Get Incensed

It’s all under control….

There are many experts who say we are living in the most stressful time in history.

I’m a little skeptical. It seems to me finishing a Power Point presentation by Friday isn’t anywhere near as stressful as getting chased by a saber-toothed tiger.

Sure, you might not remember to save the last three hours of slides, but is that really as bad as forgetting your club back at the cave?

But enough conjecture, let’s look at this question scientifically by taking a look back at the Top 5 Most Stressful Periods in History and see how people coped before there were Stress Less coffee mugs ….

5.) The Middle Ages

4.) Ancient Rome

3.) The Aztec Era

(more…)

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Hey, gang…

It’s that time again - time to announce the Project Blog Week Nine prize for contestants and readers! In the dark about what Project Blog is all about? Basically, it is a competition for bloggers, where readers get to have a say in the winner. You can read more here. Last week we gave away copies of some great books, courtesy of Humor-Blogs. This week, we have some new incredible sponsors puttin’ up the goods. And for more giveaways, check out this massive list.

Week Eight’s Sponsor: Stress Less

Week Eight’s Prizes:

And that’s not all! Allison over at BCS Frenzy is sweetening the pot a little and throwing in ANOTHER prize - The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook. (She thought it was appropriate, given that this week’s prizes are all stress-busters!)

That means two lucky winners and the blogger of the week are all getting prizes! Woo hoo! How can you enter? Simple - just tell us what stresses you out most, and then (this is important) head to the Stress Less website and give us a product link to what you’d like to buy to relieve that stress. So, your comment might look like the following,

“I’m most stressed out by problems in my love life. I could sure use a copy of the Lover’s Massage Healing Touch Video.”

(If you don’t know how to use html to link words, just copy and past the product link for us!)

That’s all you have to do! Comments are open for one week, so spread the word and leave your comment today!

Remember: To be eligible to win you need to leave the product comments over at BCS Frenzy. All other snarky comments should be left here at Get Incensed.

“Early in the mornin’, I’m giving you a warnin’ …”

I realize I’m not the first guy to complain about Internet ads.

Most of the time, though, I don’t have a problem with ads. I used to be a bartender, so I’m accustomed to ignoring people who are trying to get my attention.

I understand everyone has to make money. I know that server space, web programmers and stocking your IPO party with fashion models costs money. I don’t begrudge AOL, Yahoo or NaughtyNeighbors.com their ad space. And I’m very appreciative of the ability to have 24-hour access to news, e-mail and porn.

I look on with amusement when advertisers try to make their Internet come-ons more “interactive.” If you want invest money on designing a banner ad that lets me shoot ducks, putt golf balls or step on cockroaches, that’s your prerogative.

But here are two things I can promise wont’ happen in my lifetime: I’ll never change my mind on a serious issue because of a bumper sticker and I’ll never buy a product because you let me win at a javascript video game for morons.

I barely even look at those ads and I’ve never stopped to play one of those stupid games. I don’t have as many friends as Hillary Clinton, but there isn’t anyone I’ve ever talked to who has ever clicked on one of those ads either. So, to me, it all seems like an incredible waste of marketing dollars.

And yet, I’m really okay with the fact that my web page has more signs tacked onto it than the community board at a local supermarket.

But I draw the line when you interrupt what I’m doing because my cursor happened to make inadvertent contact with a corner of your ad as I tried to navigate the article I was reading.

Suddenly, even having my cursor touch an ad has become the online equivalent of making eye contact with a homeless person. Let’s get this straight, rolling across your link on my way to doing something else isn’t an invitation get in my face and yell at me by having a window pop up.

Do you really think you’re building customer goodwill when people have to stop what their doing to search for the “Close Window” button? Sure, you may get one person out of three million who actually follows the link to subscribe to Newsweek, but you’re aggravating the hell out of the rest of us.

There’s a special circle of hell reserved for those advertisers who have taken it upon themselves to camouflage the “Close” button to the point where it’s harder to find than a woman’s G-spot.

