Texts, Drugs, Rock n' Roll

God cant love you more than I do...

2010-05-18T13:26:00.000-04:00

This morning Gabrielle came downstairs to tell me she "loves me" as I got dressed.

"I love you too honey...." I replied.

"But dad, you can't love me more than God and I can't love you more than God."

"Bullshit Gabby." Yes I swear around my children. If you think it makes me any less of a parent than I already am the go piss up a rope.

I explained to her that it's fine that you love God more than me, I am "okay" with that but I will not have her thinking that God loves her more than I do.

"Gabby, I will love you forever and always, even when I am not here on this earth you will know that I still love you. God is not here to kiss your boo boo's. God won't hold you when you're sad so, therefore: I love you more than God does!"

My love for my children is more than any god could give. Their concept of a god is in it's infancy. My love is tangible where god's is not. God doesn't put food on the table, he doesn't tuck them in at night, he doesn't remind them how much he loves them every chance he gets.

It's hard for them to understand that, in my book, God is a thing of myth or urban legend. I've lost some very close friends and family members over the past 6 years and if there was a god that was so loving, why didn't he cure their ails?

It's fine if my kids want to believe in god, that's their prerogative and I'm sure it wont hurt them any, but when my kids think that god loves them more than I do......

I have a problem with that.

Ybor City, Florida

2010-02-16T17:15:00.001-05:00

We had arrived in Tampa a day after a hurricane had just blown through. It was mid-September and a friend of mine, who we will call John, set up the trip to Clearwater for a long weekend. He booked the flight, room, rental car, and even had a daily itinerary of things for us to do; all I had to do was give him the cash.

After fetching our luggage and walking out of the terminal the outside temp was equal to getting slapped in the face with a steaming hot towel; I immediately start to sweat my balls off.

We picked up the rental car, a convertible Mustang, popped the top and turned the AC on full blast to keep from frying like bacon on the seats.

Shortly after arriving at the hotel we change into our bathing suits when I realized that I needed a pair of sunglasses. Across from the hotel was one of those beach stores where towels are 3 for $9.99. As usual, the cheapest pair of sunglasses are ten bucks and a pair that were remotely stylish broke me of $20.

Back across the street to the beach we find ourselves in solitude except for that one guy who wades in three feet of water with his metal detector. By this time I look as if I had already jumped in the water because I have been sweating balls since we stepped foot in Tampa.

I peel my shirt off and make a mad dash for the ocean with John right behind me. Into the water I dove forgetting that I still had the sunglasses on that I had bought about ten minutes ago. I quickly surface with glasses M.I.A. I dive back underwater hoping to retrieve the new shades but alas, they were gone for good. After wading around for a few I hit the sandy beach to work on my tan.

While catching some rays I am busy watching this old fart with the metal detector who has now weaseled his way over to where I had been swimming.

Watching, waiting, watching, sweating, BINGO.....the metal detector starts beeping. The old codger kept waving the detector over the object as if he couldn’t hear the loud annoying beep. I sit up as the old man bends over to feel around in the water and to my surprise he pulls up a pair of sunglasses. This is my cue to run over and ask for them back.

I walk over to the old man and tell him I had just lost my glasses and if they were mine, could I have them back. He looks up and smiles and says, "are these the glasses?”

"Yes they are, thanks!" I sigh in relief.

"Finders keepers" he says.

"You COCKSUCKER!!!!" I shout at him as he walks away.

I was really hell bent on not getting my glasses. I really would’ve liked to pull some Jackie Chan shit on him, but I figured if he couldn’t give me the glasses back the poor bastard needs them more than I do. They weren’t even the big clunky wrap around like half the population in Florida wears so I have no idea what his intentions were with my glasses....they were gone.

After a day at the beach we decide we'll ride down to Ybor City, which I was told would be like the Flats in Cleveland. We arrived there and it was a ghost town.

We pick out this little restaurant because I thought it would be nice to have a couple drinks and some fresh seafood, John agreed. Now I have shrimp on the brain but there is one craving that has to be handled first.....beers! After a few cocktails I order what I thought was shrimp cocktail.

The waitress lays the shrimp appetizer on the table. By now I am feeling like I can finally get over the incident on the beach and I was feeling great. The conversation was great as we talked about important things like getting laid, off the hook bars, and work.

As I am flapping my jaw I grabbed a piece of the jumbo shrimp and dipped it into the cocktail sauce. I stop chatting for a quick second to bite into the shrimp and it was crunchy. I quickly grab the napkin to spit the shrimp in and I begin inspecting the other shrimps to see why they are crunchy.

While inspecting the shrimp the waitress comes to the table to ask if we need anything else while we await our dinner and she asks me if there's something wrong.

"Yeah the shrimp is crunchy!"

"That’s because it’s peel and eat shrimp cocktail!" she laughs.

"Well you might as well just bring me another beer while I work on this shrimp" I utter in an unassumingly embarrassed tone.

After eating I came to the conclusion that even though we are surrounded by ocean, it doesn’t always mean great, fresh seafood in every restaurant. I would’ve been content eating at Red Lobster.

Aww fuck it. I'm on vacation and there's always tomorrow and plenty of seafood to be had is what I thought to myself.

The next day I decided that I had to try that parasailing gig they offered up the street from the hotel. John didn’t seem interested in doing much more than taking a nap so I hoofed it up the block to the dock.

I paid my thirty bucks for approximately fifteen minutes of 'air time'. While up in the air I concluded that it wasn’t worth what I had paid and figured it would be more fun to unstrap myself and freefall about fifty feet into the water, but I didn’t and I was reeled in.

There was a middle aged couple that was next and the wife was gung-ho about doing something so risky. For Christ sakes it’s only parasailing, its not skydiving or even bungee jumping; I had walked iron 300+ feet at work, unharnessed, so there was really no thrill in it for me.

The woman is all giddy as she is being strapped in and when it’s the husbands turn, he backed out because he was afraid of heights. Seeing that this woman weighed about 100 pounds soaking wet, I was asked to ride with her. There has to be a minimum amount of weight on the tow line for them to reel you back in, so I got two rides for the price of one. The husband looked like a nervous wreck as we took on air. The second free ride had made up for the thrilless thirty bucks I had spent on one.

On Saturday night, John suggests we should go to this high class bar called 'Liquid Blue'; it came highly recommended by his cousin who lives in the area and he claimed there were plenty of scallywags for the taking. With pimp suits on we rode.

We arrived at the club and walk in; swanky was my first thought. Black lights, strobes, neon, leather couches everywhere, and the perfect hunting ground for a date.

First things first we hit the bar for some drinks. Now John tends to be slow and cautious with his drinking, but not me; I had a tendency to drink like I lived....fast and hard. Had to build up those beer muscles to compete with guys who were on steroids at this club.

The people there were plastic people, dolled up with snazzy outfits and hair. I almost felt like a homeless bum mingling with celebrities. The alcohol quickly erased those barriers in my mind. Now I was in pimp mode as I made my way over to these two blondes sitting on one of the leather sofas.

John and I walk over and I make some small talk with them to see if I can spark some conversation, but these two ladies were about as sharp as bowling balls. The conversation is not going as planned and I can see I am going to strike out before I am even up to bat, so I throw out a quick "can I buy you a drink?".

Neither of them was willing to let me buy them a drink, so I immediately cut through the crap and ask the one chick about her fake boobs which she wasn’t going to admit were fake. In all my years of pimpin, that is thee only time that a woman has ever sad no to me buying them a drink. Let's face it, when you use that line, most women will feel a slight obligation to converse with you if they accept and that is undoubtedly the best time to change their mind about you.

Now I am just a wee bit offended that they shot down the drink offer so out with some more polite insults; I mean as sharp as they were, they took each and every insult as a compliment until John decided it was time to roll before the Barbies found some Kens they knew to ruffle our feathers. We stayed at the bar for a while longer, just enough time for me to get totally blitzed before we headed back to the room. I was feeling like Popeye as I talked out the side of my mouth the whole ride back, not quite getting over the fact of being shot down.

The following morning around seven o'clock I awoke to the door of the hotel room opening. It was John with a bag of McDonald's.

"Damn that was mighty white of you to get up so early to grab us some breakfast."

"Get up? I am just getting home from the hospital!" John replies as I choke on my hash brown.

"The hospital? What? When did this happen?"

"Don’t you remember last night when I woke up and told you I couldn’t breathe?"

"Uhhh, NO" I state in a sort of disbelief.

John goes on to tell me that after getting back to the room after the bar, that he had been asleep for a short while before he had woke up. He was having trouble breathing and he said it felt like his throat was closing up. Scared, he called the front desk to see if there was a doctor at the hotel. There was no doctor so the front desk called an ambulance for him. He tells me that he laid back down and minutes later the ambulance arrived and the paramedics pounded on the door. He also says that I hopped outta bed and opened the door to let them in and said " hey come on in, you guys want a beer?" right before I did a swan dive back into the bed and instantly fell back asleep.

"Wow, I don’t remember that at all. We had more beer last night?" I asked.

The paramedics took him to the local hospital where a doctor examined him. The doctor said there was a bite mark on the roof of his mouth near his throat. He had obviously been sleeping with his mouth open and must've been bit by a spider and had an allergic reaction which caused his throat to swell. They gave him a shot of Benedryl and sent him on his way.

I guess there is truth to the story that you eat about eight spiders a year while you sleep.

While eating McDonald's, John and I find it amusing that I don’t recall a single second of the incident.

"Remember I told you I woke you up telling you I couldn’t breathe?"

"Yes"

"You know what you told me?" John asks.

" 'If you cant breathe, try harder!' and that’s when I got scared".

The TDRR Daily 02/05/2010

2010-02-05T08:56:00.000-05:00

Well today I have both girls home sick. Gabby is over the hump of her cold and is feeling better, but last night Olivia started coughing and sneezing. She woke up this morning with a fever so once again my work is cut out for me today. Even though the both of them together can be a handful when they are healthy, I really hate to see when they are sick and not themselves.

