It’s Time To Try Some Stuff

MY WORLD

Guys, it’s okay to look into your neighbor’s windows now. (Deep gasp…. “Honey? Do you know where our binoculars are?”) No, stop it. I’m not talking like in the creepy Peeping Tom sense, I’m meaning like, if you can see into your neighbor’s apartment or house, it’s okay to just stare into there now. It’s quarantine and there are only so many episodes of “Mad Men” you can watch while pretending that all you’re thinking about isn’t “Dear God, when can I look at MY FUCKING PHONE AGAIN?!?!” (New nightly game in our household is watching the other one on the phone while “our” show is on and acting like you’re not super pissed and jealous about it. Is there a more condescending question than, “Why do you need to look at your phone so much?”)

Anyway, you can look into your neighbor’s window now. As long as you’re sitting in your place, and you’re not using binoculars (“Forget it! He said ‘no binoculars’. DAMNIT!”) And the reason I know it’s okay is because that’s what I was doing for the 37 minutes prior to writing this. What I did was, I sat down at my writing desk (it’s special because it’s white and…my laptop sits on it!) opened a blank word document, and then…stared out my window and into the apartments of ALL of my across-the-street neighbors! Nothing too interesting, but there were a few instances where I’m sure this guy on the 3^rd floor saw me, and I just didn’t try to hide that I was looking into his apartment. Usually, I’d do the thing where I’d awkwardly look up at the ceiling and then leave the room, but not tonight…NOT IN QUARANTINE! I’M LOOKING IN YOUR APARTMENT, BUB! AND THERE AIN’T A GODDAMN THING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT!

So voyeurism is a new thing I’m trying, and that got me to thinking: What else would I do or try now that I am so obscenely quarantinoed (“torpedoed” with the quarantine blues = quarantinoed)

SMOKING CRACK

I would. If a drug dealer was riding his bike up and down my block yelling, “I’m going to give free crack to someone in whichever apartment building I stop in front of tonight!” and that drug dealer stopped in front of my apartment, where I just so happened to be looking out the window, and we made eye-contact, and he was like “You! You want some free crack?” I’d be like “Yeah.” Of course he’s wearing latex gloves, and I would insist that he simply leave it at the front door to my building because of contactless pick-up and all. But yeah, as long as he did that, and was willing to explain to me from the sidewalk up to my 3^rd floor apartment how to smoke crack, I would do it.

There are just so few opportunities in life to justify smoking crack in your apartment, that I feel like passing up the covid quarantine justification, is a disgusting waste of a perfect excuse. Also, we’ve all watched all of the drug shows and documentaries and news stories, and I’m sure, like me, you’ve thought “I bet I wouldn’t get addicted if I tried it.” And you know what? YOU WOULDN’T IN QUARANTINE! Unless the generous drug dealer decides to bike down your block again, but chances are he won’t because he’s busy spreading cheer to surrounding neighborhoods. Free crack is one thing. Free crack TWICE? Dream on, weirdo!

And if you do it just once, in the safety of your own apartment under the horrified supervision of your southern wife, what’s the worst that could happen? (Not a serious question, do not send me google articles about the first, and last time people smoked crack. DON’T RUIN MY DREAM!) Would explaining why you felt compelled to do this to your wife be uncomfortable? Of course! But what is she going to do? Leave? Where? It’s a quarantine babe, ain’t nowhere to go!

In fact, I’m pretty sure smoking crack suppresses hunger, so I would make a health-based argument to The VP that would go something like this: “VP? Hi, it’s me Jimmy. You know I want you to find me attractive, right? Well I know that you’ve noticed me eating 8 meals a day and snacking in between, and I can tell that my turbo-charged weight gain is really bumming you out. So! What if I told you I could ingest something that would suppress my appetite and cause me to lose a few lbs?” As the VP would pretend not to be supremely disgusted by my newly explosive waistline, she’d say something like, “Oh stop…but what?” That’s when I’d show her the spoon with the crack on it.

