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.
-- Toney and I went to a few more
open-houses on Sunday.
The
first was pretty old, built in the early 1930s, and too small for our
needs. But it was well-maintained and nice. It also had a big old
fashioned sittin' porch on the front, and stained glass in one of the
living room windows. A charming place, but my inner-barometer said it
was priced fifty thousand dollars too high.
The second was in a high-dollar fancy-pants neighborhood, and was built
in 1990. It was NOT well-maintained, and my instincts told me it was
priced a hundred grand too high. Well, maybe seventy-five, taking
into account the neighborhood it was in.... But the carpets would have
to be ripped out, they were all horribly stained(?!), and the kitchen
was all screwed up; you'd have to gut the bastard and start from
scratch.
Also, it looked like they'd recently painted the trim on the outside,
and slung paint everywhere. It was all over the driveway, the shrubs in
front of the house, and on the sidewalks. It appeared that they'd hired
Muhammad Ali and Janet Reno to paint their house. Wotta sight.
The best feature was the huge deck on the back, but they'd slopped that
up as well. Dark wood stain was splattered a half-foot up the wall.
Somebody needs to go to painting school, and quick.
And get this: there was no central air. It's a rich folks house in a
rich folks neighborhood, not very old, and there were window units all
over the place. Sometimes I just don't get these people up here....
Where I come from being miserable all summer is not a badge of honor. I
mean, what in the honeybaked hell??
The third property was one of the strangest experiences of our
considerable open-house careers. It's located on a high-traffic road,
and has a big circular driveway in front. And when we arrived there were
probably ten cars parked on the thing. Damn, we muttered, this one is
busy.
We wedged the Blazer into a parking space
that probably wasn't supposed to be a parking space, and made our way to
the big sprawling ranch-style home with an asking price that seemed, at
first glance, far too low. I mean, the shit looked like an estate.
I wondered what we'd find inside. Oh, this was going to be interesting.
We had to wait for a family to exit before we could enter (it was a
madhouse), and when we finally got in we saw an old lady sitting on the
stairs, behind a folding card table with a cash register on it. The
crap?
We squeezed past some more people, into the living room, and it was set
up like an antique/junk store. There were big display cabinets, and
clothes racks, and random items scattered about.
I was totally confused, but tried to act cool. I wandered around,
scratching my chin and pretending to be in the throes of deep
consideration. Two gay men stood nearby and were holding up an old
rusted-out lantern, and one said, "This is a really nithe piethe."
Then the animal sounds kicked-in.
From somewhere deep inside the house there was a loud
shriek, and it sounded like the flying monkeys on The Wizard of Oz.
Good God, what was that?! I asked Toney. Her eyes were wide with
concern. And we heard a woman laugh hysterically, from the bowels of the
house, a full-throated cigarettes 'n' bourbon cackle. Then the " monkey"
went off again.
And that's when we decided to leave. But when we reached the living room
door, which led to the foyer and the exit, there was now a velvet theater
rope pulled across the doorway.
What is this place?? Is it the
Addams Family?
I opened the rope, replaced the hook to its former resting place, and we
high-tailed it out of there. And as we were making our escape, a man we hadn't seen before, dressed in full western
wear (wtf??), emerged from behind a curtain and said, "Thanks for
coming!"
Yeah. I think I slung gravel halfway up the side of the house, trying to
drive away from that place. Holy shit! I still don't understand any of
it.
-- Have you read about the new cell phone ringtone that only kids can
hear?
By the time a person turns twenty their hearing has already
started to deteriorate, supposedly, and an inventor in England has
figured out a way to exploit the fact. He's come up with a ringtone that
adults can't hear, which includes teachers, of course, and allows kids
to text each other in class without detection.
Here's an article about it. And here's a sample of the ringtone itself.
I can't hear a damn thing. Nothing. But, of course, I've seen Dinosaur
Jr. in concert a couple of times, so I guess it's not that surprising.
But what about the Secrets? I figured it would sound like a buzzer on The
Price Is Right to them, and decided to find out.
Yesterday evening I huddled the whole family around my computer and
played the file. And it was just complete silence to me and Toney, but
the boys both said they heard a really high-pitched whine. Andy bolted
from the room, but I'm not sure if it was related to the ringtone, or if
he heard Poppa Half-Shirt's yapping pussy-dog again.
So anyway, can you hear anything? I'm a little suspicious, if you want
to know the truth. I think this could be an elaborate hoax, a high-tech
snipe hunt, designed to mock the over-twenty crowd. What do you think?
Can you hear it? Is there even anything to hear? What the hell, man?
And once again I've been long-winded, and didn't cover all the things
I'd planned. But that's what they make tomorrows for, right?
The
first was pretty old, built in the early 1930s, and too small for our
needs. But it was well-maintained and nice. It also had a big old
fashioned sittin' porch on the front, and stained glass in one of the
living room windows. A charming place, but my inner-barometer said it
was priced fifty thousand dollars too high.