Lately I've been in this funk where I question the powers that be. I've posted status updates on Facebook that question faith, both mine and others'. Most of you know my situation with the accident I had at work and how things really haven't went my way for the past 7-1/2 years. I tried prayer for the first few years with no positive results. That is the reason for my cynicism and sarcasm. Do I really need to explain myself to anyone who reads these blogs??

I have always enjoyed posting pictures that I found funny, but one thing I've come to realize is that as people become more faithful they tend to lose their sense of humor.

Most times when I post controversial statuses/pictures/links I can literally watch my friends list decrease; hence this is why I do such things. If a person is going to delete another because of their sense of humor or beliefs then maybe we weren't really friends in the first place. I am the king of making blanket statements and I like to be ambiguous, on here and in real life.

So take a chill and don't over analyze the things I say and do on an internet website.

I'm out of here for now, have sick kids to tend to. Have a great weekend!

Let's do something gay

2010-02-04T09:48:00.000-05:00

It was a cold Thursday night in 1999 when I was cordially invited to do some drinking and dancing with two girlfriends of mine. Michelle and Jennifer wanted to meet up with friends from work at a bar in Ferndale.

I was a little hesitant on going because Ferndale is known for its predominantly gay community, but what the hell; drinking and dancing had become two of my favorite pastimes in the years prior. I agree to go with them and so I ask a friend of mine named ‘Chubs’ to come along.

Chubs was always down to ‘roll’ the night away with some E and he didn’t work at the time so he was almost obligated to go with. He tried to weasel out with the “I’m broke” excuse but when I said “I got your back on some drinks” his attitude changed.

The four of us arrive at the club where we had to check our coats at the door. When we walked into the building there was a long corridor with a tiny coat check room at the end. The music from beyond the double doors at the end of this corridor is deafening. We hand our coats over to the skinny, frail looking guy that has hip huggers and a cut off shirt.

I snicker at this guy’s get-up and as I open the door for the ladies I’m with and I lean over to tell Jen and Michelle what I think about the coat check guy. I have to raise my voice to just under a yell and I say;

“That coat check guy looks like he’s flaming!”

“WHAT?!?” replied the girls.

I am half way through repeating myself when the music comes to a sudden halt and just in time for the whole bar to hear me say “….he’s flaming!”

That should’ve been hint number one.

We make our way through the double doors and into the barroom. The bar is very low lit except for the intermittently flashing strobe. I order a beer for Chubs and I as I scope out a possible date.

“What the fuck man? This is cockfest ‘99” I tell Chubs who most certainly agrees with me.

By this time the girls we came with are unseen so I am guessing they must’ve found these friends from work.

“There’s a couple hoes over there” as I point Chubs in the direction of the restrooms.

“Well I gotta take a piss before I grab another beer…”

“Yea I have to piss too. I’ll go with ya.” Chubs says hesitating for a moment.

At that very moment Chubs has a look of uncertainty, a look of discomfort.

We walk over towards the restroom where I noticed men coming in and out of both the men’s and women’s bathrooms. This is where it dawns on me that I am a gay club.

This is fucking amazing, something you would never see at a heterosexual club. So fucking A, I am going to use the women’s bathroom.

Ok for me.

Not Ok for Chubs.

I took a whiz and saddled up for more drinking. I stand waiting for Chubs in the small little walkway that separates the two bathrooms and as he is walking out a man on his way into the restroom lightly slaps Chubs in the ass.

You would’ve thought Chubs got hit with a 6 foot long wooden paddle the way he jumped.

Now I am really amused that we are in a gay bar and Chubs is a wanted man by men with the same plumbing.

“Holy shit!! Did you fucking see that?!!? That dude just slapped my ass!! We HAVE to get the fuck outta here like right now!!” Chubs says in a nervous and agitated voice.

“Take it easy fancy pants, we just got here and Jennifer and Michelle are not going to want to leave this soon.” I try to explain.

We find Jen and Michelle talking with some friends at a table so Chubs and I join.

“We gotta get the fuck outta here!” Are the first words out of Chubs’ mouth.

I am having some beers and shots and talking with the gay friends Jen and Michelle had come to meet and they were pretty cool people. Not once that night was I ever hit on by a member of the same sex and the friendly friends explained why.

They go on to tell me about this thing called ‘gaydar’ and tell me that it is a common feature among gay people; both men and women have this.

I am intrigued by this concept and in the back of my head I am thinking about the bathroom incident just moments earlier.

Chubs is listening in on the conversation I am having with this fellow and you can see him becoming very uneasy right before he asks for the keys to the car. I tell him “no”.

“We need all you eligible men who are looking for a date tonight to come on up!!” Say a Rupaulesque looking man. Well the once man I should say.

All these men make their way to the dance floor as this Rupaul plays matchmaker for the single gay men. These were indeed the happiest bunch of people I had ever seen.

By now Chubs is repulsed by the display of groping other men on the dance floor. He is becoming very homophobic, so I agree to let him wait in the car before we end up fighting because of his blatant use of the word ‘fag’.

As soon as he leaves, the man explaining the concept of gaydar leans to me and says “Your friend is going to be very unhappy the rest of his life by staying in the closet”.

Shocked I say “he’s not gay”.

My new friend tells me that Chubs had been setting off the internal gaydar of a few of the men at the table, so they were shocked when opted to wait in the car. They also tell me that he must’ve set off some serious gaydar for another man to slap his booty.

“Well what about me?” I inquire.

“We knew you were straight from the moment you walked into the club, but your friend is a different story!”

Feeling a sigh of relief, I offer to buy the whole table a round of shots. I had felt so joyous that I wasn’t setting off anyone’s gaydar that I wanted to reach over and kiss this guy on the cheek, but I didn’t as I didn’t want to give anyone mixed signals.

It was a great night and Chubs only had to wait in the car for about an hour as I confidently hammed it up with my new gay friends.

I may have never went if Jen and Michelle had told me it was a gay bar and it was quite the confidence boost knowing the same sex doesn’t find you desirable; if only Chubs could’ve had the same great experience.

Closed minds keep you in the closet one might say!!!

The TDRR Daily 01/29/2010

2010-01-29T07:35:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking back over the past 7-1/2 years since I've been on workman's comp and yesterday I felt humbled for the first time in the longest time; thanks to two people.

After posting the blog about having to sell my guitar I had two people send me emails via Facebook offering help. A friend I went to high school with knew my situation as she had been there before and another was a brother Boilermaker I had just met on Facebook a day earlier.

The first friend, Melissa, had went through a similar situation with her finances and explained to me how ebay could be a moneymaker for me. She offered to help get me going selling some stuff to make some money ( as I'm only familiar with buying off ebay). I may take her up on her help with getting started on ebay.

The second friend, Thomas, is a brother Boilermaker from another union local. He emailed me via Facebook and showed his concern about my financial situation. He offered to help me out with money and food or both. I had only met this guy a day before and he was willing to help a me out. That is what a brotherhood is all about.

The point I am trying to make is that you really never know someone's situation until you've been there yourself. I'd like to thank both Melissa and Thomas for their willingness to help out. I still may take Melissa up on her ebay offer since it sounds like a good way to get rid of some old toys, clothes, and junk.

Kindra is supposed to get her taxes back today so we'll be rich for a little while. But to say the least, I am humbled by your guys' willingness to help. It was a humbling experience to say the least and I greatly appreciate it.

Side note:

I know my situation sucks but I am in no way looking for sympathy or a handout. I write these blogs to vent or else I'd explode inside. I am angered more than anything that someone else's negligence got me to where I am today, and in the next few months they are going to pay dearly for the hell they've put myself and my family through.

Thanks again Melissa and Thomas for the help, you don't know how much it means to me!

Mike aka TDRR

The TDRR Daily 01/28/2010

2010-01-27T22:27:00.000-05:00

Last night was like losing a dear friend. I had to sell my Epiphone Les Paul Standard with the Zak Wylde active pick-ups because Kindra and I have been hurting for money. Over the last 6 months we've been having a tough time just making ends meet.

I've given up a lot of bad habits like drinking and smoking pot because I don't have the extra cash for that stuff. Sometimes I even go without my favorite coffee (Tim Horton's) if I don't have the extra cash to buy it.

This is how things work in this household. Kindra pays the rent which is $850/month as well as her car payment which I believe is $260/month. I am left with the rest of the bills: utilities, cable, phone bill, and groceries. And I fill our car up once a week.

We're on a "shut-off" protection plan for our energy bill and we pay $199/month during the winter months, then in the spring/summer is when we have to pay off our outstanding balance from the winter months.

I broke it down to where I pay $100 towards each bill every week to fulfill the monthly payments and we still have enough money to buy groceries to get us through the week. Essentially we're just making it and I'm thankful that we're able to have food on the table most nights.

Our girls have no concept of the burden of money. They don't understand when mom and I stress about opting not to pay a bill one week so that we can put food on the table. When you're a parent you have to make these tough decisions when you're in the boat Kindra and I are in.

I'm not complaining about our lack of money, and I don't believe that if I pray things will get better because they wont. I tried that prayer shit before, it failed, and my aunt lost her life. God isn't putting food on my table, yet the money that Kindra and I make together is putting food on the table and keeping a roof over our heads. Kindra and I make a lot of sacrifices so that our kids can have nice clothes, nice birthday parties, and nice Christmases.

One of the only few assests I have was my guitar, and one of the few remaining vices I have is smoking. When I run out of cigarettes I am one crabby fucker. I had tried to sell my electric guitar about 6 months ago but they only offered me $150 at Guitar Center so I opted not to sell it because I wasn't hurting that bad for cash at the time. $150 was like a slap in the face when I paid nearly $600 for the guitar new. A year or so after I bought the electric I had some Zak Wylde active pick-ups installed for about $200 plus labor.

So we were in desperate need of cash today. I put my foot down and decided to sell my guitar, and I know that Kindra was against the idea because she knows I love my guitar. I walked into Guitar Center, told the guy I wanted to sell it back, and he offered me $250....much more than I had expected.

