May 16, 2007

-- I’ve been assigned the responsibility of monitoring and making appropriate bids in an eBay auction for Sunshine and Mumbles. It ends today, around noon , and somehow it’s been left to me to make sure they win that bitch. And I don’t much care for it.

They’re bidding on some sort of hilarious apparatus that looks like the oxygen tanks a deep sea diver might wear on his back. I guess it’ll allow Sunny to be more mobile, and presumably do even more shopping. Because, you see, she has lungs the size of tea bags.

Yeah, and I know how that’ll all shake out. Mumbles will end up having to strap on the tank harness, and then be required to walk near her all the time. It’ll be like she’s tethered to the mother ship and on a spacewalk inside TJ Maxx every day. 

I can hear her now: “Dammit Mumbles, the line is stretched! You need to stay within a two-rack radius of me at all times!! …Gawd, you’ve upset me; turn up the flow!”   

I just hope nothing goes wrong, and one of those auction assassins doesn’t come in with two seconds left to go, and the whole thing comes crashing down. Because I’ll get the blame, and it’ll never be forgotten. 

Both of them are completely clueless about the process (they think bids can only be placed from Toney’s computer, and that if you close the page you’ve “disconnected” and are thus out of the running) and are relying on me to make this Hilarious Apparatus procurement deal happen. 

They’ve already called me twice this morning to get updates. And, like I said, I don’t much care for it.

-- I didn’t hear anything yesterday from the company I’ve interviewed with three times. On Monday they told me they’d be making a decision on Tuesday or Wednesday, and would let me know either way. So, I’m stuck in the waiting mode.

My old boss in California told me they called him yesterday, and asked a bunch of questions about me. No way to paint that negatively, is there? They wouldn’t be making such calls if I were out of the running.

But, of course, there are still plenty of ways this might not work out for me. Like money, for instance. A 44 year old fat man with almost two decades of relevant experience doesn’t come cheaply, dammit. So, that could be a problem. Or they might just go with someone else, straight up.

All I know is, I need closure like a member of Oprah Nation. Waiting isn’t really my area of expertise. I’m sitting here running my hands through my hair like a retard at a cakewalk.

-- I bought the new Wilco CD  yesterday, for $11.96, at an honest-to-God record store. And the cashier called me “man,” and not “sir,” like I’d feared. All in all, a pleasant experience. 

I’m not so sure about the CD, though…. It’s either a) a grower that requires repeated listenings to unlock the beauty and magic, or b) crushingly dull. I’ll let you know my final verdict in the coming days.

-- Speaking of music, here’s yet another list from Burned-Out Hippie Quarterly, or whatever it’s called. Any opinions? How about additions? Two jump immediately to my mind: Goodbye Cruel World by Elvis Costello, and Monster by REM. Both of those albums, in my opinion, suck it to completion.

-- Check it out, they’re talking about our Ads vs. Reality page behind the Iron Curtain. It’s a real-life Surf Report discussion in Russian! Pretty cool.

-- Any of you have any experience with Carbonite? I signed up for a free trial a month or so ago, then decided to take the full plunge for a year. 

They back up your hard drive automatically, at an off-site location. So, if your house burns down, somebody steals your computer, or your machine shits the bed completely, you’re covered. 

A few months ago I bought an external hard drive to back-up the website, but that requires action on my part. So it doesn’t work very well…. I’m just using the thing now as an outsize Phil Hendrie depository. In fact, I’m thinking about having Phil’s head emblazoned on the front somehow.

Any opinions about Carbonite?        

-- Here are a couple of fresh new Smoking Fish sightings, this time from San Francisco. Thanks! And keep your eyes open, folks, 'cause our logo continues to get around.

And that’s about all you’re going to get out of me today, I’m afraid. Steve and I are going to Cooperstown tomorrow, but I’ll try to squeeze out a short update in the morning before we leave. Then you’ll get a full Baseball Hall of Fame road report on Friday, complete with full-color illustrations.

I’d better plant my ass in front of eBay now, and start fighting off assassins...

See ya tomorrow.

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Last updated
01/17/12 12:12 PM

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