Nobody should have to pick their way through a minefield of mortgage and herbal remedy ads while they’re trying to get some quality surfing in during work hours. If I want to navigate through a maze in a bizarre world where scary creatures keep popping out at me, I’ll play World of Warcraft.

I can’t wait for the day when somebody comes up with an application that allows me to zap unwanted pop up ads and send a torrent of phony subscriptions to the offending company’s server.

I’d pay good money for that.

Even if I found it through a pop-up ad.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

Mexican bus pass…

It’s hard out there for a senorita.

I tell everyone I meet who believes in reincarnation, that I don’t want to come back as a woman. It’s just too hard to go through life that way. Between high heels, a regular monthly hormone fest and lower pay for the same job, I’d go crazy.

But the hardest thing would be coming back and having to deal with all the nonsense from guys.

Sure, somebody might hold the occasional door for you, but on a more regular basis you’d have to deal with getting whistled at, being hit on by every skeezy dude in the bar and turning up missing whenever you go on vacation.

And, up until recently, you couldn’t go to Mexico.

The good news is, due to some very forward thinking on the part of the Mexican government, this is all starting to change. After numerous complaints by women’s groups, Mexico City is rolling out a new service for ladies only.

Is it affordable day care? An additional week of pregnancy leave? Oh, it’s way more exciting and progressive than that. It’s buses.

*in my best smarmy game show host voice…* “Yes, ladies, it’s public transportation juuust for you. Check out the new buses with pink signs in the window. Buses put into service, so you don’t have to get groped like you would on a regular bus…”

Are you kidding me? How bad does the groping situation have to be that you have to have a special fleet of buses for women only? Well, as it turns out, at least as bad as it is on the Mexican subway where they’ve had Ladies Only cars for some time now.

Obviously, the whole conquistador mentality hasn’t ebbed quite as quickly in Mexico as we all might have hoped.

On the other hand, ladies, how great is it that every time you’re feeling lonely and neglected, you can just hop on the bus and immediately get fondled? That’s the kind of genuine warmth and affection you can only find at a strip club or political fund raiser here in the States.

If you think economics is a strong incentive for immigrating to the U.S., where do you suppose being poked and stroked like you were in a petting zoo ranks on the “reasons to move to a country with individual rights” scale?

At least in America, most guys will buy you a drink before they start rubbing your thigh.

Still, there are people who say we should be thankful for some progress. These people are known as optimists because they see the glass as half-full. In reality, there’s just a splash of progress and it turns out these folks are just bad at fractions.

Okay, high fives and an “Ole!” to the Mexican government for at least acknowledging there’s a problem. But, going forward, you might want to work on the underlying idea that women exist only as objects for the sexual gratification of men.

‘Cause you never know when you might be reincarnated….

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

The Friday Six? Man, I am … JACKED UP! ….

After the five month orgy of football leading up to the Super Bowl, I’m ready to lean back against the headboard and take a cigarette break. And I don’t even smoke.

Watching the last two rounds of the playoffs have made a couple things clear to me…

The first is that die-hard football fans are crazy. There is absolutely no excuse to attend a football game in conditions that normally serve as the backdrop for March of the Penguins. I don’t care if your kid is playing or if you’ve mortgaged your house and need the Packers to win by more than four points, Lambeau Field and a minus 24 degree chill factor are the reason sports bars were invented.

Secondly, Al Gore is a compete idiot. Okay, that’s not really fair … I knew that before the playoffs. But if you have a choice of watching a game and being warm and comfortable versus cold and hospitalized for frostbite, my guess is most people are going to opt for warm and comfortable.

If more people want to go to the game, then prices for scalped tickets will go up. If more people go to the game, they will also spend more on beer and overpriced souvenirs — which is just what we need to get this economy moving again.

I guess what I’m saying is, the first candidate whose platform includes more football and more global warming gets my vote. Try not to grovel, people.

You don’t have to grovel for the Friday Six. They’re right here — six blogs, videos or food and wine pairings that made us laugh over the past week.

