend of mine recently let me read some scripts that he had written. I was jealous to say the least. This guy has talent. How he doesn’t have a job writing movies or a sitcom is beyond me. Even hanging out with him makes me feel like we’ve got a shot at making it in comedy. It also makes me feel like I’m not that funny (there I go beating myself up again). After asking him how he became good at writing scripts, he told me that he just absorbed as much as he possibly could. I took that advice and ran. It wasn’t just because he told me to, but because that was the one piece of advice I kept hearing over and over again.

From that moment on, I read, watched, and listened to as much comedy as I possibly could. I bought books on script writing, listened to podcasts, watched all kinds of stand-up, and paid especially close attention to sitcoms. Every thing flowed into each other. What I read in the books was happening in the movies and sitcoms. What I heard in the podcasts were proven methods and great advice for what I saw in stand-up. But with all that information, there was one bit of advice I wasn’t following; just go out there and do it.

That’s how this blog was started. It’s how two great friends and I started writing skits for a troupe we called Mod Follies. It’s also responsible for my one successful night at doing stand-up. I still tell people that I do stand-up because I like the attention it gets. If you’re reading this and I’ve told you this before, I’m sorry. I’m a fraud and have done stand-up only once. Don’t be so quick to write me off yet, though. I’ve got pages of bits that are just waiting to see the light of day/a stage.

So, that’s where I’m at. I type away on a MacBook and hope that one day it’ll lead to something else. I’m out there. I’m doing it. I’ve just got to keep up to date with this blog. The next time you see me and you’ve noticed that I haven’t posted anything new the previous Tuesday or Friday, I give you full permission to punish me by getting me a beer.

Cock Pit Rock Out

Have you ever just rocked out in your car? I mean full on, radio blasting, singing at the top of your lungs, raising your fist to the imaginary crowd that makes up the speedometer, kind of rocking out? Now, have you ever been caught doing it?

Unless you absolutely hate your life, I can safely assume that we’ve all done this. Maybe you’re not a driver, but you’ve rocked out in public with your ear buds in. I can say that I’ve worn and have seen them on the city bus. And after catching someone watching us as we ‘literally’ melt off some faces, blood rushes to our cheeks, our eyes widen, and our mouths shut at a staggeringly slow pace. We turn away from the stranger’s gaze and beat ourselves up in our internal monologue. 

Tonight, I vowed to never do that again. I was driving down the road and had been stopped at a red light for about a minute. Foster the People were on and the volume was louder than normal because I was just doing 50mph right before coming to this stop. That’s when I started bobbing my head to the beat, then came the singing along. Before I knew it, I was full out singing the words and beating my fist into the passenger seat to the kick drum.

As my ‘rock out’ is in full swing, I turn my head to the right to see a guy watching my performance from two lanes away. Instantly the thoughts of “you’re an idiot” and “I can’t believe that dude saw me” came rushing to my brain. That’s when I shut off my brain, slapped on a huge grin, and waived to the mustached onlooker. He wrinkled his eyebrows and held up an unconvincing wave. At that moment, I didn’t care what this guy thought of me. Hell, I will most likely NEVER see this man ever again and even if I do, I know for sure I won’t recognize him. Let him be completely jealous of my good time and bow before the awesome that is my rock out.

What About Mom?

I’m terrible, I mean God awful, at buying gifts. The only person who I seem to get things right for is my sister. If that’s not the case, she’s one hell of an actress and deserves a lifetime achievement award for the performances she’s put on every Christmas morning. But even when it comes to buying things for myself, I’m the absolute worst. I’m sure some of you out there could give me a run for my money (It’s mine! You can’t have it.) and you’re probably right. At least I can get my sister the right things.

Mom has always been the toughest person to buy things for. It’s not because she’s a cold hearted woman with the emotions of a boulder. She’s the exact opposite of that, but this doesn’t help me buy gifts for her. The thing that makes my mom the toughest person to buy a gift for is that she was born on Christmas. Christmas! How am I supposed to find the right gift that says “Happy Birthday, Mom! You weren’t upstaged by Jesus in the least bit”? So far, I’ve resorted to jewelry and spa days. 

It just sometimes feels like I have to make up for the years that I couldn’t afford gifts while I was hanging out in the playground. Honestly, the thought that my Mom shared a birthday with Jesus on Christmas never really hit me until I was making a decent living. I guess I just took it for granted that my mom had dealt with it and moved on. But now was my moment to make her birthday and Christmas two separate events. Not to mention, I was completely wrong about her “dealing with it.” No one would.

