Drilling Toilets for Fun and Profit - or - Forced Vacation Day 4

 Ssssssshhhhh.

Over here.

I have something to tell you, but it's gotta be very quiet. You can't repeat a single word. Promise?

It's my shirts. They're going missing.

Unlike every other house, my socks come back without fail, in pairs. It's the shirts, I swear.

Because the Department of Wash doesn't run on a schedule, I was presented with many more pairs of socks. It works very well. I already have more t-shirts than Imelda Marcos had shoes. Or even my wife. So I didn't notice it at first. Men aren't the most observant creatures on the planet, so it took a long time to realize there was a Shirt Issue<tm>. In fact, most men would miss a freight train running through the bedroom, even if they were looking for a freight train running through the bedroom. And even if they were looking for a freight train, they'd have to ask their wife where it was. 

Let's say I have one hundred t-shirts. I just took two clean ones to the room. And I only have one to wear tomorrow. That's math even a man can perform.

The thing is, there are no dirty t-shirts about. I don't have fourteen hampers of dirty shirts waiting for the Department of Wash to process. The Department of Wash, strangely, was not affected by Congress' inability to put together a budget. It has functional equipment and personnel to do the job. Just no shirts.

Every now and then a shirt will appear that I haven't seen in a year. It's clean and folded, but nobody knows how it got there or where it's been. We asked Giorgiou Tsoukalos, ancient astronaut theorist and owner of some of the strangest hair on tv, about my shirts. Giorgiou (Stan to his friends) said the ancient astronauts have tunneled through time to the future, and are taking my t-shirts back to Sumeria to help with the pyramids. I asked Stan (Giorgiou to his viewers) how my t-shirts were helping with the pyramids. He said there were only theories until a recent pyramidal excavation proved him right. While trying to decipher the heiroglyphics on the walls, they came across strange writings....

Jeff Beck - 2018 Tour

Do you know what your problem is? You're stupid.

Marshall Amplification

Yes, those would be my t-shirts. That's half the problem solved. The ancient astronauts are very bad at returning the shirts. Further, the Department of Wash is very upset because it feels it gets blamed for the disappearance of the shirts.

Score another one for ancient astronaut theorists. Watch for the episode on National Geographic. Or Science. Or whatever ($#&ing channel it's on. Next season will be dedicated exclusively to getting the shirts back or at least setting up a schedule, so I'll have something to wear. I don't have the kind of chest to go shirtless. Especially around Christmas.

This is the kind of stuff you notice when you're forced to take vacation. 

Note to the Department of Wash: if you could contact your counterparts at the Department of Marital Relations and tell them to get on their asses, no one wold have time to notice missing t-shirts. It's a win/win.

• Police urge against firing guns into the air on New Years Eve, as what goes up must come down
• Just in case you missed this in your physics class

Speaking of marital relations, Mrs. lefty is in the midst of spring cleaning. Possibly from several springs ago, but I like my body parts so I dare not ask.

As it's late on day 5 of forced vacation, she said she was going to bed a few hours ago, so she's up cleaning. I'm up blogging. This is incredibly far from a good combination, like Megadeth performing near land mines. Oddly enough, some of the sounds are the same, which is why I'm typing this.

Another thing men are horrible at is knowing the names of furniture. Men and women have reached an uneasy truce, where the guys just refer to things as 'that brown thing in the corner'. Is there some sort of class guys missed growing up that only girls attended?  So the uneasy truce also specifies that no matter how many times women say what the piece of furniture is called, men don't have to remember it. That one part has saved my bacon countless times.

I mention this because she's starting tonight's 11:30pm cleaning on one of the tall pieces of wood furniture that goes in a corner and has shelves. I'm long past asking what it's called. Have I mentioned she's part of a large group called Elephants in Tutus? Or just Princess Grace. Let's say she's... ummmm.... less than dainty, and may not hold onto things well. So there is no act she can perform that is silent, or of fewer decibels than a plane taking off. This includes putting on shoes. So she's cleaning stuff on the shelves of the Mystery Furniture.....

Are we going to use this?   CRASH

Remember this? (kicks box full of metal parts)

I'm going to put these away. BOOM (something falls off table, taking 12 other things with it).

[10 minutes later]

Weeee.... BANG.