But, no matter how much you beg, there’ll be no alliteration. That’s my campaign promise.

Have a great football free weekend ….

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

Just the tip … of the space tourism market …

Man, I knew I should have stuck with regular coffee and never gotten started on Starbucks drinks.

I took my socks off and did a quick calculation, and if I add up all the extra money I would have saved by not upgrading to a chai latte over the past eight years, I’d have a little over one percent of the money I’d need to go on the first tourist flight into space.

The Virgin Galactic spacecraft is already under construction and is scheduled to make the first commercial flight in June of 2009. That’s right, next year.

That clinches it. I’m not eating for the next 12 months.

If you thought the iPhone was cool, how awesome do you think it would be to be among the first “regular” people to go into space? But like the iPhone, you’re probably better off waiting until the technology improves and the price drops.

The going price of the two hour space ride is about $195,000 at current exchange rates — or about the same as United Air Lines charges for a New York-to-Los Angeles flight if you book less than 14 days in advance.

To be totally accurate, it’s not like you’re going to be orbiting Mars or something. The Virgin Galactic will be carried into the atmosphere on the first part of the journey by the mother ship. At 50,000 feet (the cruising height of the Concorde) the Virgin Galactic will fire its own rockets and proceed to an altitude of 68 miles above the Earth.

I’m not sure who calculated it or why they chose 68 miles as the cut-off but, apparently, at that height you are considered to be officially an astronaut.

I think it’s safe to say that this makes you an astronaut the same way appearing in a sex video makes Kim Kardashian an actress.

The whole space journey only lasts two hours, not including the three hours you’ll be taxiing on the runway at JFK and the hour and forty-five minutes you’ll be delayed waiting for the flight crew to arrive from Atlanta.

You will, however, get to experience four minutes of weightlessness which is a whole lot more than the three seconds you normally get when your commuter flight hits an air pocket in bad weather.

Among the people who are rumored to have already put a deposit down for the first flight are physicist Stephen Hawking, former Dallas actress Victoria Principal and designer Philippe Starck.

Look at that … you really will be flying among the stars. (zing!)

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

“He got all of that one…”

If you’re a New York Post headline writer, some days you just can’t wait to get to work.

What are the chances that the writers at The Post, with a video of Bill Clinton dozing off during a Martin Luther King ceremony, would miss the chance to caption the video, “Clinton Has A Dream?”

I’d say closer to “none” than “slim.”

Heavy petting….

As I mentioned in a previous post, I have allergies. One of the things I’m allergic to is cats.

My smart and sexy girlfriend is a lover of all animals and, being a single woman, of course owns a cat.

Perhaps you can see the beginnings of what your English professor might have termed “the seeds for dramatic conflict.”

According to experts, if you do nothing else, the one thing you should do to minimize the allergic effects of living with a cat is keep the animal off your bed.

The basic chain of events is this: The cat rolls around on the bed leaving dander and hair clinging to your blanket and pillow. You settle in for a good night’s sleep. After breathing in various bits of cat funk for six or seven hours, you awake to discover your sinuses had a party during the night featuring an open phlegm bar. You stumble to the bathroom with a splitting sinus headache and after 20 minutes of hacking and clearing your throat your girlfriend asks, “Hey, how many homeless guys are in there, anyway?”

One thing should be clear from all this: experts don’t have girlfriends.

Because, if they did, they would know your girlfriend lives with her cat long before she meets you and she loves, loves, loves, to cuddle with a purring cat in the morning. This, of course, encourages the cat to make a morning pilgrimage to the bed to get petted and held.

It’s really no surprise that after this kind of training, a cat will behave as it always has. If no one is awake when this creature of the devil decides to make a pre-dawn appearance in the bedroom, the hairy little beast will come up and lick your face or bat gently at your head with its paw.

I’ve been tasered for less.

So, there are a couple of issues here …

First off, there’s the jealousy. I am cute and cuddly and have only slightly less fur on my back than the cat but I don’t get held and stroked every morning.