After the fact I felt like I wanted to cry. It was almost like hearing about the death of a good friend or relative. Since I had got more than I bargained for out of the deal, I took the family out to eat at Applebee's. Eating out is something we rarely do because we don't have the money, so eating out with the family was nice. Even though I was a crabby fuck who just sold his baby.

The thing is I sacrificed my guitar so that we'd have money to get us through the rest of the week. It's just one of those things you don't think twice about when you're a parent. I know that one day when I can afford a real Gibson Les Paul Standard I will have an electric again. But until then, bills have to be paid and we have two growing girls that have to be fed.

We are the taboo of society, "the working class poor." We all know someone who will turn a blind side to people like us but are so quick to send donations to a foreign land.

Side note:

I'd like to thank all my readers, especially the ones who use to follow me on my Myspace blog. I've battled to get what's rightfully mine over the past 7-1/2 years and in the end I will prevail.

Mike -aka TDRR

The TDRR Daily 01/27/2010

2010-01-27T06:01:00.000-05:00

I've blogged about this before and I've been warned several times about this: beware of what you post on Facebook or Myspace. The social networks can be used against you in a court of law or when it comes to keeping a job.

Quite a few of my friends had to clean up their Facebook page because of their jobs or had to delete coworkers off friend's lists. My lawyer has warned me several times to be careful of what I post: two words - fuck him!

I can see the justification for cleaning up your page if your a manager for a large corporation or even not having friends from work on your page just to keep the whole work/play things separate but how does this precaution pertain to me?

How does what you do on a social networking site dictate the person you are while you're at work? I can see how some people would nail their own coffin shut by befriending a coworker, posting statuses about getting "Crunk" then not making it to work the following day. That's the jackass' own fault.

If worker's comp or the people from my third party lawsuit wanted to dig up some dirt on me, what is the worst they could find? Do they look at the people on these friends lists also? What could those insurance companies possibly dig up that would help them win a case against me, the plaintiff? I've been off 7-1/2 years, don't have any money to have any real hobbies, I'm more less the house bitch because the wife works, and developed a case of anxiety/agoraphobia so I like to "socially network" with other like minded peeps. I get some good laughs, I get angered at the religious fanatics who think their belief is the only way, and I've been sick of politics. (I think I've said this before) But on another note, I've got this really awesome fake farm. Would farming be consider a future income earning potential in the insurance company's eyes? I told a friend last night that if the insurance companies wanted to take away my benefits or use anything I do on a social networking site to hinder my case, I'd get them in front of a judge and drop my drawers and have my benefits reinstated - pronto.

In my opinion, what you do on your own time is your own business. I could see social networking becoming a problem if you're doing it while "on the clock." The same goes for drug testing. You need to take a drug test to work at flipping McDonald's these days....are you fucking serious?!?

Speaking of jobs and drug testing, now that marijuana is legal for medical purposes how is this going to work out when you give a urine sample for a job? Even if you have the medical Mary Jane card I can almost guarantee that they'll hire somebody who doesn't give a dirty sample. The laws with regards to medical marijuana are still in that gray area when it comes to getting it legally and trying to get a job.

Someone asked me the other day about how much I donated to Haiti. Not a dime. I'm on the brink of destitution and have no "extra" money to give but if I did I'd make a nice contribution. It's shocking really. The same people who'd dig deep to help the people in Haiti wouldn't bat an eye at helping the people who are in dire straits here on the home front. Just turn your blind eye and they go away eventually. I am glad to see so many Americans stepping forward to help Haiti in their time of need, but if Americans were only this empathetic to the poor and starving right in their own yard.

Enough of that bullshit....

Last night I decided to try something different in the kitchen. I got these fresh, unsplit, bonless, skinless chicken breasts from the farm market by my house. I decided to make a homemade cornbread stuffing, butterfly the chickens, and bake in the oven over a bed of Uncle Ben's chicken flavored rice. Although it looked good when it came out of the oven, my kids didn't give it the "wow" rating (as in WOW daddy this is good!). The chicken and rice was good but the stuffing was kind of soggy. Next time I'll buy the box of "cornbread stuffing" and go that route.

That's all for today. Beware of the company you keep!! HAHAHAHA

The TDRR Daily 01/26/2010

2010-01-26T10:53:00.000-05:00

I have to get back into the groove of writing on a daily basis because I can feel my brain starting to decay. I have a lot going on with life as far as my injury case getting close to coming to an end after 7-1/2 years. When that part of my life is done, I will be able to do the things I've wanted to do for years now but couldn't because I'm on a "disability" case.

The past month and a half I've had to answer interrogatories from the people I am suing. Along with the interrogatories I've had to relive the day of my accident by reading through a stack of MIOSHA's reports/findings about that fateful day. I let my mind stray and have put my writing on the back burner. I'm at a critical point now that if I don't write I'll let the anger build up inside and that will continue the brain decay.

I quit blogging on Myspace a while back for a few reasons: I got tired of reading political blogs, blogs about religion, and the drama that's runs amok within the same group of bloggers. I've always had a Facebook account but my blog on Myspace was my baby. I had a good following until my first account got deleted because I exploited a glitch in the blog format. I had a backup account but I would've never regained the readership I had with the first profile so I left.

I got tired of reading about how Obama is the antichrist. Tired of hearing about "Palin 2012." And got really tired of reading all the religious bullshit.

I was born and raised a staunch Democrat, most of my family members all served in some type of union skilled traded. These days I don't bother to argue with people about politics because I just don't care anymore. Sure I still get out and vote so I have the right to bitch when things don't go my way. The state of the US is in bad shape, which means I look out for number one - my family - Kindra and my two girls.

I've never been big on religion and it seems that everybody is going overboard with pushing their beliefs on others. I attended a Catholic school from kindergarten through eight grade, and because I wasn't baptized into their church I was considered a black sheep.

Kindra and the kids attend church most of the time but I really don't care to attend. I don't have 10% to give and the particular church she goes to frowns on people who cant give their 10%. So I will be looked down upon because I attend a service but don't have any money to give? I think that is just wrong.

On Facebook, on any given day, somebody will update their status to include some kind of bible quote. I posted a status update the other day that said "I'm disgusted that society decays into conservative politics. God never put food on my table, and prayer isn't going to fix anything that's broke. Keep telling yourself you're not a lemming and I'll keep questioning authority." The religious fanatics came over to tell me how offended they were that I would put up such an offensive status update.

Here's the double standard: it's okay for the religious to post their updates all day long, and when someone whose "religulous" posts something, well if I were in public I'd probably be stoned to death for not agreeing with the consensus on Facebook about religion.

If I want religion, I'll go to church, not on Facebook.

So that's all for now. I am going to be writing a daily blog to hone my writing for an upcoming project. Tell your friends about this and subscribe through the "networked blog" link.

Mike aka- TDRR

Christmas Jews

2009-12-19T09:09:00.000-05:00
I guess last night was a bad time to start Christmas shopping! If finances had panned out otherwise, I would've started much earlier -- like this past July.

Oh the crowds of people wandering aimlessly around store aisles and to top that off most of them are rude. I wouldn't mind the rudeness so much if they threw a "Merry Christmas, now excuse the fuck out of me" at me. I'm in the department store with Kindra and the girls, I am dripping sweat because I am dressed for being outdoors. The crowds of people are setting off a defense mechanism in me that makes me want to ram their cart out of the way after the first "excuse me!!!!!"

I hate the phrase "happy holidays." Sure there's two holidays crammed right next to each other but c'mon people. Do I look Black or Jewish or Arabic?? Okay. Maybe I throw people off when I talk ghetto, or maybe the 5 o'clock shadow has me on the terrorist watch list, or maybe it's because I usually have enough change in my pocket to give exact amounts at the register. I don't know, but y'all know how I feel about people being politically correct and people lay the PC on thick this time of year.

I could only make it through two stores of assholes and elbows before I felt the Tourrette's starting to kick in. (I had to Google Tourette's for the spelling, I didn't want to offend any of you cocknockers)

This year Gabrielle asked for an Ipod, a Blackberry, and a laptop. She is five. I laughed and asked if she needed a bra too. Kids these days. When I was a kid we got socks, underwear, and five different sets of Legos; we were content. But back then we weren't so excited about the gray tube socks with yellow and green stripes around the calves.

My Christmas shopping has just begun, so today I would double the dose of anxiety meds and baby-step through the stores.

On another holiday note; a couple nights ago they had a piece on the evening news about how to correctly "tip" service people and how this year most people don't have the extra cash to leave the kind of tips they want to. I can see tipping a waiter/waitress or someone who valet's your car or the pizza delivery guy, but tipping the Fedex or mail carrier. (Sorry to my mail carrier friends!!)

Tip the mail carrier, this is a new one to me. I've offered the mailman a cold bottle of water or a cold Coke when it was blazing hot, but tipping them for Christmas?!?! I took the advice.

I wrapped a frozen burrito in gift wrap, and on the tag came the real tip: "Please try and drop my mail at the same time on a daily basis. Also, please keep the junk mail I am supposed get on Monday's and Wednesday's and last but not least -- watch out for the landmines in the yard."

I bought a lot of extra stamps this year with the intentions of all you mail carriers getting a raise.

The other day our puppy, a Boston Terrier, was playing with our other dog, American Bulldog, and she got so riled up that she latched on to his balls. The Bulldog started to bleed like a stuffed pig so Kindra got a wash cloth to wipe his sack off. He laid there on the floor, with his leg twitching, as Kindra wiped the blood away. The more she rubbed the more the dog got excited. She abandoned that chore when Mr. Pinky started to show himself.

I was browsing through the local drug store a while back looking for something to get rid of my foot odor. I was really off in la la land and found myself in the "feminine hygeine" aisle. I stopped and looked straight ahead at eye level and Eureka!!!!!!

