I realized I had a crappy first name when I was five.
Our family was moving from Chicago to Peoria. One day, close to moving time, sitting shotgun, my mother was running errands. At a stoplight she turned and said, “We’re moving somewhere where nobody knows you. If you’d like to change your first name, now is the time.” I had always gone by D.J. (and still do today), but the message I received in that moment was clear.
I’m a blog conference junkie.
This year I’m attending New Media Expo (NMX), BlogHer, Type A Parent (mind you, I’m not a parent), and the AimingLow Non-Con. I’m also currently on the waiting list for the Erma Bombeck Humor Writer’s Conference. If I could take more time off work I probably would attend Social Media Marketing World. Okay, enough of this nerdy list. You don’t care.
Currently sitting in an airport getting ready to board a flight to Las Vegas. I don’t even like Las Vegas. Well, not really. It’s a little too crazy for me and I’m kind of vanilla. I don’t frequent strip clubs, I’m booze-free, and I haven’t the stomach for true gambling. I’ll play a few hands of blackjack, but will stop after losing $100. And I’ll be super-pissed about even that.
I wasn’t originally going to attend NMX this year. It would have been be my third year in a row and I thought a break was in order. Then, a month ago they did some brilliant marketing.
I received an email telling me that my podcast had been nominated for an award. They host a podcast awards ceremony and some big podcasters show up. I haven’t looked into it, but I suspect I’m nominated in the humor category. I’m not sure how the nominations work, so if one of you did it, thanks. I won’t win, but hey, bragging rights. My dog and cat will be so impressed!
As soon as I read through the nomination my ego inflated and I decided right then and there that I was going to the conference. Oh, back to their brilliance. What pushed me over the edge was that they provided a coupon for half-off admission because of the nomination. I have a lot of frequent flyer miles and the suites at the Rio are only like $40 a night. All in all, it’s not an expensive trip.
Well, I do splurge at least once per Vegas trip and do one of those $60 buffets. Sure, the food’s always disappointing, but I feel like a big shot. Last year I did the Cosmopolitan’s buffet – I felt wealthy and cool! (I’m neither)
I’m flying in a day early so I can have some fun. I don’t have anything planned, but obviously there’s plenty to do. I’d like to take in a show if I can find something interesting.
Here’s an ego-deflater. I sent out a tweet a few weeks back asking followers if they wanted to do a reader meet-up. I’ve done this before in a other cities and it’s been a good time. I figured since I have around 100k followers I’d get a decent-sized number of interested peeps.
I received exactly three responses.
Now, I’m thrilled that anyone wants to hang out with me. Three people is better than none! However, I know from organizing events like this that most people won’t end up coming. I’m looking at a realistic number of one person coming to have a drink with me. And, while that would make for a great blog post, I feel like that interaction is too personal and intimate. It’s just weird.
So, for all intents and purposes I’ll be alone during my free time in Las Vegas. I’m not saddened by this reality. I’ve learned one thing when traveling by myself – with social media you’re never really alone.
If I want responses from strangers I’ll tweet out a joke. If I’d prefer my friends to remind me that I’m loved, posting a Facebook status will generate a few likes.
So, I’ll probably be a bit needier (not sure if that’s a word) than normal over the next few days. I’ll lean on you and appreciate each reply.
Thanks in advance for your validation.
Now, I’m off to craft a joke about how I believe that foreigner pee smells worse that American pee in airport bathrooms. It really does.
I ran into the kitchen pushing her out of the way and squared up to the cutting board. I opened my eyes up as wide as they would go and lowered my face to a mere inch away from the freshly chopped onions.
I haven’t personally cooked with onions for quite some time. For most of my adult life I worn contacts which nulled one of the greatest body-food magic tricks. The crying thing with onions. When you have contacts, the contact acts as a barrier and you don’t bawl. I, having had the eye-laser sugery thing can cry now on (onion) command.
Because I’m a man and my emotional range resembles that of a toilet seat, I jumped at the chance to fake-cry. I can’t remember the last time I real-cried, and it’s kind of fun to do artificially.
I stayed in front of the onions for two solid minutes allowing the gas to penetrate through my eyeball into whatever mechanism activates the tear ducts. Sadly, these must have been lame onions because nothing happened. No crying.
That got me thinking of other food-body magic tricks you can enjoy, and I made a list.
Mothers are supposed to have at least one expression designed to send you into a frenzy of anger and frustration. It’s their job.
Mine is the moment my mom walks through the door of my condo. Without exception, she mentions that she can smell cat pee all throughout the house.