What was that?

I tried to put something on a shelf in the pantry.

I see.

Weeee.... BANG.  Weee BANG.

Tried to put more things on the shelf?

[5 minutes later]

BANG CRASH. Bang bang crash.

Have I mentioned that the tension is ratcheted up from a long day and we just need to relax?

BANG CRASH.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAH, please STOP.

What's your problem?

[guys, you know there's a problem when she asks that question and your answer better be good or you better be in a different part of the country]

Honey, didn't you mention being tired and on edge, and that we were winding down for bed?

Yes, I'm cleaning..  CRASH. [plays an entire song with aluminum foil while things fall off a shelf in alphabetical order]

I'm waiting for the vacuum to start, but that's my job. So she starts the 74 Camaro in the dining room and punches it every now and then. I'm reading Passive Aggression for Dummies and this seems to fit the definition exactly. I dare not make the observation aloud, for fear of getting run over by said Camaro.

The thing is, I'm trying to BLOG here.  BOOM CRASH FALL

If I don't type it this moment, I'll forget it    SMASH SIZZLE FIZZ

My nerves are a little  BOOM  on edge.

I can help tomorrow, during normal cleaning hours  SMASH BANG CURSE CURSE KICK OOH

Would this be going on if I weren't on vacation?  You betcha. I'd have moved myself into bed an hour ago, and started my... ahem... nighttime rituals.

If I were on Twitter, there would be fourteen nasty tweets asking me why *I* wasn't cleaning.

Simple - I work and clean during Eastern Standard Cleaning Time. I clocked out hours ago.

BANG BANG THUMP THUMP THUMP CRASH THUMP THUMP OUCH THUD 

That was the sound of being chased with a frying pan, then having it applied to my cranium, followed by my body applying itself to the floor.

The palindrome of Bolton is Notlob

Itchy Itchy Nasal Passages

Your love is like   mouse fricassee

I'm always behind, to the detriment of my career(s).

I've been a smartass for my entire life, saying the first thing that came to mind. Then I heard Howard Stern.

I've talked back to the tv since before I could actually talk. Then I saw Mystery Science Theater.  Dear Lord, I was home. Except for the fact I couldn't get anybody to pay me to keep a running antisocial narrative. So I've been doing it for free for well over 25 years. Mrs lefty calls it "STFU, I'm watching this."

However, something happened tonight. She discovered a new DIY/HGTV/FLIPit show. I will never bother, preferring to watch my laptop process individual bytes, then count my ear hair. The thing that caught her was the couple saying their budget for a house was no more than $750,000. Ok, at that point, it was ON. 

They got their 'small cottage' and needed a room decorated for Christmas. So they called in 3 ladies. Now when I needed to decorate my $650,000 cottage for Christmas, I put up a tiny Charlie Brown tree and plugged in some lights. When I met Mrs lefty, she came with her own decorating skills (and crew). Huge tree, tinsel for various pets to ingest, expensive ornaments for a cat to throw to the floor, and strings of lights that actually worked. Even the pets had stockings. I couldn't have done better.  Well, according to this show, I could.

One lady was in charge of the mantle over the fireplace. She envisioned making it come alive. She went home and sketched things, trying them out on her mantle. It turned out that she had a favorite evergreen, which she wrapped around herself in orgiastic glee. She talked (and talked) about the smells and situations in which she used certain evergreens. She also had some sort of red buds she kept talking to. We couldn't hear what she was saying, but we knew it was scary. She had a bedroom with 3 dead boyfriends in it, decorated with her work.

The 2nd bouncy lady was a precocious little girl, by which I mean she spent a lot of time at the table, coloring with crayons.  Her mother encouraged her, because she knew that if she didn't, the little bastard would be vacuuming the curtains and performing unnecessary procedures upon the cats. Mom called the crayon scribbles 'designs.' When the little girl hit 20, she called herself a 'designer' and, being quite attractive, married a wealthy man, giving herself the time and space to  work on her career and designs. For this particular project, after some Very Serious Thinking, she decided on stockings. Not your store-bought stocking units, no sir.. these people were getting all handmade decorated stockings. She took us through the whole process of deciding what would be on the stockings. Since the baby didn't have much of a past to draw from, she decided on some decorations. Mrs lefty took one look and said, "Do you see what she DID? She took a small button, glued it to a safety pin, then glued it to the stocking. The baby will get hold of it, choke on the button, then put holes in his windpipe with the safety pin. The baby will die before they finish dialing 911."  Do ya see? Do ya see why I married her? So this was obviously her first project, to be followed in short order by her first lawsuit. Her husband better be well-insured.