Now, would she be excited? No. I can’t imagine any wife is excited when her husband announces that he’s going to smoke crack in front of her. BUT! There is a chance that A) She doesn’t know that it’s crack on the spoon, or B) That if it does end up causing you to lose weight, she’ll justify the means to the end of your waistline expansion. Obviously, there is a ‘C’ option that could take place where she calls her mom crying that “Jimmy is smoking crack!” but I think that’s unlikely because this is my dream AND what woman wants anyone to know that their husband is a crack smoker?

So, I’d end up getting to smoke crack without most of all of the negative consequences associated with smoking crack NOT during a quarantine. The positives include:

Getting to finally see what all the “buzz” is about with this crack thing!
Can’t get addicted when you only do it once and have no chance to get it again…anytime soon at least.
Can’t get arrested at a time when cops have much more important things to do than bust a pudgy 34 year-old looking to “just try something crazy, man!”
Can’t lose your wife because the government says she is not allowed to leave the house. By the time all of these restrictions are lifted, she’ll be laughing about you smoking crack!
It has to be a pretty kick-ass high, right?

Am I asking for someone to send me crack and instructions how to do it from the spoon thing? (Like, can you use any old spoon or…is a spoon even involved? Wait, no…I’d just need a pipe wouldn’t I?!?!) I am not looking for someone to send me crack and instructions on how to do it. But, yes, if it were sent to me I would smoke it…and, I would probably try heroin too now that I realize that’s the one you use with the spoon. Either one.

HACKING A WEBSITE

In normal-times, hackers suck. They sit in front of their computers all day and just fuck with websites because they can, while we’re all out being COOL PEOPLE doing things like drinking shots with people you don’t like that much, and hiking. However, when EVERY PERSON is sitting in front of their computer all day, aren’t hackers the coolest? By default, they become top of the human food chain. Well, since I don’t want to be at the bottom of that food chain, because the bottom…uh…DIES! I’d like the opportunity to prove my worth by hacking a website.

I wouldn’t want to be a hardcore, governmental website hacker that gets hauled away by The Punisher. No, instead, I’d like to be that like friendly, harmless hacker guy. Like, hack into the TJ Maxx website, rename it “TJ Min” and make it so the ONLY product available is a bandana that says “Born to Ride” on it. Everyone’s aunt, having just recently learned how to e-shop on account of quarantine, would be so excited to check out what TJ Maxx has to offer until… “How come all I can buy is this very very cool bandana?” Then they’d buy the “Born to Ride” bandanas even though they don’t even ride! SUCKERS!!!!

Most of the reasons why I would try these things during quarantine come back to me being able to tell people that I did that thing once, and this is no exception. I’m imagining some dumpy dinner party I’ll be invited to a few years down the road, where I don’t really know anyone and am giving The VP half-smiles from across the room that she knows mean, “can we get the fuck out of here now?” As I’d guzzle WHATEVER alcohol was available in between menacing half-smiles, some blob would come up to me and say, “Hey, I’m Blobbington, what’s your name?” It would be at this precise moment, that I would bypass the typical introductions: “Don’t worry about my name, Blobbington. I’m a hacker.”

Blobbington would try to chuckle off the “I’m a hacker”-thing to ease the tension, but I’d lean into it and give him a menacing “I’m not fucking kidding”-chuckle. Then it’s awkward, but I’d have the power position in this interaction that I never really wanted in the first place. “I’ve hacked websites, and that’s all I’m going to say about that.” Then I’d finish my drink, hold out the empty glass for Blobbington to take, and yell across the room, “I’m leaving now!”

And I’d be able to do all of that because I tried hacking a website during quarantine.

DM’ING CELEBRITIES

I want to DM celebrities because getting celebrities to personally respond to me would feel like a real victory and I know that’s sad, but it’s true. How many boring ass stories about someone’s celebrity sighting have you sat through? How many have you enjoyed? The answers to those two questions are: a billion! And zero!

Buuuuuuuuut, if I told you a story about how I DM’d Robert from “Shark Tank” about “how proud I am of you for being an advocate for the very short businessman community,” and he responded with “Thx” and a praying hands emoji, wouldn’t you enjoy that? I bet you would!