Unless I do it to myself.

Secondly, there’s the whole issue of being involuntarily awakened at 5:30AM on a Monday morning. There are really only three reasons to be up at that hour on a Monday: you have a lousy job but it pays the bills, you’re going to play basketball at the gym before work or someone is breaking into your apartment.

In each of these instances, it is perfectly acceptable to roll over and go back to sleep. The Starbucks empire won’t grind to a halt if you’re 15 minutes late; the guys will play four-on-four with a sub if you miss a day; and a thief will eventually think he broke into a garage sale when he sees what kind of stuff you own.

The one time you can’t get back to sleep? When an insanely persistent cat is mewing and playing handball with your face.

All of which explains why I was wide awake at 5:45AM on a Monday and in a gloriously foul mood.

My mood was somewhat improved after I took an extra half-hour over coffee to read the paper and allowed myself the luxury of a long, hot shower instead of the usual commute-induced run-through-the-sprinkler speed bathing I normally practice during the week.

My girlfriend was downstairs doing a crossword puzzle as I grabbed my coat from the upstairs closet and prepared to leave for work. Passing by the second bedroom, I glanced in to see the cat sleeping contentedly on the chair in the warm morning sun.

I didn’t have even a momentary pang of conscience as I took three long strides across the room and poked the cat awake.

For good measure, I said, “Hey! Hey! Hey!” in the cat’s ear as I was doing it.

Karma’s a bitch, Kitty.

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

There can only be one Highlander. Shouldn’t that spark some kind of anti-trust lawsuit or something? ….

Oh, are there football playoffs going on or something?

We’re down to the Final Four in Project Blog and your favorite humor writer is still in the running for blogging immortality.

No, not Diesel or Dave Barry …. me!

Has all the excitement from being in the contest stopped me from compiling a list of all the funny stuff I’ve come across this week? It has not. I do and do and do for you. Is it too much to ask that you hang up your clothes once in awhile?

Gawd. Even in print and without a high-pitched nasal twang that sounds really whiny and naggy. It’s a wonder men and women ever get stay together.

But it’s Friday so we’re not here to dwell on the negative. And dwell … and dwell … and dwell ….

We’re here to enjoy the Friday Six. Six websites, videos or crossword puzzle clues that made us laugh this week. No pesky alliteration. Just the funny stuff.

So, would you mind bringing me another beer when you come back from the kitchen?

Thanks, babe.

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Why aren’t you dancing?
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Johnny Virgil over at 15 Minute Lunch explores why most schools are cutting back on funding for the arts.
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Overheard In New York is like your own private teleporter to the Big Apple. This week’s favorite:
Conductor: Ladies and gentlemen, our train cannot proceed because of the passenger on the tracks.
Young black dude: If he is on the tracks, he is not a passenger.
Let’s go!
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It’s been a while since I visited Dan Cronin’s site. It won’t happen again…
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Double Viking runs down the 10 Greatest Advancements in Fast Food. Getting punk’d at Burger King by being told they don’t make Whoppers anymore isn’t one of them.
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What Sucks is a blog about pretty much what you’d expect a blog named What Sucks to be about…
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Just so you don’t get the wrong idea, I’m in a great relationship with an amazing woman who is intelligent, captivating and, for some crazy reason, digs me.

For the record, she is a pleasure to be with and is not at all whiny and naggy.

Yet.

Have a great weekend, all!

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

Who will be America’s Next Teen Disaster?…

The following is an open letter to America’s Next Teen Starlet.

In any event, I’ve got a few things to say….

Dear Next Teen Starlet,

I hope you have a long and productive career.

More importantly, I hope you have a long and productive life.

For your own sake, you might want to take a little bit of a longer historical perspective when it comes to picking someone you decide to model your behavior after.

Because I think we can all agree most of your current role models suck.

The fact that you are right now wondering whether I meant “suck” in a lousy, uninspiring sense or “suck” in a sexual sense pretty much tells you all you need to know about the impact of the Britney Spears-Paris Hilton-Kim Kardashian Axis of Skeezville on what it means to be young, beautiful and famous in this day and age.

