Clearly You Must Not Have Heard

As many of you may have see on Facebook, I have spent an inordinate time on the phone in the last few days with the EDD, who supplies me with my deeply appreciated unemployment checks. But the thing is, it has been a couple of months since they have done so, which means I have been having to bother them on and off about the location of my missing funds.

So here's the story: yesterday, I spent a good hour plus on the phone, trying to maneuver my way around the various touchtone menus, doing everything I could to figure out a way to get a hold of a real live person. Having failed at my valiant attempts, I had to send yet another terse yet understanding email stating my problems.

In the past, sending emails has been a slow and gradual process - you send an email, and you get a response a few days later telling you that you either need to call, or that you will receive a letter informing you of a phone interview. Yes, it's the most absurdly roundabout thing: to send an email and get a letter in reply about a phone call that will happen in the future. Still, that's how it usually goes.

Today, apparently, was the exception. In response to an email, I get a phone call.

At seven thirty.

In the fucking morning.

Seven.

Thirty.

A.

M.

I pose this to you, gentle readers: what unemployed person in their right mind is up for funzies and wanting to talk on the phone at seven thirty in the morning? Who in the devil thinks it's okay to call much of anybody at 7:30 in the a.m. unless it's an emergency? Would you call someone for any reason, personal acquaintance or business associate, on their cell phone at 7:30 in the morning? Didn't think so. Now don't jump to the whole "maybe they're on the East Coast" idea - it's a California-only call center for a California-based government body. What also kills me is that they say "sorry you missed our call, we'll call again later." What they don't mention is that "later" is, from my two or three experiences with missed calls, two minutes later.

Now, think of it this way: if someone didn't pick up their phone when you called, do you really think you have the slightest chance of them picking up two minutes later? Maybe at 7:30 in the morning, I would be semi-consciously stumbling out of bed and not make it to the phone in time, but seriously? Two minutes?

But back to the matter at hand. Two phone calls. 7:30 and 7:32 a.m. To an unemployed person. It's like they are trying to aggravate me. As a matter of fact, despite the fact that I was running on about four or five hours' sleep, I stayed awake. I was so worked up at the sheer gall they had that I couldn't have fallen back to sleep if I tried. So I wrote them an email. I said I was awake and would be for the rest of the day, and sure enough, I got a call back within maybe forty five minutes. The guy on the phone was both pleasant and apologetic; he said "Sorry we woke you up this morning, I probably would have gotten a different response had we called at eleven." To which I assured the gent that they could have called at one or two in the afternoon and I'd probably have still been asleep, though probably considerably more coherent.

Yes, I know that I keep incredibly peculiar hours. Yes, I recognize that normal people don't sleep through the lunch hour. Still - am I wrong? It is not the slightest bit strange for someone to get a call like that so early in the morning? Has the whole world gone crazy with this "get a jump start on your day" thing? Let me know what you think.

Pride vs. Nookie

So I was going to write a kind of heartwarming feel-good blog tonight about how comfortable I am at the moment, and how things kind of feel right down here in the hovel. I was going to discuss the blend of music (Explosions in the Sky), clothing (a flannel shirt I've owned since the 7th grade), and the warm light from the standing lamp in my bedroom all make the experience of sitting around and reading a book so enjoyable.

But here's the thing: that's about all I had to say about that. Yes, it's been a good evening. Yes, it's been a refreshing relaxing night at home after the madness of the last ten days or so, but then I remembered that I had a post that I had pledged friends that I'd write. So here goes.

Okay, as you probably know, I live in San Francisco. As you also probably know, a week ago our hometown baseball team won the World Series, and proud we are of all of them. You may or may not know that myself, being a man of fine taste and wonderful breeding, am a die-hard fan of the Oakland Athletics, as is my friend Iain, the young man around whom this crux is based.

Now, last Monday, Iain, myself, and our pal Deth (who is a Padres fan for the record) were all together to watch what proved to be the final game of the World Series. Some of you may have heard that the city of San Francisco went borderline batshit crazy for about two or three days when this happened. We met up with one of our more die-hard Giants fan friends, and the four of us ambled our way down to the Lower Haight to soak in some of the revelry. On our walk, as men of a certain age are wont to do, we were speculating on the ease with which a properly motivated young man might ingratiate himself with a willing young lady who was caught up in the excitement, the electricity in the air, and the vast quantities of alcohol that were being consumed. However, at this moment, my friend Iain dropped what the rest of us considered to be a very bold statement: he claimed that he couldn't consider "lending his services" to any female Giants fans based on the fact that they are Giants fans. Myself, being the only other non-committed male of the quartet said that the word female, not Giants fan was the operative part of this phrase, but he was adamant that no woman who claimed allegiance to the orange & black would be allowed to hop on the express bus to Bang City.