To be fair to her there was a time where my place smelled like urine. First of all I’m a guy. I’m not cleaning the litter box twice a day like some of your fanatics. Second, I’ve well-documented here my struggles with my cat peeing outside her designated area. I probably wrote twenty pieces on it last year alone. The bottom line is that she’s on Prozac and doesn’t do it anymore, thank God. Not my mom. The cat.
The place used to smell pretty bad because the cat would spray all over this enclosure I had for my cat box and I had no idea she was doing it. Once I removed that piece of furniture, the odor disappeared.
Well, the cat still does go outside the box once in awhile. She pees on the rubber mat in front of the box. But I clean that up as soon as I find it.
My mom is on the “your place always smells” trip. She hasn’t changed that tune in two years. And it drives me nuts.
I guess the biggest problem is on my end. I expect her not to do this each time she comes over. I’m violating that Buddhist principle of “What is, is.” What is, is that my mom is going to say the place smells bad. And my insanity is that I keep wanting her to change.
She made this comment when she came in last night (I had two air fresheners going), and again once this morning, blaming the smell on her inability to sleep last night. I became offended and the reason is that I thought she was lying. Not out and out lying, but exaggerating.
Growing up I was blamed for a lot of the family’s problems. That was my role – the scapegoat. And whenever anything touches around that “it’s your fault” thing, I go nuts.
So, I asked my father who was also here if he noticed any smell. He said he didn’t.
I asked my mom to pinpoint the location of the smell so I could find and eliminate it. She just said the whole place smelled. I brought my dad into the bedroom where they slept and we both couldn’t smell anything.
It’s hard to correct something you can’t locate, of course.
My mother accused my father of lying to protect my feelings. Now I was really confused. Did it smell in there or not? Was someone exaggerating or lying? It was a mess.
I’m not so sensitive I can’t handle the truth. If it smells like cat pee, tell me where and I’ll fix it.
So, we’re all basically yelling at each other at 7:30am. It was brutal.
Here’s what I know. I can’t control my mother’s nose. If she’s exaggerating about the smell (and I don’t think she’s doing it on purpose), that’s her deal. Only she knows. If she’s being honest then I have a horrible sense of smell.
Either way she’s going to say it smells like cat pee, as she does every time. And that’s going to trigger the “It’s all my fault” pattern in me. And I’m going to go nuts and explode.
So, how do I avoid this?
Well, first is to make sure the place actually doesn’t smell like cat pee. After this ordeal I ordered a three pack of professional cleaners to come over. After three cleaning sessions it should be roses in here. As a dude this is a solid investment.
Second is to learn to release control of someone else’s hangups. I’m a big control freak and need things to happen exactly the way I want them too. Not a good strategy in life. I’m working on it.
Also, I need to remember that aside from their best intentions moms are just built to annoy their kids. It’s the way of the bushido.
I am picking on my mom a bit. My oSex co-host, Karen sent me a message today saying I have the greatest parents in the world. We all went to a Cubs game last night. She’s right. I’m very lucky. 99.9% of the time we get along perfectly and they’re generous, supportive, and loving.
She’s coming back this Thursday to spend the night again. I will hear more about the smell. I will not go nuts. I will not go nuts. I will not go nuts.
But, since I’ll definitely go nuts, I’ll try to record the audio so you can see just how batty I get. Will make for a great post.
As many of you know I don’t drink, smoke, or use drugs.
About three years ago I even gave up caffeine. While never a coffee or soda drinker (we grew up saying “soft drinks” because “soda” was too low-class), I got hooked on energy drinks. I was engaged at the time and my fiance thought it was cute that I had this one vice. Harmless, right?
Well, not really. Back then, I responded pretty hard to caffeine. It would get me high. Now, not as bad as a crank abuser shooting ice between their toes. I wouldn’t hear colors or watch the wall breathe but I did get a wicked endorphin rush.
I also turned into a bit of a jerk.
Caffeine had two additional side effects – it removed all empathy I had for human beings and decreased the tiny bit of patience I possessed. This is a deadly combination of jackass.
I would turn into a chatterbox and endlessly wax philosophic until my poor woman wanted to hang herself. She wasn’t as talkative and just wanted me to shut the fuck up. Since I had ginseng, B vitamins, and 1000mg of caffeine coursing through my pancreas, all I could do was express every thought as it arose. And it also gave me the false sense of brilliance. My girlfriend would grow tired of me and I would get furious that she didn’t want to stay up until midnight discussing whether we truly have free will about our feelings.
We would get into horrific fights and she’d blame it on the caffeine. She was right to do so.