It’s your life, but since it’s my blog … here are a few observations from a trained cultural observer. And by trained, I mean I have Page Six and Gawker bookmarked in my web browser. So there.

Let’s go over a few basic points:

I know it’s hard to be the focus of so much attention, Young Starlet. All I’m suggesting is that you take a moment to consider what you really want and how you’re going to go about getting it.

I hate to break it to you, but you can’t snort, borrow or shoplift the thing you crave the most: Respect.

The respect you so desperately want, is the difference between the notorious and the famous, between those with character and those who are considered characters, those who have ephemeral popularity and those who are the object of enduring admiration.

You can’t buy it or demand it. You can only earn it.

It’s a worthwhile goal. I wish you the best of luck.

Best regards,
Mark Jabo

PS - Don’t take your critics too seriously. If most of them had the money and fame you have at age 16, they would have partied themselves to death before their 17th birthday.
Be yourself. You’ll do fine.

“Make me blog for it…”

This week two of our favorite sites are intertwined in a heaving, throbbing link-fest of liquid passion. Both driven by a primal need to bring joy to their readers, they join in a white-hot frenzy of blogging ardor — surging and thrusting until they climax in a orgy of sports, humor and reality TV.

Man, I gotta lay off the romance novels before nap time…

You see, it’s time again to announce the Project Blog Week Eight prize for contestants and readers! In the dark about what Project Blog is all about? Basically, it is a competition for bloggers, where readers get to have a say in the winner. You can read more here. Last week we gave away a subscription to ESPN Magazine, courtesy of Allison at BCS Frenzy. This week, we have a new incredible sponsor puttin’ up the goods.

Week Eight’s Sponsor: The Humor-Blogs Network

Week Eight’s Prizes:

• Crummy Church Signs: Volume One by Joel Bezaire of Crummy Church Signs
  • From the only website currently in the Top 10 of both a Humor Blog ranking and a Religion Blog ranking comes Crummy Church Signs Volume 1 (2004-2007). See what happens when a snarky Christian gets fed up with bad grammar and spelling, poor theology, inane attempts at humor, and outdated pop culture references. With submissions from 36 states and 10 different countries, see why this hilarious blog has become an internet hit with this “best of” collection.

• Antisocial Commentary: From the Secret Files of the Mattress Police by Rob (Diesel) Kroese of The Mattress Police
  • This book is a hilarious excursion through the mind of Rob Kroese, aka “Diesel,” the twisted mastermind behind the humor website MattressPolice.com. From topics as varied as James Blunt and The Incredible Hulk to global politics and perpetual motion machines, Antisocial Commentary is a tour de force of satire, sarcasm and just plain silliness.

  -

  
  She was a beautiful debutante; he owned a Foot Locker franchise. Their torrid love affair would scandalize a nation…

The reader who wins this week will have their choice of book, and the blogger who wins this week will get the other one - prizes for all, yippee!

How can you enter? Simple - just leave a comment here telling Allison (and the rest of the free world) which book you would pick if you win the prize! That’s it! If you want to learn a bit more about the books, head over to the Humor-Blogs Store, where you can purchase both books, and more!

And if all you want are free laughs, visit Humor-Blogs.com where Diesel has compiled over 100 of the top humor sites on the web — all to bring a few laughs to your taut, well-toned chest or your heaving bosom…

Now, if we can just form a blogger’s union and get these wages up….

I promised myself I wouldn’t go all Sally Field on everyone if I happened to win a segment of Project Blog.

I’m going to try to abide by that promise.

But it’s not going to be easy because it really is an honor and, honestly … I’m pretty excited about it.

Mostly, it feels good because I am a fan of all the other bloggers in the contest. These are people who I read on a regular basis and who, in the short time I’ve known all of them, have provided me with advice, insight, food for thought and a whole bunch of laughs and good times.

Somehow, I think I got the best end of that deal.