This is a very curious statement. I realize that my allegiances are swayed by the fact that I harbor no real ill will towards the Giants. No, they're not "my team", but I certainly wouldn't pass up the opportunity for nookie strictly because a girl likes them. Yes, I had to think twice when I met a girl who thought that Brian Wilson was sexy. I'm sorry, but anyone who thinks that this yutz is dreamy is not someone I would want to climb into bed with. I understand in some heated rivalries that people feel that way, but for teams in opposite leagues who seldom play each other, I don't understand the hostility and, frankly, the disinterest in cozying up with someone, just because they happen to like a team that you don't.

Your thoughts?

I Couldn't Help But Overhear

Last night I was out to dinner celebrating my good friend's birthday, and we were in a rather cramped little restaurant. These are pretty status quo for San Francisco: due to ridiculously high rent prices for everything from studio apartments to storefronts, we pride ourselves on cramming the most people per square foot as possible everywhere. After all, we fit a population of 750k people into 49 square miles. That's a picture of the actual restaurant to the right there, and those tables at the bottom are about the layout of where we were.

So we're at this rather nice restaurant in a bank of four tables that are all maybe five to six inches apart. I'm talking I could barely squeeze my forearm between them if I tried. So, this means that it is nearly impossible to not overhear what is being said next to you. Plus, as my friend has a particular penchant for hearing what people around us are saying, we had a few laughable moments at the expense of those around us. And for that I apologize if these people happen to be reading this or have any clue in the slightest of who I am.

Now, the best part of the night was when the table to our left was in the midst of a heated discussion. See, there was some kind of Prop 19 discussion going on between a man and a woman seated next to us. Both were in the late twenties to early thirties range, and the man seemed to be an ardent supporter for legalizing marijuana. Personally speaking, I agree if for no other reason than the fact that here in SF it is so commonplace that it might as well be legal, and we can both lose the social stigma of it being an "illegal drug" as well as make a sweet amount of coin by legal sales. Still, he was amped up to the point that his female companion had to shush him a couple of times, most notably of which was after he yelled out "Come on, it's just weed!" Again, I have heard that argument hundreds of times from many people, but you have to admire the man's conviction given his surroundings.

Funnier still is the fact that I was relaying a few stories I'd picked up the night before. One of which involves a former high school acquaintance who has gone completely off the deep end and was just making no sense in his attempts to wander into conversations. I mean, come on, the guy called me one of the greatest DJs who has ever lived. Yup. The other story was a secondhand tale of some friends from high school and their bachelor party shenanigans which involved a lot of alcohol, a combined bill of nearly a thousand dollars at a strip club, and a friend who soiled his drawers in a drunken stupor, deposited his underpants in a nearby trash receptacle, and continued on partying, only to arrive at said strip club, and upon removing his pants in a private booth, realized that he was sans chonies. Granted, much of this tale was relayed in hushed tones, but still, I can only imagine what the people next to us must have heard. Guess this teaches me to go to a nicer restaurant where people can hear about the wild exploits of my friends.

Couch Potato Week/end

I've spent a hell of a lot of time house sitting over the last little while - I think I've been house sitting for somebody for six or seven of the last eight days. One thing I always appreciate about house-sitting for people on the weekends is the ample supplies of cable channels running marathons of their programs. That and sports, of course. I've been able to watch playoff baseball, regular season football, and over the last two days, a whole crapload of "Ghost Adventures" on Travel Channel. I don't know what it is, but there's something that is just super entertaining about both learning about haunted sites around the country and watching a musclebound tool with a cock-a-doodle-douche haircut (who just so happens to be a former wedding DJ of all things) getting the crap scared out of him. It's the recipe for a fantastic weekend of doing nothing. But for me, this existence is a little strange - I didn't go out Saturday at all (going to my parents' place for dinner doesn't count), and I haven't left the house I'm house sitting all day today save for walking the dog twice. Yes, literally walking a canine, not the euphemism, you dirty kids. But yeah, this sedentary life is pretty damn foreign to me.

But you know what? Every now and again, a couple of days spent in like this really do me well, more than anything else because now I want to go out and raise hell tomorrow. Usually, I'd just be keeping the status quo of doing a few things here and there every day, but now after two days of doing no work outside of solidifying a nice butt indentation on my friends' couch, I am looking forward to doing some writing, some cleaning, some music composition, hell some anything that doesn't involve sitting down or watching a TV screen. Yes, it helps that I am going to a show tomorrow night, so I know I'll be getting out of the house in the evening time, but I'm talking about waking up at a somewhat human hour, taking the dog out for one last walk before her parents get back into town, and going home and checking a bunch of stuff off my list.