My sister and I, mainly my sister, hammered that fact home two years ago. We had decided to throw Mom the biggest party she’d had in years. The significant part of this event? It was going to be at the end of January as to keep it far away from Christmas and the holiday season. The party went off better than expected and planned! She was completely surprised and had a blast. The night was filled with dancing, drinking, and lots of laughs. Seriously, what more could you ask for in a party?

So, that had settled it. As of that night, I was able to separate my mom’s birthday from the holiday season. Too bad it didn’t help me with picking out gifts, though.

Give Me Them Digits, Girl.

Someone please explain to me the miracle that is the cute girl hanging out with the dude “playing in the minors.” You’ve got this guy; bearded; glasses; really long, stringy hair stuffed under a crappy cadet hat; wearing cargo khakis with a pull over sweater that looks like it might have some bong water stains, and the absolutely cute chick who is a third the guy’s size; wearing a cute plaid skirt; nice skin; and great make-up. 

In my head, this scenario NEVER works out for the ugly fat dude and the cute girl leaves without giving the underdog another shot. Secretly, I’m pissed at the guy because in my head, I could have been the next “underdog” she decided to give a shot, but now that’s ruined. Thanks a lot, fatty cargo ass! 

That’s when I realize that I’m not the underdog and I’m not playing in the minors. I’m playing for the big leagues and on the winning team. Unfortunately, I’m also not taking any shots (switching it up to soccer). I’ve been spending most of my time just passing the ball along and not driving it at the keeper. To be honest, had my love-life been an actual player, I’d make excuses that he’s creating opportunities for other players before I truly hated him for never crushing the ball when the opportunity showed itself.

Now, I’m not actually upset with myself about my love-life. If anything, I’m pretty proud that I haven’t put up with any BS since college. Seeing some of my friends go through the crap they dealt with this past year really raised my confidence in that decision. It’s been one that I’ve stuck to, but it’s sometimes the one in which I wonder if I’ve put too much weight on. Seems like I’ve decided not to deal with any BS that when I get even a hint of it, I immediately write a girl off and move on to the next one. Unfortunately, the ‘next one’ tends to take her time.

Playing in the top league does mean that I have to really start playing like I know I belong there. I’ve got my friends cheering me on; telling me I’m awesome; reassuring me that I deserve the best, but I still have a tough time believing them. The worst part is that I’m absolutely terrible when it comes to picking up on a girl’s hints. I’m pretty sure this has been mentioned in a post before, but if it hasn’t, you’ve probably heard me say it in person. I’m completely oblivious to them.

A few months ago, I wrote a post where I called myself a “green beret of vagina”. This title has never helped me out when it comes to women. Something in my brain shuts off when I’m talking to a girl I dig and I can’t tell if she’s into me. Sure, I can strike up a conversation with any person in a room (Nazis excluded from that list) and have a really good time, but I can never tell if I should ask for a girl’s number. It’s a weird feeling knowing that I can talk to someone with such ease, but not know if a girl would be into continuing the conversation over dinner. Maybe I’m just too polite and focused on having a good time. One thing that’s for certain is that I’m ready for my chance to smack the ball into the open net and hear the roar of the crowd – or just hearing my friends say “cool.” 

The crazy part about the scene I described up top is that the guy was the bored one. That pompous jerk.

All Up In My Business

Over the past few months, I’ve gotten to know a lot of Apple employees. It’s not at all because my computer has been breaking and I needed to stop in so frequently that I learned their names. I’m typing away on a MacBook that was put out in ’06 and it still works like a charm, which is more than I can say for any clothes that I owned at that time (man, I’ve got to lose weight). I’ve come to know them because two of my closest friends have started working at the same store and we end up hang out together. But it’s not just those two. I currently know five people who work for Apple that I’ve known before their time there.

What stinks is that my budding ‘friendships’ with their fellow employees has caused me to see how small the Apple world actually is. I could literally see the phrase “a few bad apples” come to life if I wanted to. Within this small circle, news travels really fast and that means I need to watch where I step. For instance: I started talking to a really cool girl who is an Apple employee – not even the same store my close friends work at. Before the week was over, it was known throughout a few stores that we hung out over drinks. I felt like a guy trying to squeeze out a fart in an elevator; no matter how hard I tried to keep it under wraps, everyone would soon find out. This didn’t have any bearing on my thoughts about the girl, but it did make me question what the rumor mill would be like.