So, rather than toot my own horn, I’m just going stand here and quietly enjoy this.

I’m also going to thank everyone involved in the contest — especially Allison Boyer over at BCS Frenzy.

Allison put this contest together and has been herding cats from the beginning. The rest of us have gotten to do all the fun stuff while Allison works her, um … fingers off with all the behind the scenes details.

Make sure to check out all the bloggers and judges. All the people involved in Project Blog are very good writers and each of them has their own unique voice. I guarantee you’ll enjoy every one of them.

Judges:
Allison at BCS Frenzy.
April at Life As a Christian Woman
Beth doesn’t have a blog but she won the Reality on Bravo “Create Your Own Reality Contest,” so you’ll just have to chat with her at Starbucks. (You may want to explain how you know her so you don’t get pepper-sprayed…)

Bloggers extraordinaire:
Kate at Babylune
Jodie at Gossip on Sports
Winnie at Watching the View
Sally at Style Fix
Cynthia at TV of the Absurd
Randi, Brad Pitt Watch
Kara at Colorado Review

I’d also like to thank all of you who read this blog on a regular or irregular basis. I’d like to thank my mom, my high school English teacher, the drive-through lady at Dunkin’ Donuts, all the comics I work with, anyone I’ve ever slept with …

*orchestra music starts playing…..*

Thanks!

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

It’s Poe-etry in motion….

This week’s cool/creepy science breakthrough comes courtesy of researchers at the University of Minnesota.

They’ve been able to grow a live, beating heart in a jar.

On the downside, the position of night janitor has been vacant for the last six months…

Can you imagine being all alone with a bucket and mop at two-thirty in the morning and all of a sudden a heart in a jar starts beating? Minimum wage and a second-rate HMO don’t even come close to covering the kind of nightmares that experience would cause.

I’d turn in my resignation as soon as I stopped screaming hysterically.

All I’m saying is, I’d quit in a heartbeat. (zing!)

And if you think the idea of a heart beating by itself in a jar is creepy, just wait until you hear how they accomplished it.

First, the researchers took a rat’s heart and put it in a beaker. If your gag reflex hasn’t distracted you, you’ll notice this means they first had to have a rat. Not a cute little white mouse, but a garbage-eating, Plague-carrying, nuclear-attack-surviving big, gray, surly member of the vermin family.

Next, they had to find Patrick Swayze because only Dalton can rip the heart out of an animal while it is still breathing. Swayze didn’t want to do it at first. He didn’t want to be type cast, but when the rat burned down Red Webster’s store and threatened the woman he loved, he really had no choice.

“I want you to be nice..until it’s time not to be nice….”

Okay, so now we have the rat heart in a beaker.

The researchers then “used detergents to strip the rat heart of its own cells, leaving behind a white, three-dimensional scaffolding of connective tissue.”

This genetic engineering breakthrough brought to you by new and improved Tide. Now with rat cell stripping action!

For the next step, the researchers infused the scaffolding with cardiac cells from newborn rats. This procedure sounds a lot like one of those construction jobs where they put that foam insulation stuff into a building.

Just like on a real construction project, there were two researchers working, five others whistling at girls and sixteen who were on the Teamster’s payroll but weren’t actually on site.

The end result, however, is being termed a major step toward growing organs to be used in human transplants.

It won’t be long before you’ll be able to drive through Minnesota and see field after field of kidneys, livers and hearts. You’ll even be able to stop at a roadside stand with a painted wooden sign that says: Fresh Pancreas - Just Picked!

It’s staggering to think of all the good that could come from this kind of scientific advance. Oh, sure, we’ll be able to save some lives but, more importantly, you’ll be able to scare the bejeezus out of bratty little kids at Halloween.

It’s not all good news, though …

Getting tickets for the Telltale Heart tour at the Edgar Allen Poe mansion just got a whole lot tougher.

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

The number to beat….

After an extended holiday respite, we’re back with The Friday Six.