Generally I am opposed to the whole "sloth for fun" idea, since I usually get so distracted, but I tell you what, there's nothing like a rainy weekend in the Outer Sunset to make the allure of sitting on a couch watching cable TV sound like music to my ears. I guess now the big test will be to see if I blog again tomorrow and show that I kept riding this wave of energy to fruition.

My New Car Is So Great, I Don't Even have to Know How to Drive!

Okay. Tell me you've seen those commercials. The Mercedes ones, where the morons talk about how badly they can't drive, but it's okay because because the car fixes the mistakes for them. They get me just unwarrantedly angry. I'm talking I kind of lose my shit. (Yes, the video is right there, but there's another one like it too that's been all over TV lately)

See, I am a simple man who believes in the fine art of driving. The closest I've ever come to a luxury car was my 1978 Cadillac, which was incredibly luxurious, but was considered state-of-the-art for having a tape deck instead of an 8-track player. I've never owned a car with seat warmers, cup holders, a backup camera, or a lot of the other amenities that you hear about with new cars. (No, cup holders are not a new-fangled luxury development, but come on, is a simple place to put my coffee while driving too much to ask, Isuzu?) But here's the thing: I don't need them. I have my four wheels (five if you count the steering wheel hurr hurr hurr), my engine, and an entire brain full of driving know-how. I can parallel park in spots that I shouldn't rightly fit into. I understand merging lanes from an onramp. I can stay in my lane, keep safe distances from the car in front of me, and even stop in a comfortable manner. I know these are all shocking and high-risk maneuvers for some people, but for chrissakes, it's something that should come second nature to people who deem themselves functional enough to actually operate a motor vehicle.

So, maybe now you can understand why this commercial tees me off so much. I am all for these wonderful technologies that will help keep unsafe drivers a little safer. But you know what might really make them a hell of a lot safer? Getting them off the road. Making sure they don't drive because they can't drive. Yes, it's fantastic that a car can correct your drifting into another lane, but if you knew how to drive in the first place, or weren't too busy adjusting your radio, talking on the phone, drinking your latte, and yelling at your kids in the back seat at the same time, you might have not gone over that lane line in the first place. I just find it ridiculous that car companies have given in to the fact that when a vast majority of the population is driving, they have their heads so far up their own asses that they can't be held accountable for actually, you know, driving their friggin' car.

So, help me out folks. I never thought I'd say this, but get on that horn of yours. When someone is driving like a damn fool, use that glorious invention on your steering wheel to correct the driver and their idiot driving before their car has a chance to, or in case their car can't. I will do my part, but I have an Isuzu Rodeo, and if you've ever heard the horn on those things, they can't hardly scare a kitten.



Sorry for all the bitterness and spite recently, but apparently my decreased caffeine intake over the last few days, paired with the warm-ish weather, has made me a bit churlish. I will do everything in my power to make sure that my next post is all silly, smarmy, and wry as you usually tend to expect.

You're Kidding, Right?

Yesterday, as you either read already, or can read by simply scrolling down a little bit, I wrote about the warm weather and all that. I was trying to find a good example of someone to use for a sweaty celebrity to complete my simile. Those of you who are Simpsons nerdy as myself may remember the episode where Homer fell in love with his co-worker Mindy, and tried to write an eloquently stated breakup talk on his hand before confronting her, but got sweaty palms due to nervousness and said "Jeez, I'm sweating like Roger Ebert here." Normally, I would have just recycled that line, but given Ebert's recent medical issues and his downright inspiring fight with thyroid cancer, I don't really think it's anyone's place to poke fun at him anymore. But allow me to get off my soapbox for a second.

So, in the hopes of finding a good, and possibly embarrassingly sweaty picture of some celebrity I just typed in "fat guy celebrity" thinking I could turn up a funny image of some guy that we all know and love who had a healthy glow of well-earned perspiration. I didn't find that, but I think the Gandolfini picture I chose at least works on some level, as he looks kind of big and miserable.

However, in this search, I couldn't help but notice a link towards the top of the page for "FatGuyShirts.com" and being a man of generous carriage who prides himself as having a keen eye for interesting, fun, or entertaining t-shirts, I thought I'd give it a look. What I found was not only borderline offensive, it was kind of worrisome.