Summer's Eve feminine body wash. If that can kill some funk down south, it should be like using a cannon to kill a house fly on my feet. I took it home and scrubbed my feet with it. Man did that shit work good. One day Kindra was in my shower and said "what's the Summer's Eve for?!?!" in that suspecting voice. I told her my story and erased all suspicions. She thought it was dumb at first, I thought it was a scientific breakthrough, and when she couldn't smell the funk of my feet, she agreed it was a great idea.

Now I buy the shit in bulk at Costco. I have no shame in going to Costco for a 12 pack of "feminine body wash". The people in line behind me probably think the old lady has serious problems but oh well.

On work bonuses....

Back in the 90's I worked as an Ironworker for about a year or so. I worked for a company that put up commercial metal buildings. It's the bottom of the Ironworking trade.

98% of our jobs were outside and this particular day we were siding a building. The siding sheets were about 60 feet in length and had to be screwed in about every 10 feet. It was just days before Christmas and it had been blistering cold for weeks. It was a Friday so the owner of the company decided to hand deliver our checks with our Christmas bonuses.

My coworkers told me the boss gave cash bonuses and usually a turkey or a ham.

The boss pulls up in his SUV, we all climbed down from the scaffolding and walked over to his truck. He hops out and starts handing out the envelopes. My coworkers and I opened our checks and each of us got a different cash bonus. One guy got $500, another $300, another got $250 and I got $100! ! !!! !!!!!!!

I immediately started thinking "what a fucking cheap ass!" The guy had a 40 yacht, owned his own Yacht club, his own contracting business that was booming and I got a measly 100 bucks?!?

"C'mon over here for your turkeys." He gave all of us turkeys but when I got my bird it looked more like a Cornish hen than a turkey.

By now I was wound up tight with the skimp check and even skimpier bird. I stood there with check in one hand and a baby turkey in the other. Everybody wished him a Merry Christmas.

I hastily said "Happy Hanukkah Ray!!"

"But I'm not Jewish, Mike." he said in this dumbfounded look.

"Well from the looks of this check and this turkey, you're a fuckin' Jew bastard!!!" I slung the turkey across the frozen parking lot and went to the break trailer.

Needless to say, I got fired a week later on a Tuesday for being 5 minutes late. The boss had my check made out already, so I was lead to believe it was planned around my Jew comment.

Merry Christmas people!

Does anyone still get Christmas bonuses?

Have your kids asked for something and you laughed?!?!

Got any other "home remedies" you want to share?

On Social Networking

2009-11-15T12:56:00.000-05:00
Social networking on the internet is serious business, at least to many people it is.

I have 285 "friends" on my Facebook page and I probably know about 250 of them in real life (yes I'm that cool). When I use to blog on Myspace I had about 700 "friends". But were they really friends?

Myspace had a bulletin feature and quite often people would post bulletins "Cleaning out my friends list, if we haven't talked in a while you will be deleted..." or something of that nature.

Get a fucking life. The odds were on space that, that person befriended me for some reason (my blogs would be an excellent guess). It's a social networking site, key word networking. My life will go on even if the number of friends is lighter one day than it was in previous days.

You see folks, some people get carried away and take social networking too seriously. If you get so upset that some of your "friends" haven't poked you, took a quiz about how well they know you, or sent you fancy glitter comment, then maybe you should re-evaluate your life.

Would you be upset if not everyone on your wireless network didn't contact you? NO! So why would it be any different on a website?

Since I've left Myspace for unspecified reasons I've been trying to whore my blogs out on Facebook to get people to read. There's a big difference between the two sites: Myspace is like a sleazy night club and Facebook is like rehab or church. Your grandma, your Aunt Edna, or your boss is more likely to be on Facebook than on Myspace because Facebook censors a lot of us free thinkers.

But since I've left the uncensored Myspace (it's a lot harder to be censored there) I haven't changed the way I think or who I am. I'm still the same smart ass with a warped sense of humor and what is even more humoring is when people delete my comments or wall posts. It's means I've struck some kind of chord and that's music to my ears.

I will befriend just about anyone and I'm sure I could just about offend everyone, but I won't be deleting anyone because we've never corresponded since we became "friends". And if you are offended that someone on your list has had no contact with you and you plan on deleting them, maybe you should cancel your internet service altogether and get some real life friends.

It's easy to make and delete friends on the internet but have you spent so much time social networking that you've lost any social skill you had to make or delete friends in real life? I think there may be quite a few on my list that have socially decayed.

Remember, networking sites are in place to stay connected with people. If your life has come down to who leaves comments and who doesn't, then all you're doing is taking up air. I know this isn't the case with everybody but there are some out there like this and I'm certain everyone has at least on person like this on their "friends list."

So from me to you: if you feel I haven't been in contact with you enough feel free to delete me. If I deleted everybody who didn't read my blog, I wouldn't have many friends.

Stop taking social networking so seriously, it's only the internet!

My life in a nutshell

2009-11-06T05:40:00.000-05:00

Since I haven't been able to sleep well the past few days I figured why not update y'all with what I've been up to and what's been going on in this little bean of mine.

My dad went back into the hospital Sunday because he was having a hard time breathing. When the check him in and did x-rays they found out his lung had collapsed. Blood and fluid had built up between the lung he had his surgery on and his chest cavity resulting in a collapsed lung. They immediately hooked up a "chest drain" to get the fluids out and as of last night he still had the drain device on. Now that he is able to do his breathing exercises his lung should re-inflate back to normal. He is looking and feeling better and should be coming home in the next few days if everything goes well.

Thanks to everyone who kept him and the rest of our family in your thoughts and prayers, it is greatly appreciated. If you have tried to call his cell or my parents' house they haven't been up to talking to anybody except immediate family, but my dad says he will return phone calls and send out emails when he gets home and is feeling better.

Last week I got to the point where I'm just downright fucking sick of not having any extra money. I usually get paid on Friday and by Monday I'm lucky to have about $20 to last me until I get paid again. Between the bills and groceries there's no money left to do anything extra. My lawsuits should be settled in the early spring but after being broke for the past seven years, every time I get a shut-off notice from cable, electricity or my phone carrier I feel like I am just going to snap and choke the living shit out of my lawyer.

I talked with my lawyer last week about taking out a loan against my 3rd party lawsuit for around $50,000. He gave me a number to a guy who does settlement funding and I talked with him. He made it clear that by the time I would be able to pay the money back, the interest will have compounded and the $50k would be worth $200k. In the scope of things $200k will be like chump change to the money I will get, hopefully in the spring.

Why do I need that kind of money now?

I've been on probation for some dumb shit for the last 5 years and I've completed all the requirements to get off probation expect paying the $1000 I owe in fines. To top that off I haven't had a valid license in about 6 years because of drunk drivings. I owe the state about $5000 in driver responsibility fees, and they've even sent me a letter a while back that they were going to garnish my taxes, wages, and seize my bank account.

What a fucking joke!

If the $50k loan is approved I will pay off probation, pay the driver responsibility fees, and hire a lawyer to help me get my license back. So there's around $10k-$15k, but I will be the happiest mofo if I am able to do just that.

I've struggled with the "system" here in Michigan since my accident. Yes it sucks but I don't want anybody's pity. I've applied for social security temporary disability and have been denied three times. Even IF I were to miraculously receive benefits from the state for disability, I could also qualify for medicade, and the state would want repayment of anything they have given me if I were to settle any type of settlement. Is it me, or do I just get fucked every which way I turn. I can't tell you how many 10's of 1000's of dollars I paid in FICA, Federal, and State taxes as an apprentice Boilermaker who claimed Single and Zero most of the time. I know now that you can't turn to the government for assistance if you've earned an honest living most of your adult life.

We've gotten state aid for Kindra and the girls. Health insurance for them and state child care assistance for my daughter to attend Michigan's Head Start program. They've been on for 3 years and then all of a sudden this past August the state "lost all of Kindra's paperwork" and closed her case. It's taken her these past 3 or so months just to get in contact with somebody at the Department of Health and Human services just to get the insurance benefits and child care for Olivia back. Now that's she's got the paperwork refiled we'll see how long it actually takes to get my kids back on the program. I just pray that they don't get sick or get the fucking swine flu while there's a lapse in their health insurance.

In the event that state doesn't approve the kids for health care, I am going to have to buy them insurance out of pocket so the money that's left over from getting my shit squared up with probation and my driver's license may have to go toward the purchase of health insurance. Kindra and I have talked about putting money down on the house we rent so that we could buy it and be able to call it "ours."

Last January Kindra bought a 2007 G6 GT with a rather high interest rate loan. The high interest wasn't because of bad credit, but because of not really having any credit at all. The loan money would go to pay that car off to get away from all the money in interest she's paying now.

Lately I've just been fed up with people in general. Banks charging ridiculous overdraft fees. I lost count of how many $35 overdraft fees Kindra has had to pay because she's went over $5-$10. Late fees on our bills because we pay on them weekly and not all at once on the due date. We find it easier to pay them down weekly but then we're charged money to do so. That is the only way we can pay our bills and still put food in the fridge to last a week.

We hardly ever go out to eat because what we spend in one sitting at a restaurant is enough money for me to make dinner at home for two or three nights. I usually try to cook everyday but with my dad being in the hospital and all the running back and forth I've kind of been slacking down to four to five nights a week. Over the years I've been off work I've learned to cook well enough that people rave about some of the meals I make.

One of my dreams when I do finally get my settlement money is to move down south, most likely the Carolinas or Georgia, and open myself up a restaurant. I love to cook and I love to watch when people are eating and enjoying the food I made. I guess you could call me the "voyeuristic cook."

One thing is for certain when I do become an overnight millionaire I'm not going to change who I am. I will live a modest life somewhere with my family and I will show my gratitude to anyone whose ever helped me out over the years.

I haven't been writing much lately because I just haven't had the desire. I don't care to write about politics, war, or religion...it's all depressing stuff to me. But I do miss writing and interacting with my readers so I will try to write more and keep my readers informed with what is going on with my life since there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel.