The last lady was the baker. She was startlingly normal by comparison. She made a humongous house, iced to death, which almost disintegrated on the trip over. She was also early in her career, as the entire little city was outlined in little candies for the baby to choke on. Business would really take off if they called themselves The Babykillers.

The final scene was everything in place, with the family in the room. The looks of terror on the children's faces were worth the time wasted watching the show. The adults hid it much better. You know what the cake is going to look like, you know more or less what the stockings will look like, but just revealed is the 'Living Sculpture' of previously alive flora, called Hell in Evergreen. I don't want to say it was scary, but if Vincent Price saw it, he'd have run, screaming, through the wall. Sure, you can put a wreath or 2 over the fireplace, make it look spirited... but this looked haunted, alive, and dangerous. It looked, from any angle, like it was going to grow itself over the walls and kill you (and your little dog too). The baby screamed for its life, which the parents played off as having a cold.

When the Dangerous Trio left, dad got the axe and started hacking away at the evergreens. The oldest boy got the fire extinguisher and repeatedly doused the things, in case they tried to rise from the dead. Mom called the emergency bricklayers, to fix the hole in the wall left by Vincent Price.

Can't you just see our silhouettes in the lower right of the screen, doing running commentary? Although I don't think any of the House networks would pay us...

Today I identify as  a Christmas gift of a cologne set

• Occasionally I come up with a fashion tip: if you have long, dark, silky hair, let it hang! Unless it's growing from your back, in which case, wear a shirt, ok? 

The Holiday moves on, with bright eyes, expecting to get the tree decorated.

The homemade cards, finished mid-December, await printing. The people who got the electronic version have already been horrified and/or confused, but politely responded with a thank you.

The gifts remain under the undecorated tree. No idea whether decorating or gift-opening comes first. I'll stand by, strangely quiet (and quietly strange).

Some neighbors gave out pens and little things. My paranoid schizophrenic neighbor and I suspect they're bugged by the NSA.

The pickles that were requested to be left out are still out, untouched and out of dog reach. I don't think they're good after 3 days but I don't eat them. In another day, I'm going to get an angry question: "Why are there pickles on the counter?" Because you asked. "I did not."  This is why everything's my fault. Well, this and I'm the man in the relationship.

Because we're in danger of getting the tree lit and the celebration started within a week of Christmas, we decided to go visiting, like some sort of demented Santa and Mrs. Claus.

• An RV in Nashville announced it was going to explode in 15 minutes and kept its word. A subject is being interviewed.
• Completely blown up was the AT&T building. AT&T subscribers say the service has never been better.

God.... Solved 

As we know, a religion's seriousness is judged by the size and height of its headgear. The taller the high priest's headgear, the more serious the religion.

I'm watching Ancient Aliens when it hits me.... 

Giorgio Tsoukalis is God.

Rather than having Serious Headgear, he has Serious Hair, therefore he is obviously divine. I'll give you a moment to think about this.

There are many variations in God's hair, which is how you tell he's telling the truth or giving you some sort of jive. God has a hell of a sense of humor, unlike the God depicted in all the religious texts. God's hair seems to get up to all sorts of heights and widths, but it's generally symmetrical. When it's not symmetrical, you better run, because somebody pissed Him off and there's gonna be a plague.

God is a seeker and has His apostles with Him, which He calls His Posse. They are well known to anybody who watches Ancient Aliens:

George Noory: a popular nighttime radio host and the only Indian guy I've ever seen with a bad rug

Erich von Daniken: wrote Chariot of the Gods, wears impossibly-shaded blue suit jacket, thinks it officially marks him as a member of the God Squad

David Childress: aka David Hatcher Childress, is given the least important stuff to say, because with his sing-song voice, no one can listen to him for more than 1 sentence

David Wilcock: just makes stuff up. The outrageousness of what he's saying is depicted by the size of his forehead. It can range from 'that's big' to 'oh no, it's going to take over his head!'