Which celebrities would I most like to DM, aside from “Shark Tank” Bob, and what would I say to them hoping to elicit ANY sort of response? I’m glad you asked!

Adele: “Can you palm a basketball?”
- I really want to know. I think she can.
Scottie Pippen: “Be honest, do you think you were better than Michael Jordan?”
- How many nights do you think Pippen stayed up thinking, “If Phil would just let me take the last shot, I’d be the star!”
Just saying “I love you” to all of my celebrity crushes in the hopes that one of them would respond, “I love you too.” Then I could show off and tell everyone that “Don Draper’s mistress from Season 3, episode 7 of ‘Mad Men’ loves me too!”

PODCAST TO LISTEN TO:

Season One of “Up and Vanished”. I listened to it on a road trip a while ago and I don’t remember details, but I remember it was engrossing.

MUSIC TO LISTEN TO:

A bunch of musicians have been playing live concerts from their homes during this quarantine, and I watched some of Pete Yorn’s on Instagram live. That was good. But I also just found that Dave Matthews plays a solo show on Yahoo and it’s recorded and I can watch it whenever I want. So…yeah, maybe I’ll check it out. Whatever. I do what I want.

Here’s the link…I don’t know if it’ll work because I suck with computers, BUT I’M TRYING MY BEST!

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/dave-matthews-livestream-concert-verizon-pay-it-forward-live-234734706.html

TV SHOW TO WATCH:

I’ve been having a really hard time focusing on television shows, so I’ve been leaning more towards shows that I can enjoy without paying THAT much attention to. One of the best for this kind of viewing is “Shark Tank”. I feel like it’s on 24/7 and I always kinda’ enjoy it without having to really try that hard.

MOVIE TO WATCH:

The VP and I watched “Sicario” a few days ago and it was smart, intense, and cool. I like those things.

K, bye.

I Sat Next to an NBA Superstar Yesterday and You Have to Believe Me

MY WORLD:

I sat next to James Harden at lunch yesterday. Now, the reaction to that from the text message I sent to my friend groupchat, should have been “whoa, cool!” Or, “no way dude, he’s so good at basketball!” Or, “he has a big beard!” Or, I don’t know, why couldn’t ONE FRIEND write something like, “hey Jimmy, even though it was blind luck that you ended up sitting next to the NBA MVP Runner-up, you should treat this as an accomplishment in your life, feel better about yourself, and expect to receive praise from others when you tell them of this accomplishment.” WOULD THAT HAVE BEEN SO FUCKING HARD?!?! But instead, all I got was “pic or it didn’t happen.”

So there I was, a 34 year old adult, contemplating how I could take a spycam picture of a 29 year old guy I’ve never spoken to before. The situation went from exciting to terrifying immediately, and I basically stopped talking to the person I was actually having lunch with because I was so caught up in my brain about what I should do. Some of the thoughts that went through my essentially useless brain, included:

-Do I ask for a selife? Go up to him, say something like “huge NBA fan here, James! Love watching you play! Mind if I get a pic?”

Yeah, that would’ve been a cool thing for me to do except uh…no it fucking wouldn’t have been. I’m not a selfie guy. I’m the guy who makes fun of people who take selfies! THAT’S MY ENTIRE IDENTITY!!! Although, yeah, I would ask to take a selfie with someone who actually IS a hero of mine (cough…Eddie Vedder…or someone who knew Chris Farley…cough) But then I started thinking of how big of a lie, that would be.

Okay, so I’m meeting James Harden for the first time and the first two things I tell him are FLAGRANT lies. 1) I am not a huge NBA fan. I like it, but I don’t really care about the NBA until football is over…and even then, all I think about is how “I miss football.” 2) I actually hate watching James Harden play basketball. If I was being totally honest with him (and isn’t honsesty ALWAYS the way to go?) I’d say “James! Whenever I see the Rockets are playing, I loudly exhale and text my friends something I’m only half-joking about, like how I’d rather cannonball into an active volcano than watch you travel on every play before bitching to the refs that you were breathed on too hard.” Wild guess here, but I don’t think he’d be excited about posing for a selfie with my fat face (you went to the gym yesterday, Jimmy. Did you tell them yet?) after hearing that.