I canceled my second Myspace account about a month or so ago after my first one got deleted in August. I had about 300-350 reader who would read my blogs and I couldn't build my readers back up on the second account I made, plus Kindra didn't care for the people I was "interacting" with in my blogs so I decide to part ways with Myspace and continue to write here when I do.

So anyway, thanks for reading. I will keep y'all updated with my sarcasm and cynical life. I changed the comment box so that you don't have to have a gmail account to comment on this blog. Use the scroll box and choose an option for leaving a comment.

Thanks again,

Mike

No Pigeons Here

2009-11-03T17:13:00.001-05:00

It was early one cold January day like today when my phone rang. I reach over to look and it's this chick Jennifer so I hit ignore as I had for the past couple weeks now.

It had been a week since she called and I even deleted her from my phone book, but I recognized the Cincinnati area code.

I quickly wait for the voicemail I know she'll leave, most certainly hate mail.

Finally it arrives and I call. One new message from 513........

"I am calling to congratulate on winning the asshole of the year award. You know I thought you were something special, an eagle. You're nothing but a pigeon so GO SHIT ON YOURSELF!!!"

I press 9 to save the message.........

Woohoo!!!! It was only January 6th of 2001. Such an achievement to win so early in the year! I couldn’t wait to brag to my Boilermaker buddies that night; I knew they would be envious when I played them the message!

I had met this girl from Cincinnati through a friend we'll call John. He said she was cool, so I agreed to meet her when she came to visit friends and family here in the 313.

I thought she was a pretty decent chick; she was a bank manager, had her own apartment, no kids and she liked to drink.

We were kind of leading a parallel life in two different towns.

She on one hand made great money at the bank, and liked to have fun.

Me on the other, raking in the OT as well as the cash behind it, and I was all about having fun.

Working, Drinking, Smoking, and hanging with my boys. Fun, fun, fun!

We starting talking on the phone, which I guess kind of turned into dating. We both worked a lot, but she agreed to come up one weekend to hang out and I told her she could stay at my apartment.

She came up, we hit the bars, and got shitfaced like a mother! Well I was lit, but not as brightly as her. I was a little well more seasoned but she wasn’t that far behind. It's time to leave the bar and she's having a hard time walking and I'm not having the easiest time shuffling as we hold each other up.

We get into the car and it’s less than a mile to my apartment thankfully. We get in the door, she says she’s gotta use the bathroom and I swan dive into the bed with coat and shoes on.

I wake up sometime right before day break and take my shoes off. Where could this drunk be?

She's not in the bed next to me and I've been passed out for hours.

I walk to the bathroom and open the door and there she is, curled up in a ball with her panties and nylons around her ankles, and the rug she was lying upon is soaking wet!!

I'm thinking, "HEY I just bought that Martha Stewart shit and she pissed on it".

She had obviously either passed out sitting on the toilet or fell down and passed out getting ready to use the toilet, either way I am appalled.

I tried waking her and I checked to make sure she was breathing when she didn’t wake up.

I should've severed ties then.

On another weekend she came up, my friends Steve and Sean were throwing a party at their house. I knew better than to get too fucked up around this chick because I would be the one who had to drive.

She's three sheets to the wind at the party and starts telling our mutual friend John's girlfriend that she (Jennifer) loves John like a brother. She just goes off and starts blabbering some fucking fairy tale about how her parents and John's parents go way back. John's dad lives in Atlanta and his mom in Allen Park; her parents live in Kentucky. John's Greek woman becomes enraged by her mindless drunken fairy tale.

It's time to take this bitch home before she gets killed.

The next day I wake her up and tell her she's gotta go back to Cincinnati early. I knew she had no recollection of her fabrication. I was through with her; I was not into the role reversal where I was the sitter when we drank. It's supposed to be the other way around.

There is now just 2 weeks until Christmas. I avoid her calls all through the holidays and just when I think she has gotten the point she calls after New Years.

On the evening of January 6, 2001 I made it into work around 6:30 pm at Belle River power plant. My buddies and I are all sitting around ready to go to work at 7 pm.

"You guys wanna hear something funny!?!?" I say with excitement as I called my voicemail.

"I am calling to ........... GO SHIT ON YOURSELF!!!"

The crew of 40 men gathered around when they heard the laughter from the guys at my table, even the foreman and the super. I had to replay it several times in a row so everybody could hear.

It was a rather glorious and stunning achievement bestowed upon me so early in the year. I was the envy of all my working peers!

© Mike McDonnell

The Bitch Slap

2009-10-26T10:15:00.000-04:00
Last night me, Kindra, my daughters, and my baby cousin attended a "Trunk or Treat" that the church has every year.

Just a little insight. I rarely attend church. What's my excuse? I don't care to attend. But I decided to go along for the Trunk or Treat.

We went inside the gym for a few to let the kids play on the bouncy things. Said hi to a few folks then I went outside when they got ready to serve pizza. There were hundreds of people there so I went out to talk to a friend's husband.

I went over to the friend's Scion, where he had the trunk open and was talking with his new father in-law. I asked how they both were and asked the hubby what was new.

"Same old same old" he replied.

He asked what I had been up to and I gave him the "same old same old" bit. Then the father in-law put in his 2 cents.

"Yep same old stuff, just sitting around." He turns and says to his son in-law and says "that's all he does is sit around all day."

For somebody I have only met a half a dozen times sure knows how to push my fucking buttons.

"Yeah, sit around all day buddy" was the extent of my smart ass comment before I turned and walked away.

So it's this I wonder. What does he really know about me? And where does he get his information.

Seeing that I don't attend church often as Kindra he feels inclined to feel I just sit around. Or maybe she tells her friends at church all I do is sit around.

Does he know why I sit around so much?

Because I can't work.

I don't even think he's worthy of hearing the story of why that is. Maybe he knows somewhat of what has happened to me.

Does he know how well I can cook? Maybe he's mad because he's never been over to eat at my house.

Does he know that there's a hot meal almost every night of the week, and Kindra, the kids, and I all sit down as a family to eat?

Does he know that I sit down and color with the kids. Does he know that my kids love to make their own dinosaurs and color them?

Does he know I try to teach my kids responsibility and routine. Each school day I make them eat breakfast, take their vitamins, and shower. After they shower they know to brush their teeth then get dressed. Does he know this?

Does I sit and read books with the kids while they play Barbies?

Does he know that I make sure they brush their teeth before I tuck them in at night?

He must!!!!!!!!!!!

Because I go to church so often to mingle with people who like to pass judgment on others.

Years ago a man like that might have got bitch slapped for that kind of comment.

...story of my life

2009-10-23T10:29:00.001-04:00
Life flight to base. We have twenty five year old Caucasian male, severe burns to legs, hands, face, and lower torso. Patient's vitals are stable at the moment, but blood pressure is steadily increasing. Patient also stated he was in pain and was having difficulty breathing. EMT's confirmed that patient has suffered internal burns as well. Pain meds were administered and patient is sedated. Estimated Time of Arrival is twelve minutes.

This is what I remember from my last day at work. Was this the beginning of the end for me? I wasn't going to fold because I hadn't any trump cards left in this game of life. It was time to renege and just pray that I didn't get caught.

At one time I used to be the jack of all trades and master of none, but that was until I had become a Boilermaker, or more less a high pressure welder. So what if the job was the dirtiest I ever had. I had a job I loved and a pocket full of money. Being an apprentice and a second generation Boilermaker was all I needed to give me the grandeur visions of the sugar coated life I was trying to achieve. I was on top of the world and it finally felt like my life was on the right track after 25 years of mistakes.

Life flight to base. We are approaching the landing pad. Patient is now in critical condition and his throat has started to swell. We will need a vent in place upon arrival.

As the life flight neared the landing pad there were several nurses awaiting the arrival of the helicopter. It's not an everyday thing to air lift patients to a hospital unless they are in a serious condition. The medical staff knew this and were adequately prepared as the helicopter was about to touch down.

"Okay!! Let's get the patient to the ER! Plastic surgeons are waiting to assess the situation. We have to finish cutting off his clothing to see how bad the damage is. The vent is in place in the ER!"

Slipping in and out of consciousness I could feel the gurney rolling down the never-ending corridor to the ER. The staff around me was scurrying. The sounds of their slip-on shoes shuffled together as if orchestrated. At this point, I felt comfortably numb to the commotion around me with only thoughts of the closest of family in my head. I couldn't begin to imagine how bad they would take the news of me being injured at work.

"Hello Mike. I'm Doctor Cederna. On the count of three we are going to lift you from the gurney onto a table so that we can finish removing your clothes and get you on the way to feeling better again..."

"Okay Doc"

"Here we go!! One.., two.., three!!"

The voices! The voices of the frenzied medical staff had started to become distant. Everything started to seem as if it we being played out in slow motion. The orchestrated sound of slip-on shoes becoming faint. I was no longer in control of my movements. Was I in control of what was to become of me? What about my family?

"Let's get the patient stabilized and prepped for the I.C.U. If I had to take a guess, this patient has burned probably about fifty percent of his body. Since burns can take up to forty-eight hours to run their course and actually stop burning, there is no need to take him to the tub room to get the wounds cleaned."

"Doctor", one of the frenzied nurses said, "The patient has a wallet with no contact info, but he does have a cell phone with him."

"Good. Let's see if there is a phone number for anyone we can contact, preferably his parents. In the meantime, let's get the patient wrapped loosely in some non-stick bandages as the swelling will increase significantly. Make a call and get an anesthesiologist down here. We are going to induce the patient into a coma because of the severity of the burns. Once we have him sedated we need to get the vent in before his throat swells shut. The pain is going to be unbearable if the patient wakes up and that's not what we want."

"Yes Doctor", the nurses replied in unison.

So there I lay, wrapped from head to toe in gauze, as if it was Halloween and I was dressed as a mummy with a tube down my throat. Every now and then I would take all my strength and any willpower I had left inside me, just to make sure I was still the one in control of my life, and open an eye. I plead to God inside my mind. "Please God; I know you call the shots. I know this is your world we're living in, but if you are taking me please give me one last chance to see my family while I'm still in physical form. One last glimpse of the ones I love to take with me forever. Please God, Please." Off to sleep I went.