Six websites, videos or other nonsense that made us laugh over the past week. The Friday Six is never alliterative and is filled with 20% more giggly chuckle-y goodness than a Fabulous Friday Five.

It’s good to be back … to-back-to-back-to-back-to-you-get-the-idea…..

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If you don’t click on any other website this weekend, make sure you make it over to Mattress Police for Diesel’s weekly caption contest. It’s gonna be like combining a food fight with a UFC pay-per-view.

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In keeping with the political theme, Julius Sharpe over at News As Gossip has his usual hilarious take on the recent New Hampshire primary and other world events.

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I tried picking out my favorite Tyler Durden story this week and I couldn’t do it, so I just linked to the entire website instead. Britney, Ashlee Simpson, and Michelle Rodriguez all made this week’s WWTDD Hollywood gossip fight club even more fun than usual.

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I’m not sure how to describe the Cult of Qelqoth. It’s kind of like that one porn video on your hard drive that’s just a little bit freakier than all the rest … the one even your best friend would watch and say, “Dude. WTF!?” I guess I’ll go with Q’s own tagline, “Alternative News for Alternative People.”

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I thought I would get tired of all the political coverage between now and the Presidential election. I was wrong. Guys like Sinister Dan over at the Reasonable Ego continue to make the whole process even more fun and goofy than our Founding Fathers ever expected.

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Kathleen Madigan. In Other Words … funny.
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Friend and fellow comic/producer Will McKinley has a blog entitled Previously Owned. The blog title is from a brilliant line from his comedy routine about being adopted.

If you like good writing sprinkled with a generous dose of humanity, humor and insight — Will is a good bet to become a regular read for you.

Have a great weekend, folks.

Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

“Darkside’s comin’ now…”

This week’s Project Blog challenge is to get up close and personal.

Don’t worry. I’m just as uncomfortable with that as you are. Probably more so. But metaphorically walk with me for a bit and let’s see what we can come up with, shall we? ….

Who are we? How do we become the person we are?

We our defined by our family.

As a kid growing up, my family moved a lot. Before I graduated from high school I lived in Philadelphia, New York, St. Louis, Cleveland, Baltimore and Buffalo. To this day, the longest I’ve ever lived in a single house or apartment was the four years I spent working in Tokyo, Japan.

The most common question I get when I mention our family’s travels is, “Was your father in the military?”

I was in high school before I realized this wasn’t most people’s idea of a summer home…

He wasn’t. My father began his professional career working in the marketing division of a soda company. He was very good at what he did and had the results to prove it. He was also cocky, impatient and had zero tolerance for company politics.

It made for an idyllic childhood. My father would come home and regale us with stories of his latest successes. He would go on to tell us how his boss was a complete and utter moron and how he had been able to convey this fact to his boss in their meeting earlier that afternoon.

It got to the point where, as kids, we didn’t even wait for instructions. We’d just start packing.

I’ve been told on more than one occasion that I have a rather large problem with authority. That’s a pretty fair assessment but it doesn’t really shed an light on whether that’s the result of genetics or environment.

~
We are defined by our experience.

If I had to pick the three areas of interest/careers I’ve had that have defined me as an adult, I would say they would be basketball, Wall Street and stand-up comedy.

They are not as different as they may appear on the surface. All three arenas require a certain focus and intensity and, while they are all highly individualistic, there are team goals that do come into play.

Another characteristic these spheres share is that you make close, personal friendships in all three. The friendships are unique, born of a desire to connect with people you enjoy, respect and who you can count on to perform in a highly charged situation.

Game of life

I think the shared intensity and fear in all of these walks of life contribute to friendships that get experienced deeper and faster than relationships formed under different, more casual circumstances.

This makes it all the more surprising that many of the friendships forged don’t last. I have guys I’ve spent more hours with than most girlfriends — guys I’ve have shared insights, thrills and insane amounts of beer with … and I haven’t spoken to them in years.

My Psychology Dr. Girlfriend thinks there are Y-chromosome factors at work here, too. Guys don’t bond, they hang out. And, like we sometimes do with sex and love, we confuse the two.

