Monday, October 26, 2009

When Harry Met Sally - vignettes



My favorite part of When Harry met Sally were the little vignettes of old couples talking about how they met. Two of my favorites are the "We never met" and the "I sneak into her willage" couples. Too cute for words. For years I've been quoting these vignettes all wrong. It's nice to see them again and remember their original charm.

Friday, October 23, 2009

Mr. Nerd

When I was in college, there was a boy who was possibly the biggest nerd on campus. I use the term nerd in the most affectionate manner for he was a nice nerd. Needy and ugly, but nice. He was especially needy for female affection and would latch on to girls like a crack addict sucking on his crackpipe. He was a true nerd, extremely smart, coke bottle glasses with black frames, button down short sleeve shirts with high waisted pants, and a humongous Frankenstein head. He even had a suitably nerdy name - Eugene. There was no doubt that he was the smartest kid on campus, he physically had the biggest brain.

I'd gone to high school with Eugene and had tolerated him in my half nice/half sarcastic bitch manner. But in college, I didn't have a class with him again until my sophomore year. The first thing I noticed was how big his head looked, but he was still the overly anxious nerdy nice guy that I'd teased before. Not unexpectedly, he latched on to me that semester, even going so far as to take the train home with me and getting off at my station, although I knew he lived 2 stations back. He'd bring me candy and constantly ask me if I were hungry. I sympathized slightly for at the time I was madly in love with Eddie, my Cuban American lab partner in Organic Chemistry. I hated Organic Chemistry but I adored Eddie who was just about the sexiest thing I'd ever seen in my whole life. It was also the start for my love of Cuban food as Eddie would take me to these delicious little Cuban joints in the city. But Eddie was already dating some beautiful theater major over at the Tisch School of Arts, but that didn't stop me from flirting madly with him over our bunsen burners and through our steamy goggles. I never had a real chance with Eddie, his girlfriend was way too possessive, just like Eugene never had a shot with me. But I always thought of Eugene as a nice guy, no matter how irritating he could be.

Fast forward nearly 20 years later. I'm at a reception and I notice a humongous Frankenstein head. There can only be one other head that big. I wander over and lo and behold, it's Eugene. He's gotten stouter and I don't know if memory is playing me false or what but his head looks even bigger. You've got to have some pretty strong neck muscles to hold up a head that big. His glasses are thinner and more fashionable and he is wearing a nice suit, although it doesn't fit him that well. But otherwise, he looks exactly the same. Still ugly.

I smile and saunter over to say hello.

"Eugene!" I say.

His large head swivels over with an imperious twist and he stares at me down the side of his nose. "Yes," he says with quite a sharp and impatient tone."

"It's me, Ellen, from NYU. How are you?"

"Ellen, Ellen, Ellen," he says in this really unctuous tone. "How are you? What do you do now? Did you go to med school?"

"No, I went to law school," I respond, not sure how to take him. He immediately launches into how he went to medical school and has a thriving practice in the area and how his son is a genius pianist who'll probably go to Juliard and his other child will definitely go to Harvard or Yale and then introduced me to his third wife. Yes he told me she's his third wife. All the time, speaking in this arrogant, offensive and belittling manner towards me.

His ego had finally surpassed his ginormous head.

As soon as I could, I extricated myself from him and his third wife and fled the scene thinking my friendly nice nerd had turned into an unbearable jackass. This saddened me and I started thinking about how when you practice law, you come across so many assholes that you know were most likely nerds when they were younger. What caused them to change? What makes a nice person turn into a jackass? I don't know, but I definitely don't want to remember this new Eugene. I prefer the old one, with his sweet demeanor and ugly face that grew on you. Too bad that Eugene is gone forever.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Funny Asians in Slo Mo

I have stolen this video from the Angry Asian Man blog because I laughed so hard I cried, coughed out a lung and peed myself and then immediately wanted to share this moment with all of my wonderful faithful blog readers.

WARNING - You may need to put on a pair of Depends protective undergarments before watching the following video. And if you don't laugh in the first 3 minutes, I guarantee you will be snorting coffee up your nose when you get to 3:46 on this video. Guaranteed.

You have been warned.



PS - it's a fish not a gun.
PPS - yes, I'm pretty sure he's dancing with yellow underwear on his hands.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Ploppy the Penguin

I was completely out of ideas for a blog post when I asked the girls if they wanted to put something up. They made me take this picture and then made up a story to go with it. So here it is. An Oh girls original.
Ploppy the Penguin
By the Oh girls


Once upon a time there was a little penguin named Ploppy. He had two friends named Pinky the pink mermaid and Penelope the purple dragon. One day Ploppy was thirsty and looked in his refrigerator but there was nothing to drink. Then he looked in his cabinet but all that there was was bags and bags of Funyuns and on the top shelf in the farthest corner there was a bottle of Frank's Red Hot hot sauce. So he decided to drink it.

At first he turned very pale. Then he turned bright red, then dark red, then red orange, then purple, green, blue and all the colors of the rainbow. His throat was burned and his tongue was on fire! He ran out into the snow and screamed "HELP!!!" Penelope the dragon and Pinky the mermaid were outside. Ploppy screamed "Help" again and fire shot from his beak. The fire burned off all of Pinky's beautiful pink hair.