At this point I was in an induced coma.

Finally I had awaked to see my family by my bedside sobbing. I tried to shout and tell jokes to let them know that the Mike they knew was still here, but they couldn't hear me. Why couldn't they hear me? I could here myself perfectly fine. Why were they crying? I was going to be okay, or so I thought.

"Nurse, NURSE!!!" I shouted. I had finally been acknowledged by one of the nurses.

"What DO YOU want?"

"I'd like something to drink. Would it be too much to trouble you for a damn soda?"

"If you want a soda, get up and get it your damn self!"

All the nurses turn to look at the spectacle I had become and began to laugh and point as if we were children on the playground and I was the fool who fell of the monkey bars.

Why were these nurses acting this way? I knew this whole scenario wasn't right so off to sleep I drifted again.

"Well Mr. and Ms. McDonnell", said Doctor Cederna.

"Please call us Jim and Marlene."

"If I could please have you calm down for just a moment I will try to explain your son's condition."

"CALM DOWN?!?" sobbed my parents. "Why is he so swollen up? Why do you have a tube down his throat? Is he going to live?"

"As you know your son was in an accident at work where he was burned significantly over multiple parts of his body. What we don't know is the percentage of how much of his body is burned. These first twenty-four hours are critical in your son's survival. If he makes it through the first twenty-four his chances of survival greatly increase. If he makes it through the initial forty-eight hours, he will survive. The swelling of your son's body is normal"

"But to the size it is now? For Christ' sake he's about tripled in size..." Jim screamed.

"Chris and Chris, thank god you guys are here! This hospital staff is cuckoo. I think they're trying to kill me..Hey, guys!!"

"Why what are they doing to ya Mike?"

"Last night they let me piss all over myself then let me lay in it. They didn't clean it up until just before you guys came. They also told me to get out of the bed and get my own damn soda, and kept pointing and laughing at me. There's something really funny about this hospital staff. I don't like it here."

"You sound tired Mike; maybe you should close your eyes and get some rest."

"Okay, Jaime! Lower me down the lead and the bucket of tools then come on down."

"I'll be down in just a sec. Something's wrong with my harness. Don't go in that hole until I get down there Mike."

It was a long drop into this ancient old coal burning boiler. It probably hadn't been run in decades. Lord knows why they would want to do any kind of maintenance to this piece of junk. What were they going to use it for? Man this place was dirty. Fly ash from the spent coal was on everything it could rest on. It even made it difficult to breathe because everything you touched sent this ash airborne.

"We need a doctor in ICU room four!! The patient is pulling the vent tube out of his throat, as well as the feeding tube. Get a doctor in here! Quick!"

"Did you bring me a respirator Jaime? This damn fly ash is making it hard to breathe down here."

"Of course I did Mike!"

I strapped on the respirator so that I could breathe a little easier. Jaime and I proceeded to open

the trap door to the entrance of the room where our work was.

"I gave the patient a sedative which will calm him down. If we have to, we can put restraints on his arms to make sure he doesn't pull the vent out", said the doctor.

"I don't think that will be necessary Doctor." Replied one of the nurses.

"This young man has about fifty family members and friends in the waiting room awaiting their

turn to see him. It seems these rages only come after seeing a family member. Are you sure we

shouldn't restrain him?" one of the nurses implied.

We had finally got this fly ash encrusted door open. I was dark inside this little room where we had to go in and weld some plates to the wall. We still couldn't figure out the purpose of our work on this ancient boiler. There was no point in fixing this piece of garbage. It didn't even have electricity to power tools or lights. All the power we had was from our portable welding machines.

"Well I guess I'll go in and get these plates welded Jaime." I said.

"Are you sure you don't want me to go in and do it? It'll only take a few minutes."

"Nah. Just have one of those apprentices up top throw down some electricity and some drop lights."

I crawled into the hole with a drop light. I had all the materials I needed for the job. The little spots on the walls where the plates were to be welded were all prepped. Just as I put my welding hood on, the resistors in this tiny room started to hum as if power was restored.

"Jaime!! What's going on out there? There's not supposed to be power to anything in here except for what we brought!!" I screamed in terror. "I don't know what's going on Mike. Somehow the boiler has been fired up!! How the hell can that be?!?"

There I was in this little room of resistors that had started to hum and glow red as the power went through them. The humming sound was like I had my ear next to a 747 jumbo jet while it was taking off. At that moment I didn't need any light. The resistors had become cherry red all around me as I started to burn.

"Excuse me, nurse." said Marlene. "What's the matter with my son? Why is his blood pressure 198/133?"

"Well Ms. McDonnell, with the extent of Mike's trauma and his overall body temperature mixed with the combinations of drugs, his blood pressure will be on the high side for a few days."

"High side!" Marlene cried.

I awoke to see my very good friends from high school Matt and Tony. I hadn't kept in touch with Matt as much as I had Tony. I knew Tony since kindergarten at St. Mary's. We used like to smoke some left handed cigarettes once in a while, but at the present time I had out grown such childish things and our friendship remained.

"Tony, Matt, you guys have to get me out of here. The staff is brutal to me."

How is that?" they replied.

"When I have visitors the staff is cordial, but when everyone's gone they treat me like a prisoner."

"We can get you outta here if you want. We can arrange it for tonight."

"Most definitely!"

"You look tired Mike get some rest and we'll be back for you later tonight."

"Okay."

Later that night the staff came in and took me from my bed and put me onto a gurney. I could hear the muffled voices of the staff saying something about the operating room. Once again I was on a long journey down a never-ending corridor with the faint beeping of the blood pressure monitor in the background. I kept thinking over and over again that it was only a matter of time before Matt and Tony would be here to rescue me from persecution. From time to time I was able to open my eyes, but the lights streaming along the corridor were blinding. It was cold, very cold. Who was I going to tell with a tube down my throat?

"Hello Mr. McDonnell. We are going to perform one of several skin grafts on you today," one of the nurses said as they moved me from the gurney to the operating table. Somehow I was able to open my eyes and keep them open. As I was lying on the operating table I was able to see everyone in the OR. To my surprise I noticed the surgeon administer himself what I guess was morphine. At that moment I tried to get up and get the hell out. Why would the surgeon be taking morphine before he was going to perform surgery on me?

"What the hell are you doing doctor? You're not operating on me while on morphine!"

"Hush up! I'm the surgeon and you're the patient. The morphine helps to relax me and gives me a steady hand during the procedure. Besides, if you don't like it you're free to leave!"

I squirmed and squirmed, but nothing. I was strapped to the operating table. All the while, the surgeon was taking his own dose of morphine, as well as his interns. The laughter grew as I tried to escape. I knew escape was inevitable so I gave in and just lay there. Had Matt and Tony just been filling my ears with what I wanted to hear, or were they really coming to save from these wacko doctors and hospital staff? All I could do was wait.

The doctors proceeded to bring these long, steel flat bars into the OR. These bars were about eighteen inches long, quarter of an inch thick, and about an inch wide. What these bars were for I hadn't a clue. That was until the rolled me over onto my stomach and strapped me back down again. The doctors proceeded to put these bars vertically over my calves. How they got them to stay in place I dare to ask.

Once the operation was over I was taken back to the ICU room I called home. I was so doped up that I could only feel the discomfort of the bars on my legs.

"How did surgery go Doctor?" Jim and Marlene asked.

"There is significant damage to his legs, mainly his calves, but overall the first surgery went well." Doctor Cederna stated.

"We had to administer more anesthetic so Mike may be asleep most of the night. Tentatively, there is another operation scheduled for tomorrow."

I awoke to the sound of a helicopter outside my window. Over a loudspeaker I could hear the voice of Tony, "Mike, we're here for you man. Break the window and we'll throw you a rope to pull you out of here!"

In the meantime, sirens in the hospital started to go off as Tony broke the window. The sirens that blared were so loud I felt as if my ears were going to bleed.

"Come on Mike, we gotta go!"

"I can't get up Tony; I got these steel bars on my legs so I can't walk."

"Okay then, I'll come in for you!"

Just as Tony said that, in flew another chopper that shot down Matt and Tony's.

All I could think was that my only way out of this hellish hospital was Matt and Tony, and now that's gone. What was I to do? There was nothing I could do I could no longer walk because of the bars on my legs. I began to think. Was I dying and this was God way of repaying me for all the sins I had once committed? Or had I already died and stuck in purgatory? I would give anything not to be in the hell I was living.

"Well good news Mr. and Ms. McDonnell!" said Dr. Cederna. "It's been seven days since your son's accident and the swelling in his throat has decreased enough to take the vent out. Now we will keep him sedated for a few more days to ensure his comfort level."

"Oh thank you doctor" they replied.

"Nurse it is really hot in this room. Could you turn down the heat a bit for me?"

"Oh poor baby can't stand the heat. Well how about I turn it all the way up for you? How would you like that? Is that all you do is complain Mike? You act like you're the only patient we have!"

Several days had passed and so had several operations. The vent was taken out of me and they began to bring me back from the coma I was in. My parents had been there religiously waiting for me to become coherent.

"Hey mom! Where the hell am I? What happened to me?

Mom and dad both came over to my bed and began to cry as they hugged and kissed me.

"What's with all the emotions?"

"If you only knew" replied my father. "If you only knew."

"What the hell are these boots on my legs? Man they hurt like hell."

"Mike, you burned about forty percent of your body at work. You were in a drug induced coma for 10 days, and they kept you sedated till now."

"Ok, so what day is it?"

"Thursday" my father replied.

"Damn I got to get up and out of here. I've been in here over a week. That means my friend Steve's wedding is Saturday. I have to pick up my tux and I have to get a haircut. I have wedding rehearsal tomorrow! Give me a hand getting up will ya?"