There is also the case of actually hanging out with my friends and their co-workers. Every get together’s conversation has been dominated by the going ons of their job, usually leaving me and some others out of the loop, scratching our heads because we don’t know who they’re talking about. When the conversation finally dies off, it’s always followed up by the taking out of iPhones and checking their social networks. It really made me self-conscious about the number of times I checked mine. I do have to say that it’s actually gone down since I bought a watch, which I made the excuse of never wearing one because the time was on my phone. At least now I don’t look like I’m addicted to my phone by constantly pulling it out of my pocket (what was the equivalent term of ‘crackberry’ for the iPhone?). Let’s face it, whenever we check our phones for the time, we always forget what it is and have to pull it out again. So, I’m extremely thankful to my wristwatch for not making me look so addicted, which I guess is the same feeling heroin junkies have towards the veins in their legs during winter time.

Now the question is how do I interact with this community? I think I’ve come up with a solution. Get them drunk! Get them so drunk they stop talking about work. This method actually worked the night before Thanksgiving. There we were at our local bar, talking about everything under the sun except the latest gossip at Apple. Oh the good times we had. I also attribute it to the fact that most everyone in their social networks were present at the bar. No need to check Facebook if your status updates are all coming from the same location, right? And if anyone was posting pictures on Instagram, chances were that you’re in the photo being shared (you can ‘like it’ when you got home).

So, that’s my advice: forget about it all and become the ‘bad apple’ yourself.

Now, I know these friends are going to read this entry (you better or we’re not friends!) and you should all know I love you. I just can’t stand hearing about so and so who blows up the bathroom every day in between ping-pong matches in the break room (note: not an actual person).

Doppelgänger My Eggos!

I walked into my normal coffee shop this evening and the barista takes one look at me and shouts out my order before I even get to the counter. There I am standing, a bit in awe, contemplating how often I actually frequent this shop. That’s when I realize the order she shouted out is similar to mine but not how I like it. Then I notice that I rarely ever see that barista and wonder how she would know what I order. I speak up and make my changes to the order and she looks up at me. “Oh, you’re not who I thought you were,” she says, “you look exactly like another guy who comes in here. You two could be brothers.” I pipe up, “yeah, but I’m probably better looking than him.” That’s when another barista behind the counter just looks at me and her face tells me I’m wrong. 

I can’t count the number of times I’ve been mistaken for someone else. How about the time I went out for a walk and a van pulls over (I immediately think of the crazy scenarios involving vans and strangers on the side of the road)? The driver gets out with a huge smile on his face, makes his way towards me and stops about five feet before reaching me, no longer smiling. He starts to laugh because he thought I was a close friend of his. It’s all cleared up with a hand shake and he climbs into his van and is on his way. Now, this guy was way older than me and I wondered how old I must have looked in order for this guy to think I was his friend. If he’s hanging out with people my age, he’s definitely a creep, but his getting out of the van pretty much solidified that thought in my head.

So, how many times have we done this ourselves? We’re out and about and come across someone we think is a friend. If you’re me/a creeper, you follow the person for a little to make sure that your suspicions are correct. Sometimes you’ll text the person to see if they check their phone. 9 times out of 10, I won’t approach the person. I’ll just let it go by and bring up the “encounter” the next time I see that person, ignoring their advice of approaching them next time. I don’t care how sure I am, if there’s a shred of doubt it’s not you, I’m not saying anything. But, I have started to walk close by just in case, though.

What I wonder is if I actually look like these people. There was only one time I actually thought I was in a picture with a group of people I had never met in my entire life. It was during the silver age of Myspace and I stumbled across someone’s profile. In their pictures was a shot of a guy who I could have used as a double had I been born a Hussein. I shared the pictures with friends and even they were convinced that this guy was me.

But my favorite story is about how I came to work for Urban Outfitters. It had been just a week or two since I moved to Denver and I was in need of some cash. I’ve come to accept the fact that I wouldn’t make much money if I were to sell my body on the corner. So I did the next best thing; I found out where people I knew worked and asked if they were hiring. After getting a call to come in for an interview, I sat down with a manager and I noticed him staring at me and sometimes laughing. As I filled out some paperwork, another employee sat down next to me and struck up a conversation. He was laughing at times also. After a few weeks of being there, they came clean as to why I was actually hired. Apparently I looked and sounded exactly like someone they all loved who had left the store a few months before I arrived. There was even a test to prove this theory.

This guy’s ex-girlfriend walked into the store and the same co-worker who sat next to me while I filled out paperwork told her to shut her eyes. He got me and told me to say hi to her. There I was, standing in front of a girl whose eyes were closed, being told to speak to her. It was a little weird, but when she heard my voice, her eyes shot wide open and she couldn’t believe I wasn’t him. We looked so alike that it took her a second to realize I wasn’t actually her ex-boyfriend. I stood there hoping their relationship ended on a good note and that she wouldn’t attack me.