So, I quit. I’ve lived off of Fresca and water for years now. No caffeine. Just me and sobriety. Peaceful.
Then, a few days back one of the Jewish fellows in the office brought in a two-liter of kosher Coke. It’s a different formula in that it contains real sugar as opposed to artificial sweeteners. In a moment of weakness I poured a cup. Ten minutes later the rush hit me. I was back, baby! Like a junkie I needed more.
I managed to hold off until this weekend and for fun decided to take a caffeine vacation. Whereas most people would take a break from caffeine I decided to hit it full throttle over the Easter break. Enjoy myself.
Something has changed in how it affects me, however. I don’t know if it’s the four years of therapy or if my body has changed or whether I’ve been healed by Shiva, but my body reacts totally differently to caffeine. Yes, I still get the endorphin rush and sense of well-being. But now, I can laser focus like you would not believe on work tasks. I had my most productive day this year today. I’m sort of a creative spaz – great at ideas, terrible at organization and details. Today I was all about prioritization. I managed to organize the next month of tasks and I only stopped to eat some ham and turkey. Gotta protein up, you know.
I did notice one downside – my creativity decreased to almost nil. Normally I come up with good jokes, tweets, and ribald boners throughout the day. Not today!
But, I wasn’t a jerk! Well, actually, this guy on the bus kept insisting that I was a celebrity and that he’d seen me on television. After a minute of not convincing him I just put my earbuds back in while he was in mid-sentence. Inside I was proud, however, to be mistaken for somebody famous. Ha.
Oh, and caffeine makes you pee a lot. Sort of forgot about that. Damn diuretic!
In fact, right now I’m stoned to the gills on energy drinks. I got a mighty buzz and the ability to see every pixel as I type. But no good jokes. It’s a creative killer.
Also, I’m afraid of getting addicted to this feeling. I don’t want to be a daily caffeine person. The withdrawals are brutal. Also, that means I will suck at work if Walgreens runs out of RockStar Zero Carb Blueberry Extra Intense Power Surge Nectar Explosion Juice.
So, my caffeine vacation will be coming to an end shortly. I need my creativity and I’ll just fight against my inability to concentrate. Or maybe I’ll have my doctor hook me up with some ADD meds. You get the same buzz, I hear. Then it’s not an addiction. It’s a prescription!
photo credit: International Man of Conundrums via photopin cc
Turns out my mom was wrong.
Sure, there are moments when my condo resembles a dishelved hobo riding the rails, but mostly it’s close to tidy. Note I said “tidy” and not “clean.” I never dust and rarely sweep. If I’m having someone over I run the Swiffer. It’s not really supposed to double as a vacuum, but, hey, close enough.
My mom has thoroughly shamed me over the years since the divorce by saying, “If you bring a woman back to this mess she will run screaming.” And, to be fair, she’s got a point. Nobody wants to date a slob. Well, I guess other slobs are cool with it. Let’s put it this way – I don’t want to date a slob.
I’ve become masterful as keeping the place tidy. At first glance it will appear as if I steer a pretty tight ship (I don’t think that’s the correct expression, matey). Upon further examination you will discover that the baseboards in the kitchen are splattered with marinara sauce, there is tiny chihuahua hair all over the pillows, and the underside of the top toilet seat in the master bath has a small pee stain.
I should write a whole essay on how a physicist would have a hard time explaining this phenomena. Pee should not be there. I can’t explain it. But it is.
My mom however sees through this charade and simply walks in and goes, “I can smell the cat box! Gross!”
I finally broke down and ordered a housekeeping package. I vowed this time to only use a reputable service as the last person I hired via Craigslist stole a bunch of my shit. I found a Groupon for half-off and placed the order. They called me a day later to schedule and upsold me on the deep clean package. It was like $100 more but, hey, I’m pretty sure mold is not supposed to be growing on the ice cubes in the freezer. I needed the full monty.
The woman who came to the apartment lumbered up the stairs with her supplies. She was in her early forties and overweight. I always feel bad when delivery people come visit and have to hike up four flights. It’s hard enough when I do it every day. She had to take a few rests and now that I think about it, I probably should have offered to carry up the mop. It didn’t occur to me.
She was very sweet and got to work. Since I had the bad experience with the thief I decided to stick around. Now, I only have 1250 square feet. It’s not like I was just going to hang out in the west study while she dusted up the portiere. So I took a nap, read, and watched some television.
Cut to five hours later – she was STILL cleaning. I hadn’t had a woman stick around that long in my condo since my sister who came to spend the night on a business trip last April.