Both of my parents stood there laughing at me and my ambitions. They knew the seriousness of my situation, and knew I wasn't going anywhere for quite a while. For a minute I tried to get out of bed, but found I couldn't move my limbs. I had been bedridden for ten days and had lost so much muscle mass that something as easy as lifting a leg was a task. I never really knew the extent of what had happened to me until the nurses came in later that evening to do a bandage change.

Later in the evening when the nurses came to take me for my bath was when the truth finally hit home. In the tub room, as the nurses unwrapped my bandages, is when the severity of my burns had become clear. I had suffered severe burns to the legs, hands, upper body, and face. By the time I realized what had happened, I already had five skin grafts. My legs and hands were burnt the worse, but despite my condition I was still alive. Even though menial tasks were by themselves tasks, I was able to learn how to walk again. The awful pain in my legs was from these big plastic boots the doctors had put on me while lying in bed. The purpose of the boots was to protect my new skin, and to keep me from becoming pigeon-toed from being in bed for so long. I had spent a total of six weeks at the University Hospital.

Everyday things began to have a whole new meaning as I began to heal. I used to talk about everything I was going to do when I got out of the hospital, all the places I was going to go, and all the people I wanted to visit. After a couple of weeks in the hospital I was on a first name basis with most of the nursing staff. I had survived trauma and lived. Life was grand again, and the hospital menu was quite exquisite; some of the best food I had ever tasted! Colors had become more vivid, smells more unique, and the sunlight much warmer and brighter than I had ever realized. Who could say they cheated death and won? I was given a second chance at life. A life that would have more importance; more meaning than just waking up and going to work, and never really slowing down to notice the little things that make life grand.

© Mike McDonnell 2004

About my Dad...

2009-10-13T07:10:00.000-04:00
A few weeks ago my dad was diagnosed with lung cancer and Waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia. Waldenstrom's is a blood type cancer. That time he had checked himself in because over the course of a couple months he had been feeling severely fatigued, and had barely energy to do anything. Over those couple weeks he had started to look pale and physically tired.

Upon the first blood test the doctors found his blood's hemoglobin to be very low. Normal range for a man is 14 and his was 7 when. Immediately they began blood transfusions to bring his hemoglobin count back up.

Dad had the whole work-up while there. CAT scans, x-rays, blood tests every 6-8 hours. Doctors couldn't figure out where the blood was going: he wasn't bleeding internally, or through his urine or stool, and no external bleeding such as a bloody nose. The doctors decided to do a bone marrow biopsy.

He had spent nearly a week in the hospital before doctors could give him a diagnosis. They had found lymph nodes swollen in various parts of his body. A scan found a small mass, about the size of your fingertip, on his left lung. The lung cancer was not related to all the years of smoking, but the doctors deemed it to be environmental.

He went to an oncologist for a second opinion who confirmed the first diagnosis: stage 2 lung cancer and Waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia. The oncologist explained that the mass on his lung was so small that they could surgically remove it before it spreads, and the Waldenstrom's could be treated with a drug called Rituxin.

As bad as the news may have seemed, the prognosis was very good. The doctors wanted to start the Rituxin treatment right away and get him in immediately to remove the spot on his lung. The oncologist explained to my father that people with Waldenstrom's who received the treatments had an 80% chance of never having a problem with the disease for many years if at all.

Through all of this my dad has had the best outlook and is ready to attack these problems head on. He had his first treatment on Friday and on Saturday he looked and felt like a million bucks.

Yesterday was his lung operation. Doctors were concerned that the lymph nodes throughout his body that were swollen may be related to the spot on his lung. My dad's hemoglobin count had dipped back down and the doctors decided not to biopsy a lymph node in his chest area but they proceeded with the lung operation. Their concern was that they couldn't control the bleeding in his chest if they had removed a lymph node, but the bleeding in the lungs could be controlled.

Last night I went up to see my dad in intensive care and it was hard to fight back tears. I could see he was in a lot of pain. At that moment I knew how he must have felt when I was in the intensive care unit and it was him looking down at me. They got my dad set up with a machine to administer his pain meds at the push of a button: he was doing a lot of button mashing while I was there. The nurse showed me his back where the incision was and the bandage was pretty large. The surgeon had told my mom that he was only going to make a cut large enough to get his hand in -- ouch!

The oncologist came in to check on him last night while I was there and said that he should be able to get up and out of bed today. But that seems like wishful thinking on the doctor's part. The doctor also said that test results show that the Rituxin is already working.

The doctor's said that he should be in the hospital approximately 7-10 days. After he gets out he'll have about a 3 month recovery over which time he will resume the Rituxin treatments.

Getting past these first few days of post-op will be painful and we're keeping our fingers crossed that the swollen lymph nodes are not related to the spot on his lung. If they are related that means he'll have to do chemotherapy.

I really hate the word "chemo." It seems to be a killer more than a treatment.

What really irks me is that my dad just retired 5 years ago from the Boilermaker's trade after 25 years of service. The whole point of retiring from work is to enjoy the money you've made over the years, and not have to deal with serious health issues. But what really chaps my ass is that I still have a lawsuit pending from an accident I had as a Boilermaker. I want him to relish in victory with me when my lawsuit is over.

My dad took it pretty hard when I got hurt at work because he had put in all those years without a serious injury and I had been in the trade 2 years and nearly got killed. I know how he felt as he sat at my bedside now. I'd do anything to take his pain away.

Overall he's a tough old bird and his attitude towards getting better is awesome. He still remains positive throughout this whole bump in life's road, and that's what I admire most about him.

Funny Money

2009-10-07T07:07:00.000-04:00

Funny I got this phone call yesterday from a fan but not the kind you think. Usually when I get phone calls from 800 or 888 numbers I don’t answer them and let the voicemail take over. But yesterday, I couldn’t let this particular voicemail go unnoticed.

This collection agency has been calling me for the past couple months. You'd think that after the first dozen failed attempts of trying to recover the $79.80 they'd stop. No, they just had somebody else try calling.

What happened was when my cell phone carrier merged with another wireless carrier; somewhere in the switch to the new billing system $79.80 somehow got scraped off the old carrier’s bill and went into collections. Now I really don’t think it is my fault that they didn’t just leave the $79.80 on my bill which would’ve got paid but instead it went over to collections.

When I got this voicemail that was in a threatening tone of voice, I had to call back to mess with the hothead who left it. I dialed the 800 number, gave them the reference number for my bill, and they connected me with the mad voicemailer.

He answers and demands me to tell him when I am going to pay the $79.80. I asked him to run through his spiel about "this is an attempt to collect a debt...this is being recorded...” If the mad voicemailer who makes a little more than minimum wage is going to be a hothead over 80 bucks, I want it recorded.

"It's $80 dollars. Do you really have to leave me a threatening voicemail everyday?" I asked.

"You have owed us this debt since January 2008 and when did you plan on taking care of it?" the collector said in a snooty voice.

"Well maybe if you stopped harassing me over 80 bucks I'd just send it off in one of the payment envelopes I receive on a weekly basis, but you keep harassing me. You leave long, demanding messages and I call back and we argue over the debt which I don’t quite understand. And our little arguments cost me airtime that could be better spent on something like this very debt. It's not my fault the merging of two cell companies left me in collection status."

Now I am starting to get underneath the collector's skin.

"It's $79.80 and how did you plan to take care of this today?"

"I don’t. How much do you make an hour?"

"That's none of your business sir. Now how are we going to resolve this matter?"

"We're not going to resolve anything today. So let's see, I'd say you make $10 an hour. You've been calling me for months over $80 and I'm sure that your company has spent at least 8 hours trying to recover this debt. That's $80 right there. If you hound me this much for this measly amount of money, I'd hate to see what a real ass you can be to somebody who owes hundreds or thousands."

I ended the call while I was ahead. I mean really, is it worth harassing somebody over $80? I went and dug up one of the envelopes they had sent me that had a return envelope. I took $80 out of my Monopoly game and stuffed it in the return envelope with the bill.

I could pay it but that would mean sacrificing something like a bag of groceries or diapers to pay this bill so I sent them some funny money. On the bill I wrote “credit my cell phone account the 20 cents.”

© Mike McDonnell 2008

The House Bitch Extraordinaire

2009-10-07T06:58:00.000-04:00

I ran across this video on Yahoo today about 'men doing more house work.'

I found it pretty funny because when a man does more housework than a woman, he's known as the 'house bitch'.

Since I don’t work and my old lady does, guess who gets stuck having to cook, clean, and then have sex at the end of the night?

None other than yours truly! The first couple years of it suck a donkey dick, but I've grown accustomed to it....being Mr. Mom.

Mom and the kids leave in the mornings by 9 am to start their days at work and school. Of course a house bitch is up before the sun; if not you’re getting six lashes from the tongue of a mad woman.

Up in the morning usually before 6 am to make my pot of rocket fuel. I would have an anxiety attack if for some reason I didn’t have coffee that morning or knew I would have to get dressed and run to Tim Horton's. It's hard for someone with OCD to break routine ya know?

I have till 7-7:30 am then its time to wake everyone in the house, even the lazy bulldog, but momma bear. Not until the heathens are dressed and I've got breakfast crammed down their throats that the momma bear comes out of hibernation. A big stretch up a morning yawn before I am summoned for the first kiss: a good house bitch gets these kinds of perks!

Once mom and the kiddies are all off it's time for Mr. Mom's breakfast of champions. A left hand lucky followed by a Mt. Dew is all the motivation one needs to get into laundry mode. The shit is never ending in a household of five.

I may get a spare moment here and there to plug in the guitar and rock for a few. That is if I don’t have an appointment somewhere or a mile long grocery list to knock out. For a man that doesn’t work, I am the busiest mutha on the planet.

All this in an effort to get laid. It's not like I have a BIG bonus check coming from work or some dividends rolling in on a quarterly basis that I can buy diamonds and shit with. Nope. I have to earn my keep.

So before the family starts pouring in like hungry wolves from a long day at work or school, this obedient house bitch will be serving dinner with a smile. Remember....friendly service means good tip! My tip will be dinner at the Y.