There are plenty of other stories like these; ask me the next time you see me and we’ll swap some ‘gang’ stories. Just make sure it’s actually me.

Not me.

Who Inspects the Inspectors?

Something most New Yorkers have to go through is getting their car inspected. Since my first car, I always had this fear that mine wouldn’t pass inspection and I would have to spend hundreds of dollars repairing something that I wasn’t even sure needed to be fixed. It wasn’t so much the fear that I would have to spend a lot of money but the thought that someone could possibly take advantage of me. I’m not completely clueless about cars, so that fear has subsided a little over the years, but there’s always the lingering feeling that it would still not pass.

What has also helped was that I had cars that were better than the last. I’m not talking about expensive cars. I currently drive a Mazda Protege (not the hatchback) and it’s probably the “nicest” car I’ve owned. It’s completely reliable and great on gas, but I wish I had power windows. Still, the second car I ever owned was a Ford Explorer, which I purchased after being involved in a crash. I was scared of small cars because the one that was totaled in the accident was a small two door sports car. So, to get over my fear of tiny cars, I thought I’d buy the biggest car I could afford with the money the insurance company gave me. Boy did I make a huge mistake with buying that Ford.

The very first inspection I had done on the Ford cost me over a grand in repairs. I was only 19 at the time and my dad slapped the back of my head so hard that I’m sure my 39 year old self felt it, and I’m not looking forward to experiencing that pain again. This is definitely where my anxiety of car inspections stems from. 

Hopefully I’ll be a successful writer one day and I won’t have to deal with that. I’ll be able to purchase a car that I know will pass its inspections. On top of that, the cars had better be new, and if they’re not, they damn well better be gorgeously restored sports cars. I’d like to think no one in their right mind would fail a ’69 Mustang Fastback. Now that’s a Ford I wouldn’t mind owning.

"What your mom buy you a ‘puter for Christmas?"

Imagine what this world must look like to a guy who stepped out of a cryogenic sleep chamber, after being frozen for years. If you’re like me, you immediately think of the movie Forever Young starring the sometimes controversial Mel Gibson. He plays a World War II era dream boat pilot who signs up to be part of an experiment for his pal. They forget about him and he wakes up in the 90’s, not knowing what happened. Long story short, he meets a budding actor by the name of Elijah Wood and learns about the things he’s missed.

Now, if I ever find myself in that type of situation, I wouldn’t wait to hear about new technology. I’d want to find out if holograms existed and if people are actually having sex with robots. Maybe nano technology took leaps and bounds and disease is cured with a robotic army attacking viruses, but I have a feeling the common cold will still plague us. I would do all this after mourning the loss of my family and everyone I’ve ever met, of course.

Well, while I was sitting down at the coffee shop I over heard some older gentlemen say, “something box.”

“Xbox?”

“Yeah. That’s it.”

I thought to myself if that’s how I would actually turn out in my old age. Everything I mentioned up top was the follow up to this thought. It’s, honestly, more of a declaration that I wouldn’t turn out to be like these gentlemen. But, the above situation would also happen while I was still 28 and frozen then thawed out fifty years from now. So, would we become like our grandparents, handing over our new cell phones to our grandkids because we can’t figure out how to work the damn thing?

But, the question that I keep asking is how hard must it be to not take notice of new technology around you? Did we take a huge leap that it created this rift between people who kept up and those who didn’t? Looking back fifty years from today, the world was completely different. It’s hardly a shadow of its former self. Rather than growing the guts to walk up to a girl, guys are fawning over women from behind a computer screen. They don’t pick up the phone and call, they send texts, which led to “sexts”, which prove that technology is now in the bedroom, and how can you ignore that? Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against flirting via texts, but there’s a problem if your only interactions have been based in text.

What weirds me out the most is that kids are insanely competent with new devices. I can’t watch a toddler play with an iPhone before they’ve learned how to properly wipe their own butt. A friend of mine told me about how is kid would take his phone and play around with it. They knew how to take pictures, access them when done, how to play games, and how to avoid deleting applications. Granted, he has two of the smartest kids I’ve ever seen in my entire life. In fact, one of them speaks better english than I do after a few beers, and he’s only 2. (Please don’t read that as the two year old drinking beer.) But, something about watching them makes even me feel a little obsolete.

Then I think back to grandparents. I want to be the grandfather who takes things away from my grandchildren in order to get it right, and to be what internet speak defines as L33T (elite). I always want to be right there, on the edge of what’s new. From what I’ve noticed in my day to day life, it isn’t that hard of a challenge.