After each room the cleaning lady would come up to me and say, “Mr. Paris, can you come check my work?” Now, I never check even my own work, much less somebody else’s. But she insisted. And each time I would give it a two-second glance and say, “Looks perfect.”
Then, without exception she would get excited and say the exact same thing.
“That’s cool beans!”
I haven’t heard that expression since I was a lame white kid in central Illinois saying that during my junior year of high school. Bowling on a Friday night since I didn’t have a date? That’s cool beans!
Each time she said those words I would LIL – laugh in loud. I should have recorded it. She did such a good job I’m going to have her back in a month or so and we’ll get that voice on tape. She didn’t just say it, she exuded those beans. First, it was funny that she was so excited to get my approval. I always feel a little shame that I should be cleaning the place myself. Then, those words. Cool beans. It’s just a perfect expression of joy that nobody says anymore.
The weird thing about that phrase is that if you actually ate cool beans, you’d be disappointed. Hot beans trump cold beans.
Oh, to get back to the beginning on why my mom was wrong. Since I’ve started dating a number of women have made their way into the condo. For dessert or a drink or to meet the dog. So, I’ve had to keep it tidy. It’s not clean. Well, now it is. But it never really was before. And nobody has run screaming.
Doritos are the Skittles of the chip world. The first twenty six are delicious. The twenty seventh one will make you keel over. Hard. And when I grew up there were only two kinds, the Nacho Cheesier and the Cool Ranch. Two was enough. Sometimes you wanted tang (insert bad joke here) and sometimes you wanted cheese. They were equally good and equally destroyed your breath. Also, you can’t read eating these chips. You will destroy that leatherbound version of Moby Dick that, like me, you have on your bookshelf to impress people. So who cares I don’t know who Queequeg is? You don’t either.
Let’s face it – penguins are the best and only reason to go to the aquarium or zoo. To watch them waddle, run, dive in the water and show their bellies is awesome. Plus, they sleep standing up and their necks go into their bodies. It’s fantastic. However, and this is gross, the best is when a penguin bends over facing the glass where you’re standing, and shoots a stream of white waste right at you. I’ve seen it several times and you instinctively jump. They must get a good laugh on that one.
Chicago privatized their parking meters a few years ago and the prices have risen dramatically. I was in the Gold Coast this morning getting my hair cut and I paid $6 to park on the street for sixty minutes. It’s expensive. Here’s an idea to make the whole thing more enjoyable. This is dumb but I think it would work. There should be a little simple slot machine where each time you park, you push a button and it runs. If you win you get $20 credit back to your card. Like one in a thousand wins or something reasonable. At least then you’d feel a little hopeful each time you’re shelling out $25 for two hours of parking in the city.
Okay, first those aren’t trolls, they’re dust mites. You need a decent carpet shampoo and a Dyson. But, I always said there are trolls who steal in the middle of the night. Cigarettes, beers, guitar picks, barrettes, and twenty dollar bills are all lifted while you snooze. The only chance to keep these thieves at bay is to pee around your bed in a circle. The trolls respect this boundary and will leave to find habitation at another home. Tonight you must pee on the floor around the bed. Please do this now. ProTip – not a great idea to eat asparagus beforehand.
I went on a bath bonanza for the past week.
I realized I hadn’t taken a bath in a while, and I think I was sad about something. So I took a bath. I rocked it out pretty hard in there (meaning I laid down and sat motionless for twenty minutes) and so I repeated the next day, and the day after that. I probably got four in five days.
Then I left for the blog convention in Las Vegas.
To explain what I think happened next is to talk briefly about something that transpired unfortunately when I was twenty. I was working out with a trainer very intensely and I tore my urethra. Leave your jokes at the door, because I know where you just went. It turns out you’re supposed to breathe out when you exert force, not in. So I was doing the bench press and breathing in when I should have been breathing out. I’ll save the details for another dedicated post to this story, but suffice it to say, the pressure localized in my John Thomas (best expression for it ever) and somehow it tore.
Now, let’s continue the story.
I’ve always been super sensitive to pressure when flying. My ears used to burn like crazy when I was a child and it can still get to me even now. I take a decongestant (actually a whole bunch of ’em) before a flight just to loosen up the old sinuses. I’ve never had an allergy, broken bone or major health issue, but I do get pain in my sinuses if I don’t take the meds.
Well, this time I forgot to bring the pills with me.
I noticed a little pressure in my sinuses on takeoff. No big deal as it didn’t hurt but I was worried about landing. Landing is always the worst for us ear-burners. And then for some reason I needed to pee three different times in the three hour flight. I reviewed my morning intake of food and drink. I had cereal and an egg McMuffin. A small water. That was all. I don’t normally urinate five times (I did two before flying) before 1pm. I just sort of found it interesting.