First, here's the link, see for yourself: http://www.fatguyshirts.com/

Now, hopefully you scanned at least most of those, but I personally, as a guy who is carrying more weight than he'd like, finds this sight nauseating. Obesity has a nasty habit of killing people, and here in the U.S. we have a distorted view of caloric intake and portion sizes. Yes, I enjoy "extreme foods" as much as the next guy. Yeah, I'd probably try the hamburger made out of grilled cheese sandwiches once, just to say I did, if we had a Friendly's around here. However, as much as I'll defend eating good (yeah, another recent blog tie-in, so sue me), I also think there is a limit to what is funny. When you're trying to convince someone to buy a shirt celebrating the fact that they can't see their toes or bringing up the slogan "Eat Now, Think Later" I kind of want to punch whoever thinks these shirts are funny or appropriate in the face. Oh, and let's not forget the fact that these shirts are available in sizes up to 6XL. I mean, I know it's kind of an extreme example, but to my eyes, this would be no different than someone marketing a line of extra-small t-shirts to people with Anorexia with slogans like "Does my ribcage make me look fat?" on them. Yes, that's a horrible thing to say, but you get my point. I mean, just look at where we are as a country: obesity is gaining on smoking at an alarming rate as the leading cause of death according to the New York times.

Sorry to sound preachy here; you know I usually keep things light here, but this one really got to me for some reason. Still, there is a very, very fine line between being comfortable in your own skin and denying medical knowledge. This may be a bit of my own insecurity speaking here, but I don't want to celebrate the fact that we as a society are pushing towards morbidly obese at an alarming speed. (I was going to make a joke about it being the fastest that overweight people have moved for anything recently there, but it seemed out of place. Thoughts?)

There should be some grandiose closing to this rant of mine, but I kind of feel like I hit all the bullet points I needed to. So to ease the tension, I'll close with one of my favorite "fat guy" jokes:

Two fat guys are drinking together in a bar, and one friend turns to his buddy and says 'your round'. His buddy says 'So are you, you fat bastard.'

Sweatin' Like James Gandolfini Over Here

It's been hot here. Not that ridiculously crazy that a lot of people should be complaining about it and all that, and that's only kind of what I'm going to do here. So while I know that it's been warm out, and there's exactly jack that I can do about it, there's a bit of a mental thing people need to remember when it comes to the weather.

See, unlike so many of you people out there who were born and raised in places where the sun comes out for more than about three weeks out of the year, I was raised in the Fog Belt of San Francisco. This means when the weather reaches much of anything over about 75, I start to wilt just a tad. So rather than explain why that is, I will explain how I react to it. See, much like the majestic kangaroo will dig itself down into a burrow and wait for the uncomfortable heat of the Australian Outback to subside, so does the native unreticulated Bill seek shelter from the sun, and avoid all activity unless absolutely possible when my fair city's weather reaches "warm" status. I would be so bold to believe that you, internet friends, already know that about me, since chances are if you're reading this right now, you have probably had some real-life interaction with me, and in the course of that you have probably invited me out for something in the afternoon on a warm day; and unless that something involves indoor air conditioning or maaaaaaybe ice cream, chances are I've given you either a well, well formulated excuse or I have just plain said "It's too goddamn hot for me to leave my basement." It's fine, it's regular, it's nothing personal, and I'll be more than happy to join you come sundown for some nice cool cocktails in the cool recumbent breeze of the evening time.

Somehow, not surprisingly to many, my family has not gained this understanding about the Bill in my 29 years on this planet. Somehow whenever it is too warm for me to wear pants, I manage to talk to one of my parents who encourages me to go outside and get some fresh air. Now, let me remind you of the assertion I have made in the past: I am not exactly the outdoorsy type. I don't go frolic in the sunshine. I don't go for a stroll when it's nice and sunny, and I sure as hell will not schedule one of my rare bouts of exercise for a day when it's 80-plus. Quite simply put, leaving the cool and relaxing embrace of my basement hovel, where I get no direct sunlight and can escape further into the garage for an extra ten to fifteen degree drop on a good day, does not sound like a good or fun idea to me. I know lots of people love to get out and get active on those rare sunny days in San Francisco, but this kid is not one of them. I'm much more inclined to go on a late night walk or hit my stationary bike when it's raining outside. Besides, is there really that much difference on a warm day between reading my book indoors and reading my book outdoors? Nope, didn't think so.

So, if you are one of those wonderful folks who enjoys a nice warm outdoorsy afternoon, I say bully for you! I will never stand in your way, and will only occasionally try to lure you from your self-improvement with a cold pitcher of beer somewhere we can sit outside, but all I ask is that you extend the same courtesy and understanding to those of us who are cold weather kids, and prefer to hide behind fans and cool beverages when the clouds aren't there to comfort us. Most of you do, and I love you for it.