"Quick!" Penelope said. "Eat the snow!"

Ploppy began gulping down piles and piles of snow until finally his throat no longer burned. He sighed in relief.

But Pinky was furious and hit Ploppy in the stomach with her strong tail.

Ploppy went "Ooooooof!" and then his stomach began to rumble louder and louder and faster and faster like a motorcycle. Then he said "Uh Oh!" Suddenly, the rumbling stopped and a humongous fart blasted him into the air, melting away all the snow, and burning off all of his feathers.

Pinky was satisfied and jumped into the ocean, away from the terrible smell. Penelope caught Ploppy before he hit the ground and took away his bottle of Red Hot hot sauce. Because only dragons should be allowed to breathe fire.

The End


Thursday, October 8, 2009

The Hwacha - Korean Rocket Launcher

I do a lot of research for my books. In fact, I adore research. So imagine my surprise when one of the coolest weapons in Korean history was not discovered by me and my nerdy library research skills, but by Da Man. Da Man who hasn't been inside a library since law school. Yes him. He found this genuine artifact of Korean history. On TV. How funny is that? So what is this thing? It's the Hwacha - a Korean rocket launcher. Below is a model displayed at the Seoul War Memorial. The Hwacha is this really awesome, really cool weapon invented in the 1400s by Korean scientists. But it doesn't really look that impressive right?


File:Hwacha2.jpg

It's basically a two wheeled cart with a launch pad with 200 holes filled with ammunition. Ah, but there in lies the beauty of this weapon. The ammunition is made up of small rockets attached to iron spiked arrows, each with a small paper bag filled with gunpowder attached to its fletching. Once the weapon is ignited, it fires off all 200 arrows in mere seconds with a trajectory of 500 meters. That's more than five football fields, folks. To really have an idea what it would look like, here's a very short clip of an actual hwacha in action.



Da Man caught this on The Discovery Channel's Mythbusters show and yelled at me to come down and watch it. I was blown away. Mythbusters made their own replica and tested it out to prove that it actually worked and would be deadly against a large attacking army. Score one for Da Man.

So why am I bringing it up? Well first of all, it's cool as hell! Secondly, I plan on using the hwacha in my books. I couldn't fit it into my current book but I plan to use it in the final book, where an all out frenzied battle royale will see 50 of these in play against a large demon army. Course this all depends upon selling the first book. So be patient my lovely little hwacha. Your time will come soon. And the world will know the power of your awesomeness. Cue evil laugh.

evil laugh Pictures, Images and Photos

Monday, October 5, 2009

Black Eyed Peas

Really liking this Black Eyed Peas video with Oprah. It's quite cool. You can see she's totally shocked by what's happening. FYI - that's 21,000 fans/dancers in the crowd!

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Still Growing

Hey everyone! Thanks for the welcome back! And to answer the question of whether or not I'm back, the answer is, well sort of. I'm so off my blogging game that I haven't caught up to touring the blogosphere - more like random drive bys when I have a moment. Part of the problem is that I'm in the throws of paper hell right now. The other problem is that my brain has taken its semi-annual vacation. And as usual, it didn't warn me that it was leaving until it was too late and stupidity was unavoidable. I'm just a tad nervous about teaching without a brain today, but not having a brain isn't always a handicap. After all, some famous no brains have even become President...

So I went to Target with Oldest and Youngest to buy a tennis skirt. Something I swore never to do because skirts accentuate my Popeye the Sailorman like legs of sausage link beauty. Especially tennis skirts which seems to work under the philosophy that shorter is better. I've seen grandmothers in skirts so short I can see their grannypanties and other things they should be ashamed of flashing. But I find that people reach a certain age in life and they just don't care anymore. I once watched as an old lady adjusted her sagging girls on line in the supermarket, fondling them like she'd fondled the tomatoes and peaches not 2 minutes earlier. I had to turn away when she slung one long breast over her shoulder and scratched under it for what seemed like 5 minutes straight. But I digress...

What the hell was I talking about? Oh yes tennis skirts. Skirts have never ever been my thing. But lately the indoor tennis court I play in has been a sauna and my cool athletic pants have been as comfortable as leather pants in the Sahara desert. So I went shopping for a tennis skirt. I grabbed a few and tried them on as Oldest and Youngest decided to critique my fashion choices.

Oldest - Why does it have a big white line over your butt? It looks like someone tried to circle it and ran out of white paint.

Youngest - I can fix it for you Mommy.

Me (ignoring them and trying an all black one instead)

Oldest - That's better but why is it so short? You want everyone to see your underwear?

Me - It's a skort, see. Shorts underneath.

Oldest - Those shorts are too short. They're more like underwear.

Youngest - I need a tissue for my boogers.

Me (wiping a huge ass booger from Youngest's nose and trying another skirt)

Oldest - That's better but still too short.

Me - Hmmm, it's a little big at the waist. I'll have to get a smaller size.

Oldest - Just get that one cause you know you'll grow into it.

Me (blinking) - What are you trying to say?

Youngest - I farted.

Oldest - I mean not that you are still growing but you know like when you eat and your belly gets too big...

Youngest (reaching over to pat my muffin top) - And it goes down again when you go the bathroom!

You seriously can't have an ego around these girls. It's just not allowed.

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