Important First Date Questions: Part 1

The following is a list of questions that might come up, should you and I ever go out on a first date. This might be a running list - a serial blog, if you will - and here's part one. Because it's important for me to find out early on whether or not this is going to work.

1) In what has to be considered the best week of your life, you meet two different men, and you're convinced that both could possibly be your soul mate. You find both incredibly attractive, intellectually stimulating, deeply compassionate, and while it's completely unlike you to do so, you decide to date both at the same time. Without telling either guy about the other. Soon into your relationships, you realize that each guy has his own very odd quirk. Every time you're out in public with guy 1, he talks and acts exactly like Sam Kinison. Only in public though. If you're at a restaurant, he's red-faced, sweating, screaming his order (and a great deal of profanity) at the server. If you decide to grab dessert after the movie, he's shouting at the Dairy Queen clerk about the blizzard flavor of the month. Needless to say, it's very uncomfortable. But then you get home and everything's normal. The thing with guy # 2 also strikes you as a little strange. Every hour on the hour (whether you're in public or not), he gets down on a knee and serenades you with Peter Cetera's "Glory of Love". Even when he's asleep... he instinctively wakes up hourly just to sing to you. He sings the song perfectly, and there's no doubt in your mind that should the situation ever present itself, he really would fight for your honor. Which guy do you stick with longer?

2) For the better part of a decade now, Vikings and Ninjas have been involved in a brutal war for control of Europe. After a week-long summit, the UN has convinced both sides to settle the dispute once and for all. The venue for this last battle royale is the newly rehabbed Roman Coliseum, and each side will send their 500 best fighters to the historic non-televised event. Weeks before this deciding battle, a local radio station dials your phone randomly, asks you 3 simple pop-culture questions, and after answering all three correctly, you're awarded one front-row ticket to the fight. They also throw in airfare and hotel accommodations. The one big problem with all of this (which you don't realize until two days before you fly out) is that the viking/ninja battle takes place on your wedding day. What excuse to you give your fiance for missing your own wedding?

3) ConAgra Foods, creators of Manwhich, have agreed to pay you $80 for every Manwhich sloppy joe you eat for the rest of your life. After doing the math, you realize that if you ate 3 sloppy joes a day, you could quit your job and support yourself reasonably well. This is good because - for some reason - ConAgra will call the deal off if you hold any other job except for sloppy joe-eater. How long do you keep this up?

Seasonably Insightful

Do you ever catch yourself being real deep and introspective, even if there's no good reason for you to be that way? I feel like it's been happening with me a lot lately. It's kind of silly, and I have to stop and laugh at myself sometimes. Today after work, I'm just hanging out on my balcony enjoying the breeze, when off in the distance I spot a couple birds flying off towards the setting sun. For whatever reason, I start thinking about current events in my life, how I got where I am, the lifespan of your average bird, what it'd be like to peck my way out of an egg. And on and on and on. Oh, the birds I saw aren't pictured above, if you were wondering. That's just a picture I borrowed from the internet. Well, I guess it's possible... you don't think... whoa... that's messed up, man

Fake Drunk

Last night I slept on the couch, for no good reason except that I wasn't falling asleep in my bed like I usually do. It was good - it kind of reminded me of coming home real drunk. So, sometime just before 3am, I gave up trying to sleep like normal people and headed for the couch/tv. But not before grabbing water and chips from the kitchen. And here's what I've learned about crashing on the couch on turn back the clock day - it is very bright in your nearly shadeless living room at 8am¹. A good recipe for a super inactive Sunday, if you're ever in need of one of those... well... once a year I guess.


¹Or 7am, depending on how you look at it.

Kid Rock Is The Smartest Man In History

I know what you're all thinking - what about Archimedes? Or Plato? Or James Woods? Fine, all those people are smart too, but hear me out on this. Just this past week, I was in my car and switched to a radio station that I don't regularly listen to. Sure enough, Kid Rock's new single was playing. In it (his single), he samples Lynard Skynard's Sweet Home Alabama¹. Now, it occurs to me that while I never want to hear this song ever again, Kid Rock has an exceptional formula for success here. Somewhere along the line, he must have realized that he doesn't have the talent to impress rock critics, other musicians, mid-30s online bloggers, etc. However, there are literally millions of Americans that consider themselves either a) Midwesterners or b) Southerners. And more than any other demographic, these millions of people still buy their music at Wal-Mart or Target or other high-volume retailers. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to paint the people from the south or from the midwest as dopey or musically retarded or anything along those lines. All I'm saying is that if Kid Rock was interested in profiting from his career choice, he picked a good audience to appeal to.

And now that he's got his audience, all his songs have to do is be mildly catchy and make endless references to that rural lifestyle. And while we're at it, why not sample one of the most popular southern-rock songs in history? This particular song that I heard the other day is mostly about young love in Northern Michigan. Its lyrics mention walleye fishing, campfires, and whiskey drinking, among other things. In the song's thrice-repeated chorus, Rock rhymes "things" with "things"² -- We were trying different things / We were smoking funny things. It's ingenious. Every thing about it is just plain brilliant

¹ This marks the second time in six years that somebody has stolen Sweet Home Alabama from Skynard. The 2002 incident was the Reese Witherspoon/Patrick Dempsey movie. I'm sure it's just a matter of time before we're blessed with the teen-drama TV series version.

² And as luck would have it, these two identical words do indeed rhyme with one another.

Inside My Head I've Heard A Lot

Since it's very likely that I'll never be elected president, I suppose this is my inaugural address. This blogging idea hit me close to a week ago; I had just made a series of realizations about castaways, pop music stars, and women that drive white Hyundai Sonatas on Chicagoland expressways. It was maybe the most important week of my life.¹ So there's a little background. Oh, and I should further mention that I made a deal with myself to be careful about plagiarizing other people's work. I've already broken that rule twice (it's not uncommon for me to break promises to myself). The name (and URL) of the blog is taken from a Radiohead song that was on just a few minutes ago, and the title for this post is taken from a whole other song by a whole other band.² So that's that. Hope you enjoy reading (assuming I keep up with this new hobby), but please try not to dwell on anything from this blog for very long.<sup>3


1</sup> I realize that this may seem like an overstatement, but as you read future blog posts, I'm sure you'll conclude that it was at least in the running for the most important week.
² Although, only people from Munster, Indiana or possibly Raleigh, North Carolina would catch that.
³ I would say that thirty to fifty seconds should do it for just about any of my future ramblings.