We want to be nurtured … it’s just not in our nature.

“What I want is songs that echo. The stuff we’re doing now is like somebody’s bedsheets; spread ‘em out, soil ‘em, ship ‘em out to laundry, you know? But our songs…I want us to be able to fold ourselves up in them forever…understand? That’s the most you’ll ever get out of me Wordman. Ever.”
-from Eddie and The Cruisers

~
We are defined by our dreams.

Most of my dreams these days center around my son. He’s growing up waaay too fast.

I don’t know if I’m weird or not (who am I kidding — I know I’m weird) but I don’t dream specific things for my son.

Stuff dreams are made of….

I have no burning desire for him to follow a particular path. I don’t care if he’s a basketball player or an opera singer. I don’t care if he’s a doctor or a bus driver. I can honestly say, I don’t even care if he’s straight or gay.

My dream is for him to be strong, centered and an independent thinker. I also want him to be happy and loved.

I think he’s got a pretty good start. His mom is an amazing person and a fierce advocate for him. His step-dad is pretty cool and, as far as I can tell, loves him a whole lot.

In my worst moments, I drive myself crazy wondering how things might have been different if I’d been whatever it was I wasn’t enough of to keep us together as a family. If I spend too much time thinking about it, I go insane regretting the thousands of missed moments because I’m not there when he gets ready for school or when he sits down to eat dinner.

To keep myself from going totally out of my mind, I try to concentrate on dreaming good dreams and working to make them come true.

~

We are defined by our family. We are defined by our experience. We are defined by our dreams.

And, with a little luck, we get to be happy and loved.

It really doesn’t seem like too much to ask, does it?

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Project Blog is an ongoing competition for bloggers, which began at RealityonBravo.com and is ending at BCS Frenzy. Every week, blogtestants from all over the blog-o-sphere compete in blogging challenges. The top blogger of the week wins a special prize, and the blogger with the lowest score is eliminated. There are prizes for readers too! To read more about Project Blog, check out this post.

The overall Project Blog winner gets a prize pack of awesome schtuff, which includes:

• An autographed picture of Jackie Warner, courtesy of Sky Sport and Spa
• A pair of shoes from the newest line from Jonathan Kayne
• A Soffe college hoodie, courtesy of me, BCS Frenzy!
• Gold-plated earrings from Aurora at Between My Sheets
• A pet portrait, courtesy of Intricate Art
• A set of bud vases from Top Design’s Jonathan Adler

Like I said, every week there will also be a prize for readers. This week, I’m throwing in the prize myself, since we’re making the move from Reality on Bravo to BCS Frenzy! You can enter to win a FREE one-year subscription to ESPN Magazine. There are two steps to win: First, leave a comment here telling me why you want to win - and second, using the same name, leave a comment on ANY OTHER post on this site! That’s all you have to do and you’re entered!

Note: the winner of this week’s Project Blog competition will receive a magazine subscription of their choice.

Here’s this week’s competition challenge, keeping in mind that we’re in the middle of a two-week challenge about using photographs:

Last week, you were asked to simply use photographs in your post. This week, dig deeper. Expert bloggers can reported time and time again that you MUST connect with your readers in order to raise your stats. Return readers and subscribers trump SEO any day! And to do that…we need that personalized touch.

So, yes, that’s right - I want to see some personalized pictures. I’m not saying that it has to be a picture of you - but we want to feel like we can enter your world as readers, so find a way to do that!

Of course, keep in mind that you can write about whatever you want. Make it work with your blog topic!

You have until 8 AM on Friday to post, but remember - your link will be posted here for voting as soon as you post your entry, so for maximum voting, get your entries in soon!

Bloggers, start your engines! Check back later for a complete list of posts from our blogtestants, and don’t forget to vote on your favorite! Oh, and if anyone else out there wants to play along, send me the link to your post and I’ll include it on the list - you won’t be eligible for the grand prize, but you will get a little link love.

Good luck, bloggers!