Holy
crap in a Bundt pan...
Due to the
recent well-publicized shortage of
amateur websites produced by assholes who consider themselves to be
clever, I
have been called into action. My name is Jeff Kay, and I’m an
Ugly American living
on the cusp of a mid-life crisis, near Scranton, PA. And I’m here to
serve, baby.
The
State of My Fat Ass A journal of
sorts, updated every once in a while.
--
On Sunday, at Sam's, we got onto the subject of fingernails, and whether
or not they float. Yes, you read that correctly. As I polished off my
big emasculation dog in the snack bar, a few feet away from a man
purchasing a 50-inch plasma screen TV and a rotisserie chicken, Toney
told the youngest Secret she needed to clip his nails when we got home,
because they were getting a tad womanly.
At the same time, the older Secret was telling us about a friend who
hated one of his teachers, and was always coming up with elaborate
schemes to "get back at her." These included such classics as
the thumbtack on the chair, as well as a few originals that seemed to
invariably feature a network of lines, pulleys, and cream pies. It just
goes on and on.
As usual, I was barely hearing any of this, because it's just too
confusing. It seems like the entire world is talking, all at once,
'round the clock. But I got enough of it to suggest that both things be
brought together for mutual benefit. Perhaps, I said, the friend could
put fingernail clippings in the teacher's coffee?
Toney shot me a shocked look that screamed, "Don't give him any
ideas, dumbass!" But the oldest Secret was already running with it.
He was laughing and imagining the woman taking a big slug of Maxwell
House, and ending up with a bunch of nail clippings stuck to her lips.
Good times.
Then we started wondering if fingernails and toenails would float. I
thought they'd probably sink, but everybody else had the opposite
opinion. So, there was but one thing to do.... we needed to conduct an
experiment.
And when we got home Toney cut the youngest Secret's fingernails, we put
them in a paper cup full of water, and watched with great anticipation.
Care to guess the outcome?
-- A few people mentioned this yesterday in the comments, but it looks
like Anheuser-Busch has gobbled
up Rolling Rock, and is planning to shut down their historic
brewery in western Pennsylvania. It's that last part that makes me
sick.... They're reportedly going to start making the stuff in one of
their sprawling beer factories somewhere, and that's a sad state of
affairs.
So, does it mean that they'll now have to
change the label? It says, and has always said, "From the
glass-lined tanks of Old Latrobe...." But that won't be a true
statement anymore. I think they'll need to change it to something like,
"From a characterless but functional football field-sized vat in an
industrial park near St. Louis..."
Somehow it just doesn't have the
same ring.
For a few years (Greensboro), Rolling Rock was my beer of choice. I
drank a lot of it. Oh, nothing like this guy with his Coors Light, but a
substantial amount anyway. They served it in the longneck green bottles
at College
Hill, one of America's great bars, for a buck seventy-five
each. We called it R Squared and did our best to drive up their stock
prices.
It's not a great beer, by any means, but it's better than most everyday
brews. It has a distinctive flavor, and I might buy a case this weekend,
just for old time's sake. Here's the Snopes page where they attempt to
explain the mysterious "33" that is printed on every bottle
and can of Rolling Rock, and don't even come close to pulling it off.
Those St. Louis fuckers just better keep their booger-hooks off Yuengling, that's
all I can say.
-- And since we're on the subject, here are the 100 best beers in the
world, and the 50
worst. Supposedly.
-- Have you ever revisited, after several years, an album that you
thought you didn't like, and realized that it is, in fact, really
fucking good? I'm experiencing that now.
I was a huge fan of the early Angry Young Man albums by Elvis Costello,
the ones produced by Nick Lowe "with one hand on the board and one
hand on the bottle." But then Elvis booted Nick to the curb, and
started crooning. He went from writing pop songs, to creating
art. And I don't like that.
Maybe if he'd just eeeased into it? I don't know, but I've always
had a real problem with Imperial Bedroom, the moment everything
changed. It sounded completely different from all the previous albums,
and I never warmed to it. I was pissed that he'd abandoned Nick and
changed his approach, and the thing always meant betrayal to me. I can
remember hollering at my turntable: Just sing, goddammit! What
are you, Bobby Vinton??
But over the past few years I've been working on getting all the Elvis
albums on CD, preferably in the new fancy-pants editions from Rhino. A
month or so ago I picked up Imperial Bedroom, out of a sense of
duty, and was shocked to realize that it's incredibly good. I can't stop
playing it.
So there you go. Perhaps I was a tad unfair, back in the day? Anything's
possible, I guess. I hope Elvis will accept my apology.
But the Nick records are still best. I will never concede that it isn't true.
Never!
-- And finally, Surf Reporters Kyle and Daniel spotted the Smoking Fish
this past weekend, and managed to snap a few photos. Check it
out.
Thanks guys, for being on your toes. Our logo, man, he gets around.
And that'll do it for today, children. See ya tomorrow.
--
On Sunday, at Sam's, we got onto the subject of fingernails, and whether
or not they float. Yes, you read that correctly. As I polished off my
big emasculation dog in the snack bar, a few feet away from a man
purchasing a 50-inch plasma screen TV and a rotisserie chicken, Toney
told the youngest Secret she needed to clip his nails when we got home,
because they were getting a tad womanly.