-I should pretend to be texting on my phone, while slowly rotating my chair to the right-where James is sitting-while I really have my camera up so that once I get him in frame, BOOM! PIC TAKEN!

Clearly, I am not one of those people who have mastered the spycam technique. (It’s because you’re a scared baby). It’s not because I’m scared (it is, though) I just think that the risk of getting caught outweighs the reward. So…shit, yeah I’m scared (my Dad just called asking for blood sample. Something about “no son of his-“) Can we think, for just a second, about what would happen if I DID actually get caught trying to take a spycam pic of James Harden?

The bartender had already told me “don’t be weird about it” when the guy I was having lunch with asked if that was, in fact, James Harden. It was weird because I didn’t ask the question, but she looked directly at ME and said “don’t be weird about it.” Of course, I calmly, quickly replied with a, “too late,” that drew some laughs but…like, it was too late. I was caught in between staring and doing the “I”m not staring, I’m just drift-looking at the ceiling above your head James Harden”-thing. Yeah, weird was accomplished. So if after that, she caught the camera on my phone screen, there is a decent chance that she would have gently grabbed my arm, clenched her jaw and uttered a furious, “I fucking said not to be weird!” Then, I’m the PROVEN weird guy who has to be touched to be believed. She would probably be thinking “I have to touch this person to make sure that I’m not hallucinating that I’m witnessing an adult being THIS weird.”

And what if James Harden caught me? (Can’t call him just ‘James’ because we’re not close enough friends) With how petty NBA players are, and how ready they are to air their shit on Twitter, is out COMPLETELY out of the realm of possibility that he would take my picture in retaliation only to post it on his Twitter with the caption “Chicago Creepo”? Guys, that’s fucking possible and you know it. YOU KNOW IT GODDAMN WELL!

Next thing I know, people are printing kitchy, graphic t-shirts featuring the pic Harden took of me on them with his caption underneath. Then I’m walking down the street with The VP of Ops and people are whispering while staring at me. So the VP curiously asks, “why are people looking at you and whispering?” I pretend not to hear the question and just keep walking, until some girl starts laughing as she approaches me pointing and saying “you! You’re the Chicago Creepo!” Then I’m trying to explain that the reason a girl called me “The Chicago Creepo” is because I got caught taking a spycam pic of James Harden, but she won’t believe that. No, she’ll go straight to “a girl pointed him out, so that must mean he was taking spycam pics of girls.” So we’ll end up getting divorced, and any date I have with any girl after will be a terrifying “I hope she hasn’t seen that James Harden pic of me” experience.

-I could tell the bartender to buy James Harden a beer and tell him that it’s from me.

So, I’m trying to pick up James Harden in a bar now? Either two things could happen here: 1) He could accept the beer, raise it for a “cheers” from down the bar and carry on with his lunch. 2) He could decline the beer, in which case the bartender would then return it to me–but I didn’t want to drink during the day on a Tuesday, so now I’m just sitting at lunch with this beer/”James Harden rejection trophy.” He’ll look over a few times to see what certified bozo-the-clown sent a Tuesday afternoon beer over to a professional athlete and I’ll catch him with a half-smile in an effort to convey “I’m not a weird guy.” He won’t smile back, though. Instead, he’ll look to the guy he’s actually having lunch with and say something like, “keep an eye on that dude for me.”

In the end, I convinced myself that doing nothing was the only option. So I sat at lunch, pretended to listen to the guy I was having lunch with, and made the executive decision that proving I sat next to James Harden wasn’t worth risking my marriage/dignity/future. BUT I FRIGGIN’ SWEAR HE WAS RIGHT NEXT TO ME WEARING A BIG HAT AND BIG FLANNEL SHIRT AND LOOKING FLYYYYYYY!!!!

OUR WORLD:

Continuing the theme from today’s “My World”, I’d like to educate my fellow early-to-mid 30s people on, aside from taking a spycam pic of James Harden, what other things you are no longer allowed to do. Of course, if you’re one of those “I don’t believe in the word ‘can’t'”-people, then this section will read as a challenge. But maybe, even those people can take a break from their life of posting inspirational quotes over their crossfit videos and actually contemplate whether “can’t” is something that they should incorporate.