Linda Moulton Howe: the lone female, her mouth has gotten progressively wider over the years, threatening to swallow her whole face. When really serious, refers to herself as Linda Howe. As the lone female, enjoys being chased by every male ufo researcher ever.

Ancient Aliens developed a huge following, resulting in many seasons. One of the first things they were told came from the legal department. The show would say "Cher came from Mesopotamia, 700 years ago." Legal told them you cannot say that, so every claim, no matter how outrageous, is preceded by "Ancient astronauts believe..." which cuts way down on the lawsuits.

This, in turn, led to the Ancient Astronauts Drinking Game. You take a shot every time they say "ancient astronauts believe." Legal suggested they downplay this game, because it killed several hundred people during the season opener.

The team was on a historic dig and found this item:

After careful consideration by Erich, in a slightly darker than normal blue jacket, everybody agrees that this is a 17,000 year old account of an alien visitation to the Yeahreally tribe. You can see the spacesuit, just like our spacesuits, in the brown part. Notice the goggles. You can see this in all the tributes to it through the years. You might even have one in your house. They all go back to this piece.

As it turns out, Erich was pretty far off, timewise. In 31,000 BC, the Yeahreally tribe was minding its own business, when these things came falling from the sky. The Yeahreally's chief, Bob, was naturally suspicious. Bob asked his advisor, Frank, "Why, in 31,000 BC, are these things falling from the sky?" Frank asked, "What is BC?" Chief Bob told him to keep his mind on the matter at hand. 

To commemorate the day these things fell from the sky, they created tributes. They never figured out what these were for, but had an inexplicable feeling the things should be with the women of the tribe.

To this day, Giorgio has a small replica of this alien artifact pinned to his jacket.

With all this talk of trips to Mars, there is now arguing over how to set up government on Mars. A long time ago, the rights to the Moon were established. Imagine the hubris of claiming parts of a planet, Apollos planted American flags on the surface, and recently, the aliens moved them, because they like messing with us. Most recently, China farted in the general direction of our flags, refusing to recognize US sovereignty.

So now we're taking our nonsense to Mars. Has anybody asked the Martians about this yet? It's bad form to claim part of a planet without asking the current residents. NASA has not released the photos of the Mars Rover, with "Hey hey, we're the Martians," written on it in the dust. I don't know about you, but I don't think this is going to end well. Be very vigilant: if the Martians immediately high-five Elon Musk, the fix was in.

Dear lefty 

• What did Penny get for Christmas?
• Chewy treats, chewy snacks, chewy stuffed animals (that weren't hers)
• What did Mrs lefty get?
• an adult size Eeyore costume she calls a Won-Z 
• What did you get for Christmas?
• cold. It was very cold 
• No, really.
• lefty's Home Demolition Kit<tm> - intermediate version - just add Thermite! 

A 37 year old man 'allegedly' beat an 82 year old man to death with an oxygen tank. Because this was California, they charged him with a hate crime. The 82 year old was praying, which set off the 37 year old. How do the police know the 82 year old wasn't praying for the peace and relief of death and the 37 year old wasn't delivering?        ----> I think I just finished paying off my ticket to hell

Folks, we're at the halfway point of the point we've been waiting for since a few months ago: that week between Christmas and New Years Day. We already got Christmas off work, then the better part of the week is work until New Years. Unless you're one of those crafty people who took a Monday off to get more days. Or one of those complete bastards who took vacation time on the week in between, leaving your coworkers with all the work, while you sleep late, eat Christmas junk, and hit the sales, buying next year's Christmas decorations. Or sit around and touch yourself. The joke's on you: there's no work to be done this week and your coworkers are sitting at their computers, trying to hack the payroll server.

The more neurotic of you are already depressed and mentally back at work, after the new year, with no more days off for a while. You will not be happy with this situation, or life, until you seek counseling, or a Scrooge-like transformation occurs. Rest assured that when it does, and you give presents to everyone, they will listen for ticking, and place them in one of those bomb squad concrete containers in the garage, never to open them. The joke's on all of you: fruitcake doesn't explode (unless eaten).

The World is My Oyster. I Don't Like Seafood.

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