As we landed the pressure was a little rough, but not painful.
Later that evening I noticed I had been peeing all day long and that, please forgive me here, there started to be a little tiny bit of discomfort the moment I started going. Only like a .5 on the pain scale of ten, kind of like a little pinch. And only lasted for a second, at the beginning. Now, this has never happened before. I didn’t think too much about it and settled in for a bath. In a hotel bath that may or may not have been scrubbed prior to me sliding in.
All throughout the conference I noticed I had to go more often than usual. I was also slamming tons of water, though, as it was available in every discussion room. Each time I noticed that slight pinch and I finally realized something was up.
Not sure whether it was the many baths on consecutive days or the air pressure, but I think I may have a UTI.
I didn’t even know dudes could get those. It’s either that or I tore my John Thomas again. Either way, something is up. Well, not up. Kind of down and broken.
When I flew in today I started thinking that I should go to the doctor but I’m too busy until next week. Then I remembered that chicks do tons of cranberries when it happens to them. I should have Google’d it because I was wrong on two counts. First, cranberries are only for preventing UTIs, and second research has come out that suggest it does nothing to prevent the infection.
I ran to the grocery after work and picked up a bottle of the pills. Also a POM juice with cranberries in it.
I will definitely get myself to the doctor if it doesn’t heal because, well, hey, it’s the John Thomas. Plus, after this cranberry thing, I’m all out of ideas. Hopefully it’s not something un-awesome like a kidney stone. Although that would give me some decent blog material.
So, I either tore my d or gave myself a UTI. Or maybe I’ve got the gout. Who knows? Either way, here’s what my next few days are going to look like, even though there’s no evidence to suggest it will help.
I have promised never to mention cat pee problems again, but I just have to this once. It’s funny.
This post will not be about cat pee, by the way.
One of the challenges with administering Prozac to my cat is how to get it in her body. There’s really only a few options. The first is to shotgun it in her mouth with a plastic syringe. This is most effective, yet most dangerous. There are all sorts of videos on how to fire a pill down a cat’s throat, and it’s usually a two person job. You can do the liquid Prozac this way, too. What happened with my cat is that within a week she started hiding from me. The only other option is transdermal gel. You rub it into the inside of her ears. There’s a lot of debate about the efficacy of this technique since the drug molecules may or may not enter the cat’s membranes due to size.
But, here’s what I do know – her pupils get crazy big after about half an hour. That’s a stoned cat. It works.
I texted my veterinarian ex-wife about the big pupils and she said, “You’ve got a high kitty!”
And high kitty doesn’t pee outside her box. Huzzah for the good people at Eli Lilly.
Okay, moving on from that. Thanks for bearing witness to my indulgence.
Spending so much energy on my cat was important to me because she most likely has a stress that is causing her to pee. But, since I’m a human, I don’t know what it is. As her owner (yes, humans own animals – it’s okay) it’s my responsibility to do everything I can to help her. And, for now, this solution works. I’ve tried about a dozen other strategies.
I hope this means I’m going to be a good parent. I also think, however, that we all need someone who is looking out for us and will do things to make us feel good. I know that my biggest challenge in life is shame. That I’m never quite doing enough. Since I’m not yet totally self-sufficient to soothe and honor my accomplishments, I enlist surrogates. I have friends that call me up to tell me that I’m doing okay. I also use family, support groups, etc.
I’m embarrassed to say that when I metaphorically look in the mirror I see the fat – I suspect many of us do. But we need people that don’t even know to look at the fat in us. And we need to lean on those mofos when we can’t pull ourselves up. Most importantly, you must trust those people’s perceptions are actually more accurate than your own, even though your mind will tell you otherwise.
I think our job after that is to still look in the mirror, see the fat and go, “Well, that is fat there. But I don’t hate myself for having it. I’m fat – okay. And I’d like to shave off some pounds. But what if I learned to love myself along the way?”
My big fear is that would decrease my motivation to fixing things that need to be fixed. My experience has told me that shaming myself doesn’t change anything. This is the bane of the perfectionist.
So, for now I need my friends to champion me every so often. I also need to champion someone else, like my cat. Lastly I should spend some time in the mirror getting friendly with my fat.
Note – I’m actually pretty cool with myself in the mirror. But that’s because I’m vain. It’s everything else I have a hard time looking at.
photo credit: andres.thor via photopin cc
I'll never give this child another cigarette, pinky swears!