-You can’t wear sweatpants in public anymore.

The sweatpants-wearing public has been fooled by the tapered (?) cuffed (?) bottoms of new sweatpants into thinking that those make it acceptable to go outside wearing them. Yes, this was a “Seinfeld” bit 20 years ago, but the emergence of Lululemon (and imposters for those of us poors) has caused a confusion that has led to a sweatpants-in-public resurgence. It’s like when you work out a lot and then think you can eat whatever you want. Next thing you know, you’re too sluggish from all the chips to go to the gym anymore and you’ve put on 14 pounds. Just because the hot mannequin guy is pulling it off in the store window, doesn’t mean that you and your puffy beer face can.

-You can’t go to music festivals and post non-funny videos of yourself there.

Was I the only one seeing people my age post Instagram stories of themselves wearing basketball jerseys and neon whatever while at Lollapalooza this past weekend? They’re cringeworthy, and even though I hadn’t spoken to these people in years, I felt like contacting them just to see “is everything okay?” Now, I’m not judging if you actually went–that distinction must be drawn. There are bands at music festivals that we are still allowed to love (oh thank god Jimmy told me I don’t have to give up music!) So you can go, yeah. But while there, if you find the need to send any sort of video of the band on stage, or you in the crowd, you better be damn sure that it’s a funny video. Because if that video says something like “all the feels” or is just of you doing some sway-dance moves that your drunk brain thinks are “actually pretty cool,” then you become THAT person to EVERYONE IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE. One “look at me at this music festival” Instagram video after the age of 30 will cause: banks to never give you a loan; friends not to trust you alone with their spouses; and your parents to drink more.

-You can’t have dirty dishes in your sink when guests are over.

This one is deeply personal and, frankly, really fucking stinks. Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know it was a goddamn crime to put a DISH in a SINK! Unfortunately, I have been hit with one too many “you’re a slob, huh?”-looks from guests who see the plate I used at breakfast that morning sitting there in the sink. Now, thankfully, there is a trick if you have a dishwasher, aka “the best hiding place in the world.” Look, you don’t have to have every dish actually clean once guests arrive, they just can’t be able to see them without opening a SECRET door. So do yourself a favor, jam every dirty dish or kitchen utensil you have into your dishwasher right before your guests arrive. That way, when you’re giving them the grand tour of your 900 square foot apartment, you’ll get to shoot them a “bet you feel dumb for thinking I was a slob”-look when you get to the kitchen portion of the tour.

LETS HATE THIS TOGETHER AT THE SAME TIME:

When you get your dog all riled up and running around your apartment, but then she accidentally jumps into a table and starts crying. You grab her, almost start crying yourself because it’s your fault and you think you’re about to pay $2,000 at the vet because her leg “has to be broken if she’s crying like this.” Only to have her, one minute later, walk around like nothing ever happened while you try to convince your wife that you weren’t crying.

LETS LOVE THIS TOGETHER AT THE SAME TIME:

I really love this band and am reminded of it when their songs randomly come up on my Spotify mixes.

MOM MEMORY OF THE DAY:

Yeah, I know, this may be a bit heavy, but I’m always trying to be really honest in this blog and I think a lot about my Mom. So, until I start gambling again (“I can’t wait!” said the VP in a shitty, sarcastic tone) I’m going to share some quick memories of my Mom.

When I was 15, my parents got me a 1984 Ford Escort hatchback to learn on. They didn’t want me to learn on their much nicer cars, so they gave me this hunk of junk and DARED me to say anything negative about it. Within the first week of having it, my Mom backed her Chevy Suburban directly into the driver’s side of my Ford Escort. I was outside when it happened, and I watched like it was slow motion. She left a massive dent in my car, while there wasn’t a scratch on the Suburban. While I stood in the driveway watching, she rolled down her window and very matter-of-factly said, “we’re not fixing that,” before driving off.

K, bye.