After a long hard day and the kiddies are tucked away all comfy and cozy and you can hear the dog's snoring resonate through the hardwood floors: it is only then that the obedient house bitch gets some loving from momma bear.

It’s not as bad as it sounds. The laundry is folded and the wood floors have been cleaned with Murphy's oil soap and I get to hone my OCD skills. I've even learned to be a gourmet kid's chef.

In my slack time, I get to fuck around on myspace, blognag, and play a tune or two on the guitar. I even learned the soulja boy dance. Cook, clean, dance and fuck. I even know how to brew my own beer and wine. What more could a woman ask for? Diamonds?

You don’t need diamonds if you've got a good house bitch!

© Mike McDonnell 2007

The Pink Cap

2009-10-06T11:09:00.000-04:00
The other evening I was painting in the basement and had on an old hat from work. The type of hat is a Landry cap that protects a welder's head from sparks. The two girls found the hat to be cool. I both of them try it on. They thought they were cool.

I got to thinking as they tried the hat on.

Hey Gabby, Olivia: I have a pink work hat just like that one. I'll have to find it.

They get all giddy whenever their dad wears pink. They love my pink shirts, so they were pretty engrossed in dad's pink work hat.

As they finished their dinners I went and found the pink Landry cap I had tucked away in the bottom of my clothes closet. I had to make sure to shake the spiders out before I showed it to them.

Here's the deal girls: the first one to get done putting away all their toys gets to wear the hat first.

Gabby and Olivia had mad a monstrous mess with their toys in the basement and they worked together to put everything away. They both wanted to wear the pink welding cap first!!!

They cleaned everything nicely but Olivia got done first, which was a very first for her, so she got to wear the pink cap. I told Olivia she had to share the cap with Gabby, take turns. Olivia got to be cool like daddy for a little while and then she let Gabby wear it so that Gabby could clean her room and be cool while she did it.

The hat worked like magic. As Gabby cleaned her room, I helped Olivia with hers.

Rooms clean + beds made + pajamas + toothbrush = bedtime at 8pm.

Boy did I ever trick them with this silly hat. We'll see how much momentum with chores we can maintain with the cap............

Yes I did catch some hell for wearing a pink hat while at work. All good fun though. But my girls find my work hat highly amusing. Went from getting teased at work to now getting teased by a 4 and 5 year old set of girls.

The No Collar Worker

2009-08-04T22:22:00.000-04:00
I told you how my morning started but if you weren't quick you missed out on that slice of life.

I had to take Kindra to the doctor for a case of butt hurt this morning. I posted the sentence "off to the doctor to check on my butt hurt" on my Facefuck page. I get back home and notice I have a new message from the pastor of the church I semi-belong to; apparently my mom is the only one not networking. Mike, You're sick. I guess that's why we get along so well.

Since he's not a friend via Facebook he's only privy to selected information. Religious views: The Antichrist By golly I've never been struck by lightning but I can guarantee he's going to pull me aside to ask questions.

Wrong answer = lightning bolt

So a long time friend is going to get a job with Kindra in the real estate business. From I.T. to selling homes. He goes to interview with Kindra's boss earlier today. Well he's totally opposite of Mike....

Okay. What's that supposed to mean?

He's a white collar worker and I'm a no collar worker. If it requires a shirt with more than two buttons....fuck that shit.

I'm slaving over a hot stove while I drill my old lady on the differences between my friend and I, according to her boss.

-You're just not the professional type. *Well what type am I?

-You're more like a trucker or sailor.

*Because I use the "F" word in almost every sentence?

I may not have a regular job per say but somebody has to keep things real.

Happy Birthday Gabrielle

2009-04-15T11:12:00.001-04:00
Today's my daughter's birthday, she's 5 to be exact. Last Tuesday we attended a kindergarten round-up to get her ready for the fall. Unbeknownst to mom and I that is was a "parent's only meeting." I picked the girls up from head-start school and the first thing Gabrielle says to me while buckling herself into her booster seat was "daddy I am so happy cuz today I am going to kindergarten!" I explained to her it was just a meeting but her happiness I shared. I am just as excited as she is about her starting school because she is very smart. On Saturday we had Gabby's party ahead of her actual birthday. Family and friends attended and it was nice. Gabby made out like a bandit on gifts; most of which were clothes, puzzles, lots of school "stuff". Gabby is so ready to be a big kindergartner. We got her lots of learning books to get her ready, reading and writing before she starts the big K in the fall. She is very excited about learning to write and is starting to spell things on her own. This morning at the grocery store as we waited in the car for mom to get cupcakes for school, Gabby spelled out the words "Kroger" and "food". Both signs on the store. Now we are working on familiarizing her with the letters and phonics. Every night we have been doing her little writing tablets and reading her new beginner's books. The books contain two short stories, then asks questions about the story. When she first picked up the pencil more than a year ago now, what seems like just yesterday, I asked her "wouldn't it be nice to learn how to write stories to share with your friends?" She got the biggest look of amazement and when she finally came to she said "daddy, I want to write stories too." That was a year ago and she is on her way to reading and writing. Both of which will put her way ahead of her classmates. Around this last Valentine's day I started to write them their own fairytale and got into it pretty far. I read it to Gabby and Olivia, and both were mystified over the fact that daddy had wrote it. They were very excited. I told them "picture this in your head as I read….." They used their imaginations as I read and both were indulged to the characters. The characters which mom and dad were the starring roles. Kids are creative sponges. I am grateful that I can show them one outlet where their minds can run free. © Mike McDonnell 2009

The Foil Hat

2009-04-13T10:55:00.000-04:00
Yesterday was Easter and my mom always hosts dinner that evening for the whole family. It's awesome. I get to see my family, eat great food, and indulge in really fattening deserts. During these holiday gatherings we get to catch up on gossip and such as well as meet my cousin's new boyfriend. I had heard the day before at Gabby's birthday party that her new man is an FBI agent. "Well ain't that fucking great. He's not welcome in my house." I joked seriously with family and friends. I related all my bad experiences with law enforcement to her boyfriend. I sure as hell won't be inviting the man in my house for any reason, no matter who he might be dating. I hate all badges equally, I don’t discriminate various organizations. So there we were at Easter dinner and the whole family is already in the "know" about my thoughts on a certain cousin's new beau. I walked into the kitchen and I could feel the tension in the air. My sixth sense felt that my joke was out of the bag and everybody knew but him. Maybe he knew, but I politely greeted myself and shook his hand. He looks like a mountain man with a full thick beard. I grabbed my little cousin and asked if he wanted to go smoke. He knew that was the cue to make our move to the front of the house away from the patio outside the kitchen. Don't want to be burning a grape blunt in front of the man's plain view. Me and WAP burned half the blunt and went in to get our grub on…stoned out of our minds. I made a big plate of food and went downstairs to the other dining area to keep an eye on my shitlins. Of course my mom comes down and mere remarks how red my eyes are. "Have you been smoking that stuff?" "No way….it's my allergies" I said all giggly as I stuffed ham into my mouth trying not to choke on my own jokes. I sat there with my mom and my aunt and my mom assures me that he only does aerial surveillance. "Well that's nice. He could be flying a little plane or helicopter over my pad and taking hi-def x-rays of what's going on in my crib!" Never trust the man and all his expendable technology being an FBI agent. I made my way outside for my after dinner ciggy and got to hear all about my cousin's Wii Bowling injury. He had his bowling shoes on in his living room and when as he stepped into his snap, his bowling shoe caught an even floor board. He twisted his knee and has been hobbling around since. He said he's got to get a knee brace before this weekend big game…the final game of his Wii Bowling season. "I've got a 200 average!" Now that I was on a roll making jokes about his bowling injury, he focused the conversation on our cousin's new man. I filled him in on just what kind of work he does for the FBI. We laughed as I told Josh that he'll be flying over his pad taking hi-def x-rays too. "You know how it is with technology. I hate to be kickin it in my crib with a tinfoil hat so the man can't steal my thoughts on one of his fly-bys." I told Josh to get some Icy Hot and an brace for his big game next weekend. "Don't worry about the hats, I got us covered with some heavy duty foil and I'll make some for us." © Mike McDonnell 2009

FUNNY FAT GUYS GET THE GIRLS

2009-04-10T20:43:00.000-04:00
In the news today...Women find funny men attractive. Really? I'm sure money was wasted on some study to prove this fact. I'm proof that funny fat guys can get gorgeous women. While some men spend hours in the gym trying to maintain a healthy image, I'm busy eating chocolate/peanutbutter Easter eggs and making new jokes.It's all about image. While you talk about how many muscles you have on your dick, I'll talk about the pack of hotdogs on the back of my neck and how I should be grunting in the gym with you. It's all good. To each his own. Last night I had some of the greatest sex and my milk duds are still twitching. The trick to those 30-0's men, dining at the Y. I've got this porn dvd we were watching one night and I couldnt help but laugh.The ever so muscular guy had his face resting on the side of porno girl's leg and he looked like he was a frog trying to catch flies. It was like an x-rated version of Fear Factor and he was eating a rancid can of tuna. The pleasure of dvd porn ~ you cant smell that nasty snatchbox he was munching on like a novice.Back to being funny...Why would women want to date a man who is so serious about everything? Seriously, they have a pill for the uptightness. I have yet to invent the pill for funny. Two nights ago I went to the gas station to purchase my sleep aid and there was a young black woman there. She said "Oh you go ahead honey." I knew she was diggin on my sacks of cheeseburger eyes.Anywho, I set my G2 on the counter and asked for a pack of Marlboros and Nyquil. Before the smart ass could say anything I whipped out a fistfull of singles and said "hope you dont mind the singles, but you look like you could use a good night at the strip club."Hodgie wasnt amused by my remark, but the young lady standing next to me LOL'd and said "you sumthin else arent you?""I'm a diamond in the rough." I was just talkin the first bit of shit that came to mind. There were more LULz as I left the gas station. Moral of this story. There is none. "Man who tell one too many light bulb jokes soon burn out." © Mike McDonnell 2009